Boardwalk Empire

[BooG690]

How HBO's 'Boardwalk Empire' finally got great in its third season - Grantland

Nicely written article about the best show ever.

[wufwugy]

We're lucky that BWE has such big names behind it that kept viewers through its exposition phase because if it didn't it would have been cancelled prematurely just like Carnivale was.

[Penneywize]

So fuckin excited about tonight's episode. COME AT ME BRO

[Renton]

Holy jumping fucking fuckballs

[BooG690]

Richard fucking Harrow.

Also, this is a good read about the finale: Boardwalk Empire creator Terence Winter talks Nucky, Richard, Chalky and more from season 3

[BooG690]

Scorcese, you genius.

[Eric]

It sucks that the season is over!

[bikes]

AWWW YIISSSSS

[Penneywize]

September 8 FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

[Renton]

I'm thinking this is the most technically perfect show on television right now other than maybe Breaking Bad. By that I mean measuring all the parameters by which one would rate a show. Game of Thrones might be more enjoyable at times owing to the source material and the acting but it is far less good than BWE in terms of directing and script.

I randomly watched the S3 episode with Nucky and AR's big fight, one of my favorite A.R. moments:

Arnold Rothstein: It's not alright. Do you think I entered into this arrangement because I value your companionship? You are a convenience of geography and supply. You promised a quantity and a price. *You* have failed to deliver! And now, owing to your inability to manage your affairs in *New Jersey* - a state I have little interest in or affection for - you expect me to start a war? In New York? Where things actually matter?

Also I noticed on the rewatch of that episode that during AR's meeting with Gyp Rosetti in Tabor Heights he notices the newspaper boy and then later gets Benny Seigel to use that as a ruse in the attempt on Rosetti's life later in the episode. Not sure how I didn't pick that up before.

[boost]

Yeah, my gut reaction is, "buh-buh-but Game of Thrones!" However, you make a solid point. GoT somehow tends to make the adaptation of such an expansive piece seem effortless, but still they are cramming so much into 10 episode seasons. Boardwalk is completely free of such constraints.

And yeah, that was a powerful scolding. But it was more nuanced than most gave it credit for I think. If you look back through the seasons, I think he actually does value Nucky's companionship. Obviously business comes first, but he almost seemed hurt, as did Nucky. It's lonely at the top, and Nucky is a respectable peer-- dropping the ball made him less respectable and therefore less of a peer, which debases their business relationship, and, more importantly in regards to my point, their non-business relationship.

[pictureman78]

Love Boardwalk Empire but they got the Al Capone wrong at least in how he treated his son.I've read alot on mafia / organized crime history.One by Al Capone's family member.Who i've had a chance to chat with on facebook.Her book Uncle Al Capone.Is written with love of her family of course.But I believe to be the best on her uncle.

[bikes]

WHAT IS MEYER SAYING WHEN HE BEATS THE SHIT OF THE THE RICH GUY?!?!?!?

[Renton]

<3 meyer

[boost]

WHAT IS MEYER SAYING WHEN HE BEATS THE SHIT OF THE THE RICH GUY?!?!?!?

He's speaking in Hebrew, imo.

[wufwugy]

I love this show

[bikes]

it's def def def picked up the last 2 eps for sho

[wufwugy]

I think that may be a trend for every season. The plot arcs are still too isolated to each season, so much of the tension is reset

[Penneywize]

Anyone else think it's awesome that they brought Herc from The Wire / Dom from Entourage in as Al Capone's brother? F YEAH

[boost]

I like him as an actor, but he has very limited range, so he tends to stand out in scenes while others are better at blending into the world.

But, like I said, I like him, so it doesn't bother me.

[Penneywize]

Hilarious how his accent is fitting in the contexts of being from Baltimore / New York / Chicago in the 1920s

You know, I always wonder this whenever I see an actor I recognize from elsewhere: is my impression of him/her coloured by the fact that yes, I am sort of appreciating their performance GIVEN the perspective I have on them already? I wonder if it's even possible to be completely impartial. Maybe it is not.

I'm sure you know what I mean, but let me give some more concrete examples: the actor playing Edmure Tully in GoT - same guy who plays Brutus in HBO's production of Rome (which, if you haven't seen this - I highly recommend it). Yeah, the characters are different, but the delivery by the actor is essentially the same.

The actress playing Margaery Tyrell (yes, GoT again, deal with it) was a queen in a different show, too - she played Ann Boleyn in Showtime's The Tudors, and was pretty damn good in it. Yet, having seen the GoT version of her prior, I couldn't shake the feeling that I was watching Margaery Tyrell the entire fucking time.

