And Another Thing… Emmys supplementary post 2015

If you’ve arrived here, you probably came from my main Emmys post. Congratulations. If not, you can find it here. If you haven’t arrived here yet, that’s okay. You’ll make it, don’t worry.
Anyway, this is where I’m putting a bunch of thoughts about some of the TV shows I’ve watched this year that don’t really fit into the gently flowing, carefully structured narrative of the Emmys post. Juicy.

Bloodline
I enjoyed Bloodline quite a lot, but goodness me, it believes its own hype. It’s good, but the mystery aspect is played up far too much when what actually happens is quite predictable. The premise sees estranged brother Danny return home for a family event, where he receives a lukewarm reception from his brothers, sister and father. Something bad happened in the past, and Danny was involved somehow, and we have to wait for scraps of the story to be fed to us.
The tantalising mystery is sometimes an effective storytelling method, but I didn’t think it worked at all well here. There was nothing for me to be invested in so early on, and I didn’t especially want to find out more about the bad thing. By the end of the season, the whole thing had fit together very well, the past and present, and the background of each family member. It’s a good show, well-written and well-acted, but it does feel very self-satisfied, particularly in the first few episodes.
I did not find Kyle Chandler’s character (John) particularly interesting. Ben Mendelsohn (as Danny) makes the show what it is, and the other two siblings (Linda Cardellini’s Meg and Norbert Leo Butz’s Kevin) are both very strong. There’s not much more I can say about the show without spoiling it, and it is definitely worth a watch, but don’t expect it to be the new True Detective. You should also not expect the second season of True Detective to be the new first season of True Detective.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine
I started watching this a few months ago, after my pal Simon told me he’d seen some of it and thought it was terrible and I would probably like it. Thanks, Simon. I quite like it, but it’s very hard not to compare it to co-creator Michael Schur’s other recent series, Parks and Recreation, which as I’m sure you know, is one of the best things ever to have been televised. Rather than solving parks in Pawnee, Indiana, though, these people solve crimes in Brooklyn, New York, New York. It’s not in the same league as Parks and Recreation, but the style of humour is similar, it’s very watchable and quite amusing, and it’s not unusual for it to be quite clever. I like it, but I don’t love it.
There are definitely a lot of similarities to Parks and Recreation, though, and they don’t necessarily do the show any favours. Lead character Jake Peralta is not far removed from Andy Dwyer, who possessed the intelligence to be a police officer, but had too much empathy. Both are loveable, silly, childish men, who are ultimately good, loyal, caring people, and hard workers too. Amy Santiago, a dedicated, organised, by-the-book detective who is always keen to impress her superiors, is not dissimilar to Leslie Knope. Ray Holt, the precinct captain who rarely smiles or shows emotion, puts me in mind of Ron Swanson. Detective Rosa Diaz and admin worker Gina Linetti seem to be two separate strands of April Ludgate’s character, and if you didn’t think there was enough Jerry in Parks and Recreation, you’re in luck, because Brooklyn Nine-Nine has two: Hitchcock and Scully. Terry Jeffords and Charles Boyle don’t have a close comparison on Parks and Recreation, but the trend still suggests a lack of ideas in Schur’s arsenal. That’s not to say that Brooklyn Nine-Nine isn’t good, but there may be limited scope for the show’s longevity. Granted, the familiar characters now have new actors putting a different spin on them, and they are in quite a different situation, but there’s only so much you can do with them.
That said, Dean Winters has a recurring role as a troublesome cop from Major Crimes, so I’m happy to sit and watch how this plays out.

House of Lies
This show had been on my radar for a while, and I started watching it out of my love for Ben Schwartz, and a misguided hope that he would be playing a Jean-Ralphio type character. Sadly, he is not, and nor is anybody in sight; everyone is out to make as much money for themselves as possible, and nobody spontaneously bursts into song. The characters are selfish and horrible people. It’s like It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, but they’re much worse and not as funny. It’s a decent show, but the big laughs are few and far between, and none of them are even remotely sympathetic. Marty’s son and father are decent people who are worth rooting for, but they’re in the background most of the time.
Marty means to be a good father to his son – an effeminate boy named Roscoe who sometimes describes himself as genderfluid – but often fails. Roscoe is obviously quite difficult to handle for a conservative parent (although Marty’s own father seems perfectly comfortable with him), and at times Marty deals with this well, fighting for his son’s right to be himself. At other times, he is too busy to put up with any of Roscoe’s shit, and never really seems to spend much time with his son, despite Roscoe living with him, rather than with his mother. Transparent and Orange Is The New Black both feature transgender characters, and do a great job of putting LGBTQ issues in the public eye; House of Lies could do that, but is very inconsistent, and doesn’t seem to know what to do with Roscoe a lot of the time. A lot of his storylines feel very slapdash and, rather than giving hope and reassurance to viewers who might need it, may end up leaving them treading water.

