The Essential Cult TV Reader
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by University of Kentucky University of Kentucky UKnowledge American Popular Culture American Studies 2010 The Essential Cult TV Reader David Lavery Middle Tennessee State University Click here to let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Thanks to the University of Kentucky Libraries and the University Press of Kentucky, this book is freely available to current faculty, students, and staff at the University of Kentucky. Find other University of Kentucky Books at uknowledge.uky.edu/upk. For more information, please contact UKnowledge at [email protected]. Recommended Citation Lavery, David, "The Essential Cult TV Reader" (2010). American Popular Culture. 2. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_american_popular_culture/2 THE ESSENTIAL CULT TV READER Essential Readers in Contemporary Media and Culture This series is designed to collect and publish the best scholarly writing on various aspects of television, fi lm, the Internet, and other media of today. Along with providing original insights and explorations of critical themes, the series is intended to provide readers with the best available resources for an in-depth understanding of the fundamental issues in contemporary media and cultural studies. Topics in the series may include, but are not limited to, critical-cultural examinations of creators, content, institutions, and audiences associated with the media industry. Written in a clear and accessible style, books in the series include both single-author works and edited collections. Series Editor Gary R. Edgerton, Old Dominion University THE ESSENTIAL CULT TV READER Edited by David Lavery THE UNIVERSITY PRESS OF KENTUCKY Copyright © 2010 by The University Press of Kentucky Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and Western Kentucky University. All rights reserved. Editorial and Sales Offi ces: The University Press of Kentucky 663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008 www.kentuckypress.com 14 13 12 11 10 5 4 3 2 1 Unless otherwise noted, images are provided by Jerry Ohlinger’s Movie Material Store. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The essential cult tv reader / edited by David Lavery. p. cm. — (Essential readers in contemporary media) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8131-2568-8 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Television series—United States. 2. Television viewers—United States. 3. Television series—Great Britain. 4. Television viewers—Great Britain. I. Lavery, David, 1949– PN1992.8.S4E87 2010 791.45'6—dc22 2009035878 This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials. Manufactured in the United States of America. Member of the Association of American University Presses Contents Acknowledgments vii Introduction: How Cult TV Became Mainstream David Lavery 1 Absolutely Fabulous Angelina I. Karpovich 7 The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. Bartley Porter and Lynnette Porter 15 Alias Henrik Örnebring 22 Angel Joyce Millman 28 The Avengers Angelina I. Karpovich 36 Battlestar Galactica Ian Maull and David Lavery 44 Blake’s 7 Steven Duckworth 51 Buffy the Vampire Slayer Milly Williamson 60 The Comeback Joanne Morreale 68 The Daily Show and The Colbert Report Sam Ford 77 Dark Shadows Jonathan Malcolm Lampley 84 Dexter Michele Byers 90 Doctor Who Matt Hills 97 Farscape Jes Battis 104 Firefl y J. P. Telotte 111 Freaks and Geeks Jonathan Gray 120 Heroes Nikki Stafford 127 The League of Gentlemen Leon Hunt 134 Life on Mars Robin Nelson 142 Lost Marc Dolan 149 Miami Vice Jon Stratton 159 Monty Python’s Flying Circus Marcia Landy 166 My So-Called Life Michele Byers 174 Mystery Science Theater 3000 Robert Holtzclaw 181 The Prisoner Douglas L. Howard 189 Quantum Leap Lynnette Porter 201 Red Dwarf Dee Amy-Chinn 208 Roswell Stan Beeler 214 The Simpsons Jonathan Gray 221 South Park Jason Jacobs 229 Stargate SG-1 Angela Ndalianis 237 The Star Trek Franchise Rhonda V. Wilcox 244 Supernatural Alison Peirse 260 This Life Stephen Lacey 268 Torchwood Matt Hills 275 24 Steven Peacock 282 The Twilight Zone Jonathan Malcolm Lampley 291 Twin Peaks David Bianculli 299 Ultraviolet Stacey Abbott 307 Veronica Mars Sue Turnbull 314 Wonderfalls Stan Beeler 322 Xena: Warrior Princess Carolyn Skelton 329 The X-Files Mikel J. Koven 337 Appendix: Series by Genre and Nationality 345 TV and Filmography 349 Works Cited 359 List of Contributors 381 Index 387 Acknowledgments As an experienced editor of collections, it is impossible for me to imag- ine having a better ensemble than the American, British, Canadian, New Zealander, and Australian contributors to this book. My sincere thanks to Stacey Abbott, Dee Amy-Chinn, Jes Battis, Stan Beeler, David Bianculli, Michele Byers, Marc