Louie (Louis C.K.'s show on FX)

They're all good, ffs

― the tuomas clown affair (Whiney G. Weingarten), Saturday, 20 August 2011 03:15 (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^^

its the goddamn tree of life of sitcoms

lol

ok i just caught up and yes, they are all brilliant

Wait so the duckling was his fear I get it.
http://28.media.tumblr.com/Ii3YbXKTvkssk8umVGwknZy2o1_500.jpg

i love this guy a lot
http://feeds.feedburner.com/louisckvideopodcast

Why isn't this a world where I can watch pootie tang before the storm comes to eat me?
http://www.avclub.com/articles/pootie-tang,30745/

how is this shit not on netflix i ask you

always thought chris rock had the best moments in pooty tang

the duck episode was really haunting. can't stop thinking about it.

it was really good!

s2 enters all-time tv list for me, like w Simpsons and Roseanne in realness

p much

This is always the show we put on last because it's so reliably excellent that we know we will never be let down.

i just rewatched the last ep of season one, not having watched the rest, i think keenly because i remembered the last scene well. it's so great, and kinda an exemplar for what's great about the show - the real variety in scenes, & the interesting things that happen in them (there's this great silent-comedy scene, but set against the overloading music of the club he's taken to, in which he creeps up on a girl trying to cop a guy's moves); the dynamics between him & a few of the other characters, like the hysterical babysitter, the guys he goes out with, his dirtbag friends, etc; and the emotional reach in the last part. it's so good.

re: the criticism upthread that there's a part of this that's trying to project too hard that he's a great guy: i don't disagree with this, necessarily, but don't find it such a troublesome premise. i think it's accepted with the same sort of reflection as that he's a frequent masturbator or that he's pretty solitary. & i don't so much think it's that he's 'a great guy', always doing the best thing & stepping back to allow others to go forward, so much as that he's trying & has a certain set of priorities, like his kids, etc. there's some seinfeld thing that they realised some way through that it wasn't problematic for jerry to be successful - like they didn't have to revert to the traditional klutzy thing of everything blowing up in the lead's face for comic sake. & that there's a basic mode for louie in which he's doing okay & is pretty moral (though obviously with weird behavioural extensions to that - he's not excising the 'sure i would date a 19 year old' bits, etc) seems like a v reasonable starting place for him to be at in the show.

like, not having rewatched the rest, rather

yeah i don't mind his "i'm a pretty decent guy" schtick at all. and, as you say, it's not like he isn't aware of the fact that he might think too highly of himself. cf the standup bit in the ep a couple weeks ago where he talks about how ppl like him think they're so great for not staring at ppl with disabilities (or something to that effect).

kinda wondering when the louis ck backlash begins. i love the dude but he's getting so much hype right now, so many people saying "OMG BEST COMEDIAN/SHOW EVER."

still feel like i don't really get the show but i'm glad he's doing it and people like it a lot

like bill simmons is praising him on grantland for no reason

don't know why i started posting again, sorry

basically, dude got the "funniest guy in america" mantle for a little while; I agree that he's bound to slip at some point but I'm really just enjoying him being at the top right now.

"i don't really get _______ but i'm glad ______'s doing it and people like it a lot" has such potential as a really irritating, condescending turn of phrase with high levels of plausible deniability. like i absolutely don't mean that i read it this way here, but when all you have is a shitty personality everything looks like a way to bother friends' boyfriends who like party down too much

i guess it could read that way if you're naturally cynical about people's motives/opinions. i'm ok with people liking stuff i don't like without having to feel that it's "lesser." it's just not for me.

for me it is. if i don't get something i figure it must not be very good.

kinda wondering when the louis ck backlash begins. i love the dude but he's getting so much hype right now, so many people saying "OMG BEST COMEDIAN/SHOW EVER."

yeah i've been bracing for this.

yeah its kinda approaching the point where even if you kinda like him and think hes 'just ok' the monstrous overpraise starts to grate but then i remember that like hardly anyone even watches his show im just friends with all of them on the internet

haha, true.

I still love the show, but it is getting more and more cuddly. I didn't like the USO episode, maybe because I'm an asshole? Like, do you really have to show country music guy singing his ENTIRE song!? I hit fast forward for a lot of that, but iirc they showed dude singing TWO entire songs - just intolerable. Not to mention the entirely non-critical gaze on the military. You don't need to show them randomly shooting civilians or anything, but this was like straight-up soft focus propaganda.

