DVR Overflow

I’m glad Breaking Bad likes the name Todd enough to make...

toss-stevens — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 21:13:00 -0400

I’m glad Breaking Bad likes the name Todd enough to make it the name of a recurring character. I’m also glad Breaking Bad was able to add a fantastic actor like Jesse Plemons to its ensemble. But did they have to go and pair the two, forever making America associate the name with a person who looks like the dimwitted Matt Damon doll from Team America: World Police? We Todds were just beginning to put the yam killing Iraq War vet behind us, and now this…

Just Why Exactly Is Breaking Bad Great? Aside from the fact that...

toss-stevens — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 11:32:00 -0400

Just Why Exactly Is Breaking Bad Great?

Aside from the fact that this post’s title implies other possibilities, I think - no, declare, with what tiny speck of authority I have - that Breaking Bad is worthy of the label of “great show.” Since this blog started, I’ve never questioned its status on the consensus Mount Rushmore of Golden Age television, along with The Sopranos, The Wire and Mad Men.

But of the four pantheon shows of the post-Sopranos era, Breaking Bad is easily the one that seems the most peculiar. The other three have come to somewhat define what high class television is now, mainly cerebral, oblique and dense.

In contrast, Breaking Bad is far less literary. If we equate the modern television with the New Hollywood era, people like David Chase and Matthew Weiner would be its Scorsese and Bogdanovich, while Vince Gilligan would be more akin to its William Friedkin, which is really a roundabout way of saying that the adventures and evils of Walter White are relayed to us in a much more straightforward way.

That isn’t a bad thing by any means. Walter White is unlikely to ever venture off into a Test Dream, ponderously stare down an empty elevator shaft or largely abandon us for an entire season so we can explore the life of some dock workers or middle school students. But the pulpy nature of Breaking Bad, along with Gilligan’s knack for visual quirk, allows the show to embrace a very effective style over subtlety approach that has been incredibly successful for many filmmakers (Quentin Tarantino is probably the most notable of late).

This pulpy aspect can also result in flaws - the convoluted Lily of the Valley twist at the end of the last season was a good example of how the show can overly stress its Rube Goldberg style chaos when it tries to apply some method to it - but more often it allows Breaking Bad to embrace the ways of traditional television but elevate it to much more rarefied territory.

So why is Breaking Bad a great show? Look no further than two of the key scenes from this week’s episode “Madrigal,” featuring emerging go-to character Mike Ehrmantraut, cleaning up messes the way only Mike the Cleaner can. In the scenes at the home of Mr. Chao and in front of the pleading Lydia, Mike is every bit the traditional badass that any viewer can appreciate. But the scenes are filmed in such a way to orchestrate the tension and dread to operatic levels. The vengeful hitman is about as pulpy a storyline as you can get, but when filmed with that level of skill, it transcends pulp. It’s just great.

How HBO Made It Look Like Critics Liked ‘The...

slaneofthought — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 13:11:31 -0400

How HBO Made It Look Like Critics Liked ‘The Newsroom’ (Forbes)

It’s been a long time since HBO has had a series so critically villified as The Newsroom. Though Aaron Sorkin’s show sits in the ‘comfortably mediocre’ range on rating aggregators like Metacritic, many critics have savaged the show. Yet you wouldn’t know it from the two-page ad HBO ran for the show recently, full of laudatory phrases from TV criticism’s elite. But there’s a catch:

Time’s James Poniewozik, summarizing his views on “The Newsroom” for non-subscribers, flatly declared, “I was not a fan.” Yet the ad makes it sound like he was, burbling, “The pacing is electric…captures the excitement.”

Salon’s Willa Paskin is quoted in the ad calling “The Newsroom” “captivating, riveting, rousing.” Here’s what she actually wrote: “The results are a captivating, riveting, rousing, condescending, smug, infuriating mixture, a potent potion that advertises itself as intelligence-enhancing but is actually just crazy-making.”

As the article accurately points out, movie studios have been practicing this kind of marketing deception for years — Sony went so far as to invent a completely fake critic to plant positive reviews for A Knight’s Tale. But HBO’s shows are usually so well-received that they wouldn’t need to stoop to these lows.

Hopefully the show will stick around for a few more seasons so Jeff Daniels can address the scandal himself in The Newsroom’s trademark “ripped from the headlines from two years ago” style.

THE EMMY NOMINATIONS ARE IN! As usual there’s a lot to...

slaneofthought — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:29:00 -0400

THE EMMY NOMINATIONS ARE IN!

As usual there’s a lot to like, a lot to be upset about (NO NOMINATIONS FOR COMMUNITY AGAIN?!?!?!) and a lot I don’t care about, like whether The Amazing Race wins its 478th Best Reality Show award.

Here’s a quick rundown of the categories I care about, with a little commentary for each.

Best Drama

Should Win: I’d be happy with almost any of the shows picked, but I’d lean towards Mad Men. The argument could also be made for Breaking Bad.

Shouldn’t Be Here: Of these shows, Boardwalk Empire deserves it the least, but I’m not complaining.

Was Robbed: FX’s Justified had a hell of a year, and probably deserved a nod.

