MAX HEADBLOG: HEY NBC! WE NEED MORE 'CAMP'!

NBC's sleeper summer series Camp airs its season finale tonight at 10 pm, and we are not ready to say good-bye. The hour-long comedy-drama has yet to be renewed by the network and Stay Tuned is making the case for why we need a second season.

Now if you are expecting clean, wholesome fun with games, bonfires, and sing-alongs, then this Camp is probably not for you. Camp definitely has its moments of fun with swimming in the lake, canoeing, movie nights, talent shows, and mess hall antics. It also is a raunchier and sexier camp, like the old school '80s summer camp movies. Is there sex? Yes. How about alcohol? Yup. Are people getting naked? Of course...but it's just the sign of changing times. Summer camps aren't like your parents' version of camp, and that's what we love about NBC's Camp.

Here's a quick breakdown of the show: Recently divorced Mack Granger opens and runs her summer camp, Camp Little Otter, which is struggling against the resort across the lake, Camp Ridgefield. She tries to keep her camp afloat while also raising her adolescent son Buzz, usually sacrificing her home life for work. Mack enters into a love-hate relationship with Ridgefield's owner, Roger Shepard, and ultimately succumbs to the mutual attraction that builds up between the two. The relationship is thrown a wrench, primarily in the form of Little Otter handyman Cole, who gets a love jones for Mack and enters into a rivalry with Roger. Meanwhile on the camper front, new camp counselors Kip and Marina try to fit in with the returning, seasoned counselors including annual summer couple Robbie and Sarah. Kip and Marina instantly bond as both don't necessarily fit with the mold of the typical counselor, and each one harbors a secret they rather not reveal. But of course its summer camp so those secrets come to light sooner rather than later. There are also several recurring characters that add more filler than actual storyline, so why make things more complicated?

...Basically that's Camp.

So what is great about Camp? Pretty much it's an outlet to escape reality for three months. Mack gets away from the repercussions of her divorce. Buzz escapes the hell of living with divorced parents. Marina is transported to another world that doesn't recognize her for sexting video...yet. Kip can be treated normally since nobody knows he had cancer...yet. Robbie and Sarah escape for one last hurrah before embarking on the journey known as real-life. Summer camp allows for new beginnings (albeit temporary), new friendships, and even new relationships. Almost everyone can relate to the need for a break from reality, and for those of us who remember summer camp (*raises hand!), you pretty much live in an entirely different world where nobody knows the real you.

Camp also allows room for personal growth. Three months is a long time in camp terms, and most of those days often drag on sloooooooowly. The downtime allows the discovery of new interests, whether it's learning how to swim, using a bow and arrow, or making swap-meat wallets. Camp fosters the environment of skill-building and exposing individuals to new experiences, even different perspectives. Let's face it, sharing a bunk bed is hard enough, but having to share a small, dingy, smelly cabin with 5 or 6 other people is down right rough. As we get older, however, we learn that the best bonds in life are those we make with others in close quarters - parents, siblings, roommates, fraternity brothers. Living at camp teaches us to put on our big kid britches and learn to share small spaces...and it also teaches us tolerance of funky odors. At camp we mature, we become self-sufficient, we clean after ourselves, and a whole lot of other stuff mom and dad did for us at home.

Now for the B-side. Truth be told, camp is hell on wheels for newbies, and NBC's Camp highlights that sentiment to a T. Summer camp is harsh, competitive, and among other things, cliquey. Breaking in is a hard thing to do but it can be done within those three long months. Those that can brave it will be back the following summer, and those who can't cut it just don't return. It's a harsh truth but that's camp. Communal bathrooms and showers, mess hall pranks, being picked on a team for a sports activity, putting on your bathing suit -- these are just some things to brave in order to survive camp. Camp does a great job in showing the meanness, cattiness, and downright ugliness that can be summer camp, and we applaud it. Why sugarcoat it when it isn't a great representation? Watching Kip and Marina thrusted from the shells of their worlds into the mix of Camp Little Otter, and adjusting to camp life each week helped us identify with their feelings and emotions. "This sucks!," "That's so lame!," "I hate this place!", yeah we have used one or all of those phrases more than one time at camp. Little do they realize that these experiences are a building block to becoming a better person.

Summer is the time for change, whether we grow taller, get slimmer/fatter, or deepen our voices. Beyond the physical changes, however, comes the double-sided coin of choosing our paths. Camp is about doing the right or wrong thing. Do we pull the prank on the newbie? Do we spy on the girls in the shower? Do we dive into a summer relationship? Do we start a food fight in the mess hall? (Well that last one is a given "hell yea!"). Camp takes right and wrong to another level -- Should Sarah cheat on her camp boyfriend with her crush who lives across the lake? Should Mack continue her affair with her enemy? Should Kip accept being blackmailed by a girl just to keep his cancer a secret? Should Zoe post flyers of Marina's sexting pics? Ultimately we are the ones with the final decision and we will have to live with the repercussions of our actions. We usually end up doing the wrong thing and later have that moment of self-realization once the fallout clears. It's only then that we can understand the other person and co-exist with him/her for the rest of the summer.

