Transparent - Jill Solloway television series on Amazon

four episodes in and this is A+ fanfuckingtastic. never really rated solloway much and dislike six feet under but hooboy, the acting is awesome, the writing is awesome, the casting is awesome and this is awesome.

it is free to watch with amazon prime which i think xbox and playstation and ios have apps for to put on your teevee
there's about a gazillion think pieces out there, would be curious to see any that are recommended

what's the deal w/ these amazon shows? is this one getting a full series? is the stillman one?

and wasn't chris carter doing something w/ them? whatever happened w/ that?

was not curious abt this but didnt know soloway was involved

most otm thing QT has said in abt a decade is that her film afternoon delight was one of the best of 2013

is there a way to watch it w/o amazon prime

this is an ongoing series, ten episodes live now
i think you can just buy individual episodes or the whole series from amazon but it's exclusive to them. amazon produced it.
it's not the stillman show, it's the other one.
predominantly about gender/self identity, family, sex, selfishness but manages to not get preachy or shameful about any of them
killer cast: jeffrey tambor in the lead, gaby hoffman, amy landecker, rob huebel, judith light, jay duplass (the baghead guy, playing to type)
am avoiding talking about the show's central conceit until a few more people chime in.
but again: HIGHLY recommended.

it's a half hour comedy with some intense drama and real emotional impact
and the theme song was driving me CRAZY with "why am I getting a little teary here?" when i finally figured out that the music sounded creepily like the always-effective opening theme from UP. same little tinkly french piano bit. the show's charged subject matter did the rest.

super hyped for this, the pilot was really interesting

landecker rules

Carrie Brownstein is on this too.

she's gaby hoffman's pal/drug hookup

landecker is A+ good in this and super hawt

The pilot was great. Looking forward to watching more.

yea i watched the pilot too, a++

okay, i just power watched the whole show. really fucking great. will rewatch when the next season starts. everybody should do their best to give this a go.

this is not as good as i was hoping yet but it is very appealing

otm

I don't find it funny at all really but it has a pretty cool vibe. The credits help

the pilot was so long ago that i can't remember what the thing about it was that was so promising, i think maybe some of the kind of fluidity & digressive sort of structure? like this languorous pace. & now this is slightly more trad in following like, a couple, &c. really getting a kick out of the performances though; in some other gaby hoffman stuff i saw lately it seemed like her type & casting was the point, but she has a depth in this.

this show is really good. i'm sorta surprised there's not more chatter here (maybe that's due to the distribution method).

i'm 6 episodes in. any scene with Jeffrey Tambor is really good, and i'm warming up to some of the other plot lines. the scenes with his 2 daughters and son kind of remind me of High Maintenance in that their conversations feel contemporary and, for the most part, natural. however, as the season progresses i realize that i find myself thinking more and more that Amy and Jay are complete fucking assholes (especially the episode where their stepdad with dementia goes missing and they don't give a shit). but that seems like a common feature of most tv shows these days - the airwaves are full of complete psychopaths.

but really this show is all about Maura. those are the scenes that stick with you the next day. the part where he chooses his name. when he runs into an old friend seeing him as maura for the first time. when he says he's been dressing up as a man all of his life. it's good stuff. it's a bummer that they couldn't have gotten a transgender actor to perform the role, but Tambor definitely pulls his weight. he's excellent in every scene.

(PS one of the daughters (Ali/Gaby Hoffmann) was the little girl on Field of Dreams! kinda blew my mind when i realized that)

i kind of want to see this but every time i log into Amazon i see them gloating over this series and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth

the previews make it seem very self-congratulatory and feel-good-PC but i also get the feeling that it isn't actually like that

yeah it really isn't.
my takeaway was that it's primarily about how horrible we are to our own family but maybe i'm coming with baggage.

maura is also a self-centered asshole! everyone on this show is a self-centered asshole! but likeable and human all the same.

(PS one of the daughters (Ali/Gaby Hoffmann) was the little girl on Field of Dreams! kinda blew my mind when i realized that)

Not only that, but her IRL mom is Warhol Superstar/Actress (Midnight Cowboy, Play It Again, Sam) Viva!

I plowed through all of the episodes last week. Love it. Judith Light! Much Jewish!

I watched the pilot and I felt like it was well-written and acted but I didn't want to spend any more time with the characters, especially the kids.

otm

Yeah, I can only stand Ali, and even she gets on my nerves sometimes too. I think the assholeishness of the other two siblings is supposed to be balanced by their wisecracks, but I don't share their sense of humor so that their attempted jokes just add to their crappiness.

Still pumped about another season though, it's a great show

Yeah I didn't find them all that funny. I think I'm just not in the mood right now for yet another show about a family of wisecracking assholes. I could totally see enjoying it at a different point in my life, and can see how someone else would enjoy it.

something about the way they seemed to luxuriate in their behavior too, I just felt like "yes, there are people like this in the world, and yes, this is a skilled portrayal of them, but I just don't need them in my life right now"

I'd encourage you to check out another episode or two, though, because I had a very similar reaction to the characters in the pilot and still ended up liking the show quite a bit.

yeah, woman alive likes the show a lot, is ahead of me, I'll probably give it more time

they're all assholes but i loved the season despite/because of that.

^

totally overrated show. good/great acting by most of the leads (though mom = terrible), but such hokey writing, from the lesbians to the "ho ho ho jews and their schmear", characters reduced to caricature except when saved by individual actors' performances.

^
xp

"ho ho ho jews and their schmear",

that was silly and too on-the-nose, but i appreciated the general Jew-yness.

I did find some of the loljews humor in the first ep to be kinda played out, think that was part of what turned me off.

as a ho ho jew, it felt fairly dead on to me

loving this to death. just watched ep 8, different from the rest so far [don't want to spoiler anyone], very very excellent.

but BRADLEY WHITFORD!!

On Saturday, for 24 hours only, Amazon is making all eps of this available to stream free to all customers.

