House Of Cards TV Series

good call on damages. this fits into the same sort of niche, except maybe with less suspense, since its basically all from patty's pov.

Haha I was about to say that no one mentioned Damages, and then I remembered my drunk post. Even apart from the character similarities, the opening titles are *very* Damages: the prestigious-looking typeface (Trajan?), clouds moving over the skyline in time-lapse, quick shots of busy city streets, lingering shots of hallowed stone statues, everything turning from dusk into night.

I'm going to start watching this back-to-back with episodes of The West Wing

miss the damages theme song something serious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsrqKMFdEE

blimey this was a shock

omg

both maria and i were reminded of ayn rand watching the 2nd episode of this last night. kill all the losers! haha! the non-profit loser lady. let her work at walmart! the old lady in the coffee place who can't even work a cash register. what a loser! old reporter hag at the newspaper. step aside, loser! they really make you root for the strong sharks.

You thought it was making you root for Spacey's wife over the office manager she was firing? Seriously?

Sorry, trying to make you root for her, I should have said.

I mean I get that you are meant to root for Spacey's character. His wife, I'm not so sure. That may be bad casting/writing or it may that the charity storyline doesn't seem to fit anywhere yet.

Whether you're meant to root for him or not, Spacey's character is def an anti-hero.

I'm ten episodes in and I think it's gone from 'compulsively watchable' to 'actually quite smart', at least character-wise. Agree that some of the political manoeuvring is a bit silly.

the non-profit loser lady. let her work at walmart! the old lady in the coffee place who can't even work a cash register. what a loser! old reporter hag at the newspaper. step aside, loser! they really make you root for the strong sharks.

I thought the cash register scene was to show ex-Mrs. Penn having a pang of conscience about throwing her old employee back out into the job market where she'd have to be schooled by 18 year olds.

My BF and I had a debate about this scene, I also thought it was a moment of remorse, he thinks it was more confirmation about getting rid of the old, and getting younger people in, hence the younger women fixing the issue. Who knows?

I could see the second reading only if the younger employee had come out and fired the old one

they keep playing with the idea of whether or not the wife is as evil as Spacey-- especially w/ the hospital bed scene

Can we talk about the ending in this thread?

maybe in another week

I thought the cash register scene was to show ex-Mrs. Penn having a pang of conscience about throwing her old employee back out into the job market where she'd have to be schooled by 18 year olds.

Either that or we as viewers were supposed to have a pang of conscience and it was showing Mrs P not to give a shit. But you could read it either way right now.

Given the general direction her character has gone, I think we can assume it's the pang of conscience.

I'm only two episodes in. Gah this format makes online discussion impossible.

"You thought it was making you root for Spacey's wife over the office manager she was firing? Seriously?"

totally. she was a loser. and a whiner. and i KNEW mrs. spacey was gonna have her fire everyone and then fire her. i thought that was funny. old charity worker. old political newspaper writer woman. i don't mind the dog eat dog thing on t.v. they made those characters really unsympathetic. well, especially after the newspaper woman called the young one twitter twat and metro hack.

lady in the coffee place was a loser too. i'm just getting into the spirit of the show. still think spacey should have broke crazy homeless guy's neck though while he was cuffed to the pole.

most unreal scene to me so far the early a.m. b-b-q visit. for some reason. he would have his ribs delivered.

He wants them fresh

I thought the lady in the coffee place reminded Mrs. Spacey why she must be hypervigilant at all times not to decline at all.

YES!

with the sad charity lady i wanted to say to her lady that's right you are 59 years old and you should have kept your head down and done what that bitch told you to do. you better recognize...

Old charity lady, why do you hate african children?

i mean how would you like to work with that sad lump for 10 years? 10 years you'll never get back!

its possible she just so closely resembles an actual person i would hate to work with or for that i became gleeful when she got whacked.

I still haven't finished ep 1 of this, but a big - maybe principal - pleasure of the OG series was seeing suckers getting served, even if - or because? - it wasn't fair.

well there ya go

Definitely read the Starbucks scene as a pang conscience.

Robin Wright is so fucking blank, though. I can't tell if it's great or terrible acting, whether her character is a complete sociopath, etc.
I suspect she might end up the most interesting character.

I found that Starbucks scene heartbreaking, personally.

you would, loser.

hahaha, kidding. this show has me going.

Wright was terrific on Enlightened S1 as the sociopathic hippie frenemy

Scott - probably because you've got your own shop and you're your own boss, you've forgotten what a nightmare it would be to work with people like Zoe Barnes.

i remember. that's why i have my own shop.

Finished! I recommend.

For those wondering, Allen Coulter directs the last two.

haven't seen the uk series (plan to now), but my sense is the u.s. one was very smart in making zoe as much a ruthless climber as everyone else rather than some sort of ingenue.

i love that too. so far. don't know how far she goes yet. gonna watch more tomorrow. loved her aw shucks t.v. interview. that's when i knew she was good at this thing.

ok, at ep 6 the hospital scene is super great for the wife.

Underwood is a totally underhanded badass politician. Underwood for President!

watched two more. felt so bad that he had to go down south and deal with all those losers. ugh. it must be so hard for politicans to go back home to their dumb states.

that bit reminded me v. much of "in the loop". but in the loop probably picked up stuff from house of cards to begin with.

ok, I'm kind of mad at the ending.

I know, even ignoring comparisons to the UK version

End of first half, with 13 more episodes to come...

ending of UK version was fucking perfect.. that red light...

Kate Mara masturbating on her bed for Kevin Spacey is a mental image I could have happily done without.

THE NEW POLITICO seemed like a 1999 vision of a Web 1.0 startup's office, only with MacBook Pro Retinas everywhere.