The Big Show featured one of my favorite sports anchors of all time, albeit a semi-ficticious one.
Keith Olbermann, of the creatively named Olbermann, featured Josh Charles who inhabited his Dan Rydell persona from SportsNight, following a big moment of his on his show The Good Wife
Olbermann introduced Charles at the top of a new segment at which point he sat at the desk as his co-anchor, reading pieces as only Dan Rydell could.
Charles is from Baltimore and even prodded voters to support former mayor and current governor Martin O'Malley. It also makes him an Orioles fan. And while there were no Orlando Rojas highlights*, Charles did do a Orioles bit.
* The episode featured Dan trying to avoid learning the result of a spring training game featuring a pitcher making a comeback, problematic considering his job as a sports anchor who is supposed to report the news.
KO also references The Cut Man*, who showed that you actually can give yourself a nickname, and Charles and Keith pay homage to fill in co-anchor Bobbie Bernstein, Dan Rydell's co-anchor Casey McCall played by Peter Krause, and show creator Aaron Sorkin.
* Hilarity ensues.
Sorkin came up with the idea for SportsNight while he was living in a hotel writing what would become The American President, and a significant amount of The West Wing*. He watched Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann doing SportsCenter, back when it was The Big Show, every night and thought about doing a show behind those scenes. Back before ESPN gave all their writing resources to Bill Simmons ** they had Page 2, which did a short piece on the show.
* And doing all the drugs.
** Who invented blogging. Did you know that?
Olbermann is a spectacular sports show if you are the sort of sports fan that is able to make the connection between football and brain damage. Or that the professional football team in the nation's capital needs to change their name. The highlights will go for several minutes in some cases. They feature hockey more than the rest of ESPN on aggregate.
SportsNight is a show to enjoy if you ever liked The West Wing, or anything Sorkin's written. It premiered in 1998 and ran for two seasons. Much of the main cast went on to other shows like Six Feet Under, The Good Wife, The West Wing and Desperate Housewives.
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Monday, March 31, 2014
Thursday, March 27, 2014
The Toll - Justified
Justified
Episode 5-11
"The Toll"
Written by Benjamin Cavell of "Good Intentions" earlier this season
Directed by Jon Avnet who directed episodes of Boomtown, a cousin of Justified
Body Count
Picker, done by Boyd in the hotel room with cigarette masked bomb. And boydid he get blowed up. There's nothing left but a body cavity with a Picker head. Sheesh.
Continuing to cull the herd of shitkickers, roughnecks, morons, crimelords and wannabes, something that has been a constant this season
Things
For a hot second it looks like Tim and Raylan are going to embark on an epic rogue manhunt for Darryl Jr, something that would bring to mind the great Get Drew/Decoy Western of last season. Instead the show goes near bottle episode. Much of the action takes place in the hotel room or marshal office.
Nothing will unite a team like a grave injury to its leader. With all the conflict between Raylan and Art, nothing puts Raylan in his place, staying by the side of the acting marshal like his guilt and his sincere affection for Art, however deep it is buried at the time.
Art's been looking at retirement for a long time which in cop drama means he's going to get shot at some point.
Similarly, nothing is going to piss Raylan off more than Daryl making Kendall take the fall for the shooting, if that is indeed the case. To tell the truth, it doesn't matter what the facts are because this is what Raylan believes, and he's going to take it out on Daryl, for spoiling the version he sees of himself. Raylan doesn't even know at this point that Daryl took the Caller Number Seven money he gave Kendall.
Ava's One Thing
For the first time she may be in a better situation than previously, as the former Christian gang pays homage via ice cream cups. Maybe that is to lull us into a false sense of calm, as Ava has still only smuggled zero heroins into the prison.
Episode 5-11
"The Toll"
Written by Benjamin Cavell of "Good Intentions" earlier this season
Directed by Jon Avnet who directed episodes of Boomtown, a cousin of Justified
Body Count
Picker, done by Boyd in the hotel room with cigarette masked bomb. And boydid he get blowed up. There's nothing left but a body cavity with a Picker head. Sheesh.
Continuing to cull the herd of shitkickers, roughnecks, morons, crimelords and wannabes, something that has been a constant this season
Things
For a hot second it looks like Tim and Raylan are going to embark on an epic rogue manhunt for Darryl Jr, something that would bring to mind the great Get Drew/Decoy Western of last season. Instead the show goes near bottle episode. Much of the action takes place in the hotel room or marshal office.
Nothing will unite a team like a grave injury to its leader. With all the conflict between Raylan and Art, nothing puts Raylan in his place, staying by the side of the acting marshal like his guilt and his sincere affection for Art, however deep it is buried at the time.
Art's been looking at retirement for a long time which in cop drama means he's going to get shot at some point.
Similarly, nothing is going to piss Raylan off more than Daryl making Kendall take the fall for the shooting, if that is indeed the case. To tell the truth, it doesn't matter what the facts are because this is what Raylan believes, and he's going to take it out on Daryl, for spoiling the version he sees of himself. Raylan doesn't even know at this point that Daryl took the Caller Number Seven money he gave Kendall.
Ava's One Thing
For the first time she may be in a better situation than previously, as the former Christian gang pays homage via ice cream cups. Maybe that is to lull us into a false sense of calm, as Ava has still only smuggled zero heroins into the prison.
- I can't remember what happened to the mail order Bosnian doctor wife.
- "The Toll" brings to mind "The Cost" which is a Season One episode of The Wire with a similar development to this one
- They conspicuously focus on Boyd's cigarettes, when he first gets one, when he's frisked and while he sits there so you know something's up. With Boyd's background a bomb wasn't a bad guess. It brought to mind the time bomb in Stalag 17
- Hoping this woman carries on through the remainder of the series
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Weight - Justified
Justified
Episode 5-10
"Weight"
Written by Taylor Elmore of last season's "The Hatchet Tour" and Keith Schreir of last season's "Outlaw"
Directed by John Dahl whose done episodes for Breaking Bad, The Americans and Homeland
Easily my favorite episode of the season.
Most of the season's main aspects have been disconnected from each other which is unusual for the Justified universe. However, the tenuous alliance between Crowder and Crowe, along with Raylan following a lead on the heroin, and the conclusion of the Mexico trip, have begun to bring the stories together for what in my opinion was the strongest episode of the season.
George RR Martin could take a cue fro Graham Yost about bringing the different storylines together. While they were separated by geography for much of the season, with episodes set in Detroit, Mexico, Florida, Tennesee, and Kentucky, everything always comes back to Harlan. While we know this season will be over in a few weeks, I personally doubt GRRM is going to finish his series in the next two books, as he said he would. I think we're in store for a third one, making eight total.
Ava's death seems as likely as ever, as she's now severed her relationship with Boyd and only finds herself in worse and worse situations, no matter how she tries to get out of them.
A few of my favorite things
Episode 5-10
"Weight"
Written by Taylor Elmore of last season's "The Hatchet Tour" and Keith Schreir of last season's "Outlaw"
Directed by John Dahl whose done episodes for Breaking Bad, The Americans and Homeland
Easily my favorite episode of the season.
Most of the season's main aspects have been disconnected from each other which is unusual for the Justified universe. However, the tenuous alliance between Crowder and Crowe, along with Raylan following a lead on the heroin, and the conclusion of the Mexico trip, have begun to bring the stories together for what in my opinion was the strongest episode of the season.
George RR Martin could take a cue fro Graham Yost about bringing the different storylines together. While they were separated by geography for much of the season, with episodes set in Detroit, Mexico, Florida, Tennesee, and Kentucky, everything always comes back to Harlan. While we know this season will be over in a few weeks, I personally doubt GRRM is going to finish his series in the next two books, as he said he would. I think we're in store for a third one, making eight total.
Ava's death seems as likely as ever, as she's now severed her relationship with Boyd and only finds herself in worse and worse situations, no matter how she tries to get out of them.
A few of my favorite things
- Raylan's correct use of "whence"
- Parker Stevenson sounds like it should actually be someone's name, and it is
- They brought the funny!
- "Raylandonthangupitsdickeybennett!"
- Briefcase of money
- Subverting expectations with extreme prejudice (this week's 21 foot showdown)
- Introduction of possibly another cunning, ruthless and beautiful woman
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Wrong Roads - Justfied
Justified
Episode 5-09
"Wrong Roads"
Written by Dave Andron, of many episodes, and Leonard Chang, of some episodes
Directed by Michael Dinner, also of many episodes. Notably, he was also an executive producer on the Elmore Leonard inspired Karen Sisco who also popped up in the Justifed world.
You have to appreciate the United Nations of Assholes meeting at Audrey's. Like the gorillas who freeze death after eating the snakes who ate the lizards who ate the pigeons, Daryl wants a meeting with Boyd, crashed by HR's guys, crashed by Raylan and Miller.
All resulting in the some quotes from King Lear, and the line of the night, possibly the season: "Raylan, can I be excused from the table?
