That's So Raven

Miss Raven Simone
what does the title of your
show mean? I wonder.


I've never seen her show before, but I do often wonder about the meaning of the show's name. In a moment of weakness, I typed in "what does thats so raven mean" into my Google search bar. I would never trust Bing with this type of a job. Only Google would safely guide me through the murky swamps of the internet, leading me safely to the answer of this vexing mystery. This is what I found:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110101212330AA6Mv0A

Yahoo just scored some points with me, because there it was, on Yahoo Answers.  I'm very satisfied with the explanation given by BRaini: If someone does something silly, you can say, "That's so silly." If someone is known for doing things in a certain manner over and over and over again, you can use their name as a "brand" for the action.

In her TV show, Raven Simone is known for getting into trouble, so when she gets into trouble YET AGAIN, rather than just saying, "that's so silly", you can brand her by saying, "That's so Raven." Those that know Raven will understand the usage - but those that DON'T know of her and her antics will be at a total loss.

If Timmy is known to have problems by falling over all the time, rather than saying, "That's so clumsy," you can say, "That's so Tim."

Style points go to QuestFC: "Its a tv show that is freaking stupid."

I'm happy with BRaini's explanation and can only assume that is the rationale behind the show's title. But isn't every sitcom about somebody, and that somebody probably has a lot of trademark quirks which get him/her into and out of trouble on a regular basis? Why wasn't the "Mary Tyler Moore Show" called "That's So Mary?" Why wasn't "The Hogan Family" called "That's So Sandy", or "That's So Valerie" when it was only "Valerie"? It probably should have been called "That's So Hogan", because I don't even remember that show focusing on Sandy Duncan all that much.

Peter Pan

What I was hoping to find was this: that "That's So Raven" is an allusion to "That's so random", an unstoppable phrase with seemingly universal appeal. I don't know when it found its legs, but there sure are a lot of people that use it, me included. For us citizens of English speaking countries who cannot decide on what to call potato chips (alternate: crisps), flashlight (alternate: torch), or markers (alternate: textas), the ubiquity of "That's so random" seems significant. I've heard Aussies, Irish, French, Canadian, English, and Swedes use it, usually to refer to a comedic moment where something unexpected either occurred or was said. Or maybe it was used when a slippery comment from out of leftfield was uttered, and the people within the vicinity do not know how to respond. Maybe in the past nothing would have been said after such an event. Silence would ensue, and people would move on. Has everyday existence always been so orderly that a random moment is immediately worth taking note of?

Raven Simone getting her own sitcom seemed totally random, and I was hoping maybe the entire series would be a self-referential commentary on the arbitrary nature of fame, wealth, celebrity. Instead, it sounds as if the show had episodes about Raven drinking alcohol and hiding it from her parents, or betraying her oldest friend in the world by hanging out with her newer 'cool clique' friends. That's fine and all, but I think the show missed a real opportunity there. Maybe Raven could have scripted episodes about how growing up a pint-sized child star was due more to being in the right place and the right time?


Random is openly celebrated today, so I don't know why it needs to be pointed out when it occurs. The Ipod Shuffle's main marketing gimmick was a feature which has existed on music players since the inception of the cd. My favorite radio station is one of those network of 'random playlist' stations across the nation (Bob in Austin), because, for some reason, Don Henley following The Troggs is far more tolerable than Don Henley coming on after Steve Winwood. 


I admit I hardly ever say "that's so organized" (unless I'm on Jimmie Nguyen's computer and examining his hard drive), but is an instance of 'random' so remarkable? 

Maybe it's merely a recognition of the cruel rules by which the world is ran, or a reflection of us having fallen off some intelligible and coherent path, sliding into an ocean of utter meaninglessness  (far more eloquently said by Fredric Jameson). I saw a t-shirt with V from V for Vendetta doing something unmentionable to Sarah Palin here in Vietnam, and the young man wearing it knew the Vendetta character, but had no idea who Sarah Palin was. Is this the same thing when people pay for pre-faded concert t-shirts of bands they've only heard a song or two of? But let's say you know the length of every song on every single album this certain band has released. Can you lay claim to more 'meaning'? What does the crocodile mean on a Lacoste shirt? Does it mean less when the shirt is counterfeit? Why a crocodile? Does Sandy Duncan have a glass eye?

Watch some TMZ, for my money the most entertaining show on modern television, and try to  mine some significance in any of it. Find something entirely un-random about any of our vocal talents in modern pop and see if randomization is worth commenting on. 
If we are to take Nassim Nicholas Taleb's word for it, the root cause of many of life's foibles is the fallacy of narrative, how we conveniently assign causation to many events that might simply have no explanation to begin with. Random is the order of the day.