I have never seen an episode of the original ABC Family drama Switched at Birth—not even one minute of it—but because I watch reruns of Gilmore Girls on the channel almost every day, I see melodramatic commercials for the program all the time. And I have just got to say, “What the fuck is going on there?”
When the season began, it looked like Constance Marie was marrying someone she didn’t love—to get him a green card perhaps? Weeks later, I noticed that one of the girls, the one who is deaf (I don’t know her name), has developed a crush on a much older man who may or may not be her boss. Am I even close? All of this prompted me to wonder, What is this show even about? But the best part has emerged over the last couple of weeks: it appears as if the other teenage protagonist (you know, Luke’s daughter from Gilmore Girls) has made a less-than-savory friend who has routinely gotten her into potentially dangerous scenarios. Looks like next week’s episode is going to be tense!
I am not pointing out all of this because I want to make fun of the show. In fact, one of these days I will start from the beginning by streaming it on Netflix; I think its premise at least is compelling. For two babies were, uh, switched at birth, and when they meet their birth parents and become a part of each other’s lives many years later, race, class, and ability are cast in sharp relief. I’m only writing about Switched at Birth (what a horrible title, can I just tell you?) because I feel as though I sort of do watch it. Sure, I don’t know any of the characters’ names, and I really have no clue as to what happens in each and every episode, but by paying 50% attention to the ads touting what’s coming up next week, I have soaked up major plot points. I can put an over-arching narrative together week-to-week, at least for this season. That is more than I can say for the similarly heavily promoted Pretty Little Liars. That one, I totally disregard. It looks like another program on the basic cable channel with a similar title (I can’t remember what it is), and all of the actresses on Liars appear so physically alike that I can’t tell them apart. Worse, I have no desire to attempt to distinguish them.
Anyway, Switched at Birth seems pretty crazy to this “viewer from a distance.” (What can we call someone who doesn’t watch a show but has a loose understanding of its plot, and is it possible to have an impression of a show viewed this way wherein the program doesn’t come across as strange?) If the newly canceled Secret Life of the American Teenager is ABC Family’s answer to Seventh Heaven (which I am only vaguely familiar with because a roommate in college watched it), then Switched at Birth might be their Beverly Hills 90210 from the look of things. That one, too, began as a prime-time soap for young audiences, who were eager to see what teenagers were really like, and then it unraveled as it came up with more and more ridiculous plot points. So, I just have to know: Which girl is Brenda Walsh, making the other one, her friend-from-her-own-mother, Kelly Taylor? Or am I totally wrong, and they’re either Donna Martin or Andrea Zuckerman?
The Rumination Refinery 