Ava has her one thing per episode happen but it is a doozy. Dr. Rowena wants her to kill the prison den mother.
Poor Dewey. He would just be the idiot wherever he happens to be. Here is happens to be rural racist Kentucky being a pawn with Boyd or Daryl or whoever happens to need him. Plus he gets picked on by everyone and it sucks to be forced to be around people who simultaneously don't want to be around you, but make you stick around.
Delayed post due to the DVR cutting off the last 20 minutes of this episode.
The Justified-esque elements
Episode 5-09
"Wrong Roads"
Written by Dave Andron, of many episodes, and Leonard Chang, of some episodes
Directed by Michael Dinner, also of many episodes. Notably, he was also an executive producer on the Elmore Leonard inspired Karen Sisco who also popped up in the Justifed world.
You have to appreciate the United Nations of Assholes meeting at Audrey's. Like the gorillas who freeze death after eating the snakes who ate the lizards who ate the pigeons, Daryl wants a meeting with Boyd, crashed by HR's guys, crashed by Raylan and Miller.
All resulting in the some quotes from King Lear, and the line of the night, possibly the season: "Raylan, can I be excused from the table?
Ava has her one thing per episode happen but it is a doozy. Dr. Rowena wants her to kill the prison den mother.
Poor Dewey. He would just be the idiot wherever he happens to be. Here is happens to be rural racist Kentucky being a pawn with Boyd or Daryl or whoever happens to need him. Plus he gets picked on by everyone and it sucks to be forced to be around people who simultaneously don't want to be around you, but make you stick around.
Delayed post due to the DVR cutting off the last 20 minutes of this episode.
The Justified-esque elements
- Using the pencil as a weapon
- The hard drinking, seemingly corrupt, DEA agent
- Paying off the 21 foot rule with a nightime showdown on the highway
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Form & Void - True Detective - Part 3
The format of True Detective, continued
We'll see the anthology format again this spring with Fargo on FX, featuring John Watson. And maybe it will be something that will become more popular in coming years, considering the success of True Detective.
One of the benefits of cable seasons is they are only thirteen episodes, freeing the actors to do other projects such as movies or other television shows. Allowing the freedom to move about, rather than lock someone into 22 episodes a year for multiple years has to be appealing to actors.
It will also allow the shows to recruit star power similar to the level of True Detective with McConaughey and Harrelson. McConaughey's television career consists of little more than a cameo on Eastbound and Down, plus some voiceover work and appearing on Unsolved Mysteries waaay back when. Woody's only has had one semi-regular role, on Will and Grace, since Cheers launched him into his movie career. Everything else is a one off guest spot or voiceover work. Understandable considering the monetary difference between television and movies over that time, as well as the stringent requirements of television.
Doing a show with one season and done will be appealing to actors, as it allows them to truly get into a character in a way not as possible with movies. David Fincher said it well when talking about the reason he wanted to do House of Cards, addressing both teh high quality, the freedoms it allows and why 13 episodes is a-okay:
If you're working in the movie business, you’re thinking in terms of you have this two-hour form that requires a kind of ballistic narrative that doesn’t always allow for characterizations to be that complex, or that deep, or that layered, or that you can reveal slowly and be as faceted. And I felt for the past ten years that the best writing that was happening for actors was happening in television. And so I had been looking to do something that was longer form. I never said I was going to hold my breath until somebody offers me 26 hours. And when they did it was sort of shocking when you try to kind of wrap your mind around the number of different storylines that it’s going to take to fill 26 hours. It can be a particularly daunting experience. But I had liked the idea of doing something either on premium cable that could be challenging to an audience of adults in terms of its drama and subject matter.
There's even other options now for the medium in which the art is shared. It requires thought about how best to view a show, and the acknowledgement that the best medium depends on the type of show.
For example, I love House of Cards. And I love the medium that it comes from, allowing me to watch all of Season Two over President's Day weekend, rather than my usual History Channel presidential marathon.
House of Cards is essentially pulp though. It doesn't take away from how fun or twisted or creative the show is, or how well Spacey and Wright act. But it is pulp. It can be consumed in large quantities very quickly. So making thirteen episodes available together works for the show. House of Cards is a page turner, but not an exercise in deep thought. Which is just an observation and not a judgement.* Another show that would lend itself to this format would be 24, which saw returns on its four episode mini-marathon years ago. As a page turner, something like The Davinci Code* would be a lot of fun for streaming relase as well. Not the Great American Novel, but a fun read. It is a bag of Doritos, which is completely delicious and gone in a single sitting and no I'm not sorry.
* If I watched nothing to True Detective, life would be rough.
* Dan Brown's book was a candidate for what a show like 24 would be about
True Detective, despite being a serial/novel/whatever, is still in my opinion best suited to the weekly format. The show, especially as it gained steam, benefited from digestion. And while it did not include supernatural elements, it did have a mystical tone to it, which is a quality that lends itself to discussion and going down those Internet rabbit holes. One of the best parts of shows like this are the conversations you can have about theories. Binge watching may be better suited for subsequent viewings of the show, which I no doubt will do.
Or, it could be the complete opposite. Going down those rabbit holes can affect ones expectations of a show by getting pulled into conversations that are way off base. Viewing the show in a vacuum could allow you to form your own opinion and expectations, free of some of the nonsense that a show like True Detective generates.
The Wire splits the difference, probably best viewed on DVD in short bursts, which is probably how most people became acquainted with it (based on the number of people who say they watched, and the ratings on HBO). Digestion is required but details are easy to miss over 13 weeks. The show gives you a lot to think about, and if you watch a season in a weekend, you may miss the forest for the trees. But if you spread it out over three months, some items in later episodes may not have the same impact due to a lack of remembering details from early episodes.
Lost is a victim of the format and was at its best in Season One, and then again later when seasons were shortened and more or less ran in consecutive weeks without breaking. There are so many episodes, that it is impossible now to space them out and still finish. It's also impossible to not get spoiled on the show if you were to do any research during intermission. The show benefited from character based flashbacks and plot based island action, which, by the end we realized thanks to the flashback revelations, was secretly character driven as well.
One of the big differences that may point a show in one direction or another is if it is plot based or character based. Despite the conspiracy sprawl, True Detective is character based. A show does not need to have loads and loads of characters in order to be character based, as it is quality not quantity. Everything in the True Detective universe exists to provide insight to Rust or Cohle, or to provoke a reaction by them. House of Cards is plot based, creating the page turning atmosphere of a Dan Brown novel. One is not better than the other, it may just depend on preference and mood.*
* An interesting case is Homeland, which in the first season seemed more character based, but moved to be more plot based in Season Two.
True Detective may tell a different type of story next year, and with a different director, may be best viewed in a different way. The tough part is, we can't know the best way until after we've viewed it. Another possibility is that the differences are marginal enough to make no difference, or that most viewers do not place a priority on it as much as weirdos like me. Probably the latter.
Two Players, Two Sides.
One is light, one is dark.
Pizzolatto told us the agenda would be clear by the end, and it was. The battle between good and evil, light and dark ( in this case, as told through Rust and Cohle's actions, catalyzed by the Lang investigation) is as old as time, but doesn't feel that way.
We've seen it in television before, whether via Jacob and his brother on Lost/by proxy Jack and Locke, or on Twin Peaks seeing the struggle between the forces of Mike and Bob.
The showdown happens in the arena/Carcosa/Civil War fort between Rust and Childress. Both willing if not expecting to die trying to attain their goal. For Rust, it is to take down the "bad man". For Childress, it is less clear, but here's one opinion.
The Yellow King mythos provided a mystical backdrop for Childress as a character and for the investigation as a story. Rather than be a simple devil worshipper, something already seen in stories, the Yellow King helps True Detective stand out as unique. The mystical nature let us run down rabbit holes and enjoy the show even more, but at the same time was not so dominant that it held the entire story hostage. Since the first episode, enough has been fleshed out so this story doesn't live or die on the quality of any single aspect. The last episode is when we get treated to the most clues.
The peek at Childress at the episodes open gives some insight into the final scenes. It's the first time, besides Maggie's sit down with Papania and Gilbough, that the story isn't told through Rust and Marty.
Childress said he hasn't made his mark, probably his literal spiral mark on the back of victims, in weeks. Probably three weeks because that was the last time he was "giving flowers" to his sister (and would also be approximately the time the last case surfaced).
He seems to be anticipating the showdown, and through those acts, attain some kind of higher plan. In preparation, he giving flowers again, which I bet is part of his preparation or ritual every time he does this.
Because Childress is so devout to his Yellow King cult he lives his life so that everything is done to advance his goal of attaining that higher plane, the goal of ascending beyond the disc in the loop, the flat circle. By ascending to that higher plane and breaking free of the loop, he can attain something. The domestic and the half sister speak about existing beyond life, being there before and after death. So perhaps Childress is seeking eternal life, gained through practice of these rituals and sacrifice, done in the name of the Yellow King. Everything he's done has bee in the name of this journey, the journey he allowed Reggie to be witness to. So, because it's time again, he "gives flowers" and prepares to ascend by meeting Rust in Carcosa.
