Disappointed.....

[deleted]

I bought the complete box set a couple of months ago. I'm just over half way through the third volume and have found that I've become more and more addicted to the series each volume I've watched. I don't know whether this is because the episodes generally get better or because the series has grown on me. Some of the acting is indeed a bit wooden, I suppose, and some of the 'action' sequences, i.e. people chasing each other and fighting each other, have reminded me a bit of some of the slapstick comedy from seventies comedies like Monty Python and Fawlty Towers. Some of the episodes are evidently meant to raise a chuckle or two. Perhaps one needs to be old enough to have watched 'Thriller' when it was first on British TV to appreciate it. I was born in '62. My wife, who was born in '72, would probably hate it. She loves 'Spooks'.

You know what you might enjoy?

Set aside ONE night of the week as "Thriller NIght" and restrict yourself to watching a single episode. Thriller can sometimes be heavy going if you watch a few episodes back to back, so instead break it up.

Phoo Are My World!

Thriller cannot be compared with ANY OTHER series. It is unique.

I'm sorry OP, you disliked the series, but I think it's a classic.

I loved it way back in the 1970s and I still love it.

I think the horror film industry over the last several decades has done a tremendous dis-service to the filmgoing audience. The decades of bargain-basement 'horror' films, emphasizing blood, gore, grue, and quick cuts of someone jumping out from the shadows and yelling "Boo", have trained the younger generations that this is the essence of horror. And, no doubt, the reason the target audience for 'horror' films today is the youth generation.

In the 1930's and 40's, the target audience was the adults. Not that kids didn't want to see Frankenstein's monster or the wolf man, too, but a great many adults enjoyed these films. No adult in his right mind goes to see today's garbage-dump horror films. They appeal to the unsophisticated juvenile mind, not a more sophisticated, discerning adult mind.

Ergo, the reason why shows from the 1960's and 1970's don't appeal to younger viewers. Older film and television wasn't made with the intent of shocking the audience into the need for psychiatric care, or promote intense fear or vomiting into the seat in front of you.

In the first place, that sort of presentation just wasn't acceptable during that era. In the second, the vast majority of the adult audience didn't need that sort of thing to enjoy a story. Back then, people didn't watch this genre to be scared witless, but to watch an entertaining film. Which is why films such as the great Universal monster series from the 30's and 40's are not scary. They weren't supposed to be.

That's also why novels like "Dracula" or "Frankenstein" seem incredibly dull to youngsters and are so greatly enjoyed by adults. And outstanding films like "The Woman in Black" (1989) are enjoyed by adults, but dismissed as dull by younger viewers, who are looking for a heroin-overdose of shock and gore and haven't grown to appreciate the subtlety of horror.

Horror isn't the same as terror. As someone once described, terror is two airliners crashing into the World Trade Center. Horror is a first responder seeing a tiny hand clutching a stuffed animal sticking from underneath a massive chuck of concrete. And why the ending of The Woman in Black '89 is so much more horrifying that the ending of the 2012 remake. At least, for an adult viewer.

So, recognize that you've been trained by the industry to focus on the superficial and not on the substantive. Perhaps, and with luck, you're tastes will improve to enjoy the more subtle aspects of an earlier generation of film and television fare.