Muta, Munin, Nopnapa and co, watch out, you're in a deep, err, pit. The bitchfest, the slap party, the stink, the Flaubertian scandal, the diabolical Siamese twins, the joy of jealousy - all of these you're accused of promoting, turning them into the pride of Thai television and poisoning the purity of the land. Like tear gas. Like live broadcasts of parliamentary debates. And now, dear Muta and Munin, the senatorial watchdogs are after you, calling for your pretty heads, setting you up not as the worst, but the baddest example. All of this despite the fact that your melodrama will end on Dec 4. Girls just want to have fun, don't they?
Yes, but someone thinks it's gone too far. Far where? That's another matter. After the moralist clamour over the past few months regarding the excessive drama of men-snatching of Rang Ngao, the fuss refused to die down. Two days ago the Senate committee for social development invited representatives from the Culture Ministry to discuss what should be done to curb, prevent, stop (they didn't say censor) the baleful vibes spread through the airwaves by the story of a twin, Munin, who takes a home-wrecking revenge against the man who once wronged her twin sister, Muta. That man also has a gay son; in a recent episode, the father whips the boy with a belt, sparking an official uproar, in addition to the much-publicised alarm over the show's portrayal of man-eating vixens and sexually manipulative debutantes. In short, addictive stuff - stuff we watched as we grew up to be journalists or bureaucrats or ministers or senators.
We've been through this off-screen soap before. Last year a national hysteria was stoked by the series Dok Som See Thong, which featured the beautiful serpent Reya, another careerist home-wrecker who later had her Les Miserables moment when her story became a hit musical. Addictive stuff, I told you. That time, it was the Culture Ministry's chief watchdog Ladda Tangsupachai who brandished the crusader's flag (or a sword, or an AK-47); this time, it got even more gnarly, like Munin's fate indeed, with the flag-bearers including the Senate committee, the Culture Ministry as well as the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), emerging from the Euro Championship and 3G rackets into another strange and malarial swamp of Thai TV.
As we can see, there's a rating logo stamped on the screen - Munin's serial adventure gets 18+ - to serve as parental guidance. The plan, for which the NBTC will solicit additional opinions, is to ask (demand?) channels to shuffle the timetable and move programmes with adult-oriented content, those labelled 18+, to after the 10pm watershed.
The concern, understandably, is that teenagers will learn the slapping techniques and great-husband-robbery stunts from the characters and start practising them in real life - though I wonder if those teens, in case they really root for Munin, can't rewatch it on YouTube on their tablets in the privacy of their bedrooms beyond parental vigilance. Or if the guardians are talking about really young children, I sincerely wonder why kids would want to watch something beyond their comprehension in the first place unless, at the family prime time of 8.30pm, the parents are spellbound by Munin's beguiling ruses and let the kids watch the series with them. In that case, the argument is shifted into another dimension.
Munin et al - don't take me for your apologist, even though I find your shamelessness quite seductive and dizzying, like a drugged-out Baudelairian reverie. And I don't buy the defence that your saucy adventure has a feminist bone in it; intellectualising trash is a good exercise, but not with this. Actually, I'm slightly inclined towards the after-10pm slot despite its imperfection, as long as no censorship and script-inspection are involved. Late night is the time for poets and murderers - and I'd add screaming mistresses and cuckolded husbands to the roster.
What struck me, however, dearest Munin and Muta, is the feeling that the series' producers and the TV station - buoyed by the scandalous success of Dok Som See Thong and the Reya phenomenon last year - are moving towards a kind of exploitative opportunism: they seem to relish the scandal, even the involvement of official moralists, because it heats up the hype and Facebook frenzy. And the authorities, alas, are playing into their hands by upgrading a fart into a cyclone.
Muta and Munin will be gone by Tuesday, but the saga between the gatekeepers, the audience and the marketers always looking for the latest catch will continue as long as there's TV. I've said it before but I'll say it again: don't let the state censor you, because you can do it yourself. When television sucks, just shut your eyes. We should do that more and more.
Kong Rithdee is Deputy Life Editor, Bangkok Post.