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rabite gets whacked!
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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 Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 5:45 am |
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I call dibs on the tuba.
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| People who seek novelty will inevitably eventually succumb to ennui. |
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Toptube
Anti-cabbage Party Candidate
Joined: 23 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 11:51 pm |
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| fuck, Rubicon was canceled (almost a month ago). Why does every fucking show have to maintain blockbuster ratings to survive GAWD. |
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internisus
shafer sephiroth
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 1:36 am |
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| Toptube wrote: |
| fuck, Rubicon was canceled (almost a month ago). Why does every fucking show have to maintain blockbuster ratings to survive GAWD. |
Not that I'm against you in principle (still worried about Fringe and checking ratings week-to-week), but like Caprica I feel that Rubicon deserved to fail. It was occasionally great but mostly a lot less than it should have been. |
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handsomenattou
Joined: 15 Oct 2010
Location: tokyo
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| Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 5:09 am |
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| Dracko wrote: |
| http://exiledonline.com/walking-dead-a-character-study/ |
I have only seen a couple episodes of this show, and though I have some issues with it myself, I think she misses the whole point of zombie stories.
In the "slow-zombie" movie tradition, characters begin to normalize the danger when the threat of death weighs down on them for months and months. Human nature only allows us to be "on alert" for so long before we just can no longer take it physically or emotionally. Hence come those moments of carelessness that eventually due them in.
This normalization of threats in the Romero movies is seen as symbolism of real-world threats that we begin to ignore as soon as we can't remember where they started--unchecked consumerism (Dawn) and capitalism (Day), and the growing divide between wealthy and poor (Land). These problems could eventually destroy our whole society, but nowadays many people don't even see these as national travesties that need to be corrected.
The author complains that it "seems as if the characters have forgotten the plot of the show", but the argument of all zombie stories is that "forgetting the plot" is just human nature. |
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Toptube
Anti-cabbage Party Candidate
Joined: 23 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 7:27 am |
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| internisus wrote: |
| Toptube wrote: |
| fuck, Rubicon was canceled (almost a month ago). Why does every fucking show have to maintain blockbuster ratings to survive GAWD. |
Not that I'm against you in principle (still worried about Fringe and checking ratings week-to-week), but like Caprica I feel that Rubicon deserved to fail. It was occasionally great but mostly a lot less than it should have been. |
Rubicon was not an amazing show. but I disagree that a TV show shouldn't exist if its not. and Rubicon was pretty consistently good, just not in its main story arc. it was just very low key with a much slower burn than most of the in your face stuff that is out there. I've seen it said that for a myster/ thriller, it had little actual thrills. But I really think the thriller storyline was just a vehicle for other worthwhile things. Maybe it was by accident, Maybe the writers set out to craft a new classic thriller but instead found significance elsewhere. I dunno. But It really put more weight and significance on smaller events than usual, which was perfect because these people fucking mine documents for OPSEC indicators. They aren't normally field OPS or the ones directly enforcing security, which made the couple of times they were asked to do that stuff all more significant. Some good acting in there.
Yes, the show did constantly stretch out the thriller vehicle near its limit, I do though think even the general payoff there was good enough. I dunno, I'm just tired of every damn show being cancelled because it doesn't pull 2 million viewers per episode. Much like the games industry, I don't think TV should try to sustain itself on blockbusters only. AMC came from nowhere 3 years ago with a couple of the best TV shows maybe ever, but I don't want to see them only hunting gold. |
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rabite gets whacked!
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 5:09 am |
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Rubicon honestly might have been better with a shortened season (like Walking Dead, which definitely doesn't deserve the numbers it gets); it's hard to keep up suspense when you make everything so tidy in the final episode. It was a little too hermetic.
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Toptube
Anti-cabbage Party Candidate
Joined: 23 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 8:11 am |
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I haven't seen Walking Dead, but I imagine it will remain pretty successful because zombies.
which urks me.
not the zombies, the principle of the matter.
