Saturn's child wrote:(apologies to all those that couldn't care less about Millennium):
Don't apologise; it's great being able to discuss such an underappreciated show!
I kind of hope (& trust) that the new Peaks will have a similar rollercoastery sensation in store for me.
I think my touchstones, in terms of what I'm 'expecting' are the pilot, episode 14 and FWWM. That covers all the bases for heightened emotion, humour, quirkiness and terror.
i agree, no need to apologize.. with the lack of news on the Twin Peaks revival, a discussion of "MillenniuM" which to me is in many ways the closest thing to "Twin Peaks" ever produced, along with "Carnivale" and perhaps S1 of "True Detective" and so many people seem to have totally missed it, i think we're doing a public service
claaa7 wrote:i agree, no need to apologize.. with the lack of news on the Twin Peaks revival, a discussion of "MillenniuM" which to me is in many ways the closest thing to "Twin Peaks" ever produced, along with "Carnivale" and perhaps S1 of "True Detective" and so many people seem to have totally missed it, i think we're doing a public service
Yep. More than The X-Files, I'd love to see new Frank Black stories. The difference with Frank is that his story now really moves beyond the Millennium Group into more complex territory dealing with pure good and evil. Mulder and Scully can return to the FBI (although I'd rather have seen them as independent investigators perhaps with covert senate funding,) but Frank is very much out there on his own.
Moreover, the conundrum still exists: are Frank's adventures set in the X-Files universe or not? In seasons one and three, it's possible (we see Mulder and Scully lookalikes walking downstairs in Lamentation, played by David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson's X-Files stand-ins) while season two has The X-Files running on TV, has pictures of David Duchovny as a Selfosophy adherent actor and seems to go out of its way to hire guest actors who appeared a couple of weeks before in the concurrent X-Files season! Then the X-Files episode 'Millennium' features Frank but reduces the defunct Millennium Group to a necromancer and a couple of zombies.
I actually think Frank somehow exists across – or perceives – several different universes at the same time, which might explain his chaotic connection to the continuity of his own show; that the trauma of Catherine's disappearance in season one switches him into a different reality in season two and the trauma of Catherine's death switches him again at the end of season two. Interestingly, his hair, which turned white at the end of season two returns to brown at the start of season three, but gradually turns white again as the season wears on, as if he's somehow burying the trauma of season two and it steadily comes through (or, perhaps more simply, he stops buying hair dye!! )
I'm definitely a different sort of animal here. There are so many brilliant shows that have come out after Peaks that I completely loved and was amazed at, and that were structurely better... Mostly with the luxury of shorter seasons and the benefit of long term planning. Breaking Bad is perfect. The Wire, The Sooranos, Mad Men (although I hated the last episode)... And yes, completely in the trenches of Game of Thrones. But I don't think anything ever captured me like those first fifteen episodes of Peaks, even with its imperfections... The world, the characters and just the fun of anticipation.
I think the only thing that compares for me is the Sam and Diane saga during the first five years of Cheers... Yes, I'm serious. While my friends were playing GI Joe, I'd be equaling excited about the latest Cheers cliffhanger. I really think that was the only thing that compares for me... The Sam/Diane years.
My favorite shows of all time are smart, deft sitcoms... First five seasons of Cheers, Mary Tyler Moore Show, All in the Family, MASH, The Dick Van Dyke Show and Fawlty Towers.
Audrey Horne wrote:Mad Men (although I hated the last episode)...
Yes, I have to say it felt less like a last ever episode and more like the end of a season. It was a shame that Jon Hamm never really interacted with the rest of the cast ever again and especially disappointing that he never had a proper final scene with Peggy, given how important their relationship was to the show down the years. The ending was very clever if you know your history of commercials, but, here in the UK, my brother and my parents were thrown because they didn't have any recollection of that commercial from the era. Also, I've seen better quality versions of the Coke ad on YouTube than the one Mad Men used. I vaguely remembered reading about the ad and had to look it up to confirm my suspicions. It wasn't a good ending for an international audience, IMHO.
Gabriel wrote:felt less like a last ever episode and more like the end of a season
I like those kinds of endings best. Deadwood comes to mind. It wasn't supposed to be the ending, but I thought it was better than a 'proper ending' would've likely been, as with Twin Peaks. Makes you feel like it's a world that's still there, instead of a self-contained story that has come to an end.
