Television Discussion Thread

[Smooth Criminal]

And I'm only halfway through political animals and it's already great. Very refreshing having this few commercials.

[vidae]

Ah holy crap, with Newsroom and Breaking Bad I totally forgot Political Animals was on last night. Must.. watch..

[Ngatachance92]

Did anyone watch Small Town Security after Breaking Bad? It looks like it could be funny or it could be awful.

[Smooth Criminal]

Originally Posted by vidae

Ah holy crap, with Newsroom and Breaking Bad I totally forgot Political Animals was on last night. Must.. watch..

I watch four things Sundays at 10:00 now. Good tv night for sure.

I loved Political Animals. Could make an awesome series. Definitely enjoyed it more than Newsroom. But not breaking bad, obviously.

[jrdrylie]

Originally Posted by Ngatachance92

Did anyone watch Small Town Security after Breaking Bad? It looks like it could be funny or it could be awful.

While watching the Walking Dead Marathon, I saw about 100 commercials for Small Town Security. It looked terrible.

[Brodeur]

Originally Posted by jrdrylie

While watching the Walking Dead Marathon, I saw about 100 commercials for Small Town Security. It looked terrible.

I found your problem right there.

[Rosebud]

Sorkin really needs a co-writer. This was the best episode so far and still Sorkin's pretentiousness pour out of the screen. The desperate housewives? Really? Who gives a ****, artist have manipulated people's lives for centuries for stories and real emotion. I don't watch any reality TV, though I did watch a season of Survivor, but that's at least still kinda a game show, but again Sorkin goes for the low hanging fruit with a machete. And why can't he admit to himself that he just can't write love triangles and should stop trying to figure it out?

[comahan]

I'll be his co-writer.

And just do nothing and let him keep going at it alone, because Im a huge fan of the result so far :D

About to watch Political Animals.

[Smooth Criminal]

It was the real housewives, not the desperate ones...

[themaninblack]

Some of the faces Alison Pill makes in The Newsroom are flat out creepy.

[XxXdragonXxX]

I'm really enjoying the Newsroom, this weeks episode was definitely the funniest of the so far. Loved the Bigfoot thing and I thought it actually did fit the charecter because he's a huge nerd.

Also the love triangle doesn't bother me (between Jim Don and Maggie), it's like a mirror image of some things that I've gone through. Now if Maggie ends up cheating on Don with some other guy, gets caught and ruins her shot with Jim in the process, I'm gonna start thinking someone is watching me for storylines.

[comahan]

I really liked Political Animals, Sigourney Weaver is awesome.

[eaglesalltheway]

I recently started watching Parks and Rec. I understand why Ron Swanson gets the love he does here. The man is a man in every manly sense of the word man. Its a pretty damn good show averall, too, btw.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by eaglesalltheway

I recently started watching Parks and Rec. I understand why Ron Swanson gets the love he does here. The man is a man in every manly sense of the word man. Its a pretty damn good show averall, too, btw.

[descendency]

Originally Posted by themaninblack

Some of the faces Alison Pill makes in The Newsroom are flat out creepy.

Really?

I thought Newsroom was one of the best shows on TV, but last night's episode was kind of disappointing.

[Rosebud]

I thought the season premiere of Political Animals was better than anything we've seen from the Newsroom, just looking at new Sunday at 10pm shows.

[Brodeur]

Originally Posted by descendency

Really?

I thought Newsroom was one of the best shows on TV, but last night's episode was kind of disappointing.

[comahan]

I enjoyed Political Animals, but Id take any of the Newsroom eps over it so far. But im also a pretty huge Newsroom fan. Very different shows though.

[vidae]

Originally Posted by eaglesalltheway

I recently started watching Parks and Rec. I understand why Ron Swanson gets the love he does here. The man is a man in every manly sense of the word man. Its a pretty damn good show averall, too, btw.

The show gets so much better after the first season too. Keep with it, you won't be disappointed.

[Xiomera]

Watched episode four of The Newsroom. Oh boy ...

My criticisms — I'll put them in spoilers just in case the people who bash me for disliking it want to be spared:

- "She's a person. Doctors pronounce her dead, not news networks." — While true, it's really sad that Aaron Sorkin is deathly allergic to subtlety. Could he bash it over people's heads any more if he tried? It's funny how condescending Sorkin is his own audience. He's writing a television show that seeks to criticize real cable news for enabling an ill-informed electorate, but treats the viewers of The Newsroom as the same caliber of idiots by being so damn overt about his message. It's all "tell" and no "show."

- Is there anything less interesting than the Will/Mackenzie relationship and all of the craaaaaazy mishaps that go on between them with their personal life? Have we been given any single reason to give a **** about whether or not they end up getting along and reconciling? My god, the entire episode seriously revolved around the most asinine series of encounters with women for Will. And they really justified the presence of Olivia Munn by writing her some really interesting stuff to do as Will's love guru. That was fun.

- How often does a woman actually throw a drink in a man's face relative to the number of times Aaron Sorkin thinks it happens? Why the **** did the staff of the newsroom throw drinks in Will's face, and subsequently, why did he react as if it were a perfectly-acceptable occurrence?

