@Tjuz Late response! Sorry! The Great sounds like a gr- good recommendation. I will check it out... after Succession.
I'm in Season 3. I'm hoping to pick up the pace again this weekend. Really enjoyed season 2 a lot, but season 3 so far has been a bit more like its going with the motions than before. The start of the season especially feels way more insignificant than it should. Hope the season will reach a nice climax soon!
Has anyone watched Suits? I don’t remember reading any chatter about it here or elsewhere but I happen to notice really high user ratings on IMDB while I was looking at something else. I saw 10/10 for the last season and 8.4 overall. I read the brief summary of what the show is and it honestly sounds just like a million other shows out there. I’m not really that big of a fan of corporate drama or legal dramas. Anyways, just wondering if these 10/10’s are overstated.
The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
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@Th3solution My wife and I watched it a few years back and we both enjoyed it. The acting was top notch, loads of great actors in the show and the time period was fun. (60's) Don Draper was quite a character. This was the show that introduced us to Jon Hamm, Jared Harris and Elisabeth Moss!
@Th3solution It seems to have inexplicably got big again. I watched it at the time and it started off well with a plot that ended up running itself in circles. It gave us Meghan Markle I guess.
@Th3solution I concur with @nessisonett's assessment: started out fine but dropped off pretty quickly for me. Been a while, but I don't think I lasted more than a season and a bit.
@nessisonett Haha So It is. @Th3solution sorry for the blonde moment haha. My wife has seen suits and she enjoyed it. But she watches a lot of stuff I wouldn't.
@Kidfried No worries! That's definitely a common complaint with the third season and the way I felt too for quite a bit of it. I think it picks up in the latter half though, and fifth episode in particular is one of my favourites of the whole show. Still goodness to come for sure!
You're 100% right! Mad Men is an absolute classic, so many brilliant characters... not to mention it serves as a bit of 'breakout role' piece for Elizabeth Moss (Peggy) and Jon Hamm (Don).
It is a great ride, probably in my top 10 somewhere
Just finished season one of Heartstopper on Netflix. God, it's such a wonderful show. Amazing performances throughout, and totally devoid of all the trauma and needless melodrama that typically make gay teen romance/coming out stories such a drag.
Every single time the show looks like it's going to bend into the various damaging/hurtful tropes that plague LGBT media, it deftly swerves away and subverts them at the last moment, giving the viewer something wholesome and far more nuanced instead.
Gay and trans kids are bombarded with messages about how hard and hurtful it is to be who they are in various media. We need more stuff that comes along and says: "Hey, there are some issues, but there are probably a lot of people in your life who love you and want the best for you as well. You can live a happy life."
@Ralizah I’m pretty sure this is more of a British thing but my feelings with Heartstopper and general attitudes from a certain section of gay and bi fans is that the show is too earnest not to be slightly annoyed by. Like, I absolutely understand what it means to some people to have a gay love story that doesn’t get bogged down in the crap but it rankles a little because that’s still lived experience for every single person I’ve known in the community. A few years back, when there was a little more hope, I’d be right there celebrating it (despite the inherent ick I get from the admittedly silly grumble about fujoshi vibes) but the recent resurgence in media and government backed discrimination makes me nervous about complacency. It’s such a thin line, I totally respect the intention because there really isn’t all that much wholesome content especially for teens, but it can sometimes just slightly veer into presenting a view of the world that isn’t true. Part of me wonders if this is how the older gays felt when the wave of shows featuring sexually liberated characters came about like Queer as Folk and such, having lived through the AIDS crisis. I fundamentally cannot fathom high school being possible in an out gay relationship, the abuse would drive me to the brink. But then things change so maybe I’m out of touch!
As somebody who had a 98% happy secondary school and sixth form college experience as an out gay kid in the early 00s, I'd argue that fictional entertainment has a responsibility to provide a positive blueprint for what's possible, and to set a good example going forward.
But then I also had a miserable early adulthood, so I totally respect the criticisms to the contrary, too.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
The late 90s and early 00s was a completely different experience for me. Utterly miserable period in terms of routine, casual homophobia both on screen and off: gay people were either tragic or a joke. At least I developed a good poker face. Section 28 was only repealed after I had left school and gone to university, which seems insane, looking back. Perhaps a show like Heartstopper in 2001 would have made an immense difference.
We need both, right? We can appreciate art because it can show us how things are, but art can just as well be appreciated because it shows us how things could be. I haven't seen Heartstopper (and I probably won't), but as long as it doesn't pretend it's reality for everyone, I think the world could always use the occasional moment of hope!
@nessisonett Anti-LGBT backlash has been pretty bad in the States as well. Particularly in the south, where I currently live. There's also a very real possibility our right to marry is going to be compromised soon. If a foundational decision like Roe v Wade can go down, a more recent decision certainly can.
That said, I don't see what's gained from primarily reflecting the worst aspects of human life in our art. And I don't think the show is necessarily unrealistic. Certainly some people live in communities where the level of homophobia is much less pervasive. It's not like every gay/trans person ever has been beaten within an inch of their lives, y'know?
More than that, though, the most important function of art is to provide a vision for the way life should be. To give hope for the future. To inspire people to live openly and proudly. And you don't do that by focusing on the bad things that could happen.
I'm not saying depictions of discrimination and hatred need to disappear entirely from our media. But they need to not be the dominant thing people are seeing.
LGBT people can and do live happy lives. That should have more of a place in our art.
And, putting aside the gay theme of the show, I like the way it avoids the usual tropes associated with the genre of teen romance. Characters actually talk to each-other. They seem like human beings. That's a level of nuance typically missing in this genre.
@Ralizah Yeah, like I said, I totally get the intention. In many ways, this is what life could be like if the world hadn’t lurched to the right around 2016. It just hits me in the same way that Pride becoming a happy clappy concert sponsored by oil companies does, I get that celebration of identity can help but there’s still so much work to be done. If it’s just a heartwarming piece of escapism then it’s doing its job!
@Tjuz Somewhere in season 4 of Succession now, right after "the" episode. If all of season 4 is as good as these first few episodes, it's going to be my favorite season of the bunch.
@Kidfried Ah yes, the big episode! You got yourself through the third season fairly quick. Hope you were able to enjoy it more as it went on too. There's definitely no decline in quality from this point in the fourth season so be sure to savor all the great moments. I know for many that big episode is the highlight, but personally I'm a bigger fan of quite a few episodes that come after. It's gonna be a wild ride to the end, I assure you!
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