I recently finished True Detective, and I stopped caring about Game of Thrones because I've already read the books so all I need to do is watch episode 9 of every season. That being said, True Detective was amazing and way better than Breaking Bad.
That's right.
I.
Said.
It.
Anyways, with nothing to watch TV wise, i've been watching movies. First I did a marathon of M.Night movies, because I enjoy my descents into madness being slow and debilitating. After that it's been Martial Arts movies and Asian Revenge films. If you're looking into those, I suggest Vengeance, the Raid, The Man From Nowhere, anything with Beat Takeshi in it like Battle Royale, etc. etc. Netflix actually has a good selection of movies like that.
Then when school's over, my sister and I plan on catching up on anime we missed during our Ramadan hibernation.
The point is my roommate is always at his girlfriend's place and the other is in his room playing League of Legends all day, give me something to occupy me with, please-
Fuckin' GoT is badass, yo, and I read that shit in real time. I'm one of those pricks who waited years'n'years for Dance with Dragons. The best show in the history of television is The Wire. I'm somewhere in Season 3 of Breaking Bad and while it's good, it's kind of too intense for the sake of being intense. The Wire? David Simon had a point, and he makes it, again and again and again and again. Plus it's worth it just to see Littlefinger as the mayor of Baltimore. And fuckin' Omar Little. Mutherfucker is the baddest-ass badass since Bill Munny. Maybe badder-ass. And that's saying something. CBS constantly surprises with The Good Wife. It's actually a brilliantly-written, brilliantly-acted series. I recommend it. AMC also has a hell of a thing going with Longmire. I'm probably biased because it's shot in some of my favorite places in New Mexico. Longmire's cabin is on the Valle Grande, a giant open caldera that was forbidden when I was growing up because Old Man Baca would shoot at you with a shotgun loaded with rock salt if he saw you, while "town" is Las Vegas, NM, a place truly dear to my heart. However, it's also largely well-written (season 1 starts to disintegrate towards the end) and it's got Katee Sackhoff (Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica) who I very much enjoy watching. And Lou Diamond Philips. When was the last time you saw that guy? Orange is the New Black is pretty good. It's light. As far as "light" goes, My Name Is Earl is one of the best comedies I've seen on television. It died before its time. Jamie Pressly is an excellent comic who also happens to be gorgeous. I love seeing that. For Anime, the two best series I've ever seen are Genesis Climber:Mospeada and Serial Experiments:Lain. The former because it was so much better before it got butchered to be Series III of Robotech - the basic premise is "what if earth was invaded by aliens and the earth was kind of okay with it?" And it stars a crossdresser named Yellow Belmont. The latter because it's an exceptional Peter Greenaway-like take on schizophrenia interspersed with all sorts of Marshall McLuhan/Vannavar Bush conspiracy weirdness. Watch both in Japanese. For some reason the english version of Lain is extremely lame. That'll keep you occupied for a few months.
My favorite scene in all of the Wire is in (I think) season two, where Omar is in court as a witness, wearing his fucking tie over a t shirt when the lawyer is going after him for what he does, benefiting from the drug trade by stealing the money from and to make a living. In the middle of his grandiose spiel Omar pipes in with, "well that's what you do." He's fucking floored. "You do it with a briefcase, I do it with a shotgun." Shrugs.
It's a damn fine scene. This link is a spoiler. But for me, it pretty much sums up The Wire.
My close friend/bandmate has an uncle who is a character on The Wire. I fee like a jerk because everyone i've ever talked to has said it's amazing and i've never even made the slightest effort to watch it. I think your comment has convinced me, though. I'll abandon Lost and give The Wire a try.
