Nathan For You

Hate to admit that so far I'm having a really hard time getting into this, but I trust Nathan enough that maybe he’s got some more tricks up his sleeve over the course of the show. Just find the satire of clueless influencer types plus sleazy reality TV guy to be really cliché & tired, feel like I’ve seen these beats so many times over the years. Really hope there ends up being more to it than that.

I sort of feel the same way, and I also don't really like the way it kind of leans harder on the Safdie brand of discomfort than the Fielder Method (even though Fielder directed a lot of it, iirc). But I trust in Fielder, since none of his projects have ended where they began. On the other hand, I think this is 10 episodes long, which is a lot for this story.

I like the show but this made me even more curious about where it's going.

saw the first three eps of the curse at NYFF and thought it was extremely whatever but when i watched the whole thing at home i realized it’s probably the best new show of the year (disclaimer: i barely watch TV). my review for @PasteMagazine https://t.co/GgKBmna1jg

— brianna (@justbrizigs) November 6, 2023

fwiw I was kind of underwhelmed by the first episode of The Rehearsal and figured the positive reaction was mostly from people who just really missed NFY. but yea not only did the show get way better/weirder it also turned out to really need a first episode like that lest the thing just make no sense whatsoever

wait is the whole thing out or no?

no, only the first 2 of 10

apparently reviewers have the whole thing

right and very much like The Rehearsal a lot of them are saying "oh, just you wait"

Episode 4 is great. I can't stop thinking about the last scene -- I think it really gets at the core of... something.

I can't imagine wanting to talk about this show, but I need to know that other people are watching it.

NB I'm still getting caught up, so the episode Chris L. mentioned (that ends with the corporate comedy class) is the last one that I've seen.

Dougie makes an extremely plausible alcoholic. I loved his stupid faux-soul-baring about being cursed himself ("It's the only way to explain what happened!")

It's so, so good. I also feel like nobody else is watching it. I think maybe what it has to offer is something not that many people are interested in. I do not agree with the blurb above that calls it "a biting satirization of white guilt."

It's a pretty uncomfortable show, and, what, six (?) episodes in it's a little tough to discern the precise target of its satire. Which I think it is - a satire, that is - it's just uncomfortable in multiple directions/dimensions.

Speaking of Nathan, I got my daughter a pair of Summit Ice "Deny Nothing" socks for Hanukkah.

it's a little tough to discern the precise target of its satire.

the human fucking condition, man

like that's fielder's entire thing, that the painful, wince-making, difficult thing about people is that they're people

I had to take a break from The Curse and will be catching up sometime this week. It was becoming a little bit too cursed

Honestly though! The only time so far when I've really felt like the show was "doing satire" was during the focus group, when a guy* starts rattling off his talking points against climate change, and the lady he's arguing with goes "You know I thought the show was boring while I was watching it, but I changed my mind, I like it now." That felt a little on the nose, but not unrealistic.

(And even in that scene, the show bucks convention: when they ask "Did anyone actually like the husband?" the asshole climate denier is the only person to raise his hand)

that part was very funny

i'm not certain its a satire, but i also dont know what i think its doing. whatever it is, i'm not convinced yet that it needs 10 hours to get there.

having an issue with this that i have with stuff sometimes where there are elements that seem very obvious, stock, or overfamiliar, and i'll end up overthinking and getting confused about how intentional that is, how aware of it i'm expected to be, etc - if that makes any sense. i'm obviously curious about where it will end up but so far i feel totally lost at sea with it.

there are a lot of semi-satirical points in the episodes I’ve watched. all the people asking them if the mirror house is related to the work of an artist who had a similar concept, the constant talk about how they’re enabling people and then immediately fretting how those same people are doing it wrong

they don’t want to help people, they want the perception that they’re celebrities helping people. and they’re not succeeding at either! they’d be effective in one of those goals if they just did what was prescribed at the beginning: shout at someone that you have a small penis and move on with your life, imo

I just got done watching episode 7 and I'm a little confused... I was listening to a podcast host who had already seen the advance screeners and said it gets really weird and funny in episodes 6&7, but that was not my experience at all. And also those episodes are 10-15 minutes shorter than all the others. I'm wondering if they may have been recut at some point?

I think the thing that I ponder the most is how different characters perceive the existence of a reality tv production intersecting their lives. A different show might be too on the nose and have a populace that fawns over the characters in an attempt to glom on to
fame, or more people reacting with outright disgust

Having most people see this as benignly annoying or malignant but not overly threatening, or not have any opinion whatsoever, is something Fielder’s brought to the table. All of the supporting cast here is just viewing this as a curiosity that probably won’t affect their lives in any particular way.

I liked seeing that one actor as the sweaty prospective homebuyer husband. He’s got a great look

Yeah the fake homebuyers were probably the highlight of the series so far. "Can we do another one where you don't touch your belly" lol

the complete lack of commentary on the guy giving his wife a look and then bursting into song was excellent

It should finally be noted here that Emma Stone is giving an all-time great performance in this.

I’m also loving the use of Alice Coltrane music.

Stone is incredible in this, but now that we're caught up we still have no idea where this is going. Death?

