What TV SHOWS are you watching ARCHIVE

I am nearly finished watching season 4 of Boardwalk Empire. Great show. Stephen Root is back in an interesting minor role. Another actor from The Wire has a small part this season. And one of the more prominent actors from Band of Brothers is in the mix. Even Patricia Arquette has managed to do a bit of real acting in a minor role this season, and I didn't think she could act at all before this. Like each season before this, Boardwalk Empire season 4 does a stylish slow burn, punctuated by occasional sex or violence. Events build to a furious crescendo in the final episodes. I love the 1920s setting, and the acting is very good. One of my favorite actors on the show looks like a cross between Lurch and Leonardo diCaprio.

There may be a fifth season of Boardwalk Empire, but I think that I am satisfied with stopping after the fourth season. Not because it sucked, but rather because so many critical storylines were brought to a close that anything past the fourth season finale would probably feel forced and unwelcome. And what a finale! A beloved character dies. A subtle villain is finally brought to justice. Proud men are humbled. Hearts are broken. And there was an extraordinarily violent fight scene, possibly the most brutal fight that I've ever seen in a tv show. And fine music. Thanks to the introduction of the Onyx Club, season four had some exceptional music, better than all the previous seasons put together.

Shellhead wrote: There may be a fifth season of Boardwalk Empire, but I think that I am satisfied with stopping after the fourth season. Not because it sucked, but rather because so many critical storylines were brought to a close that anything past the fourth season finale would probably feel forced and unwelcome. And what a finale! A beloved character dies. A subtle villain is finally brought to justice. Proud men are humbled. Hearts are broken. And there was an extraordinarily violent fight scene, possibly the most brutal fight that I've ever seen in a tv show. And fine music. Thanks to the introduction of the Onyx Club, season four had some exceptional music, better than all the previous seasons put together.

The final season is actually somewhat interesting. I dig the ending and there's some cool interludes with Nucky flash backs to when he was young.

If I ever meet Kerry Ingram in real life, I'm going to want to give her a big hug.

Black Barney wrote: If I ever meet Kerry Ingram in real life, I'm going to want to give her a big hug.

Yeah. That scene was HORRIBLE. One of the worst things I've ever seen portrayed in a TV show.

Season 5 of Game of Thrones was pretty tough to get through. Rape, murder, more rape, war, couple of dudes getting eaten by a dragon, rape, a little girl gets burned at the stake , undead frozen armies ... I sorta feel like I did going into the final season of Breaking Bad, when I was just worn out by the never-ending despair and darkness. Everything is bleak and horrible and pointless. All the remaining characters are flawed, terrible people. Ugh. I'm just exhausted by it all. At some point, this shit stops being "entertaining."

I recently started rewatching The Wire, and that show is pretty bleak too. But it's also goddamned hilarious at times (something GoT could use more of), and very, very human. And the characters are allowed to win once in a while! Sometimes it's a small victory, but it's not all horribleness! Game of Thrones needs to lighten the fuck up a bit.

A lot of the most extreme stuff (that felt a bit pointless) was show specific too, which I thought was odd. It feels pretty obvious not to add some of this stuff, I would understand more if your hands were tied by the books in those places.

This was so much worse for me than the Red Wedding. i wasn't even shocked, I was more just haunted by it. Season 2 and 3 of AGOT were great but all of Theon's torture scenes really started wearing thin. There's only so much of that I can watch.

I was glad to see that the show then moved the big season moments to stuff like Red Viper vs Mountain. That's the proper kind of climaxes that get people talking.

The Sansa r@pe was no big deal I thought since we saw that coming a mile away. What else is her husband going to do? Light candles? The guy is a monster. They needed a new Joffrey and there he is.

...but this.... they didn't even portray it, to be fair. It happens off camera but those screams.... they made it so fucking real that it was just not fun at all. It was full blown horrifying for me. I just can't believe it.

I really need some rainbows and lollipops in the next episode or season to make up for this stuff. I think only Tyrion, Dany, Mormont or Snow could help me with that. Maybe Arya if her story arc becomes less boring. Why does she have it in for that guy of the king's guard? I know he's awful but I forget what he did.

Hey, on the bright side, Sam's love scene was gorgeous, I was so insanely happy for him I think I might have shed a tear. That's one brave fat hobbit.

anyway, no joke, I'm totally going to want to hug Kerry Ingram if I ran into it. I know she's just an actress but i can't stand it. I hope Davos loses his SHIT when the next thing he reads is a tombstone.