Best Comedy

Should Win: Of the shows nominated, I’ve got to go with Girls. I would have argued for Louie, Parks and Recreation or Community, but every one of them was inexplicably snubbed.

Shouldn’t Be Here: The Big Bang Theory, Modern Family, and Curb Your Enthusiasm should have tapped out for the aforementioned three shows.

Was Robbed: Glee. (JK JK, Glee not being nominated for anything was the highlight of the nominations for me).

Best Actress, Drama

Should Win: Claire Danes for Homeland, or perhaps Elisabeth Moss for Mad Men.

Shouldn’t Be Here: Kathy Bates and Glenn Close. Legends, yes. Worthy this year? Not even close.

Was Robbed: Jessica Pare had enough screentime on Mad Men to warrant a lead actress nod, and she arguably had the meatier role than Moss this season.

Best Actor, Drama

Should Win: Another solid crop, but I’d go with Bryan Cranston in Breaking Bad with a slight edge over Jon Hamm and Damian Lewis of Mad Men and Homeland, respectively.

Shouldn’t Be Here: Michael C. Hall. Dexter was nearly unwatchable this season, and while Hall always finds a way to keep the show entertaining, his time has passed.

Was Robbed: Timothy Olyphant and Kelsey Grammer for Justified and Boss.

Best Actor, Comedy

Should Win: Louis CK.

Shouldn’t Be Here: The rest of the category. Specifically Jon Cryer and Don Cheadle, whose House of Lies was one of the worst comedies not on CBS or TBS last year.

Was Robbed: No one deserves it but CK, sorry.

Best Actress, Comedy

Should Win: Lena Dunham. Poehler would also be an acceptable choice, but Dunham redefined comedy for women in 2012.

Shouldn’t Be Here: Melissa McCarthy. She’s hilarious, no doubt, but Mike & Molly is not, and neither is her performance.

Was Robbed: Laura Dern was outstanding on Enlightened, but too few people saw her performance for it to be nominated.

Best Supporting Actress, Drama

Should Win: Anna Gunn or Christina Hendricks

Shouldn’t Be Here: Christine Baranski

Was Robbed: Kelly McDonald was great on Boardwalk Empire once again.

Best Supporting Actor, Drama

Should Win: Do I have to choose? Gun to my head, I’ll go with Aaron Paul, but Giancarlo Esposito or Jared Harris would do in a pinch.

Shouldn’t Be Here: No one. This category was too good for screw-ups.

Was Robbed: At least a dozen guys. A few to highlight include John Slattery and Vincent Karthieser on Mad Men, Michael Pitt on Boardwalk Empire and Dean Norris on Breaking Bad, but the list goes on an on.

Best Supporting Actor, Comedy

Should Win: Ty Burrell, as the lone remaining standout on the suddenly pedestrian Modern Family.

Shouldn’t Be Here: The rest of the Modern Family cast. With so many deserving candidates, how can Emmy voters justify giving 4 of the 6 spots to one show?

Was Robbed: Nick Offerman, Danny Pudi, Aziz Ansari, Adam Driver, and Adam Pally could hold an even better “Best Supporting Actor Inexplicably Snubbed by the Emmys” contest. My money would be on Driver in that one.

Best Supporting Actress, Comedy

Should Win: Yikes. With so many incredible women on TV, it’s amazing that Kristen Wiig is the only woman I’d like to see win this category. (To be fair, I haven’t seen Nurse Jackie, but I hear good things about Meritt Weaver).

Shouldn’t Be Here: Kathryn Joosten, Mayim Bialik, Sofia Vergara, Julie Bowen.

Was Robbed: Aubrey Plaza, Alison Brie, Maya Rudolph, Casey Wilson, Elisa Coupe, Gillian Jacobs. (In a repeat of the Best Inexplicably Snubbed group, I’d go with Brie)

Best Animated Series

Should Win: American Dad. Or maybe Futurama. Possibly Bob’s Burgers. Meh.

Shouldn’t Be Here: That Madagascar bull.

Was Robbed: HAS NO ONE SEEN THE SHOW ARCHER? NO ONE? NOT ONE GODDAMN EMMY VOTER? JESUS.

Best Variety Series

Should Win: Colbert

Shouldn’t Be Here: Maher

Was Robbed: Conan

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So, those are my thoughts, which I’m sure most of you disagree with. Feel free to let me know if you do.

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip’s Nate Corddry answers my...

toss-stevens — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 23:26:05 -0400

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip’s Nate Corddry answers my question about Aaron Sorkin’s casting decisions. I am satisfied with his response.

Predictions for Season 5 of Breaking Bad: - Mike the Cleaner...

toss-stevens — Sun, 15 Jul 2012 15:47:00 -0400

Predictions for Season 5 of Breaking Bad:

- Mike the Cleaner returns from Mexico, figures working at Walt’s car wash will allow him to still go by the name “Mike the Cleaner.”

- Skyler becomes a spokesperson for Pepsi Max, claims it tastes “exactly the same” as regular Pepsi.

- Walt starts to get paranoid when he realizes several characters on AMC shows have the exact same green Pontiac Aztec SUV.

