While Brazil Telenovelas Shrink Families, Jdramas Seek to Expand Them?
Let’s take a look at Mother first. Aired in 2010, it starred Yasuko Matsuyuki, as a teacher who grew up in a wealthy home with her other two sisters, and Mana Ashida, an only child from a struggling single mother. It was one of the most popular dramas of that year, launching Ashida Mana’s career like a rocket to the moon.
Last year, there was the popular Kaseifu no MITA — which got a whopping 40% rating on its final episode — about a family who spirals out of control after the mother’s death. It was interesting to point out that they were relatively well-off, having enough money to have their own house and keep a very efficient housekeeper to tend to the father’s four children.
My reaction (and my father’s) to that was… “WHO HAS THAT MANY CHILDREN???”
To a lesser extent, there was also NHK’s Bitter Sugar, which dealt with struggling women that were in transitional relationships, with one of them looking for her husband who had left her and his only kid. Or Secret Spy Erika, which dealt with a secret agent who had left the force for a life in the suburbs with her husband and his child (from his previous marriage — widowed, NEVER DIVORCED).
Of course, television influences society. At least I know here in America, from the commercials to the “reality” television, everything is obviously designated for certain demagraphics of the population. From an early age, even, girls are taught that they’re going to need to take care of children, cook (commercials with baby dolls, Barbies, and makshift kitchens), and do the shopping while the men are going to fix things, get jobs, and provide for the family, and even go to war (Tonka trucks, tools, Nerf guns — sniper rifles to close range weapons).
As much as we like to preach about progress, a more conservative society sells products like crazy. So we have the commercials and the idiot television shows that everyone is so entranced by. Makes me SICK! HaHa.
But, it seems like that’s what modern society wants — to go back to the 50s (or whatever equivalent decade/era in another country).
@Camiele, I always felt so weird that I never was the kind of girl that liked to play with dolls or wear pink. I used to hate pink, like… with a passion. And I used to give mohawks to the barbies I got as presents, though there weren’t many… my family used to give me loads of fruity balls (you know, the ones that smell like grapes, and stuff) because we had a thorny jujube tree, so I was always in need of fruity balls or footballs.
One thing is true… telenovelas can fuck you up. Down here, the most common theme in telenovelas are the ones about the girl from the poor family that ends up as a maid in a rich people’s home, and ends up falling in love with the patron or the patron’s son, who also ends up miraculously falling in love with her because the rich women are bitches. LOL
Social-climb through marriage is something a lot of people grow up dreaming of, I guess. Especially to telenovela viewers.
@amy, Yeah. It’s a bit disgusting. I never wanted kids nor did I ever want to get married. I don’t know if it was some sort of subconscious rebellion or not, but it never really was something that was very high on my to-do list.
I was always the perverted kid that had her dolls become… very intimate >.>. Yeah, my parents should’ve known that marriage and kids wasn’t my thing… Ken never came with Barbie, just sayin… HaHa.
@Camiele, my cousins and I always used to play “la casita” but we never thought of it as making a family, we build our “houses” with our toys’ chests and bedsheets and we had like a business and jobs hahahaha.
TV is trying to tell them that if you can afford them, have as many kids as possible please… WE NEED TEH BABIEZ!!!11!1
@Mirella, as long as it’s not “have babies and be rich (or die trying?)” it’s fine. The best way is to prohibit having sex and having babies, lets see how many of them do xD just, you know, for the thrill of it. XD
@amy, HaHa. That’s adorable. Yeah, I was all about building forts and pretending I was a secretary. Don’t ask me why that’s something I wanted to do as a kid, I just loved the sound of typewriters and being busy… HaHa. It was never about kids and marriage with me. Give me a job any damn day of the week… HaHA.