Vee

I'm always happy to see Frazer Hines. I don't know how they haven't made more use of him.

The Parks and Recreation parallels are interesting in that a lot of fans have twigged the Tariq character as likely becoming a bigger presence a la how Chris Pratt/Andy Dwyer blew up on that show. He clearly has a good heart and is good with the kids whenever volunteering despite also being a layabout idiot. I don't think Zack Fox/Tariq will become as big as Pratt/Andy did on Parks, but I do think there's a fair amount of similarity. I'm most pleased to see Tyler James Williams in a popular lead role - he's been so, so good as an adult performer on a bunch of shows and he deserved a lasting showcase. But Sheryl Lee Ralph, Quinta Brunson, Lisa Ann Walter, the whole ensemble is great.

I had to make a thread for this after catching up with its first short season on HBO Max - it just began its second on Hulu/ABC. Sweet, earnest and very funny. Sheryl Lee Ralph's Emmy is well deserved after so many years of great work, but the entire ensemble crackles and Janelle James steals every scene as Ava.

Frons went to the wall to try to save first Guza, then GH in 2011 from the ax IIRC. He felt Guza was GH's true north, that only he could write it. But he couldn't protect him after a certain point, and he was gone not long after himself. I think JFP stayed on because she was a capable line producer, and because after Guza's grand return with Frons' blessing in '02 and her complete disaster stint with Megan McTavish the previous year that was largely what she was reduced to. Guza had learned from his battles with Wendy Riche and came back with a co-producer credit; he had creative control (beneath Frons), which was unheard of for anyone other than JFP in the mix at that time. And she lost it all. Based on the difference between her past work at other shows and at GH post-2001/early '02, it appeared as though Jill never had real creative control (outside of the '08 WGA strike) at GH again. And she deserved to lose it. She was reduced to getting her ex Kale Browne constant voice-over gigs on the show because he was widely disliked among performers and production across ABC (Hillary B. Smith and Mark Derwin were still taking anonymous shots at him in the OLTL oral history, and he was fired the instant she moved to GH) and she no longer had the power to force him onscreen.

I have no idea what's going on in this thread but God bless.

I've always found it spooky too just reading about it.

That was Ty Tennant, son of (ahem) former Doctor Who David Tennant and Georgia Moffett, as the young Aegon tonight (Tennant adopted him upon marrying Moffett). I was not expecting that scene.

David Tennant's adoptive son Ty (he has raised him since marrying Georgia Moffett from "The Doctor's Daughter"; Moffett, fans will recall, is the daughter of Peter Davison) had a, uh, very memorable debut tonight on House of the Dragon as the teenaged Aegon Targaryen. I was thinking they even looked and sounded alike until I remembered David had adopted him.

It's from the source text which spans a ton of time into the adulthood of the next generation, I believe (and the show is apparently only intended to run 3-4 years). I like it, I think it's really different and surprisingly works. The new approach cuts the fat from the old show's pacing (although that was a very different and still unfinished text), and you don't see it often in television narrative outside of stuff like I Claudius.

I can't fault people for taking issue with another gay death given the rocky treatment of Loras (I didn't hate Loras' storyline but I didn't love it either), but it's something in the Fire & Blood text IIRC and I understood that. I do think it's an unfortunate optic given the past, but I think the show can make up for it any way it chooses. As for tonight, I haven't seen it.

This ain't Knots Landing, I doubt I'll be watching long lol. I did decide I'd try the first week or two, and maybe look at some of the big exits. I know RTD just wrapped work on his Crossroads mini with Helena Bonham Carter.

You know we're in year 3 of a pandemic when I'm watching the first few episodes of this on a bored lark. It's definitely bizarre, but the location and several of the central characters could've worked. I know non-actors were apparently Julia Smith's idea which I understand as a concept (and it often works out for some films), but it obviously didn't play. I wonder how much was changed from Tony Holland/Jordan/etc.'s original ideas, because the structural bones of the British family, the villain and the lounge singer seems sound. The whole thing with Bunny and the young girl is grotesque.