Yeah, dude. Fuckin' walk on Lost. I gave that shit a season and a half and knew they had no fucking clue what they were doing. Then I heard the scuttlebutt. Ever noticed how everything JJ Abrams has done since Felicity has been a remake? Yeah. Disney pitched JJ Abrams on having him remake Fantasy Island. They wanted something a little darker, but still family. So instead of Mr. Roarke and Tattoo we got a smoke monster. And instead of an episodic where Mr. Roarke teaches everybody life lessons every week, we got bullshit non-linear "here's some backstory so that you don't pay attention to the fact that nothing is actually happening" narration. Pull the plug. It just gets worse. The Wire, on the other hand, basically takes a swipe at a different aspect of the drug war every single season. Season 1 it's the druglords. Season 2 it's the teamsters. Season 3 it's the politicians. Season 4 it's the schools. Season 5 it's the media. My main criticism of The Wire is there are effectively no girls in it. It's an almost entirely all-male show - even the female detective is a lesbian. Thus my wife could never get into it, because it's straight up all crime and men behaving badly. But it is truly incredible. Eric Holder asked David Simon to do more of The Wire. That's the Attorney General of the United States, asking for more of an HBO television series. Here's what David Simon said: Source Which character?The Attorney-General's kind remarks are noted and appreciated. I've spoken to Ed Burns and we are prepared to go to work on season six of The Wire if the Department of Justice is equally ready to reconsider and address its continuing prosecution of our misguided, destructive and dehumanising drug prohibition.
I loved what I've seen of the Wire but did not enjoy obtaining it through less-than-ideal means. As soon as that deal with Amazon Prime begins, I'm binging on it. I know I've mentioned it before, but you should watch Madoka Magica Kleinbro. It's on Netflix. And this will sound weird, but I'm really hoping you dislike it/actively hate it, because the only discussion I hear about it is how fantastically-amazing it is, or arguments that aren't very strong against it. It'd be nice to get an informed opinion about it from someone who isn't hating it for the sake of hating it, or loving it blindly.
I'm sorry to disappoint you, but Madoka Magica is an unalloyed masterpiece. I was "eh" at Episode 1, "hmm" at Episode 2, and by the end of Episode 3 I was fully engaged, entirely absorbed, and giving it my complete attention. The ending explains too much and drags out a bit. I recognize that's cultural in many ways. It's also entirely necessary to start it the way it does - slow and banal - in order to entrench the viewer in its world. I'll be watching it again, and watching it again soon. I would say it doesn't just rank highly amongst Anime - it's easily the best anime I've ever seen - but highly amongst television. The plotting and story are absolutely top-notch. Thanks for the recommendation. I was completely blown away. EDIT: mk - it is breaking my heart that I cannot embed this gif.
Would you like to make a contract? Hell yeah, I'm glad you liked it! It's always fun seeing someone react to the show for the first time. They just released Rebellion, a film continuation of the show's story that I didn't even realize I wanted or was necessary until I had seen it. It also contains one of the best animated fight scenes I've ever seen. If you ever end up watching that, let me know what you think of it as well. And that soundtrack. Unf. Edit: The second rewatch really changes your perspective on the entire show. I watched it again with my sister, it being her first watch, and it's like watching an entirely different show that time around. Episode Ten: I Won't Rely On Anyone Anymore, is one of the best episodes of a show I've ever seen. Totally didn't see it coming.
I haven't, but my sis and I have got a #SummerOfAnime2014 thing going on, so it shall be added to the list posthaste. I will let you know what I think after I've seen it. I think you recommended My Name Is Earl, btw, thanks for that. It's a nice balance switching between that and the League, as the League has a cast full of assholes, while Earl gets some nice character development per-episode. Both are hilarious, though.
I had a coalgirls rip, but when my server went down (after neglecting to inform me it hadn't been backing up for a month) I somehow managed to not restore it. Fortunately, Lain is now on bloody Hulu so that's pretty hilarious. Raising Hope ain't bad, either. Earl is better.
Shit. It's been forever since I've watched My Name is Earl. Time to go watch a few episodes of that, definitely feel it was an under-appreciated show when it was on TV.
I have come to hate Game of Thrones. This may be in part because at some point I start hating things too many people love (see why I responded so positively to your Gaiman review) and I am a bitter betsy bitch, or due to actual problems I have with the author, his editor, and the text, or most accurately both. I would love to read kleinbl00's reviews of GoT (the books).
