Television Without Pity: 752 Things We Love to Hate (and Hate to Love) About TV (Paperback)

by Tara Ariano (Author), Sarah D. Bunting (Author)
Key Phrases: series finale, New York, Star Trek, Gilmore Girls (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Ariano and Bunting, the brains behind Televisionwithpity.com, have assembled a wickedly funny encyclopedia of TV's people, plots, formulas and quirky phenomena, and loaded it with irreverent commentary. A typical entry, such as the one for Laverne & Shirley, begins with "Lord, what a terrible show," and only gets nastier from there, culminating in a list of cross-references both useful and shameful: "Bad Sitcom, Sure Signs of; Canned Laughter, Manipulation by/of; Marshall, Garry; Neighbors, Intrusive." Everyone who has hit stardom because of television is good-naturedly skewered, as in the case of "the ham that ate Pittsburgh," William Shatner, a subject so worthy he gets two helpings of barbs-one in his eponymous entry and one in "Shatner, William, Legendarily Awesome Saturday Night Live Appearance of." Other entries get more general (such as "Sexual Tension, Ruination of Show by Resolving") while others go delightfully specific (the very next entry, on the Family Ties theme song lyric "Sha La La La!"). Addictively entertaining, this book will make a compulsive treat for TV addicts, trivia enthusiasts and those who enjoy looking down their nose at America's chief pastime.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Product Description
Calling all Dawson's Creek fans! Television Without Pity features irreverent entries about the shows, characters, actors, clichés, plot devices, memorable moments, and catch phrases that make watching TV such a guilty pleasure. From weekend-long Real World marathons to the People's Choice Awards, from favorite characters (Brenda Walsh, Seth Cohen) to the most unfunny recurring skits on Saturday Night Live, this is a celebration of television unlike any other. Written by the creators of televisionwithoutpity.com (hailed by Entertainment Weekly as "the industry standard" for obsessive TV fanatics), this snarktastic volume features 100 illustrations and an encyclopedic two-column design. It's great fun for nostalgic browsing and guaranteed to prompt more laughter than a whole season of Seinfeld.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Quirk Books (October 12, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594741174
• ISBN-13: 978-1594741173
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #474,939 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars I was hoping for better, November 24, 2006

By	juliannagirl (Raleigh, NC United States) - See all my reviews

I am a longtime reader of the Television Without Pity website, so I expected the book to be snarky, occasionally irreverent, and a good read. And it was...to a degree. There's a fine line between snark, bitterness, and just plain meanness, and while the authors didn't cross that last line (often), they bounced between the first two a lot. Maybe watching television for a living makes it impossible not to be hyper-critical of everything coming across the screen. There were times when I wondered if the authors actually like television all that much. Still, if you're a fan of the site or just a TV buff, it's worth a read.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For those who love television and love making fun of television, October 26, 2006

By	Joopiter (Connecticut) - See all my reviews

I'm a long-time fan of Television Without Pity - it's essential web-reading in my book. So buying this book was a no-brainer for me. I love the encylopedia format complete with what are truly the most important entries for any television addict - things like notorius "show killers," signs that you're watching a bad sitcom, and the answer to one question that's bugged the hell out of me for years: how to tell apart twin "actors" Jeremy and Jason London.

And, hey, any book that has entries for "Jack Bristow" and "Jem & the Holograms" on facing pages is a must-read for me!

14 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Delightful Reference Repository of Television Snarkiness, October 24, 2006

By	George Buttner "Agent0042" (Dayton, Ohio United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I've been a member of the site Television Without Pity for a long time. I used to be an active forum poster --- these days, I mainly just lurk. But the site is still as good as ever and this book won't fail to delight readers of the site or television fanatics in general.

Ariano and Bunting (Wing Chun and Sars) have laid out "Television Without Pity: 752 Things We Love to Hate (And Hate to Love) About TV" rather like a traditional reference book. So you'll find entries such as "Brady Bunch, Musical Stylings Of" and "Police Videos, Shows Reliant Upon." This book can easily be read cover-to-cover, or depending on your tastes, you can start by looking up some of your favorite shows and people and reading what it has to say about them.

This book covers a wide range of material and there's no doubt there'll be stuff in there you probably won't be interested in, or just plain disagree with. For example, the book skims over "Star Trek: Voyager" as barely worth mentioning, but it's my personal favorite "Trek." And the authors also comment that they don't really mind the split-screening of closing-creidts on programs because people can look that stuff up on the Internet. Well, sorry, but somebody has to *enter* that stuff on the Internet first and for those doing that, those splits are a real pain.

But never mind that, though, within seconds, you'll soon be finding something to laugh at and that you can totally identify with. For example, the hilarious description of local television news broadcasts "News, Crappy Local --- ...something about local unions, about which nobody cares... and then the weather report (always overhyped, always inaccurate)" or something surprisingly touching about "Reading Rainbow ... just really, really cute."


"Televisin Without Pity" is no doubt a book you'll be coming back to often. And given how large this medium is, if this book sells really well, there's certainly more than enough material for something like "Television Without Pity 2 The Sequel: 1000 More Things..."