We'll see the anthology format again this spring with Fargo on FX, featuring John Watson. And maybe it will be something that will become more popular in coming years, considering the success of True Detective.
One of the benefits of cable seasons is they are only thirteen episodes, freeing the actors to do other projects such as movies or other television shows. Allowing the freedom to move about, rather than lock someone into 22 episodes a year for multiple years has to be appealing to actors.
It will also allow the shows to recruit star power similar to the level of True Detective with McConaughey and Harrelson. McConaughey's television career consists of little more than a cameo on Eastbound and Down, plus some voiceover work and appearing on Unsolved Mysteries waaay back when. Woody's only has had one semi-regular role, on Will and Grace, since Cheers launched him into his movie career. Everything else is a one off guest spot or voiceover work. Understandable considering the monetary difference between television and movies over that time, as well as the stringent requirements of television.
Doing a show with one season and done will be appealing to actors, as it allows them to truly get into a character in a way not as possible with movies. David Fincher said it well when talking about the reason he wanted to do House of Cards, addressing both teh high quality, the freedoms it allows and why 13 episodes is a-okay:
f
you're working in the movie business, you’re thinking in terms of you
have this two-hour form that requires a kind of ballistic narrative that
doesn’t always allow for characterizations to be that complex, or that
deep, or that layered, or that you can reveal slowly and be as
faceted. And I felt for the past ten years that the best writing that
was happening for actors was happening in television. And so I had been
looking to do something that was longer form. I never said I was going
to hold my breath until somebody offers me 26 hours. And when they did
it was sort of shocking when you try to kind of wrap your mind around
the number of different storylines that it’s going to take to fill 26
hours. It can be a particularly daunting experience. But I had liked the
idea of doing something either on premium cable that could be
challenging to an audience of adults in terms of its drama and subject
matter.
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
If you're working in the movie business, you’re thinking in terms of
you have this two-hour form that requires a kind of ballistic narrative
that doesn’t always allow for characterizations to be that complex, or
that deep, or that layered, or that you can reveal slowly and be as
faceted. And I felt for the past ten years that the best writing that
was happening for actors was happening in television. And so I had been
looking to do something that was longer form. I never said I was going
to hold my breath until somebody offers me 26 hours. And when they did
it was sort of shocking when you try to kind of wrap your mind around
the number of different storylines that it’s going to take to fill 26
hours. It can be a particularly daunting experience. But I had liked the
idea of doing something either on premium cable that could be
challenging to an audience of adults in terms of its drama and subject
matter.
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
If you're working in the movie business, you’re thinking in terms of
you have this two-hour form that requires a kind of ballistic narrative
that doesn’t always allow for characterizations to be that complex, or
that deep, or that layered, or that you can reveal slowly and be as
faceted. And I felt for the past ten years that the best writing that
was happening for actors was happening in television. And so I had been
looking to do something that was longer form. I never said I was going
to hold my breath until somebody offers me 26 hours. And when they did
it was sort of shocking when you try to kind of wrap your mind around
the number of different storylines that it’s going to take to fill 26
hours. It can be a particularly daunting experience. But I had liked the
idea of doing something either on premium cable that could be
challenging to an audience of adults in terms of its drama and subject
matter.
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/house-of-cards-director-david-fincher-on-making-13-hours-for-netflix#cJuEPvSJ4i6mou42.99
If you're working in the movie business, you’re thinking in terms of you have this two-hour form that requires a kind of ballistic narrative that doesn’t always allow for characterizations to be that complex, or that deep, or that layered, or that you can reveal slowly and be as faceted. And I felt for the past ten years that the best writing that was happening for actors was happening in television. And so I had been looking to do something that was longer form. I never said I was going to hold my breath until somebody offers me 26 hours. And when they did it was sort of shocking when you try to kind of wrap your mind around the number of different storylines that it’s going to take to fill 26 hours. It can be a particularly daunting experience. But I had liked the idea of doing something either on premium cable that could be challenging to an audience of adults in terms of its drama and subject matter.
There's even other options now for the medium in which the art is shared. It requires thought about how best to view a show, and the acknowledgement that the best medium depends on the type of show.
For example, I love House of Cards. And I love the medium that it comes from, allowing me to watch all of Season Two over President's Day weekend, rather than my usual History Channel presidential marathon.
House of Cards is essentially pulp though. It doesn't take away from how fun or twisted or creative the show is, or how well Spacey and Wright act. But it is pulp. It can be consumed in large quantities very quickly. So making thirteen episodes available together works for the show. House of Cards is a page turner, but not an exercise in deep thought. Which is just an observation and not a judgement.* Another show that would lend itself to this format would be 24, which saw returns on its four episode mini-marathon years ago. As a page turner, something like The Davinci Code* would be a lot of fun for streaming relase as well. Not the Great American Novel, but a fun read. It is a bag of Doritos, which is completely delicious and gone in a single sitting and no I'm not sorry.
* If I watched nothing to True Detective, life would be rough.
* Dan Brown's book was a candidate for what a show like 24 would be about
True Detective, despite being a serial/novel/whatever, is still in my opinion best suited to the weekly format. The show, especially as it gained steam, benefited from digestion. And while it did not include supernatural elements, it did have a mystical tone to it, which is a quality that lends itself to discussion and going down those Internet rabbit holes. One of the best parts of shows like this are the conversations you can have about theories. Binge watching may be better suited for subsequent viewings of the show, which I no doubt will do.
Or, it could be the complete opposite. Going down those rabbit holes can affect ones expectations of a show by getting pulled into conversations that are way off base. Viewing the show in a vacuum could allow you to form your own opinion and expectations, free of some of the nonsense that a show like True Detective generates.
The Wire splits the difference, probably best viewed on DVD in short bursts, which is probably how most people became acquainted with it (based on the number of people who say they watched, and the ratings on HBO). Digestion is required but details are easy to miss over 13 weeks. The show gives you a lot to think about, and if you watch a season in a weekend, you may miss the forest for the trees. But if you spread it out over three months, some items in later episodes may not have the same impact due to a lack of remembering details from early episodes.
Lost is a victim of the format and was at its best in Season One, and then again later when seasons were shortened and more or less ran in consecutive weeks without breaking. There are so many episodes, that it is impossible now to space them out and still finish. It's also impossible to not get spoiled on the show if you were to do any research during intermission. The show benefited from character based flashbacks and plot based island action, which, by the end we realized thanks to the flashback revelations, was secretly character driven as well.
One of the big differences that may point a show in one direction or another is if it is plot based or character based. Despite the conspiracy sprawl, True Detective is character based. A show does not need to have loads and loads of characters in order to be character based, as it is quality not quantity. Everything in the True Detective universe exists to provide insight to Rust or Cohle, or to provoke a reaction by them. House of Cards is plot based, creating the page turning atmosphere of a Dan Brown novel. One is not better than the other, it may just depend on preference and mood.*
* An interesting case is Homeland, which in the first season seemed more character based, but moved to be more plot based in Season Two.
True Detective may tell a different type of story next year, and with a different director, may be best viewed in a different way. The tough part is, we can't know the best way until after we've viewed it. Another possibility is that the differences are marginal enough to make no difference, or that most viewers do not place a priority on it as much as weirdos like me. Probably the latter.
Two Players, Two Sides.
One is light, one is dark.
Pizzolatto told us the agenda would be clear by the end, and it was. The battle between good and evil, light and dark ( in this case, as told through Rust and Cohle's actions, catalyzed by the Lang investigation) is as old as time, but doesn't feel that way.
We've seen it in television before, whether via Jacob and his brother on Lost/by proxy Jack and Locke, or on Twin Peaks seeing the struggle between the forces of Mike and Bob.
The showdown happens in the arena/Carcosa/Civil War fort between Rust and Childress. Both willing if not expecting to die trying to attain their goal. For Rust, it is to take down the "bad man". For Childress, it is less clear, but here's one opinion.
The Yellow King mythos provided a mystical backdrop for Childress as a character and for the investigation as a story. Rather than be a simple devil worshipper, something already seen in stories, the Yellow King helps True Detective stand out as unique. The mystical nature let us run down rabbit holes and enjoy the show even more, but at the same time was not so dominant that it held the entire story hostage. Since the first episode, enough has been fleshed out so this story doesn't live or die on the quality of any single aspect. The last episode is when we get treated to the most clues.
The peek at Childress at the episodes open gives some insight into the final scenes. It's the first time, besides Maggie's sit down with Papania and Gilbough, that the story isn't told through Rust and Marty.
Childress said he hasn't made his mark, probably his literal spiral mark on the back of victims, in weeks. Probably three weeks because that was the last time he was "giving flowers" to his sister (and would also be approximately the time the last case surfaced).
