#head 1968

i can feel my monkees hyperfixation starting to wear off but before it fully goes i need to say no current boy band can claim to be the best until they also get put on an fbi watchlist for "spreading left wing ideology" and make a psychedelic art film about the evils of capitalism and the military industrial complex

The Monkeeverse is one of those things that makes less sense instead of more as you get into it. The show spans genres and never has multipart plot lines and yet somehow manages to have better continuity than many shows that rely on ongoing storylines. The show in question is fictional, but the actors share the names. Are they characters or are they people? The lines blur between them, creating an air of ambiguity. People hate them for not being the fictional characters. People accuse them of not being the fictional characters. They are mistaken for the fictional characters. The real men, ordinary men turned television rock and roll gods, are now locked into these personas in the real world. They make a film about killing themselves to escape the machine that forces them to be living comedy caricatures. The movie flops because it isn’t funny. The public doesn’t get why that in itself is ironic. Behind the scenes they fight tooth and nail to be a real band. People don’t believe they play their own music. They will perform these same songs until they die. They are sex and drugs and rock and roll given a G rating and make it through grueling schedules with cocaine. They regularly appear on the show in drag and speak out against the Vietnam war. Hippie ideals and fashion leak steadily into the show, creating even more of a blur between television and reality. They hate being The Monkees. They will always be The Monkees. They will miss being The Monkees. The Monkees will never die. The Monkees are killed on screen. Are the “blooper” clips spliced into aired episodes performed by the actors or the characters? They signed away their names and there’s no difference between them and their brand. With one signature they’ll never be taken seriously again. With one signature they’ll change history. No, as an audience you’ll never get to know how much is real or what all of it really means. It was never meant to be taken seriously. It’s not that deep. It is that deep. Anyway, take a guess whether The Monkees being on an FBI watchlist is a fictional plot line or real life.