TV Thread - beware, [expletive] can get spoilery

[longhornbaseball]

Less than a week until Dexter!!!

[JL21]

I think Mad Men has hit it out of the park the last 3 episodes after a rough start. Dramatically, I think the easy way out is to let Don continue on a downward spiral, and I'm glad they're not going that route. At the same time it doesn't seem cheesily uplifting or revelatory as he figures out how to do the right thing. He also still fails here and there.

This is the first season of Mad Men where I've felt like it's actually worth all the praise it gets. I thought the Draper voiceover during the last episode was a bit much (an unnecessary break in style) but that's my only minor gripe.

Also got through Season 2 on Breaking Bad. No way to be certain of this, but if the two leads aren't as spectacular as they are, I'm not sure that show is as good. Nice that they both got Emmy's because they're both deserved. I'd like to single one of the two out but you really can't. I read a good review comparing it to Mad Men, and it made the point that you care about these characters more than those on Mad Men, even though Mad Men has a tougher job in that it has to create drama out of real life (and avoid being soapy) as opposed to the conflicts imposed by the criminal life or cancer. That summed it up pretty well for me, though I think the two shows are apples and oranges.

I agree that the show wouldn't be as good without Cranston and Aaron Paul. But I still think it'd be a very good show because of the writing. Things are foreshadowed, characters develop fully, there are consequences for their actions, etc. And despite the fantastic current season of Mad Men, I still think Breaking Bad runs laps around it because there's real-life character development and not just a bunch of sloppy plot lines. You mention Mad Men having to avoid being soapy, but that's my biggest gripe with it. It embraces the soap opera b.s. Peggy is pregnant... with Pete's baby! Don Draper's name is not really Don Draper! Every single employee at Sterling Cooper is cheating on their wife! Don has a double super secret past life! OMG! Enough already.

[Freed Roger]

Rant -Wildnerness shows.

Stumbled across "Man Woman Wild" show on Discovery Channel. Ugh. Could they make it any more obvious that this "survival" show is rigged. They drop them in a contrived-simulated survival situation. Think about that - you know the destination survival situation going in -thus you can study up on maps, resources, strategize and probably pre-select the tools at your disposal. Its stupid.

I like the concept - putting a lady friend out there in the wilderness, and she is cute. Women in the outdoors = hot. But not the guy's wife. And the dude -surely he is bad ass who could kick my arse, but he has this colloqial accent schtik going -what a complete douche. The husband -wife dialog is beyond obnoxious.

Nat Geo has some moronic pretty boy on a show called "EXpedition Wild" Every time I flip through that channel he's
anthropomorphizing some animal - typically bears.

Some other Nat Geo channel has "Science of Survival" which isn't half bad. It does a decent documentary of real survival situations. Only complaint is they drag it out. They don't really need the "science" tie-in. But typically good tales.

[thrill]

Boardwalk Empire was a solid, solid pilot. They did the pilot thing where they try to touch on everything the show wants to cover at the expense of sticking with some of the more interesting characters in the plot. Example would be how Omar from the Wire makes a 2 second appearance asking Nucky's secretary to tell him "he ain't got all day." Kind of as if they just wanted any Wire fans who were checking it to know that just because he isn't featuring this week, they've got him.

Anyway, I love the premise, I love the historical accuracy including the timelines, famous historical figures and of course the costume and set design. Obviously, Scorcese wouldn't have been involved if the accuracy wasn't there. He only directed this pilot, but it's fantastic. He was on top of his game.

Even with all of the great stuff I've mentioned, my favorite part of the pilot was the constant, "Hey...it's that guy" moments. The guy who played Guarnere in Band of Brothers was one of Arnold Rothstein's henchmen, Arnold Rothstein himself is played by the guy from A Serious Man, the guy who played young Al Capone has been in a million things and the main federal agent is the creepy looking guy from Bug and a ton of other movies.

[JL21]

Even with all of the great stuff I've mentioned, my favorite part of the pilot was the constant, "Hey...it's that guy" moments. The guy who played Guarnere in Band of Brothers was one of Arnold Rothstein's henchmen, Arnold Rothstein himself is played by the guy from A Serious Man, the guy who played young Al Capone has been in a million things and the main federal agent is the creepy looking guy from Bug and a ton of other movies.

Wow, I didn't notice any of those.

I'm already thinking of it as HBO's attempt to squish together The Wire (multiple elements of law enforcement, including criminals and politicians and the feds) and The Sopranos (duh... organized crime) with all of the period drama of something like Carnivale.

[thrill]

Even with all of the great stuff I've mentioned, my favorite part of the pilot was the constant, "Hey...it's that guy" moments. The guy who played Guarnere in Band of Brothers was one of Arnold Rothstein's henchmen, Arnold Rothstein himself is played by the guy from A Serious Man, the guy who played young Al Capone has been in a million things and the main federal agent is the creepy looking guy from Bug and a ton of other movies.

Wow, I didn't notice any of those.

I'm already thinking of it as HBO's attempt to squish together The Wire (multiple elements of law enforcement, including criminals and politicians and the feds) and The Sopranos (duh... organized crime) with all of the period drama of something like Carnivale.

I know you aren't as big a Mad Men fan as I am, but with Matthew Weiner creating Mad Men and Terence Winter making Boardwalk Empire and it looking as awesome as it does, it's becoming apparent that David Chase can't be solely responsible for how great Sopranos was. That was a Dream Team of TV writers.

[JL21]

I know you aren't as big a Mad Men fan as I am, but with Matthew Weiner creating Mad Men and Terence Winter making Boardwalk Empire and it looking as awesome as it does, it's becoming apparent that David Chase can't be solely responsible for how great Sopranos was. That was a Dream Team of TV writers.

No argument here. I find it funny that there are common threads that run through all three of those shows. Draper and Tony Soprano have a ton of similarities. I saw an article a few weeks back comparing Betty Draper to Tony's mother. James Darmody already is showing a lot of Moltisanti-esque tendencies.

I'm digging the hell out of how true they are to the period and to AC. That baby incubation thing was (apparently) somewhat popular at Coney Island. I felt like I was watching an art film and not just some TV show- shots of Buscemi looking at the babies, looking at the fortune teller (constantly looking towards the future... in the first episode of the show), the opening shot with the fog (the henchman staring into the unknown, again, in the first shot of the first episode).

In short, I'm already bananas for the show.

[jeffbgoofy]

We will watch the Chuck premiere tonight and tape the How I Met Your Mother premiere...

[thrill]

the opening shot with the fog (the henchman staring into the unknown, again, in the first shot of the first episode).

I'm glad you mention that opening because, to be honest, that shot was a double-edged sword for me. It was awesome because it was a reminder right off the bat that one of the greatest film directors that will ever capture moving images was behind the camera for this episode and it sucked because it built such great tension and anticipation that when it turned out to just be some rum runner boats pulling up to offload booze, it was a bit of a let down. I kept expecting something epic right off the bat.

[Richie Allen]

Season 4 of The IT Crowd has wrapped up (I think they may show them on IFC) and should be available on DVD soon. For the uninitiated, it's a British sitcom created by Graham Linehan (Father Ted) which revolves around three members of an IT department. It's one of the funniest shows on TV. http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-it-crowd

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