The A-team Fans V3.0 ~ Bekijk onderwerp - The A-Team

Moderator Geregistreerd op: 23-12-2004 Berichten: 368 Woonplaats: Wevelgem

It's Tuesday evening and you've set-tied down in front of the TV after a hard day at work - you're going to watch your favorite show, The A-Team. You are tired of having the critics knock your show. There is a place for pure escapist television and this is it.

I have been watching the show for several weeks now for the purpose of writing this article. I have talked to friends who are fans of the show for their point of view. I am ready to admit that the show has its pluses.

The A-Team is a crack commando unit who was sent to prison in 1972 for a crime they didn't commit. They escaped to the Los Angeles Underground. Still wanted by the government, they survive by hiring out as mercenaries.

The leader, Hannibal Smith, usually has a cigar dangling out of his mouth. When the cigar is gone his mouth creases into a smirk. Hannibal is capable of coming up with the wildest schemes to get the job done. Seldom is he fazed by anything that happens. He always thinks one step ahead of the enemy and when things go wrong he takes the attitude that he can turn the situation around and he does.

The Face is the picture-perfect, handsome hero. He normally is dressed to the limit and enjoys fine cars and fine women. He carries fake ID's for any occasion. Very glib, he can often talk himself out of a situation. Behind that smooth exterior there exists a top fighting man, if he can't talk his way out, he can definitely fight his way out. Often he is the patsy in Hannibal's farout schemes.

B.A. Baracus has become the most popular of the A-Team members with the public. So popular that the actor, Mr. T, now has a Saturday morning cartoon show. B.A. seldom has lines extending beyond five words. He is the muscle man of the group and few people would willingly take on this giant of a man. B.A. is not as stupid as his restricted dialogue would indicate. He has no problem understanding the tricky schemes of Hannibal's and is capable of fighting using both brute strength and trained, specialized techniques. He can show great tenderness, especially towards children. His Achilles heel is a fear of flying, which was the running joke of the first season.

Howling Mad Murdock is perhaps the most interesting of the A-Team members. It is difficult to know if he is really totally insane or a genius beyond our understanding. One week he thinks he's a dog, another week he is convinced that a cockroach is the reinecarnated Herman Melville and consistently carries on a conversation with the bug. Mad? Sounds it, and yet he can read and speak Chinese fluently; having a headache one day, a really bad one, he recovered to find that he could understand Chinese. Perhaps proof positive that those whom the gods bless they first make mad. He is a topnotch pilot and the bane of B.A.'s existence.

Making occasional appearances is Amy Allen, a reporter, and the only member of the A-Team not wanted by the government. Late rumors have indicated that Miss Allen will be replaced later this season with another character having more T & A to recommend her. Amy's contribution is research and going in when feminine charm will provide sufficient distraction.

The A-Team goes around and takes on the bad guys of the world - the small town sheriff who has the illegal liquor and gambling markets cornered and kills anyone who gets in his way; the smugglers of illegal aliens who treat the people as so much cattle to be auctioned off at market; the mysterious Tong who terrorize the merchants of Chinatown. This is what makes the A-Team so popular with the viewers, the same thing that makes the Dirty Harry films of Clint Eastwood and Death Wish of Charles Bronson popular. Vicariously we get even with all the bad guys in the world.

We know the A-Team is going to win, the fun is watching how they out-maneuver the villains and some of the stunts are wild indeed. Out of pieces of steel on a construction site they create bullet-proof tanks. They surround jeeps filled with soldiers come to arrest them simply by taking them by surprise. Under arrest, their identity soon to be discovered, Hannibal calls downstairs posing as the policeman who bagged them and asks for an extra uniform. An unsuspecting cop delivers it and the whole A-Team march out of police headquarters led by Hannibal.

They are able to help people because Hannibal sincerely believes there is nothing he and his men can't do, and so far he's been right. The police are usually either helpless, ignorant or corrupt. The army is just plain stupid, they're still after the four men as criminals when all their actions prove they really are on the side of Truth, Justice and the American Way.

