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PaulDirac posted:What I find most weird about the show is that every character talks like they re on tv with script written by people trying to be clever, there are no real conversations, people sometimes finish eachothers sentences, or muse to empty space. It makes the whole show weirdly surreal. The whole thing is just so.. masturbatory.
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Nov 13, 2014 01:39
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MrBuddyLee posted:The whole thing is just so.. masturbatory. Yep. Your post and the one you quoted nailed it as far as im concerned. Its hard for me to separate the writers smarmy voice from the character. Its distracting.
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Nov 13, 2014 01:47
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If you had to pick one word to describe Aaron Sorkin, masturbatory would be it.
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Nov 13, 2014 02:09
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Lack of distinct character voice is certainly a problem but the one I've been noticing is that a good half of any given conversation just feels totally incidental. People just quip at each other to kill time without actually contributing to the arc of the conversation, and it's really annoying.
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Nov 13, 2014 02:28
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The Piper posted:thread title material. Which is funny because it was the NY Post front page "Bag Men" article that started the real shitstorm.
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Nov 13, 2014 02:44
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MrAristocrates posted:The death of Osama Bin Laden is easily one of the most important and memorable moments of the early 21st century So is this actually a thing? I got them impression that it was only relevant to Americans and the rest of the world had virtually no interest or attachment to it. You killed someone who was involved in a pretty horrific atrocity and that ultimately changes nothing in the grand scheme of things. Like its closure for Americans, I get that but I always got the feeling the rest of the world didn't really care. I watch the show and only just realised that 'oh yea he died didn't he'.
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Nov 13, 2014 02:54
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I'm Canadian so the main thing I noticed in that episode was how weird it was that everyone was so happy Bin Laden died.
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Nov 13, 2014 03:31
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Osama died? Obama lied?
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Nov 13, 2014 05:43
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Dr_Amazing posted:I'm Canadian so the main thing I noticed in that episode was how weird it was that everyone was so happy Bin Laden died. a fair accurate portrayal of peoples attitudes here im afraid it was rather unsettling seeing people drink to and cheer about somebody dying tbh
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Nov 13, 2014 19:58
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I'm not the kind of guy to buy into that kind of patriotism but it was really just a universally unifying moment that finally gave some resolution to this awful tragedy that had been just hanging in our collective memories for almost ten years.
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Nov 13, 2014 20:02
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Season 1, Episode 8: “The Blackout Part I: Tragedy Porn” I'm not sure I've ever seen a writer with as much clear disdain for modern culture as Aaron Sorkin. It's consistently impressive to me how thoroughly he manages to work in his utter contempt for the world around him and its failure to live up to his standards. That kind of smug, hardened cynicism permeates this latest episode, and by the end I was laughing when I wasn't just rolling my eyes. There's none of those bizarre digressions into irrelevant nonsense in this episode. No, most of this is actually well-structured, for the most part. Every scene has a clear purpose, and even the stuff that doesn't seem to pay off seems like it's clearly building up to something for the next episode. All things considered, it's pretty tight for part one of a three-parter. I take it as a sign of confidence from Sorkin. Not in the importance of the news the characters are covering, mind you, but in the absolute, undeniable unimportance of that news. I think I may just prefer Sorkin when he's not quite so convinced he's right, because I'm not so sure I can handle Sorkin when he's this strong. This is like 80 proof Sorkin, and I'm just looking to get buzzed. When he waters down his impossibly strong ideals with bizarre plotting it makes it all more palatable even if I'd hesitate to call any of it good. This, what we get in “Part I,” is near-constant proselytizing. Most plots, most scenes even, have not one clear goal, but one clear target. There's always someone or something being used as an example to rail against. Maybe I'm just noticing it more now, but I don't think the soapboxing has ever been stronger than it is here. The worst part is that he is right, at least about some of it, and he knows it. Sorkin when he's wrong is usually just infuriatingly wrong-headed or irresponsible at absolute worst. This is just insufferably smug, which probably isn't as quite bad, really, but I find it somehow even harder to watch. The main thrust of the story this time is that News Night is in conflict with itself. The Casey Anthony story, which they didn't cover, caused literally half the audience to migrate to such venues as Nancy Grace. This creates multiple problems. First, if the ratings drop holds Will's likely to get fired immediately by Leona Lansing, who wouldn't even need an excuse at that point, and second, News Night is trying to secure Republican presidential candidates for a mock debate, which they need viewers for. Against everyone's wishes (but mostly