[Lucky]

You see my problem with the show and basically FX shows? Everyone on the damn show is evil! This week's episode not only advanced Tara as more nasty and less like the person she was when this started but managed to corrupt the ONE character on the show that was an honest to God good guy. Now there's NO ONE! I mean... I guess anyone under the age of 10 is still a good guy. And that nanny who showed up in 1 episode. She's a good guy.

Also, since I'm here can ANYONE justify that scene last season when Tara and Jax make love 2 feet away from the rotting corpse of the rapist they just murdered in cold blood? Because THAT's the moment I decided this show would be nothing more than amusing trash because that was just HORRIBLE. Am I just in the minority on this? Did I miss the comic genius or emotional significance of two people engaging in such a terribly creepy act? Because that's still bugging me.

I should say that I only watched S1 2 weeks ago, right before the S2 premiere. So this stuff is still fresh in my mind and I'm still very much a new viewer.

EDIT: Also, just in case it comes up, I STILL haven't watched the final season of the Shield so I'd appreciate it if no ultimate spoilers were casually dropped just because you reasonably assume I finished it. My thanks.

[Byrntrigan]

I liken SoA to the Attitude era. No clear cut good guys, no clear cut bad guys.

Hale is using the Nods to oust SoA and I reckon it'll only push him closer to SoA when the Devil he doesn't know turns out worse then the Sons.

As for the justification there is none per se. Call it shock, call it wanting to feel something other then the crushing feeling of almost being raped and then watching a murder. I dunno.

Ultimately the Sons have a sense of "honor" that the other gangs don't have. Children and women don't get targeted by them, they check places before blowing them up etc.

It's all shades of gray...

[Lucky]

Its really not "gray", isn't it? I mean, Jax is NOT a good guy. He's a gun dealer and a murderer. And I'm not talking about cold blooding killings of rapists who threaten the love of his life. I'm talking about blowing up crazy militia guys and killing God knows how many fellow criminal bikers and contributing in the death of a man under the false pretense that he killed his friend's wife. I'm talking about dragging women like Tara and that biker slut he picked up on the road into dangerous and criminal environments. Raising his son in this world. And Jax is better than Clay and Trig, sure. He wants less violence and less criminal behavior. But he's still doing it and guilty of it. There are no good guys in SAMCRO. They're all scum criminals who should be locked in prison and by all rights will rot in hell if there is one.

And this isn't a judgment of you the viewer or anything. Its shocking escapism. There's nothing inherently wrong with watching a bunch of evil fuckers do crazy shit and in the back of your mind say "Man, imagine if my life was like that." I'm watching too. I just can't really CARE about these people because they are BAD people. They ARE "heels." Some of them are just objectively worse than the others, and honestly as Jax walks around killing people and keeping secrets and plotting against the MC and Opie betrays his responsibility as a father I question if even that's true.

And that's just a big reason why I can't regard it any more than that trashy True Blood show I watch with bemusement. Hale IS a bad guy. He's allowing crimes in his town, allowing drug dealing to a lower class community of hard workers. He's doing this because he's tired of waiting for a way to legally fight SAMCRO and stop them the right way. And thus he's folded and agreed to do things the wrong way and become exactly what he hates. A criminal justifying his action by claiming they net good results.

[Lucky]

You know what the problem is? I apologize to any SoA fans who think I'm just spouting off negative comments of their show for no reason. You're right. I've been hanging around the SomethingAwful TV forums too much. And I've noticed this weird thing about watching TV shows like this. The audience isn't really like me.

Supernatural: Thread filled with women obsessing over the appearance and behavior of the pretty male leads and hating on all the females who walk on set. Many occasionally hinting that they'd love to find out some of the characters are gay.
Glee: Thread filled with people who were in the glee club growing up, felt ostracized, and love seeing a world in which everything they've ever felt was justified. And lots of gay posters.
Sons of Anarchy: Thread filled with dudes screaming about how they want to buy a Harley or wear the SAMCRO gear Jax did. Just a bunch guys reveling in this crazy world and not so secretly wishing they could be scary bikers who beat the crud out of people, bone strippers and mistreat them, and live outside the law.
Big Bang Theory: Thread filled with nerds who actually UNDERSTAND everything the characters are saying and RELATE TO the horrible socially inept and most likely mentally damaged main character. A lot of people saying "Man, I love Sheldon because like him I have no friends because everyone is too stupid to be my friend."

Its just a weird thing I've noticed of late that has nothing to do with you guys. So I was just reacting in the wrong place. My apologies.

[punk/core]

I enjoy it. I don't need for a character to be inherently good for me to get behind them. If they're interesting, that's good enough for me.

Plus I tend to root for the sinners much more than the saints anyway. When it comes to TV and movies, at least.

[Byrntrigan]

Sept 24, 2009 0:04:58 GMT -5 Lucky said:

You know what the problem is? I apologize to any SoA fans who think I'm just spouting off negative comments of their show for no reason.

You're sharing your opinions, so no apology needed.

I can see why people might want to be like SAMCRO, I personally don't, but I guess I could see why some would want to.

Most people I think just want to stand up for themselves, since most people don't in real life, so it really is escapism at it's finest.

Oh and on Tera, I was really disappointed that she took the passive aggressive way to "defend" her man.

[Byrntrigan]

Sept 24, 2009 0:10:54 GMT -5 punk/core said:

I enjoy it. I don't need for a character to be inherently good for me to get behind them. If they're interesting, that's good enough for me.

Plus I tend to root for the sinners much more than the saints anyway. When it comes to TV and movies, at least.

