Sarchasm - word for the day.

[shadowkat]

1. Word for the day...assuming it is one?

Sarchasm -- the gulf between an author's sarcastic wit and the readership/audience that doesn't get it.

Yep. This is me........and my readership.


2. Reading "Where did you go, Bernadette" -- which I keep forgetting that I'm reading. On my way to the train after work, I had to remind myself that I actually read something on the commute to work this morning, and what it was. This does not bode well for the book in question.

Sarchasm...the gulf between the writer's wit and me the reader, who is not finding it amusing, annoying yes, amusing no.

Maybe, like "Barry", it will get better? Barry got better. There are things that I start off disliking and thinking why am I bothering with this? I don't think of myself as masochistic? Life is truly too short to be this irritated and bored...then wham, oh my god, this is so frigging good, I can't believe how frigging good this is! Wow!

List of things this has happened on?

1. Breaking Bad
2. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
3. Game of Thrones (the books) -- which to be honest were sluggish, then book 3 got really frigging good, then sigh...and the television series was great, great, great, not, uhm..better, looking really good, oh dear...you just jumped the shark didn't you? Alrighty then.
4. The Wire
5. Angel
6. Mad Men

And I'm sure there are others.

3. Apparently both Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams had to deal with mental illness as a direct result of the social media attention during Game of Thrones. (Note to self, if I ever get famous, do not, repeat, do not spend any time on the internet.)

Maise Williams speaks on mental health as does Sophie Turner

4. Out of curiosity, can you think of any really good, flawless endings to television series?

After reading email from co-worker, who is uncritical of the things she loves, I realized this is not how I think. I'm critical of everything I love. The more I love it -- the more critical I will be. I'm critical of myself. I ask questions, think okay what worked, what didn't work for me, how do we improve on it, and what do I learn from this. I'm enjoy being critical of art and television and films. It's fun.
I don't understand not being critical at all.

Hmm...let's see endings that worked for me:

* Mad Men's ending worked -- don't remember it, but it worked.
* I actually really liked the ending of Angel the Series...which I do remember, it worked. I didn't need anything after that.
* I also liked how The Wire ended.
* Star Trek Next Generation - with Picard going forward through time and back again.
* Farscape's four hour movie wrap up worked for me.
* Cheers -- I don't remember the ending, but it worked.
* Newart -- best use of a dream ending, ever.
* Fraiser's worked
*Bablyon 5 for the most part worked


Endings I am on the fence about, that I don't think worked, although others seem to:

* MASH -- too neat and overly long and sentimental, although I'm not sure what else they could have done (I liked it before I wrote a paper on the series and had it torn apart for not being critical enough.)
* The West Wing...can't remember it clearly and it felt off somehow
* BSG -- also felt off somehow
* St. Elsewhere -- not sure I bought that the whole show was in an autistic kids head
*Buffy the Vampire Slayer -- still on the fence, I can argue it both ways
* Firefly -- not fair to be too critical, had no time


Endings that were abysmal...and did not work at all:

* How I Met Your Mother -- this was...just...oh dear
* Lost...yeah, well, it's okay that you felt the need to make the island purgatory, but did you have to be convoluted about it?
* X-Files - pick your own ending
* Dollhouse - a convoluted mess

Comments

[colls]

Oh! Adding to your list because my friend and I had been talking about series that ended well. I get that endings are HARD but some series have nailed it.

Series I felt ended well:
Friday Night Lights
Star Wars Rebels
Travelers - mostly because it was recent, not that it was spectacular or memorable (but I thought it ended well, despite the plans they might've had for another season)

Series that didn't end well:
Star Trek: Enterprise

I'm sure there are others, these are off the top of my head.
I remember really liking the ending of M*A*S*H but a) I was young and b) I haven't watched it sense. What I probably like was the fact that it's the only time I can recall my mother and father and I all watching TV together.


orangeful posted this article earlier and it was a very interesting read. It mentions The Wire as well, which made me think of it.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/the-real-reason-fans-hate-the-last-season-of-game-of-thrones

[shadowkat]

Agreed on Friday Night Lights -- I remember it ending well. I haven't seen the others, outside of MASH, which I'm on the fence on.

Regarding the article link below? I actually posted that on my journal a while ago -- snagged it from elisi on 5/19/19. I think everyone on DW snagged it from elisi? LOL!

Go HERE for my thoughts.

