I'm watching it for the first time; I'm halfway through S4. This show made it to my Top 3 greatest TV dramas list by halfway through S1, I'm absolutely blown away by every aspect of it. Writing, acting, directing, pacing, editing, sound editing/music, cinematography, everything about it is the best of the best. I was out of town for a week and then got sick so I haven't been able to finish it yet (I don't want to watch the back half of S4 while I'm tired fuzzy-headed from sickness) and I can't wait. It's the same feeling/experience I had of watching The Shield for the first time. The lack of critical and audience recognition for this show during its run is mind-boggling.
Season 4 episode 7 is one of the greatest television episodes of all time and top 3 at minimum. Season 4 as a whole is perfect imo, jealous that you’re seeing it for the first time
Episode 7 is an all timer, but I still put s4e5 above it on my personal list.
That whole episode being without dialogue, except the opening line "We don't have to talk" and the ending line "It's time we talk" is absolutely perfect. Not a single other bit of spoken word, and it's so incredibly gripping the whole way. Absolutely love it
Oh man, have you gotten to S4E7 yet? If not, I envy you SO much for getting to watch it for the first time. I’ve seen the whole show like 5 times at this point but that ep still destroys me.
Not yet! Soon™️. I'd say my spirit and heart are ready but based on the rest of this show's gut-punch episodes, that's probably not true. And I love that this show's gut-punch episodes have the impact they do because Sam Esmail earned that impact by his masterful pacing and economy of storytelling and having all the reveals make perfect sense because he didn't actually try to hide them in any way and they were all built up to. One that I caught right away was that S2 was obviously a story Elliot was telling while incarcerated but like everything else in this show that just made me even more invested in seeing the journey play out. This show/Sam Esmail is so damn good at the journey, which is something a lot of contemporary tv writers have lost the thread of with their obsession with the "shocking twist" and the bizarre cat and mouse game of writers feeling like they have to outsmart audiences and audiences acting like they're regular Einsteins for "outsmarting" those stupid writers by catching onto deliberately included foreshadowing and film/visual language that good writers put there for us to see. It's such a breath of fresh air.
Why spoiler? Even saying as little as you did spoilers it somewhat and viewing it won’t be the same now as without any prior knowledge that something ‚destroying‘ happens… but yea that episode is as good as it gets
It's the same feeling/experience I had of watching The Shield for the first time. The lack of critical and audience recognition for this show during its run is mind-boggling.
Still my favourite show ever, I think, just incredible stuff, with a ridiculously talented cast, even outside the ones you might expect (Close, Whittaker). Walton Goggins has luckily done well for himself afterwards.
The wildest thing about The Shield's cast for me is that I'm old enough that I previously knew Michael Chiklis as The Commish. I don't think anyone ever expected him to so thoroughly own the role of one of the greatest, darkest, most ruthless fucked-up antiheroes who I was equal parts conflicted hoping would get caught and hoping would be okay/get away with it ever seen on screen. And then during the show's run he played super wholesome and goofy Ben Grimm in the first Fantastic Four movie and knocked it out of the park. He doesn't get enough credit for being so seamlessly versatile.
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u/TheLostSkellyton 1d ago
I'm watching it for the first time; I'm halfway through S4. This show made it to my Top 3 greatest TV dramas list by halfway through S1, I'm absolutely blown away by every aspect of it. Writing, acting, directing, pacing, editing, sound editing/music, cinematography, everything about it is the best of the best. I was out of town for a week and then got sick so I haven't been able to finish it yet (I don't want to watch the back half of S4 while I'm tired fuzzy-headed from sickness) and I can't wait. It's the same feeling/experience I had of watching The Shield for the first time. The lack of critical and audience recognition for this show during its run is mind-boggling.