Posted by: haro1d
You thought I missed it, didn’t you? What about you? Did you miss One Tree Hill because of the day change?
I didn’t, but John Lennon once said, “Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans.” What do I mean by that? Not a thing, really. OTH is fond of starting new episodes with a literary citation, so I thought I’d pull one out as well, even if it’s from a deceased Beatle instead of Walt Whitman.
Let’s be honest, though — by now, you’ve either seen Monday’s episode or you’ve read someone else’s synopsis. If you read this blog, chances are it’s not because you’re dying to catch the recap. You’re either with me or against me in lampooning one of the most entertainingly poor shows on TV. Instead of talking about what happened on the show this week, I’d like to take issue with its form.
Monday’s episode didn’t start, like many do, with the aforementioned literary swipe, but we pretty quickly got into an editing pattern as the show jumped from one character’s drama to the other with a simple verbal segue. A little of that is fine, but when you edit the entire show that way, it starts to look pretty contrived. And when you edit OTH that way, it’s cheesier than Wisconsin pizza.
I will give credit to the show’s creators. They do try things here and there that other shows wouldn’t — like inserting the show’s creator in the show, as we saw with the return of Max (Mark Schwahn) on Monday. But if those other shows don’t, it’s usually for a reason. (Schwahn happens to look like a slightly older version of any number of the cast, instead of looking like Dom Deluise or Francis Ford Coppola, so he probably can get away with it.)
More often than not, though, OTH adheres to its formula. Voice-over narration — often Lucas, but sometimes Nathan or another character; ping-ponging between the various dramas taking place, always ending up in an ostensibly thoughtful “montage” at the end that bookmarks the fates of the various players until next week’s episode. It’s a formula that works for the show, obviously, but wow, if there’s anything that accentuates the high-school-drama quality, that ending montage is it.
It’s easy to think that OTH, like all of its characters, needs to get over itself. But if it ever did, it more than likely would cease to exist. And then, as Richard Nixon once said — and I’m paraphrasing, here — we wouldn’t have it to kick around, anymore.
