LOOKING — Page 46

I don't think the writing was bad. Not great, mind you, but not bad. Sure, some of the characters and story lines could have been more compelling, but I just don't think a story about a group of gay men navigating in today's world, specifically, San Francisco, USA, is all that interesting in and of itself, regardless of the writing. A group of gay men in today's Iran...now that might make for some compelling TV! Or a period piece about a group of gay friends in the early days of the liberation movement, and the years leading up to the Stonewall riots, that could even work in the right hands.

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Updated On: 3/27/15 at 02:56 PM

Screw it if I felt that they didn't represent me (what the **** does?) or if I felt that was boring.

There was only one character on that show I could identify with but I seriously refuse to waste my time on a badly written show let alone a boring one. My time is too valuable to waste, but to each his own. The public has responded by tuning out in droves and the consequence of that was it's inevitable cancellation. Looking was a show looking for an audience, when they should have been looking for continuity and good writers to keep viewers interested and invested. The show had a promising start alas it was unable to deliver.

Updated On: 3/27/15 at 04:37 PM

I get that SonofRobbieJ, but for me at least it got to the point that even that half hour took effort to get through and I was totally giving the show a chance to "pick up" but it never really did for me and I just gave up on it and I don't think I was the only one. The ratings don't lie - - - the show took a huge dip in viewership.

But don't get me wrong I'm not doing a happy dance over it's cancellation.

Updated On: 3/27/15 at 05:22 PM

Oh wow...that's cool. If watching the show actually inspired you to develop something along those lines then that's a great thing. I would love to hear what you have in mind I am sure it's good. I wish you luck with it.

Interesting commentary.


What Was 'Looking' Missing?

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Updated On: 3/27/15 at 06:13 PM

We'll never know for sure, but I imagine that if this show had been about a similar group of straight people it would have also had a small, niche audience, but because it was set in a heteronormative space it might have been a big enough niche audience to sustain it for a few more seasons. I don't have any data on this - how could one? - but I suspect the "ick" factor still applied for a lot of potential viewers. You know the mentality: gay marriage is great, and I like the fat funny one on Modern Family, but gay men actually being intimate and sexually frank with each other? Groooosss!

I know it's more subtle than that. I'm not suggesting that people who turned the show off were grossed out by the gay stuff - I recognize that plenty of people didn't connect with the show's sensibilities. I'm talking about potential viewers - people who probably never tuned in BECAUSE of what the show was about. When the actual actors from the show are saying their parents told them that watching Looking made them uncomfortable, I don't think it was solely because their kids were being depicted as open, unapologetic, sexually active gay men, but because ANYONE was.

That leaves you largely depending upon gay men as an audience and to expect gay men to be one monolithic block in 2015 is probably asking too much. And then we get into the wildly varying statistics on how much of the population actually IS gay in the first place. I know several straight female friends who were big fans of the show, but it was not a water cooler show for them that they'd discuss with all their gf's the way GIRLS is - or at least - was. I'd be curious to see the breakdown of viewers, but I'm imagining they were under-represented and perhaps better marketing to women might - MIGHT - have saved the show.

if my life was like any of the Looking gays I would need to be in therapy to prevent my suicide.

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And that is different from your life in any other show... how? I would hope that anyone's life being like a tv drama would include therapy...

Horse--well said, and I agree (obviously.)

I'm long on record as being TOTALLY OVER the serialization of all TV shows in the post-Cheers era.

I can think of a MILLION ways to make an interesting slice of life series about gay guys (and their friends) in a major American city that doesn't have to be serialized from week to week and that could actually be good.

So yeah, it wasn't advertised as a soap but it had continuing stories, oh wait, sorry, "arcs". God I hate arcs.

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Let's make a Discovery Channel special: "In Search of Looking's Arc". We could even design a museum and theme park.

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 I only read the first couple lines of that, but I guess Dom really did have a chicken?

I think it's time for everyone to move on.  I couldn't get past the first couple of paragraphs.  Not because of Rohin Guha, but because I'm all Looking'd out - I think he wrote a really interesting collaborative piece a few weeks ago on Medium - Guardians, Gatekeepers, and the Gay White Media.  

Smartass.