- Jesse discovers the Meredith Brooks song “Bitch” and starts listening to it on continuous repeat (followed by a long obsession with Chris Brown’s “Yo”).

- Nobody bothers to point out that the Lily of the Valley revelation was an almost obnoxiously convoluted end to season 4.

- Everything ends up fine and all the characters live happily ever after.

New gag reel for season 3 of Community. All you need to know is...

toss-stevens — Sat, 14 Jul 2012 12:07:00 -0400

New gag reel for season 3 of Community. All you need to know is that it features Alison Brie rapping and it is glorious.

GET EXCITED, PEOPLE.

slaneofthought — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 12:08:19 -0400

GET EXCITED, PEOPLE.

I Have a Completely Rational Hatred for Mark Duplass The fourth...

toss-stevens — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 15:31:53 -0400

I Have a Completely Rational Hatred for Mark Duplass

The fourth season of FX’s The League doesn’t premiere for a couple months yet, but that doesn’t mean its stars haven’t kept busy. Paul Scheer filmed a second season of Adult Swim’s NTSF:SD:SUV:: this spring. Nick Kroll is working on the Nick Show Kroll for Comedy Central. And Mark Duplass, the ostensible lead of The League, has no less than five movies coming out this summer, which is somewhat ridiculous.

I’ve always had problems with Duplass on The League. Considering the ensemble around him, he always felt like the odd man out. The show already has a much more relatable and sympathetic comic foil in Stephen Rannazzisi, yet Duplass’ acting style isn’t manic or bizarre enough to compete with Scheer, Kroll or Jon Lajoie. He has the demeanor of an everyman but works with material better suited for a more exaggerated character. In other words, he’s the one annoying aspect of an otherwise great show.

I’ve wondered if this was just a result of poor casting. Considering Mark Duplass is somewhat of an indie film darling, having served as a leading figure in the mumblecore movement, I thought it might just be that he didn’t really fit in with The League, which isn’t necessarily his fault. It could be a similar situation to that of former Parks and Recreation cast member Paul Schneider, the proto-normal guy who never really gelled with the rest of the ensemble (Adam Scott basically stepped into that same role when Schneider left the show and has proved a much better fit).

Until recently the only other work I had seen Duplass in was Lynn Shelton’s Humpday, a movie I thought was couldn’t quite handle its high concept plot, and I hadn’t seen any of his directorial efforts with his brother Jay Duplass. But this summer is making me feel that Duplass in general is just an overrated talent. His performance in Your Sister’s Sister, another Lynn Shelton movie, fell completely flat despite the fact that he was working with two actors in Emily Blunt and Rosemarie DeWitt who tonally should be a good match for him. Meanwhile, his work in the Aubrey Plaza-starring time travel comedy Safety Not Guaranteed runs into many of the same issues that hinder him in The League - he is given a character who is a bit extreme and out there, but Duplass just doesn’t seem capable of “out there” characters.

Conclusion: The League’s creators didn’t just screw up in casting Duplass. Duplass screwed up in being Duplass. If that makes any sense. Which it probably doesn’t.

Happy Independence Day, everyone. (Text image via Alex Leo)

toss-stevens — Wed, 04 Jul 2012 11:04:24 -0400

Happy Independence Day, everyone.

(Text image via Alex Leo)

Details of Dwight Schrute’s Office Spinoff The Farm...

slaneofthought — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 11:08:43 -0400

Details of Dwight Schrute’s Office Spinoff The Farm Revealed, Including Detailed Character Descriptions

The long-discussed spinoff series for Rainn Wilson’s Office fixture Dwight Schrute is finally taking shape. TV Line posted a list of character descriptions for the new show, currently titled The Farm, and to be quite frank, it sounds pretty terrible. Call it Spinoff Skepticism or Joey Syndrome, but the idea of a Dwight-centric show already sounded pretty ludicrous, and the character list below does nothing to assuage my fears.

Here’s the known character list of The Farm, and writeups from TV Line. No word on whether Mose Schrute (Parks & Recreation showrunner Michael Schur) will have any involvement, though it seems doubtful he’ll be available for much more than a cameo given his commitments.

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FANNIE SCHRUTE | Attractive, urban and in her late 20s/early 30s, Dwight’s younger sister fled the Schrute farm life for Boston as soon as she could, and has had little to do with her roots for quite some time. Now divorced with one son, Fannie is “a bit of a pseudo-intellectual lefty” with an ironic sense of humor and a great heart.

JEB SCHRUTE | Dwight’s easygoing thirtysomething brother hasn’t done well in any of the career paths he’s followed – worm breeder and Bigfoot hunter among them — but has found some success with a pot farm. He’s got none of Dwight’s dedication or work ethic, but he has made an exercise video about things you can do with a knife and a canoe. (We like him already.)

CAMERON WHITMAN | Dwight’s smart and slightly weird 9-year-old nephew (Fannie’s son) is a cosmopolitan lad who nevertheless feels the pull of his Schrute heritage, especially when he’s around someone — his uncles, perhaps? — who can offer the fatherly guidance he lacks.

HEINRICH MANHEIM | The Schrute siblings’ great uncle is charming, greedy, manipulative… and just may have had to spend time in Argentina following World War II, thanks to his German National Socialist roots. Oh, and he vows to kill Dwight by the end of the first episode.

