For me this is perhaps the best television show ever produced, certainly my favorite of shows I would put at the top of quality. I don’t own many dvd’s but I have the box set for seasons one and two of this.
Anyone else a Roustie?
It was one of my biggest disappointments when they didn’t finish this but I love watching what they did make over and over again, I can fill the rest in with my own imagination.
Go ahead and discuss anything related here, liked it, didnt like it ect.
I loved it, but the unfinished aspect ruins it for me. I don’t want to rewatch it because I know it will never be finished.
Amazing show, but also deeply flawed. The pace was just waaaaay too slow, the plot impossible to follow without reading notes from the creator online(just for instance bearing an avatar or the omega drives the mother to insanity) the cryptic clues were piling up so high I felt like I should be taking notes. Many episodes were in desperate need of an editor, the show often felt like a good novel but one that was sprawling out of control.
In my opinion HBO should have laid out at the beginning the show would never get more than two seasons, that way they could have cut some stuff and picked up the pace and it would have been amazing.
Carnivale is one of my favorite shows of all time, but I have to agree with all of the above (except I didn’t find it too slow), especially the problem with all the important backstory staying in the creator’s head instead of making it into the show. It’s a tragedy that HBO won’t sell the rights back to Dan Knauf so he could continue the story in another medium (preferably a novel, so he can spend all the time he needs fleshing out the world without worrying about time-, space-, or money-constraints).
I vastly preferred the Brother Justin plotline to the carnival plotline, but I also found it very frustrating, especially in the second season. Once in a while I’ll rewatch the first season, but I never make it more than a few episodes into the second season before I give up in mild depression. Too many unfulfilled possibilities.
Gorgeous, fascinating show, though. There really is nothing else like it out there – even the comparisons with Twin Peaks aren’t really appropriate. Also, I credit it for sparking my lasting interest in 1930s history, fashion, film, and music. I think I’ll listen to some Ruth Etting now in the show’s honor. 
Have you read the wiki article Mythology of Carnivale? Knauf’s background mythology about the avatars and rules of succession were incredibly detailed.
I just got done rewatching the entire series. It’s such a shame that it ended so abrubtly.
I think Carnivale did a great job of capturing the look and feel of the period, and the casting was brilliant. The pacing of the show also tied into that.
the divemaster and i threw things at the screen when we found out it wouldn’t be back. we were utterly hooked. absolutely mesmerizing production. huge shame it will never get finished.
We loved the show as well, and if I remember correctly, it was thisclose to being renewed, but they decided not to at the last minute - damn! Great cast, great stories and excellent mood/cinematography.
The interesting thing is that if they renew it they could set it in modern day, ancient times, or anywhere in between based on the Avatars. I doubt we’ll ever see Carnivale again because most of the stars (particulary Nick Stahl and Clea Duvall anyway) have moved on, but Daniel Knauf has said he has other projects from the same universe to pitch.
One thing that bothered me about the ending: Why bother healing Reverend Balthus (Ralph Waite) from his stroke only to have Justin kill him 2 minutes later? I thought Balthus would be the one to do Justin in.
We loved Carnivale and will forever HATE HBO for canceling it. Amazing television.
I’m really heartened by the responses here, sometimes I think I’m alone in a wilderness of tasteless knaves. Glad to get proven wrong.
Personally I love a story that has enough detail that you don’t quite know exactly why everything is the way it is, adds to the suspension of disbelief for me, makes me feel like it’s a real world with more and more around every corner.
The pacing was epic, which for me felt perfectly appropriate. I think if things progressed faster it would have cheapened the storyline and characters. One of the best things the show did was instill integrity in the supernatural. It wasn’t just a gimmick, it was a universe.
I LOVE Carnivale. I’ve watched it about 10 times and pick up on so many different things each viewing. So disappointed they never got to Alamagordo, N.M. as hinted at. I thought the tar and feathering scene was absolutely hair-raising, and the family with the coochie dancing daughters! Casually renting them out as prostitutes! (I read somewhere this was based on actual fact, but can’t find anything about it.) Oh, I could go on and on, but it was a wonderful, eerie show that really was spell binding. (If you ignore the very last couple of minutes at the end, when the carnival is moving out - you could sort of consider that a satisfactory ‘ending’).
Love Carnivale! It’s not my favorite HBO show, I like Deadwood and the Wire more, but Carnivale is the show I most regret HBO cancelling. The Wire got to run its course, Deadwood was at best a season or two away from being done, but Carnivale had so much more left in it.
I loved the explanation of some of the supernatural elements. The big example is that when Ben heals somebody it isn’t without consequence: it takes that health from somewhere else.
My favorite character was probably Professor Lodz (loved his relationship with the bearded lady). Another moment I loved was when Justin shows Norman Balthus the worst act Balthus ever committed, expecting it to be rape or murder or whatever, and it was saving him and Irina (what a cold killer she was) as children.
The scene where the murdered one is looking through the window at the Carnivale leaving and miner’s hand pulls her away is one of the creepiest, goosebump raising scenes ever filmed. Samson deserved an Emmy for that episode.
What would you guys have liked to see happen in the third season?
I wondered if Ben, in the back of that wagon, was now going to be the new “Management”. Or if he somehow would have rallied and healed. As this took place in the '30’s, leading up to WWII, the development of the atomic bomb (as hinted at earlier), and what involvement some of the Carnivale people had with that, is a question with no answer. I think Ben would have tried to use his magic powerz to try to derail the making of the bomb, and failed. Though he would have died heroically.
Wasn’t Samson as the head of the carnival just wonderful in his role? Too bad the actor playing him passed away IRL.
Are you sure? Wikipedia and IMDB show him as still alive and he’s got acting credits right up to 2011. I hope not, anyway. And you’re right, he was awesome in that role. Easily my favorite character of the show.
I was just about to link that as well, Terraplane.
Anyway, my wife and I loved Carnivale and were disappointed a bit with the ending. The showdown between Hawkins and Brother Justin was so gripping, then to see Justin still alive at the end with Sofie. Argh. And I liked Sofie so much up until then.
Anyway, it was a great series. There was a nice, mythic quality to it with an epic arc playing out. Some of the bits dragged a bit and it is unfortunate that it had to end after 2 years.
Woops, my mistake! You are right, he is still alive, I didn’t check it out. Another Carnivale fan insisted Michael J. Anderson died, HBO didn’t want to recast his role, and that’s one of the reasons it was cancelled. He was great though. I also loved his ‘ex-wife’ on the show - her role, not his actual ex. She was the real-life lady with ‘lobster hands’ who had been a TV anchor for a while.
Sofie was a character I wanted to like but just…couldn’t. I don’t know if it was the character or the actor, though, since everything else I’ve seen Clea Duvall in, she’s been prickly and off-putting there too. I did feel sorry for her at times because, Lord, girl had a hard life, and I would have loved to see where “Sofie is the Omega” would have gone.