This has been an odd summer in the popular culture. Across the board, in every medium, movies, and music, and television there have been hardly any big hits.

The cultural products most obviously failing are the bloated and conventional and passionless, from movies like Pear Harbor and Disney's Atlantis….to network television in general.

Network television absolutely tanked this summer. Since last year, the big old-line broadcast networks have lost more than 15 percent of their primetime audience. Lost those viewers to the scores of cable channels that take creative chances, and give particular audiences what they particularly want.

Same thing in music. Overall record sales are way down from last year. And even more to the point, almost every week this summer there's been a different number one hit. Which is unusual, and means the number one records are essentially number one by default.

As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, one week the top record was by the reggae artist Shaggy, then another week by a pop confection like Janet Jackson, then, another week, an old-fashioned rock act like Dave Matthews, then an angry metal band called Tool.

In other words, it's niche after niche after niche -- and no coherent trend or giant pop trend that everybody under 30 cares about.

Just like in the movie business. Until last weekend, no movie this summer had been number one at the box office for more than a single week. Which is strange -- even freakish. Usually, one or two pictures become the must-see films, and stay at number one week after week.

This summer, the successes, relatively speaking, have been movies of two types. Type One, as always, are movies that teenagers like. Either sequels to broad comedies, like Rush Hour 2. Or else sexy teen coming-of-age movies, like the surprise hit The Fast and the Furious. Or better still, sequels to broad coming-of-age teen sex comedies, like American Pie 2. Which is the movie that's been number one at the box office for two weeks and counting.

The other kind of movie that succeeded this summer is much less obvious, because it isn't an existing category. "Good" is not a genre.

It's true -- this summer, well-made movies have done well. Among the handful of hits were three of the season's best mainstream Hollywood films -- the computer-animated fairy tale Shrek, the screwball comedy Legally Blonde, and Nicole Kidman's thriller The Others.

So what are the morals of the story of pop culture this summer?

Well, that audiences keep fracturing into smaller and smaller slices…which isn't necessarily a bad thing. That blandness and lousy craft are usually failing to draw audiences. And best of all, that quality, when it appears, is usually succeeding.

Like I said, it's been an odd summer.

This is Kurt Andersen in Studio 360.

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