Creator Quinta Brunson says some viewers are asking for a school shooting episode of Abbott Elementary
Brunson asks fans to please direct their energy to elected officials instead of showrunners
Aux News Quinta
In the wake of yet another mass shooting, it’s only natural to ask: is there anything we can say or do that will actually change the grim reality of American gun violence? An all-too-familiar feeling of helplessness may have us looking to unexpected places for leadership.
Abbott Elementary creator Quinta Brunson has found herself in that position following the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, and she seems understandably uncomfortable with the situation. On Wednesday, she posted on Twitter: “Wild how many people have asked for a school shooting episode of the show I write. People are that deeply removed from demanding more from the politicians they’ve elected and are instead demanding ‘entertainment.’ I can’t ask ‘are yall ok’ anymore because the answer is ‘no.’”
“Please use that energy to ask your elected official to get on Beto time and nothing less. I’m begging you,” she added in a follow up tweet. “I don’t want to sound mean, but I want people to understand the flaw in asking for something like this. We’re not okay. This country is rotting our brains. [I’m] sad about it.”
Later, Brunson posted an example of such a request, in which a viewer urged her to “Formulate an angle that would get our government to understand why such laws need to pass.” The fan–who suggested this idea for the “eventual series finale”!—wrote, “I think Abbott Elementary can affect change.”
And here’s one of the many flaws Brunson was attempting to highlight: if the deaths of actual, real-life children aren’t affecting change, how is a sitcom going to do it? There are Very Special Episodes about school shootings (or lockdown drills) out there, and none of them have moved the political needle.
Not to mention, why would anyone want to watch the adorable kids on Abbott Elementary go through something that traumatic? (You want that to be the series finale?!?) The appeal of the series is the unmitigated optimism. While Abbott may be realistic about the challenges of being a teacher, who really wants to see a school shooting through a sitcom lens?
While pleading with elected officials on this issue can feel about effective as banging your head against a wall, the solution is definitely not to slide into Quinta Brunson’s DMs. We all need a better outlet for these feelings.
41 Comments
Also, Abbot Elementary isn’t that kind of show. If anything they highlight lesser publicized issues with schools in majority black neighborhoods. Everyone is aware of school shootings.
It is a comedy show, just let it be a comedy show. I have to say that the principal is so realistic and accurate that I get the shivers.
People are asking for this? It’s not a lollipop, you weirdos.
I sincerely hope I never reach the level of “fandom” where I send unsolicited pitches to showrunners.
hey, it’s how Ronald D Moore got his big break!
ST fans do it all the time. Oh, I see your point…
Yeah, you definitely want to pull the nose up before hitting “I’m going to weirdly stan for a celebrity in a trial because I KNOW he’ll see it and wanna fuck me!!!!”
I know there’s some right-wing/MRA machinations going on in the background trying to make the Depp/Heard trial into a cause célèbre, but man, the Depp stanning is weird.
They should instead do an episode on the difference between “affect” and “effect.”
But the person used ‘affect’ correctly…
Nope. The phrase is “effect change.”
But what if you want to modify how the change happens?!
That’s “iffect.”
I’ll allow it.
To add to her point, I also don’t think any of the politicians or voters who need to be swayed watch that show. They are probably watching Tom Clancy or some CBS crime/police crap that validates their world view. Watching a humorous, kind, gentle show that shows kind people trying to good in a system that is failing them is not something they would be interested in.
It also doesn’t fit the show. The kinds of school shootings that are happening over and over again, the mass shooting kinds, tend to happen in more well off and well funded school systems. This show is about a Philly city school. There’s plenty of shootings and violence that happen at schools like that for sure, but it’s not this kind of single person going in and wrecking absolute havoc to anyone and everyone there.
The kinds of school shootings that are happening over and over again,
the mass shooting kinds, tend to happen in more well off and well funded
school systems. No, those are the ones that get the publicity.
See also: missing attractive blonde white girls.
Unpopular opinion: the “Glee” school (false alarm, mostly) school shooting episode was fine, actually.
As much of a train wreck Glee was I kind of agree. It went off the rails at that point anyway.
I can’t imagine having this opinion about ANY glee episode outside of the first season, let alone one so exploitative
Cool, what does that have to do with anything?
