let's talk about tv shows itt

oh my god they are soooooooooooo horrible they are just UNBELIEVABLY horrible

no they're good, they have the CLAIRE DANES IN A MAZE bits which aren't so hot but mainly they convey the fractious & dystopian assemblage that is today's multimedia culture, bravo

oh my god no schlump. no.

bill clinton
lonesome bugle
upside down obama
frantic claire danes dialogue excerpt
~showtime~

they are the worst credits in the history of ever

idk it sorta strikes me as one of those prized-character-idiosyncracies born of a tv writer, who stubbornly clings to it & refuses to have it written out as an irrelevance.

this totally explains Maria Bello's hat on Prime Suspect

the NY Times declared yesterday that the sitcom has stopped evolving, so y'all can quit them.

NYT otm, and very late with the news

sitcoms have evolved into police procedurals and gangster series

I want to like each of the last three comments

At least Homeland's opening seq isn't as bad as Rubicon's.

god help me i am still really enjoying american horror story

lol u got caught up

signed, someone caught up on Grimm ;_;

if there has ever been a show on tv that is just str8 shock/filth candy, it is american horror story

AHS is basically just about a bunch of perverted ghosts, right

I have like 3 or 4 boardwalks in the backlog, might save them for my train ride on Friday

last 2 boardwalks have been v good fyi

i really like enlightened also, tho feel like im the only person watching it

tbh I was only half-watching boardwalk empire (most of my time was being directed towards torturing specific ppl in ILX fb chat with damn you autocorrect links) but every time I looked up it seemed like you could rename that show "White People Go Ham"

boardwalk hampire

Enlightened is p interesting since it teeters from a boring dramedy with a more pretentious Greys Anatomy voice over about life, friendship, emotions, blahblah to something actually really astute and ambitious at the same time.

But yeah. Even though I hardly get a laugh out of it, I'm liking all the eps so far save the kayaking trip one.

yah the v.o. & its self-help speak is kinda brutal 2 take. i would bet they thought they needed something light, redeeming to counterbalance the rest of the day-to-day disappointment stuff, which is what they capture p well

did anyone see that latest Mitch Albom TV-movie muckfest? Martin Landau as a dying rabbi?

based on the ratings, I'd wager 'no'.

Boardwalk development at the end of the last ep was brutal, but mostly gutting because I thought that character had a lot of promise.

Yea, the day-to-day struggles are the best part of it, like when she wants to volunteer at the homeless shelter but can't because it didn't pay enough. It's impressive how poignant that was even though you knew from the very start she was going to fail.

so I'm watching fringe – I'm on the season 3 episode where SPOILER AND SHIT – belly possesses olivia or whatever. and i realize that i'm ... beginning to lose interest in the show. does it ever return to its goodness, and is season 4 worth investigating?

did anyone see that latest Mitch Albom TV-movie muckfest? Martin Landau as a dying rabbi?

Oh! I met the producer of that when we dined next to each other in Buenos Aires. He bitched about having to be in Detroit for three months.

Nice guy, though.

according to the twitter someone beloved is coming back to parks & rec for an episode! i won't say who becuz idk spoilers but i'm super-stoked.

so I'm watching fringe – I'm on the season 3 episode where SPOILER AND SHIT – belly possesses olivia or whatever. and i realize that i'm ... beginning to lose interest in the show. does it ever return to its goodness, and is season 4 worth investigating?

― remy bean in exile, Monday, November 28, 2011 5:33 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Permalink

its picked up since that bit for sure, managed to change stuff up in the new season without fucking too much w/ the formula. get the feeling therell be some mid-spring doldrums the way there basically always are w/ sci-fi shows

i got 1 episode into this season of Boardwalk Empire and was like "eh, i wasn't really into this last time." maybe i'll try to catch up but it kinda felt like no matter what crazy stuff happened, i didn't really care. i get shock value fatigue with most edgy cable dramas these days.

Sons Of Anarchy has been REALLY extreme this season, though, i feel like every episode lately has just totally put me through the ringer of just serious shit going down constantly.

you should at least see the bits of Boardwalk Empire that feature stroke victims getting beaten

is it a flashback explaining how paz de la huerta's face got that way?

surprisingly, no

ppl also do fascinating things with wrenches on BW, plus there seems to be a good amount of gratuitous elder abuse

Rubicon opening >>>>>> Homeland opening

hey I'm gonna shamelessly self-promote the Arrested Development commentary podcast that my friend and I have been recording, it's called Hero Squad!

