Swingtown – Is this the best that CBS can offer?
Swingtown
Network: CBS Time: 10PM on Thursdays
Overview Summary:
CBS this evening launched their well hyped new summer series, Swingtown. Set in 1976’s Chicago, this series sets out to explore life and the discovery of part of the sexual revolution that many avoid and yet others relish – swinging. Being curious and still awake I tuned in to appease my curiosity.
For the uninitiated, swinging isn’t considered cheating on your spouse, per se. It’s generally defined as when both spouses indulge in sex with other marrieds or singles, with the full knowledge and consent of their partners. I’ll leave the Biblical implications for you to discuss with your priest or rabbi.
In the opener we’re introduced to three primary families covering the basic three areas of curiosity: not interested, curiously interested and active participant. With that, their families and a lot of music from the mid 70’s era, we’re brought in to the households of how some families lived, developed and in general how a lot of life was back then.
Now, before you write me off as a prude, I’m firm believer in what people do in the privacy of their own homes is totally cool. And, whatever floats your boat in the privacy of your home, that doesn’t negatively impact me, is also cool. But I have to really be concerned if a show promoting a lifestyle of open sex, drugs, drinking and teen coeds having the hots for teacher is really the best thing to be promoting and showing in prime time TV! Please keep in mind, that back then (and still today) most sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are bacteria and can be easily and quickly treated with medication if caught early enough. BUT, in the last few years, we’ve added viruses to the mix of STDs. You can’t cure a virus. And some of the current STD viruses are big time killers – and that’s something you won’t see a show on CBS nightly at 10pm about any time soon!
Is this the best that CBS has to offer? If so, then it’s time to find a good book!
Now The Details:
Swingtown starts its opener as any new debuting show would. We’re fairly quickly brought up to speed on the new found successes of the stockbroker father of the main family and that his family got started with a bang, pardon the pun, when his girlfriend found out she was pregg’ers and well the rest is family history. Their daughter is sexually active with her pot head beach bum boyfriend and would much rather be humping her philosophy teacher. Meanwhile, little brother has discovered his father’s archives of old Penthouse and is discovering that female bodies can be really interesting and thought provoking. Oh, did I forget to mention that his wife seems to enjoy catching the eye of her best friend (and neighbors) husband? The plot line get shallower and easier to read than an old porn flick, but then, not many porn flicks have gotten an Oscar for their plotlines!
So, these folks move down the street into their new home and while christening the new house are interrupted by a visit from their new neighbors who invite them to a party with the admonition to “get a sitter, this one will run late.”
Needless to say it runs into the next morning with everyone starting the day with good memories of the night. During the party we’re treated to very heavy sexual overtones and innuendo, but also to the free and open use of ‘ludes, pot, coke and booze… Yes, that existed a lot back then, and still does today, but is it something we really need to be promoting?
Ah, let’s not forget the 3rd family in our tryst here. The best friend and her husband. Well, they happen to show up a few minutes before the party starts with some housewarming gifts and as good hosts would do who are stuck in a lurch with being interrupted on the way out the door to a party, invite them to join in on the fun. Needless to say, they get a bit of a shock when the party really gets underway.
Meanwhile, back at home, the stockbroker’s son has just come home from the movies to find the daughter of their new neighbor in his room looking for a ring that she left there. Evidently, her mother’s a cokehead, her father has split and she’s sadly running away.
Well, where this leads, only the writers really know. The plotlines were left fairly open for future development, in between all the ads we’re going to have to wait through.
If you look between the lines here, there’s a lot of sadness that also permeated society at that time of trying to find oneself through experimentation with drugs and sexuality. Perhaps, back to the basics works better than we thought.
But, if you’re looking for light shallow plotlines, peppered with gratuitous, but FCC approvable for public TV, sex and drug use, then hey, tune in and turn on. But, if this is the best that CBS has to offer, it’s time to find a good book!
I’m Don Rima and that’s the way thinks looked From Where I Stand.
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