182 replies to this topic

[TWoP Mars]

From TV Guide:

Linc's authority at Stinkweed is threatened; Ramon oversees a new construction project at the motel; Palaka receives medical attention from Dr. Smith.

[rocketman909]

As Linc said, Money in escrow if anyone can tell me what's going on.

[MsBaxter]

Beautiful.

I don't even care what's going on. While John convoes with Dad, everyone takes care of everyone else and Cissy almost smiles. Nice.

Edited by MsBaxter, Jul 22, 2007 @ 9:26 PM.

[DoodleDoo]

Well, I enjoyed it ... but I didn't understand it.....

I swear to God, when "Trixie" said something unintelligible and then followed it up with, "isn't that what I just fuckin' said?" I felt like we were back in the hardware store in Deadwood.

By-the-by, I made tuna today with Sissy's recipe and it was really good! (I never thought of adding lemon juice.)

I'm dying to know what is disturbing Cass so much about those tapes she's watching....

I wonder if the ep will make any more sense on future viewings.

Totally couldn't get the Link, Shaun's Mom connection.....

Confusedly yours,

DoodleDoo

[notanextra]

What's next, will Ian McShane come out of the water? This show really makes me long for Deadwood 4.

[Penn]

John's Father is in the elephant cage.

Bill + Shaun = pure joyous TV

Stinkweed has $65 million for a golden parachute?

Nurse Barry!!!!

Edited by Penn, Jul 22, 2007 @ 9:03 PM.

[lynch]

A very good stepping-stone episode. It looks like I've finally come around on Grayson Fletcher. He was very good in tonight's episode. I will let the smarter people deconstruct stuff that I missed.

[Fisher King]

...and Bill goes to the top of the stairs but still reluctant to face whatever happened with Lois?

Missed the surfing and loved getting it right off the bat.

Another Mitchless episode proves God does exist.

What's in the camera, Cass?

[thatguy01]

Wow, that was bland. No Milchifying, lotsa domestic stuff. No wonder these people get bored and fuck things up.

ETA: Rewatched and it works the second time. It's like wrapping myself in a blanket. BVH carries it from start to finish. Geez, this show is odd.

Edited by thatguy01, Jul 23, 2007 @ 11:02 AM.

[Sir Donald]

Damn, I gotta find me a hippie circle. That was trippy but very well done. In the word on the wall to come we can watch real life a second and third time to get it down like my DVD with its zeros and ones.

In Cass's camera to come TWoP is a hippie circle on the wall and all mankind can jump in and get wet from the HALO effect. - Sir Donald

[jmz]

This is absolutely the worst show HBO has ever done. I've given it chance after chance and in return I get garbage episode after episode. I hope somebody at HBO loses their job over this. Luckily, the ratings are horrible so we won't have to waste any more time with this show taking up a spot that a good show could have.

[marleyfan]

I really liked this episode, No, it's not Deadwood, but it gives me something to look forward to on Sunday nights again. The stick figure Dickstein drew in the drying concrete ...didn't John say something about that in his sermon at the motel?
I still don't understand the blackmailing thing with Linc, Tina and whomever. Can someone explain it to me?

[thatguy01]

The stick figure is the monad symbol that John draws.

Tina got an offer from Linc's partner to betray Linc, then reversed it by recording the transaction for Linc to use.

Don't know why either Tina or Linc would particularly choose to do that.

[lynch]

I still don't understand the blackmailing thing with Linc, Tina and whomever. Can someone explain it to me?

I'm not sure of Linc's business parter's name, so I'll just call him Zach. So Zach felt that Linc was hurting the company, so he wanted to get Linc to leave the company. So he gets Tina on tape talking about Linc doing a bunch of shady business dealings, like paying her to try to sway Shaun into signing a contract. Zach also pays Tina to lie about things like taking drugs. Zach plans on using this as a bargaining chip in case Linc doesn't want to be bought out. Tina, in turn, recorded Zach offering to pay her to lie about Linc. Linc then used his tape as collateral to increase his buyout by $30 million. Linc now is staying in Imperial Beach because he's now been taken with the events unfolding. Linc might've had more screentime in this episode than in all the previous ones combined.

[marleyfan]

Thanks! JFC fans are so helpful. Thanks a lot.

[Lucille]

I loved it. I had tears in my eyes practically the whole time and I'm not even sure why. There was such a quiet. . . what. Unease, I guess. Like when Bill's book talked about helping to make someone at ease, this episode made me very uneasy and scared. Because they were all too calm, maybe? And John's furrowed brow and concern at the outset. Shaunie's sadness and breaking down at Bill's killed me. He must sense something "big and huge" is coming.

Kai looked so beautiful and peaceful.

There was a positive change in everyone since the sermon in the courtyard (except for Shaun anyway.)

Linc got back in the game by getting out of the game. He's on the John miracle train now, and maybe he'll help Cass make her film with the 65 million, like John told her to think a few episodes back.

