Too many storylines with nothing to tie them together, and most of them pointless. The Veep isn’t even the Veep anymore. It’s clear that most of the actors are great as an ensemble, but can’t carry a story on their own. Yhe central theme of the story is gone, replaced by sex jokes. This is exactly what happened to “The League” and was the first thing I thought of five minutes in.
Dan has potential as a storyline as a morning TV host who doesn’t want the job and is trying to get fired, and JLD is a comic genius, but the others either can’t hack it on their own or aren’t getting any attention from the writers.
I’m no prude and the sex jokes are funny, but it’s like a standup club where everyone has the same act. They either need a way to get them all back together for a reason or drop a few of them.
I was horribly disappointed in episode 1. Veep was one of my favorite shows.
I was thinking all the cast will end up reunited as Selena decides to run one more time. It’s not going to be quite the same thing with her out of office, but I think they can hold together another season although it will be more of sitcom like show than it was before. I haven’t seen The League but it sounds like the now popular multiple plot line shows like Modern Family and Life in Pieces. I kind of like that format but Veep had more depth than those shows and the natural story arc of elected office and re-elections that won’t be there now.
The League was about a group of friends tied together in a Fantasy Football League. It
rarely had an episode all about the League, but it was always there to tie things together. The less attention the League got, the worse the show got. The final season was a disaster. It was a great show that completely crashed and burned.
The Season Premiere wasn’t great, but I think after last season ended, it wasn’t going to be (that said, if the show ended last season, what a fantastic ending that season finale would have been). I do feel there is going to be an arc of ‘getting the gang back together’ and maybe not for a Presidential run, but maybe even trying to get back into the Senate. I mean obviously Amy’s relationship with the Nevada would-be governor isn’t going to work and Dan may get himself canned by his horrible co-host.
My absolute favorite moment ever in The League (unfortunately) happened in the very first episode. When two of the guys negotiated a criminal’s jail sentence for the first pick in the draft. It was hilarious and was something they never really recreated. Instead they went with stupid too-fake-to-be-real situations (The Dallas Cowboys lapsed on their website? Yeah, no.) You’re 100% spot on with your assessment of the show.
My opinions on Veep are the same thing. The situations are too-fake-to-be-real and would literally never even come close to happening IRL…but the dialogue and characters are funny enough to keep me placated. But there’s a breaking point to that…and The League definitely reached it. Veep is coming very very close.
The sex humor was stupid enough and unoriginal enough that I clicked away for a little while. But guy-trying-to-get-fired humor still works for me, so Dan’s plotline still cuts a little close.
I think that they will all come back together as the season progresses, probably with most of them ending up working for Jonah. The episode started with Kent working for him and then Ben.
Sue wasn’t in this episode. I hope that we see her back.
Yeah, the idea of Amy ending up the First Lady of Nevada (or First Lady of anything) is probably the weirdest thing they’ve done on the show. So if Selina’s been out of office a year there’s just under 3 years until the next presidential elections, and about 2 years until most of the campaign stuff; if the writers are going that route we’ll need a few more time skips, even if this isn’t the final season.
I saw that Kevin Dunne was on one of the news talk shows last night, Chris Matthews I think, I only caught a little of him at the end but he seemed as politically astute as the character he plays on Veep. My wife let me know it was on with a sudden WTF, she had just finished watching Veep when it switched back to live TV with him on the show still talking politics.
He’s one of the stronger characters and he’s basically playing the same role as the crusty political veteran. His scene as the Uber political consultant fell on it’s face.
That also rang false to me. I can get that his character is supposed to be used to doing things a certain way and expressing himself a certain way, but a guy like him would also be able to readily adapt to his audience.
But whatever, it’s a bunch of “what the characters did during their inter-season vacations” storylines and once we get that crap out of the way, we can get back to the yummily profane and pointlessly cruel goodness that is Veep.