Deja
Vu All Over Again.
With
any luck this may be the last
essay I ever have to write.
It is, after all, the 80th
“Ramblings” and
although there’s no
specific required number like
there is for television shows,
it’s pretty clear that
I have more than enough to
start a regular rotation of
old essays and keep the gravy
train rolling for the next
50 years.
So
starting in two weeks you’ll
receive an essay from January
2000 entitled “New Beginnings”
which for all intents and
purposes will seem brand new
since – let’s
be honest here - you probably
don’t remember it anyway.
Then every two weeks after
that I’ll send out another
“Classic Ramblings”
until around April 4, 2006
when, having forgotten all
about this essay, you’ll
get it and find it humorous
all over again. Well, as humorous
as it ever was.
Now
before you decry me as being
lazy or accuse me of resting
on my rejection letters (er,
laurels) understand that I’m
merely attempting to follow
the latest trend. It seems
as if collectively the world
has run out of original ideas
and so to compensate, we’ve
resorted to reselling and
repackaging anything that
was even moderately successful
in the past.
Drive
by the marquee of your local
movie megaplex these days
and you’ll see what
I mean. Whatever isn’t
the second or third installment
in a “franchise”
is probably an adaptation
of a play, a novel or –
my personal favorite –
an adaptation of another movie
that was previously adapted
from a play or novel.
 Television
is no better: whole channels
exist to rerun shows from
the past while others explore
our history. Even VH1 and
E! spend most of their programming
day reexamining the eighties,
finding lost rock stars, or
reliving every controversy
of an old television series.
And when the networks roll
out their “new”
programs they look suspiciously
like last year’s hit
movie or an updated version
of “Let’s Make
A Deal.”
Even
the newspaper seems stuck
in a different era –
full of comic strips that
my parents read* and advice
from dead columnists. Heck,
I know I’ve even read
the headlines before: a Bush
is in the White House and
we may go to war with Iraq.
Been there, saw that, still
have the Topps “Desert
Storm” trading cards
to prove it.
The
fact is that after spending
millions with independent
consultants, the powers that
be have concluded that their
best chance of success is
to feed us the same drivel
day in and day out. Certainly
if we loved “Beauty
and The Beast” we’ll
have to love “Beauty
and The Beast XXIII –
Belle and the Convalescent
Home.” Sure, maybe what
made us like the first movie
or that new rock band was
the very fact that it WASN’T
like everything else, but
since I’m positive that
those high-paid consultants
must be worth every dollar,
I’m going to follow
their lead and present “Classic
Ramblings” from here
on out.
I
mean, no one really wants
to be challenged with original
ideas these days, do they?
This
Essay © 2003 Lee Totten
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