NEWS(ROOM) ROUNDUP The full first episode of Aaron...

slaneofthought — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 10:52:01 -0400

NEWS(ROOM) ROUNDUP

The full first episode of Aaron Sorkin’s controversial new show, The Newsroom, is now on YouTube. Smart move by HBO to make it as easy as possible for viewers to check out the show in light of negative early reviews that I touched on late last week.

On a slightly related note, for those of you who read my piece on hype and backlash from Friday, pseudo-elitist-intellectual culture site Grantland essentially proved my point by running an interview with one of their writers who had the audacity to say he actually liked the show.

Whether the interview was tongue-in-cheek or not is immaterial — though, for the record, it clearly was. What matters is that by publishing a tongue-in-cheek send-up of the backlash, Grantland is sending us down a path where Backlash — like Hype before it — becomes tired, trite, and ripe for parody. I, for one, welcome a move from the negative feedback loop of backlash, but can only wonder what societal response mechanism will be the next criticism du jour.

Until then, I’ll be counting the days until someone writes a think piece offering a reactionary post-post-neo-post-post-modern reading ofCommunity, at which point culture will collapse into a black hole of irony and self-reference.

The Newsroom is Aaron Sorkin at His Most Comfortable - And...

toss-stevens — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 11:43:00 -0400

The Newsroom is Aaron Sorkin at His Most Comfortable - And Complacent

A couple months back, after the release of the trailer for HBO’s The Newsroom, I said the following about Aaron Sorkin’s latest television project about fictional cable news anchor Will McAvoy:

The character of Will McAvoy needs to be emotionally filthy, covered in the slime that cable news personalities like Olbermann constantly spew. He needs to be an anti-hero with a particularly strong emphasis on the part before the hyphen.

At its core, I wanted this because it would lead Sorkin to explore something besides the well-worn stories he had explored in Sports Night, The West Wing and Studio 60. I wanted The Social Network Sorkin who didn’t make excuses for his characters, because lately that’s been by far the most interesting Sorkin. Now that the show’s first episode has aired, I can offer a preliminary (read: too early) verdict: We didn’t get the right Sorkin.

Kevin already presented a detailed look at Internet backlash using The Newsroom as a case study, and I’m honestly surprised at just how many people consider this some new low for Sorkin. I could understand criticism calling it repetitive or redundant. But Sorkin didn’t suddenly forget how to write. There’s nothing laughably bad about this show, the structure and presentation are competently done. In fact, this is almost EXACTLY the same Sorkin we got on every poli sci major’s favorite show ever, The West Wing. And that’s what I find disappointing.

It’s not that The West Wing was a bad show. It was a good show, which regularly showed flashes of being a very good show (just regularly enough that they stayed mere flashes though, which got regularly frustrating). But it came to existence in a completely different era of television. The West Wing premiered before the modern conceit of television as an art form was remolded by The Sopranos, which had debuted just nine months earlier. Since then, we have seen The Shield, The Wire, Deadwood, Lost, Friday Night Lights, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Justified, Game of Thrones, Homeland and other shows that were not only considerably more ambitious than The West Wing and the other shows of its era, but realized their ambitions far better. They created a whole new level of achievement above The West Wing for shows to aspire to.

Basically, with The West Wing Sorkin could talk a big game but play small and he would still get credit for a grand display because so few people even dared to imagine television being more than a mere evening diversion. He does not have that excuse anymore. The Newsroom was made in a creative environment that encourages creativity and daring and airs on a network that gives its creators ample room to spread their wings. Sorkin doesn’t take advantage of that at all here. Instead, he’s still covering the same topics and approaching the same themes in the same way with the same characters. Which can work if you’re Werner Herzog or Woody Allen, but despite the countless times he has been assigned the label of “genius” Sorkin has never worked at that level. The only time he even came close was when he diverged from his typical schtick in the aforementioned The Social Network.

I would love to see what Sorkin could do by turning McAvoy into a true hack journalist. Or even better, it would be great to see him actually focus on the negative consequences of his main character’s ferocious integrity. And in subsequent episodes or seasons, that might very well happen. But in the first episode, McAvoy is such a gigantic asshole that nearly his entire staff of dozens deserts him, yet they’re still able to break the entire 2010 BP oil spill story without a hitch. On a side note, is every event The Newsroom tackles going to be like this? Because the ACN crew broke 6 weeks worth of BP stories in the span of an afternoon. I’ll accept occasional ridiculousness in a grounded reality, but not constant ridiculousness.

Of course, like The West Wing I would still consider The Newsroom to be a good show. It’s a more than suitable Sunday night time waster, and the characters are all enjoyable, save perhaps Thomas Sadoski’s news team coup leader Don who seemingly exists just to be the guy who says “no” even when you have a clear home run story to pitch (These are pretty much the same characters Sorkin has been using for years after all. Emily Mortimer is effectively playing the same role as Felicity Huffman in Sports Night, Alison Pill pretty much has Janel Maloney’s part on The West Wing, etc.) Jeff Daniels and Mortimer are both great in the lead roles. And if nothing else, the patented Sorkin Dialogue (TM) is still incredibly entertaining. It’s at least enough to make me forgive Sorkin’s old man style dismissal of blogs & Twitter or his genuinely stupid view of American history, or even the already tired love triangle between Pill, Sadoski and John Gallagher Jr.’s characters.

