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Seriously, when people rave about the X-Files, they're raving about the stand-alone episodes.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:09
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We're in the middle of season 3 on our watch. 3-4 episodes a week can take a while. Definitely worth watching through once. A lot of drat good episodes.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:14
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HorseRenoir posted:At the end of the of the original series, they said that the aliens were going to invade the Earth in the year 2012. Do they ever mention this in the new episodes or did they just sweep that whole thing under the rug? That was resolved in the movie, wasn't it? Black tar aliens were stopped because... reasons, I can't remember, it was a very dull movie.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:40
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The metaplot of X-Files is about as coherent and varies in quality as much as that of Lost. I personally love both stand alone and metaplot episodes. There are some really good ones in both categories. I also really liked that the first movie, Fight the Future, basically dogpiled all the different metaplot together into one conspiracy. The various conspiracies in X-Files are not really part of a super-consistant continuity. Things like "the black oil" are more like memes or symbols. The original black oil was literally haunted engine oil from ww2, later, a different black oil came from the Tunguska Crater. The movie features a 3rd origin of the black oil with yet different properties. It's good poo poo.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:42
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Carter has gone on record saying he doesn't plan poo poo out. He enjoys making it up as he goes along. That's one reason his Amazon show wasn't picked up. The execs wanted a bible showing where the show was going over 5 seasons. He said no, and they made their decision.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:43
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Lycus posted:Seriously, when people rave about the X-Files, they're raving about the stand-alone episodes. Yeah, I remember Kumail Nanjiani listed the best episodes to watch if you're going through X-Files for the first time, I think I'll look that up then.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:48
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GreenNight posted:Carter has gone on record saying he doesn't plan poo poo out. He enjoys making it up as he goes along. That's one reason his Amazon show wasn't picked up. The execs wanted a bible showing where the show was going over 5 seasons. He said no, and they made their decision.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:49
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Though Vince Gilligan frequently talked about not planning stuff out for Breaking Bad, so you can run a good show while flying by the seat of your pants.
Lycus fucked around with this message at 00:55 on Jan 28, 2016 |
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Jan 28, 2016 00:53
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Josh Lyman posted:It's almost like he's a poo poo showrunner. The people Goons spend the most time calling terrible showrunners are the ones who helm incredibly popular, long-running, and successful shows.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:53
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Shawn Ryan didn't have much of a master plan for The Shield, either. He's spoken openly about how the writer's room would paint the Strike Team into a corner and then spend three days figuring out how they could get out of it. Sometimes not having a plan makes for more interesting television; it all depends on the writer.
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Jan 28, 2016 00:58
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IIRC Vince Gilligan's original plan for Season 1 of Breaking Bad was for Walter to immediately turn evil and brutally torture the guy in his basement. Kurt Sutter also wanted to reveal that Dutch was secretly a serial killer in the last episode of The Shield. Sometimes it's good when showrunners don't have plans.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:07
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By the way, if I can get pedantic, "showrunning" is a much different skillset from "writing." Writing is about what's on the page. Showrunning is largely about making sure the production runs smoothly while keeping the final product true to your vision. If you're interested in all the poo poo that's involved in good showrunning, Javier Grillo-Marxuach (Lost, The Middleman, The 100) lays it out here: http://okbjgm.weebly.com/the-eleven-laws-of-showrunning.html
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Jan 28, 2016 01:09
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In fairness The Shield and Breaking Bad weren't "conspiracy" shows the way Lost and X-Files were. They were character pieces so you can say "I'm going to write Walter White/Vic Mackey and see where the character takes me" and it can all work out fine and maybe even better than if you had a plan all along and felt forced to stick with it even if it wasn't really working. Lost and X-Files were about bigger plots and conspiracies with tons of questions and mysteries. So not knowing what the hell the answers are to the questions you're posing is kind of a huge problem in storytelling. That's different from "I don't know how Mulder's personal growth or story will end. I'll let it happen as organically as possible and hopefully it works out."
