i agree - i have been dying to see this show again, just went to youtube to see what you mentioned, there is one almost whole episode and then just the beginning credits and promos. i haven't seen it since i was a teen, but it's like i saw it last month, it all came back to me. and it is just as funny as i remembered it, too.
yes, it is cornball. it's not shakespeare. but it's better than 99% of what is called funny today. we have too many heavy, dark shows, too many dramas, too much crime and punishment, not enough humor. look at modern family, they get so many awards because they are just funny. they're cornball, too, they are politically incorrect, they make fun of stereotypes. it's not rocket science. and heck, i wouldn't even be picky, they don't even have to come up with new shows, just show us the old '70s ones again! i would watch this show over most of what i see today, any day. tv had to be better back then, we only had 3 channels plus PBS, they had to compete for our attention, because we could just as well go outside and do stuff.
i am not a southerner but i spent most of my adult life in the south, and i don't think anyone would find this offensive, most southerners i know like poking fun at themselves, that is how jeff foxworthy got so rich! but i also like that we were not so d**ned uptight! that we could laugh at our world. all this hate going on right now, seeing Carter Country again reminded me (and i'm a historian)just how much fun the US used to be. all those hollywood people are remaking movies from their childhoods, why not tv shows?
as for critics: i am a big fan of Rob Schneider movies. they are really stupid movies, we all know that. they are completely panned by all critics. and i am told, as a woman, i should be offended by him. but i'm not. i see something in his movies that is redeeming - the theme is often about being happy with who you are, don't try to be someone else, someone will love you for you. critics don't see that because they are looking for a picasso. it's not a picasso, and yet it is. this show is a masterpiece of its own. it reminds us that we once had a president, of whom we made fun because he was a west point cadet from a peanut farm in Georgia and his brother was a redneck who made his own beer, and we laughed about it together, whether you liked Carter as a president or not. this country really needs something to rally around again. and we need to laugh - all at the same time, again. we need to get this show on dvd!
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KobiyashiMauru
11 years ago
I'm a Southerner and I've found that the people who get really offended live in the Northeast and out in California. It's like they swapped a chip for a boulder on their shoulders. I enjoyed the show and usually enjoy people making fun of Southern stereotypes. But I also enjoy laughing at the liberal stereotypes and their offense just makes is funnier, to me.
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taos65
11 years ago
I know of no one who was offended by this show for its depictions of the characters. Everyone I knew felt it was well written, even if the situations were too contrived, and it was silly instead of witty. But none of that, good or bad, had anything to do with it being about the South or where anyone is from. It had to do with the quality of the show.
In fact, most Northerners I know -- and I was still a kid growing up in Pennsylvania when this was on -- loved this show because we saw Southerners as the uneducated, bumbling country bumpkins as they were portrayed in the show. We loved the show because we felt it got it just about right. We weren't offended by it, we were the ones who loved it. That was OUR "liberal" stereotype you were watching. That is what we thought of you. Still do, for the most part, by the way. That is why the New York cop in the show was the only one who was normal.
I have no idea where you are getting your observations of people in other parts of the nation from, but it's not from reality, it's just from your own bias. This show isn't being shown TODAY. It was in the '70s, so I don't know how you are pinning your 21st century political garbage on a show that was only on tv almost 40 years ago. It was a different nation then, not the hate-filled, rude, bifurcated mess we have today. People were able to laugh at things - which is also what we were lamenting in this thread.
An example of a similar show would be Barney Miller, another cop sitcom. It poked fun at New York cops. Barney Miller also made fun of just about every ethnicity that came to the Northeast in the 19th and 20th centuries, when my family came; I found that humor to be crazy good, too.
And how would Californians be offended at a tv show they created? That doesn't make a lick of sense. Again, how the rest of the world views the South. The Californians I know don't really care that much about the South to hold opinions other than what Carter Country depicts. So, I'm not sure how they would be offended by what they see as the Southern reality.
Your comment really doesn't further this discussion along except to bring in the current Southern "liberal" bashing and hate-filled fundamentalism that we are lamenting the rise of, that Carter Country lacked. It's sad that you trolls feel the need to stamp YOUR 21st century stereotypes and political hatred where it just does NOT belong, where it is completely inappropriate. We didn't have that mentality in the 1970s. What you are doing is what historians call anachronism. You are pinning your current ideologies on a past time period that did not have those ideologies.
Carter Country was an underrated show because it was funny. It was Three's Company funny. If it was revived today, I can bet you that Northerners would be the first people who would watch it and laugh, because it still shows the South in the light we see you all, what you, personally, have shown to still be very true.
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