I think that GoT has lost a lot of narrative power as a result of multiple "main thread" characters being killed or dying off. I very much appreciate an author who is willing to kill his or her characters. It avoids trite happy endings and strikes fear and real feeling into the heart of readers, who often think "Oh but [the author] would never allow this character to die, they are too integral." It also creates a more realistic story. However, when you repeatedly kill characters, especially characters that your audience likes, you encourage your audience to stop caring so damn much about your characters in general. The reader (or watcher) learns that everyone is expendable and so as a result stops investing as much in everyone. Ultimately, each main character death becomes less meaningful in the long run as a result, and in order to create the same kind of reaction as (Book 1 Spoiler) Ned Stark's death the author must ramp up the extremity of each death. See (later book - either 4 or 5) the Red Wedding. In addition, due to the narrative structure of GoT, each main-line voice that is killed off must be replaced by new characters, or face a dwindling cast of main-thread characters and PoV. GRRM has obviously chosen against the latter. In fact, the main-thread characters have increased. On top of that, GRRM has at times introduced characters whose narratives only appear once in the story or very sporadically. This last bit causes me to again care less about individual characters because I no longer know who's important or who is coming back. Each new main-line character must cultivate a relationship with the reader; the reader must find either the story, PoV, or the narrator appealing, or else why bother reading that section? When this relationship is hastily cultivated, not cultivated (by only having one instance of it), or not thoroughly cultivated, the reader will lose interest. I feel that GRRM fails to realize this in later books as he begins introducing a great number of new main-line characters who I felt (as a reader) I had no or little established reason to care about. It is trying to continually attempt to establish relationships to new characters/POVs/storylines. GRRM further complicates this as he introduces more and more complex storylines. When you are jumping from place to place and person to person, it is easy for the audience to become confused about who is whom, where a given character is, and which events the character has experienced or is experiencing. This is of course even further complicated by the fact that characters move about all the time. This results in a significant amount of thumbing back to previous chapters so the reader can refresh him- or herself on prior events. As a reader I find this extremely frustrating when it occurs on a heavily repeated basis. I don't think one can deny that it makes it significantly more difficult to progress forward in a book if one is constantly thumbing back to ensure one has the correct understanding of a situation. And in addition, it builds on that detachment that I mention earlier. Many people have a few favorite cast members, as I'll call them, and they read on primarily for those characters. The attachment to those characters and their fate keeps the reader going. Unfortunately this can also result in readers paying less attention to stories that don't involve those characters, skimming, and thereby not forming the new attachments that are necessary to continue interest in the overall story as a whole. So this contributes to the "not building relationships with new characters" issue - because some characters a reader has deep relationships to are still left. I think GRRM got overswept with his Grand Brilliant Idea and began throwing in more extraneous detail and story than was necessary. I think his editor got overwhelmed with the success of the books and is basically letting GRRM do whatever the fuck he wants. And I think the text, over time, encourages readers to become alienated. Basically, I think that shit needs to get edited the fuck down. I realize my complaints may come down to "GRRM/GoT is overly complex" and some people will say "Complexity makes a work great." Sure, yes, complexity can help work be really, really successful, see Infinite Jest. But like any other tool or technique, when it's overdone, it becomes harmful to the text. Some of what I complain about in the long run helped make GoT what it was in the short run/beginning. I guess I feel like GoT is now pulling the same old tricks, same old rabbit out a hat, except now I've seen it ten or fifteen times and because I see it coming, I'm not even interested. I'd rather read the Wikipedia summaries of every forthcoming GoT book than spend the time it takes to wade through them. The writing and story are not good enough to justify the time or emotional attachment. GRRM isn't doing anything new with the writing. It's plot plot plot and I'm no longer surprised by or interested in most of the plot.
I think it's hilarious that you're extrapolating your experiences with the Red Wedding out to the rest of the series. That's what everybody does. That's what I did. There's nothing "hasty" about Game of Thrones. If anything, the books are tedious in their detail. Book-wise, the show is less than half way through Book 3, and there's plenty of shit to get through. Is it "plot plot plot?" Sure. That's called storytelling. For what it's worth, I've never met anyone who didn't put the books down for a few months in the middle of Book 3. Like I said, that's basically where the series is right now. Every single one of them, however, picked them back up, and was glad for it. 