Summer Camp is all about risks and taking chances, and while it may be a temporary escape from the hell or bubble we live in, we reluctantly return to those worlds just a little bit better and wiser. So c'mon NBC, give us another summer of Camp!

Boy Summer, How You Have Changed...

Summer...the time of year for family vacations, popsicles, pools, cookouts, and fireworks.

We have a little more daylight in the evenings, traffic is slightly better, and for us fortunate ones, our work environment is a little more relaxed and flexible. For some people it is also the time of year to sleep in until 11 AM, eat big bowls of cereal for lunch, and do absolutely nothing for hours on end. Usually we are given the options of mowing the lawn, picking up that "boring" book assigned to read for the fall, or plopping down on the couch and watch TV. The third choice usually wins the contest.

These days, however, there is a lot of variety on the boob tube and we are not relegated to the depths of perennial summer rerun hell. Gone are the days when every network re-aired entire seasons of television shows during the summer hiatus. We don't have to check the TV Guide every week to see if that one episode we missed in the fall will air this coming Tuesday.

We now rely on streaming outlets such as Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and even network websites to catch up on missed shows and episodes. Don't get me wrong, the networks still air repeats of shows that need a little boost in viewership, in preparation for the fall season. But now they mix a little bit of the old with the new.

In the past, new shows that premiered in the summer were already considered DOA and used just for filler. They rarely saw a full season in the next production season. What has remained the same is the "burning off" of episodes from already canceled TV series. Currently, ABC is burning off unaired episodes of Zero Hour and 666 Park Avenue for filler on its Saturday night schedule, as well as Family Tools on its Wednesday night comedy block. Sitcom episodes were also casualties of the summer "burn off" when they were produced within the normal production season but considered too weak to win its time slot. Today, networks have to hedge bets and take risks on introducing new TV shows during this time of year. Why? Could be for revenue. Could be for ratings. Could be for survival. Mostly likely, all of the above.

CBS' Under the Dome and ABC's Mistresses are examples of bets the networks are counting on.

The summer television landscape has also changed in the past few years with the increase of original programming on cable networks. HBO's True Blood and Showtime's Dexter have been strategically placed to retain its Sunday night viewership from the spring. TNT continues its stronghold with new seasons of Falling Skies, Major Crimes, Perception, Rizzoli & Isles, and Franklin & Bash. Even TV Land has stepped up its game in appealing beyond its regular audience of cats and cat people with new seasons of its sitcoms Hot in Cleveland, The Exes, and The Soul Man. 

On the Reality TV front, let's be honest, there are too many shows currently being aired to list and frankly Stay Tuned has little to no interest in reporting that type of programming. Some of those shows are creative, others are not, and most are on the brink of just plain absurd. But to each his/her own.

The one thing that is no longer standard, and that clearly defined summer television, was the Made-for-TV Movie of the Week. I used to love those movies, at least the campy cheesy ones. There was some cheese factor to made-for-TV movies, but it was low cheese. Most of these movies were re-airings since TV movies and mini-series were originally shown during the fall. A lot of them were dramas featuring then-taboo topics and forbidden romances. And almost all of them featured television stars from popular network TV shows.

Check out the link for the 1987 made-for-TV movie Shattered Vows starring Valerie Bertinelli and David Morse. Both actors were popular among viewers, Bertinelli was still on the post-One Day at a Time high while Morse was enjoying his long stint on St. Elsewhere. The movie's subject matter was deep stuff at the time. Basically a nun (Bertinelli) falls in love with a priest (Morse).

Shattered Vows - 1987

Crash Course was originally aired in the winter but repeated during the summer and is an example of the campy cheesy made-for-TV films. The movie basically was a vehicle to promote the TV shows of its stars Alyssa Milano (Who's the Boss), Rob Stone (Mr. Belvedere), Olivia d'Abo (The Wonder Years), Tina Yothers (Family Ties), and Jackee (227). Considered to be a low-budget version of The Breakfast Club, the movie centers around a group of high school students re-taking a Driver's Education class where unlikely friendships and relationships form in the confines of the classroom.
 

Well we all know that you cannot relive the past, and for some of us, who would want to? But we can enjoy the memories associated with summer and sitting in front of the tube.

What are your memories watching TV in the summertime? Please feel free to share and rant...share and rant and share...rant rant rant...share share share, right here and remember to Stay Tuned.