MEN are out, women are in. The male TV hero of today no longer says: 'Stay here, this could be dangerous,' to a whimpering damsel, more often than not he is the one doing the whimpering. This week's listings show that the main protagonist on today's TV is more likely to be female than male.
Take Eye To Eye With Connie Chung. The downfall of the male protagonist came when she was brought on to anchor the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather. He was the sequel to Walter Cronkite: you could see the battle scars etched into his face, legacy of the climb from Texan anonymity to anchor fame. But that he knew his stuff was apparently not enough. On June 1, 1993, studio execs foisted Chung on him to 'soften his style' and boost flagging ratings. It was the triumph of the heroine over the hero and the look of defeat on Rather's face is still there.
On Wednesday, Chung's second report is on girl scouts. Apparently, their cookies are a multi-million dollar business in the United States, but the girls see little of that money. Someone is keeping it from them. With the hero-villain dynamic applied to girl scout cookies - innocent individuals take on evil corporation - the humble girl scout, previously just a nerd, gains heroine status.
Girl scouts fighting for their cookies are just the tip of the iceberg. Consider the fourth episode of World's Special Babies on Friday, which looks at the problem a 171-kilogram woman faces as she gives birth.
If you have not been watching the series, do not be deceived by the title. It is really about mothers and giving birth. Babies, after all, make rather poor heroes: they haven't had time to develop a sense of mortal cowardice which is supposed to be overcome to qualify as a hero. Mothers, on the other hand, have the advantage of being one of the most universal of archetypes - creatures of power, pain and pocket money. Like a Shakespearean drama, pain and ecstasy are the main expressions and it is the mothers who make the best dramatis personae, not the male doctors.
Also on World is the sequel to last week's A Masculine Ending. Don't Leave Me This Way again stars Janet McTeer (Emmy award-winner for The Black Velvet Gown) as Loretta, the London University lecturer who specialises in sleuthing. Her main talent is the frown, connoting intelligence and seriousness: she is no bimbo.