I've read all the way through up to Dances With Dragons. Tried to get into Dances With Dragons and mostly completely failed. Maybe part of it was the wait between books; I lose interest and accurate recall when enough time and other distractions (like in this instance other books) get between me and a given thing. By the time DWD came out I was no longer attached to most of the series. Maybe it was time, maybe it was my completely self-confessed bitter bitch coming through: I must admit here that when something I like, but do not love, becomes the obsession of a large, loud group of people, it generally tends to turn me off of the object of their fandom. Everyone running around going "OMG Game of Thrones" made me go "Yes. Please shut up. GoT." I guess part of it is that while I enjoyed GoT a lot at first, I never fell in love and found such passion alienating. (What wasn't I seeing in the series that everyone else saw?) I wouldn't say hasty. I would say "more dramatic" and/or "more painful." We become inured to shock when we are frequently exposed to it. Let's say [x] amount of shock like the death of a single character. If [x] occurs every 50-100 pages by 1,000 pages in [x] is expected. Now to get the same reaction the author must deal out 2[x] of shock. Or whatever. You build a tolerance for it, especially as a reader because readers are already detached from the "reality" of the world within a book. (Edit: OK, yes, basically I'm saying that emotional reactions from book characters and events are like heroin. At first you're super sensitive to the characters and their pain. But if they're in pain fucking all the time you're just like "oh yeah, you're suffering again. fuckin' frodo and your fuckin' ring whining about it i get it." Then Frodo has to lose his fucking FINGER before I'm like "Oh yeah he's suffering some more, that really, really sucks." Or, whatever.) I watched the first season. I got tired of all the people going "OMG" on Facebook and Twitter. Like, a) contain yourselves, people, and b) you think the HBO series was good? go read the fuckin' book, and c) you fucking newbs that are just getting into this through the HBO series and think you're "fans," you don't even fuckin' know. Like, sure, TV series are cool. I never got into Got:TV. I'm not up-to-date and don't care to get that way. I understand TV/movie adaptations of novels are not their novels and maybe should be treated as separate objects because of it, but based on some of the changes they've made in the series I'm not really interested. And I certainly don't care about becoming emotionally invested in GoT:TV. Like, I clearly can't bestir myself to be emotionally invested in the books at this point. Why even bother with the show? I skimmed DwD to read the stories of the characters I liked and/or despised. DwD is when I got really fed up with GRRM. I guess my point is it's all plot and so I feel like I can just read the summary later and not lose anything at all. Just give me the freaking tl;dr so I don't have to slog through the books but I get some kind of resolution to the story if I want it. I really, really dislike GoT, but it's not because I haven't gone in as deep as I could try. - to the books.
Agree. But. See below. I'm pretty sure he's admitted to this. -- I like the complexity of GoT, it's fun. I like the Easter eggs most of all -- much like rationalist fiction, it's "solvable." We have a lot of fun over at r/asoiaf doing predictions. Frankly, I'm mostly interested in reading book 6 and 7 to see which stuff we got right. I also hate the complexity. It feels at times shoehorned, but then so does learning about history. Martin is a student of history. Pretty much every little incident in GoT is modeled on event that happened to Eleanor of Aquitaine or Hannibal or some interesting fucker. This is neat. Martin's commitment to realism is bound to hurt his narrative. Realism dictates that he make us love a castmember and then tear their character to shreds while killing them off. It makes the novels unique, not excellent. I can name any number of fantasy series I enjoy reading more, and that's not just because of my opinion of Martin's often-trite prose, but I really, truly don't know how Game of Thrones is going to end -- and that's pretty unheard of. -- The show is completely hit or miss. Some actors are incredible -- Tywin, Arya -- some are lackluster. The showrunners have made a lot of questionable decisions, but they've also improved on a few things. This season's episodes have been great, decent and okay in that order so far, but certainly all worth watching for the spectacle.In addition, due to the narrative structure of GoT, each main-line voice that is killed off must be replaced by new characters, or face a dwindling cast of main-thread characters and PoV. GRRM has obviously chosen against the latter. In fact, the main-thread characters have increased. On top of that, GRRM has at times introduced characters whose narratives only appear once in the story or very sporadically. This last bit causes me to again care less about individual characters because I no longer know who's important or who is coming back. Each new main-line character must cultivate a relationship with the reader; the reader must find either the story, PoV, or the narrator appealing, or else why bother reading that section? When this relationship is hastily cultivated, not cultivated (by only having one instance of it), or not thoroughly cultivated, the reader will lose interest. I feel that GRRM fails to realize this in later books as he begins introducing a great number of new main-line characters who I felt (as a reader) I had no or little established reason to care about.