There is definitely more to it IMO and some of it has been rumored for years, rumors I believe, in addition to very real and serious health issues she's spoken about publicly. tbqh and I've said this before elsewhere, I think they keep Kirsten in part for her own well-being at this point. It's speaking out of turn as an [!@#$%^&*] on a message board, but without the show I often wonder what might happen to her. Regardless, I don't think it's good for her or the show, and what made her Maxie take off after a rough start is long gone. The character has been a shadow of herself since the early 2010s.

Kirsten has looked and felt wrung out onscreen for over a decade, and Maxie is worse. The offscreen issues are well known and I don't believe it's all been her physical health. They both need a long break.

Louise Fletcher was so good in so many things (and was the inspiration for Lily Tomlin's character in Nashville but didn't get the part, something she never forgave Robert Altman for), but there was such a specific artistry and tone to her work that it could be mistaken for stilted or alien. It wasn't, it was simply on its own unmistakable wavelength. Most know her from her big Oscar-winning role, but I know her best from Flowers in the Attic and other roles, like when I watched her valiantly attempt to carry the weight of the hysterically bad Exorcist II: The Heretic (in a role originally written for George Segal) - nothing broke her stride. Most of all, I'll remember her most as the very complex antiheroine/villain Kai Winn on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, a character that ran the gamut of everything from religious fundamentalist to a quietly revolutionary woman of faith, from a craven and ambitious power player to a broken and disillusioned ex-believer, to a liberated woman who finally finds personal passion in the arms of a terrible dark force.

She was not that much younger by soap recast standards, lol (11 years). But no, Luner was starring on Savannah as a vixen in her 20s when Adam and Liza were first together. The issue wasn't the age IIRC so much as JL being a complete miscast. Trevor St. John for Stephen Nichols and William Russ is much, much more extreme de-SORAS.

Shorter opening, but cute. I'm a little surprised Katey Sagal isn't in there - Louise is now married to Dan, right? I guess she's still technically recurring.

WTF?? It's giving Foxy Roxy's Hair Haven!

That's what this corner of the show has been since Jordan #1, who also was never a fleshed-out character despite poor Vinessa Antoine's talent - the sidelined 'Black storyline'. They do not invest in these adult characters or care about them at all, it is B/C-story material at best for thin characters designed to isolate them together while saying 'we write for Black people'. Most of them are worthless to me except Brook Kerr as Portia and poor Tags, I stopped caring about Curtis years ago and Turner seems checked out. And as for the teens, as I've said there is a reason Spencer and Trina have yet to even kiss IMO.

Yeah, I get part of the complaint but took some of her comments re: the timeslot with a grain of salt. She is also clearly in her cups lol.

Jasmine Guy, Kadeem Hardison and several glasses of champagne have her trending from The Breakfast Club today:

