In 2002, when U.S. teen channel The N “delayed” broadcasting “Accidents Will Happen,” a storyline about teen abortion from Canadian import Degrassi: The Next Generation (DTNG), the vehement viewer backlash made national news. U.S. viewers fashioned petitions (one of which made it into Entertainment Weekly), letters to the network, and distributed the episodes on the Internet via Canadian viewers who uploaded them. Most of the Web and print petitions emphasized that it was unfair that Canadians could see the episodes when U.S. viewers could not.1 On message boards, viewers even complained that they wanted to move to Canada because of The N’s practices and that Canada is better, more progressive, and less sheltered than the United States. These viewers essentially defined (and essentialized) “Canadianness” through their experiences with Canadian television—in its U.S. incarnation.

This discussion situates The N’s censorship of Degrassi against that of other U.S. channels broadcasting Canadian series, examining how they inadvertently and sometimes purposefully encourage fetishization of Canadianness through practices that invite viewers to imagine national ideologies in terms of televisual parts—parts that Canadian viewers can see and parts that U.S. viewers cannot.2 While I have outlined elsewhere a set of aesthetics that we might call “Canadian,” in this context the “Canadianness” of a series becomes its potential for sensationalism or controversy, which depends entirely on each channel’s self-branding and branding of the parts.

Generally, U.S. channels edit and censor Canadian series in order to make them look like U.S. productions or to sanitize elements considered too graphic and/or political for particular audiences or the channels’ trademark. The latter kind of editing—somewhat akin to TBS’s sanitization of its Sex and the City reruns—often results from the channel’s limitations: TBS, for example, cannot air the same level of profanity or nudity that HBO can. But editing takes on different connotations when series originate from different countries and when the edited parts meet FCC guidelines. In the mid-1990s, Disney Channel censored Canadian series Ready or Not, removing entire episodes, profanity, and discussions about puberty, anatomy, and sex. Like TBS’s changes to Sex, it made sense that Disney, “America’s Family Network,” would find Ready or Not more problematic for its audience than Showtime did when the series aired there. Viewers who found out about the edits through the Internet, however, consistently referred to this as Americanization of the series, and many saw it as representative of the differences between U.S. and Canadian television.3

The N’s practices, however, intentionally highlight Degrassi’s so-called Canadianness in order to sell an increasingly inconsistent, commercial, and exploitative teen brand. The marketing encourages both fetishization of the series’ parts and the national contexts that allow for their production and broadcast. DTNG has served for several years as the N’s highest-rated, most popular series. Initially a commercial-free dual network, The N structured Degrassi as educational, universal, authentic, and controversial. In 2002, the network’s first slogan for the series paralleled The N’s self-branding as “the authentic voice of teens” with “Degrassi: If your life were a TV show, this would be it.” Later, The N’s ads boasted, “Degrassi: It Goes There,” marketing DTNG as more authentic and salacious than other teen programming. Commercials abstracted shocks and reactions shots, all of which supposedly testified to Degrassi’s willingness to “go” where other television does not. When in 2004 The N attempted to introduce U.S. series South of Nowhere, it marketed South as “Canadian-made” Degrassi’s “American” counterpart: Commercials placed images from each show on a map of North America with South over the United States, Degrassi over Canada, and a voice asking, “…Mexico, What you got?” The features that made Degrassi salacious and controversial became through this marketing overt symbols of its Canadianness.

In a 2006 campaign called “Degrassi: Director’s Cut” and a corresponding online feature called “Degrassi Snaggables,” commercials promised parts of Degrassi that U.S. viewers had “never seen before”: Emma’s violation, Spinner’s erection, extended scenes of Ellie cutting herself, Craig’s violent beating from his father, the scenes with the train, and “Accidents Will Happen.” The network renamed several episodes—“The Boner” and “Manny’s Butt Floss,” for example—revealing the edited parts and abstracting them from their educational contexts as sensational, rather than realistic, moments. Episodes that were once inappropriate in their TV-PG forms now became soft-porn mockeries of the series, where context mattered less than scintillating viewers with tawdry parts. Enacting a sort of fetishism that privileges parts at the expense of the whole, The N emphasized the Directors Cuts as enhanced viewing experiences rather than as complete originals. And playing with Degrassi’s slogan, “Degrassi… It Goes There,” commercials promised, “Degrassi… Now It Really Goes There.”

