TV Tuesday: The Water Cooler

[yourlibrarian]

Do you ever talk with anyone in your offline life about TV shows? When you're trying to strike up a conversation with someone, do you have a go-to related to TV viewing?

Comments

[dine]

I don't talk TV with most folks - I'm not really up on most popular shows, and conversations with family/coworker rarely involve viewing. the exception is a couple of local fannish friends, and usually we end up talking more about fic based on shows than the shows themselves

[yourlibrarian]

Technically only 2 of my friends are not fannishly active themselves, but the others are not necessarily active in TV fandoms. The non-actives do talk TV with me (in fact one considers me a sort of guide to what's good). It's usually a general sort of question as to what I or they have been watching lately and what we think of it. But nowadays the shows could be old or new since so much stuff is accessible on demand.

[jo]

It's pretty rare. My husband isn't interested in watching TV in general, although I will mention shows to him that I think he'd probably enjoy if he ever bothered to sit down to watch. One of my sisters watches a lot of TV, and sometimes we'll talk about certain shows (in emails), but we don't often watch the same sorts of shows. Occasionally my other sister will email asking for recommendations re: things to watch, and I'll suggest some, but we rarely have any discussion of the shows beyond that. Sometimes at work, the topic of this or that show will pop up, but not very often. I think the last time that happened was with regards to The Night Agent (Netflix). I have on occasion recommended shows to one of my colleagues because I do have a sense of what sort of shows she likes, but we don't typically actually discuss episodes or anything.

[yourlibrarian]

Your reference to email reminded me that I spoke more about TV to others in the past, probably because I emailed more people than I spoke to in person or by phone. Especially in long email chains it was more likely to become a topic.

[jo]

I think it's just generally close to impossible to discuss shows (e.g. episodes discussions) now because everyone watches things at different times. Streaming services has been the death knell of viable shared show discussions. I remember back in ye olde times when things like "Who shot J.R.?" kept people buzzing and speculating all summer long until the next season started in the fall. Even in the early days of the internet, it was possible to have show discussions online, which I did on discussion forums. But now -- that just doesn't happen. Everyone watches things at their own pace, at their own time. It's even more difficult for me because I don't hesitate to torrent stuff, so I've seen shows that just aren't available in Canada otherwise -- who am I going to talk to about them? They may become available on something at some point, but I can't be arsed to wait.

[yourlibrarian]

Yes, that's very true about how staggered a lot of people's viewing is. I have things I plan to watch when I rotate onto a platform. But that might be months or a year later. Plus seasons are so short now that someone could easily watch one in a week (if it isn't a new release) which makes it even less likely others can join in at the same time.

[mulhollands]

Nope :(

[delphi]

Not in depth, unfortunately. I have a lot of people in my life that I swap recs with, but our tastes in fiction never really end up aligning. I tell them why I'm loving the thing I'm watching, they tell me why they're loving the thing they're watching, we try out each other's shows and then never speak of it again.

[rogueslayer452]

Yes, with a select few of people. I'm very fortunate to have relatives who like watching media (and some who are also of the fannish sort) and we will talk about it, and I'll end up striking up a conversation with shows we watch or shows that I'm familiar with. It can range from being quite surface level interest to going deep into conversations, depending on how invested they are. Although I'm not someone that watches a lot of current stuff until long after the fact, whenever I mention the shows I am watching (mostly it's been Asian dramas lately) that they're not familiar with it can be kind of awkward at first but if they're interested in what those shows are and why I like it, depending on my relationship with them I will discuss it further.

[olivermoss]

Not really. I tend to like obscure shows and people tend to react weird to me liking shows they haven't heard of. It's like they think I am anti-social for not being into the big canons or there is some secret reason I am into the show.

[alchemicink]

I tend to watch a lot of anime and other Japanese TV shows, and most people I know offline aren't really into that, so I don't usually bring it up. But I think even when I was regularly watching things like broadcast TV procedurals (like NCISLA, Elementary, etc), I never really found anyone else irl that was into them too, so those conversations never went anywhere. I also cannot seem to run into Star Trek fans in the wild either, despite its popularity. Maybe I just have bad luck 😅

This topic got me thinking about how often I hear TV discussions among other people offline too. My coworkers don't really talk about TV too much either (it's just four of us, so this is too small a sample size to mean anything, lol). But occasionally two of them discuss Big Brother (the reality competition show), which they have been avid fans of for years!

[saddlerfan]

I wish I had someone to talk to about TV shows (or anything else) IRL, but alas, I don't. But even if I did I'm not sure I'd get things across because I'm better at writing than talking, especially when it comes to things I like. I tend to just stand there waving my hands around looking for the proper words. Writing is the better option for me, lol!

[shadowkat]

Yes. I have various co-workers that I discuss television shows with, along with my mother, occasionally my brother, and my friend Wales.

Mother & I discuss: General Hospital (daytime soap opera) every night. It gives us something to discuss other than ourselves. And we agree completely on it. So there's that. We used to discuss Grey's Anatomy - but it got old. And we did discuss Peaky Blinders (which she rec'd to me), and The Crown, and let's see..she rec'd The Diplomat and Night Agent to me, which in turn were rec'd by my brother. And I'm watching Slow Horses, which was rec'd by my brother.

Sci-Fi Co-worker has rec'd various sci-fi shows, and others. He rec'd Funny Lady (PBS), we've discussed Star Trek and various other shows here and there.

Chidi (a co-worker who basically looks like Chidi from the Good Place and kind of talks like him) - we discuss movies, television shows (House of Dragon), and he recs stuff to me, that I often don't watch. (He likes dark true crime stuff - I do not.) But we have other tastes in common.

So, yes, I discuss television and movies with my co-workers.

[feurioo]

Nope. I used to do it way more back when I still watched German network television. Trash television, in particular, seems to be a good conversation starter with some people but these days, I genuinely don't have the time or the taste for it.

Then again, I tend to enjoy discussions with other fannish folks the most because I feel safe showing my joy and excitement. IRL, people tend to judge me for that.