Tom Leger is apt here about some of the reasons I feel extremely wary about this series and Solloway: https://storify.com/meauxdal/jill-soloway-and-bruce-jenner

discovering that solloway's dad is trans suggests a lot about the perspective and intent of the series to me

That may be true, but even leaving aside this last faux pas and my concerns about Solloway casting a cis man to play a trans woman, we're not exactly lacking for cis narratives about middle-class white people transitioning that mostly speak to cis concerns. That it sounds like Transparent adds to that glut is probably inevitable given the economics of producing a tv series, but it doesn't make me any more inclined to engage with the show, especially given the more challenging work by trans writers that's been coming out of small presses like Topside over the last few years (Katherine Cross has written about some of those developments here: http://bitchmagazine.org/article/know-tell-trans-women-literary-fiction-nonfiction-writing-publishing). Anyway, I can't fairly judge this series without watching it, and I don't begrudge you your enjoyment of it, so I'll stay out of this thread.

better yet: watch a few episodes and see what you think!
and yeah, i would also certainly welcome a non-cis perspective narrative series made for television; maybe the success of transparent will lead that direction in the next few years

Yeah, point taken: whatever my misgivings, I'll try to approach the series with an open mind when I eventually get around to watching a few episodes. (A non-ILX friend whose judgment I trust described it as decently written, despite her ambivalence about its casting and whiteness and class focus.)

the complints re: race/class stuff is understandable but the show goes into more depth re cultural/religious identity w/r/t Judaism than I was expecting, and I think it deserves some points for that

I watched the pilot and I felt like it was well-written and acted but I didn't want to spend any more time with the characters, especially the kids.

Yeah, otm. We're taking a break between seasons of "The Americans," so my wife suggested it, based on buzz/acclaim. As I watched it I was worried she might be into it, because I hated everyone, but thankfully at the end she turned to me and basically said she hated it and didn't like anyone and that she just couldn't relate to anyone or any of their problems and particularly their pervasive selfish unfunny assholery. I may make her watch another ep, to be fair, but frankly between this show and a general disinterest in revisiting "Orange is the New Black," I'm happy to be able to knock a few series off of our collective must-see list.

not meaning to make this a thing but the "i don't like these characters" argument always loses me. i can get "i find these situations / the directorial eye and intent appalling" but they're actors in parts; whether I like them or not is totally secondary to the reliability of the narrator and the creative skill of the whole team

i feel certain there must be a thread about this somewhere.

the characters in this are no less likeable than the characters in arrested development, i think.

it definitely gets better, and deeper, as it goes along.

Unlikeable characters in ridiculous comedits like AD or Curb I can get behind. But I find it tougher in ostensibly reality based drama.

Comedies, sorry.

Conversely you could say it's a failure of the creative team to make these unlikeable characters compelling. Obviously I love lots of assholes and narcissistic peeps on TV, so it's not that it's always bad.

I don't know, I found the characters compelling enough, and I thought it was a very well-written series, but I'm judging it on the whole season and not the first episode or so.

For me, it's that their unlikeable traits are presented as adorable or sassy (the Californication problem), and just their straight-up meanness seems hack-y and easy rather than an attempt to dig deeper. (I've heard it gets better too though)

Yeah, that was exactly the problem we had, that the show sort of smugly double-downed on these unlikeable character traits, like they were supposed to be funny or even endearing rather than just abrasive or obnoxious. I admit it's a really tough call, when to stick it out, and so many shows improve after the pilot, or after the first few episodes, or even after the first season (this one has already been picked up for two more seasons, right?). Perhaps expectations were too high for this one, since we've heard nothing but good things, to such an extent that we were sort of left scratching our heads.

Sorry, but that strikes me as a terribly misguided reason not to watch anything, unless you're looking for more passive entertainment (and it's totally cool if you are, obviously). But the supposition that likeable characters makes a show good needs to be questioned from the beginning, especially here where none of the kids are supposed to be likable: they're flawed, frustrating, self-destructve, extremely selfish assholes, and the nuances of that are what make them good characters, and make the show interesting.

Again, there's probably a thread on this, but the idea that the default setting is that you should be able to relate, that identification should be as smooth and pleasurable as possible, strikes me as ????

But the supposition that likeable characters makes a show good needs to be questioned from the beginning, especially here where none of the kids are supposed to be likable: they're flawed, frustrating, self-destructve, extremely selfish assholes, and the nuances of that are what make them good characters, and make the show interesting.

I agree with this. They are unlikeable and deeply flawed characters, but I still find them - or their individual narratives - interesting.

Oh, it's not a default setting at all, at least not for us. There is nothing we watch just to watch something, simply as boob-tube "what's on?" escapism. We have to be interested and invested, at least to some degree, and yeah, entertained, too, not least because we have limited time to sit around watching anything. Obviously like all art it's ultimately personal, because like I posted a few inches back, there is plenty I watch, have watched, have read, etc., with flawed or otherwise unlikeable characters, often to an extreme, but I've still soldiered on, often to great reward. This show, we were struck by just how much it rubbed both of us the wrong way. Like, I know folks who can't stand "Seinfeld" for the same reason, and that's fine. These folks were a very particular strain of ugly that we just couldn't take. Again, it's the kind of unlikeable they are, the kind where I suspect you're supposed to find them kooky, or funny, or some other appealing eccentric quality that helps you get past their horrible personalities. But we didn't sync up with that. I suppose it's all about how the story is told, then.

The father's story was the most compelling on every front, but every time a kid showed up, let alone opened their mouth, we were just ... ugh. I mean, Tambor's character literally says something along the lines of "I can't believe I raised such selfish, horrible children," so I can only assume the show will be partly about their transition too, in a sense.

It's like books. I usually finish every book I begin, but every once in a while there's a book I hate so much I just can't do it. Like, recently I read a third of 'The Making of Zombie Wars,' by Aleksandar Hemon, and it was so bad that I eventually just had to stop. TV I guess is even more cutthroat, because (sorry 21st century) we only watch it on an actual TV, around the same time block, as available. Unlike a movie, which is only 2 or so hours long, or a book, which we can take with us wherever we go, several hours of a show is a much bigger commitment for us.

