We just picked up The Big Bang Theory and watched the first two episodes tonight. I think we have a winner. It has some sort of following, doesn’t it?
Well, I searched this thread for “The Americans” and was surprised I didn’t find it anywhere. It runs on the FX Network on Wednesday nights. It has just shown the final episode to its 2nd season and there won’t be any new episodes until Season 3 begins. It has been renewed for a third season. I just don’t know when that Season will begin broadcasting.
It is my new most favorite show and IMHO, it may well be the very best drama currently running on TV. I would say it is tied with Game of Thrones - but GoT is not a drama - it’s a SciFi or something like that. But the two of them are the very finest shows on TV today. Again - that is just my opinion.
I won’t tell you much about The Americans. It’s about deep cover government agents. But it is extremely well done and it has some very beautiful people (both men and women) and we get to see a fair amount of nude scenes. But the reason it is so good is because of it’s “gripping” power. By “gripping”, I mean that once you start watching it, this show will grab ahold of you and grip you in your seat and you will not want to get up or walk away until it’s over. It often gets your heart to pounding with excitement. IMHO, “gripping” power is the single most important factor when deciding how much I like a movie or TV show.
Bottom line? I can’t say enough good things about it. If you take a quick look through its thread in this forum, you will see a fair bit of arguments concerning its “realism”. At times, it can def be very unrealistic. But it’s not full of unrealistic events. It does have its share. But the reason I love this show is not because it is a realistic depiction of what occurred in the 1980s in America. The writers do stretch the truth and stretch your imagination at times. If you cannot accept that, then perhaps this is not the show for you.
There is an expression that reads something like, “it will suspend disbelief” or something like that. I can’t remember exactly what it is. But I guess if you want to give this show a try, you will have to be prepared to accept that some of the events will be very unrealistic. If you are willing to accept that, I would recommend this show to you with mighty great enthusiasm.
Good luck to you!
FYI: I found the following info on “suspension of disbelief” in Wikipedia:
Suspension of disbelief or willing suspension of disbelief is a term coined in 1817 by the poet and aesthetic philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who suggested that if a writer could infuse a “human interest and a semblance of truth” into a fantastic tale, the reader would suspend judgement concerning the implausibility of the narrative. Suspension of disbelief often applies to fictional works of the action, comedy, fantasy, and horror genres. Cognitive estrangement in fiction involves using a person’s ignorance or lack of knowledge to promote suspension of disbelief.
The phrase “suspension of disbelief” came to be used more loosely in the later 20th century, often used to imply that the burden was on the reader, rather than the writer, to achieve it. This might be used to refer to the willingness of the audience to overlook the limitations of a medium, so that these do not interfere with the acceptance of those premises. These fictional premises may also lend to the engagement of the mind and perhaps proposition of thoughts, ideas, art and theories.[1]
Suspension of disbelief is often an essential element for a magic act or a circus sideshow act. For example, an audience is not expected to actually believe that a woman is cut in half or transforms into a gorilla[2] in order to enjoy the performance.
Charlie, The Americans wasn’t mentioned because this is a thread that was last posted on in 2012.
Oh my. I had no idea. But, tell me, what do you think about that show? Is it reasonable to recommend it in this thread?
Oh, why oh why would you ever say such a thing?
I gurantee you there are a great many people who would love to trade places with you.
People in prison, people confined to a hospital, people otherwise confined to institutions would all love to be able to lounge around and watch some entertainment.
I’m just positive about that.
You really need to consider things from their perspective. I think that would leave you feeling a whole heck of a lot better.
Yes indeed!
Yes indeed, dude!
Can anyone who has watched this show (Doc Martin) please tell me what is going on with that dog? I’ve only watched the first season and a few shows into the second season and it’s kind of funny that dog is never explained and the doctor never asks anyone about it. I figure maybe it belonged to the previous doctor?
It’s a real mystery. How does it survive if the doctor keeps kicking it out of his office and it has nowhere to go and nothing to eat? This must be one of many British attempts at humor. It is actually quite funny. I like the mystery and I like this show. Does anyone know for certain where it came from and why it’s always hanging around his surgery? (I think “surgery” is the British word for “doctor’s office”).
P.S. This is a very good show for adults. It may be British. But it was so nice to find a new TV show that was not about vampires or werewolves or teenagers with magical powers like the ability to become invisible.
I would like to recommend this show to anyone who thinks they may be interested in a show about a doctor in a seaside sleepy town that has loads of problems. (the town - not the doctor)
There is a show called Misfits that is about teenagers with magical powers. It is British and it’s actually pretty good considering that it’s about teenagers with strange magical powers.
For example, one of the girls is very pretty and sexy and her magical power is that whenever she touches a man, the man then wants to have sex with her.
Well, I got news for the writers. That does not have to be a magical power. It is an ordinary power and most all pretty and sexy teenage girls have that exact same power. Really.
And as far as one of the boys’ power goes, he becomes invisible sometimes. Problem is that he can’t control when he becomes invisible and when he becomes visible again. It’s just kind of random. Tha is not a very good power. I could very well become the opposite of a power. It could just get him into a lot of trouble. It’s not a very good ability to possess. Maybe if he could control it better, it could be useful. But random invisibility is just kind of stupid - not a power.
So, I would have to say that … all in all … this show is really missing a few parts. It needs to be better written.
There are some other new shows that are about young people. But they are also kind of weak cuz they’re missing some important components.
