Better Call Saul

agree

I don't think it's been delayed at all? They started shooting this year and haven't even announced an airdate yet

Sorta delayed, the first two seasons both premiered in April, season 3 in June. This one won't be until August or September (as I read in that Odenkirk interview w/ yo la tengo), so just a longer wait than previously.

i started listening to the podcast bcz i’m
a saddo & quick sidebar (same sidebar i had with the breaking bad podcast):

kelley YOUR QUESTIONS ARE TOO LONG. it takes you five minutes to ask anyone anything or you include all the stuff they’re waiting to say in your question or you talk over them aaagghhh

i mean love the convos but girl, my god, you gotta chill

...just a longer wait than previously

or exactly the same wait as last year!

I've listened to the podcast a little, I can't imagine being able to follow it unless you're listening 100% week by week. although they often get super-confused themselves bcz they don't record it week by week.

or exactly the same wait as last year!

ha, yeah, true. just feels longer this time i guess.

Renewed for Season 5, back on Monday August 6th.

:D

Finished Breaking Bad over the winter, just about to stat the last season of The Wire; Saul is next up (so I'll have to catch the upcoming season on rerun).

"start"--Freudian slip brought on by the stat-crazed higher-ups on The Wire.

s4 now on Netflix!

Not in America, the first episode only aired tonight, and that one wasn't even on the AMC app for hours afterward. Guess the next 9 weeks' ratings'll plummet if we can torrent the entire season tomorrow.

It's not dropping all at once anywhere, AFAICT.

aw man. The email from Netflix literally says 'season 4 now on Netflix' but I guess it's only ep1. Never mind, I quite like watching this week to week.

I'd happily re-watch the whole series if I had the time

got lost during s3 and didn't manage to work out where i was

I'm seven episodes into the first season. I've liked everything so far, except maybe the episode with the billboard. Loved how they used Tuco as a link in the first episode.

got lost during s3 and didn't manage to work out where i was

Albuquerqe iirc

i accidentally ran across this analysis of chuck and jimmy recently and think it's worth sharing. spoilers abound, even in the title, so here's the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ddHGpQm9oE

like a lot of you, i haven't watched in quite a while and kind of forgot what was going on, so it also serves as a decent refresher of where at least one of the storylines currently sits

NO!! i thought my formatting would just make it a link instead of embedding the video. welp, sorry about that. chuck goes through some shit in this show, spoilers

v excited about this

this show is really outstanding. I probably prefer it to Breaking Bad, probably because I find the characters more likable and somehow what we already know about the characters who carry over from BB doesn't cheapen their appearances but deepens them. And whether or not a prequel was the plan initially (I sincerely doubt it), the writers seem to have left enough room, left enough unsaid, and planted enough clues throughout BB to allow for that richness. I'm particularly fond of the single mention of Nacho in BB turning into a completely outstanding character here, and what I imagine will be a lot of filling in of the gaps around Mike's comment protesting Walter and Jesse sparing Lydia (something akin to "you don't know what she's capable of" or whatever.) And surprisingly the Gus backstory has a lot of room to grow as well.

it is def better than Breaking Bad

also I've never seen Rhea Seehorn in anything before but she is *incredible*

it's not as exciting or as intense as breaking bad but it's deeper and more fulfilling.

I see Rhea Seehorn's outstanding role and performance as a (most likely) intentional corrective to the shitty material the women in BB had to work with

Breaking Bad is great but i guess my primary criticism was that it felt like a narrative vise from which there was no escape for anyone, and towards the end its grimness felt a bit OTT in places. I understand that was probably the point, moving from darkly comic to totally bleak (cf Mr Chips to Scarface) and it's more of a "me" thing than a BB thing.

I'm particularly fond of the single mention of Nacho in BB turning into a completely outstanding character here

Nacho was mentioned in Breaking Bad? Do you remember when/what episode?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8gM6_FCeiBA

Daaaamn, that's a deep cut.

a narrative vise from which there was no escape for anyone

yup, it's more like a contraption than a story.

Just watched the second-last season 1 episode--almost tragedy, Chuck's betrayal.

What was the Wire courtroom reference alluded to above?

anyone else momentarily confused by the Walter White type dude in this ep?

Yeah, we thought that was WW for a second too. Seemed obvious enough that we wondered aloud if the show runners were deliberately messing with the viewers a little.

It's down to one showrunner now! Gilligan didn't work day to day on this season.

didn’t recognise the name of the director of this episode but it is as brilliant as ever

GENE AND THE TAXI DRIVER 😵

taxi driver freaked me OUT
he looked like William Forsythe & I was so sure something bad was going to happen (mainly bcz I was so convinced it really WAS Forsythe)

The guy with the baseball cards (three episodes into Season--not sure if he'll be back): he seems to have based his performance on William Macy in Fargo, but he was great.

he looked like a nerdy Rob Cordry

My most bingiest binge since Mad Men: Season 2 on Friday, Season 3 on Saturday. No repeat of the Season 4 debut today, before the second episode tomorrow--I probably missed a bunch of them all week--so I'll have to wait on the new season.

I liked the first two seasons a lot, found the third wandered. The performances by the new actors are great (i.e., those not in Breaking Bad--I'll call them by their character's name): Kim, Chuck, Nacho, lesser roles like Ernesto and the baseball card guy. There were two things that lost me a bit in the third season. (Specifics ahead.) Mike's surveillance as he tried to figure out what was going on with Hector's crew--the gas caps and all that--seemed to go on and on. They could have scaled that back a lot. Also, as great as Michael McKean is, I thought his story should have more or less ended with his courtroom meltdown and the subsequent shot of him cowering behind his door. With everything that happened after that, I'd had enough of him. All I really learned that hadn't already been made clear was that the director and writers have seen The Conversation.

Loved "Sugar Town" to start Season 3.

Mike's surveillance as he tried to figure out what was going on with Hector's crew--the gas caps and all that--seemed to go on and on. They could have scaled that back a lot.

get out

lol otm

Mike might be the most meticulous character on television

almost to the extent I’m convinced that if every character he advised did exactly what he said, nothing would ever go wrong

if that happened we wouldn’t get his glaring and exasperated looks, though. and those are truly rewarding

I get that it was totally in character with Mike; I already knew that. As a viewer, for me, it just dragged on.

Actually, the post before is part of why I was getting impatient: I love Mike's interactions with other characters so much--his words, those looks--having him out there in the desert on his own isn't as interesting.

Mike Doing Stuff whether laying concrete or inspecting a warehouse is one of the joys of this series - not just him, tho, it’s full of long scenes of intelligent ppl meticulously doing shit (often but not always schemes). Very here for the ambient heist movie vibe in general, this was one of the few tv shows I thought of when watching the new twin peaks - particularly the pre-reveal dr jacoby scenes where he carefully painted shovels for several minutes

I really liked him setting up the playground, especially the subtle flirtation with Anita. If they launch another spin-off, I would absolutely watch Mike Saying Stuff. Mike Doing Stuff, maybe.

I’m still laughing at “oh the soaker hosea you were making!”

mike itemizes his tax deductions to absolute perfection, saving over $1400 compared to the standard deduction: season 4