Mac's), they're forced to cover the story. It's a decent hook, I'll admit. Like in “Bullies,” they're forced to make a sacrifice for some larger good, but in this case, that good is much more nebulous and the lows are that much worse. News Night sells its soul in this episode. The problem isn't with that, it's that the episode isn't really so much about that as the chance to get really angry at the way the Casey Anthony story was covered. It probably is worth getting angry over, I suppose. The phrase is never actually used in the episode, but the moniker “Tragedy Porn” from the title is apt. The problem is that it's, to use a phrase I seem to be repeating once a writeup at this point, just too much. Sorkin doesn't do anything by half if he can help it, and he makes the most of his opportunity to dig into the emotionally manipulative coverage of that story. He makes the most of every opportunity. All of them. It's exhausting trying to get through these scenes of people telling us this is stupid. I know that. If I didn't already agree with Aaron Sorkin about everything, praise be to him, why would I be watching The Newsroom? Don gets a whole scene where he does nothing but dissect a Nancy Grace clip and it's loving interminable. Mac has this whole bit where she crosses important stories off the block because they need to save 15 minutes at the top of the hour, and makes sad remarks about covering entertainment instead of news. Sloan constantly, in three different scenes, tries to convince Mac to cover actual important poo poo like the uncertainty over the looming House vote over raising the debt ceiling. I get it, show. I really, truly get it. Our culture of celebrity and “tragedy porn” is poisonous and distracting. You don't need to keep convincing me. The other plots cover other subjects, thankfully. The most prominent of them is Will calling in Brian Brenner (Paul Schneider), a reporter who's down on his luck and trying to relaunch his career after a failed startup site, to write a piece on what News Night is doing, and because Will may be an actual sociopath, Brian turns out to be Mac's ex-boyfriend, the guy she cheated on Will with. In terms of both bad romantic plots and awful poo poo Will's done this barely even ranks for me, honestly. Beyond the initial disbelief the plot is pretty thin and Brian's enough of a dick I couldn't even really get mad at Will anymore. Mac does get in at least one decent jab at him (“I'm no longer required to live up to your standards.”). Anyway, Brian's eventually able to puzzle out the real reason he wants the piece, which is that Leona is desperate to fire him and invented the tabloid stories for that purpose. Charlie finally meets up with Solomon Hancock (Stephen McKinley Henderson), the NSA tech who gave him the tipoff a few hours before the Bin Laden news broke in “5/1,” and finds out that the tabloids Leona owns are involved in wiretapping, just like News of the World, and that it goes as high up the chain as Reese Lansing, Leona's son. It's mostly setup for the next two episodes I imagine, but it's one of the more legitimately interesting stories in the episode. Finally, in a plot that will almost certainly be godawful, Neal tries to pitch a story on trolling for some reason, and has to pull off a “successful incident of trolling” to be welcomed into the community. It's absolutely insane. It only gets two scenes but oh my god, I can't even comprehend all the ways in which this is wrong. For one, Neal, the guy who's ostensibly internet-savvy, starts this pitch by saying “Turns out they have their own websites,” a sentence I still can't believe. Yes, trolls have their own websites, the internet is scary, hide your children. Next, “successful incident of trolling”? What? And then he decides that to do this he needs to ask Sloan, in an absolutely bizarre conversation, if she'd let him spread false information about her on the internet. I have no idea how he intended to prove this was him, but it doesn't matter because she says no like any rational human being. I almost can't wait for the rest of that plot. Back on the news side of things, they're already feeling plenty guilty about the way they're going about things... and then the Anthony Weiner scandal happens. Will decides they need to budget a few more minutes for that because the Republican candidates won't come on if they don't give in to the “balance” malarkey and report on an embarrassing thing a Democrat did, a topic this show already skewered several episodes ago. Why this would be the straw that broke the camel's back and not the six-month-long campaign against the Tea Party he went on is a mystery. Maggie gets a woman who was part of dirty Twitter conversations with Weiner and clearly wants nothing more than a minute in the spotlight on the show, and right as they're about to start taping the segment, right as Mac begs for a sign to tell her if they should stop, the power to the building goes out. And that's when I burst out laughing.
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Nov 13, 2014 20:09
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Fetus Tree posted:a fair accurate portrayal of peoples attitudes here im afraid I was seven when the attacks happened. For months afterwards I spent every day afraid someone was going to fly a plane into the skyscraper my Dad worked in. You want to talk about unsettling? Bin Laden was a oval office, and I have zero regrets about celebrating his death, morality be damned.
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Nov 13, 2014 20:17
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MrAristocrates posted:I'm not the kind of guy to buy into that kind of patriotism but it was really just a universally unifying moment that finally gave some resolution to this awful tragedy that had been just hanging in our collective memories for almost ten years. I didn't really revel in the whole thing when he died, but I was in NY during when 9/11 happened. I understand why people were so disturbed by the reveling, but remembering what everyone was like a few days after the towers went down, I also understand why there was so much rejoicing, especially in the city.