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Jan 28, 2016 01:14
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HorseRenoir posted:Sometimes it's good when showrunners don't have plans. The classic example, of course, is that Jesse was supposed to get killed in the first season of Breaking Bad (by Tuco, I think?). Hard to imagine how differently the show would have been had they gone that route.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:15
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STAC Goat posted:In fairness The Shield and Breaking Bad weren't "conspiracy" shows the way Lost and X-Files were. They were character pieces so you can say "I'm going to write Walter White/Vic Mackey and see where the character takes me" and it can all work out fine and maybe even better than if you had a plan all along and felt forced to stick with it even if it wasn't really working. Honestly, I felt that Lost's problem was that they stuck too closely to their original plan and ended up with an ending that felt anticlimactic in comparison to everything they had built the show up to be.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:23
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HorseRenoir posted:IIRC Vince Gilligan's original plan for Season 1 of Breaking Bad was for Walter to immediately turn evil and brutally torture the guy in his basement. Kurt Sutter also wanted to reveal that Dutch was secretly a serial killer in the last episode of The Shield. Sometimes it's good when showrunners don't have plans. It was pretty weird to have Dutch kill that cat then it never come up again.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:26
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HorseRenoir posted:Honestly, I felt that Lost's problem was that they stuck too closely to their original plan and ended up with an ending that felt anticlimactic in comparison to everything they had built the show up to be. I think that's more of a criticism of the choices that were made between the beginning and end. I think that speaks to the idea that Lost was just constantly throwing in twists and mysteries and upping the stakes to try and keep the fervor going. If Lost had a clear plan from the start that ended the way it did then it might have been fine. "Its purgatory" was always a popular theory amongst fans. But they took a million indirect roads to get there and it just didn't feel like any of them were really that necessary or together. I mean, the entire "Here's a group of plane survivors we didn't know were there but they have these important connections and... nevermind, they're all dead." thing always summed it up for me. It just felt like a giant waste of time.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:34
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Oh my god thats not what happened.
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Jan 28, 2016 01:54
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I haven't had chance to watch X-Files yet, but does it *look* like the old show at all? The trailer just made it look like generic 2010s drama #371 starring people from X-Files. The original has an aesthetic (probably to cloak the fact I'm sure it didn't have the highest budget) where you could see a frame that didn't include Mulder/Scully but you still knew what show it was. If I was in charge, I would've just made a bunch of episodes that would just sit standalone and slot in anywhere around the first 3 seasons or so. Isn't that what everyone wants, really?
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Jan 28, 2016 01:58
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EL BROMANCE posted:I haven't had chance to watch X-Files yet, but does it *look* like the old show at all? The trailer just made it look like generic 2010s drama #371 starring people from X-Files. The original has an aesthetic (probably to cloak the fact I'm sure it didn't have the highest budget) where you could see a frame that didn't include Mulder/Scully but you still knew what show it was. I don't know man. It's not 1993 anymore. I'm watching both and the new show sure looks a million times better. Plus you can't de-age the actors.
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Jan 28, 2016 02:02
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Tell that to Scully, because dayyyym!
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Jan 28, 2016 02:42
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Rocksicles posted:Tell that to Scully, because dayyyym! It probably helped that she was in her early 20s when the show started.
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Jan 28, 2016 02:46
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GreenNight posted:I don't know man. It's not 1993 anymore. I'm watching both and the new show sure looks a million times better. I'm watching old episodes every so often and everything about them just rubs in why I just have zero time for glossy, generic looking network dramas. I'm also watching West Wing again, which doesn't help. I know it's incredibly unfair that I'm watching two shows that stand out from the dross that aired around them, but ugh I just don't have the desire to invest 24 hours a season into the stuff that goes out these days.
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Jan 28, 2016 02:48
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Hey, shot in the dark, has anyone seen the Norwegian TV series Occupied (you may know it as Okkupert)? It's from the director of the original Insomnia, and it's about Russia seizing control of Norway after the latter country's PM tries to stop fossil fuel production cold. The premise certainly sounds absurd, but it got my attention when I saw it on Netflix, and the one-two punch of the opening scene and the main titles got me interested REAL quick. I'm probably gonna check it out regardless, but I wanted to know if anyone could give me an idea of what to expect.
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Jan 28, 2016 04:10
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it's 2016 and some people still think lost ended with they were in purgatory 
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Jan 28, 2016 05:02
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Escobarbarian posted:it's 2016 and some people still think lost ended with they were in purgatory People are stupid, I don't get it either.
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Jan 28, 2016 05:10
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EL BROMANCE posted:I haven't had chance to watch X-Files yet, but does it *look* like the old show at all? The trailer just made it look like generic 2010s drama #371 starring people from X-Files. The original has an aesthetic (probably to cloak the fact I'm sure it didn't have the highest budget) where you could see a frame that didn't include Mulder/Scully but you still knew what show it was.
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Jan 28, 2016 05:30
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Escobarbarian posted:it's 2016 and some people still think lost ended with they were in purgatory I understood the ending of LOST the second I saw it, with a few minor details kindly explained by X-O. Honestly, it couldn't have been more blatant, I thought it would be more ambiguous given how many people in Couch Chat are confused by it. Really, there's something to be said about one's intelligence when you don't understand something that Ravane got.
