Topic: alt.guardian.die.die.die

[TrenterPercenter]

You have a very low opinion of the audiences mental capacity.....blah blah blah

Sorry stopped reading.  Exact same thing people like Farage peddle in the absence of any real criticism.



It is nothing do with mental capacity (whatever you think that is).

[Bazooka]

You really are the same as Freeman, fantastic at comparing apples with oranges.  You should join her and set up a green grocers.

If you want to see real criticsm please read the rest. (I know you will)

[Blue Jam]

You say that like it's a negative! :)

Ha! You should see half the crap I watch, I enjoyed V Wars FFS.

I can't really knock BrBa. Or pretend I dind't enjoy it immensely. It's great but the spin-off is better, sorry.

Although it is interesting how the show with the more superficially wacky and "big" character ended up being the most mature of the two.

It's probably been noted a billion times by actual TV critics who get paid for their opinions but yes, the fact that a spin-off about the wacky comic relief character played by a comedian ended up becoming an utterly heartbreaking tragedy is remarkable isn't it? Perhaps not much less remarkable than Malcolm In The Middle's silly dad playing a sociopathic druglord though.

Fuckit, they're both great shows, I'm splitting hairs here.

[Mister Six]

Horribly off topic for this thread, but re class-blindness and income blindness, I think it's interesting that it tends to be shows about youngish unmarried urban professionals that attract this criticism. I think there's a sense that if you're a young person living in the city, then whether you're living in a flat-share hovel or a huge loft with a kitchen the size of Paris, then as long as you're dating, hanging out with friends, getting drunk, and trying to decide what to do with your life, it's all basically the same, whether you're in Friends, SatC, Broad City, Made in Chelsea, Jersey Shore, etc. Obviously this isn't entirely true - and even less true if you're black or disabled. But if it's a show about people working at jobs, raising a family, etc, then class and income becomes much more obvious, and there's no way to pretend that we're all just Carrie/Samantha/Rachel/Monica when a few of us might be in Dallas but most of us are living more like Roseanne pre-series 9.

Isn't a lot of that about genre and focus, though? Shows about young, attractive people in cities tend to be sitcoms or comedy-dramas where the focus is on romantic relationships and general wacky hijinks, and the characters only have jobs as the mildest of mild nods to reality[1] whereas shows about older people or families tend to be more dramatic and focus on established couples, where the dramatic potential comes from outside the relationships, so stories about job security, money woes etc are more pressing.

Search Party is a fantastic example of a show about young wealthy people in the big city that makes their obnoxious privilege a key part of the story.

1.

And those jobs are frequently either entirely sidelined or the kind of thing that sounds good but most viewers know nothing about in reality, so they can be used to suggest character traits without ever actually impeding the plot - Ted from How I Met Your Mother is from a long line of fictional architects in film and TV because it's a job that sounds kind of artsy but also kind of mundane and definitely well-paid, but isn't going to seriously eat into someone's personal life in the way that, say, being a cop might.

[mr. logic]

I’m sorry but Better Call Saul is boring

[Mister Six]

Better Call Saul is not boring. It is you that is boring.

It's probably been noted a billion times by actual TV critics who get paid for their opinions but yes, the fact that a spin-off about the wacky comic relief character played by a comedian ended up becoming an utterly heartbreaking tragedy is remarkable isn't it? Perhaps not much less remarkable than Malcolm In The Middle's silly dad playing a sociopathic druglord though.

Maybe a bit more remarkable - I remember reading interviews with Odenkirk around the time of season two or three in which he fretted about his acting abilities and being given more screentime. Well he really showed himself, eh?

[TrenterPercenter]

You really are the same as Freeman, fantastic at comparing apples with oranges.  You should join her and set up a green grocers.

If you want to see real criticsm please read the rest. (I know you will)

No I won't. What on earth makes you think I will.

The most typical response to any criticism of any medium is suggesting the critic thinks they are above other people, it is a complete choke hold on progressive analysis used by bad faith actors everywhere.  If you haven't learnt that then I'm very confident that there isn't anything of interest to me reading whatever else you said.

