Boardwalk Empire: looks like another must see from HBO

[Art Shirk]

Truly bizarre yet still strangely compelling.

Hope Jimmy's death doesn't lead to diminished Gretchen Mol's boobies.

Fack, it was my fault for checking in, especially being episodes behind, but Jimmy dies? He fuckin rules.

[PNWbrit]

Oooops

Sorry Mark.....

[Art Shirk]

Oooops

Sorry Mark.....

Totally my bad. I will have to name my next dog Darmody as a tribute.

[PNWbrit]

I thought that character became increasingly over/poorly acted. Think it's a function of the previously mentioned emphasis on depth of scene rather than depth of story.

Other nominations for over actORing go to the the guy with the mask, and the Micky Doyle character.

[neckdeep]

I'm glad they killed Jimmy. It was a good storyline but until the last two eps, it was getting repetitive. Jimmy had painted himself into a corner in many ways, acted recklessly and disloyaly, despised himself and basically didn't give a fuck about life. To keep him alive longer would have been narratively pointless. I like writers with the guts to shake things up and give us new things each season, like the way The Wire shifted from season to season.

[Moeghoul]

Can't wait to see Nucky's reaction when he gets home and asks his new bride for the property deed..............

[Blashyrkh]

I agree that Jimmy's character ruled at the beginning, but I think he gradually got stupider / more frustrating / less tactful as the season wore on. It seemed that he had a lot of potential to be a player, but in the end couldn't hack it with the big boys.

At face value i was totally disappointed by Jimmy not being a super-criminal or whatever, but it's probably more clever / realistic the way it worked out.

Also, since the series is loosely based on real-life characters (the main ones at least), the fact that no "Jimmy" existed in real life was a pretty big sign that he wasn't long for this world.

[Dantheman]

I finally finished the season. I wasn't surprised to see Jimmy go, you can't try and fail to kill two mobsters without consequence. After he finished off Jimmy I was hoping Nucky would shoot Eli too. Eli is a lying disloyal waste of life.

The Princeton flashback scene where Jimmy fucks him mom, holy shit.

I was pretty disappointed with Nelson's escape. He shoots a federal prosecutor and just runs out the front door with so little pursuit that he is able to round up his daughter and the nanny and skip town?

Can't wait to see Nucky's reaction when he gets home and asks his new bride for the property deed..............

Yeah, talk about a massive shitstorm on the horizon.

[Jay P]

surprised to see the hate and lack of appreciation for Jimmy and Richard. Only two worthwhile characters on the show IMO. Nucky is a greedy sociopath with little to no redeeming qualities. I cannot empathize with him at all. On the other hand Jimmy had a crazy borderline abusive mother, was in WW1, had his wife murdered and had a little boy whom he loved. He was the most layered interesting person on the show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVpf8FT95CM

[BmillsSkier]

surprised to see the hate and lack of appreciation for Jimmy and Richard. Only two worthwhile characters on the show IMO. Nucky is a greedy sociopath with little to no redeeming qualities. I cannot empathize with him at all. On the other hand Jimmy had a crazy borderline abusive mother, was in WW1, had his wife murdered and had a little boy whom he loved. He was the most layered interesting person on the show.

Which is why I believe that Jimmy worked out his own "suicide" with Nucky. He killed his dad, banged his manipulating mom, his wife was a carpet muncher and she got killed by someone he tried to work over, he had war issues. . . He had enough and wanted a way out that would make everything somewhat better for his former friends and enemies. Except Richard. I wonder what will come of that tortured soul.

Nucky got his outright control of AC back, he made Chalky's people whole, he made sure his estate would pass to his son and not his mom, I suspect he filled Nucky in on Eli and Manny and there will be hell to pay for them next year.

I do agree that there is some je ne sais quoi about Margaret; she will get her comeuppence next year when Nucky realizes that his life savings was just given to the church.

[shredGenius]

^^yea, the giving the land to the church was a little bit ridiculous. Why do they suck so bad at assassinations on the show? If I recall, Nucky survived to attempts, the Valcheck butcher guy, no idea what his name, Chalky has survived on or two. What the fuck? How hard is it?

In terms of Jimmy, I also agree that he was the most layered character. Knew what was coming to him with all his fuck-ups. Dont know if it was mentioned before, but I heard he got sick of working on the show and pretty much was killed off for that purpose. Nothing to back it up, but that's what a friend told me. Certainly makes sense, interested to see the direction the writers take the show.

But as a huge fan of The Wire, my absolute favorite line of the series, Chalky saying, "Well, I ain't building no book case."

[Dantheman]

Thinking about it more, I think Nucky may resolve the land/church deal fairly smoothly. After calming down, he will probably sit down with the priest, sip some whiskey together and offer up a generous donation in exchange for deeding the property back to him which the priest will probably accept. They'll shake hands and move on like gentlemen. Nucky's relationship with Margaret will probably not be so easily mended though.

[BmillsSkier]

Anyone else looking forward to the season premiere this weekend?

Curious what happens with the land deal, Jimmy's kid, Owen from Ireland, Eli, ... Should be good

[Hugh Conway]

curious, but honestly for the decent costume drama without much of a quality plot, the S3 Downtown Abbey this weekend is more compelling, or Ep4 of Parade's End

[Hugh Conway]

oddly Parade's End has the problem of cramming too much into a series, the complete opposite of the not much happening BE

[Benny Profane]

Pretty typical HBO series. Strong start to the season, build up in the middle, strong finish. Also, between American Horror Story, Walking Dead and Dexter, Boardwalk is a much needed respite from terrible acting.

Yup. Love the Walking Dead, but man, the acting can be just awful.

[BmillsSkier]

oddly Parade's End has the problem of cramming too much into a series, the complete opposite of the not much happening BE

I've heard good things about those shows, I'll have to check em out.

I think Showtime's Shameless is like what you describe; they're able to pack a ton into each episode whereas some recent HBO shows go the entire hour without moving an inch forward in the plot line.

I thought the BE premiere was good and the stage is set for some good story-lines. Still a lot of questions though...

[Jay P]

Loved the season premier. Watching the marathon on HBO right now. Richard, Gyp, Dean O' Bannion and Van Alden all look to have promising story lines this year.