Shortland Street

Shortland Street was pretty good for a soap (although I prefer Home and Away, which has more excitement like a gun-toting, crystal-meth addict on the lose), but Shortland Street has gone down hill.

If you like your programs with 99% relationship stuff and 1% excitement, then you might like the 2005 series of Shortland Street. I haven't actually watched much of it, but I can tell from the ads on T.V. that relationships are the main source of entertainment for 2005.

But, if you can see episodes before 2005, it has had some good stuff and the end of year cliffhangers are a must for most viewers of this type of soap opera.

Ive watched the odd bit of Shortland Street over the years and what astonishes me is how incredibly bad the acting is in this show and yet somehow this doesnt seem to bother the people who watch this show religously. I wondered whether perhaps part of being taken on as an actor in Shortland Street is NOT having the ability to act? I say this in all seriousness. Is part of the likeability of Shortland Street that the acting is so bad? Are actors maybe encouraged to "act badly"? Ive seen actors who have been with the show since the beginning and seen their acting in more recent years and I can honestly say that their acting ability has not changed in all the years and if anything appears to be worse, so I do wonder "is that Shortland Streets charm, that it is so bad?

In it's original form, "Shortland Street" had a certain naive charm. It was cheesy, it was bad, but it was a soap opera, it was filmed locally (about two minutes from my house, to be exact) and we were young so we forgave it's flaws.

Over the eight years it's been on, however, there's been a definite drop in quality. The early writers of "Shortland Street" knew it was drivel, so nothing was taken very seriously. Minnie's devotion to American soap "Tides of the Heart" was an opportunity for SS to poke fun at itself. Unfortunately, the self-depreciative remarks have gone, as have the enjoyably silly story lines. Current writers seem to believe they're writing Montana Sunday Theatre...only without the talent. Consequently, storylines are now delivered in deadly ernest, and those over the age (and IQ) of 15 are beginning to turn off.

This is quite possible one of the worst shows ever made.

The acting is bad. The scripts are bad and repetitive. The whole show is bad!

I could barely stay awake through the episodes I was subjected to! It's so bad, that I can't even watch it to laugh at how bad it is! Everything about this show annoys me!

This show also promotes bad morals. Which wouldn't be so bad, apart from the fact that so many people in New Zealand actually LIKE this show. And they seem to think that the way these bitchy, grumpy hormonal fictional characters carry on is normal and acceptable.

Come on New Zealand, you can do better than this! Look at...oh hang on, I can't think of ANY good New Zealand TV shows. Except TellyLaughs. And they were great because they pointed out what was wrong with New Zealand's worst TV shows.

Shortland Street is New Zealand's most successful television "drama". Market saturation (it runs at every weekday) and determination by TVNZ has seen the show a steady rater. But despite all the hype (critics and academics who once drubbed it now fall over each other in praise), it's hard to see what's so great about it. Sure, compared to Neighbours, Brookside, Days of Our Lives, it comes off well, but Shortland Street is hardly great drama. In fact, technically, it ain't drama at all but melodrama. The plotlines are thin and pointless, largely consisting of the standard soap love triangles of who is sleeping with whom this week, and the show's much vaunted "humour" is about as amusing as jamming your fingers in a door. I think that Shortland Street's success has, in the long run, crippled NZ TV drama. It seems that, having one success, broadcasters and production companies are now unwilling to branch out and try new things. There is no stratification of primetime drama, there's just Shortland Street and nothing else.

At the end of the day, Shortland Street is a finely put together little soap. But that's all it is, and until we learn to grow up and create proper TV dramas, this silly show will be all we're ever capable of.