The Following (spoilers included)

[Ann_SS]

Anyone watched The Following? I watched it for James Purefoy who I love as an actor, but thought the show was a bit of a let down. Kevin Bacon and James were good, but the premise of the story is so ridiculous. A serial killer with disciples carrying out his work while he is in prison. Gah. Oh well. It has 14 episodes. I will watch next week's episode to see how it goes.

[EricMontreal22]

There's some discussion on it in the FOX forum--I was just going to post. I actually liked it more than I expected to--but I agree with your criticisms. For a show that seems to want to be, stylistically, realistic--ALL these planted followers just spending YEARS waiting to act, seems a bit extree (I mean I know cults can make people do crazy things, but they usually at least need the element of having cult meetings, etc, to keep them in that lifestyle).

I liked Ken Tucker's ent weekly review (though I thinkI'd give it a B not a B+) and how he mentions how ridiculous that a fancy university class and prof would talk about these authors like they were just out of Jr High (apparently these flashback scenes gt more ridiculous in later episodes). While a lot of people have huge respect for Poe, nowadays, you don't usually see him talked about with the other authors mentioned in the class--and then the fact that when Bacon sees Nevermore in blood, it seemed lik 5 minutes later he clued in "THE RAVEN!! It's POE!" was beyond silly--I suppose they just think their audience for this show will have zero knowledge of these stories and poems??

[Juliajms]

Yeah, I can see a serial killer having one or two very devoted followers. If you've ever seen Prison Wives, you know there are some real idiots out there. Still, a legion of them? No. I'll keep watching, but I have to put my brain aside and just enjoy the ride to do it.

[Ann_SS]

They said that he had about 400 (or some outrageous number) visitors over the years which made me roll my eyes. How is that possible? What kind of prison facility or authorities would even allow this? Serial killers are kept in maximum security prisons with limited contact to the outside world.

[EricMontreal22]

On one forum someone said it was just like the Manson cult so could happen. Except... it's not. That was a group of people who lived together and lived for his words for a LONG time, and then some of them stayed loyal to him (or have stayed loyal). And yea, you do hear about people who fall in love (if love is the right word) with charismatic mass murderers and the like through prison correspondance, and even have been convinced to do horrible things--but this is just too much of a stretch. There could be a literal army of these people scattered round, who, at least in the case of the "gay" neighbours in theory have put up a facade for, I think they said, three years about who they were and how good friends they were with that woman, etc, etc.

Still, I did like much of the acting, some of the writing and directing and am gonna stick with it for now--just, as was said above, with a huge suspension of disbelief. (And I admit, I was kinda shocked by some of the violence for a network tv show--which surprised me after being used to what I've seen on cable).

[Ann_SS]

The two leads are outstanding so I am sticking with this for the time being. Kevin Bacon is too often underrated as an actor. I even forget about him at times and I fawn over very talented actors. Jame Purejoy is a joy to watch and I expect good things from him as the series progresses. I hope this series opens even bigger doors for him. I don't like Natalie Zea period, I didn't like her on Dirty, Sexy, Money, didn't like her on Justified. She is bland and uninteresting. I had a second of hope that the chick who died from Lost would be the lead actress because I like her much better, but nope.

I have seen comments on blogs and elsewhere about the violence. I have to admit that I did not notice. The Walking Dead, Dexter, Justified, and Game of Thrones have inured me to violence and gruesome deaths.

[Vee]

I thought it was incredibly lame. Yet for some reason I'll give it another week. Probably because I like Kevin Bacon, Annie Parisse and Natalie Zea, and I used to enjoy Purefoy on Rome.

[alexisfan07]

I enjoyed the show but like all of you, I found it to be pretty unrealistic. Kevin totally had some "Scream" shoutouts with killing Maggie Grace off in the first episode, ala Drew Barrymore, and one of the 'gay' neighbors was in "Scream 4." Anyway, I was not expecting the twist with them but the babysitter was a bit more obvious. Had some great suspenseful moments and I think I jumped once or twice at the jump scares.

LOL at me hating the lead detective chick and then logging online right after to find out she'd been fired after the pilot and replaced with Annie Parisse, who I don't know but is much cuter. I kept thinking MOLEY MOLEY MOLE!

[gtru1981]

And True Blood, American Horror Story and the Walking Dead are realistic? lol..Stuff like that are what people like.

[alexisfan07]

No, of course those aren't. But if the show is based in fantasy, people usually don't care how crazy the show gets. When it's based in reality, people become more critical. For the record, I don't watch or care for any of those shows.

[Ann_SS]

Exactly. It is one thing to suspend reality and create a fantasy/alternate world where magic, vampires, werewolves, zombies, and ghosts exist like Being Human, True Blood, The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones which I watch, it is another to base a show in reality with an unbelievable premise that pisses on the viewers and tell them that it is raining. This certainly does not mean that the show is doomed, in fact, the premiere had great ratings, but it should be expected that people will comment on the unbelievable aspects of the show. The same thing happens with Dexter which tries to sell some unbelievable moments.

Annie Parisse played crazy Julia on ATWT for three years. I am actually surprised by her prime time success. I never thought that she was anything special.

[EricMontreal22]

Well said Anne. I know it's a TV show, and I watch plenty of fantasy/sci-fi/whatever TV shows (though even there I get pissed off if they seem to contradict their own reality they've been building). But, unless I completely mis-read the show, this show wants us to feel it's set in the present, real, world.