Are (HBO and other) TV shows like Californication and Shameless just a kind of "adult entertainment", drug and alcohol promotional vehicles and "harmless" fun - or is there some educational value to them?

I have not seen any of them, but I heard about these shows… well… to be honest: I think they are great vehicles to earn money for the TV-Stations showing them… ;)

I have a hard time watching Californication, but my husband loves it. (perhaps he identifies with the character a bit too much) I don´t like the main character and I don’t sympathise with him when his life turns to shit. I feel like throwing things at the tv rather than seeing another episode. Perhaps having the protaganist be such an asshole is meant to be a lesson for us? I don´t know. He´s a bit too much of an anti-hero for me.

Shameless is a different story because of the daughter and the kids. I hate William H Macy’s character. We are meant to not feel sorry for him, but they created these strong characters with the children and I ‘get’ them (though my situation was no where near that bad..).

I think they are strictly entertainment. I rarely have learned a life lesson from watching TV shows. I don’t think they promote substance usage any more than the Hangover movies; in fact Shameless seems to promote abstinence more through the awful family life. I watched it twice, didn’t like it hardly at all.

I think this is the same as asking whether there is educational value to entertainment. The answer is, of course, that there is. Our entertainments teach us a lot about human nature and human relationships, and also about technical issues. I have learned a lot of science from science fiction novels because a lot of the people who write them also work in the field and know what the latest research is all about.

In these other shows, people learn about life and family situations that are different from their own and that they may have never heard anything about. It’s like watching some talk show. We learn stuff from what other people do. So they are both fun and educational.

I think @wundayatta nailed it. Stories about human behavior and relationships teach us about ourselves and each other.

I’ve only seen the original UK version of Shameless and I’m ashamed to say, it is just a mirror of life for many people in the UK

@RareDenver As I read your comment I immediately thought, “Oh I could learn something about many people in the UK by watching that.” So I guess the answer to the OP is yes, it is possibly educational.

I enjoy Californication because it’s funny, but I don’t relate to the characters very much. Each and every one of them make the same mistakes over and over, in episodic fashion. What I DO find educational, from a writing standpoint, are the plot devices that the show utilizes. For one thing, many of the episodes have no real antagonist, so they have to balance who’s relationship is going to be going well at the moment and who’s relationship is going to be shitty.

Sometimes the only REAL threat to the characters of the show is that they might move to New York and live happily ever after. Oddly enough, New York becomes the villain because the show is called Californication and can’t possibly go on if the characters are living in the wrong state.