As with others also happy to see Goggins return. Enjoyed City Primeval with its somewhat ambivalent conclusion. Probably very superficial of me, but perhaps the best part of the return to Kentucky was the movement from the color palette of suffused in blue shadowy Detroit to bright clear original Justified. I get the rationale but sometimes the oppressive blues and shadows of Primeval worked too well on mood my watching it.
We need a permanent ban on the Twilight/Ozark blue filter. It was almost impossible to detect what was happening in some scenes that were seemingly filmed in pitch black.
Perhaps I'm in the wrong camp but I've grown tired of the fan service of old characters. Perhaps the recent Star Wars movies did it to me but I was so, so happy with the end of Original Recipe Justified that I was happy to never see Boyd again. It was just a perfect ending.
And now they're going back to that well and starting up more KY content? I'll watch it I'm sure, but I was seriously bummed to see him again.
You’re not wrong that Raylan and Boyd’s final scene was so perfect that there’s nowhere to go but down. I will say, though, that my guess is another miniseries would spend very little time in Kentucky, even if it brought back some combination of Art, Rachel, and Tim. Boyd is heading to Mexico. This would be a fugitive hunt. Which is a very different dynamic from any previous conflicts between him and Raylan. And really for the show. We occasionally saw him hunt fugitives -- including in the show’s best stand-alone episode, with Alan Ricke as the dentist -- but not enough that it will feel like old news if a season is devoted to that.
I don’t think Boyd’s full return in an eventual S2 will ruin his original arc’s ending anymore than it did when a Cheers character returned to visit on Frasier.
An interesting comparison, because I actually really hate the Sam episode of Frasier. Feels like it undoes every good thing Cheers did with Sam in its home stretch.
I don't know. As a Cheers fan who didn't care for Frasier, it was easy enough to just exclude it from the canon—different name, different city, different job, mostly different cast. A Justified-titled reboot with Olyphant already feels like a continuation of the original series; add in Goggins and it's inescapably canon.
To me the power of Justified ending came in part from its definitiveness. Boyd will spend the rest of his days in prison. He and Raylan take a moment to acknowledge their shared history before parting ways for good. It's a powerful scene, and I can't help feeling that this ruins that, at least a little.
Agree...if the subsequent appearance is terrible on a revival/sequel/spinoff, I just ignore it. The original ending will always be there. Anything after that should viewed as a bonus feature.
I think it's pretty official from the original series that Quarles didn't die as a result of losing his arm. When Ava goes back up to Nobles Holler the next season he comments that the last time she was up there "a man lost his arm".
Loved the Justified ending. Interesting that Olyphant has been in 2 of the only 3 revisits/relaunches of shows that IMO have maintained the quality of the original in Justified and the Deadwood movie. (The other would be the spectacular recent revamp of Party Down.)
More whooping over here as well (although tainted by the fact that City Primeval was done and we were unlikely to see Raylan v Boyd for at least a couple of years, if at all). But like the Party Down revival, have loved revisiting Raylan's world (even if he has matured in the intervening period more than any of the Party Down characters).
In Justified, when one of the Detroit police shifted one way and another shifted the other way (I'm trying not to spoil) I felt that their actions were not, well, justified. Did you feel that way? Did it matter?
I felt similarly excited to see Goggins playing the character again, he was excellent as always, but was disappointed in his escape, I can’t imagine telling a story with Raylan and Boyd that would be more compelling than the original Justified finale at this point.
While I liked City Primeval overall and there were many wonderful characters and actors playing them, it did seem a bit too over the top to adapt a single Leonard story into more than 5 1/2 hours of material. That's three hours longer than Jackie Brown!
There is some irony in the general response to the strikes/glut of future TV shows being "I'll just watch stuff I didn't have time for the first time around," considering *that* ridiculous over-investment in "content" is a big part of why the studios are struggling now in the first place.
Since there won't be a lot of new to review in the near future, will you do a re-watch series like the old days of the blog, maybe try to revisit some of the shows of the last five year you liked at the time but had no time to actively write about?
By the way, I wonder how much of the show's budget for this season was wrapped up in the cold open with Cheese slaughtering zombies and in both live action and a fake video game?
I also really loved this week’s episode of Reservation Dogs. So peaceful. It’s like nothing else on TV. I still have 2 episodes of Justified City Primeval to go. I am with you that it was nice to get to know a set of new characters.