Gosh! What is wrong with TV shows today?
I know this is an old thread, but for people who liked Eureka, Warehouse 13 is in the same universe (with the occasional cross-over character). It just ended, and the final episode was sort of “meh”, but as long as you don’t mind your disbelief being completely strangled, it’s good fun.
Alphas is also supposed to be in the same universe but has a VERY different feel; I watched the first season and didn’t bother with the second (it may be on the third season).
The Dead Zone (with Anthony Michael Hall and Nicole deBoer) was fun, though it ran 6 seasons and apparently it was stopped unexpectedly - no time to wind up a huge loose end. It was an entertaining ride though. Loosely based on a Stephen King story (and later standalone movie).
I just want to say thank you to NAF1138 for recommending the show Doc Marten.
It starts out kind of slow. But it’s OK. After about 8 episodes however, it gets really superb. The episode where his parents come for a visit was the first episode that I thought was just outstanding and after that, they were all really excellent.
This show is really deep. On the surface, it’s nice story about a rural seaside community and a new doctor who doesn’t seem to fit in at all with the people living there. But the more I watched, the more that I learned about the doctor and the reasons why he had the personality he did. It just became a very entertaining experience after that.
If you are an adult, I would be very happy to recommend this show to you. Not because it has a lot of adult kind of experiences. It’s just that I think adults would find it much more entertaining than children.
Anyway, if you are looking for a new quality TV drama/comedy, this one is really good. It starts out mostly as drama but the more you watch, the more you get to appreciate the underlying comedy. I think you really need to watch each episode twice. I got a lot more out of each episode the second time I watched it.
Oh yes, it has quite a following. I’m a fan.
I just learned there are popular Big Bang Theory-themed bars in China with episodes of the show running continuously. One Chinese lady who does the subtitles said she liked to do it because it taught her how to be a nerd, because “smart is the new sexy.”
I just watched my first two episodes (random ones that DVR happened to pick up after my wife started recording it.) Great show! and we watch too many murder dramas, so it’s nice to have a show that doesn’t start with a grisly death for a change. One thing that’s nice about the show (at least, the eps I saw) is that you don’t have to know the history to appreciate it. Quirky and humorous. Is Doc supposed to be autism-spectrum? Sure seems like it.
We didn’t watch that at first; we don’t care for horror genre and assumed, but were wrong. Somehow my wife and son caught the beginning of a marathon of these, and we ended up watching the rest of the series. I really liked it as long as they kept it episodic, until they got into the “deep story” near the end. (That happens to me a lot. I have nothing against deep stories, but I think a lot of series that start out as episodes and then turn to the long story mode just don’t do it very well.)
I keep considering picking up a fistful of 24 seasons. I only watched a couple episodes, and I know I’d enjoy the lot. We don’t have Netflix but are thinking of re-joining – do they carry it?
I’m working my way through Damages now, which I really like, after finishing Friday Night Lights and The Wire.
Recommend Damages.
Not sure if it meets your 4 seasons criteria or not, but I can recommend a BBC police procedural called “New Tricks”.
If you like understated British comedies that are occasionally very funny, look up “As Time Goes By”, Staring Judi Dench, et. al… It ran for 13 seasons, 1992 - 2005.
What about Perry Mason? I’ve seen 3.5 seasons’ worth of it (1957-early 1961) from the DVD releases, and IMHO, it has very much lived up to its legacy.
So now we’re up to about the middle of the third season of The Big Bang Theory and enjoying it immensely. A couple of Sheldon-type quibbles though.
We’ve caught Sheldon in a mistake. In the third season, he’s arguing on the phone with a Thai restaurant. To make a point, he lectures them on something that King Rama IV of Siam did in the mid-18th century. Well, no, he meant the mid-19th century, specifically the years 1851-68, the years of King Rama IV’s reign. He did say mid-18th century – we backed it up to check.
Also, the theme song’s lyrics “We built a wall (we built the pyramids).” Assuming they mean the Great Wall of China. that was built much later than the pyramids. I wonder why they have it out of order in the song. Everything else has a nice chronological flow.
But it’s a great show. Highly recommended.
I have to agree about Big Love and Homicide. They were excellent. But Saving Grace was a big disappointment for me. Every episode was very similar to the previous one. I don’t mean the plot of the episode. But all the characters and all their relationships. They were always the same and I guess I just got bored.
Also, I have always liked Holly Hunter and I’ve enjoyed her work for a long time. But in this show, she is actually over 55 years old (born March 20, 1958 and the show was made between 2007 & 2010) and acting like a 20 something or a 30 something. I’m sorry but I just found that to be very hard to watch. It really damaged my enjoyment of the show. Maybe that is why this show only ran for 3 seasons? Once she hit 60 that image would have been fairly impossible to maintain.
“Holly!” You can’t play a 30 something when you are pushing 60 or over 60. It just isn’t realistic.
Yeah, it’s one of my favorite sitcoms of all time. My friends and I were just like them growing up except we weren’t that smart.
I don’t know if you’ve gotten to the part where Sheldons’ mom shows up yet but she and Sheldon together are hilarious. She’s only in a couple of episodes but I wish she was in more.
We’ve seen her in a couple so far, so she appears early on. I have to say she’s my least favorite part of the show, but I’d probably find her more funny if I weren’t from Texas myself and didn’t remember her ilk so well.