Best-written U.S. TV series of all time

[lisa needs braces]

I really haven't posted much on that .. but I did give your little clip a try though. Nice try.

Okay I'll stop trying to persuade you that modern tv can be good.

See you in other threads? 

[lisa needs braces]

Hitchcock is one of the greatest film makers of all time .. Rear Window, Psycho, Vertigo etc, etc, etc. Earlier this year I bought the blu ray boxed set of his work (below), so I guess you could say I'm a fan. MANY have been influenced by his work but few compare to what he created all those years ago. Heck, just last year they even made a movie about him staring Anthony Perkins, I haven't seen it though.

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They made two films actually...one starring Anthony Hopkins  and the other the underrated Toby Jones.

[lisa needs braces]

Well there you go. I doubt they'll be making any films on the creators of Breaking Bad. 

They also made a film about Ed Wood, a notoriously horrible film maker.

[Brian]

Ed Wood is a fun movie!

Well there you go. I doubt they'll be making any films on the creators of Breaking Bad. 

Well, one problem is that Hitchcock and Wood were crazy, or if not crazy at least strange; Ed Wood for his gleeful enthusiasm for awfulness, Hitchcock for his pent-up persona, anger, oddities, horrible behavior towards women. Vince Gilligan, creator of Breaking Bad, comes across as a perfectly normal human being, a nice guy who wants the good guys in his TV show to win - even if he won't necessarily let them. He's a control freak, but aware of it. Even if Vince Gilligan wrote the complete plays of Shakespeare, I don't think I'd go watch a movie about him.

I wonder: what current TV/film creator is most likely to have a TV/film made about him/her? I wouldn't be surprised if the answer was Werner Herzog.

[Parsifal]

Ed Wood for his gleeful enthusiasm for awfulness

I am not sure the charminly child-like Ed Wood of the film bears much resemblance to the real Ed Wood.  Based on his entire career, making money using the easiest and most crass means available was his main priority in life.

[lisa needs braces]

The world is full of people with quirks & oddities etc .. it's ultimately the creative work that draws our attention to them in the first place in both cases. In the case of Hitchcock .. well, no explanation is necessary. Brilliant. In the case of Wood .. a cult figure at the other end of the spectrum completely  ,, which can be good subject matter for a movie in the right hands (Tim Burton, Depp, Landow etc) ..

Some great artists are quirky and become dramatic subjects. Some great artists are neither quirky nor very notably interesting or impacting as personalities and, therefore, aren't interesting subjects for dramatic works. So it's strange you'd slam Vince Gilligan that way.

[CaughtintheGaze]

Never have seen a single episode, never even knew it existed till this thread .. read a little on wiki about it just now & the concept of the show doesn't sound too original or intriging at all .. i would never bother watching that .. but then again I never really cared for TV and hardly pay attention to be honest.

The Wire gets a lot of hype. It was a pretty quality show, but nothing that I would put in the 'must watch' category.

[DavidRoss]

Some of us are old enough to remember Playhouse 90.

The first season of Breaking Bad was superb. So was early Dexter.

Both Firefly and the Sci-Fi channel's Battlestar Galactica were very good.

I've seen the first few episodes of The Wire and it was surely better than average.

But the best-written show I've ever watched consistently was Homicide. And it maintained a remarkably consistent quality throughout the run.

Solid competition might have come from Murder One, if it hadn't been canceled so quickly.

[drogulus]

     Vincent Price hosted a TV series on PBS in the early '80s, Mystery! Many well known and remembered shows were presented. The only reason it still resonates for me is the film Praying Mantis, a kind of murder thriller with plot reversals and so forth which in schematic form differs little from many similar, but in execution (how appropriate..) is beyond compare. It was directed by Jack Gold, of The Medusa Touch nonfame, which I'm confident belongs on any definitive list of 100 Greatest Shitty Movies of All Time.

     

[Brahmsian]

Breaking Bad is a great series.

My personal favourite of all time is Six Feet Under

Poignant, hilarious, dysfunctional, beautiful, dirty, etc... Each of the main characters has their chance to develop and grow.

[CaughtintheGaze]

I never heard of Breaking Bad till this thread either.

I agree with David. Its first season is worth definite consideration.

[drogulus]

     

Breaking Bad is a great series.

     
     
     "Just because you shot Jesse James, don't make you Jesse James."

     This character started out as a minor and occasional part of the show, but the actor and the writing made Jonathan Banks and the character he plays indispensable. They had to make him a central figure in the story and the show is better for it.

[Parsifal]

I agree with David. Its first season is worth definite consideration.

I liked the first season and didn't find I liked it any less as it developed, although the plausibility of the story declined the characters remained interesting.  The opposite of the experience I had with Weeds.  In that case my enjoyment of the show declined fast as they departed from the original concept.

[CaughtintheGaze]

I liked the first season and didn't find I liked it any less as it developed, although the plausibility of the story declined the characters remained interesting.  The opposite of the experience I had with Weeds.  In that case my enjoyment of the show declined fast as they departed from the original concept.

Agree with you in full on Weeds. I soured on that show quickly. It doesn't help that I think the lead isn't a very good actress.

[Brian]

Mary-Louise Parker is gorgeous, and the title sequence's satire is on-target, but my initial feeling about Weeds - a curious mixture of intrigue and revulsion - gradually turned more and more just to irritation. Don't like it.

With Breaking Bad, there are occasional plot points that really strain my suspension of disbelief, and it's bizarre how many Hispanic characters are played by white actors who speak Spanish with terrible accents (the Gus-meets-the-DEA scenes in season 4 really bothered me), but the writing, directing, cinematography, and acting are so uniformly excellent that I'll overlook those flaws. BB strikes me as a show with Shakespearean ambitions towards understanding human character and motivation.

[Cato]

         
     
     
     "Just because you shot Jesse James, don't make you Jesse James."

     This character started out as a minor and occasional part of the show, but the actor and the writing made Jonathan Banks and the character he plays indispensable. They had to make him a central figure in the story and the show is better for it.

Do you remember Jonathan Banks as the F.B.I. handler of Ken Wahl ("Vinnie") on Wise Guy?

[CaughtintheGaze]

The various incarnations of Batman on the television have pretty boss writing.

[lisa needs braces]

Agree with you guys on Weeds. There wasn't much there there.

What's great about the new tv landscape is you don't really have to watch anything as it airs anymore. Just let word of mouth filter the good stuff to you. 

[drogulus]

Do you remember Jonathan Banks as the F.B.I. handler of Ken Wahl ("Vinnie") on Wise Guy?

     I didn't watch the show, I only know it by reputation. Banks stands out wherever he appears, and I know he was a big part of that show. He's become central to the story in BB, and is the most complex character in the way he's always squelching elements of decency to play the bad guy. The show is wildly unrealistic in plot development but very realistic in psychology. Yes, it is Shakespearian in scope with Mike Ehrmantraut.

[CaughtintheGaze]

Well I missed all this shit .. oh well, no real loss. I can easily live without television, and have for most of my life.

Film is still far superior to anything realized on television. I really can't think of any show, in the last decade, that is must see.