(c. late 1970's-1980's)
Educational dramas aired on network television in the late afternoon on week/school days, purportedly as a public service. Dealt with issues which are symptoms of the bankruptcy of American culture such as
sexual abuse,
drug and
alcohol use, and numerous other abusive relationships.
Most notably, "The Wave" aptly demonstrates the glaring historical similarities between
Reagan's AmeriKKKa and the Third Reich when a high school civics teacher's experiment goes wrong and turns his students into a cabal of power-craving
fascist loyalists.
Kids were thrilled with the useful and titiallating "educational" content, and the sponsors never complained when children (all too often a captive audience) stayed tuned in for the half dozen or so commercial breaks.