My Top 4 Most Hated Storylines

I know, I know... It's been a while. I have had "Bloggers-Block", which is much like "Writers Block" but not as important.

This season of Bones has me irked. While I admit that the episode last week was somewhat better than the first 3 weeks, I am still frustrated by it. It has inspired me to create a list of my top 4 most hated storylines.

Just a warning, there may be some spoilers scattered throughout this post for Bones, Alias, Brothers and Sisters, and Grey's Anatomy so if you are not up to date on any of these shows and would like to remain spoiler free, stop reading.

1.) Amnesia - You know the story... there is that one couple you can't wait to get together and just as they are on the verge of professing their undying love for each other (or have finally gotten together), one of them gets hit on the head, or is in a car accident, or goes "missing" for 2 years and low and behold, they can't remember a damn thing anymore. Not only can they not remember who they are/were, but of course they don't remember "being in love". This is weak storytelling and it drives me insane. I know, it doesn't just happen to couples on shows, it happens to single people too. For instance, there is an amnesia storyline happening right now on Brothers and Sisters with Holly. I'm not going to get into the details, mainly because I don't watch the show anymore, but COME ON, you are professional writers. You get paid A LOT of money to be creative and your viewers depend on that, so BE CREATIVE.


2.) The "new" love interest- When two main characters in a show are about to get together and the audience wants them together and then all of a sudden there is a new love interest for one or both of the characters. There is always mention of Moonlighting when it comes to a "will they? or won't they?" storyline. A lot of people say that when David and Maddie finally got together, the show hit a huge ratings decline and went downhill. Whether that's true or not, I don't know, but at least they had the gusto to give it a try. On Alias, they brought in Lauren. Viewers HATED Lauren for coming between Sydney and Vaughn after they had gotten together at the end of the second season. What made it worse is that the show jumped ahead 2 years in time, so we didn't get to see the natural progression of things. Which brings me to Bones... Booth and Bones belong together. The producers of the show know it, the viewers know it and all the characters on the show know it. Instead of finding a way of putting them together and making the show work, they had them work on opposite ends of the world for a year. When they met back up months later, Booth was ridiculously in love with this new girl, who we are supposed to accept automatically because they are so "well matched" for each other. No. Three episodes ago, Booth was professing his love to Brennan, so no, I don't buy that you are head over heels in love with this hot blonde girl. Again, get creative. You can't pound it into the viewers heads that these two main character belong together, only to turn around and say "JUST KIDDING!". It does not make for good storytelling. It makes for annoying storytelling.

3.) Poof! You have a brain tumor and/or Cancer- When it comes to Grey's Anatomy, I will be the first to admit that the show has had its ups and downs. I will also be the first to admit that one of my favorite characters is Denny Duquette but when Izzie started seeing Denny again (his character is dead now) in the 5th  season, people were annoyed. It had to be a dream of sorts or at the very least, a ghost. No my friends, she had a brain tumor which eventually led to her being diagnosed with Cancer. That "incurable" Cancer was in remission by seasons end. On Brothers and Sisters, Kitty Walker was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma last season. It was insanely depressing (of course), it was also cured within a few episodes. On Bones, Booth was seeing his old friend's "ghost" and Stewie from Family Guy was talking to him. What did that mean? Well it meant that he had a brain tumor, of course! He ended up having it removed through surgery and was fine. I get that these things do happen in real life, but they are also incredibly grueling and not magically fixed in real life. It's insulting to the people who have gone through things like this in their own lives to watch TV and for Hollywood to make it seem like these illnesses are so easily cured.

4.) Oops! We don't have Chemistry!- Remember when Joey started to have feelings for Rachel in season 8 of Friends? I know a lot of people were irritated by that storyline, but I always thought it was interesting. They were thinking out of the box and trying something that no one thought would ever happen. Then what did they do? They had Rachel and Joey (sort of) get together and BOOM, they no longer had chemistry. All feelings gone. On Grey's Anatomy, Shonda Rhimes hinted at the idea of putting George and Izzie together. Fans were adamant that this was NOT a good idea but she went ahead with the story anyway. After an entire season of the two of them pining after one another and them finally getting together, BOOM, they no longer have chemistry. It's a cop out as far as I'm concerned. I didn't necessarily WANT these couples to be together but it would have been nice for their story to be handled differently, otherwise it just feels like a waste of time.

As you can see, these storylines have been used quite often. They are overdone and they are annoying (to me, at least). If a storyline isn't working, be creative and fix it.