No, to me it felt oddly like a television show that was the antithesis to how it told its story before... Every thing having a pat and sometimes Hollywood ending for its characters. Previously we had believed characters exit and we never saw them again, just like in life. Wiener always challenged the viewer. Joan grabbing her power two episodes before to be humiliatingly fired and exiting in an elevator would be more powerful if we realize ugh, we never got a chance to say goodbye and wonder (if you're an optimist or a pessimist) about her fate in the changing world. Instead we got a checklist with all the main characters of getting closed endings. Peggy's rom com ending totally left me with my mouth agap. I think I wanted something radically different as a whole... Like the whole episode just Don meeting Peggy for drinks in 1980 and just talking about advertising, not addressing any of the previous plot points... Then the show would live forever for revisits of us always debating what happened to its characters. I was so surprised by the brilliant Weiner writing the most fan fictiony basic episode of a final episode I had ever seen... And I had gone into that episode saying I think it might be one of the best things ever put on television and said I totally trust how he handles it.
Rainwater wrote:
I like those kinds of endings best. Deadwood comes to mind. It wasn't supposed to be the ending, but I thought it was better than a 'proper ending' would've likely been, as with Twin Peaks. Makes you feel like it's a world that's still there, instead of a self-contained story that has come to an end.
In that case, they shouldn't promote it as 'The End,' split the final season in two and so on. The impression given was that they were building up to something... which sputtered out. Instead, we get 'The Don Draper Travelogue Show' intercut with a spinoff about the SC&P characters after they move to McCann Ericcson. I'm very happy to have 'life goes on' but the ending falls between two stools, giving Peggy a pat romantic ending, but nothing beyond a quick phone call with Don, Betty preparing to die, Joan setting up a business, but actually, in effect, a less satisfying ending than the average end of a season of the show.
The Coca Cola ending was clever – too clever by half for most international viewers – but as a viewer, the ending felt too much like a frayed edge, neither wrapping things up nor particularly giving the impression of 'life going on.'
Speaking of endings, what did you guys think of the Breaking Bad one? To me, they went over the top (SPOILERS!!!) with that automatic machine gun in Walt's trunk mowing down a whole nest of nazis and then Julia calling him just in time for him to give her a "death sentence" by telling her he slipped the poison in her drink - they practically made Walt into some sort of superhero which was uncalled for. They should've stuck with him being just a regular guy, the way he was during the show's duration. It's a shame 'cause it mars an otherwise perfect and poetic conclusion, with Walt giving Jesse back his freedom, the two finally making peace with each other and then Walt going off to die in the arms of his beloved chemistry lab equipment, the only "family" he was left with at the end of his journey.
I loved Breaking Bad so much and thought it was pretty flawless, even with its over the top ending. I was always in awe of how they were making it up season to season yet in complete harmony with what came before it. Except the ricin... The gun in the mantle piece... Seemed like a throwaway that they never knew how it would be used finally. I for years thought Walt would use it on himself in the end. I thought it could have been brilliant if after all the mayhem and Walters god complex, if it ended on going to Lydia's quiet home... She departs her bedroom to her kitchen and we see her family life, she has the same problems as Walter White, etc. After all the grandiose ideas he had, ultimately there are a million Walters in the world and life just keeps chugging along.
Agent Earle wrote:Speaking of endings, what did you guys think of the Breaking Bad one? To me, they went over the top (SPOILERS!!!) with that automatic machine gun in Walt's trunk mowing down a whole nest of nazis and then Julia calling him just in time for him to give her a "death sentence" by telling her he slipped the poison in her drink - they practically made Walt into some sort of superhero which was uncalled for. They should've stuck with him being just a regular guy, the way he was during the show's duration. It's a shame 'cause it mars an otherwise perfect and poetic conclusion, with Walt giving Jesse back his freedom, the two finally making peace with each other and then Walt going off to die in the arms of his beloved chemistry lab equipment, the only "family" he was left with at the end of his journey.
I loved the ending, but... the antepenultimate episode, Rian Johnson's Ozymandius, was one of the finest TV episodes I've ever seen and the final two feel like a coda after that one. Also, there was a mean-spiritedness sneaking in about certain things, such as Jesse's girlfriend's fate, which was a little out of kilter with the tone of show. It was the same with Sons of Anarchy. I loved seasons one to four, but season five was so mean-spirited that I gave it up at the end of that year.