"I suspect you're supposed to find them kooky, or funny, or some other appealing eccentric quality that helps you get past their horrible personalities."

I dunno, I'm not sure I did or do, at least not in the way vharacters on, say, Girls, are totally fucking tedious, but you're still supposed to find them "cute."

"I can only assume the show will be partly about their transition too, in a sense."

Maybe I'm misreading the comment, but I'm again curious: why this need for redemption, or any kind of coming to self-consciousness? I think if anything, the show goes further into ~why~ they're fucked up - to have them come to and suddenly redeem themselves and earn the viewers sympathy would a) betray the characters themselves (especially since they seem to not learn from their mistakes) and b) just be lazy and easy narrative, no? I mean, most real people aren't likeable, why should fictional people be?

Anyways, not to push the point, I really liked the show, but my main problem with it is that it (and I haven't read this thred pre-revive, so forgive my potential repetitions) seems largely unaware of/unreflective on/unconcerned with the pre-conditions for the whole narrative it depicts, which is that Mort/Maura is a wealthy white person with familial support and without financial or occupational dependences. Granted, I'm not sure the show's prerogative is to represent "the average" trans experience, or is necessarily obliged to show the common struggles of most trans persons (which go well beyond [SEMI-SPOILER] being harassed in a bathroom once and falling out with your bigoted friend), which brings the show dangerously close to the kind of played out, voyeuristic "rich people have problems too!" thematic of a lot of recent tv (cf. 6 feet under, which I believe Jill Solloway wrote), and at the risk of just reproducing the invisibility of the kind of trans experience they don't even acknowledge in the slightest. Again, this raises the question of whether a show can just be what it is or has an of obligation to faithfully represent the topic it represents, or alternately that is projected upon it (it may not claim to stand for the whole of trans experience - impossible in any case - but people might view it as such?). I dunno, in this caitlyn jenner moment, I'd like to have seen it express a little more self-consciousness about how it presents itself.

"rich people have problems too!"

I genuinely feel like this show's characters are like the characters in Arrested Development, though treated more in a Little Miss Sunshine vibe than the jokapalooza that AD did. Obvs AD didn't have the Trans theme, but I almost feel that's subservient to the overall theme of spoiled rich kids behaving badly, albeit learning some kind of sensitivity or knowledge of their own awfulness as the show progresses.

I can identify with your feeling, Josh, I gave up on Mad Men after the first couple of episodes because I hated all the characters (but then picked it up again a couple of years later) - but I didn't hate these weirdos so much as find their flaws and foibles interesting - or if not interesting, I wanted to see where they would lead them.

Also, I have loved Tambor since Hill Street Blues and would watch him in anything. Also my partner loved it and it came online shortly after our daughter was born and all we could do in life was stream!

I found a certain aspect of these characters instantly familiar and recognizable, and I assumed it was the Jewish family vibe, but maybe it's just the selfishness.

for me, i assumed it was both

There's nothing wrong with dislikeabke characters at all. But at some point in the early 00s, random meanness just became the comedy norm, and I think to some extent meanness is a lazy writer's crutch, and it's easier to write characters who are too mean to connect, because monologue is just a lot easier to write than dialogue, and (as Twitter will show you) it's a lot easier to write something mean than to write something interesting.

But on the other hand I only watched 1.5 episodes so I'll try again.

Little Miss Sunshine vibe

I certainly wouldn't expect change or redemption from these characters (x-post), but if they stay the way they are in episode one then I probably made the right decision cutting and running. Because -

why should fictional people be?

Episode two was a bit better, but I'm still blown away by the show's smug insistence that the kids and their lives are remotely as compelling as the dad's story. The father's story is great, but two eps in it's presented almost as a supporting story to the kids, but it really should be the other way around. it's almost like an exercise: let's take three supporting narcissists and make them the wise-cracking, ridiculous center. Every time they cut from the dad it immediately dead drops into silly sitcom/dramedy conventionality. May say as much about Solloway as anything else, tbh.

OTOH, I have been enjoying pretending it's a secret spin-off of "Parenthood." Like, there's a big reveal at the end that they're all best friends with Sarah Braverman.

I've watched 7 eps since Friday night. I love this and Tambor is AMAZING. The Maura flashbacks are great and the one where she and the guy she met in the bookstore revealed themselves to each other - omg that got me right in the heart.
Great little details too - Ali wearing a Fire Island sweatshirt (they referenced FI in dialogue too!), the oldest sister singing a psychedelic furs song in a flashback. I also really love the opening credits. Will probably finish this today. "Four out of five Pfeffermands now prefer pussy."

Oh and idk who she is but the lady playing Tammy is hot.

when is the new series when when when

IMDB sez Friday December 4th.

Too long boooooo.

^^^ this

Second season pilot is up on Amazon and it's very very good.
Rest of the episodes go up on Dec 11 I think.

Kleinkunst references!

Thought that was an amazing episode. The scene with the wedding photographer. And the Berlin 1933 vignette. And that final scene taking in the windows of the hotel rooms.

i wouldn't have imagined that the hottest sex scene on film this year would be jeffrey tambor fingerbanging judith light and yet

i don't know about that, but season 2 is EXCELLENT.

love the way they gradually bring the 1933 stuff in and connect it to the present

especially in the episode with the forest gathering. that was just amazing.

four eps in and it's excellent. but so so sad.

like, i just ache for these characters, mostly, and all the unhappiness they suffer or bring into their worlds.

three eps in they continue to pretty much one and all be horrible people, except maybe for the rabbi.
i liked the bit where she had to confront the shitty behavior he engaged in at college.