Re: Rubicon's season 1 finale
It was good. It wasn't as good as it could have been, but I thought it was good. It definitely seemed like the writers realized they'd been dangling the treat for way too long, so they opted to just tidy things up instead of maybe taking a bit of a riskier option. But at the same time, that's all we have now. We don't get to see the next season and how they jump off from where we ended here. Mad Men's season 3 finale had me wondering about the continued quality of the show----but that turned out great so we can only speculate or just literally look at what we have in Rubicon.
Again, I'm just frustrated that they can't maintain a decent show on 1 million veiwers. Even Mad Men only does half the ratings of Keep UP With The Kardashians, so we know that Dramas aren't supposed to do super amazing anyways. |
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Ebrey
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: Los Angeles
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| Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 11:24 am |
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| Toptube wrote: |
| Yes, the show did constantly stretch out the thriller vehicle near its limit, I do though think even the general payoff there was good enough. I dunno, I'm just tired of every damn show being cancelled because it doesn't pull 2 million viewers per episode. Much like the games industry, I don't think TV should try to sustain itself on blockbusters only. AMC came from nowhere 3 years ago with a couple of the best TV shows maybe ever, but I don't want to see them only hunting gold. |
The channel a show airs on determines how many viewers it has to get to survive, and sadly, shows are rarely allowed to change channels. Firefly probably would have gone 7 years on Sci-Fi (with a lower budget), while Battlestar Galactica wouldn't have lasted 2 episodes on NBC. So there's no way for most TV show creators to keep their show alive other than trying to keep the ratings up. Futurama and Friday Night Lights have jumped ship to channels with lower expectations, but they're rare exceptions.
AMC isn't "hunting gold", as 2 million viewers would be really awful on a Big Four network. They're looking for modest numbers to fund shows that look as good as Mad Men and Breaking Bad and their competitors (HBO and Showtime). It wouldn't make much sense for AMC to air a mix of high budget blockbusters and low budget shows that get lower ratings, because they're trying to establish themselves as a brand and need consistency. |
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Dracko
a sapphist fool
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
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rabite gets whacked!
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 5:43 pm |
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Nice. That's cool enough that I no longer feel like I totally wasted my time watching the show. Or: I did, but at least it served as a nice preamble.
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Judge Ito
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: IA
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| Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 9:09 pm |
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Ebrey, I think channel-changing is becoming more common, especially in times when network heads are prone to panicking. A few shows on USA were brought in to fill gaps in NBC's primetime after the Leno/oh man, Heroes blows fallout. Similarly, one (or two?) of the Law & Order spinoffs have gone on to USA after not doing so well on NBC.
About The Walking Dead, knowing absolutely nothing about the comic, I think it'll be at least a little interesting to see where things go next year. That last episode practically announced that the title of the show doesn't refer to the zombies, but to the survivors. And, not surprisingly, that notion hasn't sunk in with the majority of the viewers, who do nothing but bitch about why they aren't getting basic cable zombie porn. It has a good chance to evolve into a pretty good character drama, especially with an actual writing staff coming on board. |
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rabite gets whacked!
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 11:33 pm |
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| Judge Ito wrote: |
| especially with an actual writing staff coming on board. |
Who?
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| People who seek novelty will inevitably eventually succumb to ennui. |
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Judge Ito
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: IA
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Dracko
a sapphist fool
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 11:42 pm |
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| Judge Ito wrote: |
| That last episode practically announced that the title of the show doesn't refer to the zombies, but to the survivors. |
lol the comic has a page spread where the lead character goes
"WE'RE THE WALKING DEAD!"
die robert kirkman
SPOILERS: It's still about zombies. It's still going nowhere. It's still horribly written. And far, far, far better ongoing series - let alone creator-owned ones - are getting the axe instead. |
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JoeX111
Joined: 21 Nov 2008
Location: Some City
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| Posted: Sat Dec 11, 2010 12:50 am |
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I know this isn't the comics thread, but man, I fucking hate the Walking Dead comic. A friend of mine reads it religiously and forced it upon me for a while. Kirkman's idea of "character drama" is basically "let's see who sleeps with who and what happens then."
