What has changed for me is that it's become BORING. The story arc is more of a circle and we come back to the same set of issues over and over. Every sexual encounter is the same. The woman is predatory and Tommy is taken aback by her ardor. He never has to do more than lie there with his mouth open, uttering half-sentences of surprise. Tommy is heroic, Mike is slow-witted and maybe gay, Frank can't commit, Lou is funny, Janet is the world's biggest pain in the ass...tell me something new.
Come to think of it, every woman on Rescue Me is the same--irrational, crazed, predatory.
Maybe I should stop watching it. Maybe women are treated better
on Entourage, or The Sopranos, The Sopranos, Big Love, The Shield, or Mad Men. See what I mean. Oh for the days of Cagney and Lacey.
12 comments:
I can't take it that seriously. It's a soap opera for guys. Plenty of shows (mainly sitcoms) depict men and especially fathers as being incompetent buffoons. If the argument for those is that they are caricatures of what does exist, why not say the same for Rescue Me? Psycho chicks exist aplenty, and I think that just as some women attract/are drawn to complete jerks, the men on this show seem to be drawn to psycho chicks... although I would wager that Sheila was probably plenty nice before her husband died. And Susan Sarandon's Alicia is wonderful, as is Franco's sort-of fiance (whose name escapes me ATM).
Also, I think some latitude can be given to the "unreliable narrator." This is Tommy's view of the women in his life - I wonder how his POV would come across in a book?
Bottom line, I see this as like Fox vs. CNN. If women can have the fantasy of hunky guys in their daytime soaps, or whatever Sex and the City gave them (I never watched the show), then guys are entitled to a show that validates their experiences with SOME women. Hell, it validates my experience with New York Irish Catholic families - it's therapy! Which is I'm sure how men see it too.
I didn't take it that seriously until it started to bore me. And even the SS character did abscond with Frank's child. She may have been the better caretaker but that was pretty rough. I agree with you mostly. But why can't they get beyond the story line from season one and introduce some new stuff. Otherwise, we're down to Tiger baseball every night of the summer.
Months ago, I was so disappointed thinking that this would be the last season of The Shield. Now that I've seen it all, I wish it had been the last season. Same old, same old - do something that starts off interesting and then keep flogging a dead horse, well past the sell-by date.
I never got into Rescue Me.
Ah, I see your point about being bored. You know what's funny about that - Rain Dog and I started to watch Season 2, and I turned to him and said "No one has changed since last season." So we didn't watch it that season. Then we picked it up again in Season 3.
This brings up the question, to what extent should art imitate life? I referred to this show as therapy. Families like the Gavins so rarely change. One or two individuals might do something differently once in awhile (like stop drinking) but the behavior is always the same - bitching about each other behind their backs, etc. So how much of that should a show reflect? How much counterpoint should there be to reflect change in some quarter, even if these people aren't changing? And what's the point of showing that they don't/can't change?
I've only watched RESCUE ME this season, but you're right...it's already as static as BATTLESTAR STALACTITE. Meanwhile, give BURN NOTICE a try, if you haven't...it's uneven and also machismic, and its central romance is as well, but at least it realizes how ridiculous all that is. And Sharon Gless, when she has something to do in an episode, has been quite good. Also, it comes on at the same time as the first run of MAD MEN, so I usually watch BN and then MM's repeat in succession on Thursday nights. (And if you haven't caught any of the NBC Thu sitcoms, you might want to give them a try beforehand....)
The Shield is a family favorite but not me so much.
I know families don't change in real life but art is supposed to comment on it, not repeat it. Every other year is probably a good idea, Christa.
My husband loves Burn Notice, I like the acting very much but have trouble sticking with it. He's more the spy guy than I am. Love The Office, and Thirty Rock. Thursday is a damned good night.
Rescue Me boring? Tommy nearly threw his (his brother's?) son into the East River! What other show has the balls to kill off main characters, including kids? Yes, the characters don't seem to move toward some ultimate growth, but it's a TV show; if the characters had already come to some type of resolution to their lives, the show would be dead. Take a look at the Chief, he finally came to terms with his son being gay and accepted his wife wasn't going to get better, and he wasn't going return to some version of life he thought he wanted - and so they had him commit suicide rather than drag him through the rest of the series as a (somewhat) content character.
Granted, the show could use some fresh blood in the writing department, especially from a female perspective (though it is quite impressive that Leary and Peter Tolan have written at least part of all the scripts); but it's unfair to say that there aren't any rational, sane women when there aren't any rational, sane men. And as much as I hate the Janet character, I absolutely love Callie Thorne (more nude shots, please!) and Tatum O'Neal. They did take a major hit in the female perspective department when they lost Diane Farr and didn't replace her with another stabilizing (female) character. But if Rescue Me can be misogynisitc in its attitudes toward women, then it would also need to be categorized as misandric in its attitude toward men, which is not the case.
Yes, it is a soap opera; but I still like it.
I've lost all credibility in this discussion, having gone out today and watched Superbad.
Superbad? Really? *protects you*
I have to admit I am in love with that kid from Arrested Development. If I were a teenage boy, I'd be him.
Well, aside from seeing an avatar of yourself, how was SUPERBAD?
I have some friends who are resisting my encouragement to go see STARDUST and they hope to counterpropose I see this film instead...
I wasn't quite satisfied with KNOCKED UP, any more than I was with WAITRESS, which I took to be two approaches to the same film (slacker boy's version of unwanted pregnancy makes a man out of you vs. drifting girl's version of unwanted pregnancy makes a woman out of you), so haven't been champing at the bit.
I note that Keri Russell's newer release is also an unwanted pregnancy tale. Typecasting.
Superbad. There were some extremely funny sequences in this film and it certainly nails teenage boys. It reminded me of American Grafitti, although it was not quite of that caliber. I think there is a definite homosexual subtext running through it. It's sweet in many ways, especially the Michael Cerra character and its not as misogynistic as I expected. It was too long though, most of the sequences went on about twice as long as they should-like SNL skits. I went because I needed cheering up and it did to that.In the teen-life genre movies, I'd give it a B+.
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