Kolten is not a bad person!

and actually, i think the main characters are much more sympathetic this season. but i'll wait til you finish the rest to talk about it.

love this show

koulten worries me, like there's a well-shrouded, dangerous interior void that's gonna culminate with him trying to fuck the rabbi or burn the house down

lol i was thinking he might shoot up that school "ripped from the headlines"

three eps in they continue to pretty much one and all be horrible people, except maybe for the rabbi.

this is true, though it doesn't dim my sympathy for them. so many amazing scenes so far - the bathtub "sex" scene was just heart-breaking. sarah just floating through like a miserable ghostly wreck, perhaps the *worst* person of the bunch, but still tragic. won't say more because don't want to spoiler anything, but what a show.

Was just reading Steve Erickson on this and spluttered out my coffee in agreement:

<q>The show is less terrific when we’re subjected to Maura’s children, who—I swear on the lives of my own children—are the single most off-putting family in any history of television that stretches from the Ewings of Dallas to the Lyons of Empire... you’re also left figuring that maybe Maura has become a woman just so no one will know she fathered the almost supernaturally unlikable people around her. </q>

http://www.lamag.com/steveerickson/the-danish-girl-and-the-transgender-movement/

Ah fuck yes. I just watched s2 e1-3 and I wanted to punch the son so badly. They are the worst, all three of them.

s2 was pretty good. some of the execution of the 30s stuff felt wonky to me but it landed in the finale. the whole thing felt a bit slight compared to s1 for some reason, like it was half a story.

It's kind of a study in the tragic unhappiness of narcissists. But that's a really hard tragedy to find empathy for at times.

Me after the third ep: "This show is really well acted and written and directed, but I just don't like the people. I don't like them."
H: "Why are you yelling?"

I think I hate the son more than any character ever

We're 6 episodes into s2 and this is some pretty brilliant/brutal stuff.

The scene that got to me the most was where Josh is showing Colton around the high school and trying to be all cool about it, even with the guy registering him for classes. Ughhhhhh. Then the proposal scene, although I had a faint twinge of sympathy for how bad he bungled that somehow, because it seemed so much out of a wounded sense of himself.

I mean that's p much narcissism though, getting angry when anyone punctures your little bubble.

Somehow e4 and e5 really warmed me to this show. The characters actually are developing/progressing. Josh actually matures a little bit as he deals with Rita and with Colton's parents, and as he seems to face that he's soon going to be a dad in a much more *real* way than with Colton.

so I watched the first sode of season 2 and im not sure I can continue with this show. what an obnoxious half hour of tv that was.

otoh this was my reaction to watching the first couple episodes of season 1 but I ended up getting into it.

Keep going — push through the pain.

yeah i think i'm getting off the bus after about 4 episodes of the new season

I still haven't seen this series, but I thought this Jos Truitt essay on broader problems of representation was useful: http://feministing.com/2015/12/21/on-jill-soloway-caitlyn-jenner-and-the-trans-representation-the-media-wants/

It feels unfair that Alexandra Billings who I think is giving a great performance & probably one of maybe three genuinely likeable characters on the show is being ignored by these critiqueshttp://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2014/oct/10/-sp-alexandra-billings-transgender-actor-transparent

this show is so great. season 2 was so great. most of these characters are horrid but i end up feeling for most of them, except the son, who sucks. i like that the rabbi was shown to be fallible too, in that she clearly did *not want colton in her life, and would not be the spine the son so clearly lacked but needed to save colton from his fundie foster parents.

bring on season 3.

When can we talk spoilers in this series? Because there's one plot element I want to bring up that would be super spoilery for people who haven't seen this yet.

http://www.geekwire.com/2015/zillow-uncovers-the-backstory-to/

season 2 did nothing to change my mind that it is primarily a show about Jews, rather than gender identity. really, really liked it.

would not be the spine the son so clearly lacked but needed to save colton from his fundie foster parents

Eh, I didn't exactly see it that way. Taking Colton in didn't necessarily strike me as the right thing to do, and I don't know that he needed "saving" given that he was nearly ready to leave home anyway.

I'm not sure the show is "more" about Jews than gender identity, and it's also about families, and it's also about narcissism, and also about Los Angeles affluent liberal culture. But it definitely is a lot about Jews.

i know, i know. Jewishness feels like the common thread, but then it's the most obvious point of connection for me (being Jewish).

it's as much about jews as it is about privilege as it is about gender identity imo

there is, as jordan points out, a lot of "only my real jews are gonna get this" jokes

Like when Josh told the fundie dad "Colton *is* Jewish" and then sort of muttered "according to the reform movement anyway"

I just came here and I was going to be all I REALLY NEED TO TALK ABOUT SEASON 2 but now I see you've been doing that for a while so I will catch up and brb.

especially in the episode with the forest gathering. that was just amazing.

― Karl Malone, Wednesday, December 16, 2015 11:26 AM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

YES THIS WAS VERY GOOD

Like when Josh told the fundie dad "Colton *is* Jewish" and then sort of muttered "according to the reform movement anyway"

― on entre O.K. on sort K.O. (man alive), Wednesday, December 30, 2015 12:13 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Why cause normally you're considered Jewish if the mother is Jewish?

Everyone is horrible except for Sid and Colton and the rabbi but I even didn't like her very much at points. I think that I hate Gabby Hoffman the most but that could be because I just with my parents bankrolled me until I was 33 so that I could have been a perpetual student who got high all the time. But yeah they're all horrible and yet I still feel for them and want them to be ok and get through all their bullshit. Maybe I like it because they feel relatably fucked up.

They're very cuddly for siblings though. Maybe that's not a big thing and it just seems weird to me because I'm an only child but do most adults get naked and cuddle with their sibs as much as these three seem to?