He seems to be anticipating the showdown, and through those acts, attain some kind of higher plan. In preparation, he giving flowers again, which I bet is part of his preparation or ritual every time he does this.
Because Childress is so devout to his Yellow King cult he lives his life so that everything is done to advance his goal of attaining that higher plane, the goal of ascending beyond the disc in the loop, the flat circle. By ascending to that higher plane and breaking free of the loop, he can attain something. The domestic and the half sister speak about existing beyond life, being there before and after death. So perhaps Childress is seeking eternal life, gained through practice of these rituals and sacrifice, done in the name of the Yellow King. Everything he's done has bee in the name of this journey, the journey he allowed Reggie to be witness to. So, because it's time again, he "gives flowers" and prepares to ascend by meeting Rust in Carcosa.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Form and Void - True Detective - Part 2.....
The format of True Detective
The unique anthology format of True Detective allows for the close ended story that will avoid questions about creative direction or payoff for the viewers. The way it was executed was very similar to a novel, even more so than The Wire which may have been the first contemporary show to prominently use this technique.
Further into this is the meta-novel or meta-story of True Detective. One aspect that was featured often, particularly in early episodes, was the idea of story telling. So True Detective is a story about storytelling, or a meta-story*.
* Think about metadata
The point is driven home by the fact that Pizzolato wrote every episode and Fukagama directed every episode which would keep consistent the themes of the story, one of which is storytelling, in a way more pointed than other shows. With the show having shot for 100 days, and the scripts having been worked on by Pizzolato for several years, it will be interesting to see if they can continue this consistency next season, and if they will be able to secure the same director for all episodes, or even if this is something they desire to do.
Q&A
The unique anthology format of True Detective allows for the close ended story that will avoid questions about creative direction or payoff for the viewers. The way it was executed was very similar to a novel, even more so than The Wire which may have been the first contemporary show to prominently use this technique.
Further into this is the meta-novel or meta-story of True Detective. One aspect that was featured often, particularly in early episodes, was the idea of story telling. So True Detective is a story about storytelling, or a meta-story*.
* Think about metadata
The point is driven home by the fact that Pizzolato wrote every episode and Fukagama directed every episode which would keep consistent the themes of the story, one of which is storytelling, in a way more pointed than other shows. With the show having shot for 100 days, and the scripts having been worked on by Pizzolato for several years, it will be interesting to see if they can continue this consistency next season, and if they will be able to secure the same director for all episodes, or even if this is something they desire to do.
Q&A
- Ultimately, what is Carcosa? Is it a location?
- I think it is just the name for the location where they do the deeds.
- The domestic's cry about death not being the end is probably tied into the ritual
- The ritual may believe these girls pass on to another plan
- Carcosa, in the original Brose piece, is the setting for a being who returns to his town (I guess) after dying
- This all appears to be accurate, as Childress led Rust into the arena.
- What is the sheriff's connection to Fontaineau and the Tuttles?
- None apparently. He just didn't rock the boat when Childress altered the report
- Who is the guy cutting grass? Who is his family, the one that's been around these parts for a looooong time?
- Errol Childress. A part of the extended Tuttle family.
- What is Senator Eddie Tuttle's involvement at this point?
- The AG is a Tuttle and they still have enough juice to quash rumors about the Tuttles involvement
- Will Rust's hallucinations come back?
- Yep! Immediately before Childress plunged that knife into him
- What are the green ears?
- Leftover from a job, painting a house green. Last lead that allows Rust and Marty to connect Childress to the killings.
- What evidence has Rust gathered over the last ten years?
- Most notably, Rev. Tuttle's video tape and photos
- What did Rev. Tuttle know and when did he know it?
- All of it and probably forever.
- Just how Penn State are the Tuttle schools?
- They are branch campuses for the main campus, Penn State: Carcosa
- What is the connection between the Yellow King and Tuttle?
- It appears YK is the thing they worship
- Did Rust murder Tuttle?
- He says 'no'. Seems Rev. Tuttle's own people got to him
Monday, March 10, 2014
Form and Void - True Detective - Part 1....
2012
"Form and Void" takes place entirely in 2012, as we've caught up with all the other timelines. All that is left is for Rust and Cohle to connect what they have to Lawnmower Man, finding out exactly who he is.
What we know
The killer is most likely and illegitimate child from one of the Tuttles, possibly a Childress based on a common name between their interview with the domestic and tampered police records. It's apparent the Childress family has connections in law enforcement as well, just as the Tuttles have connections throughout the state, with resources to hide this practice that has gone on for, apparently, generations, by, ostensibly, many men in the Tuttle family and extended family. The killer likely collected the victims for the child sacrifices and whatever other unspeakable acts the Tuttles did to them, and may or may not have participated in the rituals himself.
For the first time in the series, we know more than Rust and Marty. Until this point, they've been doling out zero new information to Suck and Fuck, holding back things like the Ledoux murder and the reason for their split. Now, we know exactly who the killer is and what he looks like. We know he does landscape type work by contract for public entities and schools. It's time for Rust and Marty to catch the viewers, the Tralfamadorians.
Solving for Childress
The sheriff turns out to be a giant asshole but not more complicit in the YK killings than anyone else. He admits his reports were altered by Sheriff Childress, but Childress' death makes it a dead end for Rust and Marty.
Back to square one, Marty focuses on the green ears and notices the freshly painted house from their old casefiles. Going to the house, then to the grandmother who lived there, they get enough information to run down the lead. Using tax records again, they look up the woman's husband's records using his employer, finding the painters that did the house via the write off, then running down the painters via business license.
Lo and behold, it's Childress again.
I assume they get the address from the expired business license. Marty and Rust go there to apprehend him for the gruesome crime of operating without a license.
Rust's insurance policy is to mail his evidence, including copies of the tape, to local and national news outlets, as well as law enforcement agencies, should anything happen to him. If you're looking into police corruption, it never hurts to have a cop hating ex sniper on your side.
The Never Ending Loop
The raid on the Childress place brings to mind the raid on the Ledoux place. Again, Marty goes off on his own throughout the house and makes some gruesome discoveries. Only this time, the suspect makes off, leading him on a chase into Carcosa, which appears to be their home field for all the sacrifice. Again, the suspects gets his head blowed off. Again, they can't find all the answers they need. Again, they recover prisoners from the compound.
The End
Before the hand to hand combat in the arena, Childress confirms he was the ringleader back in 1995 as well with Ledoux and friend learning from him*. Amazingly, Marty and Rust survive, despite Childress plunging a knife into Rust and wailing a hatchet into Marty. Marty is even happy for the first time in the series when he sees his ex wife and daughters visit him in the hospital.
* I get the sense more and more that Ledoux was a 'wannabe' or 'poseur' in terms of the Yellow King worship. He was a meth cook who through his twisted family connection was brought into the circle as a pawn and bought into it hard. When he was kneeling on the ground, he spouted the Yellow King fact sheet and sounded more like a follower than a leader.
Regardless of how Rust obtained the rest of the evidence, the remains found on Childress' land, along with his imprisoned and stitched closed father are enough for the law and the media to close the case on a lot of these crimes. Unfortunately, the case still is not built out enough to solidly connect the Tuttles and extended family to these rituals, despite rumor and circumstantial evidence. Some of the evidence, obtained illegally and belonging to a dead man, is not enough to condemn them, and the remaining Tuttles, one as the attorney general, are able to quash it from at minimum a legal perspective. The birth records are no help either and were likely altered or destroyed by the Tuttles and blamed on a hurricane or two.
The Yellow King
It appears to be part of the ritual these Tuttles participated in, however, will go unexplained with the participants being dead or unknown. It's also entirely possible that the remaining Tuttles are far enough removed from this nonsense that they are not quashing it to save their hides, but to save the family name, sincerely believing this is the act of a few mad men tangentially connected to the family.
What I took it to be is that these guys practice devil worship, only instead of the devil they direct their worship to the Yellow King, whatever it is. It's less important to know the details of the ritual or of their beliefs than to know that they existed and were the impetus for the acts they committed.
The guy they ultimately get had to be incredibly creepy, and Childress was no disaapointment in that respect. With sister-wife living in filth, his father tied to a bed with his mouth stiched closed, and Chilrdess himself moving in and out of accents like James Moriarty, I had to brush away the imaginary ants crawling over my skin.
Reaction
My prediction was that this will be panned as the "worst" episode of True Detective. This is a prediction I made before watching a second of the episode.
I don't think there is a worst episode however. I think the first episode was the first episode and did what the first episode was supposed to do...a format that continued all the way until last night when the eight and final episode did what the eighth and final episode was meant to do. It is difficult to "grade" any episode against anything but itself, as each episode had its own purpose and goals to accomplish. So how anyone could rate and episode that aims to accomplish one set of performance metrics against an episode that aims to accomplish a different set of performance metrics seems unfair. But that is the state of television opinion having.