I don’t know how much call there is for newspapermen in an MCU where J. Jonah Jameson has gone digital, but would love it if the rebooted Daredevil has Ben Urich turn up alive just for more Vondie Curtis-Hall.
Reservation Dogs is great and that can’t be said enough. I was late to watch last week’s episode, unfortunately, so I’ll mention here that Young Brownie sounded so incredibly spot-on I more than halfway wondered if Gary Farmer was dubbing his voice.
I personally loved the last 15 minutes of Justified City Primeval but I am fully aware that it probably undoes a perfect series ending. That said, City Primeval was such a slog to get through and never figured out what kind of show (or story) it wanted to be. It was lacking so much of the humor, witty banter, and compelling characters of the original. When Winona and Boyd show up at the end, I was nearly yelping. Of the City Primeval cast, Boyd Holbrook and Vondie Curtis Hall were easily the best additions. Everyone else just sort of existed. There was no chemistry between actors or a fun dynamic.
I would have loved to see more of Raylan's Miami life to be honest. There's something so natural about Raylan in Miami. And the scene with Winona/Natalie Zea at the end was so tender and beautiful. And then of course we get to Kentucky, and we know we're headed for something really good...
Just finished City Primeval and I found the whole thing to be a huge disappointment.
First and foremost, there was so much hype about Boyd Holbrook as Clement Mansell and I found him to be a pretty underwhelming villain. Everyone seems to be scared of him for some reason, he's not that smart. Everyone's after this guy and even though he's banging around Detroit boosting cars and dropping bodies, nobody can lay a glove on him. He's not even that capable until we get to the final episode and suddenly he's John Wick.
None of the other new characters seemed all that interesting either, with the exception of Sweety, which is more down to the acting chops of Vondie Curtis Hall than anything actually in the script. I didn't care at all about the relationship between Wilder and Raylan and everyone else seems to be sleepwalking through the script.
Moreover, the plot is very mushy and a lot of pieces seem undercooked or pointless. Mansell and Sweeton have a book with dirt on every big player on Detroit and they use it to amass an amount of money that wouldn't pay for a new Toyota Camry.
Even the dialogue isn't that great. One thing could always count on from Justified are lines that snap and crackle, but I don't think I got a single chuckle out if the whole show. Part of the problem is that this just isn't a Raylan story and there are times when it's pretty clear he's just been grafted in to the narrative.
I'll watch if they make another season, especially if Boyd is in it, but I hope they figure out something better to do with Willa than put her into danger and maybe get Vivian Olyphant to some voice and diction work.
Fully agree that Sweety was the MVP. I absolutely loved his small arc and it's a testament to a great actor that he was able to present a wonderfully three dimensional character that feels so lived in and connected to the show. The stuff with Carolyn and Raylan was incredibly boring but I don't blame the actors. They certainly lack any and all chemistry, so there was no chance that fling or relationship or whatever it was would be interesting but the writing failed them big time. Carolyn is just not a compelling enough character to essentially be the lead whereas Raylan is a supporting character in her story.
I'm going to guess if they bring the series back, they won't bring WIlla back. Vivian Olyphant will be 23 or 24 by the time they get around to filming, and she already did not look remotely 15, so unless they are planning on setting this 5 years in the future, we can just hope this is a Willa-less story. I do hope they bring back Boyd (duh), Wynn Duffy, Winona, and Rachel.
I'd certainly like the chance to clear out some of the backlog. The True Detective push gives me more time to rewatch season 2 (which is much improved on rewatch so far) and finally see season 3. Similarly the new Brit Marling/Zal Batmanglij show getting pushed means maybe I'll finally finish The OA. And there are so many stray shows beyond that—later Girlfriend Experience seasons, Irma Vep, Devs...
Random one I'm curious about is Slow Horses. Season 3 was confirmed wrapped before the strikes, and while I can't find word on it I think Season *4* may have wrapped ahead of the stoppage as well. Will they still release Season 3 before the end of this year as planned? Or will they look to hold 3 and 4 for release in Spring '24 and End '24 the way they did with 1 and 2?
One of the few multi-episode shows that I felt worth watching each episode, rather than just watching the first one and the last 2. Gary Oldman's portrays Lamb wonderfully. The books are great and this show lives up to the books, a hard thing to do.
As with others also happy to see Goggins return. Enjoyed City Primeval with its somewhat ambivalent conclusion. Probably very superficial of me, but perhaps the best part of the return to Kentucky was the movement from the color palette of suffused in blue shadowy Detroit to bright clear original Justified. I get the rationale but sometimes the oppressive blues and shadows of Primeval worked too well on mood my watching it.