The show isn't much better, but at least the cast is smaller, so there will be less opportunities for wife swapping.
Good on Darabont for firing the writing staff. It'd be cool if they got some non-Kirkman, non-Darabont, non-anything related to horror or zombies writers in there to give these people an ounce of depth. |
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Take It Sleazy
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
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BalbanesBeoulve
Malicious Bastard
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Sun Jan 09, 2011 6:46 am |
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Year behind, but just watched the final episode of season 4 of dexter. Fuck this show.
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BalbanesBeoulve
Malicious Bastard
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 5:45 am |
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Bored to Death is good! Why hadn't i heard about this until last week?
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Joachim
Joined: 19 Mar 2010
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 5:19 pm |
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| Quote: |
| Not that I'm against you in principle (still worried about Fringe and checking ratings week-to-week), but like Caprica I feel that Rubicon deserved to fail. It was occasionally great but mostly a lot less than it should have been. |
Caprica deserved to fail... but Fringe doesn't?
To address the shows purely on a qualitative level, I'd definitely say Caprica is better. Fringe was fantastic for most of its second season up until the finale, but aside from that the show has faltered pretty consistently. The first season wasn't really that engaging until its final five episodes, and the third season has been incredibly hit or miss, with a lot of awful episodes interspersed with genuinely good ones. Or genuinely good episodes with bad or dumb concepts.
Then again, I adore Stargate Universe (which wasn't renewed shortly after Caprica was cancelled and suffered ratings almost as bad as Caprica throughout the second season) so I'm probably still just upset at SyFy channel for being generally terrible. |
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shrugtheironteacup
man of tomorrow
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
Location: a meat
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 5:23 pm |
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| BalbanesBeoulve wrote: |
| Bored to Death is good! Why hadn't i heard about this until last week? |
because you are alone in this assessment in all the world ;__;
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Toptube
Anti-cabbage Party Candidate
Joined: 23 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 7:34 pm |
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Yeah when I first found out about bored to death, I was excited that Ted Danson was in a new show.
and hen I found out Galfanakis is in it, too, and Have steered my ship clear from port. |
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shrugtheironteacup
man of tomorrow
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
Location: a meat
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 7:48 pm |
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You're such a peculiar man toptube
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Winona Ghost Ryder
lives in a monochromatic world
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 7:55 pm |
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| I literally loled. |
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rabite gets whacked!
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Fri Jan 14, 2011 4:02 am |
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Speaking of Ted Danson, I just watched the first season of Damages, which was definitely entertaining, even if it required that every single character be some sort of duplicitous psychopath 100% of the time (seriously, is this a requirement for getting your drama broadcast on Fox or something?) and the whole flash forward thing that just ends up feeling absurd and contrived. Glenn Close was pretty excellent, and I was genuinely surprised at the level of creativity in their sound design.
The second season appears to have William Hurt being excellent, and everyone else being pretty milquetoast. They sucked the life right out of this one, and kept the structural flaws as well. Too bad.
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Ronk
saucy Scott Pilgrim fanfic
Joined: 29 Dec 2008
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| Posted: Mon Jan 31, 2011 10:22 pm |
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pretty neat
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elvis.shrugged
Joined: 17 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2011 12:07 am |
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| BalbanesBeoulve wrote: |
| Bored to Death is good! Why hadn't i heard about this until last week? |
I'm with you on this, Balbanes. It's not the best show, but it can be pretty entertaining!
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elvis.shrugged
Joined: 17 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Tue Feb 01, 2011 12:34 am |
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| vision wrote: |
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Saw the second episode of this today. It's good! Carrie is actually funnier than Fred sometimes, too.
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Ebrey
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: Los Angeles
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| Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2011 9:00 am |
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I started watching the first season of Spartacus: Blood and Sand and find it surprisingly enjoyable. I was just expecting a trashy Rome ripoff, but it's pretty fun to watch. It's produced by Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert, so it's got that campy Xena vibe, but it's created by Steve DeKnight, darkest of the Buffy/Angel writers, so it can get disturbing too. The show is also constantly trying to surpass HBO in sex and gore and that works pretty well for both the campy side of the show and the dark side.
