Confessions of a DEADWOOD virgin. - Page 2

- Racist Steve's drunken rants are genuinely fucking hilarious.

I don't know what cracks me up more: his overwrought attempts at abuse (he honestly looked like he was going to burst out laughing at himself in one scene), or the other Fields's effortless non-reactions. It'd be hilarious if these two were revealed to actually share the same lineage.

Oh yeah...GOLD.

I think a big part of that comes from the introduction of Adams into the Gem dynamic. Prior to that, sure there was Johnny and to a slight extent EB, but Dan was clearly and comfortably occupying the no. 2 spot. But with Adams he could sense that this guy is a more natural heir to Al's legacy. Al and Adams will cut a throat if it comes to it, but they're also capable of more subtlety and a wider range of maneuvering around potential problems, whereas Dan knows that he's not much more than a "strong right arm" at the end of the day. That's why he's so immediately threatened by him and they have all the conflict at the beginning of S2.

I think it began from a very pragmatic place, that the Pioneer is the only paper in town, and having it as a friendly presence is far preferable to the alternative. But I think he also sees Merrick (correctly) as something of an overgrown child, and there's a part of him that wants to take in lost "boys" and teach them to navigate the big, bad world that brutalized him as a lad. You can see it with Merrick, but also to a degree with Dan (although the vibe there is more fraternal than paternal, with Al clearly being the elder), and especially with Johnny and Adams. The way he half yells, half lectures at the two reminds me very much of how my father interacts with my brother and I. Particularly the way he makes them repeat the "lesson" of the tirade back to make sure it's sunk in.
But magnificently played. It's a shame Gerald McRaney didn't get more recognition for his work, but I think at least part of that is the bad luck to have Daniel Day-Lewis playing a more flamboyant version of the character in a higher profile production at about the same time.

The theater storyline ends up feeling kind of wasted at the end of the series, but every scene with him is just awesome. I think my favorite bit is his delivery of "Fuck you, sir!" to Shaunessy when they have their random little spat in the thoroughfare. It's angry, but there's a slightly bemused undercurrent to the whole thing I find hilarious.

Reminds me of one of my favorite lines, from the mobbed government official: "You cannot fuck the future, sir! The future fucks you!"

I found out after that it was in Saturday Night Fever first, but it cracked me up the first time I heard it.

What strikes me about Hearst is how reasonable and down-to-earth an individual he appears to be at first before revealing his megalomania.

I love Steve's rants. They are so overwrought, and his voice modulation is fantastic.

Steve is practically Falstaff. In fact, I think if he wasn't so racist, he'd been downright lovable. There's something fascinating about that amount of wit, vocabulary, and artful sentence construction employed by such a stupid asshole. He's like a professional wrestler.

The cuts to the Al, Hearst, Bullock and the other major players during the amateur night presentation created quite a scary sense of tension and foreboding. I was wondering if something violent was going to happen there and then.

It sucks that the other two seasons ended so joyously, while this one left the town somewhere between defeat and compromise.

All in all, I'm really glad I gave this series a chance. Excellent stuff, easily up there with my other completed faves like The Wire and The Shield. I'll say more later.

It's a very special show. I plowed through it during the spring. I'll rewatch on Blu when that hits. I was struck by how human it was, how every single character, no matter how initially despicable, got their turn in the spotlight with some level of narrative empathy (even Hearst to a lesser degree). I was struck by how sympathetic I felt, by how the women were strongly addressed (I've loved precious few fiction characters as much as Deadwood's Calamity Jane).

"Ecce homo" was what the show was about.

The dialogue made the show. It had consistently effective narrative drama, but the language is what I remember most.

To be honest, I'm not sure I'd want to see Deadwood in high definition.

I've been rewatching the first season of Deadwood over the holidays and I'm still amazed at the complexity of the dialogue. Robin Wiegart does such an astonishing job of bringing Calamity Jane to life, I'd say it's the most definitive portrayal of the character.

The deterioration of Rev. Smith is just painful to watch culminating in Doc's breakdown, all credit to Brad Dourif for selling that scene so well it bordered on pretension.

Having literally just finished the first season (I bought it blind on a whim), I have to join the official CHUD Deadwood fan club. It's fucking spectacular, and I can't wait to watch the remaining two seasons. My thoughts on the season as a whole, in list form:

 

-Are there ANY HBO shows that don't have a kick-ass opening credits sequence? Because this one has yet another one, with a great musical theme and compelling imagery that perfectly suits the mood of the show. The only sad thing about them is that Keith Carradine doesn't stay in them for very long...

 

-Everything else I've seen Ian McShane in (On Stranger Tides, his excellent voicework in films like Kung Fu Panda and Coraline, Agent Fucking Cody Banks which I completely forgot he and Arnold Vosloo were in) has lead to this. My God, what a performance. Not many actors could pull off a speech about a shitty childhood whilst getting a blowjob, for instance, but McShane makes it riveting. I also believe his stellar work compels anyone else in a scene with him to step up their own game and give equally stellar work.

 

-Beyond McShane, it's difficult to pick a favorite performer since there's not a weak link in this ensemble, but some of my own personal favorites include Robin Weigert's weirdly adorable Jane (I can't wait for her to come back in Season 2, because you know she will), William Sanderson's hilariously pathetic Farnum, and Brad Dourif's Doc Cochran. Although it's fucking surreal seeing Dourif play a good man tormented by past demons since I'm so used to him playing creeps, psychos, murderers, or all three at once.