SPOILER
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It seemed heavily implied to me that the fundie family, in their "not even the USPS can be trusted, we have to do this in person" paranoia, were anti-vaxxers who killed the rabbi's baby by hugging a bunch of measles onto her. She broke out in pox right after they left. Was there anything explicit said to support this? Am I just pulling it out of thin air? Was it so obvious that they didn't have to say anything about it?

woah

stop blowing my mind crump

i don't think it was obvious at all but now that you say it . . .

i didn't think about it, but maybe? it seems like if it was supposed to be something to be noticed that they'd make it more obvious. maybe it'll come up next season?

did not make that connection!

it didn't even occur to me but now it DOES seem kind of obvious or at least a little coincidental

Like when Josh told the fundie dad "Colton *is* Jewish" and then sort of muttered "according to the reform movement anyway"

― on entre O.K. on sort K.O. (man alive), Wednesday, December 30, 2015 12:13 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Why cause normally you're considered Jewish if the mother is Jewish?

― Benson and the Jets (ENBB), Wednesday, 30 December 2015 19:03 (2 hours ago) Permalink

Yes, and also because the whole question of what *really* makes a person Jewish is an intense source of anxiety and debate among Jews.

The closeness of the disasters, one after another, seemed to be a line that indicated causality to me -- the separation from Colton via the Hug 'n Judge Bunch, the "whoa you've got stuff all over your back," the silence of the ultrasound. I dunno. I figured Josh would infect half of L.A. when he went to that music biz party later that night, but that didn't happen.

guess i'm displaying my wild ignorance here (first time on ILX!!), but:

- if you're antivax does that mean you can carry measles without being infected yourself?
- can measles cause miscarriages?

And I mean, you know, because while he's the biological son of a Jewish guy he's spend only a tiny and recent percentage of his life with his Jewish dad, so it also says something about the character's self-involvement and slightly shallow understanding of what it means to be a dad. Layers. I'm sure I've overexplained it by now. xp

x-post Yes to the second point for sure and I am not 100% positive about the first but I do think someone who was recently infected and not yet showing signs can pass it on so one of the fundies could have been infected but not know yet.

x-post - That makes sense i just thought the reform comment was because he was Jewish but (presumably) Rita isn't etc.

God Josh is the worst.

yeah that's why he made the comment, I just mean there were some cultural nuances to why it was funny

i just figured that the stress of the Colton thing and generally being around Josh and his family contributed to the miscarriage (and her decision to leave).

hmmm, according to the guardian recap of ep 6:

Back at home, Josh notices a rash on Raquel’s back. The pair are worried it could be measles – potentially devastating in pregnancy – and see a doctor, who tells them it isn’t, but that Raquel has miscarried.

so i dunno. it's an interesting idea though!

Pastor and Missus Gump rob Josh of both of his children with one blow... the Christian hug that's just a cover for destruction... makes u think, etc

Off Topic, but You Can Count On Me is on TV right now, and I forgot that Gabby Hoffman played Ruffalo's girlfriend in it.

Gabby Hoffman's hair in this is like a whole character by itself. A deeply annoying character.

Josh in episode 6 going to that industry douchefest and getting drunk after what had happened that day. smh. I hate you Josh!

and yeah, i would also certainly welcome a non-cis perspective narrative series made for television; maybe the success of transparent will lead that direction in the next few years

― the plight of y0landa (forksclovetofu), Sunday, February 1, 2015 3:45 PM

This thread seems as good place as any to mention the new web series Her Story. It isn't perfect (some of the dialogue can be too on-the-nose, and some of the character arcs are too compressed due to time and resource constraints), but it's promising in terms of representation insofar as it's written and directed by trans women, and generally avoids pandering or condescension:

http://herstoryshow.com

I will check it out, thanks!

Okay, I just powered through this and it was worth watching!

The good: storylines I've not seen anywhere before (a kept trans woman in an abusive relationship, a woman's justifiable trepidation on self-outing to a possible boyfriend who is too perfect), your note about lack of "pandering or condescension" is generally accurate as it pertains to the creators' belief that the audience is willingness to engage without prejudice, both of the lead trans actors (Jen Richards, Angelica Ross) are very good and watching them work certainly supports the argument that a trans woman playing a trans woman is going to bring a different level of gravitas and believability to the role than a cis man in drag would

The bad: yes the necessary compression of the spec storyline is partially to blame but the biggest issues are occasionally bad acting... Laura Zak, the woman playing Allie in particular, though she's apparently also the co-writer? I'd be curious to see who was responsible for what, as it also suffers from inconsistent script-writing and occasionally surprisingly clumsy direction. The characters are all spectacularly unrealistically gorgeous (there's some of the same DNA as s1 of 'Looking' at play here) which is soap opera gloss I don't need or want. The B-stories feel barely sketched out (Bad Penny in particular is a bad misstep). Eve Ensler is a producer, which makes me nervous.

The ugly: flawed or not (and warts and all it's certainly no worse than a dozen recent television pilots I've seen), given the current political and television climate, this should be getting more mainstream attention! i am a massive media nerd living in a major city, i should have already heard about this!

oh and just to clarify a point in terms of representation: of the three women responsible for writing and direction, only one of the writers appears to be trans if i'm reading the support materials correctly, yes?

Sorry, forks/ulysses, I should have specified more exactly: the series was co-written by Jen Richards and Laura Zak (who is cis), and I'd like to know more about the division of writing labor myself. I agree with most of yr reservations (especially about the unnecessary gloss, though my biggest issue was that the abuse storyline resolved itself too quickly to be fully convincing), but I do really hope Richards and her collaborators find a way to keep developing the series. I think that a lot of the most innovative and nuanced trans art these days takes place in writing (especially fiction and poetry on small presses like Topside and Biyuti, but also on blogs, in zines, in the performance art of people like Juliana Huxtable, and in the recent flowering of Twine games) because it requires less extensive access to capital than is the case with television or film (though obviously class inequalities still massively affect literary production and reception). Still, I do find this series (and Reina Gossett and Sasha Wortzel's Happy Birthday, Marsha!, once it's through with post-production) to at least be encouraging.

(I also found Red Durkin's comments on the series and the danger of "the after-school effect" here to be useful.)

thanks for that durkin link; I don't know her but that covered most of my caveats both spoken and unspoken, but better.