I'm intrigued to see whether Better Call Saul will do a Breaking Bad season, then move fully beyond the events of Breaking Bad.
Mr. Reindeer wrote:
GoT is just an exercise in aggravation for me, as a book reader. Incredible production value and a perfect cast squandered on half-hearted writing. It's such a sadness.
That show became fan service festival.
It keeps getting worse. I watch it basically to see how the hell they're gonna end all that mess. Winds of Winter can't come soon enough.
Agent Sam Stanley wrote:
That show became fan service festival.
It keeps getting worse. I watch it basically to see how the hell they're gonna end all that mess. Winds of Winter can't come soon enough.
I've given up on it. I'm not going to pick up The Winds of Winter when it's released either. I'll buy it when A Dream of Spring is published and read the whole series again from start to finish, assuming ADoS is confirmed to be the end. By then, I'll probably close to retirement age anyway! I'm not going to buy TWoW only to wait another decade for the next book. I have the distinct feeling George RR Martin has got hopelessly lost in all the plot threads and is waiting to see how the TV show finishes so he can use it to help work out how to pull it all together in the books.
I like both the Mad Men and the Breaking Bad finales, but there are far better episodes of both series. I find the MM ending perfectly ambiguous in a Sopranos sort of way: it can be read as redemptive, with Don finally making peace with his place in society as an upper-middle-class corporate schill and using his platform to spread a message of love; or in the alternative, as a cynical affirmation of Weiner's stated belief that people don't really change, with Don incapable of thinking about more than jingles even in his moment of spiritual enlightenment, and co-opting a pure message of love to sell sugar water.
I think it was a brilliant choice to have all of Don's last interactions with the main cast be by telephone. It's a perfect commentary on the evolution of relationships throughout the 20th century, which is so much of what the show is about. Was I hoping for a final Emmy-worthy Hamm-Moss scene? Of course. But we have plenty of those -- the telephone device was a great subversive choice (and Hamm is incredible as usual).
As far as the rest of the MM finale, I found most of the endings fulfilling and approriately open-ended. Pete and Roger are starting new chapters, but I think it's extremely likely they'll continue making the same mistakes (Pete is going to get bored as hell in Wichita away from his beloved NYC, and we don't even know if Roger ended up acquiescing to Marie's desire to move to Canada). Joan's ending is a bit neat and tidy, but I don't mind: it feels well-earned and I find her character arc the most satisfying on the series.
The only storylines that feel somewhat pat are Betty's cancer and Peggy & Stan. I appreciate what Weiner was going for on the former, but it was jammed in way too late in the series -- if introduced a season earlier, it could have given a compelling (albeit potentially distracting) storyline to a character the audience had long since stopped caring about. As to the latter, Weiner has said that the other writers had to convince him to go with the Peggy & Stan plot, and it really doesn't feel of a piece with the rest of the episode or the series. I still don't mind it: the groundwork was certainly laid for several seasons, and I find the scene charming. It's nice for Peggy to get a victory, particularly in the romantic arena; but it definitely feels more like a traditional TV series moment than almost anything else in the rest of the series. It would also be less jarring if it didn't occur while Peggy should be worried about Don potentially committing suicide.
BB's finale was far too neat and tidy, and slightly disappointing in light of the all-time great run of episodes that preceded it. I would have preferred for Jesse to play a much larger role in the final season and especially the finale, but the last several minutes (from Jesse & Walter's last stand-off to the end) were perfect.
Honestly, I can't think of too many series finales that I would call truly great. TP has probably been my favorite, but of course Episode 29 won't be a finale for much longer! Audrey mentioned Cheers, and that show's finale springs to mind. In general, I think it's easier for comedies to knock a finale out of the park than dramas, because there's less pressure to resolve story -- the focus can be solely on the characters and relationships, which tend to be the most satisfying aspects of a good series. Six Feet Under is generally lauded as the golden standard for drama series finales, and that last sequence is absolutely one of the most perfect pieces of television ever made, but I can't remember a thing about that finale besides the last few minutes.
The ending of The Good Wife split viewers in a similar way. Many professed their hatred for the ending with no clear endings given but I thought it was superb and well written. It reflected reality in that endings are never simple and clear cut. People don't always get what they want out of life (more don't than do) and journeying through life can make you hardened to it. And that is what they did with the main character Alicia. From series 1 to 7 she had a 100% change in the way she approached life. It annoyed me that people expressed disappointment in the not happily ever after.
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