....haven't read the books but I'm really hoping for a Mormont/Dany moment. When they hold hands in Dance of Dragons I think i might have cried there too.

Call me an old softy but I'd prefer if you called me a distinguished gentleman with a flagging erection.

I'm basically rooting for the White Walkers at this point.

I figure the Nights Watch is all going to die so the Walkers can overrun the wall and make it into the seven kingdoms where more than just a couple characters will have to deal with them. I know GRRM is hard to predict, but I think a final battle at the Wall would be lame at this point. I want to see dragons and undead in King's Landing.

ahhhh! I shouldn't have read that!


Hey so if Valyrian steel is the nuts against the walkers, then does that mean that Dany has access to that stuff and can equip an army with valyrian steel-tipped spears for her unsullied? That would be a pretty easy fight, no? They go phalanx style like it's 700 BC. Walkers shatter when they get hit by that stuff, da?

I'm starting to get less impressed with the inclusion of dragons in an army. If a bunch of masquerade-ball dudes with daggers and spears can go toe-to-toe with one, then I'm thinking they're a support (tank) unit at best.

I decided years ago that I was going to avoid the tv version of A Game of Thrones until I finished the books, unless Martin died without a backup plan to get the remaining books written. I understand that tv or movie adaptations need to change things because of inherent differences between print and tv/movies as mediums, and I didn't want two conflicting versions in my head.

As it turns out, the tv writers for AGoT have been given a free hand to interpret the material because Martin has fallen further behind schedule with the books. I had hoped that the show might still follow Martin's overall storyline which he had probably shared with them a while back. Instead, it looks like the tv writers have resorted to just making shit up this season to fill out the parts that they didn't want to adapt from the books. And more problematically, the tv show has elected to skew the story in favor of more rape, more torture, and more atrocities than the books. This might be more tolerable if the tv writers wrote as well as Martin.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is a really cool BBC show about two magic users in the 1800's. I've never seen a more gorgeous show with the exception of Downton Abbey, and this show is more engaging than that one.

This season of GoT didn't feel any worse than other seasons... just different specifics of man's inhumanity to man and people being alternately horrible and heroic. Yes, the girl being burned was truly horrific and awful, but it was supposed to feel that way, and the horror of that moment was effective (and Stannis payed for it, big time). And I agree with Barney that how Sansa was treated by Ramsey was not at all surprising, and mercifully they didn't actually show any of that happening. It was terrible to even know of, but in character for her new "Joffrey."

Ramsey's eventual tortuous death will be a sweet moment, so we have that to look forward to. Unless JRRM is truly cruel and has Ramsey somehow end up on the Iron Throne. His jerk face smugly smiling while sitting on the throne would be a really painful final shot for the series. Regardless of that possibility (unlikely), I don't know that we'll necessarily get a happy ending, and I certainly wouldn't expect one. The last book will supposedly be titled A Hope for Spring, which implies something positive, but not necessarily,

hotseatgames wrote: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is a really cool BBC show about two magic users in the 1800's. I've never seen a more gorgeous show with the exception of Downton Abbey, and this show is more engaging than that one.

Ooh I've been looking forward to this one. Tried to read the book ages ago and kinda bogged down in the unrelenting period drama-ness of it, which I find slightly more palatable in video form.

hotseatgames wrote: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is a really cool BBC show about two magic users in the 1800's. I've never seen a more gorgeous show with the exception of Downton Abbey, and this show is more engaging than that one.

I've only watched the pilot so far, but I loved it. It was a real breath of fresh air after the grueling self-flagellation that is watching Game of Thrones. I read the book way back when it came out, and don't remember a whole lot about it, except that it was LOOOONG. Anybody know if this is just a one-off mini-series? Or the first season of an ongoing show?

I read on the interwebs that Martin planned to write Shireen gets sacrificed in a later book.. So it must be true. Call me crazy, but I am enjoying the TV show more than I did the books. My complaint about the books is there were too many chapters about characters I cared nothing about. And every time one of them gets offed he introduces a new one that seems to have some claim on the throne. It seemed to meander and need editing. The TV show solves much of that and tightens the whole thing up. I don't find it to be significantly more sadistic than the books either. Go reread Ramsey's wedding to Jeyne. ( Sansa's friend who pretended to be Arya to we'd a noble) it's a bit worse than what happens on the show.