Butchie is so over shooting smack. Is Cissy finally done screaming at and hating Butchie? She almost looked like she liked him and was happy to see him with Kai and going off to father Shaun. Butchie did not look uncomfortable around her either, for the first time since they held hands at the hospital. (I love all the hand holding. JFC has inspired me to hold hands with friends and loved ones more often.)

The halo effect, huh? There's more than one kind of halo, beyond business; I'm thinking about the military one and the holy one.

SirDonald. Ha!

Edited by Lucille, Jul 22, 2007 @ 10:07 PM.

[TeresaDee]

My confusion is with the whole "boardroom" scene, the rants, the mooning!

All I can think is that we're not meant to understand it all, that the scene simply demonstrates how unstable Linc appears at this point--justifying his ouster from Stinkweed. Must rewatch with captions!

Next week looks very big, and course I won't be able to watch it til midweek!!

Shaunie's sadness and breaking down at Bill's down killed me.

I was also very, very touched when he "fell" into Bill.

Is Cissy finally done screaming at and hating Butchie? She almost looked like she liked him and was happy to see him with Kai and going off to father Shaun. Butchie did not look uncomfortable around her either...

I loved the nonverbal exchange between them--there was a kindness, a sweetness about it that was such an obvious shift, yet portrayed with such subtlety.

Edited by TeresaDee, Jul 22, 2007 @ 10:04 PM.

[sansho1]

I fail to see how a lousy four grand a month promised by Linc to Tina is such a brazen offense to a company with the cash to offer a $65 million buyout (an absurd sum to begin with).

Also, did Bruce Greenwood bail out or something? What's with a supposed main character getting no screen time in two consecutive episodes of a 10-episode run? Yeah, his character is annoying, but the disappearing act is just plain odd.

[Athenae]

While John convoes with Dad, everyone takes care of everyone else

Which is maybe exactly the point. He's gotten them there, stirred them up and fucked with them and brought them together to the point where they can begin to see what the others are good for, and work in concert. Take a bunch of fucking misfit cocksuckers, who on their own might lead themselves to ruin and destruction, and who might at first glance have little reason to like one another and less reason to even relate to one another, and at the end ... you have a family. Building something. Making repairs. Riding the waves, healing the sick, serving one another juice. Finding their tap shoes, like Fred Astaire. That your gifts are nothing if you don't share them.

I'd love to sit down with Milch, a bottle of whiskey, and talk religion all night. Is that God to him, people making their own purpose in the world, being helped along by something that brings them together? Is that what it all means to him? I keep going back to Deadwood, re-evaluating in light of this much more blatant retelling. "Whatever lies ahead, grievous abominations and disorder, you and I walk into it together, like always." Maybe that's God. I could love that, that's for sure.

Kai looked gorgeous this ep. And that she saved Butchie's boards, hid them before he could sell them, that choked me up. The love Butchie didn't know he had, all this time.

[Lila82]

"Cause the big money is staying in escrow for whoever can tell me what the fuck is going on." -- I think Linc just summed up how all of us are feeling!

When Kai arrived at her friend's to pick up Butchie's boards, she had her arms wrapped around herself *exactly* the way Butchie does when he's upset about something. After fifteen years of waiting for him to come around, I guess it paid off.

I can't decide who broke my heart more, Butchie or Shaun. The kid has the biggest, purest heart, and Greyson Fletcher's acting was spot on tonight. For all the complaints he racks up, he was totally on point and the perfect teenager learning the hardest of life's lessons first hand: that it isn't perfect and it isn't easy and sometimes all you can do is survive. Just like his Grams. For about the millionth time, tonight's episode reminded me of that famous Frost quote: "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."

The surfing scenes were either shot the same day as the ending scenes of the pilot episode, or the footage was recycled, or Brian Van Holt makes the exact same expression every time he's paddling into a wave. Impressive. Either way, much thanks for surfing scenes. It was a nice reminder that the show is about more than werid religious allegories. Also, the ending scene was eerie, and practically identical to the closing scenes of Episode One: the lighting, the outsider watching from the beach, and three figures on the shore watching the waves, only in Episode One, John Butchie, and Shaun were in the water with Cissy/Bill/Mitch watching them.

John is creeping me out, and not just because he'll make me cry if something actually happens to Shaun, but because I don't think he was actually with Shaun and Butchie at the beach. Neither of them reacted to him, and none of the bystanders seemed to notice the sudden appearance of a third party. So I now think John isn't the Father or the Son or the Holy Ghost, but perhaps whichever one he needs to be any given moment. Butchie certainly isn't God, but at the same time everyone else seems to live in his world: Cissy self-flagellates because of what she did to him; Shaun is alive because he made him; Kai is in love with him; Bill is Shaun's protector because Butchie carried Lois' groceries; Freddy is his drug dealer and Palaka is his lackey; the three Amigos are involved with his hotel; Linc is involved with the family because of him. The list goes on an on. Perhaps in this case, Butchie is our Father, Shaun his ressurected Son, and John is the Holy Ghost between them.

