Quiara
Grade School
Posts: 775
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Post by Quiara on Oct 12, 2019 10:41:40 GMT -8
See, I don't know how well BB does tension. Now, going into the show I knew alt & Jesse would be alive by the end, so that's one factor. But at the same time, it was pretty obvious Walt wasn't really gonna die at any point, and while the show did try to get around that in the early seasons, I don't think at any point that I ever bought that Walt would bite it until the final episode - or that Gus could ever bite it until the final episode of his season. (Weirdly, this is why I liked Lydia so much - her irrelevance to the narrative, ultimately makes her struggles feel much more real, and her ruthlessness that much more interesting.)
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Post by ThirdMan on Oct 12, 2019 19:34:44 GMT -8
Is tension in a TV show or film only related to whether or not we think protagonists will die? Surely there's more to it than that...
In BB's case, there's tension regarding his family finding out what he's doing, wondering just how dark/murderous Walt and Jesse will get, and a host of other things.
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Quiara
Grade School
Posts: 775
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Post by Quiara on Nov 3, 2019 12:05:12 GMT -8
Hey, by the way, I started watching Better Call Saul. It's an interesting show so far - but I have the sinking feeling that once Gus gets involved it'll stop being so compelling. I'm now halfway thru the third season (at "Chicanery," the alleged high point of the show) and... yes, this is kind of correct. Even though Giancarlo Esposito is game (see: his wonderful speech in "Sabrosito") it's just kind of hard to care about him!
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Post by ThirdMan on Nov 3, 2019 13:36:12 GMT -8
Well, I guess it's a good thing that's the B-story.
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Quiara
Grade School
Posts: 775
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Post by Quiara on Nov 23, 2019 13:50:10 GMT -8
Here's an interesting thing about Better Call Saul that I'm noticing in the fourth season, and something I think may be deliberate.
On Breaking Bad, one of the most jarring aspects of the show is the phones - everyone has a burner phone, which they dramatically snap in half, and there are payphones literally everywhere. Better Call Saul has been doubling down on this - Jimmy's current business is selling burner phones! Which makes me realize there's a lot of emphasis on outdated technology on the show - most obviously, the VHS FX on the opening titles (which are getting more and more decayed), but also scenes like Kim and Francesca going to Blockbuster.
There's a pragmatic reason for this, of course, the show being a prequel and all - but I wonder if there's some deeper meaning to all this.
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Post by otherscott on Dec 19, 2019 8:30:24 GMT -8
I do wonder how well Breaking Bad will stack up in most critics' estimations of "Best of the Decade." It was obviously a rip-roaring hit, but it seems like critics have moved on to other things in the years since. Maybe El Camino will reinvigorate the buzz. Not sure if the film is good or necessary, but hey, I said the same thing about Better Call Saul once upon a time. It appears the answer to this is "most critics will ignore it entirely since it didn't premiere this decade."
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Quiara
Grade School
Posts: 775
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Post by Quiara on Feb 23, 2020 12:27:58 GMT -8
I'm not close enough to the end of the series to say this for certain, but I think one of the big reasons I'm not so huge on this show can be summed up as such: going into this show, I heard a lot about what a great villain Gus Fring is. And Giancarlo Esposito is good! But I actually feel very comfortable saying that, despite only being halfway through the season, I think Lydia Rodarte-Quayle is the better villain. This might be anti-hype (since I've never heard anyone even mention Lydia before I started watching the series), but there's a more compelling reason for that, which is that I think both the show's writers and the show's fandom overrated how interesting it is for characters to be untouchable in their evil. I think Walt is significantly more interesting in the early seasons, when he's an awful and manipulative person, but he's not actually very good at being an awful and manipulative person, and when most of his really awful deeds (e.g., Jane, making Jesse kill Gale) are not premeditated evil, but consequences of him being in over his head, things that could have been avoided if he was an evil genius like Gus. I think it's tempting to describe Gus as a power fantasy, but I think the more accurate term is to call him a Mary Sue - he's too perfect in his evil. Versus a weasel like Lydia, who is in over her head and comically bad at pulling off her schemes, but still poses a legitimate threat long-term even as she's a reluctant ally in the short-term. I've been meaning to comment on this for a while, but I think the key to understanding the Breaking Bad characters is that they all are centered around Walt, and are defined by his relationship to them. I think that sounds like a bug rather than a feature, but I think it's also part of the fabric of the story Breaking Bad is trying to tell. It is really the story of the moral fall of one man. So I think in seeing Gus as this power fantasy evil genuis, I think the reason the show displays him as that is because that is how here appears to Walt, and that is the role he takes in Walt's story. I think if we had a more omniscient series view than we do, one that is not quite so much Walt's story and Walt's story alone, we would see a much more interesting nuanced view of Gus. As it is, the show throws most of the nuance with its secondary characters to really dig deep on Walt. That's not necessarily a bad thing, it's just the tactic the show took. It's pretty common in movies but less so in TV for obvious reasons. Scott, open question now that I've caught up with Better Call Saul - do you think that show gives us a new dimension to Gus by dint of us seeing him through Mike's eyes, and occasionally from the perspective of Gus himself?