True Detective, more than any other show, subscribes to the beginning-middle-end format. Usually with a season finale, there are threads raised for where the characters will go in the coming season. For example, in the waning minutes of Game of Thrones Season One finale, Tyrion is made (acting) Hand of the King, something that will dominate not only his story, but much of the story in Kings Landing in Season Two. Here, the story is close-ened.*
* I would not be surprised if there are winks and nods to Season One in subsequent seasons, as a way of acknowledging the stories operate in the same universe. Stephen King does this throughout his works. For example, Apt Pupil makes note of an Andy Dufresne.
Much of the answers about the conspiracy were spelled out in Episode Seven, and for the finale's benefit. Rather than cram a lot into the final hour, we were treated to an incredibly suspenseful Buffalo Bill gladiatorial combat scene in Carcosa. The episode felt well paced, not feeling like time was wasted or rushed. It allowed viewers to take everything in, even if you watched certain sequences through your fingers like I did.
Anytime a show incorporates a mythology, it leaves itself open to criticism no matter how the series ends. I think the point of incorporating the Yellow King into True Detective is both functional and mystical. It is functional from the point of giving a reason for the killer(s) to commit these acts, and does it in the name of something besides "devil" worship. It is mystical in the sense that we don't completely understand it, without it being a supernatural element. As far as we can tell, the Yellow King worship is an unreal escape from the world, just as how Rust views religion in general.
The Yellow King drives readers insane in Chambers' works.
The Carcosa mythology extends decades, across multiple authors, and does not exactly connect. This is an extension of that.
It is going to be a lot of fun to watch these dvd commentaries.
The Internets love True Detective. (It also hates it, so don't worry, contrarians.) If you are looking for good sources on the show, read Andrew Romano of The Daily Beast* and Issac Chotiner of the New Republic both do deep analysis. Molly Lambert of Grantland does a fine job as well. I found myself referring to Den of Geek a lot for a lot of the straight of research involved with actively viewing the show. Tangentially, there is a lot of information on the Yellow mythology out there, including a wiki. You can also download Robert Chambers The King in Yellow for ninety nine cents to your Kindle.
* All of these are great, but Romano's posts are some seriously excellent television writing. It brings to mind Todd Vanderwerff's Deadwood posts.
"Form and Void" takes place entirely in 2012, as we've caught up with all the other timelines. All that is left is for Rust and Cohle to connect what they have to Lawnmower Man, finding out exactly who he is.
What we know
The killer is most likely and illegitimate child from one of the Tuttles, possibly a Childress based on a common name between their interview with the domestic and tampered police records. It's apparent the Childress family has connections in law enforcement as well, just as the Tuttles have connections throughout the state, with resources to hide this practice that has gone on for, apparently, generations, by, ostensibly, many men in the Tuttle family and extended family. The killer likely collected the victims for the child sacrifices and whatever other unspeakable acts the Tuttles did to them, and may or may not have participated in the rituals himself.
For the first time in the series, we know more than Rust and Marty. Until this point, they've been doling out zero new information to Suck and Fuck, holding back things like the Ledoux murder and the reason for their split. Now, we know exactly who the killer is and what he looks like. We know he does landscape type work by contract for public entities and schools. It's time for Rust and Marty to catch the viewers, the Tralfamadorians.
Solving for Childress
The sheriff turns out to be a giant asshole but not more complicit in the YK killings than anyone else. He admits his reports were altered by Sheriff Childress, but Childress' death makes it a dead end for Rust and Marty.
Back to square one, Marty focuses on the green ears and notices the freshly painted house from their old casefiles. Going to the house, then to the grandmother who lived there, they get enough information to run down the lead. Using tax records again, they look up the woman's husband's records using his employer, finding the painters that did the house via the write off, then running down the painters via business license.
Lo and behold, it's Childress again.
I assume they get the address from the expired business license. Marty and Rust go there to apprehend him for the gruesome crime of operating without a license.
Rust's insurance policy is to mail his evidence, including copies of the tape, to local and national news outlets, as well as law enforcement agencies, should anything happen to him. If you're looking into police corruption, it never hurts to have a cop hating ex sniper on your side.
The Never Ending Loop
The raid on the Childress place brings to mind the raid on the Ledoux place. Again, Marty goes off on his own throughout the house and makes some gruesome discoveries. Only this time, the suspect makes off, leading him on a chase into Carcosa, which appears to be their home field for all the sacrifice. Again, the suspects gets his head blowed off. Again, they can't find all the answers they need. Again, they recover prisoners from the compound.
The End
Before the hand to hand combat in the arena, Childress confirms he was the ringleader back in 1995 as well with Ledoux and friend learning from him*. Amazingly, Marty and Rust survive, despite Childress plunging a knife into Rust and wailing a hatchet into Marty. Marty is even happy for the first time in the series when he sees his ex wife and daughters visit him in the hospital.
* I get the sense more and more that Ledoux was a 'wannabe' or 'poseur' in terms of the Yellow King worship. He was a meth cook who through his twisted family connection was brought into the circle as a pawn and bought into it hard. When he was kneeling on the ground, he spouted the Yellow King fact sheet and sounded more like a follower than a leader.
Regardless of how Rust obtained the rest of the evidence, the remains found on Childress' land, along with his imprisoned and stitched closed father are enough for the law and the media to close the case on a lot of these crimes. Unfortunately, the case still is not built out enough to solidly connect the Tuttles and extended family to these rituals, despite rumor and circumstantial evidence. Some of the evidence, obtained illegally and belonging to a dead man, is not enough to condemn them, and the remaining Tuttles, one as the attorney general, are able to quash it from at minimum a legal perspective. The birth records are no help either and were likely altered or destroyed by the Tuttles and blamed on a hurricane or two.
The Yellow King
It appears to be part of the ritual these Tuttles participated in, however, will go unexplained with the participants being dead or unknown. It's also entirely possible that the remaining Tuttles are far enough removed from this nonsense that they are not quashing it to save their hides, but to save the family name, sincerely believing this is the act of a few mad men tangentially connected to the family.
What I took it to be is that these guys practice devil worship, only instead of the devil they direct their worship to the Yellow King, whatever it is. It's less important to know the details of the ritual or of their beliefs than to know that they existed and were the impetus for the acts they committed.
The guy they ultimately get had to be incredibly creepy, and Childress was no disaapointment in that respect. With sister-wife living in filth, his father tied to a bed with his mouth stiched closed, and Chilrdess himself moving in and out of accents like James Moriarty, I had to brush away the imaginary ants crawling over my skin.
Reaction
My prediction was that this will be panned as the "worst" episode of True Detective. This is a prediction I made before watching a second of the episode.
I don't think there is a worst episode however. I think the first episode was the first episode and did what the first episode was supposed to do...a format that continued all the way until last night when the eight and final episode did what the eighth and final episode was meant to do. It is difficult to "grade" any episode against anything but itself, as each episode had its own purpose and goals to accomplish. So how anyone could rate and episode that aims to accomplish one set of performance metrics against an episode that aims to accomplish a different set of performance metrics seems unfair. But that is the state of television opinion having.
True Detective, more than any other show, subscribes to the beginning-middle-end format. Usually with a season finale, there are threads raised for where the characters will go in the coming season. For example, in the waning minutes of Game of Thrones Season One finale, Tyrion is made (acting) Hand of the King, something that will dominate not only his story, but much of the story in Kings Landing in Season Two. Here, the story is close-ened.*
* I would not be surprised if there are winks and nods to Season One in subsequent seasons, as a way of acknowledging the stories operate in the same universe. Stephen King does this throughout his works. For example, Apt Pupil makes note of an Andy Dufresne.
Much of the answers about the conspiracy were spelled out in Episode Seven, and for the finale's benefit. Rather than cram a lot into the final hour, we were treated to an incredibly suspenseful Buffalo Bill gladiatorial combat scene in Carcosa. The episode felt well paced, not feeling like time was wasted or rushed. It allowed viewers to take everything in, even if you watched certain sequences through your fingers like I did.
Anytime a show incorporates a mythology, it leaves itself open to criticism no matter how the series ends. I think the point of incorporating the Yellow King into True Detective is both functional and mystical. It is functional from the point of giving a reason for the killer(s) to commit these acts, and does it in the name of something besides "devil" worship. It is mystical in the sense that we don't completely understand it, without it being a supernatural element. As far as we can tell, the Yellow King worship is an unreal escape from the world, just as how Rust views religion in general.
The Yellow King drives readers insane in Chambers' works.
The Carcosa mythology extends decades, across multiple authors, and does not exactly connect. This is an extension of that.
It is going to be a lot of fun to watch these dvd commentaries.