It seems appropriate because this is the TV thread I guess.

watched the first two episodes of Hell on Wheels. The Swede is pretty much awesome

so is it racist?

for sure

I loved the rubicon credits -- thought they were pretty elegantly done and conveyed the right atmosphere. Homeland at its best has touches of rubicon. At its worst it reminds me of AMC's The Killing in terms of what feel like throwaway dead-ends and moodiness for its own sake and twists that really come from nowhere. Really not like either show though. Last episode was pretty good, I thought.

watched the pilot of Homeland last night. mandy patinkin is, indeed, awesome in it.

i think when i saw the pilot i thought he was gonna be the toby zeigler, idk if that's been entirely correct though, his portfolio is a lil more muscular

So I watched New Girl for the first time last night, since a girl I used to take improv classes with had a small role in it. It was better than I thought it might be, but it also felt kind of tame.

thanks dan, watching grimm now.

2 BROKE GIRLS - most like 2 HUGE TITS (and some race jokes)

thanks dan, watching grimm now.

okay lol

they get muslim prayer slightly wrong in Homeland/pedantry. also this show is a huge bummer.

could i make a living consulting with tv shows/movies about how to accurately portray muslims praying y/n?

i guess once i'd done it the first time i'd have put myself out of a job.

Horseshoe, what did you think of Emily Nussbaum's inaugural New Yorker column?

ill check back in when im done guys!

Whedon does quiet inspirational humanism really well, esp. in Firefly.

buffy rules. i've never finished another whedon series except dr. horrible.

there's a whedon-written episode of roseanne that i love to death

I think Buffy is academically good but I have almost no emotional attachment to the series aside from a couple of key series moments (Buffy's mom, Dark Willow). I have always enjoyed watching the show but never enough to make a point of trying to see it.

Firefly OTOH was just awesome, esp. once I saw it in the correct order.

Whedon is pretty great at picking actors but overall I like the Firefly cast more than the Buffy cast.

I never got past the opening of Dollhouse; great premise tho.

Dr Horrible pwns, obv

Since the sandbox doesn't have a P&R thread, this goes in here:

http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lx241ppdm61qm1br0o1_500.jpg

lol and I just now watched the Twilight Zone where Anne Blyth plays a movie star that never ages and is probably Cleopatra.

I'm iffy about Dr. Horrible, the ending wasn't very funny.

aw now i wish i hadn't finished watching firefly earlier today bc it would be the perfect thing to watch before going to bed tonight
the final ep is v good imo

Blimey, Sherlock was a bit good.

Or, as you you could say, Not Shit Sherlock.

did the new one air already??

Aye, 2010 tonight. Loosely based on A Scandal In Bohemia.

this is the 4th ep right?

Yes. Next Sunday has the one based on Hound of the Baskervilles.

looks like - max, i think? - was right:

Deadwood had sympathetic characters who threw the word "nigger" around, on the theory that we'd understand that people in that time and place might have done it without intending an insult. Everyone who uses that word on Hell On Wheels does intend an insult, which is fine, except that the show goes out of its way to lump Bohannon in with the insulted. It insists on the superior dignity of those on the bottom of society, then works extra hard to shoehorn its quick-drawing hero in there, on the theory that there's nobody more long-suffering and sinned against than a good-looking white Southern man who can kick the ass of anybody who looks at him cross-eyed. It's not bad enough that American politics have been rendered infantile and idiotic by the trend among the privileged and well-off to feel unaccountably sorry for themselves; now even our Westerns can't keep their hands off the crying towels. This goddamn show should be called H-E-Double-Hockey Sticks On Wheels.

i was just thinking about that old ilx how i met your mother thread and how i may have said some mean things about it and now it's probably my favorite show on tv.

also tv related, i really hate how this season they have turned walking dead on amc into lost...missing characters appearing in visions, people not divulging key plot points to each other, sweeping camera pans w meaningful musical score that take up 4 minutes of what should be tense zombie apocalypse, really obvious "twists" that take way too long in the revealing, etc

also tv related, i really hate how this season they have turned walking dead on amc into lost...missing characters appearing in visions, people not divulging key plot points to each other, sweeping camera pans w meaningful musical score that take up 4 minutes of what should be tense zombie apocalypse, really obvious "twists" that take way too long in the revealing, etc

also tv related, i really hate how this season they have turned walking dead on amc into lost...missing characters appearing in visions, people not divulging key plot points to each other, sweeping camera pans w meaningful musical score that take up 4 minutes of what should be tense zombie apocalypse, really obvious "twists" that take way too long in the revealing, etc

oops!

i feel bad for nathan fillion, i just love him but it seems outside of joss whedon ventures he can't catch a break.

i am not much of a TV guy, but SEVERANCE is honestly pretty grebt imo

it’s so good. I think about it at least once a week even though it’s been over for a few weeks.