It's time to turn away from the TV Trumpstravaganza. Photo / Getty Images
It's time to turn away from the TV Trumpstravaganza. Photo / Getty Images
Opinion by Karl Puschmann
Karl Puschmann is Culture and entertainment writer for the New Zealand Herald. His fascination lies in finding out what drives and inspires creative people.
There's only one show in town this week and no, sadly, I'm not talking about The Mandalorian. In any other week you can bet your lightsaber that I'd be gabbing on about the hugely entertaining Star Wars space-western that's just started its second season on Disney+. But this week?Sorry, not a chance.
For four incredibly long years I've been hankering for the long-awaited season finale of Trump's America. On Wednesday the day finally came.
It's fair to say I wasn't alone waiting for this. Just like the historical Live Aid charity concert in 1985, and the not-as-historical-but-still-pretty-good 2005 sequel Live 8, the whole world tuned in to see what would happen. From the deeply invested right through to the merely curious everyone wanted to know what would happen and how this thing would wrap up.
Would the ending to this dark and gritty drama satisfy? Would the pay-off prove worth the time investment? Would all the loose ends be tied up? Most importantly, would the good guys win in the end?
There'd been advance leaks about landslides and a brewing legal fandango but honestly no one knew what was gonna happen. It was equal parts exciting and stress inducing. All anyone knew for sure was that it was gonna be a long and bumpy ride.
A live broadcast of President Donald Trump speaking from the White House is shown on screens at an election-night party in Las Vegas. Photo / AP
But with this show that's par for the course. Since 2016, a lifetime ago, Trump's America has been addictive viewing. This is the rare instance in which I use that phrase in the most negative way possible. It's been a mentally exhausting and taxing viewing experience with occasional hits of joy serving to make it all worthwhile.
For sure, this is my own fault. I went all in on the damn thing. This whole time I've been following events and commentators on Twitter, compulsively checking in with serious news outlets and chuckling away at all the joke filled increasingly eviscerating monologues of late night chat show hosts like Seth Myers, Trevor Noah and Stephen Colbert.
There's no denying I went too far down the rabbit hole to become the equivalent of a sports bore. I absolutely should not know how America's byzantine electoral college system works, what the Hatch Act is or the name of the current US Postmaster General. It's utterly ridiculous that I do.
The sad truth is that I haven't been able to tear my eyes away from the slow-moving, Trump train wreck since 2016. In many ways he's been the perfect TV villain, causing crises after crises while creating fear at every opportunity. The atrocity of his character and actions balanced only by his comical ridiculousness; the ill-fitting suits, the lumbering stance, the rambling nonsense of his go-nowhere speeches.
And honestly, the episodes leading up to Election 2020 have been filled with so many twists and turns, betrayals and bloodbaths, outrage that it made Game of Thrones look like Sesame Street.
By scorching such clearcut lines in the sand Trump turned politics into a true blood sport. Over the years I noticed it hitting the same brain neurons as big sporting events like world cups do.
The credits are finally rolling on Trump's America. Photo / Getty Images
Two quick examples; I almost cheered on a crowded bus in 2017 when John McCain gave his fellow Republicans the thumbs down to sink their attempted dismantling of Obamacare and my heart sank earlier this year when Trump found a way out of his impeachment.
Being fortunate to not actually live in America, the results of most of the things I've been obsessively watching don't really affect me. They do offend me on a personal level but their outcome doesn't have any direct impact on my day-to-day life.
That said, the highs and lows have continually made for entertaining/exhausting viewing. But now I've had enough. It's said you can have too much of a good thing but you can also have too much of a bad thing.
Which is why when the credits finally roll on Trump's America I'm out. I'll be unfollowing everyone and everything associated with politics, deleting my news bookmarks and, all going to plan, reformatting the brain space all this nonsense has taken up.
I was sincerely hoping Trump's America would have wrapped up by now with a Joe Biden victory restoring common decency to the world's stage and showing an enlightened intolerance for the damaging and dangerous rhetoric spouted by Trump and his ilk.
You couldn't ask for a more satisfying conclusion while also relegating Trump's America to mini-series status rather than the horror of an ongoing soap.
As it stands right now Biden does have it pretty much in the bag. Which I'm extremely pleased about.
I can only hope that America 2020 doesn't have one final, awful, cliffhanger twist up its red, white and blue sleeve.