The Internets love True Detective. (It also hates it, so don't worry, contrarians.) If you are looking for good sources on the show, read Andrew Romano of The Daily Beast* and Issac Chotiner of the New Republic both do deep analysis. Molly Lambert of Grantland does a fine job as well. I found myself referring to Den of Geek a lot for a lot of the straight of research involved with actively viewing the show. Tangentially, there is a lot of information on the Yellow mythology out there, including a wiki. You can also download Robert Chambers The King in Yellow for ninety nine cents to your Kindle.
* All of these are great, but Romano's posts are some seriously excellent television writing. It brings to mind Todd Vanderwerff's Deadwood posts.
Friday, March 7, 2014
Justified Season Five - Through Eight Episodes
Crowders
I think the Crowe family is working along the lines of a classic bad guy group, albeit with some combined roles.
- Boyd is frustrated with efforts to get Eva out of prison
- Boyd’s supplier tries to double cross him so he heads to Detroit to confront them
- Turns out the supplier (Sammy Tonin) operation is in disarray. Tonin is double crossed/murdered by Picker. Boyd gets picker to take him and Duffy to the Canadian wholesalers
- Canadians offer one final shipment to Boyd. Picker to make introduction to new Mexican wholesaler for Boyd
- Boyd visits Paxter for help with Evan, becomes enraged by him. Does the murder to him. Wife sees but they are like let’s exchange cash for a NDB here.
- Sheriff Mooney tries to pin Paxton's beating on Boyd but Paxton's wife, Mara, purposefully does not identify Boyd as the culprit and tries to strike a deal with Boyd
- Still no progress on getting Ava out of prison, as the judge is not buyable or threatenable
- Boyd quells a minor uprising by his dealers by offering free drinks and a timetable for fresh drugs, after Duffy's attempt to do so fails
- Sheriff Mooney tracks Mara down to threaten her into identifying Boyd
- Boyd's shipment gets hijacked and all his people get dead.
- Boyd gets angry at Duffy, accusing him of stealing the shipment
- Paxton instructs Mooney to kill Boyd
- Boyd and Ava have a falling out of sorts during his visit, where he's more concerned with what information Ava can provide him about the drug caravan robbery than about how they are going to get her out of prison . She's mad he's not even giving her a "hey holding up okay?" and more or less blaming her (rightfully, but he doesn't need to say it) for the whole situation
- Boyd and Mara get the drop on Mooney and get him to report to Paxton he killed Boyd
- Which leads to an upset Boyd and Mara having tattoo touching time. A reminder of Boyd's Aryan beliefs, which I'm sure he still holds but doesn't practice actively.
- Boyd traces the hijacking to Johnny
- Paxton apparently goes for the fake Boyd hand as proof Boyd is dead but will still proceed against Eva
- Eva is under female guard protection at prison. The guard gives another hack what for after getting out of line with Eva
- Boyd, who is aware Messer is a CI, gives Raylan the phone number to track him
- Boyd makes Johnny an offer which Johnny rebuffs.
- Boyd stages Paxton's suicide, getting Eva out of prison, w/ a side of revenge
- The hack who has it in for Eva stages his own stabbing to keep Eva in prison
- HR has it in for Johnny who turns the tables on him by giving his henchmen his own share of the hijacking
- Boyd pays for Eva's protection in prison
- Eva's protection double crosses her
- Carl is kidnapped by the Crowes
- HR under gunpoint covertly notifies Boyd that he's under duress and the Johnny exchange isn't going to go as planned
- After Carl makes his way back, Boyd proposes a Crowe-Crowder alliance
- Boyd restores Eva's protection
- Ava is pulled into the religious circle in prison as a means of protection
- Ava gets the smuggler plumber caught w/ drugs so she doesn't have to bang him
- Johnny and Boyd both, separately, go to Mexico to gain the favor of the Cartel
- Cartel chooses Boyd, doesn't want dead Americans on their side of the Rio Grande
- Danny and Dewey for some reason start a shootout in the Mexican desert, killing Johnny and his crew
- Boyd kills Johnny
- Boyd manages to get drugs back to USA, aware of a double cross in the works
I think the Crowe family is working along the lines of a classic bad guy group, albeit with some combined roles.
- Darryl: The Big Bad
- The Haitian: The Dragon. The person Darryl directs his idiots to in order to deal with their problem. Completely unrattled by the marshals. Advises Darryl on their next cash cow.
- Danny: Could be The Dragon if The Haitian stays in Florida, but most likely The Brute. If he did take on Dragon responsibilities, I get the sense he'd fail at them. Does the dirty work taking out Dylan. Preoccupied for much of his scenes with firecrackers.
- Wendy: The Dark Chick. A city mouse while the rest of the family are country/swamp mice. Resourceful (causing the car crash) and able to act like a person in order to speak to the marshals. This is low bar, but it is relative to the rest of the swamp people
- This is Justified/Elmore Leonard so there isn't a clear Evil Genius, but it appears most of the brain power is supplied by a team effort between Darryl and Wendy (per their conversation they shooed Dylan away from)
- Dewey: Given a settlement for being operating on and punched in the face a bunch of times
- Dilly & associate: Kill Coast Guard Officer
- Darryl & sister: Makes deal with marshals to end his parole and hand over the CubanSister: drives Cuban to the marshals until he takes her hostage, but causes a car accident and escapes
- Cuban: Tries to escape, but caught up by the marshals and shot and killed
- Darryl's parole is lifted due to his cooperation. Advised by Haitian to get a hand into Dewey's $300k
- Darryl & Co. surprise Dewey by showing up in Harlan, with a reminder of Dewey's Aryan beliefs
- Darryl eggs Dewey on to get a rebate from Boyd for Audrey's
- Boyd turns Dewey right back at Daryl telling him to stand up for himself
- Darryl is amused and impressed by Dewey's newfound confidence. He side steps it though and shows Dewey he's sussed out Messer's skimming and eggs Dewey on to kill him
- This attempt goes badly and Dewey has to hunt Messer down in the woods
- Dewey is picked up by some hikers
- Darryl gets Dewey and takes him to finish the job, but Messer has died and his body is found by the police
- The littlest Crowe is taken by Raylan to put pressure on them to leave Harlan
- Danny takes everything in the world as an insult and sucker shoots the Haitian
- The Crowe sister visits Harlan to help with Kendall's case
- Raylans GF checks in on Kendall
- GF is run off the road by Danny
- Danny & Dewey kidnap Carl
- Carl is let out by Raylan
- Boyd and Carl come back at the Crowes
- Boyd Proposes the Crowes and Crowders link up rather than fight.
- Danny and Dewey kill a bunch of Johnny's crew in Mexico, putting them/Boyd on the bad side of the Cartel
- Wendy neutralizes the child services threat by complaining to Alison's boss
- Kendall calls Uncle Dad
- Uncle Dad makes off with Kendall
- Wendy enlists Raylan to find Kendall, promising info on the rest of the Crowes
Raylan
- Last season, arranges hit on Augustine via Tonin/Picker
- Goes to Florida to track down Dilly and the Cuba (and can see his kid in the process). Casually mentions Dewey's windfall in earshot of The Haitian
- Makes a deal with Darryl to find the Cuban
- Talks with Sutter about how Sutter would find reasons to avoid his family so he wouldn't have to leave his family at the end the weekend (Raylan then avoids seeing his kid)
- Goes to meet the Cuban, shoots Cuban when he tries to escape
- Fails to mention he was in town when Skyping with Winona and the baby
- Art asks him about why Sammy Tonin would contact him and secretyly investigates into Sammy
- Raylan is called to jail by Loretta and also meets her social worker. Doesn't get Loretta out of jail. Decides to "have a talk" with her boyfriend, Derrick
- Raylan moves into the seized house of a Detroit money launderer
- Raylan tries to bang the social worker
- Raylan talks to Derrick but ultimately has to rescue him and Loretta from drug dealers
- Raylan eggs on the money launderer, flaunting that he's living in his house and drinking his wine
- Rachel and Raylan flip the bangmaid and get her to rile up the money launderer by telling him his gold is stolen, directing his ire at Wynn Duffy (installer of the safe which housed said gold)
- Raylan offers protection to Duffy as he is a target, even though Raylan engineered the whole situation as a ploy to draw out the money launderer
- Money launderer tries to kill Duffy, is shot by Mike
- Ultimately, Tonin being dead severs the direct connection between Raylan and Nicky Augustine's death, but perhaps someone like Picker could link them and create a world of trouble for Raylan.
- Vasquez and Art inform Raylan Messer, who is a CI, is missing, and Raylan has to track him down
- Raylan runs across the Crowes and Boyd in his investigation, including a 14 year old bartender at Audrey's
- Boyd connects Raylan to Messer's phone, which has a GPS
- Raylan connects the buzzards to Messer's body
- Raylan's new gal pal mentions a child she had to seize
- Raylan goes back to Audrey's to take the littlest Crowe into state custody
- Art speaks with one of the Canadian heroin suppliers who tells him Sammy Tonin used to brag about having a "Kentucky lawman in his pocket" and directs him to Picker who is hanging with Wynn Duffy as of late
- A Tonin hitman takes out the Canadian who directed Art to Picker
- Art brings Picker in, Raylan speaks with Picker, Picker directs Art to the dead FBI agent
- Picker directs them to a warehouse where the Tonin hitman goes crazy with an automatic weapon
- Art and Raylan catch Theo Tonin
- Raylan has a talk with Art...all but admitting his part in Augustine's death
- Art cannot even look at Raylan except when he is punching him in the face
- Raylan and Rachel bond a bit.