Issues of capital and potential audience backlash do seem to be at the direction of new trans art; I would add theater to that list but then I have the benefit of living in a major city where i can (and will!) see three trans-focused pieces of theater over three months: Taylor Mac's excellent 'HIR', the brilliant Erin Markey's 'Ride on the Irish Cream' (tomorrow, yay) and 'Southern Comfort' at The Public.

This is very much NOT my community though I have friends and am smitten by people enmeshed in that world and find the development of trans-rights/issues/arts to be one of the more interesting culture and legal shifts of my lifetime... I don't necessarily wanna be the one to do it, but maybe we can/should start a "Rolling Trans Art" thread as that would be a more appropriate place for that discussion than here?

I'd be interested in starting a trans arts thread - maybe later this week, after the 2015 albums countdown ends?

please!

I've set it up here: Rolling trans art thread

thanks!

Watched the season finale. Damn, it hit me hard -- this show is really good.

season 2 did nothing to change my mind that it is primarily a show about Jews, rather than gender identity. really, really liked it.

― expertly crafted referential display name (Jordan), Wednesday, December 30, 2015 11:55 AM (4 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ive watched up thru the yom kippur ep (which was great) & the least compelling character in the show is tambors imo

I can't help but also feel like the show is more about narcissism than about gender identity, and that in the case of the Tambor character, her struggle with gender identity and transition is as much a vehicle for her character's narcissism as anything else. I don't mean that narcissism causes her gender issue, I just mean in terms of the character's role in the show, the narcissism is kind of more important for the character than the gender transition.

This is part of what I find frustrating about the series (beyond the casting); it's not that I need the characters to be sympathetic, but I just don't find the Pfeffernans interesting as characters. I realize that this is a series made for a cis audience, and that it's not likely to go much deeper on the relationships between its trans characters, but even beyond that, its focus just seems extremely socially narrow in a way the writers can't manage to make compelling: how many more dramas about the family lives of wealthy narcissists do we really need?

^^^ This is a personal reaction, not necessarily a fair one, to be clear, but I do think Alexandra Billings and Hari Nef were underused, and that the series is generally more interesting the more it focuses on its minor characters.

xp its more a comedy than drama imo but thats a valid pt (your last one)

how many more dramas about the family lives of wealthy narcissists do we really need?

I get this, but how many more dramas do we really need about zombies, british aristocrats, cops, presidents, people who live in haunted houses, Colombian drug lords, single twenty-somethings, etc. There probably are topics that we do need more dramas about, most notably poor and working class people. But TV is vast and I can't fault a show solely for its subject matter, and anyway I started to find the characters more sympathetic during the second half of S2. If anything, I think that tapping into the sadness underneath narcissism is not something a lot of shows manage.

I get this, but how many more dramas do we really need about zombies, british aristocrats, cops, presidents, people who live in haunted houses, Colombian drug lords, single twenty-somethings, etc.

I'd be fine with at least a few years' moratorium on these, tbqh

I guess I do leave myself open to that reproach, but I think it's the execution more than the choice of subject matter that I find disappointing. Of course, the series's treatment of class is probably more frustrating insofar as it has so little to do with the conditions under which most trans people live. While the series gestures toward acknowledging that now and then (mostly through Billings's character), it hasn't gone very far in doing so.

Anyway, I don't expect political liberation from a tv show, I just don't find it that compelling.

I started to find the characters more sympathetic during the second half of S2. If anything, I think that tapping into the sadness underneath narcissism is not something a lot of shows manage.

This. It is so good at being so sad.

While the series gestures toward acknowledging that now and then (mostly through Billings's character), it hasn't gone very far in doing so.

― one way street, Thursday, May 19, 2016 11:49 AM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I assume one moment your referencing here is davina's “I’m a 53-year-old ex-prostitute HIV positive woman with a dick. I know what I want, and I know what I need,” to Maura

idk I thought that was p powerful & beyond just a gesture

I guess I'm thinking of that as a gesture insofar as Davina mostly stays a foil to Maura and her family, which seems symptomatic of the narrative choices Soloway and her writers tend to make. I don't think it's necessarily worth continuing to explain why I found the series underwhelming, though, however frustrated I get with the way it gets dubiously framed as progressive.

I think its politics are worth taking to task. As with Girls, it's superficially progressive on "social issues" and a bit willfully blind to class issues.

Yeah, the comparison to Girls is otm.

Could also probably just say "Liberal Television in 2016" for that matter. It seems very representative of the politics of the class of people who write and produce television.

I'd agree, and I think media criticism that stays on the level of critiquing representations (rather than also talking about conditions of production and circulation) is going to end up at an impasse. I probably find Transparent more frustrating than other, similar series in part because it feels like a missed opportunity so far, and in part because more challenging contemporary trans art tends to attract less attention, but I don't want to keep repeating myself.

well like stevie says you gotta distinguish being "in it" from "of it" and that's gonna require social change which is generally manufactured through art so baby steps all round. but i can't fault you for not appreciating the peanut gallery yelling "GO SLOW"

incidentally, Kiki and Herb did an amazing rendition of Mississippi Goddam in their new show that repurposes it as a trans anthem and fuck it works well

incidentally, Kiki and Herb did an amazing rendition of Mississippi Goddam in their new show that repurposes it as a trans anthem and fuck it works well

I'd really like to hear their new work, although without knowing more about Kiki/Bond's performance, I have to say that (to speak as a white girl) I'm extremely wary of white queer people reappropriating the art and slogans of the civil rights movement. I'm curious how v handles it, though.

bombastically. taylor also agonizes at length when he does nina but the alt/nu/art cabaret scene is based on appropriation and remix so i'm inclined to give it a pass if it feels honest.

prob gonna need a thread for i love dick

soloway/hahn 2016

season 3 of this was very enjoyable, although i still think it could be called "JEWS"

the middle of this season gets fucking brutal

Just hit the middle of the season, with Josh on his road trip, and... what a fucking dick. I mean, everyone in that family is terrible in their own way, but he's the worst.

Loving the show btw.

i think i need to be done, these people are toxic. show starts to make me in a bad mood irl.