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Nov 13, 2014 20:40
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I don't want to spoil you mra but the neal thing is maybe the most insane plotline that any sorkin show has ever done and that includes the camp david "fix the middle east" plotline in the west wing that's how insane the neal plotline is
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Nov 13, 2014 21:25
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Fetus Tree posted:a fair accurate portrayal of peoples attitudes here im afraid You said the same thing about Aatrek being permabanned.
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Nov 13, 2014 21:32
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SpiderHyphenMan posted:You said the same thing about Aatrek being permabanned. lol
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Nov 13, 2014 21:42
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Toxxupation posted:I don't want to spoil you mra but the neal thing is maybe the most insane plotline that any sorkin show has ever done To be fair, the Camp David "fix the Middle East" plot line from The West Wing wasn't Aaron Sorkin. That was almost a full season after he left.
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Nov 13, 2014 21:52
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thrawn527 posted:To be fair, the Camp David "fix the Middle East" plot line from The West Wing wasn't Aaron Sorkin. That was almost a full season after he left. yeah its why i clarified sorkin show and not sorkin
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Nov 13, 2014 22:00
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Toxxupation posted:yeah its why i clarified sorkin show and not sorkin Ah, I missed that distinction.
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Nov 13, 2014 22:01
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SpiderHyphenMan posted:You said the same thing about Aatrek being permabanned. Turns out my thoughts on people rejoicing on another persons misfortune are consistent then
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Nov 14, 2014 02:11
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Fetus Tree posted:Turns out my thoughts on people rejoicing on another persons misfortune are consistent then lol
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Nov 14, 2014 16:20
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man what the gently caress even is this
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Nov 14, 2014 17:29
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OH MY GOD i'm dead
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Nov 14, 2014 18:23
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I can't wait for you to get to season 2 and Africa
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Nov 14, 2014 18:26
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I actually thought the Season 3 premiere was not poo poo compared to the rest. Except for the male cameraman having to translate white man with engorged tongue's words.
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Nov 15, 2014 02:01
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Sloan got better. Don's acting got worse.
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Nov 15, 2014 06:50
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Wouldn't Don be held in contempt of court after literally saying that he would never find for the defense (or prosecution, I forget)?
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Nov 16, 2014 10:35
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So that was probably the best episode the show has ever done IMO
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Nov 17, 2014 03:59
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I'll report back after I watch...
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Nov 17, 2014 04:05
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Episode was decent enough. I think its pretty clear by now that the show is going to portray the US government's response to Neal's involvement with the classified material as "hosed up". Neal is clearly going to be a mash-up of Snowden and the other guy who the US charged with espionage. I feel like that'll make for a much more interesting story then "sits around tables reciting journo creed and being threatened with legal action"
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Nov 17, 2014 05:31
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I'm still really confused why I feel Olivia Munn is carrying the acting chops on the show. It's like living in a Bizzaro world.
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Nov 17, 2014 05:36
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It was more interesting than last week but it's still bad.
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Nov 17, 2014 05:41
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Season 1, Episode 9: "The Blackout Part II: The Mock Debate" I swear I don't hate this show. If I found it to be actively offensive to my sensibilities I'd probably just eat the ban. Figuring out why the show doesn't work from episode to episode is generally interesting and while I can't say I really enjoy it on any level it's definitely watchable. This? I don’t know what the gently caress to make of this. "The Blackout Part II" is just a wholly dysfunctional episode, an abject failure on every conceivable level both on its own and in relation to its status as the conclusion to a two-parter. It's confused, it's busy, and it's boring. I legitimately have no idea what anyone working on this was thinking. It's the second half of a two-parter and more new plots are introduced than are resolved. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so confounded at how this could have possibly happened. I haven't even mentioned the worst part, which is that it's all focused on the romance. More than ever before, this episode is about these awful peoples' awful relationships. Jim keeps asking Lisa out and she keeps refusing, until Maggie tells her for the millionth time that she isn't really interested in Jim, at which point Jim, who was advised to pursue Maggie by Mac, shows up to do that and inadvertently stumbles right into Lisa's attempt to get back together. Meanwhile, Don saw people while he and Maggie were broken up like seven months ago and didn't tell Maggie, which comes back to bite him in the rear end when one of them sends him flowers that Jim ends up signing for. He eventually tells Maggie about this, and she ends the episode angry. You may notice that by these basic descriptions neither of these plots really end, they just kind of stop. That's going to be a theme with this one. The resolution to the blackout that ended the last episode, in particular, actively offends me. Mac gives this grand, impassioned speech about using this to make themselves better, and how they can avoid the trash they've been forced to cover and do a great news show from the street, and it all seems wonderful and grand… and then, immediately, the lights turn back on, as if merely to spite her. They record the Anthony Weiner segment like nothing ever happened, and they continue selling out. What? What? They built the entire two-parter around this blackout; it’s part of a goddamn cliffhanger. They named the episodes after it. They might have straight-up invented it because I'm struggling to find any record of a blackout, even if only five minutes long, in NYC on June 1, 2011. All this and in the end it amounts to nothing but a cruel joke at Mac's expense. Why? Why bother? Why did this even need to be a two-parter? What did any of this accomplish? I'm infuriated at the episode and it's barely even started. The main plot this time is around the mock debate, which is the event that actually unifies these two episodes, not some absurd power outage. The RNC guys come in with the boring old debate format where nothing gets too wild, but Will has a crazy plan to revolutionize the industry of campaign primaries! He's gonna be incredibly aggressive and hostile with the candidates! What's that? News Night lost the debate because while it may be better for the purposes of helping voters choose a candidate, actively trying to embarrass candidates and asking questions from non-conservative perspectives isn't going to engender you to the people you need to convince, and the dream debate format you came up with is a blatant and unattainable fantasy in our current overly dichotomized political landscape? poo poo. The plots of this are so basic and nothing and yet they still manage to mess up. Will realizes with the help that he knows that Mac deserves to be forgiven for cheating on him, and then he trusts Brian and lets him write whatever he wants. It sounds so insubstantial, so token, that I'm having trouble believing there's nothing else there, but I can’t for the life of me remember anything else. This episode is like a blur of nothing but my sadness. Speaking of nothing, the phone hacking story continue with Jim managing to gain evidence that suggests Solomon Hancock isn't a terribly reliable witness. That's the entirety of that plot's intersection with this episode. I'm serious. And then there's Neal. Poor, sweet Neal, trying to find the secret of trolling. He's able to successfully convince Sloan, somehow, to let him say terrible things about her on forums about economics, which he actually manages to do a half-decent job at through such nefarious and duplicitous tactics as sockpuppeting. The strategies he enlists are so hilariously transparent that I'd say no one would ever actually fall for them if I had never actually used the internet before or met another human being. This gets Neal into the troll boards, which seem to consist of a single chatroom, and to ingratiate himself further, he claims to be the one who cracked ACN's new comment ID system and posted the death threat, only to find that one of the very trolls he's talking to did it! This entire goddamn plot is so silly. It's almost too ridiculous for me to even get mad at, really. It's just such a dumb, absurd way to represent the internet I can't stop laughing at it. It's a terrible, terrible plot but it’s somehow the only thing in this entire episode that doesn't make me angry in some way. I can barely muster up the energy to even criticize this one, because it’s just so loving pointless. Again, most of the plots just build to nothing and then shuffle off somewhere aimlessly to die. There’s a montage at the end of the episode that's laughably nonsensical. There is no uniting purpose or theme to the events of the episode beyond "gently caress it, these idiots will watch anything," and to even suggest otherwise is absolutely insane. This may legitimately be the worst experience I've ever had with a television show.
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Nov 17, 2014 06:13
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pentyne posted:Episode was decent enough. I think its pretty clear by now that the show is going to portray the US government's response to Neal's involvement with the classified material as "hosed up". Anything less would frankly be unrealistic.
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Nov 17, 2014 09:45
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sportsgenius86 posted:So that was probably the best episode the show has ever done IMO That was inexplicably excellent TV. I loved the poo poo outta that. 
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Nov 17, 2014 12:12
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I think Newsroom has been good all the way through loving sue me, but yeah tonight was the best ep yet and maybe a top 10 script for Aaron Sorkin
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Nov 17, 2014 13:35
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I think it hit on everything that's good about the show really well. Every time they got to that line that Sorkin usually likes to leap across unbothered, they pulled up.
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Nov 17, 2014 14:01
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sportsgenius86 posted:I think it hit on everything that's good about the show really well. Every time they got to that line that Sorkin usually likes to leap across unbothered, they pulled up. I still have a problem with how much is being cribbed from his other shows, but tonights was well done at least. Always nice to see Mary McCormack.
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Nov 17, 2014 15:13
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That was a really good hour of TV.
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Nov 17, 2014 18:47
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Y'all can't fool me I ain't getting roped back into this show don't even think about it.
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Nov 17, 2014 20:18
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