- Raylan tries tracking down the Crowe who ran his GF off this road, but is blocked by a safe word
- Art put Raylan on garbage duty
- Raylan and Art have it out, Raylan asks for a transfer
- Raylan helps Wendy locate Kendall, becomes aware of Boyd's activities in Mexico
- Raylan gives Kendall $
Thursday, March 6, 2014
Whistle Past the Graveyard - Justified
Written by Chris Provenzano who wrote two great Season One Mad Men episodes, "Shoot" and "The Hobo Code" (eight and nine) which is when I would say the show really showed what it was made of.
Directed by Peter Werner of last season's "Kin" which involved the hill people
I'm going to guess the goal of this episode were to figure out a way to get Raylan and Wendy together with a common interest. Justified is pretty precise with its plotting but if there was one that ever felt like, filler is too strong a word but you know what I mean, it was this one. Boyd and Ava both progressed, albeit at a slug like place. It is the sort of episode that if Lost did one like it, I'd be furious for a week.
EDIT: From Yost: Once [actor] Edi Gathegi wanted off the show, and we decided to kill Jean-Baptiste in episode 5, I just looked at it and said, “Well, we’re gonna be short an episode, so we better come up with one now. Instead of trying to stretch out the last three episodes [of the 13-episode season], let’s put something in now. What can we do?” I thought it would be cool if there was something about Kendal and Wendy, and that it would be a cool idea for an episode if Raylan had to come in and help Wendy. That’s basically all I had. I came in with that on a Monday, and we broke the episode on the Monday, we wrote the outline on the Tuesday, and Provenzano started writing it on the Wednesday. We just had to really jam that in, and then we went back to put stuff into [last week's] episode 7 with Kendal calling Uncle Jack ...
Fortunately, this isn't Lost, it's Justified, which manages to churn out episodes every week that could stand alone better than any other serialized show does.
Uncle Jack, not the namesake of the Breaking Bad prison hit specialist, but an actor who also appeared on Brooklyn Nine Nine Tuesday evening, appears to be above board at first. He drives a nice car and has a rapport with Kendall and wears a jacket. If you ever want instant respect, wear a jacket. It will get you picked as foreman during jury duty, or it will get you elected Tribe Leader on Survivor.* He also has a respectable job in the energy industry.
* And also the first contestant voted out. Go Marlins!
Except none of these things really. Even the jacket is undercut by the ugly shirt he's wearing underneath it. Kendall trusts him not, eventually revealing the he knows Jack is in fact his father. This after the rest of the front dissipates, and while he's not a Crowe by blood, he acts almost like a relatively white collar version of them.
In true Justified fashion, he has zero wits about him. After the half baked idea to take Kendall to Cedar Point (never a good idea to abduct a kid in order to take him to Sandusky) he loses him after half a second and requires Wendy to get Raylan to fix things up. The carrot for Raylan is information about the Crowe/Crowder activities and location.
So, here we have Raylan aware of what Boyd is up to just as C&C Heroin factory are coming home.
At the end, there's a nice moment with Raylan trying to get Kendall out of Harlan alive, giving him th Caller #7 money. Even if Raylan came by the means and the money dishonestly, and planned to spend it on himself, he ultimately uses it in the interest of a noble cause. So maybe if they play the song again this season, it's related to Kendall, and Raylan's unique perspective on being raised by a criminal.
And by the way, the money Raylan gave to Kendall is begging to get stolen by his Uncle Brother or something.
Justified Identifiers
- Woman shooting a long gun (Wendy with the garbage bag shotgun)
- A bag of money ($35k, now $20k after the car, makes Jack a target)
- Double cross is in the works (Crowe on Crowder)
- Lack of other marshals (Hey, Raylan is on "vacation" though)
Monday, March 3, 2014
After You've Gone - True Detective
2010
Rust returns to Louisiana after an eight year hiatus in Alaska working fishing boats and bars. He picks up the Lang investigation again with one of the boys suspected of being molested. Several things:
2012
Hart's skeptical and ornery, but his indebtedness to Rust for the '95 shooting pulls him into Rust's investigation. Rust goes to the board of exposition for Marty's and our benefit....just long enough for Rust to share what he found in Tuttle's safe, pictures of blindfolded women in the woods surrounded by men in animal masks. Not only that but he shows Marty the video tape of something so gut wrenching that Cohle gives Marty the flask to steel himself before Marty yells and shuts it off before getting to the end.
Marty says a de facto farewell to Maggie. It's clear he doesn't have any connection to his daughters.
The video is enough for Marty to go full bore into the investigation, calling old friends, using his PI resources. They get another reference from a distantly related Ledoux to the scarfaced man. An older woman, possible a Tuttle domestic servant, implies spaghetti monster may be an illegitimate child from one of the Tuttle (Sam's granschild), given the scars by his father. She provides the name Childress as a possibility for the bastard. It's unclear if Sam is the father of Billy Lee.
The reports related to the Fountaineau case are signed off by a deputy who is now the sheriff of another parish, who also mentions a Childress (a sheriff invovled to the Fontaineau case) name in conversation with Hart. He stonewalls Hart from there, but Cohle takes over for some enhanced interrogation.
Papania and Gillbough (henceforth known as Fuck & Suck, per Marty) are driving around the bayou and encounter a man cutting the grass in a cemetary who they ask for directions. You can't help but think Cohle would have talked to this guy a bit longer. I wonder if this is the same guy Cohle and Hart talked to outside the school way back in the season. That guy also l had contracts to do the cemeteries and schools. (!)
(!)
First viewing: got an unsettled feeling about this, an I knew for sure Rust would've spent some time with this guy.
Second viewing: I almost missed it. I think we just met the killer (possibly the Yellow King if the YK is a human, rather than something they all worship). I thought that was a light blonde stubble on his face, but practically by accident I noticed it was scars.
I am cheating here, but I had to look it up. Lawnmower Man was indeed the same guy cutting grass from earlier in the season. The difference? He had a beard then.
Old Questions
A lot has been made about the female characters of True Detective, or lack thereof. I think the environments the show is about and that the characters look naturally tend to be male dominated, especially in the 1995 flashbacks, so it would stand to reason that most significant characters are male.
Rust keeps bringing up "dead/missing women and children". True Detective has so far been a story about invisible victims, people who nobody cares about. Rust has been trying to "speak for those dead" to quote Homicide. It's a population that doesn't get attention because of poverty or location or both. It's difficult for a television show to explain the absence of something or show a negative. It's the notes you don't play, as Miles Davis says. It's the same problem Season Five of The Wire ran into. So while it's difficult to explain absence and show a negative, it's even harder for the audience to pick up on it, even when done correctly.
Additionally, it's no secret the show is about Rust and Marty. I believe everything else in the show is in the service of telling us about Rust and Marty. So the explanation for why a particular character may not receive as much attention as Rust or Marty is probably because the show is about Rust and Marty, rather than that character.
In short, if you are the sort of person who viewed The Wolf of Wall Street (or Goodfellas for that matter) as a glorification of the life, rather than an indictment via realistic depiction, then this is not the show for you.
Mini Mysteries
The show has done a good job since the first episode of putting out enough plot lines, raising enough questions and developing the two main characters enough that the show does not wholly hang on Who Killed Dora Lang? much like Twin Peaks built up enough story around Who Killed Laura Palmer? and the opposite of what The Killing did with Who Killed Rosie Larsen?
Every few episodes has had a mystery unfold for us. With the overarching question of these murders obviously spanning the series, though broken into two part, pre and post Ledoux, we've had other questions raised and answered such as
Who do they like for the murders? Ledoux
What was the showdown in the woods? Hart murdering Ledoux then Cohle covering up for him
What ultimately separated Hart and Cohle? Maggie
Who broke in to Rev. Tuttle's place and killed him? Cohle for the former, and likely his weird pagan circle for the latter.
And finally, we come to episode eight with much filled in, but enough questions raised to pieque interest, prominently, what causes the Spaghetti Monster to do these things, and can Cohle and Hart stop it?
Odds and Ends
Rust returns to Louisiana after an eight year hiatus in Alaska working fishing boats and bars. He picks up the Lang investigation again with one of the boys suspected of being molested. Several things:
- Another reference to the spaghetti monster with scars on his face
- Marie Fontenault saw the animal faces
2012
Hart's skeptical and ornery, but his indebtedness to Rust for the '95 shooting pulls him into Rust's investigation. Rust goes to the board of exposition for Marty's and our benefit....just long enough for Rust to share what he found in Tuttle's safe, pictures of blindfolded women in the woods surrounded by men in animal masks. Not only that but he shows Marty the video tape of something so gut wrenching that Cohle gives Marty the flask to steel himself before Marty yells and shuts it off before getting to the end.