We need a permanent ban on the Twilight/Ozark blue filter. It was almost impossible to detect what was happening in some scenes that were seemingly filmed in pitch black.
Perhaps I'm in the wrong camp but I've grown tired of the fan service of old characters. Perhaps the recent Star Wars movies did it to me but I was so, so happy with the end of Original Recipe Justified that I was happy to never see Boyd again. It was just a perfect ending.
And now they're going back to that well and starting up more KY content? I'll watch it I'm sure, but I was seriously bummed to see him again.
You’re not wrong that Raylan and Boyd’s final scene was so perfect that there’s nowhere to go but down. I will say, though, that my guess is another miniseries would spend very little time in Kentucky, even if it brought back some combination of Art, Rachel, and Tim. Boyd is heading to Mexico. This would be a fugitive hunt. Which is a very different dynamic from any previous conflicts between him and Raylan. And really for the show. We occasionally saw him hunt fugitives -- including in the show’s best stand-alone episode, with Alan Ricke as the dentist -- but not enough that it will feel like old news if a season is devoted to that.
I don’t think Boyd’s full return in an eventual S2 will ruin his original arc’s ending anymore than it did when a Cheers character returned to visit on Frasier.
An interesting comparison, because I actually really hate the Sam episode of Frasier. Feels like it undoes every good thing Cheers did with Sam in its home stretch.
I don't know. As a Cheers fan who didn't care for Frasier, it was easy enough to just exclude it from the canon—different name, different city, different job, mostly different cast. A Justified-titled reboot with Olyphant already feels like a continuation of the original series; add in Goggins and it's inescapably canon.
To me the power of Justified ending came in part from its definitiveness. Boyd will spend the rest of his days in prison. He and Raylan take a moment to acknowledge their shared history before parting ways for good. It's a powerful scene, and I can't help feeling that this ruins that, at least a little.
That said, I'll watch a revival in a heartbeat.
Agree...if the subsequent appearance is terrible on a revival/sequel/spinoff, I just ignore it. The original ending will always be there. Anything after that should viewed as a bonus feature.
How about a one handed Quarles who somehow didn't die. Now THAT I'd be interested in if they had to revive a character.
I think it's pretty official from the original series that Quarles didn't die as a result of losing his arm. When Ava goes back up to Nobles Holler the next season he comments that the last time she was up there "a man lost his arm".
Loved the Justified ending. Interesting that Olyphant has been in 2 of the only 3 revisits/relaunches of shows that IMO have maintained the quality of the original in Justified and the Deadwood movie. (The other would be the spectacular recent revamp of Party Down.)
More whooping over here as well (although tainted by the fact that City Primeval was done and we were unlikely to see Raylan v Boyd for at least a couple of years, if at all). But like the Party Down revival, have loved revisiting Raylan's world (even if he has matured in the intervening period more than any of the Party Down characters).
In Justified, when one of the Detroit police shifted one way and another shifted the other way (I'm trying not to spoil) I felt that their actions were not, well, justified. Did you feel that way? Did it matter?
I felt similarly excited to see Goggins playing the character again, he was excellent as always, but was disappointed in his escape, I can’t imagine telling a story with Raylan and Boyd that would be more compelling than the original Justified finale at this point.
While I liked City Primeval overall and there were many wonderful characters and actors playing them, it did seem a bit too over the top to adapt a single Leonard story into more than 5 1/2 hours of material. That's three hours longer than Jackie Brown!
There is some irony in the general response to the strikes/glut of future TV shows being "I'll just watch stuff I didn't have time for the first time around," considering *that* ridiculous over-investment in "content" is a big part of why the studios are struggling now in the first place.
Since there won't be a lot of new to review in the near future, will you do a re-watch series like the old days of the blog, maybe try to revisit some of the shows of the last five year you liked at the time but had no time to actively write about?
By the way, I wonder how much of the show's budget for this season was wrapped up in the cold open with Cheese slaughtering zombies and in both live action and a fake video game?
I also really loved this week’s episode of Reservation Dogs. So peaceful. It’s like nothing else on TV. I still have 2 episodes of Justified City Primeval to go. I am with you that it was nice to get to know a set of new characters.
I don’t know how much call there is for newspapermen in an MCU where J. Jonah Jameson has gone digital, but would love it if the rebooted Daredevil has Ben Urich turn up alive just for more Vondie Curtis-Hall.
