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DogsInSpace!
Sep 11, 2001


Fun Shoe

Beefeater1980 posted:

On Ep3. This show is insanely good. Mare is such a total total rear end in a top hat and she owns.

Yeah I like that she isn't a total idiot and means well but just so drat stubborn and convinces herself that her way is the only way. She is 100% realistic to a bunch a guys I've known. Really all the characters are fairly well done and none of them cross over that line of completely unredeemable (and unrealistic) rear end in a top hat. They are assholes but gently caress if you don't know and drink with these guys and somehow don't completely hate them.

Escobarbarian posted:

Big episode 5 spoilers ahead

AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH

He's ok. He has to be. People survive that all the time. <sniff sniff> Please.

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DogsInSpace!
Sep 11, 2001


Fun Shoe
edit: double post a gogo
Posting one out for my homie - RIP

CeeJee
Dec 4, 2001
Oven Wrangler

DogsInSpace! posted:




He's ok. He has to be. People survive that all the time. <sniff sniff> Please.

It looked like a bullet under the eye which is not something you would survive.

I really cannot say what will happen now. Regardless of her rescue of the two girls she got Zabel killed as a result of her off the book investigation. The logical end would be her getting fired but being a hero for the town.

Hub Dirt
Apr 26, 2008
That latest episode was nuts. The show has small town Delco down to a T and there is a really interesting wrinkle that ties pretty much all of the action in this episode together. I'm definitely a fan of the show even if I'm not a fan of Mare.

Schlieren
Jan 7, 2005

LEZZZZZZZZZBIAN CRUSH

AFewBricksShy posted:

There's an area of Delaware County that is referred to as the Main Line, which is literally named after the old rail line that ran through it.
As the area developed in the early 1800's a lot of the Philadelphia elite had summer homes out there that were accessible by rail. The area referred to as the Main Line now still has a reputation for being an area where "old money Philadelphia" lives, and is still very well off.

There's dialogue in Mad Men where Don refers to Betty snarlingly as a "Main Line brat" which I always liked because that is the sort of deep cut of verisimilitude where there didn't have to be any; the sort of regional reference lost on more or less anyone and everyone watching that's there to be discovered for the taking

CornHolio
May 20, 2001

Toilet Rascal
Four episodes in and I'm enjoying it. Watching Kate Wisnlet hobble around as a grumpy 'gone through some poo poo' woman is surprisingly great.

I agree with the gripes of it feeling like a small town but not really. I was complaining to my wife about this - we live in Indiana, and know of some really small hick towns where everybody knows everybody and their business. I thought that's the kind of town where it was for the first few episodes but then I saw cleaner, nicer parts of towns and just thought 'oh.' The location really does change the dynamic - there's a lot more hopelessness and desire/inability to escape in an actual lovely small town.

UNRULY_HOUSEGUEST
Jul 19, 2006

mea culpa
I've been enjoying this for the lived-in quality and the character work even if the dead girl small town premise is played out as hell. Speculating on Who Did It (I'm totally guessing, but spoilered as some people are evidently catching up):

- The priest and Frank I consider pretty much played out as options

- I don’t at all buy it being Guy Pearce’s character, he just reads as self-absorbed but sincerely trying to make peace with where is he is in middle age, hence trying to push Mare to do the same on custody - and I just think it would be a corny choice to have it be someone who’s gotten intimate with Mare but has zero connection to anything else. I think there might be something to come around his trying to use the case/town for second novel material and incurring Mare's suspicion, or just pissing her off.

- Dylan I’m betting is a total misdirect: he’s making some half-brained effort to destroy all record of the kid’s actual father so he can keep the kid in his family (which is why he wouldn’t even read the diaries himself), and the money he took is genuinely still going towards the ear op.

- The cousin Billy Ross is being dangled too much in front of us already, and is simply guilty from being in on it.

- Lori's husband John seems the most likely to me as father to Erin's baby and my guess for the killer, and their kid Ryan covering for him by going along with Lori's idea that he's reignited some past affair she already knew of. Although I've seen a suggestion that it might be the kid himself who killed Erin and John and Billy trying to cover for him, which would be a little huge but actually starting to win me over. It's definitely going to come back to their household anyway, and has the vibe that the actual killing was unintentional or at least heat of the moment.