But my issues with The Newsroom still come down to the question I asked at the end of my previous post, which at the time was just a lazy way to conclude my mini-essay but was, and is, still a worthwhile question. Will the freedom granted by HBO (and, for that matter, the post-Sopranos television landscape) lead Sorkin to embrace his characters’ darkness or will it just mean they can say “fuck” from time to time? So far after one episode, the answer has pretty resoundingly been the latter. But he has a full season to craft a do-over.

On Hype, Backlash, and the Value of Criticism in Today’s...

slaneofthought — Fri, 22 Jun 2012 14:28:57 -0400

On Hype, Backlash, and the Value of Criticism in Today’s Media

Aaron Sorkin’s newest rapid-fire, hyper-literate drama The Newsroom is set to debut on HBO this Sunday, and the early reviews are in.

“The Newsroom gets so bad so quickly that I found my jaw dropping.” -Emily Nussbaum, The New Yorker
“The Newsroom, after four exhausting, smug episodes, gives us none of [The West Wing’s clever dialogue]: just Aaron Sorkin writing one argument after another for himself to win.” - James Poniewozik, Time
“Sorkin’s writing lapses into self-parody, leaving savvier viewers to marvel at how quickly the show goes awry.” -Hank Stuever, The Washington Post
“When The Newsroom isn’t obvious and self-congratulatory, it’s manipulative and shrieky.” -Maureen Ryan, The Huffington Post

Of course, there are positive reviews of The Newsroom to be found as well. But in all likelihood, early coverage of the show will be simplified into a collection of pithy quotables strung together to form a larger takedown — something along the lines of “10 Reviews that Prove The Newsroom Sucks” or “Read this Epic Takedown of Aaron Sorkin’s New Show Right Now”. These are the kind of headlines Buzzfeed, Gawker, Uproxx, and HuffPo know the average internet skimmer is going to click on, so why not resort to tabloid-style pageview grabs? Or, if the culture reporter of these fine content mills is feeling especially lazy, “The 15 Funniest Reactions to The Newsroom on Twitter”, wherein a smattering of 140 character nanoreviews by comedians of varying repute are scraped from a service built on shorthanded snark.

When did the dominant form of crowdsourced criticism move from unhinged, genuflecting, excited-beyond-belief hype to detached, ironic, dismissive-wanking-motion-at-your-culture-of-choice backlash?

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Richard Rushfield explores this very subject in his essay “The Backlash Era: Smelling Sorkin Blood”, and cites early 2012 as the turning point when prevailing internet attitudes shifted from Hype to Backlash. Besides pinpointing a specific date, he raises a lot of good points as to why this shift in attitudes has occurred. His breakdown, chronologically, is essentially this:

2005: YouTube barely exists. Facebook is used exclusively by college kids. Twitter is a twinkle in Biz Stone’s eyes. Through whatever internet back channels people used to communicate back then, people begin to buzz about a film whose working title is simply Snakes on a Plane. Fans go wild for the film, envisioning a reptilian gorefest with Samuel Jackson shouting his now-famous (and fan-made) mothafucking catchphrase. Studio execs order the crew to shoot additional scenes in an attempt to meet fan expectations. It’s referred to as “the most internet-buzzed film of all time,” and despite tanking at the box office, the internet hype machine is born.

2006-2010: Subsequent internet fan campaigns — Betty White hosting SNL, fans of Chuck saving the show by eating Subway sandwiches — pop up almost weekly. Outside of entertainment, President Barack Obama is hailed as the first commander-in-chief of the internet age. Political talking head turned internet mogul Arianna Huffington says “Were it not for the internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee.” This is the golden age of internet hype, when individuals feel that their e-interactions are helping change the world, or getting Kim Possible a third season, at the very least.

2011-present: The Backlash begins to inevitably rise. Too many campaigns exist. It now becomes standard for everything — from a big-budget Hollywood film to a 10-person plumbing company in Dubuque, Iowa — to have a social media presence. Major companies spam consumers with barely-veiled “fan hashtags”, attempting to force users to share things like “Great night with a couple of Buds! #herewego” or “Can’t wait to watch #Tosh on #ComedyCentral tonight!” Fandom fatigue sets in, and for those who live on the web, fatigue quickly turns to anger. People’s previously held belief that their role in fan campaigns somehow made a difference has lead to an inflated sense of self; this is parlayed into utilization of social networks to build their own personal brand — where likes and retweets can inflate or deflate an ego, where buzz and attention are the only acceptable currencies. Facebook goes public — attempting to convert these Buzz Bucks into Real Bucks — and fails miserably, as hedge fund managers are privy to the fast-rising Backlash Model. The Backlash Era is now in full effect.