I swear to God, when "Trixie" said something unintelligible and then followed it up with, "isn't that what I just fuckin' said?" I felt like we were back in the hardware store in Deadwood.

Seriously! The cadence of her speech, the dialogue itself, and the accent? It was like watching a Hippie Trixie! I don't have the same issues with Dayton Callie though. Freddy might share similarities with Charlie Utter, but his speech patterns and body language are different and it's easier to separate the characters.

Edited by Lila82, Jul 22, 2007 @ 11:56 PM.

[Uncool]

I'm sorry to report that I was bored to death with this episode. I stopped watching after the boardroom scene. I think I'm finished tuning in.

[sleepy33]

Agreed, Lucille and Athenae. I was choked up when Kai went to get Butchie's boards; then Butchie not-getting-high, Butchie letting Kai SEE that he copped but didn't get high, being vulnerable for her. And his joy and wonderment at Kai caring enough about him, always, since always, to take his boards and protect them and keep them safe, knowing he'd come around. That he'd want them back again someday. Or maybe she was just hoping. Blindly believing in him; having faith. And Cissy seeing the two of them together, and seeing them going to take care of Shaunie. Seeing Cissy realize that maybe she didn't ruin Butchie after all, that maybe there's hope. Linc and Tina, the jaded and cynical pair, watching Butchie and Shaunie going out to surf together. Everyone healing, everything coming together and coming right. Butchie heals, Shaunie heals, Palaka, Cissy, Linc. Everyone.

[Lucille]

All I can think is that we're not meant to understand it all, that the scene simply demonstrates how unstable Linc appears at this point--justifying his ouster from Stinkweed. Must rewatch with captions!

Milch instructs us to watch what they do, not what they say, for what that's worth. But yeah. I think at least the whole ship analogy is worth a second look. He definitely looks unstable from a business perspective.

I think Linc knew he was out of his own company from the get-go, and that the meeting was a sham and a waste of time. (Remember how he was staring into the retail store with the Stinkweed line? He looked pretty crest-fallen, as I recall) May as well have your say to the ones you brought along, who are watching you get buried but don't have the guts or integrity to tell you what's what.

[Milburn Stone]

Ted Mann (the Shit-Disturber from Deadwood) had his name in the end credits, so he was someone in this episode, but I can't figure out who. Maybe one of the folks in the hotel meeting room? Anybody recognize the Shit-Disturber in modern guise tonight?

He's mainly a writer-producer on the show (as he was on Deadwood).

[Pallas429]

I swear to God, when "Trixie" said something unintelligible and then followed it up with, "isn't that what I just fuckin' said?" I felt like we were back in the hardware store in Deadwood.

It's Milch-speech. Like last week, when John and Joe and Bill were in Bill's house, and John first did his impression of Lois. Bill said, "You are on very thin ice," then Joe asked, if he might smoke herb in the house or if not, on the patio, while Bill continued to rant about how he might rather put John's head through it and hold him there until he drowned...Joe caught on and said, "The ice?"

Same way, the phrase "halo effect" was used two different ways by different people within 20 minutes of the show, to the one person who heard them each say it. Dwayne said about the Yost website, "Shaun's (win and death) had a halo effect", creating more hits. Dickstein said about the hold-harmless papers drawn up by the hospital, "Usually, they have a halo effect, for the doctor, but in this case..." (they are cutting him loose and letting Cissy sue him rather than them, as he resigned).

"Trixie" heard the phrase used both times and thought she caught on, and said, "The halo effect?"

I do love that Milch has caught, like a firefly in a jar, this trick of people's trying to follow other people's train of thought and speech, and trying to catch up with the phrase that snagged their attention.

[sleepy33]

Ted Mann (the Shit-Disturber from Deadwood) had his name in the end credits, so he was someone in this episode, but I can't figure out who. Maybe one of the folks in the hotel meeting room? Anybody recognize the Shit-Disturber in modern guise tonight?

Was he the hospital's attorney? Wasn't that guy on Deadwood?

[marleyfan]

The hospital attorney was the guy who played Commissioner Jarry

[lynch]

Ted Mann (the Shit-Disturber from Deadwood) had his name in the end credits, so he was someone in this episode, but I can't figure out who. Maybe one of the folks in the hotel meeting room? Anybody recognize the Shit-Disturber in modern guise tonight?

Was he the hospital's attorney? Wasn't that guy on Deadwood?

No, the hospital attorney was played by Stephen Tobolowsky, who played Commissioner Jarre on Deadwood. This is just a guess here, but I think Ted Mann might've played that guy in the booth where Shaun was smoking the joint. He had a couple of brief exchanges with Butchie.

[sleepy33]

The hospital attorney was the guy who played Commissioner Jarry

Riiiight. And wasn't he also recently the mayor of beverly hills on Entourage?

[uclagirl]

About damn time there was some surfing.