When executives announced plans in 2006 to merge The WB and UPN, it was a dark day. It was the end of an era, the end of television as I grew up with it. The WB launched in 1995 and in its decade on the air, it produced a multitude of long-running, generation-defining series. It was hard to say goodbye, but remembering the good times is what it’s all about.
You might be saying, “Wait, aren’t you a tad young to be nostalgic about this?” Yes, The WB was already defunct in my formative years. In its place I—we—had The CW, The WB’s over-eager kid sister. However, I’m old enough to miss the youth-skewing, Gen X network from watching it with my family. Growing up, Monday nights were 7th Heaven (never forget) nights. It was a wholesome little show about the challenges of a good Christian family. They don’t make them like that anymore, folks.
Even though I was young and even though it was on the air for a relative blink, it certainly made an impact. It may have made an impact on you and you don’t even realize it. We grew up watching these shows and they are still around today because they meant something to an entire generation.
It was throughout high school that I became absolutely enamored with ‘90s pop culture. Everything from the music to the movies and, most importantly, the television. I began to collect and re-watch some old favorites like Everwood and Felicity. It was then that The WB’s programming influenced my writing. There has not been a time when I was describing one of my projects to a friend and I didn’t reference Felicity, One Tree Hill, Dawson’s Creek or Gilmore Girls (or sometimes all of the above in a very complicated equation). The WB primed me for who I would become as a television viewer and a writer. The WB gave me the majority of my favorite shows. In turn, many of my best friendships have been built around a deep adoration for these shows. Our whole vocabulary is structured to the characters and storylines like they are something that happened to us.
Simply put, the network set a high standard for teen programming. They may have been cheesy, but they were the good kind of cheesy. Times were different back then. Teenagers actually watched TV and liked a more basic type of show than they do today. The cancellation of The CW’s Life Unexpected in 2011 is a prime example. Life Unexpected, classic fare for the frog network, would have been around for six seasons had it been on The WB in 1998 instead of The CW in 2010. Similarly, Hart of Dixie would shed some of its Southern silliness for a touch more emotional poignancy.
Clearly, I still haven’t recovered from the dissolution of my favorite television network. I long for the days of simple teen shows with a great pop-rock soundtrack. Unfortunately, those days are gone.
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