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So what does all of this mean for the average consumer? Or, for that matter, the average media critic? Will we ever be able to be genuinely excited about a TV show again, or has internet killed the television star? Has appointment viewing been permanently replaced by a detached indifference from the general populace, who will only commit to a show once it’s had a couple good seasons and is available on Netflix? For now, the answer to that question is unclear. But as long as viewers and critics alike are aware that the current negative feedback loop exists, and do their best to rise above it — consumers by conditioning themselves not to be deterred by a few negative reviews, critics by resisting the urge to issue scathing takedowns or write a show off completely based on a few early episodes — we can make it through this together.

As for The Newsroom, I’m still going to watch the show this Sunday, and probably several subsequent episodes as well. Maybe it really is as bad as some critics allege, or maybe it simply needs time to grow, and can’t be written off because of a few uneven early episodes — I’m looking at you, Seinfeld and Parks and Recreation. It would be relatively easy for me to read into the criticisms leveled at The Newsroom and write it off as a knockoff blend of Sports Night and The West Wing from an aging scriptwriting Shakespeare whose highfalutin, 80 WPM dialogue feels stale. That sounds like a plausible reason not to like the show, right? But the thing is, I’ve liked everything Sorkin has written, Moneyball and The Social Network included, and citing his dialogue as preachy and condescending is a little bit like the criticism Girls faced from the Backlash Machine earlier this year decrying it’s upper-middle class view of twentysomething urbanites. Sure there may be a relative lack of diversity, and yes, many of the show’s stars come from privileged backgrounds, but neither of those criticisms disguised the fact that Girls is an amazing show. Critics citing the first point apparently haven’t watched Friends in awhile, and critics citing the second apparently think Hollywood is a meritocracy in which no famous people’s offspring deserve to get work.

In summary: Watch what you want to watch, and try not to allow external influences deconstruct everything you love until you cease to be entertained by entertainment. But try not to live-tweet your favorite show either, because I will unfollow you immediately.

Attention Arrested Development enthusiasts: The Henry Vilas Zoo...

slaneofthought — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 14:16:00 -0400

Attention Arrested Development enthusiasts: The Henry Vilas Zoo in Madison, WI is holding a contest on Facebook to name their new baby seal, and somehow, Lucille is losing. This needs to change. Vote by visiting their Facebook page (you don’t have to ‘like’ it or anything) and help Madison avoid making a… well, you know.

Mad Men Season in Review: Have We Seen This Before? In part one...

toss-stevens — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 21:23:57 -0400

Mad Men Season in Review: Have We Seen This Before?

In part one of the final season of The Sopranos, Tony Soprano tries to turn over a new leaf and become a better person, only to revert back to his prior terrible ways by the show’s conclusion.

In season four of The Wire, Jimmy McNulty tries to shy away from his obsessive, self-destructive path and settle down a bit. But as he steps back into his regular routine in season five, the old McNulty returns.

Now season five of Mad Men ends with Don Draper sitting at a bar, facing the temptation of two beautiful strangers as a seemingly inevitable “yes” to their proposition sits behind his lips, right next to his newly repaired rotten tooth. After a season of Don avoiding the sexual allure of high class escorts, Rolling Stones fans and Joan in an attempt at pious reinvention, I ask: Haven’t we seen this routine play out before?

In this golden age of television that kicked off at the turn of the century, there are four dramas that are largely cemented in their status as the top tier: The Sopranos, The Wire, Mad Men and Breaking Bad. There are shows like The Shield or Homeland that have tried to breach the pack, but so far those shows stand solidly ahead of anything else.

But other than quality, one notable aspect that groups these shows together is that they all center themselves on the same concept: The American Dream. They all deal with an amoral anti-hero (or in the case of The Wire, a whole mess of amoral anti-heroes) trying to rise or having risen from meager circumstances to get what they feel society has to offer them, and how they corrupted themselves in the process of achieving that dream.

It’s rather shocking that what are coming to be considered the greatest efforts of American television have such narrative uniformity. And it seems that with that uniformity, this recurring aspect of “anti-hero seeks redemption but then reverts back to his old ways” has become a trope that sees endless repetition.

After last week’s episode, I wrote that Don was now and forever would be a different character. And I still think that’s true. His visions of his dead brother Adam only lend credence to that theory, particularly the unfortunately heavy-handed final appearance at the dentist’s office. But the fact that he is now a different character doesn’t mean his actions will necessarily change. It appears Mad Men is going to go down a road of echoes as it enters its last seasons. New Don will likely go through all the motions we saw in seasons one through three, if the napalm-fueled fire from his meeting with Dow is any indication. But it’s going to be a much more self-aware version of Don, a more nihilistic Don. It will be a Don that knows he is a hollow, empty shell without substance.

If Tony Soprano and Jimmy McNulty are any indication (or for that matter, Avon Barksdale, Omar Little, Tommy Carcetti and others), embracing the worst aspects of himself seems to be the only way for a high-class drama lead to go. But on the bright side, it could be worse for Don. Just ask the gaping wound that will be working directly above him next season, Peter Campbell.