Is that the one where they disarmed the shooter by doing a terrible version of Bon Jovi’s Billy Get Your Guns?
I didn’t need the cast of Brooklyn 99 to say ACAB and perform mostly performative self-flaggellation and I don’t need Abbot Elementary to get shot up.
My wife and I just started watching this show this week and are enjoying it. I would personally hope not to see an episode of this show dealing with this issue. It does a good job of showing how underfunded our schools are, especially in inner-cities. Taking it to the level of elementary school shootings is just darker than I’d personally like to go with a sitcom I watch to chill out.
Yeah, if someone wants a depressing as shit show about public schools, the fourth season of The Wire should have everyone covered. (I mean, it’s great, but it’ll also make you sob like a baby if you’ve got anything left of your soul.)
Hell, it’s depressing enough sending my elementary age kids to school knowing that there is miniscule, but greater than 0% chance that they could murdered there on any given day. I realize the chances of any number of other bad things happening to them is much higher, but the fact that something so awful is even a legitimate possibility in this country should cause great shame to those who block meaningful shame. It doesn’t of course, which is why I’ve felt little other than sadness and fury over the past few days.
Hell, it’s depressing enough sending my elementary age kids to school knowing that there is miniscule, but greater than 0% chance that they could murdered there on any given day. I realize the chances of any number of other bad things happening to them is much higher, but the fact that something so awful is even a legitimate possibility in this country should cause great shame to those who block meaningful shame. It doesn’t of course, which is why I’ve felt little other than sadness and fury over the past few days.
Hell, it’s depressing enough sending my elementary age kids to school knowing that there is miniscule, but greater than 0% chance that they could murdered there on any given day. I realize the chances of any number of other bad things happening to them is much higher, but the fact that something so awful is even a legitimate possibility in this country should cause great shame to those who block meaningful shame. It doesn’t of course, which is why I’ve felt little other than sadness and fury over the past few days.
Please tell again how you really feel.
Man I’m starting to think there’s a sick culture of violence in this country
It’s just part of the fantasy that “you know why school shootings are happening? Because people don’t understand that they’re bad” that’s also leading people to ask journalism organizations to show pictures of the dead kids as they were found.
It’s coming from a good place, in theory, but it’s just a layer cake of problematic.
I’ve said, for the longest Billy Joel time, that leaders aren’t the entertainers and it’s long past time we stopped treating them as such.
I honestly think this is just desperation at this point, and the logical end result of a political system utterly divorced from enacting change that solves the issues most Americans are, already, united on. Even in my extremely blue town in an extremely blue state, basically nothing can get done to help anyone. In red states, it’s the same.
The rest of the time, it’s speeches and hopes and grandstanding and infrastructure that doesn’t happen and services getting cut because there’s no money and no ability to raise more money. Nothing real can get done except around the very margins, in the smallest possible ways, and most of what does get done is just making it worse for people (especially minorities and women).
So citizens, raised and inculcated with the firm and noble belief that we are actually a democracy where the people have a say in how things are governed, NEED somewhere to put that desire to affect change that is otherwise being stymied.
We’re just rats jamming on the button that ought to provide us with a tasty pellet, but the button was disconnected years ago. Like the rats, we’ll keep pressing the button until we starve.
It sounds like people want a bracing piece of entertainment to shock the viewer into feeling even a fraction of the horror of something like a school shooting. If so, it’s wild to ask that of a network sitcom when Gus Van Sant’s Elephant is available; that movie still haunts me years later.
If only MLK would have made a guest appearance on the Dick Van Dyke Show and ended racism and income inequality…Maybe if Stonewall had taken place on All In The Family, LGBTQ rights would be realized…What if the GOP had their own sitcom? Then would guns be banned? We could call it The Grand Old Party. About Senators who meet for drinks at their favorite local pub and discuss life issues while making us laugh. Only on NBC 8p Wednesdays!
What if the GOP had their own sitcom?Wasn’t that Last Man Standing?
Great show & I am glad that she trusts her instincts to NOT do this
“Save us, TV”God, how pathetic. If anyone who tweeted her is over the age of 8, they should be SO embarrassed.
No, definitely not.
Television viewers have lost the ability to discern between fiction and ‘reality’ tv. Of course they expect the teevee to sort out our problems.
Please, no. So many times, no.