[TrenterPercenter]

I’m sorry but Better Call Saul is boring

Yeah I watched this with my other half for a bit and felt similar to you about it; ostensibly there is nothing wrong with it but like a lot of these things its stretched out and kept alive past its sell by date because its brand has become worth something.

The same thing in a different way I'm struggling with Orange is the New Black - I've just got the end of season 4 and the cracks are showing; it just can't keep itself very coherent and so is increasingly becoming more madcap and without doing the necessary work to keep it all together.

[Endicott]

Yeah I watched this with my other half for a bit and felt similar to you about it; ostensibly there is nothing wrong with it but like a lot of these things its stretched out and kept alive past its sell by date because its brand has become worth something.

Extremely uncharitable. Saying Not for me was fair enough mind.

[TrenterPercenter]

Extremely uncharitable. Saying Not for me was fair enough mind.

In fact I'm only guessing here as she eventually lost interest in it and she usually sticks these things out to the death - I will consult her.

[TrenterPercenter]

Isn't a lot of that about genre and focus, though?......

Hmmm there are aspects about genre and focus. I think first off however we have to appraise programs or opinion writers for that matter, on both their individual and their addition to general environment (i.e. their commonality), we can then better assess whether something is harmful and how harmful something is.  If there was only one Hadley Freeman then for her to be highly damaging to audiences she would have to be doing something quite extreme to have the same insidious impact of lots of other Hadleys doing things several orders of degree less extreme.  The same applies for programming; one reality TV show doesn't corrosively influence audiences but lots and lots of them do; they create an environment.  One sitcom with a narcissistic but handsome male that is going to pester the disinterested-but-interested love interest into submission isn't really a problem but 10-20-30? or the fact it just becomes a ubiquitous trope that men then think well there must be something to it.  Attractiveness is of course a big thing isn't it; it holds massive advantages, not only in getting cast, but in general life chances overall, we are made to believe that we want to watch attractive people (something I think is coerced not demanded) but when you think about it, it's just really sad.  General normal looking people are just not allowed to be in some programming (well not in any lead roles) in case the normal people gazing in recognise them and don't like it.

There are masses of issues with all of this and it is complicated but we'll never get anywhere in actually assessing it if people just get defensive about programs they like, that isn't the point, it's like incels defending their porn just because you point not everything might be ok about it.  It isn't simple as "down with this sort of thing" it's obviously a delicate interaction between individuals, culture and society.  We seem to be able to handle other things that might be enjoyable for us but can also be bad (drug, alcohol, food etc..) but we really struggle with media for some reason.

[Jockice]

I watched seasons 1-5 around on BBC2, or on DVD, and then forgot about it until lockdown, when I finally decided to see if that ending was as perfect as people here said it was. I'm glad I did.

It is the best ending to anything ever. End of.

[Mister Six]

Words

Sorry, I think I might have misunderstood what you were saying in the post I replied to.

[TrenterPercenter]

Now you've mentioned the class-blindness thing, there is some interesting exploration of class in the whole Breaking Bad universe. The characters include a high school teacher, a radiographer, a law enforcer and numerous lawyers who are all really struggling to make ends meet. They're all in jobs which once guaranteed a decent income and a comfortable life, and they're all struggling because the world has changed and having a degree is no longer a guarantee of a decent job. One of the official podcasts mentioned this, it's apparently deliberate. I think that's a situation a lot of people now find themselves in, univeristy educated but underemployed and underpaid. That's certainly more relatable than Friends, a show in which a coffee shop worker can afford a massive apartment in Manhatan.

Sorry BlueJam I missed this.  Yes i have seen some bits of breaking bad and saw that it tried to confront some elements of disability which is commendable.  I saw a bit of it in a shop regarding this and thought it was pretty well done.  I think BrBa was just overly sold to me by a few people which put me off a bit. 

PS - exactly my point about Friends - someone that I worked with who I was chatting about Friends class issues defended it by saying "well Rachel was poor but she then got rich" (apparently).  Again I just had to roll my eyes and think you are not really thinking about this in the same way; Rachel was never poor, she just worked in a job that would no way afford her the life she lived because you can do that when you are making things up.