Is there a thread for "I Love Dick" yet? It's very much something. Feel like I gotta finish before I can talk about it.

yea I watched 4 o 5 eps, p good, Kathryn Hahn is the best

Kevin Bacon is pretty great in this too. So is Griffin Dunne. So is the whole cast!

...is anyone watching the new season? i've heard negative things (by which i mean i read a facebook post by someone citing the fact that THEY had heard negative things...FUCK THIS WORLD BTW), but i've really enjoyed the first couple episodes, at least.

haha yea have enjoyed the first few eps also

when this entire series is over i kind of want to watch a supercut of all the flashback scenes, just by themselves. i love them.

I kind of fall in and out with this show. I warmed to it for a while but then the same problem I originally had with it came back, which is that I find most of the characters so hard to like. I guess Rabbi Raquel is one of the least terrible but she's not that central to the show -- the moment where she blows up at Sarah for her navel-gazing version of "spirituality" kind of sums up how I feel about the whole thing -- that it's a bunch of self-involved characters on fools' errand quests for "self-discovery" that don't actually get anywhere, which is ironic considering the main theme of the show. I think the writing is self-conscious about this, yet not self-conscious enough.

Haven't tried the new season though.

there's a new season? I didn't even realize, seems like people aren't talking about it as much

That happened with me last season as well - it just sort of appeared and I didn't see or hear anything about it before I noticed it on my Amazon video screen

started last night, watched first two episodes, enjoying it but it feels like the series has moved into a kind of rote era where nothing is very unexpected. Last season with ethe flash backs to the family history was amazing; maybe it peaked at that point. i did like the use of Jesus Christ Superstar though.

Enjoyed the first two seasons (the first a little more), then we just sort of stopped halfway through the third, even though we were enjoying it. It feels a bit like Six Feet Under - like overnight it lost a certain something to compel me to keep watching, even though the quality is more-or-less the same.

Also I've been put off by watching Soloway's movie, Afternoon Delight, which is drivel.

i stopped watching this at the beginning of last season. i enjoy a lot about the show but i just find the characters to unlikeable (I'm looking at you JOSH).

too even gah

I don't mind with Josh, since he's supposed to be likeable! And it's not an Entourage thing, where he's some douchebag "bad boy" who's constantly being rewarded by the narrative - instead he keeps fucking up.

is he supposed to be likable? i don't think so

Er, I mean the opposite

All of the characters are constantly rewarded by the narrative on account of their materially rich lives that are mostly free of real consequences. None of them seem to work particularly hard, none of them seem to have crises of the non-existential nature, all live a leisurely, meandery lifestyle in aesthetically beautiful surroundings.

basically curb your enthusiasm

yeah it's high quality but I don't know if I can take these people again

All of the characters are constantly rewarded by the narrative on account of their materially rich lives that are mostly free of real consequences.

Ehh I don't really care about this. Would dispute the "constantly rewarded" part too. It's the correct critique for Soloway's movie, Afternoon Delight, but I don't think it applies to the show.

Plus, even in a wealthy milieu it's still a big deal for female/trans actors and filmmakers. And there's the novelty of seeing reform Jewish lives that vaguely resemble mine, or at least share reference points.

(It's not a perfect show by an means obvs.)

Just finished S4 this afternoon and I think it's my favorite season of the series. This one felt less driven by crisis, so the whole family could take some time and do the work of figuring out their own shit and how to go forward, and it's interesting work.

yea I only have ep 10 left ~ its an interesting/smart conceit, I always feel like once shows are a few seasons in you just need to find fresh/new ways to get your characters in one place...a season in Israel was really the perfect way for this particular show to do that imo

I loved this season.

http://deadline.com/2017/11/jeffrey-tambor-leaving-transparent-sexual-harassment-allegations-amazon-jill-soloway-1202211711/

wow. this terrible but I feel like the show ended on a high note if it's over after this past season, which I adored.

i would imagine they're gonna pivot to have the trans actors on the show all be real trans actors which might be the best thing when everything's said and done. I loved tambor in the role but it was hard to justify having him do it except that the show wouldn't have been made without a lead name. Now the show is the name and I think they can make it work.

yeah direction of the show will have to really change. to the point where maybe they need to completely shift it to another family.

I mean, they could literally just recast the role. there is plenty of precedent.

five years in, recasting the primary character would be jarring; but the show is about identity and has played with plenty of things (having Gabby HOffman play her ancestor etc); it could be an interesting creative challenge.

huh so now tambor is saying he's not leaving?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/06/arts/television/jeffrey-tambor-transparent.html

Jeffrey Tambor has been fired from #Transparent following sexual harassment claims https://t.co/PMFr5TE8UB pic.twitter.com/gKZjzLebAP

— Rolling Stone (@RollingStone) February 15, 2018

I feel like this show has an eerie resonance in the Trump era, the flashbacks to Nazi germany subtly warning "Watch out, society may not react as well as you think to this." No idea if that was the intent, but thought of it when I saw this.

https://scontent-lga3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/15894729_351162891933205_724570151774816065_n.jpg?_nc_cat=1&_nc_ht=scontent-lga3-1.xx&oh=16d31eac3026c14c1789a49ec04165e4&oe=5C48EC3F

Han Koehle
January 4, 2017
This photo is usually divorced from its specific content. It is the most famous image of Nazi book burning. Most people assume the specific books don't matter. The horror is at the notion of destroying books, any books, which I can certainly understand. But let's talk about what was in them anyway.

This image shows Nazi-aligned vigilantes (not just government agents) destroying the library of Magnus Hirschfeld's Institute for Sexual Science. Hirschfeld was the founder of modern transgender theory, and it is his displaced students who founded transgender advocacy in the US. Destroying this library destroyed the first central hub of transgender advocacy in the world. This loss is not an inconvenience. Parts of that library can never be replaced.