I think GRRM got overswept with his Grand Brilliant Idea and began throwing in more extraneous detail and story than was necessary.
I always thought the Seven were (roughly) Catholicism; and the sparrows movement represented the Protestants. I don't see the R'hllor / Islam connection, except perhaps in their dealings with the infidel? I also feel that, on some levels anyway, the dragons represent Science in our world, and their awakening / rebirth is a representation of the Renaissance. >> Me? I hate the tedium. GRRM will blow six pages on the fucking food. Sooo much grease dripping down chins.Figured out the other day that the Seven Gods are Manicheism and R'hllor is Islam.
Manichaeism post-dates christianity but predates islam. Unlike christianity or judaism, manichaeism busts the universe up into five "sub gods" - Reason, Mind, Intelligence, Thought and Understanding. These get reflected down to Ether, Wind, Light, Water and Fire in the 1st kingdom. 2nd kingdom? that's where it gets complicated. No parallels are perfect - if they were, R'hllor would be the persecutor and the Seven Gods would be the upstart. But the fact of the matter is, Manichaeism went crazy throughout south asia and the Buddhists, Christians, Muslims and Zoroastrians were all threatened by it... and drove it to extinction.
Interesting. In most of the world (outside Westeros), the Seven are the upstart - and even within Westeros, they are "the new gods". The Seven seem to me to be an amalgam of the Catholic Trinity with the old Roman and Greek pantheons.
Gotta agree with Kb. The Wire is one of the best shows ever. I've seen it three times now. First was over a three and a half day period just after finishing a very stressful thesis. For those of you counting, 5 seasons in just under 4 days is about 18 hours a day. Yeah. I like to binge. Ps., best character? Da-Bunk. Anyone that needs an appetizer to the show should watch this. Last thing I really liked was True Detective. I had to sleep with the light on for two nights after that last episode. This is a good thing. I highly recommend it.
I never thought it was my personality, but I have been getting into documentaries. All of these are on Netflix. If you like sushi, watch Jiro Dreams of Sushi. Don't blame me when you start to salivate, or if afterwards you realize you need to learn Japanese and travel to Japan solely for Jiro's sushi. Jesus Camp is great, even if you are an atheist, especially if you are an atheist that does not make atheism their religion and one that understands religion is capable of doing good things (though only a small fraction of Jesus Camp will show you that). It is also terrifying. I like horror stories. Seven Up and each following documentary is (are) enthralling. I do recommend using Wikipedia to help you follow the storylines of each character; this helped me as I am not very good with names/faces. I will warn you that although the first film is an easy 30 minutes, each ensuing one seems to double in time or at least add 30 more minutes on to the length of the prior film. This is what has prevented me from progressing TOO far, also despite having willingly spoiled the plot I still want to watch them in order. Blackfish is supposed to be very, very good. In terms of series, for humor I have been watching the IT Crowd(British sitcom).I am/was a 30Rock/Parks & Rec/beginning Office/Community/Workaholics fan. This is a similar vein of 30-minute comedy but more British, of course. Another good British comedy on Netflix is Black Books. Better Off Ted is a good American comedy that ran too short and stars one of my woman-crushes, the lovely Portia di Rossi. Although American Horror Story falls apart at times I consider it worth it, especially the 3rd season. Rosemary's Baby, btw, is a great classic horror film available on Netflix; if you like horror at all, I'd watch it. For drama I recently watched a New Zealand miniseries called "Top of the Lake." Critics have called it feminist; maybe it is. It has villains, heroes, suspense, perhaps even justice. A great dramedy I have been enjoying is "Rita." It is in Danish and follows the story of an antiestablishment schoolteacher. She is almost the typical whore with a heart of gold except perhaps less whoring. My favorite film that is generally on Netflix and yes, is very fucked up, stars the lovely lovely indie