It's not for nothing that this shit keeps happening (another example, and yes GoT again, Mance Rayder = the guy who plays Caesar in Rome). Seems reasonable to me that some combination of the actors themselves seeking roles they have experience with / know they can do / are comfortable playing and the casting directors recognizing that and seeking them out results in us seeing them in similar roles repeatedly.

So how fair is it for a viewer to judge the performance of one of these actors when it's pretty clear that the reason they're often put in these roles is to play the same fucking guy they've played before. amirite

[boost]

ahhhh just wrote up a long post about type-casting vs HBO style recycling of talented actors... then I clicked the wrong button

[Penneywize]

Damn I would have liked to read that. Ehhh cliff notes?

[bikes]

Rome is an awesome show. And I shan't forgive HBO for cancelling it.

[boost]

I just think that type-casting gets far too much hate. Every actor isn't going to be Daniel Day Lewis. And we do need a subset of people who are professional actors, else acting will generally be atrocious. I didn't touch on this in the original post, but I think the much greater offense is casting for "cuteness", or some other shallow characteristic which is not integral to the roll. This is especially troublesome with the casting of children and women. Dime a dozen boringly middle of the road "pretty" women and "cute" children are often put in rolls they have no place in, to the detriment of shows and movies. The Wire does an amazing job of not falling into this trap. Besides getting good actors, we are afforded with a side benefit of the cast actually feeling true to reality.

Now, the HBO recycling of actors-- sometimes this is type casting, but more often than not it is just tapping back into relationships they have with solid reliable actors. Of course television shows have more of a window to convince you it's a new person than a movie, but when it's done best you quickly forget who Carcetti is, and all you see is Baelish. The same happened for me with Lester Freeman and Bunk in Treme-- I only saw their Wire characters for a short time, even though that's how I had come to know these actors. When done well, it feels like you're going to see a new production put on by your favorite theater troupe.

[bikes]

MORE!

[Penneywize]

Feel terrible for Eddy, he just wanted more responsibility. In one episode he goes from being on an emphatic upswing to being dead. Too bad

[wufwugy]

For some reason I missed thee end of the Eddy thing. He died?

[bikes]

he suicided

[Renton]

No tension mounting, nothing tying the myriad plotlines together, great gaps of time without seeing Richard, no major threats to Nucky, and this is still such a great show.

Loving Agent Knox. That line where he says he has to pull himself together as his partner is bleeding out from the shotgun trap was pretty cold blooded. I'm not sure what he intended to do about blowing his cover to Eddie, isn't he supposed to be acting like a corrupt agent?

[boost]

If he couldn't break Eddie, he could just extradite him to Germany.

[Penneywize]

Boost you mentioned Treme in your post, is it any good? I'm always looking for new series to pick up whilst waiting for GoT to start back up again.

[boost]

It's an amazing novel. And for me that makes an amazing TV show. It's all about seeing the bigger picture through the small stories, it's all slow burn, and there wasn't much of a beginning, and there likely won't be fireworks for the finale-- it's just a part of time in a frame. A really enjoyable part of time, in a really colorful place.

So if you're impatient and need constant overstimulation, this definitely isn't the show for you. Otherwise, I highly recommend it.

[TeUnit]

is anybody else losing interest in this one?

[wufwugy]

is anybody else losing interest in this one?

If you're losing interest at this point, I must ask "how in the buttbarf did you get past the first season?"

[bikes]

FUCKING MARGRET FUCK

[wufwugy]

"he aint nothing but a nigga with a dictionary" for best line of the show

[bikes]

Rolling Stone branded Nucky’s estranged wife “Prissy O’Frowney,” and she does not disappoint her brand.

[wufwugy]

i hate her. not because im sexist, but because im racist. against the irish

[Renton]

i like her

[Penneywize]

I like how Margaret shows up for like 2 minutes in this episode and now that's all anyone can talk about

Yeah the ep was kinda shitty by season 4 standards I guess

Wuf's bang on that the "nigga with a dictionary" line was awesome as fuck

Surprising that Nucky's Florida guy whose name escapes me actually got his shit together, though one wonders how he hid the body and the grisly murder scene

Speaking of Nucky, him banging the chick who owns the bar was long overdue, I mean really could they have telegraphed that shit any more than they did?

[boost]

Speaking of Nucky, him banging the chick who owns the bar was long overdue, I mean really could they have telegraphed that shit any more than they did?