I don't buy that, and I'm no fan of the military.

I thought the episode was great and in a way important for just that reason; that it showed a side of the military that perhaps the Louie demographic doesn't consider very often in discussion. I'd recommend reading the travel blogs C.K. posted from his real USO experience that the episode was written about (http://www.louisck.net/2009/03/uso-tour-weblog-kuwait-iraq-af.html), he says that it was just overwhelming to see these people who he previously had a very narrow opinion of going about their lives in pretty much the way he depicts in the show; super professional, efficient, but also genuinely nice and appreciative of everything in a way that is beyond what we as civilians can really understand.

How much more critical do we really need to be of 20-somethings who are essentially sent out to dangerous regions of the world to fend for each other or die? It's kind of refreshing to see a somewhat positive portrayal of the troops from a non-Republican/etc. source. No?

I recognize that shooting with real people who have real lives, like the (real, actual) soldiers, Keni Thomas, even the cheerleader, puts you into this position where you can't really be critical of them, or even give them a gentle ribbing, really.

How much more critical do we really need to be of 20-somethings who are essentially sent out to dangerous regions of the world to fend for each other or die?
This thread isn't the place for it, but seriously? I'm not really willing to look at people in the business of killing other people with anything but a critical eye, and I'm never going to be willing to romanticize them, personally.

I think Louie is interested in challenging his audience and showing a critical view of the military would just be preaching to the choir. Much more provocative to show them in a favorable -- even romanticized -- light.

They're not being romanticised as the paragon of humanity. They're just there, living kind of shit lives and doing what they do. On a personal level I'm always going to have issues with the mentality of someone who actually wants to be in the military (these people are separate from those who see it as the best option for their future), but that doesn't mean every representation of them needs to be negative, or highlight their questionable aspects. This episode was dedicated to the guy who made Restrepo, and I think it follows along in that spirit pretty well.

Also the situation with the locals looked like it would escalate into something violent due to the procedures of the military, and is only saved by the universal language of a schlubby guy falling over trying to grab a duckling.

xxpost
I get that, really. I'm guess I'm just amazed that the tiny subset of the American population that isn't constantly bombarded with the exact image of the military that he portrayed in that episode is large enough to warrant that kind of attention. How many people are there, really that need to be told "Hey, have you ever considered that maybe soldiers are heros? Mind blowing, isn't it?"

I think he sees himself as a part of that 'tiny subset of the American population' and he's making art for ppl like him, no?

like isn't this also the subtext in the episode with the masturbation-hater lady or idk, i can't remember every episode off-hand but it seems like he's often striking this tone wrt a particular american conservatism

i can't even imagine what this alternative reality Louie military episode would look like. does he accidentally wander into a room where american soldiers are electrocuting a civilian and he shames them into realizing that what they're doing is wrong? or is it a scene where he's waiting behind some civilians at a checkpoint and they're being harassed and he is late to a show and keeps looking at his watch w/ like exacerbated expression and yakety sax is playing in the background?

("heroes", sorry).

Okay, I can totally cop to occasionally needing to be reminded that conservatives are people, too.

really really really lol fuck me

xp obv meant exasperated

IMO, no one even reports on the WARS anymore, so the fact that anyone, let alone a comedian, is presenting it in any way, is good.

as someone who comes from a military family, and whose brother who just returned home from Afghanistan, i really appreciated this episode.

p.s. i'm as anti-war/military as they come so, you know, fuck some of you on this thread

sorry

i dunno if i missed an ending but I felt like louis needed some curb your enthusiasm-style comeuppance for coming home without a duck, like he'd try to explain about improving cultural relations and the teacher would just give him a scornful stare and his daughters would be in tears, and then he'd have to go and try and get the duck back.

How many people are there, really that need to be told "Hey, have you ever considered that maybe soldiers are heroes? Mind blowing, isn't it?"

― Dan I., Friday, September 2, 2011 12:34 AM (17 hours ago) Bookmark

1) Here are the average viewerships for those Tuesday Louie airings so far (no numbers for 7/20 as yet, and no adults 18-49 or other demo ratings yet):

June 29: 1.107 million
July 6: 718,000
July 13: 622,000

2) This wasn't Triumph of the goddamn Will man, come on.

latebloomer otm

i think the upshot of this ep is that if a nine year old gives you a duck for your protection, just take the duck.

Are we waiting for the torrent people to catch up before discussing last night's ep?

also latebloomer otfm x2