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Post by otherscott on Feb 24, 2020 10:56:22 GMT -8
No, not really. Gus has never felt like an integral part of Better Call Saul to me, we really don't see all that different of shades from him compared to what we saw before. I think it's possible that BCS would have the ability to cast Gus in a different light if it wanted to, but it's never been of interest to that show to do much with Gus except be a callback to one of the beloved Breaking Bad characters.
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Post by unkinhead on Feb 24, 2020 11:17:30 GMT -8
As far as I know, "Crazy Handful of Nothing" is remembered as a high point of the series, the moments when the series really comes into its own. I think that's just because of the one scene where Walt intimidates Tuco. The rest of it is, as you say, unremarkable. This happens several times throughout Breaking Bad's run-an otherwise average episode is vaunted for a specific element or scene-"Cornered", "Say My Name", and "Dead Freight" all come to mind. Curious to see if you'll agree when you get to those. I'd like to coin this as being a Rains of Castamere...ism Also reading through this thread, I think I'd mostly agree with Other Scott's sentiment that 'Granite State' would have made for a better finale, or rather, that if written as a finale it would have been a better finale. Freudian Vampire quite some time ago made some very apt criticisms regarding the finale of Breaking Bad, wherein not only does Walt 'win', but that him winning completely flies in the face of precisely the interesting thematic undercurrent of BB. Essentially that of a progressively evil character who will suffer from his own arrogance, bitterness, and pride. Not only do they completely subvert that (and no not in a good way), but the show was fascinating in how it held a mirror up to its audience for ROOTING for Walter. The show would oscillate rather artfully in it's portrayal of Walter as 'awesome!!!' to 'dreadfully evil and vile' in such a way that actually made you think "huh...I rooted for this asshole." But the writers fall in love with Walter White themselves, which is perhaps testament to just how powerful and real that mirror and that theme is from a social analysis...but as a television series it sacrifices what was perhaps the most fascinating element of its run-time.
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Post by Incandescence 112 on Feb 25, 2020 7:44:15 GMT -8
As far as I know, "Crazy Handful of Nothing" is remembered as a high point of the series, the moments when the series really comes into its own. I think that's just because of the one scene where Walt intimidates Tuco. The rest of it is, as you say, unremarkable. This happens several times throughout Breaking Bad's run-an otherwise average episode is vaunted for a specific element or scene-"Cornered", "Say My Name", and "Dead Freight" all come to mind. Curious to see if you'll agree when you get to those. I'd like to coin this as being a Rains of Castamere...ism Also reading through this thread, I think I'd mostly agree with Other Scott's sentiment that 'Granite State' would have made for a better finale, or rather, that if written as a finale it would have been a better finale. Freudian Vampire quite some time ago made some very apt criticisms regarding the finale of Breaking Bad, wherein not only does Walt 'win', but that him winning completely flies in the face of precisely the interesting thematic undercurrent of BB. Essentially that of a progressively evil character who will suffer from his own arrogance, bitterness, and pride. Not only do they completely subvert that (and no not in a good way), but the show was fascinating in how it held a mirror up to its audience for ROOTING for Walter. The show would oscillate rather artfully in it's portrayal of Walter as 'awesome!!!' to 'dreadfully evil and vile' in such a way that actually made you think "huh...I rooted for this asshole." But the writers fall in love with Walter White themselves, which is perhaps testament to just how powerful and real that mirror and that theme is from a social analysis...but as a television series it sacrifices what was perhaps the most fascinating element of its run-time. The Breaking Bad finale was very strange wish-fulfillment. At least Gilligan made up for it with Better Call Saul. Which returned for its first two episodes of its fifth season recently, and is still great. I strongly doubt the Saul finale will be like that. Hopefully. And I'd say Rains of Castamereism afflicts almost every episode of Game of Thrones-except for Blackwater. Blackwater is great.
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