Some people say TV is a bad thing for families but I say don’t knock it. It was thanks to TV this school holidays that I almost got vaguely, slightly, accepted by Boy. Fathers of young teenage males will know exactly what I’m on about here. There comes a point — quite often bang on your son’s 13th birthday — when he suddenly decides that you’re the lamest, dumbest, uncoolest Dad in the entire history of fatherhood. And you spend many anxious months wondering how on earth you’re ever going to win him back.
Well, in my case TV has been the answer. We have bonded through our shared love of South Park and teen slasher movies, neither of which I would ever have been allowed in a million years to watch on my own because the Fawn doesn’t like such things. If I say I’m doing it as part of the vital father/son bonding process, though, I get instant permission. ‘Result!’ as we boys say.
I had, I must admit, been getting slightly worried about Boy’s tastes. In his 14 years, I’ve never once known him express the slightest interest in war, nor in violence generally. But then, over Christmas, he casually let slip that there was a film with any number of hideous deaths in it that he’d recorded off Sky. Did I fancy watching with him? ‘Does Freddy Krueger wear a stripy jumper?’ I would have replied, except I doubt he’d have got the reference.
Anyway, the film was called Final Destination and it’s about a group of American teenagers who’ve boarded a plane to Paris when one of them suddenly freaks out, having had visions that the plane is going to explode and they’re all going to die.
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