Treme

I have a lot to say about this show, but I don't have time to type it out right now. I just wanted to get the conversation going. I will say this: David Simon is a goddamn genius.

Your thoughts. Go.

 

I'm one of those who considered 'The Wire' to be perfect televsion, so I might have been predisposed to like anything Simon puts out, but last night's pilot has me thinking that 'Treme' could potentially be the best series HBO has yet produced.

In my opinion, post-Katrina New Orleans is an incredibly difficult subject to tackle. The impact of the storm was so massive and its consequences for the people of that city so varied, that I wondered how it could be contained in one coherent program. Simon seems to have figured it out. The anger, the sadness, the confusion, the pride, and the underlying hope that flourished amidst the ruins of a great American city, all communicated by a cast of characters whose lives are intricately interwoven in a way that I haven't seen since 'The Wire'.

Needless to say, I have high hopes for this series.

 

Easily the best thing I've seen on television since the Sopranos.
Anyone who likes music MUST fucking watch this show. The soundtrack was incredible.
Reminded me of the Spike Lee documentary, only more sad/scary/funny.
I am blown away. Hbo has done it again.

And they've got that Steve Buscemi gangster series coming! This is what America should be watching, not some bullshit show about some knuckleheads doing nothing.

 

Quick question: Was John Goodman playing.....himself? Seemed like it to me, but I may be totally wrong about that.

Anyhow, this show is going to be amazing. The music, the hope, the reality of a community pulling together after a tragedy....my heart was begging me to hop in the car and head to NOLA after an hour of Treme. HBO is going to knock it out of the park (like always) with this one, and I'm looking forward to it.

 

No.

From the article:

This show is shaping up to be amazing. I don't think the subject matter could have been handled by anyone else.

I am skeptical about a few of the things in the first episode, but I'm not going to second guess David Simon at this point. I would much rather continue my fellatio of his creative endeavors.

 

I forgot this started, so hopefully they'll replay it again before next week. I just got HBO again just for the Pacific, but if this is half as good as the Wire looks like I'll be stuck with HBO for awhile.

 

I'm a little nervous about this show. I worshiped The Wire so I'll give it a shot. I just wonder how much of a storyline are we going to get here, I don't want to get stuck with another "How to make it in America."

 

Ok, I watched this show and I have to admit I'm not very impressed. I enjoyed the setting, it was definitely cool to see the post Katrina city. I just don't know how interested I will be in watching these characters rebuild their lives.

Will Bunk continue to get gigs? Will Lester find other guys to dress like Indians with him for the carnival? Will John Goodman have a heart attack?....I guess we will wait and see! I'm sorry to be so incredibly sarcastic but I was hoping to get a little something different from David Simon and all the actors we had grown to love from the Wire. (Omar was a cab driver!!!)

This is the kind of thing I like to watch as a documentary, I would rather read real stories about people recovering after the storm, I want to see actual footage of Katrina, I'm not sure how interested I am in a fictional tale of people struggling to get by in the great city of NO.

I understood how much he wanted to draw attention to the incredible culture and the undying spirit, I just......well didn't want to watch it.

It is David Simon and we know how well he can tell a story, so I'll hang in there for a little bit, I doubt however I will be watching more than four episodes of Treme.

 

I found myself thinking pretty much the same thing. It occurs to me that it was not any one character who drove me to obsess over The Wire - it was everything. In the same way Simon showed us his world in the first episode of season 1, the low risers, the police station, the corners, I think he did the same here. The more character-driven storylines will start to appear as the show progresses, I would assume. Isn't D'angelo the first character introduced in The Wire? It took him several episodes to develop Stringer, many more to develop Avon, and while Bunk and McNulty were featured early, they were not necessarily the focal point. I think this show is going to be laid out for the viewer in similar fashion.

Also, until someone else wants the job, I'm happy to be the resident New Orleanian you can ask random questions to about topics that come up in the show.

 

I thought the first episode was fantastic. The end alone was amazingly interesting and oddly heartwarming. Clarke Peters (Lester Freemon) is an amazing actor. Always great on The Wire despite having not much to do, and absolutely awesome when flexing his acting chops a little more in The Corner and this so far.

I have always really liked Steve Zahn too and was very impressed by the cast as a whole. It is impossible not to give Simon a full season to see what this show will be. Every single thing he has done starts slow and builds into an outstanding narrative. As someone with little to no knowledge of real New Orleans culture, I think this show will be very informative, interesting and entertaining.

 

I was astounded by Zahn. I always enjoyed his performances but considered of him more of a goofball character actor. He proved me wrong in the pilot. He's still goofy, but he showed some serious range.

He'll have at least another whole season to build it up.

 

In rescue dawn he played a serious role to perfection. I was so excited when I saw he was going to be in this, he's a great actor.

 

I'm not being a prick when I say this I'm genuinely interested, what did you like about it?? You liked the Steve Zahn character that much?

I really am being sincere, this is a show with loads of talent from the acting to the writing but I find myself terribly uninterested in the story.

I just don't see any real protaginist in the storyline and I'm wondering what the inner battle will be, basically it's just folks trying to make it after Katrina.