Yeah, sure, but sometimes that's how a hookup works. Your paths overlap, but it takes a while for things to line up. It wasn't some huge reveal that they had done a poor job of making overly obvious before the reveal.

[bikes]

I KNEW MEANS WAS PLAYING THOMPSON! I KNEW IT!

[wufwugy]

Me too. I thought perhaps he wasn't because they didn't show him doing it, but then they did

[!Luck]

Oh man. That was great. Tony the tiger great!

He owns that bitch and yet he killed her mom. Fuck.

[wufwugy]

who killed whose mom?

[!Luck]

Dr. Narcisse. That's why his chest had scares. And he "freed" her mom with "these hands".

[boost]

Yeah, surprised you missed that wuf. I had a hard time hearing her dialogue when she was telling Chalky the story, and couldn't catch watch the weapon was that she said the hookers would keep under the bed, but I guess it was something capable of burning a person.

Pretty sick character development. I'd like to go back and count how many words of dialogue Dr. Narcisse has. This show is pretty great with economy of screen time and dialogue.

And I have to say, I'm kinda excited about the AR/Margarette arc. What the hell is AR doing buying into bum investments?

Oh, and Chicago.. here we go.

[wufwugy]

I have a hearing disability and didn't watch it with subtitles. I miss a lot. Unless it's Peter Dinklage speaking. He understands clarity. Everybody is a bunch of mumblers, and I didn't realize that until I was amazed at how crisp Dinklage's voice is. My theory is that speaking with clarity is one way he compensates by being of small stature

[bikes]

subtitles yo. subtitles.

[Eric]

Dr. Narcisse. That's why his chest had scares. And he "freed" her mom with "these hands".

Yeah, there are lots of different levels of bad guys.

[wufwugy]

omg i just realized that dude who plays al capone is tommy in snatch. zee germans are proper fucked now

[boost]

lol, you're soooo late on that one.

[bikes]

lol, you're soooo late on that one.

+1

[wufwugy]

come to think of it, i knew it but forgot it. i blame whiskey

[wufwugy]

hate red lipstick, especially on black girls. singer chick is so hot, but cant help being turned off by the atrocious color contrast of red on brown

[boost]

I don't remember being jarred by her lipstick, but yeah, some colors are just awful. I've seen red look good, but typically it is one of those awful ones.


Shit, for that matter, heavy makeup in general is awful. It surely improves some girls, but has the ability to absolutely ruin others who don't need it.

[wufwugy]

au naturel isn't always better, but it usually is

[wufwugy]

I hope that Narcisse dies by the season finale, making him a bad guy like Rosetti. But hope that the FBI guy is in for the long haul. The show needs to transition to a more Breaking Bad-esque plot style that increases tension between seasons instead of dumping it. Part of my adoration for the BWE plot was how swiftly the use of Rosetti tightened the tension, and the writers need to reintroduce that dynamic while expanding it

[bikes]

PURNSLEY B DUNN

[bikes]

COME AT THE KING? YOU BEST NOT MISS!

[boost]

That was an amazing hour of TV. Things are really picking up, and fast. Should have seen the Bureau leveraging William's cover-up coming.

[wufwugy]

god this show does gruesome so well. there's more cringe to be had in one bwe fight than in a year of hollywood gore garbage

[boost]

Yeah, I thought the makeup on the poisoned kid was remarkable.

And lol at all the naysayers who complained that William's arc couldn't lead anywhere and was a waste of time.

[Eric]

I hope that Narcisse dies by the season finale, making him a bad guy like Rosetti.

+1

[!Luck]

[wufwugy]

What a baller ass show. Van Alden could be on the road to top ten all time best chars

[bikes]

i dont understand how o banion didnt know that was frankie yale. everyone knew he killed colisemo.

that being said that was the coolest execution scene ive ever seen.

this show is moving up in tiers from great to GOAT

[bikes]

My name is Nelson Van Alden. Take off your nightgown!

[Eric]

Who was Jimmy's mom's boyfriend talking to on the phone?

[boost]

Eric, we don't know. Obviously us viewers have been suspicious, but that's the first overt sign we've gotten that there's more to him than what he puts forth.

[wufwugy]

He was talking to Lumbergh

[boost]

He was talking to Lumbergh

OMG OMG OMG OMG ONE TIME HE'S TALKING TO MEANS!

[wufwugy]

damn i think you cracked it

but why?

[boost]

Who cares.