Soccer Dad

Crashing the aircraft

"Jumping the shark" is taken from an eipsode of Happy Days when Fonzie jumps over a shark. The term is used to label a stunt pulled by a show that does something out of context, just to keep viewers interest well after the show has ceased to be interesting anymore.
(The odd thing about Fonzie jumping the shark is that it happened pretty early in the show's run. It may have been a stunt to gain interest, but it wasn't done to mask a decline.)
If there's one show that has set a record for jumping the shark has to be ER. In fact perhaps it's time to rename jumping the shark, to crashing the aircraft. On ER so far, one of the doctors had his arm sliced off by a helicopter.
A few years later, the same doctor encountered another helicopter: it fell off the heliport and crushed him.
Now ER in the next week or two is promising us a plane crash. Just a normal everyday occurrence at an urban emergency room.
What else have we had?

1) A homicidal maniac gets loose in the hospital stabbing two doctors and killing one.
2) The plague is discovered in one of the patients forcing a quarrantine.
3) A doctor gets involved in a central African war; another doctor sets off to find him.
4) The husband of one of the doctors decides to "nurse" their child.
5) One of the doctors and her lesbian partner have a baby.
6) The 10 or 11 year old son of one of the nurses runs away to go on a road trip.

These things are done more to shock than to move the plot along. It's gotten pretty ridiculous.

I'm sure there's more, but the show has long ago ceased being interesting. (I'll happily update this if readers have other suggestions.) Certainly the characters and the chemistry between them just isn't the same. I still watch it but I really don't much care what happens anymore.

Posted by SoccerDad at November 8, 2005 1:18 AM