This show has been an unexpected surprise. I was well and truly over GOT by the end of its overstuffed and abridged final two seasons, particularly with its penultimate 'blockbuster season' being a truly strange marathon of viewings on Sunday nights in 2017 alongside David Lynch's Twin Peaks Season 3, where one show seemed desperate to impress and deliver Big Moments and insane FX action while speedrunning the plot and often tripping over itself and the other simply didn't give a fùck, did as it pleased and remains renowned today. (Guess which is which.) The final two years of GOT had their great moments and sequences, and I'm not one of those people who disdains all of the ending run or thinks it's all bad - I think where Daenerys ended up was what was intended by Martin from the start, and I think Bran as the king has a certain poetry to it. But the plotting, character beats and pace got very lazy and rushed, especially re: Daenerys (and I didn't think Bran needed to be left an emotionless zombie), and ultimately the prophesied Long Night came to very little too. It was clear the showrunners (who GRRM has since said left him on read a few years prior) were looking towards their next big projects and got arrogant; to date all of those projects (Star Wars, the unfortunate-sounding HBO 'what if slavery survived' show) have evaporated. I laughed at the announcement of another GOT spinoff all about the Targaryens; I thought it was cliche, cynical and tired, trading on the audience's uncritical love of Daenerys while failing to understand that ultimately she was an antihero and tragic villain. (To this day people still claim GOT ruined Daenerys' heroic character, but IMO it was the rushed later writing that failed to fully sell getting her to where she was always meant to go; Emilia Clarke always did great work.) I just didn't think there was much interesting left to say about 'woo dragons' given the intense feelings about the overexposed final seasons which have yet to cool down, and I felt the GOT brand itself needed a long rest. So imagine my amazement that so far, HOTD - a show I only picked up out of sheer exhaustion and boredom in the summer of COVID Year 3 to watch something fluffy - is pretty solid. The deeper involvement of Martin, who seems to be very closely tied to the new showrunners on a personal level, shines through especially in the aesthetic, which is more colorful and high fantasy, less grungy than the later years of Westeros; I love Daemon Targaryen's OTT Final Fantasy-esque armor and elaborate helmet, the more vibrant colors, and the commonplace magic of dragons simply being a part of their lives. There seems to be less self-consciousness about leaning into these aspects of the source text, because this is a different era in the history (173? years prior to GOT) and also, of course, because GOT came first and did it well. Whatever we can say about GOT's ups and downs it stepped into a breach largely populated only by cheap basic cable shows like Xena, etc. and made fantasy more palatable to a broad and critical audience. Now that that's done, its spinoff is allowed to go more vibrant and wild with the fantastical elements or earnest nature. Firstly, it's nice to finally see Matt Smith in a role that isn't utterly demeaning like most of his attempts to conquer America post-Doctor Who. He looked absolutely ridiculous in the promotional material with that long wig, but he is playing a deeply nuanced antihero here who is both vicious and awful and layered and human in equal measure. (Also, the wig is thankfully gone) I've loved Paddy Considine since I first saw him as the Irish immigrant father in Jim Sheridan's wonderful In America, and he's been in so many great films since. He's not the actor you would expect to be donning a ridiculous Targaryen wig but he plays King Viserys very well, full of flaws and weakness despite what seems to be a good if deeply imperfect heart (wedding and bedding his daughter's unenthusiastic best friend to avoid being wed to a twelve year old); one quickly assumes he will get Ned Stark'ed or is not long for the show. Milly Alcock is the really excellent standout as the younger Rhaenrya, who is the central character but not a typical heroine like Arya, and it's going to be a loss to see her SORASed by the older adult performer in the next time-jump. Equally of note, the addition of a key family of color and Black characters up front feels like something that makes the original GOT and its ancillary Black characters a bit of a dinosaur already. And the integral presence of a talented female director, Claire Kilner, who talks at length in the BTS material of using the female lens to focus on Rhaenyra's agency in sex, and recontextualize how they present sex scenes on the show overall - while openly discussing her own struggle with how to do that, and the experience of largely seeing only male-directed sex scenes growing up and working in media - is really fascinating, important stuff. The regular timeskips between episodes of months and then years - Viserys going from wedding Alicent to her having his toddler son between episodes, three years apart - are not something you'd expect to work so well, but they do here because of the apparently very broad and far-reaching source text for this show (not ASOIAF) which I have not read, and because it feels like there is very little wasted movement, time and very little fat; knowing how much ground they will have to cover, they simply briskly move through story, evolution and character beats while also not feeling terribly hurried - it feels like a very focused macro-view of this world (which is still largely limited to King's Landing and its associated key families) with its own rhythm, its own rules and ethos, versus having to bounce around frenetically while trying to balance GRRM's massive and incredibly detailed original main text. Because this period in GOT history is apparently very broadly outlined in its source book, they can do what they want but (allegedly, so I've heard) intend to keep this show to 3-4 seasons maximum - which is a big boon for it, IMO. Not drawing story out unnecessarily will be a big advantage, as opposed to GOT where they treaded water at a number of periods (I'll never forget Dorne) and then by the end, when time was needed and crucial, everyone seemed to be looking for the fire exits instead. It's strange to watch a 21st century show with so many broad narrative ellipses, let alone ellipses that work - it reminds me a bit of how I Claudius did them. Next week is, I believe, eight years and the SORASing of all the younger leads. Anyway, so far I've been pleasantly surprised. The new pace, the new style, the wide and expansive timespan and shift in perspective and increased sensitivity make it worthwhile. It could shít the bed and become another lazy new iteration of what Ian McShane famously dismissed as 'tits and dragons,' but for now it's got me into it. And yes, it makes a really unique and oddly appropriate companion viewing for Knots Landing - they're both soaps. (Amusingly, I think it was the Washington Post or another major paper that dismissed HOTD early on as 'the Knots Landing to GOT's Dallas' - go figure)