 

I only saw the first half of the first season of The Wire. It just requires too much concentration, maybe when LOST is over I'll get back into it.

That being said, this show looks like its building into something awesome. The different attitudes the people have towards the city itself. People loving and hating the city for different reasons. I think there is going to be some excellent storytelling. I'm happy to see Elvis Costello appearing again.

The montage to Buono Sera was awesome. Steve Zahn has always been really likable, and this role is no different. I didn't need to start the show off seeing so much of his ass.

The music is also top notch.
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.hbo.com/#/treme/episodes/1/01-do-you-know-what-it-means/music" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.hbo.com/#/treme/episodes/1/0 ... eans/music</a>

Every song used in the show, and when it was used. F'ing awesome.

 

I couldn't get past the first 45min of the pilot, it has no plot.

You can't sell me on "the best TV has to offer" when the first 45min are just random introductions to random characters. Character-driven TV only works when there is a strong narrative and plot. This episode didn't have any.

That being said, the cinematography was tremendous and I haven't seen The Wire yet, so I should get on that.

 

The gratification you'll get from this show won't be instant. There are nine hours of story left in the first season, and we've been introduced to upwards of 12 characters in the first episode. I don't know how you thought any of it was random. On the contrary, pretty much every character we met is connected to every other character either directly or indirectly. A mother is missing her son and asks a lawyer to find him. The lawyer is the wife of the professor who is friends with the restaurant chef who sleeps with the DJ who played in a brass band with the trombone player who is the ex-husband of the woman missing her son. Everything that happens to these people ripples outward, affecting each of the other characters.

This isn't "24". There is no one overriding plot. The story isn't going to be "Jack hears about a bomb->Jack looks for the Bomb->Jack finds the Bomb->The End." It's going to take a while to develop the individual threads of each story that make up the larger picture. There will be episodes where it will seem like nothing happened until you get to the end and realize how important everything was.

You're just going to have to be patient.

 

My point, Beefy, is that I don't find it to be good story telling if there is no story for the first ~45min I dedicated to it. I still have the DVR, and I will finish it because I trust your word, but it doesn't bode well when the pilot has NO plot or progression.

The inherent drama in the Sopranos was that Tony had to weigh his family (naive nephew, bitchy wife, evil mother), his upbringing (italianess, evil mother, l'omerta) and his "family" (the criminal family, FBI, l'omerta), the spark being his panic attacks and therapy. The pilot was an actual episode and the conflict was clear.

The only conflict I noticed in Treme as that Katrina hit and they have to rebuild. Thanks, I could watch CNN for that.

 

No conflict?

-Steve Zahn is an out-of-luck DJ trying to find his niche in the musical word of New Orleans despite outside pressure. Will he succeed?

-John Goodman is an academic struggling to make the rest of the country understand why and how Katrina destroyed New Orleans, and to identify the culprits of a major government failure. Will they listen?

-Khandi Alexander is a bar owner whose son went missing after the storm, even though he was supposed to be in police custody. With each passing day, she grows more hopeless until her attorney finds a picture of him sitting on a flooded overpass. The search continues. Will he be found?

-Wendell Pierce is a deadbeat jazz trombonist, perpetually late and perpetually broke. He has two kids he never sees and just found out that his ex-wife moved back to New Orleans. How will he deal with this?

-Melissa Leo is a plaintiff's attorney specializing in police brutality and corruption. Katrina saw some of the worst legal fuckups in America's history with respect to citizens' rights. Can she earn justice for her clients?

-Kim Dickens is a restaurant chef whose house was destroyed by the storm. Not enough of her staff have returned to the city, so she's running the place with one assistant. Can she keep a small business afloat in a destroyed economically depressed city while dealing with her own personal catastrophes?

-Clarke Peters is a bar-owner/Mardi Gras Indian who lost everything in the storm. He is determined to rebuild and move on, even though all of his friends and family are urging him to give up and leave. Will he persevere?

You have 10 main characters. In a 90 minute pilot, you have less than 10 minutes to introduce 10 people. That's nothing. Now, go back and watch the Sopranos pilot. You know what they did with those 60 minutes? Introduced the cast. We got brief snapshots of the main cast and where in their lives we're meeting them for the first time. That's pretty much it. Chase said, "These are the Sopranos, this is what they're about, this is the direction in which they're headed." He progressed the plot by starting one in the first place. That's my point.

 

I just finished watching the 2 hour pilot.

The conflicts the show present are either too insignificant to make for good TV (Steve Zahn, The Chef, John Goodman, Mardi Gras Indian) or already done but with a new setting (every other plot line).

What's new or different with this show? It moves even slower than Mad Men and has the meta-link of Crash - and that's not a compliment. I don't mean to shoot down your show, I can see why people would invest their time into it, but it doesn't seem nearly entertaining enough to count as "the best TV has to offer today".

My point with bringing up the Sopranos was that there were three (well one, Tony, but three) plot lines in the pilot not seventeen. This show assumes a viewership and doesn't even bother trying to win you over. I haven't watched the Wire, I don't automatically trust the creators, other than gorgeous camera-work this show had nothing to win me over.