Game of Thrones: Belated Season in Review **If you don’t...

toss-stevens — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 17:03:44 -0400

Game of Thrones: Belated Season in Review

**If you don’t realize that means massive spoilers, then you deserve spoilers.**

The best thing HBO’s Game of Thrones has going for it is its expansive nature. The story spans an entire continent and zips from character to character, setting to setting with incredible fluidity. Its ability to cover such a broad array of storylines in such a comprehensive and epic fashion is something possibly only seen before in The Wire, though both shows are trying to do very different things.

But this strength can also turn into Game of Thrones’ greatest weakness at times too, as its second season has been somewhat inconsistent about just how it plans to tie its great expanse together. In season one, this wasn’t much of a problem. Every character’s position at any given time was defined by their relationship to Ned Stark (Even the exception, Daenerys Targaryen, had some plot connections to King’s Landing in the assassination attempt against her). This paid off wonderfully as the season drew to a close with Ned’s shocking death in the penultimate episode and the reverberations felt around the cast in the finale.

This season hasn’t had something as concrete as an individual character to link anything together. Instead, Game of Thrones has mostly relied on thematic tie-ins, such as what it takes to be a good ruler. And often this has worked, such as in season two’s premiere where the burning comment linked characters visually and thematically by drawing on their views of the gods.

But the last two episodes of season two weren’t able to pull this off nearly as well. In the case of the episode “Blackwater” this was intentional and worked like gangbusters. Zeroing in on the battle between Stannis Baratheon and the Lannisters for King’s Landing was a great way to add some narrative diversity to the show, while also delivering a truly thrilling action spectacle. It easily made for the season’s best episode. But that very fact is telling: the best effort of the year was the episode told on the smallest scale. Contrasted with “Blackwater” before it, the season finale “Valar Morghulis” was still a terrific hour of television, but it underlined just how disparate some of the show’s elements have become.

The two widest outliers in Game of Thrones are Daenerys in the desert and Jon Snow in the north, and oftentimes these plots felt like shows completely separate from the larger focus of the War of Five Kings. But the separateness of the show has broken down even further of late, with Arya Stark’s morbid escape from Harrenhal and Brienne venturing off into wacky medieval version of Midnight Run with Jaime Lannister.

At one point the writers seemed to obliquely apologize for the lack of focus on the outlying characters (or preemptively scold people like me for criticizing that lack of focus). In the episode “The Prince of Winterfell,” when Varys and Tyrion finally (finally!) learn of the new Targaryen dragon babies, Tyrion pushes that threat aside, saying they should “focus on one war at a time.” Which is exactly what Game of Thrones did in the next episode, “Blackwater.” But other than that episode, it has been at times hard to see what many events in the show have to do with that one war.

Sometimes the show provides some other commentary on how the entire map has gotten so massive that nobody is really interconnected anymore - Theon killing all the crows in Winterfell, for example. But more often than not the lack of interplay just falls flat. Whereas Ned Stark’s decapitation echoed everywhere, the Battle of Blackwater Bay just sat there for Tywin’s horse to shit on - which was kind of the point, thematically. But the biggest moment of the season should have some impact outside of just one of your half dozen plus storylines.

The last developments in our main outlier plots seem to indicate that everything will start merging together in season three. Daenerys has finally pilfered some resources to get back to Westeros, so hopefully she’ll have more people than Jorah and Ghost Drogo to bounce off of soon. Oh, and there’s a massive army of white walker zombies heading for the wall that look a bit troublesome. That might catch the attention of the Starks and Lannisters soon enough, which will be great for season three. But for season two, these developments largely made the events proceeding them feel languid and unnecessary.

Its a credit to the Game of Thrones crew that I still consider it one of the top five shows on the air even with these issues. But if its able to combine the range and detail of season two with the focus of season one, it could be so much more than that.

The Old Don Draper Is Officially Gone **Massive spoilers follow...

toss-stevens — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 11:44:00 -0400

The Old Don Draper Is Officially Gone

**Massive spoilers follow for last night’s episode of Mad Men**

In psychology there is a concept called the locus of control. The idea refers to one’s perception over their ability to influence their own fate. A person’s locus can lean toward the internal, meaning the person feels they have control over their own life, or external, meaning the person feels largely controlled by the world around them. Generally, it’s better to have an internal locus of control than an external one. But there are certain situations where that isn’t the case.

Chief among those situations is when somebody does something terrible in reaction to your words. It doesn’t matter if those words were completely justified. It doesn’t matter if the person brought the repercussions upon themselves. It doesn’t even matter if the incident would have happened even without intervention. Just knowing that you were involved, knowing that somewhere in that web of awful, fucked up misery there is a string with your name on it is enough to generate the kind of guilt that irreparably degrades your soul.

All of this is a roundabout way of saying that the Don Draper we see from now on will not be the Don Draper we have seen for the last five years. The suicide of Lane Pryce, and the fact that it directly followed his dismissal by Don, isn’t something that will be fixed by Don’s normal strategy of forgetting it ever happened. This is Don’s most defining moment since he pulled those dog tags off the real Don Draper’s corpse, and considerably more impactful than the death of his half-brother, who he had long since cut out of his life.