[Blue Jam]

Sorry BlueJam I missed this.  Yes i have seen some bits of breaking bad and saw that it tried to confront some elements of disability which is commendable.  I saw a bit of it in a shop regarding this and thought it was pretty well done.  I think BrBa was just overly sold to me by a few people which put me off a bit. 

Yes, it's got a character with cerebral palsy played by an actor with cerebral palsy rather than an able-bodied actor faking it, which is good to see. Bit like Curb casting trans actors to play trans characters, not that the Graun would applaud this.

I was also initially put off BrBa by people hyping it up and over analysing it. Then I gave it a go and now I have become one of those people, hehe.

Still not going to give Game of Thrones a go mind. I've never been big on fantasy and GoT just doesn't appeal to me at all.

Maybe a bit more remarkable

I meant the casting of Bryan Cranston possibly wasn't much less remarkable there, sorry. You're right though, it's  amazing to see how BCS ended up after those rumours that it would be a zany 30-minute sitcom with a Client Of The Week in each episode.

Imagine introducing a character to BCS for a bit of comic relief. Nope, never gonna happen. The more heart-wrenching that show gets, the better.

[TrenterPercenter]

Sorry, I think I might have misunderstood what you were saying in the post I replied to.

Nope I don't think you were I thought it was a good point.  I was just replying to you because it seemed in the same vein as what I was talking about.

[evilcommiedictator]

Real Housewives is class-blind

[bgmnts]

Just want to say Better Call Saul is indeed a tad dull and drags everything out way too long. Could have had 3 seasons of great telly instead of presumably six seasons of average telly.

I do like Kim Wexler though, she feels like quite a different character from anything I have seen in television.

[Twit 2]

I find BCS riveting. What’s the matter, not enough explosions? You make me sick. Try again.

[JaDanketies]

Better Call Saul is a slow burner and is not immediately gripping. We were actually years behind on it and started watching it again because we had finished some other series and had no ideas about what to watch next, and I'm pleased we did because I am now gripped and the storyline is burning.

[Mobbd]

Just want to say Better Call Saul is indeed a tad dull and drags everything out way too long. Could have had 3 seasons of great telly instead of presumably six seasons of average telly.

You might say it's overrated from where you're sitting but this is objectively bollocks.

[JaDanketies]

I'm now pleased BCS has taken us on this long-winded journey rather than jumped straight into "fast-talking 'criminal' attorney Saul Goodman" like I initially expected it to (and was disappointed when it didn't).

I'm not sure it could be considered overrated since nobody even talks about it except for here. It's hardly GoT.

[thugler]

BCS has artificially stretched itself out too long, mainly because they didn't know where they were going to go with it when they wrote it. That's why it feels dragged out. Genuinely believe it would have been twice as good as it is if it had half the episodes. Also his schtick of putting the camera on an object or in an unusual place, or doing a long ass montage, is played out as fuck at this point. It's not as terrible as the Breaking Bad cash in Jesse thing though.

[phantom_power]

Lots of shows don't know where they are going when they start. I am not sure that is a pre-requisite for good TV. I also don't think that they are dragging anything out for any reason. They have decided how many seasons there are going to be so are under no pressure to do so. It is clearly an artistic decision. You may not like that but I don't think it is fair to attribute it to cynicism of desperation

[JaDanketies]

BCS is one show that definitely does know where it's going before it starts, anyway. It's a bloody prequel!

[icehaven]

Going back to the Guardian, has anyone else found the formatting of the btl comments has gone all weird recently? They don't fit on the screen anymore and you have to scroll right to read them. I use several different phones/tablets/PCs and it's the same on all of them so I don't think it's just my devices.

[beanheadmcginty]

Can people stop slagging off Better Call Saul please? It's really upsetting and a waste of negative energy that would be much better aimed at all those cunts at the Guardian.

[Blue Jam]

Yes. All you BCS dislikers may be very very wrong but Hadley Freeman is still the wrongest of all. Not just about BCS, in general.

[Paul Calf]

You might say it's overrated from where you're sitting but this is objectively bollocks.

I wish people would stop doing this.

[NoSleep]

Stating the truth?