Deadwood’s lack of closure is probably the most frustrating item mentioned in this thread, with Carnivale being a close second.
The more I see of Mitch Hurwitz’s other projects, the more I think Arrested Development was lightning in a bottle. Maybe a 4th season would have been just as great, but the 3 we got were as close to perfect as you can get, and tied up nicely at the end.
And I’m not sure if it was canceled or if Simon just called it quits, but The Wire was also pretty damn near perfect for 5 seasons, and I want more. Because 6 is better than 5.
Because fuck you, The Walking Dead, I’d cancel you and put Rubicon back on. Adult oriented slow burn conspiracy drama that was wonderfully handled and got fantastic by the end. Better than TWD in nearly every single way save for having zombies, but even then…
The closest thing to Deadwood closure that we’ll likely receive is the subtle hint in the Boardwalk Empire pilot that Alma Garret is actually Nucky Thompson’s mother.
That & Justified serving as Seth Bullock methodone.
Theres so many great tv shows that never got a full run. Firefly, Terriers and Jericho would be my immediate choices. Other than Jericho, I guess they’re obvious choices. I have to say I’m very surprised by the love Jericho is getting here. Theres certainly many better canceled shows than it, as this thread has shown. But for some reason it was awesome anyway.
Andy Richtor Controls the Universe, was a show I really loved. Its almost the same show as Better of Ted, I don’t know if its the same creative team, and if its not, clearly this is the show they modeled. Anyway, I thought it was better than Better of Ted.
There was this short lived FX show called Thief, definitely would’ve loved for that one to continue. Also throw Studio 60 in. The Tick?
I am baffled by the Studio 60 mentions. You really want more of the lack of chemistry between Sarah Paulsen and Matthew Perry? The bad acting of Sarah Paulsen? Sorkin working out his feelings about ex-girlfriend Kristen Chenoweth in the form of Perry and Paulsen? The terrible skits? The awful “comedy”? (“Oh no! We lost cell reception and we are stranded on the roof in one of the largest cities in the country in a very busy part of town!” Seriously, that’s when I really started to hate the show), Whitford’s character creepily stalking his boss and she deciding that she loves him out of nowhere? Her getting pregnant and then the doctor being weirdly hostile toward Whitford for no reason whatsover? “YOUR BROTHER IS STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF AFGHANISTAN!”
YMMV, apparently. The show wasn’t perfect, by any stretch, but I do find your criticisms of the sketches not being funny…funny, since the show wasn’t about the actual sketches themselves. And yes, the rooftop scenario with Whitford and Peet was a bit much, but it still worked (for me). While I don’t find Paulson attractive, I bought that Matt did, which was what the show needed to do. And Whitford and Perry were dynamite together.
I actually liked the politics and wrangling about faith; they seemed to spring from what we knew of the characters and actual climate of the country at the time. I had a far bigger problem with Sorkin’s use of flashback episodes, showing us things we were able to imagine/picture ourselves thanks to consistent references. And we had the usual folly of Sorkin introducing guest characters who mysteriously disappear (he still doesn’t seem to trust that he’s created a compelling set of regular characters, but needs to inject someone poking and prodding to get the most out of them) after a few episodes.
I didn’t watch the show when it aired, but discovered it on DVD, and devoured the entire season/series in a very short time a couple of years ago. I still think it was fantastic, warts and all.
It wasn’t about the sketches, but it was a behind-the-scenes of a comedy show. If Sorkin didn’t understand the world well enough to have the sketches (which everyone in the actual show thought were hilarious) be funny then he should’ve come up with a different scenario for his preaching.
For me, it’d be Twin Peaks. The end of the second season was such a fucking tease/cop-out that there should be some kind of conclusion in some format. I’d also love to see another proper season of Buffy/Angel. I’ve grown rather fond of those characters and I miss spending time with them. Which sounds really, really, sad.
Regarding DEADWOOD, it sucks that we didn’t get that last season, but at leasy we were spared seeing Doc Cochran succumb to tuberculosis. I don’t cry at drama very often, but I’ve a feeling that would hit me right where it hurts.
Actually, I’d argue that what we did see of sketches was par for the course for an SNL-type show; some worked and some didn’t, despite the grueling writing and rehearsal process. The cold open for Danny and Matt’s first show was damn good (and funny); the bits of the recurring Nicholas Cage sketches we saw were funny; Harriet parodying Nancy Grace seemed pretty good; and so on. Some of the bits we saw in process didn’t seem all that great, but I think that was sort of the point. I’d still contend, though, that the sketches themselves were macguffins, and quite beside the point.
Eh. Lots of folks hated the show. Fine with me. I loved it, though (again) I don’t think it was perfect.
