Six Feet Under

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
So, The Wire has its own thread. The other mould-breaking HBO drama of the decade needs its own thread too.

I'm working my way through season 2 at the moment (so please, no spoilers!), and it's quite incredible. The treatment of issues rarely taken seriously by drama (therapy, sex addiction etc etc) is wonderful, and undercut with the darkest sense of humour.

All that, and brilliant characters (major and minor). I think i'm kind of in love with Rachel Griffiths too, which is pretty sick given her character...
 

john eden

male pale and stale
Saw all of these a few years ago and definitely rate them. Much better female characters than The Wire and Sopranos.

Kind of compare more to Sopranons than The Wire in my head (based on a Family, has the odd surreal hallucinatory moment, etc).

Kinda almost veers into cutesy melodrama in place maybe, but it's still great and I'm a bit jealous of people who are seeing it all for the first time. :)
 

Pestario

tell your friends
I love this show, so much so that I bought the whole box set last year. You're in for an epic journey Mr Baboon :).

Kinda almost veers into cutesy melodrama in place maybe,

Seasons 3 and 4 are probably the weakest because of this (relatively speaking)

I've introduced the show to my partner who funnily enough is a funeral director himself and he's completely addicted to it now. Apparently the portrayal of the funeral business is quite accurate too.
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Thanks for the replies

@john - Definitely with you on the female characters. Ruth is a masterstroke of fucked-upness, and Brenda is utterly compelling. And as for Claire...the little sister i would've wanted. I really don't understnad the love for the Sopranos, I must say (tho' I see why you're making the comparison). To me the 'points' it was making were so non-profound (it worked as entertainment just fine, of course), whereas SFU makes some devastatingly true points about the nature of relationships, that I relate to immensely.

@Pestario - interesting. My friend who is an evangelist for the show, really rates both those series, and rates season 1 as the least effective. But I'll have to see them all before offering my own perspective.
Great personal anecdote. that must add so many extra levels!
 

zhao

there are no accidents
especially if you have ever spent any significant amount of time in Cali especially LA... some of the characters are so architypally funny... the Cal Arts students (may be season 3?), Brenda's parents, Brenda, the mother's hippie sister in Malibu, etc. clare's druggie boyfriend worked out at my gym the YMCA on hollywood and gower...

did you see the one where the mother takes ecstasy yet?

i loved the entire series. last episode of season 5 has a great death sequence... but then again i loved American Beauty too so i don't know, maybe underneath it all i'm really a women-hating fascist neo-con chauvinistic psychopath pig.
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
i can only imaginen how true to California it is!

Brenda's mother is hysterical, agreed. Just saw the episode with the sister the other night - fantastic. I love Brenda's friend too(forgot her name - she works as a prostitute. Amazingly attactive).

No, haven't seen that one - isn't there a running theme in the first series of lots of characters accidentally taking E from a box of pills? If so, that's genius in itself.

I'm SO hyped about seeing the 50 or so episodes I have left to view.

I'm so at peace with being a woman-hating fascist neo-con chauvinistic psychopath pig. It's the new liberalism.

Favourite moment - brenda's fever dream during which she sees the book "I hate you, don't leave me". Discoverign that this was a real book blew my mind. And in the same episode, Nate's aborted kid appearing to him: "I have the secret to life. Now you'll never know."
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
In those moments (as with the dream that Brenda has that Nate is trying to smother her, that is initially presented as reality and then hyper-reality) it's so genuinely scary. I love that too - the production values/weird atmosphere are unimpeachable.
 

Lichen

Well-known member
" isn't there a running theme in the first series of lots of characters accidentally taking E from a box of pills?"

Yes there is...and it's as good as you'd hope.
 

nomadthethird

more issues than Time mag
really don't understnad the love for the Sopranos, I must say (tho' I see why you're making the comparison). To me the 'points' it was making were so non-profound (it worked as entertainment just fine, of course), whereas SFU makes some devastatingly true points about the nature of relationships, that I relate to immensely.

It's all what you relate to, isn't it?

Carmela Soprano is *exactly*, exactly like my mother. In every way. It's like watching my mother on screen.

I do not relate to the characters on Six Feet Under at all (although I like it ok, some seasons much better than others). I don't find any of them likable or relatable. Nate is especially awful. I hate that guy. I would rather die than spend a minute with that self-absorbed, adolescent douchebag. As for the way they all relate, I think they're a bunch of whiny, passive-aggressive middle class white people, just like any others. The gay couple was slightly more interesting than the others due to the whole adoption thing.
 