queen PARKER POSEY and is called "The House of Yes." It is one of few films I have watched several times. It is adopted from a screenplay. Memorable lines include "Love is for small people with small lives" and "People raise cattle. Children just happen!" I am currently enjoying the film "The Brass Teapot" and quite likely another pro-feminist movie with the same leading actress called "Dirty Girl." I hope that Juno Temple goes places, many many places. Haha, I think that is enough for now. P.S. I actually really really enjoyed House of Cards in part for the way the story is told: I find it artful how little is said, how much the audience must pick up. I find it an excellent study of telling the audience very little, perhaps a la The Hills Are Like White Elephants. I strive (in blog/poetry writing - clearly not here on Hubski where I am garrulous) to make every word vital. So House of Cards I view as a moving demonstration of this. I think that is enough for now :) I do highly recommend Netflix's documentaries.
No, watch this even if you don't like sushi. This documentary is incredible.If you like sushi, watch Jiro Dreams of Sushi. Don't blame me when you start to salivate, or if afterwards you realize you need to learn Japanese and travel to Japan solely for Jiro's sushi.
Dark Shadows. The original soap. All 1,225 episodes. One of my favorite aspects is the fact that due to budget constraints, every episode was "filmed live", so any mistakes the actors or crew make had to be aired.
Maybe we will check that out if we can make it through all these episodes. We got hooked when Netflix aired the series, and we watched what felt like an ungodly number of them. The last one ended and we were like "wtf?" Nothing had been resolved. There were basically 3 or 4 major plots in various stages of unfolding and it was over. Only then did I hit up wikipedia and realize that we had not even begun to Shadow. We maybe saw 5% of them. And Netflix actually started their episodes with the introduction of Barnabas, leaving a shitload of episodes on the front end that we didn't see, as the series didn't introduce that element of the supernatural till pretty far in. I also love how "not tight" the writing is. It is CRAZY how good series writing is nowadays, and it's fun to watch them introduce tropes and plots into DS in kind of a ham-handed way. I enjoy it in the same way I like the errors the live filming reveals. Not disparaging the writers because with the number of episodes, it was a herculean task to keep the quality up over both the time-frame and pace. The writing kind of ebbs and flows in quality like the tide and you can actually see it. Just like that boom mic that made it into the frame. Fun.
I barely watch series, because I really need to be hooked to spend hours and hours into a series and its characters. When I have an hour of free time for myself, and I can choose between one episode of something or hubski + facebook + reddit + youtube channels + forums + etc, I mostly pick the latter because it's more fulfilling and enjoyable. So the series I do watch have to be really good and progress the damn plot. I didn't really get into GoT or Breaking Bad because it just felt so slow the first couple of episodes and I didn't find it that impressive. On the other hand, I watched an entire season of Community in one sitting. Doctor Who I found really enjoyable when I started with season 5 (no I'm not one of those fans, but it's a pretty solid likeable series). Recently I watched Suits season one, which hooked me on its premise but became a kind of one-trick-pony throughout the season (summary: Mike Ross has to do something he can't, tries it, fails a bit but succeeds with Harveys help. Add romance and competing colleagues to fill the hour). Had a similar problem with House of Cards. Might try The Wire though.
The Man From No Where was amazing. Did you see the original Oldboy? I made the mistake of seeing it first, and then going into the Spike Jones version with the expectation that it would be on par with it. I was sadly disappointed, especially by the fookin' ending. Mostly that it was missing 75% or more of the original story. The only thing that was the same was (SPOILER HERE) (sorta) the hammer fight. The American version seemed a bit bigger on scale and filmed in one long (iirc) shot like the Korean version.
