I agree that pairs is so much more impressive in person, even at the lower levels. Pairs is really really hard to do well, but I think that amazement flattens out when you watch on TV. I also wonder if it's a chicken-egg problem, where it's less popular (in North America at least) so it attracts fewer skaters, which keeps the pool of elites extra-small, and in the end you just don't have a lot of high-quality pairs out there to bring the excitement and motivate more people to go into pairs.