As an added bonus, Spartacus: Blood and Sand has the best combination of hypermasculine violence and homosexuality since Oz. |
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space jam
Joined: 23 Oct 2010
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| Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2011 9:55 am |
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I can't watch portlandia, I keep expecting that zatch gaspiefinasky fellow to show up
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Renfrew
catchy, and giger-esque
Joined: 31 Dec 2006
Location: Hometown: America
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| Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2011 6:53 am |
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I just started reading A Game of Thrones and now I am super excited for the HBO series. It looks incredible.
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Winona Ghost Ryder
lives in a monochromatic world
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2011 7:10 pm |
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Mildred Pierce looks like it's going to be a pretty big deal.
I like Todd Haynes, and I assume he's going to go all Sirk again. |
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Winona Ghost Ryder
lives in a monochromatic world
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2011 8:17 pm |
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:48 pm |
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Hold on, Rubicon was canceled? Additionally, you guys DON'T LIKE RUBICON? How. ALSO, YOU DON'T LIKE BOARDWALK EMPIRE? Jesu Christo.
♡txty's favy shows♡
(in the order I think of them)
Mad Men
Rubicon
Breaking Bad
Boardwalk Empire
Dexter
Twin Peaks
Extras
The Office US
Arrested Development
Fringe
Skins UK
It's Always Sunny
Tim & Eric
Stella
Eastbound and Down
Damages
Deadwood
Justified
Last edited by TXTSWORD on Wed Mar 30, 2011 2:24 am; edited 1 time in total |
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:52 pm |
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God I'm so depressed to hear that rubicon was cancelled.
Look at that list, now take out every show that isn't on any more... That's not a very big list of shows I consider to be great versus the entirety of shows on television. |
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cavefish
Joined: 04 Sep 2010
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:56 pm |
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txty, a favy shows list without The Wire is wrong!
>:( |
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 7:00 pm |
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Well, in all fairness I've simply never watched The Wire. I imagine I should really give it a watch, though.
In my college days I had a fuck ton of free time to do things like watch an entire series. This is not my reality now :C |
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remote
Joined: 11 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:08 pm |
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weird, chrome displays ♡ as three lines instead of a heart
edit: for that matter so does foobar2000, but firefox is fine with it. wtf
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 9:20 pm |
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| remote wrote: |
weird, chrome displays ♡ as three lines instead of a heart
edit: for that matter so does foobar2000, but firefox is fine with it. wtf |
Dear all browsers,
Learn to understand the ways of the heart, or get fucked up.
Regards,
TXT |
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Toptube
Anti-cabbage Party Candidate
Joined: 23 Apr 2007
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| Posted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 1:43 pm |
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| TXTSWORD wrote: |
| Hold on, Rubicon was canceled? Additionally, you guys DON'T LIKE RUBICON? How. |
Dude I really enjoyed Rubicon and really wanted to see another season capitalize its strengths and re-manage the weak parts (the overarching conspiracy was the weak part, everything else was tops).
this dude pretty much nails my thoughts on rubicon:
http://www.tvsquad.com/2010/09/30/rubicon/
*to add to that something I think I've said before: The slow burn of the show only stands to highlight certain situations even more. There are a few times where some of the characters are put through a lot of stress and mentail struggle. Not only is it acted and presented very well, but these situations stand out as the important moments they are, BECAUSE the show isn't full of a bunch of fast paced nonsense.
*for those of you who haven't seen it, you should watch it. It doesn't wrap up the overarching plot, but it does wrap tidily on a more focused conflict so its not totally without closure. Though you'll be left with a huge hole knowng that you won't get to see these characters again. |
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 3:20 pm |
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| I mean... Did they work on season 2 at all? Didn't they have a "next season on rubicon" or some shit? Let's write them a letter and have them mail us the episodes :) |
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TXTSWORD
Joined: 25 Aug 2010
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| Posted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 3:22 pm |
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| Meanwhile, fucking the walking dead marches on. It was the show that made me question my "AMC can't make a bad show" rule. |
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