If you see TD from the perspective of crisis of masculinity , the ' beautiful corpses' begin to make sense. Just as the lack of black people in early Mad Men was there to make a point rather than being a flaw. Just as men in Orphan Black are painted one dimensionally in contrast to the very well written women . I'd recommend for you to read this article for a better picture <The betrayal of the American man , Susan Faludi> http://jfk83.home.comcast.net/~jfk83/Faludi-betrayal-of-american-man.pdf
I've been two episodes away from finishing True Detective for 4 weeks now. Haven't been able to find a 2 hour chunk of time where I can let my mind rest and enjoy the finale. I'm also in the same boat as you for GoT. I enjoy reading the twitter commentary when big news drops more than watching the show now. :P I've been watching Girls simply because it's shorter and I don't care if I'm not 100% focused on watching it. It's pretty bad.I recently finished True Detective, and I stopped caring about Game of Thrones
You know, there are a lot of good shows on HBO, apparently. I enjoy watching GOT, I know I'd love the Sopranos, Mr. Show is one of my all time favorite sketch shows, and The Wire is probably the greatest show of all time. But that's four shows over two decades. What else should I watch there? What's good on air right now? I tried Silicon Valley last night. That was abysmal.
Boardwalk Empire was supposed to be really good, but it's off air. I personally enjoyed True Blood for a while and you might too, but don't watch the whole thing. Watch like the first three or four seasons and then let it go like a dead horse you don't need any more. (Unless you don't get fed up with it.) It's also off-air. Hmm. Curb Your Enthusiasm was supposed to be good, but I didn't watch it...I really want to watch Veep but haven't. That's the one show I've mentioned in this post that's still on air. ...I have a secret fondness for Sex and the City though it is a problematic show and I recognize those problems. Rome was great. I would recommend Rome. That's off air though. Carnivale was pretty great and I think you'd like it. Also off-air. But if you can get your hands on any of those shows I'd recommend them except for Sex and the City, I recognize it's my own weakness there ;) Edit: Also Chris O'Dowd from The IT Crowd is in their current series Family Tree, I'd try it out just for him.
Confession: I've watched every episode of Sex and the City. It's enjoyable in its own tongue-in-cheek way. I did really like the first season of Boardwalk Empire. Has it ended? I should download that. ALSO I'VE BEEN TRYING TO REMEMBER THE NAME OF CARNIVALE. I've wanted to watch that for a long while. I'll also look up Rome and Family Tree! I watched an episode of Veep the other night. It's painfully awkward but entertaining!
To answer your original question, here are some series that I would highly recommend. I'm not sure they are all on HBO, if any of them at all but I'm sure you can find them: 1. Carnival -amazing series of fantasy/theology/dust bowl/David Lynch-esque TV 2. Twin Peaks -Even more David Lynch esque (I'm pretty sure you've seen this as I think we've trade comments about it in the past -but for the lurkers) 3. Jericho -Post Apocalyptic fun that convinced me that Skeet Ulrich was more than the poor and Johnny Depp Enjoy!
Definitely seen Twin Peaks. I've watched everything from David Lynch. If you're a fan of his more esoteric stuff, boy can we have some great discussions. Jericho's actually good? I watched a few episodes in the first season, but I was a lot younger back then.
Also, have you seen any of the David Lynch interview project shorts? Pretty cool. portraits of interesting, yet every day people.
Jericho is good in the same way that walking dead and perhaps 24 are. It's episodic and there are some cliffhanger moments and lots of action. If you're looking for beauty and art, go check out Carnival though. There's a reason I put it as number one
Here you go, you can start here: https://hubski.com/pub?id=10723
YOU GUYS. AND thenewgreen. I forgot an HBO show you all need to watch. Bored to Death is one of the greatest things of all time. Additionally, this coincidental timing is eerie, but Amazon Prime now has, like, almost every single HBO show for free.
I have not. I am actually woefully under-David-Lynched, but I have seen Rabbits multiple times and love it and love to make other people watch it. They do tend to get a little freaked out though. The first time I saw it I was halfway through college, it was like 3 in the morning, and one of my still-best-friends showed it to me while we were all sleep-deprived and inebriated. I thought it was trippy then, and it's just as trippy sober, and I just totally love it. If Inland Empire is on Netflix I will put it in the queue post haste.
