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Post by mllemass on May 31, 2024 11:31:40 GMT
Yes, of course! She played Louis Wain’s mother. That’s where I recognized her from!
I once knew someone who was ridiculously wealthy. We were university students together. Luckily, her parents were very kind and loving, but she had several siblings (older, and extremely successful in their own careers), and they were all so cold to each other. The scene where Vincent asks to spend the night at his parents’ house and his mother says no sounded a lot like what my old friend went through - except that it was her brother who turned her down.
What bothered me about Cassie was that while she and Vincent were fighting, Vincent really was trying to find a way for them to get along better. But then we find out that Cassie had no interest in getting along because she’d met someone else - that stupid Sebastian. (Sorry - I didn’t like him. )Poor Vincent was fighting a losing battle. But later, I liked her again when she went to his work and found out not only that he’d been fired, but that all his coworkers thought he has ruining the show. HIS show! I was so glad when she told them off and came to Vincent’s defence.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jun 1, 2024 4:49:39 GMT
I just finished it and oh, well. It’s not very good! Sorry! Lol I really was excited for this but it indeed has a lot of issues. Especially in the last episode! I was thinking, “yes, it’s bonkers and not because the puppet but because yeah, it had enough plot to do a long series but it’s a lie that there’s a tone issue. Lucy Forbes is managing pretty well the tone and rhythm” but then the last episode happened! And no one could tonally manage that ending!
So most of the actors are more than great and sold a lot of stuff. The direction is also pretty good but the plot is all over the place. There are practically two almost not related stories there. And it’s horribly didactic: they keep saying that no one cares for the black kid disappearance but let me tell you something: they ONLY care for the black kid! lol The policeman is practically searching only for him and only when casually someone or something related to the white kid magically appears, he remembers him!; They say the press never cared for the black kid but the press actually ask for him when the police is doing a press conference with the white kid parents and they then proceed to treat the white kids parents in the most humiliating way! They keep telling them that they deserved to have lost him! That was also cartoonishly evil. I mean maybe you think the press is evil but no one would do that in such an openly way! Not even British tabloids! It would be their end (don’t believe me: see what happened to the News of the World after it was discovered that they hacked the phone of a missing girl. They had hacked the royals and celebrities but what totally destroyed them was when it became public that they had treated horribly to the family of a disappeared girl).
Anyway, you have this story about an expressionless black gay policeman searching for a black kid and the almost not related casually remembered story of a white kid who escapes from his house. The first one is pretty complex but even more irreal and illogical than the one with the giant blue puppet! Everything is connected at the end but it’s almost comical how easily it is resolved even when it involves powerful pedophiles, drug dealers, real state developers, police bosses and even the mayor (or councillor, whatever was that guy!). Also, apparently everyone knows everyone in New York of the 1980s!
Then the one with Eric ends in in that way! So corny and silly! I guess it was influenced by the corny 1980s movies but it was senseless!
Such a shame because it looked very promising. I hope The Thing with Feathers script is much better than this! It has a very small cast so that’s already a positive!
Oh, well! At least is entertaining and easy to watch!
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Post by jbc12 on Jun 1, 2024 6:55:35 GMT
I've loved seeing your opinions on this. I don't have Netflix anymore so can't watch it myself, which is probably a good thing because it seems a heavy topic and I'm not in a good headspace for that. sgev1977, I'm seeing a lot of people mentioning that the A and B plots don't mesh and that they needed more episodes to bring the two together more seamlessly rather than just tying everything up in a neat bow in the final episode.
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Post by mllemass on Jun 1, 2024 10:46:58 GMT
I really liked it!
The whole thing about runaway boys, pedophiles, and the AIDS crisis happened not only in NY at the time, but in other big cities like Toronto. I remember it. Maybe that’s why it was easy for me to put the pieces of the plot together.
I didn’t mind the sweet ending at all.
