America’s TV Producers Want To Know: Have You Kids Heard Of This White Stripes Band?

Despite the fact that they haven’t released an album in nearly a year and a half–and that, for all we know, may not put out another one until the Raconteurs stop racontouring–the White Stripes have somehow become the biggest rock band on television: Last night’s Veronica Mars (pictured) featured two characters dressed up as Jack and Meg; an early episode of the always-on-the-cutting-edge Studio 60 had a failed sketch on the siblings, requring poor Nate Corddry to wear a black wig; and Bart Simpson faced off against the band in the Simpsons season premiere.

We’re not trying to be Jack-bashers here, but considering that the Stripes have been out of circulation for a while now, it’s kind of sad that the Mars and Studio 60 showrunners couldn’t come up with a slightly more of-the-moment artist to telegraph their musical awareness. As far as Hollywood is concerned, the Stripes in 2006 are becoming what Pearl Jam was in, say, 1993: A safe, easy-to-understand cultural shorthand for “cool.” It probably doesn’t even matter what kind of music they put out–or if they’re putting music out at all; Aaron Sorkin heard four years ago that the White Stripes were awesome, and dammit, he’s gonna use ’em.

That said, we hope the real-life Jack White cameos on Mars sometime soon, and slaps that Logan guy around. That kid is bad news.