"The Wire" on HBO

haha im the opposite on poirot/marple

luther is VERY self-consciously Gritty and Psychological but its watchable

none of these are shows id recommend to people who arent generally fans of police shows except prime suspect

I really really want to blag on about MI5 with someone, desperately.

I know we're talking abt older britisher TV crime dramas but I will rep for Luther. I just finished season 1 and holy shitballs. Yeah. Watch that!

The Shadow Line was great, one of the best things I saw on Britishes TV last year, but don't expect to have a clue what's happening in the first episode.

I thought the consensus on Luther was "amazing cast, great acting, shame about the scripts"?

(I mean The Shadow Line isn't anywhere near Wire quality but it is great)

really? I didn't have a problem with the writing.

MI5, or at least the first episode, is AWFUL. Like, easily out-sophisticated by comic books.

luther is beautifully shot too. the scripts are... serviceable

oh yeah i forgot about the shadow line, it was mostly very good, though by the end i remember being really frustrated

there so many good bbc miniseries from the 70s/80s that come close to or surpass the wire in quality and also require way less commitment, prime suspect chief among them

Prime Suspect is ITV and 90s (/00s)

1) shut up 2) whatever

MI5 is the best! There may be a thread somewhere under 'spooks'. It gets to a point where every other sites is seriously ropey but I love it

Every other SERIES

Got to say digging out ancient Brit detective series is some impressive anglophilia. Was this stuff even shown over there the first time round?

God no.

It's Netflix that's dug them out, though. I watched Sherlock and oh maybe some Agatha Christie and next thing I know it's thrusting Inspector Lynley and Prime Suspect at me.

You may enjoy Jonathan creek

hey z s have you seen the sopranos? because yeah per k3v it's the other big thing that has like ~modern cinematic television~ value & gets all complex. just watching the pilot is pretty rewarding. i can't imagine seeing it out of time?, like if it's somehow like watching a brash british gangster movie with a blaring david holmes soundtrack five years later, but i figure it holds up. another cool thing you could watch if you haven't seen it is michael apted's 7 up, where he interviewed a bunch of seven year olds from different backgrounds in the fifties & then caught up with them every seven years, to see them weather the eighties, dress loudly in the nineties and mow their lawns in the '00s. it's one of the best things i've ever seen & is so satisfying to work through over a little while.

I've never seen The Sopranos. I actively dislike/avoid mafia story-lines and the people in them. Maybe because they always, always, always end badly.

the sopranos holds up, i think. i mean anything that long is gonna be lumpy. but i watched it again in full back in...2010? and it still felt like a worthwhile experience.

plus even if there's long stretches where it gets boring or feels retrospectively silly or hammers on the same riffs, there are also just a lot of great moments.

for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNpMC4FslNk

the pines
the pines
the pines

It's Netflix that's dug them out, though. I watched Sherlock and oh maybe some Agatha Christie and next thing I know it's thrusting Inspector Lynley and Prime Suspect at me.

― grossly incorrect register (in orbit), Wednesday, December 12, 2012 12:30 PM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yeah netflix has a VERY deep library of old british mysteries. i think all licensed by PBS for masterpiece mystery probably.

lynley is pretty good too btw

i've seen the sopranos AND the 7/14/21/28/35/42/49 ups. i'm like a tv guy over here!

i was about to ask when the new UP comes out, but apparently it was this year (56 up). have you seen it?

Got to say digging out ancient Brit detective series is some impressive anglophilia. Was this stuff even shown over there the first time round?

― Matt DC, Wednesday, December 12, 2012 11:25 AM (42 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes they were, on pbs. it feels like pretty entry-level anglophilia to me!

i've seen the first part of it, which i was kinda surprised blew the suspense & revealed where neil's at, which was interesting. i'll watch the other parts sometime. the taxi driver/tv extra guy always sorta fascinated me, & the only child who seemed pained by her participation. i have no more tv advice though.
xp

watch all 30 seasons of Frontline

that's not a bad idea

I would recommend louie but at this point I think it's more of a curse tbh

oh man you know whats really good is band of brothers

i mean not really ismilar to the wire but i re-screened it over thanksgiving and it really held up

Don't try and begin mad men after the Wire, it looked so so bad

I really enjoyed Band of Brothers, it spurred me on to try The Pacific which while it was educational it wasn't a patch on BOB.

Ugh I watched that. Give me the worst British police procedural over any of that war shit.

I tried the Pacific when it aired and got bored -- circled back last year and really, really enjoyed it. I think I just needed to let go of my wanting it to be Band of Brothers.

But yeah, BoB is the BEST

i love me some war shit

it feels like pretty entry-level anglophilia to me

I'd sort of assumed they'd been torrented, and that really would be impressive digging because some of these things are pretty old and I don't know many British people who would bother digging them out especially if they were discovering them for the first time.

Z S you know what is an awesome quick & dirty series you can watch on youtube/torrents?

both seasons of MEET THE NATIVES

first season is in UK: http://natgeotv.com/uk/meet-the-natives

second season in USA: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_the_Natives:_USA

some of these things are pretty old and I don't know many British people who would bother digging them out

american public tv's relaysh to british tv is pretty odd. i think my channel here still shows 'good neighbors' and i kind of grew up on 'are you being served.' :/

being ancient, clapped-out, and corny was so much a part of how i understood brit tv that seeing contempo shit like prime suspect when it aired was a mild shock.

BoB is the bomb

'bastogne' and 'the breaking point' are pretty devastating episodes, neal mcdonough's whole character arc in those two is subtly heartbreaking.

i think the episode with colin hanks is a weak link but still effective.

'the pacific' is just grim as fuck, it kind of lacks some of the great camaraderie of BoB but that makes it a little more otm in some ways about war, really gets more at what it is to be a soldier in an enormous military campaign.

the difference between BoB and Pacific highlight pretty well the difference between those two theaters of war -- the more traditional combat style of European theater of WWII kind of lent itself to camaraderie a little better than with the Pacific, where Pacific theater was such a fucking meatgrinder, and so psychologically terrifying as far as up-close, face-to-face brutal combat that you just kept re-aligning with new soldiers all the time because everyone was dying left and right

anyway probably not the thread to bore ppl with my wwii nerdery

In The Pacific I was impressed with how it showed the psychological devastation of coping with ceaseless torrential rain and mud had on soldiers. I don't think it was a nod to Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle though.

what better place xpost