Reflecting on 2017 TV
A night that ABC dedicates to three repeat game shows is as good as any to glance back at the TV trends of 2017. Covering a medium that churns out more than 400 new scripted series a year leaves little time to sum up the year’s best and worst. Last year, FX’s “People vs. OJ Simpson” was both the best series of the year and a drama almost frightening in its ability to capture the zeitgeist. Did a similar series emerge in 2017? More than any other series, Hulu’s “Handmaid’s Tale” was the drama of the year, a dystopian tale of grim fundamentalist patriarchy, perfectly timed to air, or rather stream, right after the Women’s March on Washington and before the #MeToo movement that emerged in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein revelations.
As topical as it seemed, “Handmaid’s Tale” was also a fairly faithful adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel and, as such, a reflection of the fears of that era as well as our own.
The history of television in 2017 will be dominated by the departures of media stars in the wake after revelations of sexually abusive behavior. Bill O’Reilly, Louis C.K., Kevin Spacey, Charlie Rose and Matt Lauer are only the biggest names among the disgraced.
The exit of two morning television hosts also dovetailed with a weird 2017 story — NBC’s attempt to dumb down Megyn Kelly to make her chirpy, inoffensive and palatable to a morning audience acclimated to inane repetitive drivel disguised as “news.” The “Veep” sendup of morning news shows featuring Dan Egan (Reid Scott) is as savage as it is accurate.
Kelly’s “fun” show was tanking before she seized upon stories of women making accusations of sexual abuse and harassment at the highest levels.
If any good can come out of a year characterized by “The Handmaid’s Tale” and the MeToo movement, it’s the emergence of morning news aimed at women who think.
The year also continued a trend toward corporate gigantism in television production and distribution. I’m not just talking about Disney’s proposed purchase of Fox. Netflix has grown so large so fast that its subscriber list basically equals the number of people with cable access. In other words, Netflix has become as big as all of its competitors, combined. How big is too big?