It has nothing to do with whether Don deserves this. By any reasonable evaluation, he doesn’t deserve any blame at all. He was entirely in the right in asking for Lane’s dismissal. And Lane had been in a downward spiral for quite some time without any interference from Don. But going forward that’s irrelevant, because the character of Don Draper is all about control. The ability to control his image, control his life trajectory, to gain as much control over his domain as he possibly can. And now he either needs to admit that he has no control over the world or that his actions, however inocuous, led to the death of a genuinely decent human being.

All that matters is that Don will now forever be haunted by the ghost of a sad, pitiable Englishman. And every episode of Mad Men will be haunted along with him.

Just to point out a slight error in your "Game of Thrones is Anti-American" Sean Bean is not Irish, he is in fact from Sheffeild, South Yorkshire in England, just thought I'd give you heads up before someone gives you shit ;p

Fri, 01 Jun 2012 11:40:20 -0400

And would you look at that, Game of Thrones is even more UK-centric than we thought. Maybe this is HBO’s attempt to make up for casting so many English and Irish actors as streetwise Baltimore residents on The Wire. Or maybe this is simply a reaffirmation that we’ll never see a feudal show with Princes and Lords talking like they’re from Manhattan or Tallahassee.

Game of Thrones is Anti-American Game of Thrones hates America....

toss-stevens — Thu, 31 May 2012 12:55:00 -0400

Game of Thrones is Anti-American

Game of Thrones hates America. Well, not really. But that sounds a lot more interesting than what I’m actually examining. Basically, it seems a tad odd that the Game of Thrones cast is as British as it is. For a TV series that is run by two Americans, D.B. Weiss and David Benioff, and based on books by New Jersey born-and-bred George R. R. Martin, the cast is almost entirely dominated by chaps from the British Isles. And for a cast as sprawling as this one, that does seem somewhat peculiar. Here’s a breakdown of most of the show’s major players, sorted by nationality:

American

- Peter Dinklage (Tyrion Lannister)

- Jason Momoa (Khal Drogo)

English

- Lena Headey (Cersei Lannister)

- Sean Bean (Ned Stark) *CORRECTION: The first version of this post incorrectly listed Sean Bean as Irish, as I apparently have him permanently confused with his character from Patriot Games. DVR Overflow regrets the error.

- Maisie Williams (Arya Stark)

- Emilia Clarke (Daenerys Targaryen)

- Alfie Allen (Theon Greyjoy)

- Kit Harrington (Jon Snow)

- Sophie Turner (Sansa Stark)

- Isaac Hempstead-Wright (Bran Stark)

- Jerome Flynn (Bronn)

- Julian Glover (Grand Maester Pycelle)

- Donald Sumpter (Maester Luwin)

- John Bradley (Samwell Tarly)

- Gethin Anthony (Renly Baratheon)

- Esme Bianco (Ros)

- Gwendoline Christie (Brienne of Tarth)

- Mark Addy (Robert Baratheon)

- Joe Dempsie (Gendry)

- Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister)

- Eugene Simon (Lancel Lannister)

- Harry Lloyd (Viserys Targaryen)

- Stephen Dillane (Stannis Baratheon)

- Natalia Tena (Osha)

- Nonso Anozie (Xaro Xhoan Daxos)

- Gemma Whelan (Yara Greyjoy)

Scottish

- Iain Glen (Jorah Mormont)

- Ron Donachie (Ser Rodrik Cassel)

- Richard Madden (Robb Stark)

- Rory McCann (Sandor Clegane)

Irish

- Michelle Fairley (Caitlyn Stark)

- Aidan Gillen (Petyr Baelish)

- Jack Gleeson (Joffrey Baratheon)

- Conleth Hill (Lord Varys)

- Liam Cunningham (Davos Seaworth)

- Kristian Nairn (Hodor)

Danish

- Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Lannister)

Dutch

- Carice Van Houten (Mellisandre)

German

- Sibel Kekilli (Shae)

- Tom Wlaschiha (Jaqen H’ghar)

Now the fact that Dinklage is the closest thing the show has to a lead actor gives the colonies a bit of extra added presence. But particularly in season 2, Westeros has been dominated by Brits, Scots and the Irish.

One would expect that they would probably make up the bulk of the cast for various reasons. Chief among them is that the bulk of the show is shot in Ireland, so the main well of local talent is of course going to hail from that side of the Atlantic. And much of the storyline is inspired by the War of the Roses, so it makes sense to give the show a British sounding flair by casting people with British sounding accents.

But it’s not like Americans can’t do British accents. Dinklage has played Tyrion Lannister with an uppercrust English accent. Granted, the accuracy of the accent sometimes comes into question, but considering Dinklage’s performance is probably the best one on the show regardless, isn’t that further evidence that Yanks can do fine on Game of Thrones? The Lord of the Rings films seemed to do fine as well, despite featuring Americans like Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen and Sean Astin in leading roles, as well as Austrailans like Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving and pretty much the entire population of New Zealand.

So how about opening up the casting pool a little bit, Game of Thrones? Not that you don’t have an impeccable record with casting already, but there’s no need to keep things British (and Irish) just for the sake of being British. Appease us or we will dump all your tea in Boston Harbor, then blow it up with wildfire.*

*I’m actually not that angry about this, it’s a minor quibble. But based on the epicness of the last episode, it would be really cool to re-enact the Boston Tea Party with wildfire.