Reservation Dogs is great and that can’t be said enough. I was late to watch last week’s episode, unfortunately, so I’ll mention here that Young Brownie sounded so incredibly spot-on I more than halfway wondered if Gary Farmer was dubbing his voice.
Any specific shows you have on top of your list that you missed/skipped previously from the last decade?
More foreign stuff than anything else. Like, I'm still at least a season behind on My Brilliant Friend.
I personally loved the last 15 minutes of Justified City Primeval but I am fully aware that it probably undoes a perfect series ending. That said, City Primeval was such a slog to get through and never figured out what kind of show (or story) it wanted to be. It was lacking so much of the humor, witty banter, and compelling characters of the original. When Winona and Boyd show up at the end, I was nearly yelping. Of the City Primeval cast, Boyd Holbrook and Vondie Curtis Hall were easily the best additions. Everyone else just sort of existed. There was no chemistry between actors or a fun dynamic.
I would have loved to see more of Raylan's Miami life to be honest. There's something so natural about Raylan in Miami. And the scene with Winona/Natalie Zea at the end was so tender and beautiful. And then of course we get to Kentucky, and we know we're headed for something really good...
Just finished City Primeval and I found the whole thing to be a huge disappointment.
First and foremost, there was so much hype about Boyd Holbrook as Clement Mansell and I found him to be a pretty underwhelming villain. Everyone seems to be scared of him for some reason, he's not that smart. Everyone's after this guy and even though he's banging around Detroit boosting cars and dropping bodies, nobody can lay a glove on him. He's not even that capable until we get to the final episode and suddenly he's John Wick.
None of the other new characters seemed all that interesting either, with the exception of Sweety, which is more down to the acting chops of Vondie Curtis Hall than anything actually in the script. I didn't care at all about the relationship between Wilder and Raylan and everyone else seems to be sleepwalking through the script.
Moreover, the plot is very mushy and a lot of pieces seem undercooked or pointless. Mansell and Sweeton have a book with dirt on every big player on Detroit and they use it to amass an amount of money that wouldn't pay for a new Toyota Camry.
Even the dialogue isn't that great. One thing could always count on from Justified are lines that snap and crackle, but I don't think I got a single chuckle out if the whole show. Part of the problem is that this just isn't a Raylan story and there are times when it's pretty clear he's just been grafted in to the narrative.
I'll watch if they make another season, especially if Boyd is in it, but I hope they figure out something better to do with Willa than put her into danger and maybe get Vivian Olyphant to some voice and diction work.
Fully agree that Sweety was the MVP. I absolutely loved his small arc and it's a testament to a great actor that he was able to present a wonderfully three dimensional character that feels so lived in and connected to the show. The stuff with Carolyn and Raylan was incredibly boring but I don't blame the actors. They certainly lack any and all chemistry, so there was no chance that fling or relationship or whatever it was would be interesting but the writing failed them big time. Carolyn is just not a compelling enough character to essentially be the lead whereas Raylan is a supporting character in her story.
I'm going to guess if they bring the series back, they won't bring WIlla back. Vivian Olyphant will be 23 or 24 by the time they get around to filming, and she already did not look remotely 15, so unless they are planning on setting this 5 years in the future, we can just hope this is a Willa-less story. I do hope they bring back Boyd (duh), Wynn Duffy, Winona, and Rachel.
It's so nice to read a piece of Alan's without the non-stop ad assault the Rolling Stone website throws at you.
Hope you're feeling well Alan!
I'd certainly like the chance to clear out some of the backlog. The True Detective push gives me more time to rewatch season 2 (which is much improved on rewatch so far) and finally see season 3. Similarly the new Brit Marling/Zal Batmanglij show getting pushed means maybe I'll finally finish The OA. And there are so many stray shows beyond that—later Girlfriend Experience seasons, Irma Vep, Devs...
Random one I'm curious about is Slow Horses. Season 3 was confirmed wrapped before the strikes, and while I can't find word on it I think Season *4* may have wrapped ahead of the stoppage as well. Will they still release Season 3 before the end of this year as planned? Or will they look to hold 3 and 4 for release in Spring '24 and End '24 the way they did with 1 and 2?
One of the few multi-episode shows that I felt worth watching each episode, rather than just watching the first one and the last 2. Gary Oldman's portrays Lamb wonderfully. The books are great and this show lives up to the books, a hard thing to do.