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Jan 28, 2016 05:32
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The reason people think that is because they wanted that to be the answer so much so they could say they called it in season one. And the answer was never literally said out loud on the show by one of the characters so that gave them the go ahead to be dumb.
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Jan 28, 2016 06:21
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So what was it, just a magic island?
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Jan 28, 2016 06:23
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Christian explicitly says that their time on the island really happened. "The most important part of your life was the time that you spent with these people on that island. That's why all of you are here. " https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL26K6T3IOw zoux posted:So what was it, just a magic island? Magic is a pretty good descriptor.
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Jan 28, 2016 06:24
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I mean yeah there is a purgatory aspect to it if you count that the flash sideways was basically an extremely elaborate waiting room where they were waiting for (some) of the Oceanic 815 survivors and friends to go to non-denominational heaven together all at the same time. But yeah all the poo poo on the island happened for real.
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Jan 28, 2016 06:28
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Hey guys, we should probably talk more about the loving smoke monster on this island. Not whether Jack is going to date Kate or Juliette.
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Jan 28, 2016 06:31
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It was pretty aimless over three seasons so I think probably they just had a loose idea of what it was. I know some decision was made to focus the show and nail down an ending, I can't remember if it was the studio that forced it or not. It seems to me that if you from day one had a strong narrative arc hitting predetermined beats towards a specific conclusion, that kind of decision would have never come up.
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Jan 28, 2016 06:32
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zoux posted:It was pretty aimless over three seasons so I think probably they just had a loose idea of what it was. I know some decision was made to focus the show and nail down an ending, I can't remember if it was the studio that forced it or not. It seems to me that if you from day one had a strong narrative arc hitting predetermined beats towards a specific conclusion, that kind of decision would have never come up. When you have a smash hit show it's tough for either the showrunners or the network to put a cap on how long it will run. The third season marked the absolute worst of the "filling time because we don't know how long we'll run and don't want to rush into our endgame too soon," and it's no coincidence that they gave them an end date starting with Season 4. From there the story unfolded pretty tightly. By all accounts it was something the creators were happy to get. As for the smoke monster, who are they going to ask and what are they going to do about it? It mostly doesn't kill them if they stay in their general area and they are wildly outmatched if they try to fight it.
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Jan 28, 2016 07:59
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the best episode of the x-files is the brad dourif one
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Jan 28, 2016 08:51
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I was so sure, after watching the pilot, that angie tribeca was total poo poo. But upon a rewatch it is actually really funny. I should probably point out that the rewatch was done with half a bottle of spirits in me.
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Jan 28, 2016 08:53
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Also, I assume it goes without saying but anyone who wanted to like angie tribeca but didn't, and who hadn't seen touch of cloth. Should totally watch touch of cloth. So much better. And British. So bonus points.
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Jan 28, 2016 08:59
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zoux posted:It was pretty aimless over three seasons so I think probably they just had a loose idea of what it was. I know some decision was made to focus the show and nail down an ending, I can't remember if it was the studio that forced it or not. It seems to me that if you from day one had a strong narrative arc hitting predetermined beats towards a specific conclusion, that kind of decision would have never come up. I believe the writer's strike was after their much criticized third season. Don't know if they were told to, but the strike gave the top producers the time to set down a real plan and agree on an end point.
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Jan 28, 2016 09:35
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Lycus posted:Though Vince Gilligan frequently talked about not planning stuff out for Breaking Bad, so you can run a good show while flying by the seat of your pants. DivisionPost posted:Shawn Ryan didn't have much of a master plan for The Shield, either. He's spoken openly about how the writer's room would paint the Strike Team into a corner and then spend three days figuring out how they could get out of it. Sometimes not having a plan makes for more interesting television; it all depends on the writer. The plot in those shows got pretty bad too. A lot of the later-day 'drug cartel in-fighting' stuff in Breaking Bad is repetitive and idiotic, and the whole blackmail box and the stuff going on in the last two seasons of The Shield was super forgettable. It's just those shows were less plot-based and delivered on the character stuff more successfully, to some extent (the last few episodes of Jesse's story in Breaking Bad are mostly terrible, IMO). Speaking of LOST, this is a really good overview of it and why it kinda works but not entirely: https://matthilliard.wordpress.com/2010/05/25/lost-the-search-for-meaning/
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Jan 28, 2016 11:06
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