Marty says a de facto farewell to Maggie. It's clear he doesn't have any connection to his daughters.
The video is enough for Marty to go full bore into the investigation, calling old friends, using his PI resources. They get another reference from a distantly related Ledoux to the scarfaced man. An older woman, possible a Tuttle domestic servant, implies spaghetti monster may be an illegitimate child from one of the Tuttle (Sam's granschild), given the scars by his father. She provides the name Childress as a possibility for the bastard. It's unclear if Sam is the father of Billy Lee.
The reports related to the Fountaineau case are signed off by a deputy who is now the sheriff of another parish, who also mentions a Childress (a sheriff invovled to the Fontaineau case) name in conversation with Hart. He stonewalls Hart from there, but Cohle takes over for some enhanced interrogation.
Papania and Gillbough (henceforth known as Fuck & Suck, per Marty) are driving around the bayou and encounter a man cutting the grass in a cemetary who they ask for directions. You can't help but think Cohle would have talked to this guy a bit longer. I wonder if this is the same guy Cohle and Hart talked to outside the school way back in the season. That guy also l had contracts to do the cemeteries and schools. (!)
(!)
First viewing: got an unsettled feeling about this, an I knew for sure Rust would've spent some time with this guy.
Second viewing: I almost missed it. I think we just met the killer (possibly the Yellow King if the YK is a human, rather than something they all worship). I thought that was a light blonde stubble on his face, but practically by accident I noticed it was scars.
I am cheating here, but I had to look it up. Lawnmower Man was indeed the same guy cutting grass from earlier in the season. The difference? He had a beard then.
Old Questions
- Did Marty and Rust arrest the right guy?
- Didn't arrest anyone. Shot the dude.
- Looking more and more like a big 'no'. And by arrest, we mean murder
- Rust points out Marty caused a lot of this by not murdering Ledoux
- What happened with Rust to put him where he is now?
- See above. Also ingesting drugs, chemicals via his undercover and narco work.
- I'm sure eating all those drugs with the biker gang didn't help
- Ending his partnership with Marty, frustrated at the roadblocks to what he believes is a case that should be reopened
- Drank and spent eight years of boats in Alaska
- What's the revival minster's involvement with the task force?
- Working for the Tuttle school/task force is spurned by Tuttle. They ended their relationship shortly after due to the photos he finds, and the Penn State-ish investigation
- It's more about the task force's connection to Tuttle to the Tuttle family to these rituals
- Oh, also, who is doing the murdering? Both in 1992 and 2012?
- Reggie Ledoux?
- Maybe not?
- Lawnmower man
- When will they reveal to us the 1992 murderer?
- It could be next week, it could be the finale, the way this is set up
- Episode Five. Maybe
- Thought we had it. But the end of episode seven appears to have shown us for real
- Is Marty's daughter going to bite it? Or disappear/get murdered by Ledoux 2012?
- Probably not. Marty has little to no contact with them and they seem to be leading relatively successful lives so far as a (medicated, but not starving) artist and an AmeriCorps volunteer.
- What seems more important is what happened to her when she was younger, and it increasingly seems like her grandfather molested her, being one of the "rich men who go to devil worship" and causing the drawings, Barbie placement, and her need for medication later in life.
- Are the new investigators looking into the shootout in the woods, or are they primarily focused on Cohle?
- It seems like the lie has little to do with the story going forward, except that the result is Ledoux is dead.
- This is what leaves the case open enough for Cohle to revisit it, and the cover up is what pulls Marty in long enough to show him what he has.
- What are the paper stocks in Rev. Tuttle's safe?
- Who is the father of the spaghetti monster?
- Ultimately, what is Carcosa? Is it a location?
- I think it is just the name for the location where they do the deeds.
- The domestic's cry about death not being the end is probably tied into the ritual
- The ritual may believe these girls pass on to another plan
- Carcosa, in the original Brose piece, is the setting for a being who returns to his town (I guess) after dying
- What is the sheriff's connection to Fontaineau and the Tuttles?
- What caused the scars?
- Who is the guy cutting grass? Who is his family, the one that's been around these parts for a looooong time?
- What is Senator Eddie Tuttle's involvement at this point?
- Will Rust's hallucinations come back?
- Did the YK folk do something to the boy that rendered him immobile? Or was this sleep paralysis?
- What are the green ears?
A lot has been made about the female characters of True Detective, or lack thereof. I think the environments the show is about and that the characters look naturally tend to be male dominated, especially in the 1995 flashbacks, so it would stand to reason that most significant characters are male.
Rust keeps bringing up "dead/missing women and children". True Detective has so far been a story about invisible victims, people who nobody cares about. Rust has been trying to "speak for those dead" to quote Homicide. It's a population that doesn't get attention because of poverty or location or both. It's difficult for a television show to explain the absence of something or show a negative. It's the notes you don't play, as Miles Davis says. It's the same problem Season Five of The Wire ran into. So while it's difficult to explain absence and show a negative, it's even harder for the audience to pick up on it, even when done correctly.
Additionally, it's no secret the show is about Rust and Marty. I believe everything else in the show is in the service of telling us about Rust and Marty. So the explanation for why a particular character may not receive as much attention as Rust or Marty is probably because the show is about Rust and Marty, rather than that character.
In short, if you are the sort of person who viewed The Wolf of Wall Street (or Goodfellas for that matter) as a glorification of the life, rather than an indictment via realistic depiction, then this is not the show for you.
Mini Mysteries
The show has done a good job since the first episode of putting out enough plot lines, raising enough questions and developing the two main characters enough that the show does not wholly hang on Who Killed Dora Lang? much like Twin Peaks built up enough story around Who Killed Laura Palmer? and the opposite of what The Killing did with Who Killed Rosie Larsen?
Every few episodes has had a mystery unfold for us. With the overarching question of these murders obviously spanning the series, though broken into two part, pre and post Ledoux, we've had other questions raised and answered such as
Who do they like for the murders? Ledoux
What was the showdown in the woods? Hart murdering Ledoux then Cohle covering up for him
What ultimately separated Hart and Cohle? Maggie
Who broke in to Rev. Tuttle's place and killed him? Cohle for the former, and likely his weird pagan circle for the latter.
And finally, we come to episode eight with much filled in, but enough questions raised to pieque interest, prominently, what causes the Spaghetti Monster to do these things, and can Cohle and Hart stop it?
Odds and Ends
- Rust makes a few more references to life being a circle, except now he's looking to tie it off
- The sheriff golfs with a gun strapped to his back
- Marty says he doesn't drink much anymore but we see him surfing Match.com with Jameson, or watching tv with a beer.
- Cohle and Hart have always been very different but they are living very similar lives at this point in 2012, shuttling themselves between work and home, without anyone else in their lives.
- Hart is doing a lot of Rust-esque investigations. Last week we saw a lot of characters resurface giving the series symmetry. This is another type of symmetry, if not tessellation.
- Hart's daughter and Rust both express interest in painting
- Treme had a Mardi Gras episode where Annie went into a rural area and it was all a bit weirder and creepier. It seems like it has some kissing cousin relationship to the sort of Mardi Gras that spurned these rituals apparently practiced by the Tuttle extended clan
- Hart & Cohle take a page from Tony Soprano and the Stugots from "Funhouse"
- Hurricanes again lead to chaos, lead to opportunity for these acts
- Rust is going to the electric chair if anyone gets hold of his storage locker, due to the Tuttle photos and video
- The former domestic servant flips out at the mention of Carcosa, not unlike other characters we've seen, and not unlike Chambers' characters who go insane after reading The Yellow King
- Him that eats time, hims robes it's a wind of invisible voices
- Death is not the end, rejoice.
- Parliament of Owls is one of the production stickers are the end. I've been into Twin Peaks lately
- The preview has a voice over "take off your mask" a quote from The Yellow King. The response is "I wear no mask". The implication is the YK's face is so horrifying that surely it must be a mask. Mr Spaghetti Monster Grass Cutter has quite a few scars.
- Marty never wanted to see something like the baby in the microwave again. But the video does just that
- The show, while being super weird and creepy, does not get gratuitous with these shots. The important thing in the scene is Marty's reactions, not the grotesque scene he is seeing. For all the grief True Detective gets about being gratuitous, this is a good counterargument
- Cohle has talked about the end of human existence and tying off the circle. Marty said so long to his wife. Reason enough to believe one or both will not make it out alive next week.
- Rust has some sort of knife/leatherman type thing hanging from his belt where his badge would be.
- When they're questioning the mechanic, Rust and Marty are back to looking like cops, talking to this guy, and Rust has his ledger. Just like old times.