Television

TwoP: ‘Television Without Pity’ Web site keeps viewers current — with attitude

By Raoul V. Mowatt
Chicago Tribune
05-17-2003

As the name implies, www.televisionwithoutpity.com exhaustively recaps episodes of programs like such as The Bachelor and Sex and the City in a manner that pulls no punches. You will find characters mocked with nicknames and writers lambasted for foolish decision-making, along with the occasional “Hee” of approval. The site, with its motto of “Spare the snark, spoil the networks,” has built up a loyal following of tens of thousands and even draws in Hollywood types to see how their work was is being received. But Television Without Pity, or TWoP as its employees and fans call it, may need some pity itself. Despite its popularity — and in many ways because of it — the site has run at a deficit for so long that its future is uncertain. One of TWoP’s founders, Sarah Bunting, 30, concedes she and her comrades-in-arms learned to operate in the business world on the fly. She would not disclose how much the site owes, and she described the debt as “big” but “manageable.” Bunting said she and her partners will continue the site through the May sweeps, but then will meet to discuss its future. TWoP won plaudits from online and conventional media. PC Magazine in March listed it as among the top classic 100 Web sites because it offered “brilliant, biting recaps of the shows you’re too ashamed to sit down and watch.” Time magazine had it among its top 50. The staff was described as “lethally clever” by the San Diego Union-Tribune. Its earliest version sprang into existence in 1998 because of a love-hate relationship its founders had with Dawson’s Creek, which just ended its run Wednesday night. Bunting and her friends gradually developed what started as “Dawson’s Wrap” to the point where it now retells episode by episode what happened on about three dozen shows. Erin Dailey, a 34-year-old Chicago freelance copy writer who does recaps for the site, said it usually takes as many as eight hours to produce the detailed, joke-filled accounts. “You sort of think of yourself as a really bitchy drag queen,” she said. Reiko Aylesworth, who plays counterterrorism agent Michelle Dessler on 24, said TWoP is one of the few places on the Web she goes. “I guess there wouldn’t really be a Hollywood fundraiser, since it’s all about tearing apart the shows,” she said. “I really hope it sticks around, because when you can find that kind of ... wicked, unapologetic humor, it’s rare.” Tony Rodriguez, a 30-year-old human resources specialist from Chicago, says he spends about two hours a day bantering with fans and reading summaries. He peruses what TWoP says about the show ER even though he doesn’t watch the program. “The shows become much more interactive,” he said. “You just can’t wait to see what the recappers and members in the fan forum are going to write about it.” Natasha Miley, a 25-year-old graduate student in developmental biology at Stanford Univer-sity, found the site after searching for summaries of Dawson’s Creek back in 1999. She says she has been addicted ever since. She watches a couple of hours of television a day and spends time in between on TwoP, regularly following the recaps of seven shows including Gilmore Girls, 7th Heaven and The Real World. Miley said she finds the writing on the site incisive and says she feels like as if she could become friends with the recappers because of their sense of humor. “I would be really sad if TWoP didn’t make it,” she said.