Yeah I don’t get the love for this all of a sudden. I could watch a show about Steven Webers network exec…he was awesome. But the rest of it was just so bad.
Reaper, Firefly, Freaks and Geeks, Pushing Daisies, Life, Brisco County Jr. and Studio 60. Most of these are all recent shows. Clearly, television is a hostile environment - so I should stop watching it…or maybe stick to cable. I haven’t seen Deadwood or Carnivale yet, but they might get added to the list. I will admit, part of my delay, is because neither had a proper ending.
I am going to guess that Lights Out and Fringe will get added to this list soon, and maybe Justified.
However, if I could produce one more season of any show it is a two way tie. X-files and Lost. These are two shows that tried to have proper endings, but left me with a thousand questions. I would produce another season of these simply to answer my questions. And this is coming from a person that liked the finale of Lost and the last three seasons of X-files…
You really think there was a lack of chemistry there? I will admit that, at first, I was irritated that I was being forced to care about two characters that I didn’t know jack shit about, but by the end of the first season I truly believed these two were a couple with a rough past and I actually cared about them getting together. Did you watch it all the way through?
MichaelM… But it’s important for verisimilitude. For example, the song in THAT THING YOU DO is actually catchy and sells the idea that the band becomes a sensation. If it had been as headscratchingly terrible as some of the stuff in Studio 60, a lot would’ve been lost.
Again, I point to SNL: we’ve experienced nearly entire seasons of really terrible sketches, and the show continued to air. I disagree that every single sketch we saw on Studio 60 was terrible and unfunny (the cold open for their first show was terrific, IMNSHO).
And part of the show was the idea of Matt struggling to write a quality show week after week without help and having to accept subpar writing from the writing staff.
Of all the criticisms leveled at the show, I still think this is the weakest.
I thought Jericho went to some pretty interesting places especially as the first season winded down, and the entirety of season 2. More than the political intrigue, though, I thought the show had some pretty good character work going on and some damn find acting especially from the likes of Lenny James, Gerald McRaney and Esai Morales. The show certainly wasn’t up there with Firefly, Terriers or Deadwood, but I think given another season or two it could have kept that intriguing momentum it had.
I think the show doomed itself by daring to be something other than light, airy fluff on CBS.
I never really thought that they showed enough skits to really judge whether they were any good. But, they were the last thing I cared about anyway. I really didn’t think they put a ton of focus on the skits because they weren’t the point of the show. They gave just enough info to convince me they were working well enough. Besides, isn’t it entirely possible that even if the skits weren’t fantastic, they could have been leagues better than what the show had done for the previous few years and therefore received quite well? Isn’t that what happened in the Will Ferrell era of SNL? In retrospect, they weren’t as good as the heydays, but they were sure as fuck better than the previous few years.
Either way, it seems to be a weird thing to bitch about considering only snippets were shown. Additionally, complaining about them seems like the same difference as complaining about the lack of prison life on CSI.
Christ, one I nearly forgot…Life. An excellent procedural with two great leads in Damien Lewis and the boner-inducing Sarah Shahi. Pretty good procedural/crime of the week elevated by a larger mystery framework that seemingly every cop shows borrows from but including the one detail that makes it more awesome than the others: Garret Dillahunt playing a Russian badass. Was a fan of Lewis since Band of Brothers and dammit, that show deserved a better life, perhaps on USA or something.
I disagree. The show was too serious for the sketches to be funny. This may not have been intentional. But this unexpected approach is one of the things I liked, a deadly serious look at the pressures involved with making a comedy show.
The subject matter, was mostly excellent for Sorkin to preach, as would be expected since he’s in show business. I think this is why I liked it, it felt like a show that had a lot of relevant stuff to say. And this is why I wanted more, to hear Sorkin to tell me about the business while he entertains me. And I believe he must’ve had a lot more material to burn through. Was it flawed and imperfect? Very much so. Not all of the characters worked, but most of them felt like well shaded individuals. Sarah Paulson may not have completely sold it has a comedy superstar, but I thought her relationship with Perry actually felt very believable and developed. As for the some of the whacky plot towards the end, well they only existed because of trying to capture ratings, but I admitt a lot of it is off. Pregnancy complication was a bit of a cheap shot, and came out of nowhere. But, a lot of it unfairly gets a bad rap, like the Afghanistan plot. Sure, it was kinda lame, but the actor they get to play the military attache really sold it. And these plot points happened at the end of the series, and really isn’t indicative of the whole show or what it was about. At the end of the day, I felt the postives outweighed the negatives, not exactly a ringing endorsement, but I did enjoy the show. There are shows I’d rather see come back first, I kinda just threw the show into the ring.
I expected the eye rolling when I mentioned the show, but I’m a bit surprised no ones dismissed Jericho.
