A thread for Armando Iannucci's VEEP

Stoked for this, it'll feel good to watch a US sitcom from the beginning at the same time as America.

I doubt there have been 18 episodes of The Thick of It in total!!

16 iirc?

enlightened had 10 and it's getting a 2nd season

i enjoyed this tho i kind of hope future episodes are less...stuffed

there are 8 episodes of this season of Veep

btw i might've mentioned this in a previous thread but a lot of the show was shot in Baltimore instead of D.C. and i was this close to getting to spend a day on the set a few months ago, am really bummed that didn't pan out. maybe next season.

The first episode is good if a little slow-burny (certainly compared to TTOI, but I should make a conscious effort to not compare the two too much). Excellently acted all round.

kind of reminded me of early parks & rec in that I didn't know what the stakes were, so there was just a bunch of quality comic actors all playing clueless. It's just the pilot, though.

reminds me more of Lisa Kudrow's HBO show The Comeback than anything else

dumb Brit speaking but i've never actually understood exactly what HBO means. is it pay per view? is it cable only? over here we have some satelite/ cable stations where you *have* to pay for the channel month by month (Sky Sports, etc) but some are free with a basic 'freeview' box and so you pay once for that, then never again to watch any given channel. is that how it works over there with HBO? i was never sure also why that means you get more swearing and nudity and suchlike in HBO shows than other non HBO shows. hey i could WIKI this shit but i want the fun version from you guys.

i don't know if it's the fun version, but HBO is cable that you pay an extra monthly fee to get

HBO's pay-cable (you have to pay specifically for it, as opposed to getting it with a basic cable package) status means it can show movies unedited and make tv series with no restrictions as to content as opposed to Broadcast (heavily regulated by the FCC) and basic cable (which is more self-regulated than anything, but is dependent on advertisers and cable companies paying subscriptions), because you don't specifically choose those channels.

also having no advertisers means it's not dependent on ratings, and as it's paid for monthly it has a lot more money than anyone else.

aha it all makes sense. thanks. i wish Mad Men was made by HBO.

have not seen this but am suspicious of the choice to make it vague what party anyone belongs to. or is it not vague, upon viewing?

oh it's vague. I get the motivation but it kind of devolved things to "Looks like those clowns in government did it again. What a bunch of clowns."

JL-D's character is trying to push for "green jobs" in this ep so i'd guess dem but they don't really explicitly state it, no (/notreallyaspoiler)

i imagine they felt it would distract you from what the show is about and i think they're probably right; maybe they'll spill the beans after a couple more shows though?

"Looks like those clowns in government did it again. What a bunch of clowns."

yeah this meme is thoroughly owned by the right wing in america; i'm wondering if iannucci realizes how his schtick plays into that?

'in the loop' drew much of its power from blairite hardasses inescapably seeing what it was they'd muscled into, right?

i've never been satisfied by political drama of any kind tho, really. no show like the real thing imo.

political comedy even less

if the sense of individual characters and their relative intelligence/engagement increases, i could see the lack of political content being irrelevant, esp since the veep is such an irrelevant position.

it hasn't been for our adult life!

i think you can get away with a show that implies it is within a fantasy administration, with more jokes and a reason to get invested in the characters' dilemmas.

okay okay, i'll get of my hobbyhorse until i see the show

It's never mattered less what party anyone belongs to.

'in the loop' drew much of its power from blairite hardasses inescapably seeing what it was they'd muscled into, right?

not sure what you mean

essentially comedic characters having to look at war, basically.

some VPs (Cheney) obv more important than others (Quayle)

First episode streaming free at hbo.com and probably YouTube btw.

first episode not very funny : (

i just watched and thought it was pretty good though i wonder how it'll work without any truly frightening characters. interesting that the veep herself is the audience proxy and not some chris addison type staffer

i didn't think the entire episode of sarah palin, but i have to admit that i occasionally was reminded of palin

i don't think that's a problem or anything the show necessarily has to run from.

for sure. i didn't mind it.

was annoyed at the production designers for not matching the wapo typefaces on the fake style section. Pretty glaringly obvious on screen I'd think even if you aren't familiar with the paper.

JLD looks great. This has promise and i'll keep watching but i only laughed once at JLD referring to glasses as "wheelchairs for the eyes". the gary character is bound to get super annoying. i know he's supposed to be but still...

"oh look, it's the guy from my left foot"

this show rules. between this and Girls i was starting to feel like a criminal so i ordered hbo.

I enjoyed the first episode of this a lot

def wanna see this

was annoyed at the production designers for not matching the wapo typefaces on the fake style section. Pretty glaringly obvious

Generally, no one in the biz cares about this kind of detail. Even if they actually said "Post."

(maybe there's even some weird un/written rule not to duplicate it)

renewed

I'm kind of surprised that I like this as much as I do.

i. do they keep up the 'did the president call?' 'no' 'no' and the 'did you know i have my own flag' bits
ii. do they get funny and how many repetitions does it take for them to get funny

― thomp, Monday, April 23, 2012 10:16 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes
and no, not by the end of the first three episodes at least

have not seen this but am suspicious of the choice to make it vague what party anyone belongs to. or is it not vague, upon viewing?

― goole, Tuesday, April 24, 2012 2:56 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this annoys the hell out of me

first 2 eps strike me as a lil boring? at least v conventional sitcom-y plots/pacing/beats idk i might'ev been hoping this'd be more ambitious

i liked the pilot a lot--i think mostly because i love the mike character? but yeah the second one seemed a little aimless. i'm not sure vice-presidents have no real power is enough to hang a show on.

oh, i quite enjoyed 'did the president call' in the second episode

i'm interested how they'll work the parties in the third season of 'the thick of it' because it's been quite clear all along which parties they belong to, and if they're doing a coalition govt. with peter mannion as an MP (which i read somewhere or other) they either need to churn their cast massively, or deal mainly with the opposition, or get quite stuck into doing ... actual alternate history

Is US politics more polarised and partisan than in the UK? Maybe AI thought that making the party explicit would stop the show being about politics and start being about the party.

theres some widely cited intvw where iannucci said he was glad to have delayed the 3rd season of TTOI because the election happened and he was excited about the prospect of a coalition govt