[colls]

AH! So it's an article that's making the rounds. That's good - it's a good article!

[shadowkat]

Yep. I posted it on FB -- and everyone grabbed it and reshared it among themselves.

I don't completely agree with it though -- because I don't watch stories from that angle and that's not what bothered me about GOT's finale season, nor what got me hooked on the show. Or at least not just that. But it is a fascinating read.

[dlgood]

Dollhouse was always a mess. It didn't really succeed at what it wanted to do, but I do give it credit for trying hard to do something different with TV. In the same way that I give Eliza Dushku credit for really trying to stretch herself beyond playing "Damaged bad girl" - even if she couldn't quite pull many of those other roles off.

One show that ended really well for me was The Americans - it had some slow & dour stretches as it positioned itself to get to its final run of episodes... but I do also feel like it concluded in a way that was very true to its characters.

[shadowkat]

Yeah, I've read that The Americans had a great ending. I haven't seen it. May try it sometime, assuming it stays on Netflix long enough to give me the chance.

Agreed on Dollhouse. It always had issues. I actually think Westworld accomplishes what Dollhouse set out to do far better, with a much better cast. But I'll always give Dollhouse credit for trying to do it first, and for ED taking the risk. It wasn't an easy role to pull off.

[rahirah]

I would add Leverage and Deep Space Nine to the endings that worked, and Forever Knight to the abysmal list.

[sculpturelle]

I agree. DS9's finale was excellent, with all the threads woven into the fabric of the 'verse. And I still have occasional flashes of bone-deep disappointment about Forever Knight, even though it's been 23 years.

[shadowkat]

Agree on Forever Knight...that one I vaguely remember seeing, it was abysmal and made no sense.

Didn't see the endings of the other two.

[cactuswatcher]

I found your list of shows that got better most interesting. Not that I would expect anyone to agree 100% with your list or a similar one of mine. But it does give light on what you were looking for in a show at the time.

My list would include MASH. I really thought the original movie was just so-so, the characters I liked being Duke (the central character, who was missing entirely from the TV show), Radar and Trapper John. Though I watched it on occasion, I didn't really like Wayne Rodgers' Trapper John or McLean Stevenson's Henry Blake. It was a big hit with them, but for me it got much better when they were gone. Despite a strong start, both Gary Berghoff and I grew tired of Radar (I think the writers did too!), and the show improved again when Klinger lost his dresses and took over as company clerk. Hawkeye got too needy and preachy as the show was struggling toward the end, but usually there was plenty of good stuff going on around him.

As for the last (two-part) MASH episode, I kind of liked it. The absolute end with Hawkeye seeing "Goodbye" as he flew off was weak. His part in the end was whiny Hawkeye being needy, and getting his way as he usually did in the end. That piece of it came off particularly badly since in the episodes leading up to the end Hawkeye had had severe PTSD and his childish harping on saying goodbye in the last episode kind of made a mockery of that. But I think the ending for the rest of them worked fine, including B. J., who got to be the better man.

[shadowkat]

In re-reading the list, I realized I forgot a few, such as Farscape, which I'd given up on when it first aired, then tried again, got past certain point -- and decided it was amazing. This happens a lot. There's also the opposite, the show starts out amazing -- then goes down-hill - Lost, Battle Star Galatica (both versions), ER, St. Elsewhere, the Cosby Show...I think it's the problem of going on too long or the writers not knowing where they are going.

Thank you for the bit on MASH. I couldn't remember why I had issues with it -- and you managed to articulate them well. Hawkeye's character became annoying the later seasons as did Alda in the role. And the finale, had this whole bit about Hawkeye's PTSD over the woman suffocating her child on the bus, and how he needed BJ to say "goodbye", which was clearly contrived for that last shot of "Goodbye" spelled out in rocks. Because no one else really had -- from Trapper to Henry Blake. (I'd seen the film, which is nothing like the series, and read one of the books that the film was adapted from. The series was better, in my opinion, but I also haven't seen an episode since 1988. Which was 31 years ago...)

The problem MASH had is -- it went on longer than the Korean War. Although, I always thought it was more about Vietnam. Also, the writing lost some of its bite in the later portion of it. I think it should have ended earlier than it did. But again, haven't seen it in over 30 years...so..

[raincitygirl]

Sarchasm! I adore your new word.

[shadowkat]

I love it too..I found it on FB of all places.