 

-The dialogue is indeed top-tier, though I'm going to have to watch my mouth so I don't accidentally call people "cocksuckers" or "cunts" for the next few weeks.

 

-I like that the show makes clear the often ugly realities of living in a place like Deadwood, but only really rubs our faces in it when there's a point to it (like the torture and murder of Miles and Flora). It's not simply violent or crudely sexual for the sake of it.

 

-Is John From Cincinatti any good? I've heard decidedly mixed things about it, but I'm curious to check out some of Milch's other shows now, and I'll definitely check out Luck when it comes out.

 

What a great damn show.

I somewhat enjoyed the 1st season, although I was very aware of its flaws, and was very pumped for the 2nd season after that finale. Got pooped out during the 2nd season and don't think I made it to the end of that one...def dont agree w/ your assessment of the overall show.

 

But the cast, specifically Ian McShane, Paula Malcomsen, and Timothy Olyphant are FANTASTIC. Cant say enough good things about their work on Deadwood.

 

Weakest cast member: easily Robin Weigert. She just becomes more and more unbearable as the show goes on.

Season Two is my favorite, not just of Deadwood either. It's just may favorite. It's go the most obtuse dialogue (the Yankton stuff takes some parsing), but it's also got Francis Woolcott, so whatever.

 

John From Cincin is kind of not awful sometimes, but coming as it did after Deadwood, it might as well be watching a dog shit on the street for twelve hours. To know that instead of Deadwood's last season, we got that thing, well, I can't congratulate it's failures. It does have my all time favorite opening credit sequence though, and Ed O'Neill is kind of great in it. Doesn't matter.

Yeah, I've heard Garrett Dillahunt comes back to play Wolcott, and that's going to be weird since I've heard Wolcott is a COMPLETELY different character from Jack McCall. Still, I've seen Dillahunt in other stuff where's he playing noticeably brighter characters, so it shouldn't be too jarring.

 

Thanks for the advice on Cincin, Arjen. I'll probably check it out anyway for the aforementioned Ed O'Neill factor (well, and star Bruce Greenwood), as I'm intrigued by the idea of Al Bundy doing more dramatic work. Didn't Milch originally want him for Al Swearengen? THAT would have been surreal in retrospect.

Dillahunt is great in Cincinatti too, probably the best part of the series for me.

Dang, Milch really wanted to keep some of those actors together after the show got cancelled, didn't he? Anyway, some more thoughts and questions:

 

-Going into the show, I had no idea that Deadwood was a real place, or that many of the characters (apart from really famous ones like Wild Bill Hickock and Calamity Jane) were based on real people. Subsequently, reading about the real Deadwood and its residents has proven to be quite interesting, especially since some of the show's characters are markedly different from their historical counterparts.

 

-Speaking of Wild Bill, I really did love Keith Carradine's performance, and was doubly sad to see him leave. Keith brought a surprising amount of dignity to the aging, money-losing cowboy, and this is best shown in "Here Was A Man"; the whole episode is leading up to Bill's death, and he seems to know it. Keith's quiet bravery in facing his future brings a lot of power to that sense of foreboding, especially in his final speech to Charlie Utter: "Can you let me go to Hell in my own way?" Incidentally, I was shocked to find out Dayton Callie is a Scottish-American, as his period New York accent (I had to look up the real Utter to figure out where he was from, as I had no idea what kind of accent Callie was going for at first) is impeccable. He's also great at portraying Utter as one of the few wholly decent men in the camp.

 

-The show is also really goddamn funny at times, especially whenever Farnum or the magnificently stupid Johnny is onscreen, or the great conversation between Al and Wu: "Bai gwuk lao [or something like that] cocksucka!" "Yeah, glad I taught you that word." I also love Weigert's delivery of "Are you dead?!" when she comes back with water to Andy in the woods, or really anything she says that isn't dramatic.

 

-I also love any interaction between Al and Cy, as it generally devolves into passive-aggressive needling. I particularly love the moment in "The Trial of Jack McCall" where Al laments that they can't just shoot Jack and throw him in the river, and Cy patronizingly responds, "But that would be wrong." It of course helps when you have a great character actor like Powers Boothe, who specializes in creeps like Cy.

 

-Like the rest of you, I found Reverend Smith's deterioration utterly heartbreaking. Ray McKinnon plays him with so much energy and earnestness that we really feel it when he starts losing his mind, and credit to him for making those seizures and fits look startlingly realistic rather than goofy.

 

-Is Deadwood really the first Western to use anachronistic swear words? I'm almost positive there had been at least a couple Westerns before this that used words like "fuck", "shit", etc. In any case, it works marvelously, especially since Milch and his writers bring a Shakespearean flair to swearing that I'm frankly jealous of.

 

 

If I were you Chris, I would sell that Season One you bought and use the money to buy the whole series package that HBO put out.  It's definitely worth it if you love the show.  They did an awesome job on the packaging. You wouldn't regret it.

 

 

I think the first two season of the show are some of the best seasons of anything HBO has produced. Its just phenomenal on practically every level.  I'm only half way through the 3rd season myself.  I had a huge break between the 2nd and 3rd.  So far its pretty great but I'm sad that I'll be finishing it soon.

 

Richardson is a fucking great character.  So fucking funny and good-willed.  He's almost my favorite.

Alas, hank, my money is short right now, so I'm having to watch the remaining seasons through Netflix discs. I'd love to own the whole thing, but my budget prevents it at the moment.