Yeah, it's pretty bad. I hope you don't judge me because of my guilty pleasure. I think the first season caught me because I enjoyed watching (read: relating to) her insecurities surrounding her gender / career / sex life. It might be a girl thing.
I don't judge you for it. We all watch bad TV. But... if you don't mind my asking, how can you relate to her? It's the most insulting, degrading vision of women I've seen. Like I used to enjoy watching Sex and the City, because it always felt tongue in cheek in the way they showed these ditsy, base women. It was like light ribbing. Girls is similar, but they make it seem like it's the most accurate depiction of women, and then goes on to portray itself as, like "the most perfect portrayal of New York life." I mean, I guess, if you're rich and never heard of a black person haha.
I'm currently being fed with a slow drip feed of Castle (one episode a day) so I can mainly keep in touch with school and the outside world
I literally download everything I watch, so I can't tell you where to find it, but I'ma keep on recommending Black Mirror until someone watches it.
I've watched this and my only complaint is that there's not a third series. It's a great anthology show, reminiscent of the Twilight Zone, but more focused on the future, where technology will be in 5 or 10 years. And then presents those potential uses of technology in a way that's unnerving and fucking terrifying.
Usually I watch Community and HIMYM. HIMYM recently ended, and I picked up Silicon Valley, which is pretty good. Other than that, it's mostly just anime. Here is my anime list. Tiger&Bunny is pretty good, as is Attack on Titan. Usagi Drop was a surprise hit for me.
Turn - little bit sucky but I'm on ep4 next week so we'll see - it's like a revolutionary era Homeland so it's about ready to jump the shark I reckon. Black Sails - waiting on the concluding episode - all the dialogue might as well be the characters saying "Arrrrr!" all day (and that's just the hot naked lesbian chicas) but what is the high seas piracy lark if not escapism. Deadliest Catch s10 - High seas escapism as a trap for crabs. Portlandia S04 - "Yuppies!" Veep S03 - If not the best comedy then at least it's got some of the best comic performances. Cosmos, Bobs Burgers, Archer, more.
Mad Men is pretty incredible. I wasn't a fan of Breaking Bad to be honest. I don't like shows that grow in scale to the point where its no longer relatable. The first season was cool because he was just a regular dude trying to make ends meet and then it became so over the top that i lost interest. Also, if you haven't seen it, watch The Sopranos. I was a little too young to be watching it when it was live, but i just got HBO Go set up and watched all of it over a couple weeks, i think it's my favorite show now. Among other reasons, all that stuff i mentioned above is managed really well - the scale of the show never gets too big for itself. It's intense, but the arc of each season is always a fair and believable progression.
I'm also leisurely watching Lost.... i'm not crazy about it.
Funnily enough this is exactly what I loved about Weeds. Season one, suburban pot dealer? Come on, that's my weekend. Season six, drug lord in Canada? Now we're talking.I don't like shows that grow in scale to the point where its no longer relatable.
NO. No no no. I don't want that recommendation on my conscience. On one level, yes, she goes to Mexico and Canada and a shitload of other improbable places and if I remember right she becomes a drug kingpin. On another level, the show got a lot shittier. If I recall, a few characters were killed off, which was jarring since I thought I was watching a comedy about pot and sex.
I've been asking myself that question. We're about halfway through Season 2 and I'm having a hard time caring. We took a brief detour into Defiance, which is so bad they think "terraforming" means "physically folding St. Louis over on itself such that there are giant caverns full of skyscrapers that also coincidentally raises mountain ranges and waterfalls in the middle of the Great Plains yet somehow keeps the arch standing."
And, sadly, it's the reason i stopped watching Weeds. I stayed with it because i really wanted to like it. I loved the first season actually. Then it just got progressively more extreme until i finally couldn't watch any more. It's funny that you enjoy that about shows, i wonder which of us is the minority. I find that the level of enjoyment i feel from a show is inversely correlated to the number of times the show makes me go "...really, dude?"