In the 1910s Earl Lind read one of the books from that library and wrote for a feminist magazine that mothers ought to raise their trans children according to their endorsed gender (as Lind said, their "mental sex"). One hundred years ago there was a movement to normalize trans people. It was based on scientific study and the assertion that the policies of a just society should be based on sound evidence, and sound evidence showed that gender variance was perfectly natural and perfectly healthy. That movement is what was displaced when Nazis stormed the library and burned all the books they found.

We recovered from the loss of Hirschfeld's collection, eventually. We are once again at a place where people write to feminist journals extolling parents (no longer mothers!) to raise their trans children according to the genders of their hearts. But suppressing trans existence is so visible at the heart of the party that just came to power in this country. We'll see what happens next.

Source:
Stryker, Susan (2008). Transgender History. Berkeley: Seal Press.

Edit (10/22/18): over the last 24 hours this post has been attracting attention again. I'm so saddened that this feels so relevant as the administration seeks to legislate trans people out existence. We remember. We #WontBeErased.

where was that posted?

facebook

absolutely brutal review of Soloway's memoir

The truth is, Soloway appears to know little more about trans people now than when she began production on Transparent. She Wants It suggests that when she wrote the show’s pilot, Soloway thought of trans women like her parent as little more than crossdressing men, and the lessons conducted by writer and series consultant Jennifer Finney Boylan (and subsequently trotted out by Soloway on her book tour) are appallingly basic:

The word “trans” is Latin for “bridge,” she taught us next. Then she wrote the word “transbrella” on the whiteboard. “Not everyone is at one end of the spectrum or the other,” she explained. “People use the word trans to refer to all kinds of people, including drag queens, butch lesbians, and genderqueer folks, who metaphorically stand on the bridge, in the middle, rather than using it to cross from one side to the other.

As far as I can tell, the hideous portmanteau transbrella is of Soloway’s own inventing. (Boylan likely used the usual term trans umbrella.) “Bridge,” meanwhile, is a spurious translation of the Latin word trans, which is a common preposition meaning “across.” Evidently no one at Random House could be bothered to crack open the old Wheelock. Do bridges go across things? They do. May one go across a bridge? Reader, this cannot be denied. But I hope, for Boylan’s sake at least, that the Transparent team was told that trans may be thought of as being like a bridge, for pedagogical purposes. This would have been a metaphor, a word which comes from the Greek metaphero, meaning “I carry across”—for instance, across a bridge.

https://www.affidavit.art/articles/no-one-wants-it?fbclid=IwAR3WSqSdCd5uIgAULkBz9ZzkkkA63OtZ-d_aYivujo-VzCOQK9THP8626O0

any word on whether the show is ever coming back? I heard soloway is doing a stage musical based on the mother and Jesus Christ Superstar.

no idea. tbh I never caught the last season and I wasn't that tempted to, even though I actually liked the previous one a fair bit

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/10/amazons-transparent-will-finally-return-as-a-musical

sounds bad

I really liked this show, and it had some wonderful moments, but I am fine if the last season was the last season

From that review Simon posted:

If a Mafia analogy seems crude to you, hold that thought. “I needed to find out why she was going straight to the press with her story, to understand why she hadn’t come to us,” Soloway writes of Lysette. “We could handle this, I wanted to tell her, but let us do it internally, inside the family.” Soloway is never so sulky as in these pages, pouting about her “legacy” and losing any lingering ability to complete sentences: “If Trace released a statement, it would be over for Jeffrey. And that meant Maura. The show. Our TV family. Everything.” In a climactic, chapter-ending scene, Soloway parlays with Lysette at a Coffee Bean picnic table. “I can’t believe you’re doing this,” she tells the actress. “Well, it happened to me,” Lysette coolly replies. What happens next is so incredible that I must quote it at length:

“I had to tell my story,” she said. “But I said in my statement that I wanted the show to continue.”
“But the idea of the show will be tarnished now in everyone’s minds,” I said. “In Middle America when people think of trans people there’s still so much suspicion, and Maura became this beautiful symbol of transness and now you’re laying this imagery out there of her being a predator.”
Suddenly, I started crying.
She was horrified.
“I’m the victim here and YOU’RE crying?” she demanded.
She was right. I was sitting across from her, frozen with fear. I tried to stop myself from crying. Like Michael in The Godfather, I tried to play it stoic and cool. I didn’t say, Fredo, after all I’ve done for you. I said, “I wish you luck.”
And then I walked away.
An hour later the article came out.

I dunno much about this show or them but I gotta say comparing a woman who's been sexually harassed to Fredo is...wow.

Maura became this beautiful symbol of transness

Pretty much every character in the show is an awful terrible selfish person so I take issue with this

Yeah Maura is horrible! They all are, maybe the son is the worst I don't know

i thought the horrible selfishness of all the characters was part of the point of the show.

but a lot of these interviews with Soloway are making me think again

I thought so, but apparently it's about beautiful symbols. xp

tbh though a lot of showrunners have weird ideas about what their shows are about / what makes them good, Soloway is hardly unique in this respect

the last season was very good, people should watch it.

https://www.vulture.com/2019/04/transparent-finale-photos.html

wow that's great, I didn't realize they were going to do a filmed version of this and it seemed a sad way for the series to go out without closure.

well i certainly didn't see this coming
https://www.vulture.com/2019/06/jill-soloway-replaces-bryan-singer-as-red-sonja-director.html

hahaha

so the finale for this debuted and seems to have gotten zero attention. I just stumbled on it the other night and, while I was fucking stoned as I am always when watching TV at 10pm, I thought it was exceptional. searched up reviews and it looks like that's a minority opinion but I thought this was a good way to go out.

i watched this just the other day. i liked it overall, but didn't like the musical portions, which was too bad, because it's a musical! i think it was well done, it's just not my thing (note: i do not like glee).

it was interesting as a structure, though, because it allowed the show to hit a bunch of final season/closure kind of points all in one episode, in a way that made sense within the framework of a musical.

it was actually less of a musical than I was expecting. i thought there'd be no dialogue at all.