As the crime rate goes up and more of us experience the helplessness of being a victim, shows like The A-Team will become more and more popular. Personally I have been robbed three times and the police have admitted that even with serial numbers and all, there is next to no chance of getting my things back, or the criminals caught. But if I called the A-Team in, my neighborhood victimized by a gang of thieves, Hannibal would come through and I'd be watching my color television in no time. Wish fulfillment, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

However, (you've been waiting for this, haven't you), there is one problem with the A-Team that makes my blood run cold. Amid the rapid machine gun fire, the grenades and bombs, nobody gets hurt. I puzzled over this when I first put my finger on the cause of my unease. Did I really want to see a body slammed up against the wall by the force of machine gun fire, blood oozing out of the many wounds? Am I really that bloodthirsty?

I have always been told - and I believe it - you don't pull a gun unless you plan to use it. Guns are not toys. I'm not sure of the reasoning behind the lack of fatalities or injuries on the show but I suspect it has something to do with the fear of violence and its affect on young people. The A-Team coming on at 8:00 P.M. Eastern time is aired when a lot of children can watch it. To me this makes the lack of consequences of firing a gun even more inexcusable.

I am not in favor of gun control to the point where only criminals can get a firearm, but I do think that people who have guns have a responsibility and one of the biggest responsibilities is to understand the use and results of pulling the trigger, and letting their children learn the same. The A-Team shows people that you can fire automatic weapons with high power and hurt no one while succeeding in catching the bad guys and putting them behind bars. You shoot guns and no one gets damaged in any way. Is that what we really want impressionable minds to believe?

I never really have believed that television violence has such a detrimental affect on children. Those of us that grew up in the Fifties and early Sixties were subject to some of the most violent programming around. How many times did we see Torn skinned, sliced in two, flattened or simply crumbled into little pieces? How about the Coyote falling off of high cliffs, then crushed even further with the giant rocks landing on top of him? Saturday afternoon westerns gave us lots of gun fights and shoot 'em ups and people were wounded and people died. Yes, our youth was filled with violence and when we entered our teenage years we were one of the most peaceconscious groups of youth ever known by this country. We had learned that violence has consequences.

Some may argue that as the good guys, the A-Team cannot possibly kill as that puts them beyond the law. But they already are beyond the law, they are wanted by the U.S. Government. To mercenaries or men trained in special services, death would not be unknown. Jon Sable, a comic book mercenary, (See Daredevils #3) is a hero but he doesn't hesitate to kill when he has to. Napoleon and Illya, protectors of the tree world, killed when they had to. Kirk and Spock, the future hope of peace and cooperation, also killed as necessary. Good guys can kill.

And good guys can be hurt. Starsky and Hutch were damaged several times in the line of duty. In one Mission: Im-possible Cinammon was caught and subjected to brainwashing that left her wrapped close in on herself, a small ball of human misery. On Magnum, P. I. one of the supporting regulars was killed. It can happen (O.K. Murdock was temporarily blinded once, but compared to the violence of the show that is nothing).

I do not object to showing the violence on television. It can be exciting, get the blood pounding, fulfill wishes.

What I do object to is the lack of consequences for choosing the path of violence. All the results are good with no counter-balance.

The characters are fun to watch. They are sufficiently one-sided that you can start chuckling over their reaction long before it happens because you know what they're going to say. Can you out-think Hannibal? It's fun to try. Keeping pace with Murdock's strange twists and turns can be intriguing. The sheer animal violence of B.A. is exciting. All these are on the plusside.

On the negative side is the lack of consequences for the violent action and a certain sameness in the plot line. Last year they dropped things out of helicopters and knocked out B.A. to get him in the air. This year they're making armor out of bits and pieces of metal and running down their enemy. But compared to boring plot lines or poorly delineated characters, these are not insurmountable problems, just something the producers and writers should look to.

And if I'm robbed again, I just may call on The A-Team.