The TV Discussion Thread

[number8]

CBS did not pick up the How I Met Your Dad pilot. So you can relax now, everyone who did not want Greta Gerwig on a sitcom.

[dreamdead]

We've been going to town on HBO Go, having knocked out all of Girls last month. We're currently in the middle of Doll and Em and Merchant's Hello Ladies. They're both... ok. Too focused at times on cringe-humor, and not considerate enough to be advancing their main characters. It's interesting especially with Merchant's show, which is so transparent and shallow when the central relationship between Stuart and Jessica could be legitimately interesting if it had focused on them after coupling.

[MadMan]

All in the Family
Sanford and Son
House of Cards
Queer as Folk

That's scripted shows. There've been some immensely successful non-scripted shows, too.

Three's Company, Shameless and Being Human are/were pretty successful.

Well shit I forgot about House of Cards, Queer as Folk, Shameless and Being Human. I didn't know that All In The Family, Sanford and Son and Three's Company were originally British programs.

[Gittes]

So, one of the big pieces of film/television news today is the release date for the Twin Peaks Blu-ray collection (and other related details).


I have been wanting to watch this show for quite a while but, unfortunately, I was inadvertently made aware of what I'm assuming is one of the series' more memorable developments. A while back, Emily Nussbaum wrote an article for The New Yorker concerning cliffhangers ("The Power of the Cliffhanger"), in which she states:

[

Show Spoiler

David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks,” the critically adored auteurist breakthrough of the nineties, acknowledged its debt to the genre directly, with the soap-within-a-soap “Invitation to Love,” to which the show’s small-town characters were addicted. The series even ended with its own surreal cliffhanger, in the midst of uncertainty about a third season: Agent Cooper, possessed by the evil spirit that had killed Laura Palmer, bonked his head against a mirror, giggling maniacally and moaning, without explanation, “How’s Annie?”

]

Of course, I know the value of a series cannot be undone by foreknowledge of specific details, even if those details seem especially monumental or revelatory. Having said that, can those who have watched the series comment on this? How might my awareness of the "resolution" of Agent Cooper's story affect the experience of viewing the series for the first time? I'm going to be watching it either way, but I can't help but feel curious about how this may inflect my initial viewing (I guess I'll find out soon enough, though).

[ledfloyd]

I don't think it should affect you much. It really doesn't have much bearing on anything that happens prior to the finale.

I had Laura Palmer's murderer spoiled before I watched the series, and it did little to dampen my enjoyment of it. And that is really a more substantial spoiler.

[Gittes]

I don't think it should affect you much. It really doesn't have much bearing on anything that happens prior to the finale.

I had Laura Palmer's murderer spoiled before I watched the series, and it did little to dampen my enjoyment of it. And that is really a more substantial spoiler.

Ah, OK. Thanks.

[Grouchy]

I had Laura Palmer's murderer spoiled before I watched the series, and it did little to dampen my enjoyment of it. And that is really a more substantial spoiler.

Seconded. I assumed this was the spoiler, and that would have been far more sad.

[number8]

Holy shit, Michael Jace (Julien from The Shield) has been arrested for killing his wife.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/20/showbi...micide-charge/

[DavidSeven]

Finally making my way through Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 and only because people here liked it. Show's hilarious.

Watched the Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Halloween and Thanksgiving episodes yesterday. All perfect.

[Mara]

Finally making my way through Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 and only because people here liked it. Show's hilarious.

Damn straight. Totally underrated.

[MadMan]

I finished Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated on Instant Viewing. It, Terriers and Trigun are all due for tributes in Thirdmango and I's short lived shows thread.

[MadMan]

Oh and I badly want that Twin Peaks box set.

[dreamdead]

Finished Stephen Merchant's HBO show Hello Ladies. It serves as a reminder how seldom something like Louis works, where a comedian is able to adapt stand-up routines that balances apathy with humanism. The show, on the series finale, finally breaks through and begins to establish pathos and relationships with the main leads, but all too often Merchant comes off as a selfish dick even though the show wants us to empathize with his need to secure a supermodel girlfriend. The show's finale justifies kindness as Merchant's ultimate sentiment, but all too often the show's characters are dicks to one another. It's clear why the show never worked, but it further confuses how Gervais and Merchant encapsulated something so humane with The Office.

[EyesWideOpen]

There was an episode of The Office (US version) where I felt like the series jumped the shark and I quit watching it after that. I feel the same way about the season finale of Modern Family. I've been down on it most of the season but this last one was cringe worthy.

[Spun Lepton]

DS9's obsession with the Evil Reality is starting to get a bit tiresome. That said, Michael Dorn chewing the scenery as Evil Warf was pretty fun.

[Henry Gale]

The Critics' Choice Awards nominations are pretty good stuff, if a bit all over the place.

