6 feet under is off the fucking hook (HBOR)

Fatback

damn. who saw that shit?

gloom

i was flipping out, running around the house just straight flipping out...

dollar_bin

i was flipping out, running around the house just straight flipping out...

Damn, this has been a dark season to date and it just gets darker and darker (insert Martha Stewart "It's a good thing" graemlin here)

FORM METHOD=POST ACTION="http://soulstrut.com/ubbthreads/dopoll.php">INPUT TYPE=HIDDEN NAME="pollname" VALUE="1122911760dollar_bin">

Biggest Shock:[/b]
Nate Fisher
Stringer Bell
Deangelo Barksdale
INPUT TYPE=Submit NAME=Submit VALUE="Submit vote" class="buttons">

Jonny_Paycheck

What, did Nate die at the beginning of the show? too predictable. That show hellza fell off. Soap opera now. Didn't watch it, someone give me the 10 second rundown.

Swayze

man, i was seriously hoping someone would bring this up... that last dream shit with stoner-david, and crack-dad were too much. i woke up feeling wrong.

ariel_calmer

The whole brenda-nate connection had me on the ropes, but Nate has been even more self-obsessed this season than usual. The writers were running out of ground to cover with him. Plus the writing is getting a little predictable. Hate to say it but I'll be happy once this season is over.

George & Ruth's relationship had me yawning..... ruth gets controlling as george is helpless, then as george starts to come back a bit and be more expressive, ruth pushes him away. Keith & david's adoption trials have been interesting but also left me a little dry. The Wire has more room to breathe, dramatically speaking.

mandrew

there was a spoiler a few weeks ago...

that shit wasn't cool

ayres

there was a spoiler a few weeks ago...

that shit wasn't cool

word. plaese to edit.

Swayze

geesh guys! from what i've read already, that other shit was smallish. i was so floored at the end that during the preview for episode 61, i was all choked up. by the way, i saw your mom and dad's dressed up as santa last x-mas... what's up with that?

rootlesscosmo

yo I finally got around to watching this series, from start to finish, in a couple wks.

shit was straight coooooorrrrrrrn.

I cram to understand how this was so acclaimed.

dollar_bin

rootlesscosmo said:

yo I finally got around to watching this series, from start to finish, in a couple wks.

shit was straight coooooorrrrrrrn.

I cram to understand how this was so acclaimed.

"I'm shocked, shocked to find out you disliked something"

rootlesscosmo

haha c'mon man if there's one thing I generally canNOT be accused of it's disliking HBO shows.

my Sopranos + Wire posts alone prolly amount to half my SoulStrut scribblings.

but THIS shit....? scratching my head. couple of good episodes, like a COUPLE, over the span of 5 seasons. most of it felt really corny, like afterschool special level corny. the Dexter dude was good, but the daughter? the mother? the "cool" brother or whatever? i had trouble even watching these characters, much less taking them seriously.

hell even True Blood (Alan Ball's latest series) is Wire-esque compared to 6Ft.

I had high hopes, given the hype + friend recs over the yrs + the HBO pedigree.

but...yeah...

dollar_bin

rootlesscosmo said:

haha c'mon man if there's one thing I generally canNOT be accused of it's disliking HBO shows.

my Sopranos + Wire posts alone prolly amount to half my SoulStrut scribblings.

but THIS shit....? scratching my head. couple of good episodes, like a COUPLE, over the span of 5 seasons. most of it felt really corny, like afterschool special level corny. the Dexter dude was good, but the daughter? the mother? the "cool" brother or whatever? i had trouble even watching these characters, much less taking them seriously.

hell even True Blood (Alan Ball's latest series) is Wire-esque compared to 6Ft.

I had high hopes, given the hype + friend recs over the yrs + the HBO pedigree.

but...yeah...

Yeah, 6 Feet Under was relatively uneven compared to the more revered shows. I'd be surprised if anybody considers it anything more than second tier HBO. Plus, family melodrama can be pretty tepid if you don't create an attachment to the members of the family. It did have some pretty entertaining actors in minor roles like Rainn Wilson or Ty Burrell.

I don't think True Blood is better than 6 Feet Under, but at least True Blood doesn't try to conceal its trashyness.

rootlesscosmo

my initial thought (having not watched it when it was actually airing) was that it was really high-level for it's time, but that HBO has just stepped it up sofuckingbigtime in the meantime that it now seems quaint....

but then I refreshed my memory a little and all the shows I assumed had come after it were actually airing alongside it:

Six Feet Under (2001???2005)
The Sopranos (1999???2007)
Deadwood (2004???2006)
The Wire (2002???2008)

I dunno; I mean, 6 Ft Under seems downright silly compared to the other contemporary HBO output. And I don't mean that there was less murder, I mean it seems kinda corny by a lot of benchmarks: the stories, the dialogue, the performances.

I suppose if you had a singular aversion to guns, then 6 Ft was maybe a good HBO option during those yrs....otherwise...yeah; I guess there was a reason I never peeped it -- it was up against some great fucking shows!

But hey; different strokes. I guess what irks me about it is how *weighty-and-important* it seems to fancy itself....when in reality (for me) it's gravity registers at about a Sex in the City-level. (Not quite as lightweight as Arli$$, but close....)

BallzDeep

that's funny because i thought Sopranos was straight corn but i loved all 6 ft under.
tony sopranos sister and fusking meadow far more annoying than any 6 ft under characters.
but yeah, different strokes...

rootlesscosmo

I avoided Soprano's for the longest, due mostly to how it was marketed: it seemed like a cartoonish Italian mob drama. I eventually found it to be so much more (and better) than that. If you were to splice together all of the scenes of Tony's crew in the back of the 'Bing, busting jokes, then, yeah you'd have a pretty corny (albeit still exceedingly humorously-written) comic strip. But I'll be darned if that show didn't turn into one of the most engaging, consistently exciting (and thought-provoking) shows I've ever seen. And much of my enjoyment of the show was based on my watching it in its entirety, in order. I think to do otherwise risks losing some of the truly best aspects of the show.

Different strokes.

badder_than_evil

Six Feet Under was very good.
Not many shows create characters that go from being liked to hated and back to being liked by me again like that show did.

I couldn't get into True Blood at all..haven't started on Soprano's.

BallzDeep

the ending of 6 ft under's final episode i think was the best way a series has ever closed.
then again, this is coming from a guy who loves entourage and true blood. lol

badder_than_evil

Entourage fell off big time in the last two seasons.

white_tea

I remember liking "6 Six Under" a lot during its original run and, yes, getting a little tingly at the end as the redhead steered her Prius into the great unknown. That said, I have never once revisited the show since the final ep, despite once or twice pondering the purchase at Best Buy of the the heavy boxset of DVDs with that faux grass on top. I think it's just a show that was so of-its-time that it aged poorly and other family dramas on HBO or AMC have gone on to do what it did, but better. Still some pretty decent themes were explored:

--Dealing with death, obviously
--In-depth homosexual partnerships
--Old people relationships when one partner goes a little kooky (proto-Tea Party bomb shelter subplot?)
--Family splintering hard after losing someone