Good villains are needed to make even better heroes. Comics, wrestling, movies etc...

[OpTard]

lucky, i just skimmed the thread since i don't watch the show and wouldn't know the specifics, but here and in other threads you seem to dismiss shows like this or the shield simply because they're about the bad guys. you call them "shock TV" and "escapism," which to me means you're saying that they're cheap and without compelling story but the only reason you give for being that is that they're about the bad guys. why does compelling, smart television have to be about the good guys? and why, just because the main character(s) probably deserve to be in jail, does that make the story not compelling or smart?

i can only speak on the shield, but i don't think that was shock for the sake of shock at all. i think it was bad people doing bad things, and they showed those bad things, and there was a "cool" factor to it, but i don't think anyone (for the most part) was expecting/hoping that everyone would just get away with it scott free (though i admit, i was kinda hoping for ronnie).

and i thought the show was very smart, especially in the way that nothing was ever forgotten. every bad thing they did came back to haunt them in one way or another in a later season. and it all pieced together into a very intriguing story.

but the impression i get from you is all of that is negated simply because "where's the good guy?" i think it's unfair to call them "shock" or "escapism" for that reason. if the story is deep and compelling, why does it need to have a good guy to be legitimate?

[creepy]

I know this chick who can't enjoy or even watch a movie if there's not a good guy. Of course, she loved Taken, where the only "good guy" was killing everyone and not giving a fuck who they were and she likes Titanic, where, if I'm not mistaken because it's been 12 years since I've seen it, there is not a "good" main character. Basically, if it fits her ever ranging scope of what she thinks fits her "rule" then it's good. Of course, her rules on being a vegetarian are equally loose.




Also, music by the Lions and the Toadies have been used (are being used?) on the show, from what I've been told.

[Byrntrigan]

Yep. Toadies stuff is in there. I figured you'd notice that

[creepy]

Never seen SoA. Just heard about it. Coincidentally, I picked up their UK only ep while I was in London. Happy campa.

[Lucky]

Tard, I don't think Shield is dumb at ALL. I actually think the Shield is a very strong and nuanced show. Is there a level of shock in it? Clearly, but there's also well written and acted characters and stories. I don't see the same thing in SoA. I see one dimensional character with heavy handed writing built around a show designed to give you sex and violence. People compare SoA to the Shield all the time because of the similar content and mutual writers but ultimately it reminds me a lot more of Nip/Tuck in terms of quality and style.

I can understand why you said something because I had similar "there is no good guy" comments about the Shield, but I swear that's a different beast entirely. I love the Shield. My apprehension was that the show would ultimately not pay off on punishing the bad guys as they should be just because the bad guys were the main and most popular characters. And that

SPOILER: Click to show

some of the turns the show took since the 1st episode seemed designed to take the guilt off Vic and put it on the corrupt people around him. At some point the show stopped feeling like the story of a corrupt cop and started feeling like a cop trying to deal with corrupt politicians, corrupt IAD officers, corrupt partners who betray him. And I felt the proper end for the show is Vic getting his proper punishment, but I was worried the way it was going that too many fans wanted to see it different and that the show itself had changed their mind on Vic since the 1st season.

But again, I have not watched the last season yet so I'd appreciate it if you didn't tip me off as to whether my fears were unnecessary or played out.

And no, I can very well enjoy a story that doesn't have good guys. I still love watching Payback in which the opening scene is designed to show you what a horrible person the lead character is. I'm not one who likes to wallow in the stories about how bad people are or how screwed up stuff is, but a good story is a good story. Just like I will enjoy a Sci Fi movie if its real good even though I don't like the genre, I'll take to a villain driven show or movie. My simple problem is that SoA IS a morality play. It IS the story of some bad people running things and some better people who are trying to change the way things are. And in that end I think having no ACTUAL good people or anyone you can ACTUALLY look to as well meaning or moral hurts the story.

[Lucky]

Ok, I crapped on it so I'll just go ahead and admit that tonight's episode hit a HR. I mean, its still hackneyed and the characters are tough to sympathize with and the musical endings are just a cheap and easy emotional device. I mean, should I really feel bad that Tara's mean boss is gonna screw her when on an understandable belief when I know she Tara should actually be in prison (or death row) for murder?

But still. Tonight delivered. It was like a HR over the RF wall in Yankee Stadium or that wraps around the Pesky Pole in Fenway... Not a towering 400 foot shot that makes us awe. But a HR's a HR. And its not genius and I think every SOA fan saw it coming in Ep1 but it was still played very well how the act Zoebelle did to try and tear SAMCRO apart ended up bringing them back from the edge. Predictable as hell, but well executed.

[Byrntrigan]

and then this week's episode went further and was even better in my opinion.

It's good to see the characters actually learning and having an arc.

For example Chibbs deathly afraid and not knowing what to do and Gemma helping him. Shit, even look what they did with Piney...

I'm sad we only have 2 episodes left.

[Lucky]

I'm not. I like the show but I think a lot of these short season cable shows really benefit from the short season. Shows like Sons of Anarchy and True Blood are so cheesy and flawed that I think they'd be hurt if you slowed things down or gave the audience more. And shows like Psych and Burn Notice are so formulaic that the audience would get sick of it. Done right these short cable seasons manage to find that perfect point where the audience is jacked up and wants more but just before they get tired of formula and flaws.

Of course the reason i don't want more than 2 episodes could well be that for me it hasn't been a 13 episode (or whatever season. Since i watched S1 the weeks before S2 its really been like 1 long "full" season to me. So that probably explains why (a) some of the cheesier holes in the show were wearing on me and (b) why I'm not sad to see it go on break.