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Aug. 27, 2005 Nearly every television series of this decade has been unoriginal and uninteresting. The pay cable networks sometimes are an oasis in this desert of mind-numbing stale trash, but the Showtime series, Weeds, is just another stretch of dry land without a drop of water. I watched the first two episodes and promptly canceled my subscription to Showtime and HBO. (The reason had more to do with the cheapskate executives of those networks showing the same movies over and over rather than with the production of a bad television series.) Weeds falls flat because it's an inaccurate portrayal of pothead culture. How would I know it's an inaccurate portrayal? I was a pothead, of course. I smoked marijuana from 1980-1992 and still would if I did not have my present responsibilities. So I know what I'm commenting about when I make the following criticisms. First, the main character of the show--a very attractive mother of two--maintains her family's expensive lifestyle by selling pot out of her purse to suburban duds. This makes no sense at all. In order for her to maintain a lifestyle in the suburbs, she would have to be selling bales of the stuff. Pot--like any other agricultural product--has a small profit margin unless one buys large quantities--not the amount one can fit into a purse. Second, she doesn't smoke with her dealers. I was never present at a drug deal inside someone's house where the dealers didn't smoke with the buyers. Sometimes in a hurry on the road pot would be sold without any smoking, but if the deal was done within a house or apartment, sampling was precedent. Third, she sells pot in the open: for example she sold pot at a child's soccer game. This is just plain stupid and a surefire way of getting busted. Secretly, many people have smoked pot, but publicly, a high percentage are hysterical hypocrites who would call the cops in less time than it takes for Al Bundy to complete foreplay. In real life potheads avoid getting busted by completing deals in the concealment of homes or cars. Fourth, in the series first episode, mother drug dealer sells pot to a high school kid who turns around and sells pot to a ten year old child. This is ridiculous. I never knew a pothead who would sell pot to a grade school child. Hanging around elementary school kids just isn't cool for potheads--unless forced to because they are married with children. (In that case the parents probably need to smoke pot so they can cope with the torturous labors of child raising.) I'm sure--somewhere--there are twisted dumb losers who would sell pot to children, but showing it on Weeds gives a false impression of pothead culture. I realize Weeds probably isn't about an accurate representation of pothead culture; but if that's not the point of the show, than it's nothing but an inferior rip-off of Desperate Housewives--which is an original and interesting show. For a more realistic portrayal of pothead culture read chapter twenty-eight of my first novel, Talk Radio. In fact, take a couple nights off from television and read my book. It's better than ninety-five percent of what's on tv these days...which isn't saying much. ------------ About the author Mark Gelbart: My book, Talk Radio, is a black comedy about a radio talk show host who gets kidnapped and psychologically tortured by a loser. www.mark-gelbart.com Email: agelbart@aol.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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