The Newsroom
I’m not alone in liking this show, but it certainly hasn’t taken off like The West Wing has. Noted lefty Aaron Sorkin seems to use Will McAvoy as a mouthpiece to criticise the Republican Party from a position of relative safety, which doesn’t upset me at all, but may have put off some viewers. I’ve seen various comments from Republicans who loved The West Wing despite its politics, so I’m not sure why this doesn’t apply to this show too, but there you are.
Sorkin creates brilliant characters, and he casts extremely well, there’s no doubt about that. As well as Jeff Daniels as the lead character, I loved Emily Mortimer, Alison Pill, Dev Patel, Olivia Munn, John Gallagher Jr., and Thomas Sadoski in their supporting roles, and Sam Waterston was just terrific.
It’s a very easy show to watch; you don’t have to know a huge amount about the news industry or politics to follow most of it, though it doesn’t hurt. It is what any good drama is: characters interacting in high-stakes situations, and there are plenty of those. The Newsroom isn’t The West Wing, it isn’t The Sopranos, and it isn’t Buffy, but it’s full of character driven narrative that makes you want to keep watching. Unlike the news itself.

Orphan Black
This is a cracking series, but you really do need to suspend your disbelief. The premise is fairly off the wall: somebody has figured out how to clone humans, and has unleashed a load of clones into the world. Most of them, though, seem to have gravitated towards the same place under their own steam, and a group of identical women have found each other in Ontario, Canada, against all the odds and not for budgetary reasons at all. Also, various people are after them, including another clone who is a dangerous Ukrainian blonde psychopath. If you think you can handle all that, then climb aboard, but it gets sillier as time goes on. I’ll leave that for you to find out about, though.
It’s really very good, though, and Tatiana Maslany is fantastic in her role as everybody. It’s unusual for one actor to be such an important part of a show, but then, it’s unusual for one actor to play so many characters all at once. As well as being a science fiction fantasy madcap exercise, Orphan Black is a very detailed study of human nature, human relationships, instincts, and priorities. There are no absolute goods, although there are several absolute evils, and almost everything is subject to constant change. It’s also really fun when the clones pretend to be each other, which is what I would do all the time if I were a clone, and we were not being hunted.

Ray Donovan
As a drama with a focus on juggling a life of crime and a family, Ray Donovan will inevitably be compared to The Sopranos and Breaking Bad. Since these are two of the best loved series of recent years, these comparisons may not be favourable. Ray Donovan is quite a different character from Tony Soprano and Walter White, though; while there are two distinct sides to Tony, and Walt descends from a mild-mannered chemistry teacher into Heisenberg over five seasons, Ray almost never lets his tough guy façade slip from the outset.
The series begins when Ray’s father Mickey (Jon Voight) is released from prison following a 20-year term, which brings up a number of issues from the past for Ray and his brothers. What follows is an exploration of these, as well as the strained relationships between Ray and his wife and children. The show never really threatens to be as complex as or hit the heights of The Sopranos or Breaking Bad, but it’s a pretty gripping watch nevertheless. Schreiber and Voight are the main draws, with the brothers and children offering little that hasn’t been seen before (Ray’s daughter Bridget reminds me of a less interesting version of Dana Brody on Homeland, whose arc was one of the few good things about the show before I stopped watching it).
Paula Malcomson is good to watch as Ray’s wife Abby, but she’s no Carmela Soprano, and I’d be lying if I said she was my favourite fictitious redheaded Bostonian frustrated housewife named Donovan. Try as I might, I can’t take Elliot Gould seriously in his recurring role as Ray’s boss, Ezra; he’s not a very convincing hard man, and it’s difficult to imagine him intimidating Ray. He constantly seems to be on the edge of a panic attack or a fit of the giggles; not exactly ideal for the head of a criminal empire. For me, a real highlight of the second season was Wendell “Bunk” Pierce as Mickey’s parole officer, allowing him to make a real departure from his normal roles as police officers, cops, and police cops.

This is all very well and good, but what about who’s going to win the awards? (It is possible that I am wrong.)