Watered Down or How Entertainers Miss the Point

I've been thinking about this for quite a while, specifically how to express the point I'm going to try and make without making it seem like I'm picking on something stupid or completely unimportant. I figured that the chipmunks might be a good way to show this as I've already talked about what makes the clips from The Alvin Show so entertaining.

Below are two takes on the same theme, Alvin and how he wants to play his harmonica. The first one a lot earlier than the second.



This clip uses a lot of the interaction I talked about in the previous post. The main story here is the same, Alvin is an instigator and he wants to play harmonica and be the star. This story has more depth than that though. Dave is so pissed off at Alvin he even DREAMS about Alvin breaking the rules and being a little snot.



I guess I'll start at the beginning. So the first 30 second is a helping-loving-caring-fest. What's up with the chipmunks caring about Dave's song writing at all? A real kid certainly wouldn't care, and even if they did does anyone care that they care? I don't. That just seems like new-age let's all help each other bullshit to me.

Then Dave gets mad at Alvin for reasons I'm not really sure about, it made more sense in the original. Alvin is a brat, a real brat, the kind you see throwing a tantrum at the store for candy. The kind you just want to avoid. Simon and Theodore don't think Alvin's song is fun, Simon has a broom up his ass, and then the whole thing degenerates into rap while Dave sits back like a pansy and lets it unravel.

The real difference here is that the people who were working on The Alvin Show are interested in what makes something fun, which is really not that hard. They're trying to entertain with the things they find entertaining: the family dynamic, kid fun, extreme anger, a silly song.

The second clip is not focused on entertainment at all. Actually its foggy as to what its focused on. Everything seems disjoint. It's still the chipmunks sorta. The story is derivative of previous chipmunk things. It focuses more on "what worked in the past" than what's entertaining. Other than that is focuses on "what's hip" or "now". It adds in a bunch of new-age bullshit too. Things like hating the center of attention, and giving you life lessons.

The ironic thing is that by just trying to copy other successful things, it's not successful at all, and everything that was fun before is gone, washed up in hip trends and phoned-in feelings.

Preview: not the chipmunks