I watched the first season which I kind of liked but half way into the second I stopped watching... can't remember exactly why, but in my memory it was really frustrating to watch.
 

nomadthethird

more issues than Time mag
I watched the first season which I kind of liked but half way into the second I stopped watching... can't remember exactly why, but in my memory it was really frustrating to watch.

Yeah I watched the first couple of seasons when it originally aired, during my undergrad days.

At the time it seemed like nothing else that had been on TV before, so I liked that aspect of it. But I really didn't like a lot of the characters and agree--they were frustrating to even watch. Kind of like Curb Your Enthusiasm but different. At a certain point I totally lost interest in it, and only caught up with the last few seasons a few years later.
 
Yes, at one point I came to the conclusion that I just don't want to spend any time with these people. Plus I'm really not the type of person for continuous tv series of that length.
 

scottdisco

rip this joint please
Carmela Soprano is *exactly*, exactly like my mother. In every way. It's like watching my mother on screen.

that's brilliant!

Carmela is awesome. i love that latter-day episode where her and her buddy go to Paris. it's wonderful to see her react emotionally to her tourism experiences.

hey, Nomad, do you have a cute Meadow-style sister? i'd love to be introduced..
;)
 

scottdisco

rip this joint please
i must admit my oldest mate who is a bit of a TV geek, and often eloquently persuasive on the subject, adores Six Feet Under.

seen them all.

just two c.
 

nomadthethird

more issues than Time mag
i must admit my oldest mate who is a bit of a TV geek, and often eloquently persuasive on the subject, adores Six Feet Under.

seen them all.

just two c.

No sisters, just a brother. :slanted:

I would say that as a show, it's quite well-made, but the characters do nothing for me, and in fact some of them are just too annoying for me to handle from episode to episode.
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
It's all what you relate to, isn't it?

Carmela Soprano is *exactly*, exactly like my mother. In every way. It's like watching my mother on screen.

I do not relate to the characters on Six Feet Under at all (although I like it ok, some seasons much better than others). I don't find any of them likable or relatable. Nate is especially awful. I hate that guy. I would rather die than spend a minute with that self-absorbed, adolescent douchebag. As for the way they all relate, I think they're a bunch of whiny, passive-aggressive middle class white people, just like any others. The gay couple was slightly more interesting than the others due to the whole adoption thing.

You're quite right - it is of course what you relate to.

But I do disagree strongly that you have to like ANY of the characters in order for drama to be absorbing. Nate may indeed be awful (haven't seen enough to totally make up my mind), but, to be honest, there are a lot of people out there witht he same adolescent mindset. It rings true for me. And as for passive-aggressive - well, one of the major problems with interpersonal relatiosnhisp for me, so fascinating to see it tackled so thoroughly.

And as for them being middle-class white people - i won't pretend to know how class operates in America, but if you think that SFU is a middle-class show, you should never, EVER start watching British drama.

If it centred around a working-class Latino family business, would it make any difference if the quality of the drama was the same?
 

zhao

there are no accidents
disagree about "it's all what you relate to". i've never been around people like the Sopranos (except maybe arguing with them about prehistory online), and i enjoyed that show a lot.
 
And as for them being middle-class white people - i won't pretend to know how class operates in America, but if you think that SFU is a middle-class show, you should never, EVER start watching British drama.

Yes, this is very true. I dont know why but characters in english programmes are usually upper middle class. I could understand if it was average middle class, but people in Television must have bought into the concept of if a characters house has less than three bedrooms, the audience will not be able to sympathise with them.

As for 6 feet, i've said it before, but I suspect the UK didnt get the last series. It's hard to explain this without spoilers, but the last one on Channel 4 ended happily ever after. I read in a paper that the Americans got another series after that. Cant find anything on the net to confirm this though.
 
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crackerjack

Well-known member
Yes, this is very true. I dont know why but characters in english programmes are usually upper middle class. I could understand if it was average middle class, but people in Television must have bought into the concept of if a characters house has less than three bedrooms, the audience will not be able to sympathise with them.

Depends dunnit. Had the impression American soaps were always about the stinking rich, whereas British ones are usually about working, maybe lower-middle class.

I don't know how much drama UK TV permits these days - it's virtually all variations on a cop show (fairly classless, except Midsomer Murders types).

Of those that have/do run, there's Paul Abbot's stuff - Shameless was good for two series before C4 turned it into a despicable freak show taking the piss out of sink estates. And he wrote Clocking Off (didn't watch it, but it was set in a factory, so I guess it wasn't that MC).

British TV has two v significant middle class strands:
the costume drama, usually an adaptation of 'classic' lit, which I guess is seen as a) having export potential and b) being something of a banker - very handy in a financial climate where failure is catastrophic

the overlap with theatre - this used to be quite a regular feature. Does it even exist anymore?
 
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