Television
Due to television’s higher level censorship chainsaw violence is rare and usually only described with both the attack and the damaged body left unseen. An example of this is an episode ("Born Again") of The X-Files revolving around the ghost of a police officer dismembered with a chainsaw by corrupt colleagues, all flashbacks skip over the actual murder.
One notable exception is the series Dexter in which chainsaw attacks are occasionally seen, most notably in dreams and flashbacks regarding the protagonist’s mother’s death. This is due to the larger amount of content freedom given to programs created for pay-television, of which the series is one. Dexter Morgan, also uses a chainsaw at some points.
Chainsaws have made appearances in cartoon series, usually as a source of comedy. These have ranged from more young adult audience fare (The Simpsons, Family Guy) to even children’s series, for instance the series The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy contains a chainsaw wielding character based on Evil Dead’s protagonist Ash. In the anime and manga adaptation of Kuroshitsuji, a chainsaw was prominently featured as Grell Sutcliff's personalized Deathscythe.
CSI:Crime Scene Investigation has used chainsaws in one storyline, highlighting their potential for serious accidents. What was apparently the massacre of two victims by a third perpetrator was then revealed to be an inexperienced operator who had caused a kickback accident that killed both him and a bystander.
Read more about this topic: Chainsaws In Popular Culture
Famous quotes containing the word television:
“His [O.J. Simpson’s] supporters lined the freeway to cheer him on Friday and commentators talked about his tragedy. Did those people see the photographs of the crime scene and the great blackening pools of blood seeping into the sidewalk? Did battered women watch all this on television and realize more vividly than ever before that their lives were cheap and their pain inconsequential?”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)
“In full view of his television audience, he preached a new religion—or a new form of Christianity—based on faith in financial miracles and in a Heaven here on earth with a water slide and luxury hotels. It was a religion of celebrity and showmanship and fun, which made a mockery of all puritanical standards and all canons of good taste. Its standard was excess, and its doctrines were tolerance and freedom from accountability.”
—New Yorker (April 23, 1990)
“So by all means let’s have a television show quick and long, even if the commercial has to be delivered by a man in a white coat with a stethoscope hanging around his neck, selling ergot pills. After all the public is entitled to what it wants, isn’t it? The Romans knew that and even they lasted four hundred years after they started to putrefy.”
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)