They seem a bit overly enamoured by new stuff (The Normal Heart, Sarah Baker's performance from her Louie episode a just few weeks ago and even some seasons/series like that haven't completed their runs like Fargo and Game of Thrones making the cut, even if that's more a timing issue), but everything feels incredibly varied and gives a lot of love to unexpected stuff (the hilarious adopted kid from Trophy Wife, Andre Braugher for Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Keith David for Enlisted all in Supporting Comedy Actor, Silicon Valley everywhere, plus Broad City(!) getting Best Comedy AND Actress for Ilana Glazer).

Also a lot of awesome duos on being given half the representation they deserve. McConaughey but no Harrelson was sadly expected, but an Adam Scott nomination without a corresponding one for Poehler? Hugh Dancy and no Mikkelsen?!

[Mara]

Bert from Trophy Wife getting a nod was golden. I cheered a little.

[DavidSeven]

The Critics' Choice Awards nominations are pretty good stuff, if a bit all over the place.

They seem a bit overly enamoured by new stuff (The Normal Heart, Sarah Baker's performance from her Louie episode a just few weeks ago and even some seasons/series like that haven't completed their runs like Fargo and Game of Thrones making the cut, even if that's more a timing issue), but everything feels incredibly varied and gives a lot of love to unexpected stuff (the hilarious adopted kid from Trophy Wife, Andre Braugher for Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Keith David for Enlisted all in Supporting Comedy Actor, Silicon Valley everywhere, plus Broad City(!) getting Best Comedy AND Actress for Ilana Glazer).

Also a lot of awesome duos on being given half the representation they deserve. McConaughey but no Harrelson was sadly expected, but an Adam Scott nomination without a corresponding one for Poehler? Hugh Dancy and no Mikkelsen?!

Are people really getting behind Silicon Valley? I only watched the first few episodes, but it seemed kind of "whatever" to me. Watchable, but not that compelling or funny. Didn't dislike it, but it didn't grab me either. Surprised it would do so much better than something like Girls or any of the top FOX comedies.

[Lucky]

Mad Men shutout? Really?

[Mara]

The female half of the torture tech duo on La Femme Nikita looks like an older, less attractive Peggy Olson.

(These two fandoms have very little overlap. But it felt like a really important revelation.)

[Henry Gale]

Are people really getting behind Silicon Valley? I only watched the first few episodes, but it seemed kind of "whatever" to me. Watchable, but not that compelling or funny. Didn't dislike it, but it didn't grab me either. Surprised it would do so much better than something like Girls or any of the top FOX comedies.

I like it, think it has a nice and singularly Mike Judge world to it with characters that play well of each other, but I feel like it has greater potential than it's currently achieving. I know this season is only eight episodes, and other freshman years of other HBO comedies that come to mind (Eastbound, Girls, Flight of the Conchords, Veep) are almost too different and too miraculously stellar to compare, but I do look forward to seeing how this evolves over time.

As much as I like Middleditch and Miller, I'd almost prefer the show's focus to have been Nanjiani and Starr, since they're awesome together and I feel like it's an even funnier idea to have the series told from the perspective relative minor players like them in that sort of start-up industry.

Bottom line, I wouldn't place it anywhere among the best six comedies currently on the air like those nominations do, but I like that people might help it achieve a bigger audience with that sort of enthusiasm for it. Nice for Judge to have something of a steady gig post-King of the Hill and Beavis.

[Henry Gale]

And speaking of HBO comedies...

Danny McBride and Jody Hill's "Vice Principals" has been picked up for 18 episodes by HBO.

As much as that seems like an unprecedentedly high amount of episodes for the network, as someone still in a faint state of mourning over Eastbound & Down (despite ending as perfectly as possible) and anything Hill & McBride are behind creatively, I couldn't be happier about that. Not sure if it'll be one extended season or it's a commitment to more than one, but again, either way: Fantastic.

The one thing I could see leading to some confusion is that HBO now has shows titled "Veep", "Vice" and "Vice Principals"... (I mean, at least with "True Detective" and "True Blood" they aren't that mistakable and the latter is ending this year.)

[number8]

It's obviously going to be 3 seasons. I think they probably asked for that number because Eastbound was originally plotted to be 18 chapters but got extended. Maybe this is their way to make sure the 3-act structure will stay intact this time.

[MadMan]

I'm already enjoying Longmire Season 2. This show is really badass and I love the cast.

[EyesWideOpen]

I'm still working my way through Veronica Mars. I'm a couple episodes into season 3 and I'm still enjoying it. I know this is supposed to be the bad season but so far I find it about the same quality wise as season 2. I also started watching Flight of the Conchords and I'm almost done with the first season. Is it weird that for the most part the songs are my least favorite part of the show?