Yes came here to exclaim about Stone's amazing acting here, I really don't know much about her and had no idea she was this good

that conversation with the native artist had so many twists and turns and Stone’s expressions were so awkward and on point

Episode 8 definitely bringing the lols. I love how when Brett is making up fake profound Native spiritual shit to troll Whitney, you can tell by her face that she isn't really buying it, she kinda wants to call his bluff (or at least say "I don't understand"), but she weighs her options and lands on the fake earnestness that is her default setting ("... That was beautiful")

I think she's thinking "wow, this seems really stereotypical but it's not my place to question it."

Right, which is why it's such good trolling.

Dougie is really becoming an archetype for how I think of sleazy reality TV producers. I think his contempt for Asher stems from Asher having a humiliation fetish and being unwilling to call out Dougie's bullying for what it is.

"I can't *make* you do anything if some part of you doesn't already want to do it" = the reality TV producer code of ethics in its entirety

I worked in reality for years (editor) and knew many producers. None of them were like Dougie. We all knew we were making trash for the most part but had fun on the usually very short ride that was a series or pilot. People like Whitney and Asher, though? Dime a dozen.
Have to say Emma Stone is excellent in this.

I both like and cringe every time the show tries to define Dougie. He's very amorphous in that he seems to want to make a sleazy show, seems to actually be interested in people tangential or not in the show, but he's only ever identifiable as "the guy with the dead wife" (do not ask about her)

He's a guy who goes to the liquor store in a blackout, buys booze for teens when they ask him, but then forces them to hang out with him and endure lectures about how he killed his wife while driving drunk. What's not to get?

He's sad and lonely and (as he tells his date in an early episode) he doesn't feel like himself unless he's busy with work. He must be vaguely aware that a lot of his creative choices (starting with the menthol in the eyes) are things that would strike the average HGTV viewer as manipulative or cruel, but he views it as a sign of his professionalism that he is able to do the work without ever feeling squeamish.

Okay I just saw another comment re: Dougie's compulsive breathalyzing that made a lot of sense to me. He's obviously traumatized by the car crash that killed his wife, and he's also heavily invested in the idea that the crash was not his fault because he wasn't impaired in any way when it happened. Successful drunk driving is a way he tries to prove his innocence to himself. Each time he blows above .07 and still makes it to wherever he's going, it shows that he's a good drunk driver, not a dangerous one.

This show is so strange and hard to pin down, and even eight or so episodes in, whatever it is up to, its characters are still defining themselves. Asher is basically a meek, insecure lifetime bullying victim trying to reinvent himself as an alpha dude. Whitney is a seemingly not self aware victimizer (at least in the aggressive white privilege sense) trying to mold herself into a well making exemplar. And then there's Dougie, who is a lot more self-aware, totally steeped in self-loathing, boiling in a stew of denial and self-destruction. Their collective motivations are a fascinating muddle of complex contradictions.

I think Asher may be the most mysterious to me. As Fielder portrays him, he seems to recognize when people are fucking with him, and he's doing real time calculations to try and determine how much he is willing to take to achieve his transformation.

i dont believe anyone actually likes this show they are just stockholmed syndrome'd by nathan

i think this because it kinda sucks and is boring

i dont believe anyone actually likes this show they are just stockholmed syndrome'd by nathan

― kurt schwitterz, Friday, January 5, 2024 bookmarkflaglink

I'm generally not a fan of Fielder, but I started watching this... idk I guess out of peer pressure? There are moments/episodes where I love how smart/funny it is. And others where the discomfort is too discomfiting. I had a hard time with the last episode. I'm in it to the end at this point though I'm not totally convinced it will have been worth it.

It's funny to dislike nearly every TV show and then get accused of performatively liking one of them.

i dont believe anyone actually likes this show they are just stockholmed syndrome'd by nathan

― kurt schwitterz, Friday, January 5, 2024 12:50 PM (eight hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

i think this because it kinda sucks and is boring

― kurt schwitterz, Friday, January 5, 2024 12:51 PM (eight hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is otm.. i am pot committed at this point so will watch ep 10 but i expect to still think it sux

Latest episode was even more twisted. Things are shifting ... somewhere.

Are you talking about ep 8 (with the smoke detector batteries, and the arms dealing art collector) or is there a newer one out? I can never keep track of when this releases

9. It came out yesterday.

I was a few eps behind and watched 3 in a row to get caught up today. Put me in a weird headspace, but I like this show and think it’s good and interesting. Can totally get not liking it, I think I’d be hesitant to recommend it to most, but it’s compelling to me ymmv.

I had to pause this after episode 5, think I’ll wait until I can watch the remaining episodes in (relatively) quick succession. Watching them week by week just left me feeling “so what?” after each one, like the mains are just repeating the same character beats over & over & over again.

The last ep I watched was when she walked over to the neighbors house to talk about amazon package theft, and iirc we are shown her entire stroll over there in real time and idk, after so many hours of scenes like that overlaid with ominous synth music it started to feel like wheel-spinning. the characters are well-constructed and the performances are good but it might just fundamentally be too long for me.

I think there's been enough movement but it's a slow build for sure - also it didn't help that it's been impossible to figure out what any build that's building might be building to! I've been enjoying it.

Despite liking it ("enjoying" is the wrong word), based on where the show is now I still can't really justify the number of episodes. This probably would have worked as well with, say, six episodes. Then again, they would have probably had to cut down all those really slow, long scenes of, like, people standing there in shock, just staring in silence.