Gilligan’s Island — who would want to leave?

There’s a television station in town that shows nothing but old tv shows. Since I tend to dislike more current tv fare, I watch this station a lot. Recently they’ve been showing Gilligan’s Island, the show that makes the Bush Administration seem to make sense.

Logic will kill your enjoyment of Gilligan’s Island. To put it in old-time tv terms, Spock would find it illogical. To enjoy Gilligan’s Island, you must suspect belief and then some.

Now, I know there is a more recent, much more realistic program called “Lost” that probably fixes everything. After all, “no phone, no light, no motor car; not a single luxury,” is easy to portray if you are very literal about it, like in “Lost,” (except for how the fat guy stayed so fat and the reason nearly everyone on the show seemed to be under 35 — and well under 30 for the women — except for the requisite Middle Aged Man. I mean, was that an under-35 airline or something?).

G.I. is much more fun. It leaves the viewer pondering such tantalizing things as:

(1) How far could such a small boat go in 3 hours, even in a storm?

(2) Just how much jewelry, makeup and changes of clothing did they pack for a 3 hour tour?

(3) Did that tiny ship have a full university library?

(4) If they could build a jet pack and keep a radio running, build a satellite transmitter and even make a movie, why couldn’t they fix that plane they found?

(5) For that matter, why couldn’t they fix the boat?

(6) Why did Thurston Howell III have so much money on him?

(7) For that matter, why didn’t Thurston Howell III have his own yacht?

(8) For that matter, why didn’t Ginger have her own yacht?

(9) Just what was the professor a professor of?

(10) If Gilligan had supernatural powers, why couldn’t he help the castaways get off the island?

After watching all this, the only thing clear to me is that these castaways were never found because they didn’t want to be. That’s because they were having one thing no one on Lost ever had: fun.