Yet another take on True Detective

Tue Feb 25 12:13:45 CST 2014

In a massive change of subject, The Past, by the filmmaker who did A Separation is
first-rate, imho. 

On Tuesday, February 25, 2014 12:54 PM, Indel Icate <indelicateexplasions at gmail.com> wrote:

Here is an opinion regarding Idiot Detective.  First, you mentioned that Woody is ugly.  I take you to mean physickly.  I have to disagree.  Really?  No you meant his character.  Right, he fucked another woman, who was younger, with handcuffs, and whom she happened to be super fucking hot.  It's Hollywood, so sue them.

The great thing about that idiot show is McChaunahey is gorgeous, right, like me, and he's a complete nihilist.  

On Tue, Feb 25, 2014 at 11:29 AM, <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

Look, I really like the show, but I, too, cringed when yet another nubile young woman - she's a clerk at a phone store, not a prostitute - begs overweight, older, drunk, married and, frankly, ugly Woody to fuck her in the ass. And this young woman, with her history of being an abused child turned child-whore, growing up in the strip mall/pork-rind-eating white trash culture, has an absolutely flawless face and body. I guess if she had a little flab on her belly, Woody wouldn't dream of fucking her in any orifice at all. Even Pynchon referenced in V the sad freshman adage that "the ugly ones fuck." Where are the ugly (read: real) women?  Maybe my complaint is with the casting director: aside from the younger black detective (who's merely averagely attractive), and Matt (who cleans up well in the younger scenes, but isn't what you'd call stunning, given the character's weird personality) every man on the show is ugly. The redneck men don't have flawless
 faces and bodies - no, that wouldn't be realistic, would it? They're overweight, scarred, tattooed, pierced and butt-ugly. Poor Michelle W. - after years of a bad marriage to Woody, she doesn't even earn the right to a double chin or a little flab? Presumably, if she'd "let herself go," we'd see Woody's fucking around as justified. Oh, and where are the black women? Two black male detectives, and a token black male preacher in the first episode - who's in his congregation? Not sexy enough to be hookers or bimbos for Woody?
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>You mention Sherlock, Monte. Again,two main white male characters - but lots of eye candy for women. The show's launched practically a mass movement in China: 
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> http://www.thewire.com/culture/2014/01/chinese-women-cant-stop-reading-and-writing-sherlock-gay-fan-fic/357046/  
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>Yes, the truth is finally out about what women want. We want to see straight guys doing each other. We want to write and think and snicker about it. Why? Because it's an absolute thrill for us to see men treated as sex objects, for a fucking change.  
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>
>Laura
>-----Original Message----- 
>>From: Monte Davis  
>>Sent: Feb 25, 2014 10:44 AM 
>>To: rich  
>>Cc: kelber , "pynchon-l at waste.org"  
>>Subject: Re: Yet another take on True Detective 
>>
>>
>>I admire Nussbaum, but this time I think she's tasking TD with the sins of many lesser movies and TV shows trading in detective bromance, victimized women etc. Yeah, they've been abused a lot, but they get all their  "These tropes are so easy and abused by now." 
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>>She writes as if she fears that viewers are putting Rust Cohle on a pedestal for his philosophic insight. Huh!?! Is there any question he's as whacked-out as the whole Yellow King cult put together? This is like criticizing Sherlock for not acknowledging that the brilliant Holmes is socially awkward and isolated... 
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>>Also: I've known T-Bone Burnett was a stone genius producer since Los Lobos and Elvis Costello CDs thirty years back, but he's amazing me all over again every Sunday night with the TD music. 
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>>On Tue, Feb 25, 2014 at 9:26 AM, rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>the other shows she mentions Top of the Lake and The Fall were very good and just as good as true detective, with strong female leads. neither is really likable  as are the detectives in True detective. But to criticize a show for not having a strong female lead is like whining that the aforementioned shows above not having a strong male lead (they really don't). Moreoever, the focus is on these two male detectives with all their shortcomings--thats the strength of the show. Woody Harrelson's wife doesnt strike me as a weak character. The circles of whores, junkies, rural white trash, the overly sexualized religious atmosphere, the characters they come across fits the story. thats how I see it anyway
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>>>On Mon, Feb 24, 2014 at 11:50 PM, <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:
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>>>Yeah, the woman to bimbo ratio is pretty miniscule.
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>>>>http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/television/2014/03/03/140303crte_television_nussbaum?currentPage=1
>>>>
>>>>LK
>>>>-
>>>>Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>>>>
>>> 
>> 
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l 
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