Ironically, this marketing has not to my knowledge decreased viewer dissatisfaction with The N. Many even responded to the restoration of “Accidents Will Happen” with, “Why now? We’ve already watched it online.”6 The N’s marketing did, however, result in essentialization of Canada through the parts of the series that metonymically became Canadian. In one viewer’s terms, Degrassi “only really goes there [in Canada] on CTV. The-N just wishes they would.”7 Others complained that The N’s censorship encapsulates why Canada is better than the United States, for Canadians could see the original cuts of Degrassi. Why can’t U.S. viewers see these things, too? Some Internet discussions replied to the effect of: “Because Canadians are not prudes, and Americans are.”8 Those viewers expressing a desire to go to Canada paradoxically fantasize that production and broadcasting practices are better there, where as I have noted elsewhere, manifold problems (many of which result from U.S. interference) hinder television production. Worse still, The N’s Directors Cuts may extend beyond Degrassi’s scheduled final season in 2009: Since 2006, the channel has continued to edit the series—Spinner smoking medical marijuana, Emma’s buttocks, etc—all parts that the network may bring back in efforts to cultivate desire for its only hot commodity, which really is better (or at least cleaner) on the other side of the border.

Image Credits:
1. Degrassi: 100% Intense
2. Sex and the City Sanitized on TBS
3. It GOES There
4. “As Originally Produced — Director’s Cut — Includes “Accidents Will Happen” — The Episode You Can’t See On TV!”

Please feel free to comment.

1. See some of the following selected petitions: http://www.gopetition.com/online/6768.html; http://www.gopetition.com/online/4522.html; http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/AWH.
2. My use of the fetish here encompasses elements from Freud’s sexual fetish, Homi Bhahba’s cultural one, and Karl Marx’s commodity fetishism.
3. On IMDB, for instance, MachineGunFunk writes, “And ofcourse it [Ready or Not] was un-censored [in Canada] its CANADIAN TELEVISON WHERE WE DO WHATEVER THE F CK WE WANT(LOL)!” (http://imdb.com/title/tt0106110/board/nest/45628077, original emphasis and punctuation). All viewer quotes hereafter contain original punctuation and emphasis.
4. Quoted in John Haslett Cuff, “Degrassi High Creators Up in Arms over PBS Cuts to Abortion Episode” (Toronto, The Globe and Mail, 3 Nov 1989) C.11. For a complete analysis of this episode and the implications of its censorship, see Tom Panarese, “Sometimes a Fantasy: Degrassi and Teenage Entertainment in America,” Growing Up Degrassi: Television, Identity, and Youth Culture, ed. Michele Byers (Toronto: Sumach P, 2005) 52-76.
5. Cuff C.11.
6. TV.com “Re: AWH on The-N.” Link no longer available.
7. From TV.com: . The full post reads, “Degrassi…. It Goes There…. This Fall. Only on CTV and The-N. Though The-N really sucks and they often edit things, so yeah it only really goes there on CTV. The-N just wishes they would.”
8. One among many Internet posters wrote, for instance: “what happens that is soooo controversial that americans cant see? JEEZ AMERICA LIGHTEN UP.” Live Journal, “Facepunch,” 4 Feb. 2006 .

Because of longstanding U.S. penetration in other Canadian cultural industries, the Canadian government essentially structured television as a medium for building national identity and a counterforce to U.S. influence.((Serra Tinic, On Location: Canada’s Television Industry in a Global Market, (Toronto: U of Toronto P, 2005) 7.) An alternative to “unbridled” U.S. commercialism, 2 Canadian television would educate viewers with tasteful programming, documentary realism, and a public-service/ publicly funded model.3 But as Canadian television has become increasingly commercial, increasingly dependent on selling exports to the United States and on importing U.S. television series, these changes have, predictably, complicated the Canadian Radio and Television Commission’s creed for national identity building and televisual distinctiveness.

