The Show Mustn't Go On

Know how Amazon.com loves to sell you great deals you didn't know you wanted? The online seller (that maybe I visit once a day; maybe I have a problem) sent me an e-mail about Nip/Tuck: The Complete Series, daring me to turn them down. But you bought Mad Men, their theory goes, so of course you want Nip/Tuck too.

Oh, Amazon. The honest truth about my relationship with that frothy, overcooked soap opera is that there isn't one. Nip/Tuck and I parted ways seasons ago. Maybe the blame falls on me. I have expectations for TV shows. Like logic and character development. Clearly Nip/Tuck never aspired to the dramatic/nostalgic heights of Mad Men. But halfway through its run, I realized it didn't aspire to much at all. Shock factor, sure. But after separating conjoined twins, Christian and Sean's menage a trois with a prostitute resembling Sean's wife, Julia's near-murder of her mother, Matt and Kimber's drug-addled marriage, Gina's post-climax fall to her death... and of course, the incest... the territory was covered.

Oh right, and Matt was a mime who robbed convenience stores.

Originally the show was outrageous and grotesque, but it didn't take itself so seriously. The fatal move was relocating to Los Angeles, which only magnified its journey toward superficiality. If you're starting from the beginning, don't move with McNamara-Troy. Other TV shows have suffered the same fate when they jumped ship. Weeds began as a jaunty suburban satire, but the call of the Mary Jane blurred the creators' vision. Suddenly, in season four, the show has been reborn in Mexico after Nancy Botwin's drug ring burned her California suburb in a blazing wildfire.

Let's not forget Entourage, which has always been immersed in L.A. superficiality. But when I tuned in again last season, it was as if the creators hadn't felt the recession during their hiatus. Vince's first dramatic challenge was to buy new cars. And after Sushi-gate, it's hard to enjoy Jeremy Piven quite as much. Like Nip/Tuck and Weeds, I cut it off right there. No patch or gum required for quitting.

When I tuned back in this season to see if the groove was back, the hubbub was Vince's hair. Yes, dear readers, the plot revolved around a haircut. The dramatic tension? Movie re-shoots! What will he tell the director? What about his agent? If only Billy Wilder had thought to give Norma Desmond a new bob, just imagine how much greater Sunset Boulevard would be.

The season-changing hairdo. Everything you know is a lie.

TV shows these days jump the shark so easily. How many cast members will sleep together? How many children will have tragic deaths? Countless other shows (Hung, True Blood, Rescue Me, Grey's Anatomy) lost their integrity or never had any and vanished from my viewing schedule. I ask you readers: when did you sense your TV obsession was going downhill?