Dolan, Steve Duckworth, Sam Ford, Jonathan Gray, Matt Hills, Robert Holtzclaw, Doug Howard, Leon Hunt, Jason Jacobs, Angelina Karpovich, Mikel Koven, Stephen Lacey, Jonathan Lampley, Marcia Landy, Ian Maull, Joyce Millman, Joanne Morreale, Angela Ndalianis, Robin Nelson, Henrik Örnebring, Steven Peacock, Alison Peirse, Bart Porter, Lynnette Porter, Carolyn Skelton, Nikki Stafford, Jon Stratton, J. P. Telotte, Sue Turnbull, Rhonda Wilcox, and Milly Williamson for their timely and brilliant contributions. A spe- cial thanks to Jonathan Lampley, Ian, and Angelina, who came through at the last minute and went beyond the call of duty. Special thanks, too, to Angelina, Stacey, and Simon Brown and to the amazing Janet and Kim for many hours of conversation about television. This book began at the University Press of Kentucky under the guid- ance of Leila Salisbury, and I want to express my appreciation to her, her successor Anne Dean Watkins, copy editor Linda Lotz, and series editor Gary Edgerton for all their guidance and support. I did most of the work on this book in a London fl at from which I could see, behind the mosque across the street, the original BBC broad- casting tower at Alexandria Palace—the one the Doctor climbs at the end of “The Idiot’s Lantern” (Doctor Who, 2.7). It seemed like a perfect spot to be thinking about television and especially about a book like this, concerned as it is with both American and British shows. Even on the other side of the Atlantic, I needed and felt the support of the wonder- ful women in my family: my wife Joyce and my daughters Rachel and Sarah. Thanks to them—again. This page intentionally left blank Introduction How Cult T V Became Mainstream David Lavery On Friday the thirteenth of February 2009, only fi ve days after the man- uscript of this book was delivered to the publisher, a new series called Dollhouse debuted on FOX. It aired after Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (T: SCC), a series (based on the successful movie franchise) that was already midway through its second season and in jeopardy due to weak ratings in its former Monday night time slot. Dollhouse had originally been slated to air on Monday as well, with the long-running (and probably on its last legs) 24 as its lead-in, but the executives at FOX decided to pair the two shows together at week’s end. Friday night was rife with history for the network: It was on Friday that The X-Files had over- come a poor start to become a cultural phenomenon and cash cow in the mid-1990s. A decade later, Friday had spelled disaster for Firefl y, which met an untimely end there after idiotic micromanagement by a “desperate network” (Carter) that was dissatisfi ed with the series’ narrative structure. Joss Whedon, Dollhouse’s creator, had been the man behind Firefl y as well, so the show’s relegation to this traditional TV graveyard seemed like déjà vu to Whedon’s fans, but FOX tried to spin its new Friday lineup positively. Lower ratings on Friday would be more easily overlooked, we were told, and the pairing of T: SCC and Dollhouse would be a natural match, for both shows were likely to appeal to cult audiences. Both T: SCC and Dollhouse came on the scene too late to be included in this volume, but three other Whedon series—Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, as well as Firefl y—have entries here. 2 / David Lavery Elsewhere—on a night ruled by the expectation of high ratings and on another network—ABC was attempting a similar move. It paired Lost and the struggling-for-an-audience American version of Life on Mars back to back on Wednesday night. (See the chapters on Lost and the British version of Life on Mars in this volume.) How did FOX’s cult TV Friday work out? By the time you read this, we will all know. What about ABC’s experiment? (In the fi rst few weeks, Life on Mars lost a sizable share of the Lost audience.) The answer will tell us much, as will this book, about the state of cult television at the end of the “noughties.” Does cult television need to be ghettoized to suc- ceed? Can it be mainstreamed? What exactly is cult television anyway? When this collection was in development, ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy, the popular hospital melodrama, was on my original list of series wor- thy of inclusion. This provoked a strong objection from an eventual contributor to these pages. How on earth could I suggest that Grey’s, a mainstream entertainment that, beginning in the fall of 2007, had been brazenly positioned to go up against ratings champion CSI, deserved coverage in a book such as this? Arguing that Grey’s conformed to the basic cult media litmus test established by Matt Hills—that is, it attracted “passionate, enduring, and socially organized fan audiences” (“Media Fandom” 73)—I defended my position.