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Watched the first episode of Shane Meadows new drama 'The Virtues' last night. It was a good start to what will be pretty dark in places and its starring the great Stephen Graham.
I have really liked Shane Meadows previous work.
Here's the blurb….
With no immediate family to live for, Joseph is haunted by a past he has tried, for decades, to forget - if not actively obscure with drink and drugs. Suffering the hangover from hell - the dry spell over - he walks away from his present life and boards a boat bound for Ireland to confront hazy, fear-inducing memories from a childhood spent in the care system that he's had to forget. Emotionally and physically wrecked, Joseph reunites with an incredulous Anna (Helen Behan, This is England '88 and '90), the sister he hasn't seen since childhood. Anna persuades her wary husband Michael (Frank Laverty; Michael Collins) to let Joseph stay and give him work in the family-owned building company. There, Joseph is forced to directly confront the demons of his past when he comes face to face with Craigy (Mark O'Halloran), a shadowy figure who is dogged by dark rumours, and who won't leave Joseph alone. Joseph's precarious family reunion is further complicated when he is immediately drawn to Michael's fiery sister Dinah (Niamh Algar; The Bisexual, Pure). Angry and lost, Dinah is fiercely guarded, and, like Joseph, haunted by a deeply-held secret. The Virtues is a visceral and hauntingly unforgettable paean to the human spirit, shot through with bittersweet tenderness, compassion and unexpected moments of laugh-out-loud humour throughout. Deftly addressing challenging themes of revenge, redemption and repressed memory, Meadows and co-writer, BAFTA-winning Jack Thorne, ask questions of what it really means to be, and have, family.
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@bryaneidins I loved the first episode. Looks like it will be Meadows and Graham's best work to date. Shame the glorious Vicky Mclure was written in to it, but still. Has BAFTA written all over it. Meadows is like Mike Leigh in that he gives his cast a general idea of plot then let's them ad lib. It's what makes his work feel so real.
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Rick & Morty season 4 in November. Good to have something to look forward to on TV!
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Popped up in my mind whilst discussing THE WIRE the other day… And Ziggy... God-dang Ziggy...
I have a conversation with my 16 year olds on a regular basis regarding film and TV. They ask if they should watch a thing and I recommend it or not. They want to watch challenging stuff and the conversation is often about how challenging certain things can be (we talked a lot about A Clockwork Orange for example).
When it came to The Wire I said it’s the best TV series ever made and they should watch it but they could wait until they were older. This because they would surely miss nuances and themes that might spoil their appreciation but I was also worried that they wouldn’t tackle the pace of the storytelling and ruin it for themselves. They ignored me and started and watched the whole thing. They enjoyed it a lot but one thing made me realise they could have/should have waited. They hated Ziggy. Pair of noobs.
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Ziggy, the annoying wee gobshite but also the much needed lighter touch to an otherwise almost exclusively bleak S02 (my fav season)…
And they're bound to re-watch THE WIRE when they're older, and pick up on all those missed tidbits... Cause that's the thing with that show... You can NOT just watch it once...
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…they're bound to re-watch THE WIRE when they're older, and pick up on all those missed tidbits... Cause that's the thing with that show... You can NOT just watch it once...
That was my conclusion. I’ve watched it through and through twice and seen some seasons more times than that. When the boys were watching it I’d find myself standing in the doorway ten mins at a time staring fondly.
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Just watched the last episode.
Feel let down
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That was my conclusion. I’ve watched it through and through twice and seen some seasons more times than that. When the boys were watching it I’d find myself standing in the doorway ten mins at a time staring fondly.
Good lads [emoji106]
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Just watched the last episode.
Feel let down
Interesting. I feel like we should leave it a day or two before getting into specifics for those who haven’t seen it, but I was pretty happy with everything. Very well written and credible. I thought everyone got an ending that was right for them.
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Watching that too. Really liking it.
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Echoing the above. I'm halfway through episode 3. The show is brutal and fantastically done.
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^^^Agreed^^^
Watching Episodes 3+4 tonight.
That is what this show does…