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Post by jbc12 on Jun 1, 2024 11:30:24 GMT
I remember it. Maybe that’s why it was easy for me to put the pieces of the plot together. I don't remember it (I must've been 3 at the time ![(rofl)](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/rofl.png) ). I wonder what I'll make of it when I get to watch. I would have thought that if it's well done, then it would be relatable and easy to follow for everyone watching, irrespective of their knowledge of those issues at the time. I'm really keen to watch now and see where I fall on the matter. At least everyone is in agreement that BC was awesome, as usual. ![:)](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/smiley.png)
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Post by sgev1977 on Jun 1, 2024 11:36:36 GMT
There is a character who wants to sell the kid to a sex child prostitution ring but that storyline LITERALLY goes down to the drain!. That’s the only link. . It’s so bizarre because that “gang” is actually just one very young guy who doesn’t seem to have a lot of money or power but basically involves every powerful and some non powerful men in the city from corrupt policemen to politicians and from garbage men to child entertainment artists. I guess that’s another kinda link. But pretty weak! One “pedophile” is Vincent’s best friend and he knows the ring (well, the pimp! Who actually also seems to be the only prostitute in that ring! Apart of the dead black kid, of course!) but he doesn’t have anything to do with the disappearance of Edgar. It’s just that apparently New York was a very small town in which everyone knew each other! lol
Another bizarre element is that Vincent’s kid is just too young compared to the dead kid and what those clients seem to like. The politician and Vincent’s friend seem to like young men who sometimes are minors but not prepubescent kids. Both still horrible crimes, of course! But they aren’t medically and legally pedophiles. I don’t know if the series didn’t want to actually go there (again you basically only see two young men doing prostitution: the black victim and the pimp!) or if they were influenced by right wing Internet conspiracies, which obviously never care for those “details”! At some point, it seems that the clients are just powerful closeted men who probably like men slightly too young but whose main crime is that they or people around them would go to extremes to make sure no one knows they are gay. The point is that maybe there was a client that would ask for an extremely young kid like Vincent’s but we never see him on screen. That’s not the “main” plot at all. They indeed don’t successfully connect the two supposedly main stories. It’s very well directed so it’s entertaining and moves perfectly well. The performances are mostly brilliant and feel real even the corny very Hollywood final episode moves well and BC is very moving in it but it’s a sudden change of tone. The issue is that yeah, the stories doesn’t have any strong connection. I think they were trying to use the disappearance of a white kid like a Macguffin for discovering a very deep conspiracy but that conspiracy is managed in the most superficial way like I mentioned above and the white kid is just not related at all to it! Such a shame because the early episodes are extraordinary but sadly it becomes a mess with all those fake social commentary storylines.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jun 1, 2024 11:48:15 GMT
I really liked it! The whole thing about runaway boys, pedophiles, and the AIDS crisis happened not only in NY at the time, but in other big cities like Toronto. I remember it. Maybe that’s why it was easy for me to put the pieces of the plot together. I didn’t mind the sweet ending at all. I didn’t find the plot difficult. It’s the opposite: it becomes too simple! One black gay policeman, who according to the plot is very vulnerable because his identity, singlehanded destroys a big complot involving the most powerful people in the city and they just don’t actually show you how he did it! He just shows a VHS to other policemen and suddenly they all are destroyed! Everything is magically resolved! The Eric ending actually has slightly more logic Vincent was right: his kid would return home if he watched the puppet on screen but the issue with it was the sudden change of tone. Also, no clear explanation how he survived the fall and why he wasn’t traumatized after seeing a woman died!
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Post by sgev1977 on Jun 1, 2024 11:58:01 GMT
Also, BC is sublime in it. He and Gabby Hoffman do something extraordinary but their characters are basically supporting characters to a silly complot story that doesn’t go anywhere! Well, it did! It’s magically resolved! I am not very fond to the extremely subtle for not saying kinda wooded performance of the policeman. Not just compared to BC’s or Hoffman’s but to anyone he had in front of him!
They two and most of the cast really deserved another script.
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Post by mllemass on Jun 1, 2024 12:11:35 GMT
I wasn’t trying to imply that you had to be there in the 80’s to understand the plot. I’m just trying to figure out why there would be so many questions about the plot, when I didn’t have any. My point, I think, is that the stuff that doesn’t seem realistic really did happen.
I think Edgar lived in his head a lot, just like Vincent. They both learned how to block out unpleasant stuff. Art was an escape for both of them.
One thing I wanted to mention was that Vincent turned out to be right about everything. I actually found it kind of funny because Benedict is always saying he doesn’t always play geniuses, but here once again he really was smarter than everyone else.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jun 1, 2024 12:24:52 GMT
Another illogical part for me is why the pimp doesn’t have a live like Jeffrey Epstein’s! He even has a little black book with the name of his extremely powerful clients but he is still working as a security guard and even taking clients himself! lol The bad guy should had been the club owner but, if you think about it, he is actually the real hero! He resolves the crime! He was the one who did the research! Not the useless policeman who not only receives the VHS but also the minute in which casually the whole crime was recorded!
And yeah, mad Vincent really knew how his kid thought, what really had happened to him and how making him to return home.
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