Scene after scene in this evening's show rains down like giant golf ball-sized hail: they're clunky and bulky and hurt like hell and you just want them to stop.
But there's no relief here.
 |
| Courtesy of FOX Charlie (Matthew Fox) faces some tough decisions about his unborn baby and its mother (Jennifer Aspen) tonight on "Party of Five." |
"Party of Five," or as it might be called in an accurate world, "Party of Crap," is not a good show. It is frustratingly predicable and the characters are aggravating and unredeeming.
Where, then, is the value in the show? It's hard to find, but there is a silver lining here somewhere. I have found the truth at the core of this wretched excuse for a series, and it is this: Watching "Party of Five" makes us feel better about out own lives, no matter how good they already are - there are people that have it worse, and their name is Salinger. There isn't an unpaid parking meter's chance in Ann Arbor that so many tragic events could befall such a besotted, attention-starved lot as the Salingers in such a short period of time as five years. Even if those five years seem like 20.
"Party of Five" makes our lives look good by comparison, which isn't a bad thing. But that's all it does, period. The story-lines are dragged out long after they've been wrung dry of all their interest; the characters aren't anybody you'd want to know, much less associate with. The fragmentation of the family, with Julia off at college and Claudia at prep school, has only served to make an already disjointed show even more choppy.
Watching "Party of Five" is a similar experience to watching that pot that never boils. It never reaches entertaining greatness no matter how hard it tries, unless you aren't looking. But since television is about ratings and exactly who is looking, well, this show is never going to rise up from the ugly quagmire of mediocrity that it currently resides in.
11-04-98
| Next Article |
should be sent to: daily.letters@umich.edu | should be sent to: online.daily@umich.edu |