This is less the case in youth television, however — as Michele Byers writes, Canada’s marginalization from the production of adult-aimed texts has allowed it to excel at the “(over)produc[tion]” of youth television in at least three areas: series with universal settings that are easily assimilated into international contexts; those, like Degrassi and Road to Avonlea, that are successful in spite of their Canadian aesthetics; and those that are simply too different for exportation.4 I am most interested here in the first two categories, which provide the bulk of Canadian youth exports to the United States. With these texts, U.S. “viewers are less likely to notice the Canadian mark… because of their production values or unfashionable, chubby, acne-riddled actors.” 5 But while they may not notice a negative “Canadian mark,” they are likely to notice other characteristics that mark them as Canadian.

In this discussion I juxtapose what we might call “distinctively Canadian” texts with those that attempt to pass, arguing that Canadian series are more likely to succeed in the United States when they are attentive to Canadian places, people, and aesthetic traditions. Of the several Canadian series that have recently fallen in and out of the U.S. youth market, those that attempted to “pass” for U.S. productions failed much faster than did those that were obviously Canadian. By “Canadian” I do not suggest an essentialist, unified identity, but characteristics that stem from Canadian institutions, literary techniques, and aesthetics. In youth television, Canadian differences—documentary realism, pedagogical entertainment, ironic distance—are what make Canadian series useful commodities.
Both Life With Derek, a “tween” comedy airing on the Disney Channel, and Instant Star, a teen drama broadcast by The N, fall into the category of distinctively Canadian. Both series are clearly set in Ontario, and both include lighthearted pedagogy through characters’ experiences.

More importantly, each series utilizes irony and deadpan humor in ways that are more in keeping with Canadian traditions than those of the United States. As a sitcom, Life with Derek is an uncommon Canadian export (live-action Canadian series are usually dramas or comedy-dramas, while most U.S. live-action youth series have shifted towards sitcoms). But Derek immediately stands out against comparable Disney-Channel and Nickelodeon fare, where laugh tracks and crescendo guide humor: When characters from That’s So Raven, Hannah Montana, and iCarly usher the audience towards laughter, they generally do so by shouting (“Oh Snaaap,” “Oh no you didn’t,” “Because I said so!”). The comedic pacing in Derek, conversely, relies on situational, rather than verbal, irony. Derek uses cutaways—extraneous moments that highlight absurdity, humor, or stress—and non-diagetic sounds such as records scratching, guitar riffs, etc. to create punchlines. The result is programming in which viewers can expect to do more analytical work to “get” the jokes, but in which the nuanced humor is more satisfying because of it. Given that Derek has outrated the highly visible Hannah Montana, something in this difference appeals to U.S. viewers.

At the narrative level, distinctively Canadian dramas traditionally deal more with real-life issues—another byproduct of a documentary tradition that called for “difficult programs for disciplined audiences” —without the sensationalism of Gossip Girl or 90210 (old or new). This gives the sometimes issue-driven but often “everyday” narratives an authenticity in which drama is not extracted from context but is central to character development. Instant Star deals with “issues” as well as Jude Harrison’s attempt to find herself after winning an American-Idol-esque contest. The series adds a Canadian context for music production in which the star system is milder, Paparazzi are scarce, and commercial success is not as satisfying as independence. To that end, the show’s view of pop-stardom focuses much more on the psychological than the salacious. We might even read Jude’s continued struggle for self-definition, self-differentiation, and independent production as symbolic of the historical struggle for producing Canadian cultural products and identity. Like Derek, Instant Star has garnered an intense U.S. following and a lamented cancellation after four seasons.