- How incredibly wacky that the entire newsroom happened to be hanging out and bickering in the newsroom on a Saturday when Giffords was shot? Sure, we can forgive that convenience because it's a fake TV show, but did the selection of Coldplay's "Fix You" just made the whole thing absolutely hilarious and distracting. Forgive me for not seeing how that song choice made any ******* sense narratively-speaking. I just found myself laughing through the final 10 minutes.

- Love triangles are fun, but I feel like I've seen this particular one before on The Office. "Jim, I'd like you to meet other Jim. He's a regional paper salesman."

- Not a criticism, but amusing that the show snatched up three actresses from current NBC sitcoms in one episode.

- BIG FOOT, BIG FOOT, BIG FOOT! If I took a shot for every time comedic relief boy said BIG FOOT, I'd have died by the end of the episode.

- On the same note, let's all take a moment to heed Will's insistence that he's a registered Republican, despite what the tabloids say. If we don't listen now, he'll only be prone to further spats of indignation and start reminding us again at every opportunity.

- The show has progressively gotten worse since the pilot episode, which I didn't find terrible, just that it was based on a really unfortunate premise. There have been individual scenes to shine through as a glimmer of a non-terrible show, but there were none to be found in episode four.

Disclaimer: If you enjoy The Newsroom and are insecure about the joy you experience while watching it, the contents of this post are likely to upset you and cause you to spent precious minutes crafting a (futile) response to the many criticisms I have levied against the show. Proceed cautiously.

[sbh15]

Originally Posted by vidae

The show gets so much better after the first season too. Keep with it, you won't be disappointed.

I try to get all my friends to watch it, but it's so difficult to get them through the 1st season

[Xiomera]

No, vidae, I don't care what you are about to reply.

[Caddy]

Originally Posted by vidae

I also don't think they ruined the Neal character at all. He's still smart (as evidenced by how he sacked up and got to work when they found out about the shooting) and I don't think wanting to talk about Bigfoot is a bad thing. It was funny. He is still the same character as he was before.

You went into this episode already thinking the character was ruined so that's what you saw. I wnet into it not thinking that and I didn't think it was a big deal.

I think it came across to a lot of people that way. He was talking about Bigfoot. :\ Smart one week. Moron the next, constantly being put down by his peers.

[vidae]

Originally Posted by Xiomera

Watched episode four of The Newsroom. Oh boy ...

My criticisms — I'll put them in spoilers just in case the people who bash me for disliking it want to be spared:

- "She's a person. Doctors pronounce her dead, not news networks." — While true, it's really sad that Aaron Sorkin is deathly allergic to subtlety. Could he bash it over people's heads any more if he tried? It's funny how condescending Sorkin is his own audience. He's writing a television show that seeks to criticize real cable news for enabling an ill-informed electorate, but treats the viewers of The Newsroom as the same caliber of idiots by being so damn overt about his message. It's all "tell" and no "show."

- Is there anything less interesting than the Will/Mackenzie relationship and all of the craaaaaazy mishaps that go on between them with their personal life? Have we been given any single reason to give a **** about whether or not they end up getting along and reconciling? My god, the entire episode seriously revolved around the most asinine series of encounters with women for Will. And they really justified the presence of Olivia Munn by writing her some really interesting stuff to do as Will's love guru. That was fun.

- How often does a woman actually throw a drink in a man's face relative to the number of times Aaron Sorkin thinks it happens? Why the **** did the staff of the newsroom throw drinks in Will's face, and subsequently, why did he react as if it were a perfectly-acceptable occurrence?

- How incredibly wacky that the entire newsroom happened to be hanging out and bickering in the newsroom on a Saturday when Giffords was shot? Sure, we can forgive that convenience because it's a fake TV show, but did the selection of Coldplay's "Fix You" just made the whole thing absolutely hilarious and distracting. Forgive me for not seeing how that song choice made any ******* sense narratively-speaking. I just found myself laughing through the final 10 minutes.

- Love triangles are fun, but I feel like I've seen this particular one before on The Office. "Jim, I'd like you to meet other Jim. He's a regional paper salesman."

- Not a criticism, but amusing that the show snatched up three actresses from current NBC sitcoms in one episode.

- BIG FOOT, BIG FOOT, BIG FOOT! If I took a shot for every time comedic relief boy said BIG FOOT, I'd have died by the end of the episode.

- On the same note, let's all take a moment to heed Will's insistence that he's a registered Republican, despite what the tabloids say. If we don't listen now, he'll only be prone to further spats of indignation and start reminding us again at every opportunity.

- The show has progressively gotten worse since the pilot episode, which I didn't find terrible, just that it was based on a really unfortunate premise. There have been individual scenes to shine through as a glimmer of a non-terrible show, but there were none to be found in episode four.

Disclaimer: I'm a giant hypocrite and condescending at every turn. Proceeding with caution is not needed. If you disagree with what I said I will laugh at you and when I do the same thing I'll ridicule you. My opinion is no more valid than anyone elses and nothing is different except for the fact that I think very highly of myself.

Fixed that for you chief. :)

[Splat]

Originally Posted by sbh15

I try to get all my friends to watch it, but it's so difficult to get them through the 1st season

Get new friends.