Some of these distinctive qualities remain in Canadian series that attempt to pass as U.S. products, but their combination of noticeably different storytelling with fake U.S. locations and characters makes for precarious texts that fail to impact any market. Many of these series are co-produced for dual audiences, with Canadian settings for Canadian viewers and vague or “New England” settings for U.S. viewers. 6 Falcon Beach, for instance, which aired on ABC Family, was set in a New England beach town for U.S. viewers and Winnipeg for Canadians, and scenes with national markers were shot differently for each respective audience. The setting itself, however, is not as problematic as the attempt to adapt Canadian series for U.S. aesthetics. Falcon Beach’s less-traditional multiracial casting and its initial storytelling marked it as different. But it eventually relied on similarity to The O.C., making the series a Northern copy of the same California tale. It lasted only two seasons.

In a similar vein, The Best Years includes a Boston setting for both Canadian and U.S. viewers. Its casting, ensemble narration, and Degrassi-esque topics are fittingly Canadian, but the series relies on episode-by-episode shocks that resemble U.S. drama—temporary characters that die or leave quickly, bizarre love triangles, catfights—and undermine its believability. 7 Some viewers recognize this, arguing that the series and its actors fail to pass. One writes, “I know the actors are Canuck’s, and this is shot in Canada but you mean to tell me they couldn’t hire a few Boston natives to make it more authentic? [….] even the producers of Friday Night Lights knew their show would not work unless it was shot in Texas, and not some LA, or Vancouver backlot.” 8 After one season, The N stopped airing The Best Years, and though it still airs in Canada, it is unclear whether it will return to U.S. television. About a Girl, another comedy broadcast by The N, utilized similar techniques and met a similar fate.

Meanwhile, Life with Derek and Instant Star overtly make Canadian elements part of their narrative and aesthetic strategies—or at least they do not mask them—and they have met unprecedented success in the United States. The best Canadian television series, then, those that do not assimilate their origins, remain as Canadian as possible under the circumstances—of globalization, commercialization, etc. Difference is what allows Canadian television to fill important gaps in U.S. programming, where sameness traditionally dominates.

Admittedly, not all of these differences inspire appreciation: The realism with which Canadian youth series handle issues often causes anxiety for the U.S. networks that import them, making Canadian television susceptible to censorship, editing, and U.S-ification once it crosses the border. Ready or Not and Naturally, Sadie, for example, both Canadian series that aired on Disney Channel, became less distinctive and differently motivated as Disney became more involved in their production. And the Degrassi series have endured infamous U.S. censorship. The more “Canadian” Canadian series are before they get to the United States, then, the better chance they have of retaining their characteristics after U.S. modification.

Image Credits:  
1. As Canadian as Possible
2. Life with Derek
3. Instant Star
4. Front Page Image

Please feel free to comment.

1. Bruce Deachman, The Ottawa Citizen (Ottawa, 19 Aug. 2007) B.4. The expression “as Canadian as… possible under the circumstances” originated as the winning response to a contest that solicited the Canadian version of “as American as apple pie” and is a common title for scholarship on Canadian identity. Phillip Resnick, The European Roots of Canadian Identity (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview, 2005) 38.
2. William Boddy, “The Beginnings of American Television,” Television: An International History, ed. Anthony Smith (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1995) 52.
3. David Hogarth, Documentary Television in Canada: From National Public Service to Global Marketplace (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s UP, 2002).
4. Michele Byers, “Youth, Representation, and the Contemporary History of Canadian TV,” Flow < http://flowtv.org/?p=832> (27 Oct. 2007).
5. Byers.
6. Co-production need not imply this structure, however, as other co-productions, including Road to Avonlea, include overtly Canadian characters and settings.
7. The series’ creator, in fact, is Aaron Martin, head writer for Degrassi: The Next Generation, but unlike Degrassi, which is a fully Canadian production, The N commissioned The Best Years.
8. Original emphasis, punctuation, and spelling. “Really Lame,” Internet Movie Database, 23 May 2007, .