DogsInSpace!
Sep 11, 2001


Fun Shoe

CornHolio posted:

Four episodes in and I'm enjoying it. Watching Kate Wisnlet hobble around as a grumpy 'gone through some poo poo' woman is surprisingly great.

I agree with the gripes of it feeling like a small town but not really. I was complaining to my wife about this - we live in Indiana, and know of some really small hick towns where everybody knows everybody and their business. I thought that's the kind of town where it was for the first few episodes but then I saw cleaner, nicer parts of towns and just thought 'oh.' The location really does change the dynamic - there's a lot more hopelessness and desire/inability to escape in an actual lovely small town.

That is a really good point. I'm from a nice small town that mostly exists for people vacationing but I've seen quite a few genuinely lovely decaying small towns half boarded up even before COVID. I remember going on a trip in the beforetimes and visiting this one place that looked like something from the Last of Us: foggy windows with posters from 5-10 years before, vines growing and this grimy, sporey dirt baked into crevices. There were still a few families here and there but the nearest hospital was an hour away and even attempts to fix things just made it look even worse. Mare has some poorer parts but the town also has some parts that look fairly new and shiny that, like you said, don't quite capture the bleak hopelessness. drat.... now I'm never going to unsee that.

UNRULY_HOUSEGUEST posted:

I've been enjoying this for the lived-in quality and the character work even if the dead girl small town premise is played out as hell. Speculating on Who Did It (I'm totally guessing, but spoilered as some people are evidently catching up):


Not sure about Dylan. He's not the father but seems a bit unhinged and not just about the baby. Good misdirect if he's a misdirect but I get the feeling he just wants it all to have gone away and I could see that being the reason he killed his ex: "Just sick of all the drama." Still peg him as the murderer especially after last ep

John and Billy. I'm betting Billy is covering for John and John is the father. Just a hunch as the shiftiness of Billy felt less like "I hosed up" and "oh gently caress I covered for John and its about to all come apart". Nothing more than a feeling. That period of time Erin was staying with Billy, I'm thinking Billy walked in on them. Still don't think he killed her but Dylan did. My crackhead theory: Dylan is a selfish teenager shithead who got set up to be a dad and wanted nothing to do with any of it and was just really mad and teenagery. Erin reached out to John about being the father and he blew her off so she gets even more upset. Erin then sees Dylan and starts a big brouhaha and he does something like push her and crosses a line. He was borderline redditor before so just goes all in. Thinking he might kill that girl that was with him burning the books or try to. No grand mystery or anything.... just hosed up people being hosed up people. Oh and the writer is 100% going to use this for his next blockbuster. Also thinking the former junkie mom goes back to being a junkie and ODs as she is still way twitchy.

TheOmegaWalrus
Feb 3, 2007

by Hand Knit

DogsInSpace! posted:

That is a really good point. I'm from a nice small town that mostly exists for people vacationing but I've seen quite a few genuinely lovely decaying small towns half boarded up even before COVID. I remember going on a trip in the beforetimes and visiting this one place that looked like something from the Last of Us: foggy windows with posters from 5-10 years before, vines growing and this grimy, sporey dirt baked into crevices. There were still a few families here and there but the nearest hospital was an hour away and even attempts to fix things just made it look even worse. Mare has some poorer parts but the town also has some parts that look fairly new and shiny that, like you said, don't quite capture the bleak hopelessness. drat.... now I'm never going to unsee that.

This captures my main complaint with the show. It seems like they were swinging for something edgy and raw but the intensity was lost to a committee somewhere down the line.

I'm a little surprised HBO made this, because the production values are a little more in-line with what Sky or the BBC would produce. This is much closer to Broadchurch than True Detective, but it's now shaken down to a pretty bog-standard "whodunnit" complete with your purposefully misdirecting casting. Kate Winslet and Guy Pearce are both doing better American accents than most Americas as usual.

It's fine when I was expecting maybe a little bit of Twin Peaks or some more delicious strange fiction. It's competent in what it's doing, it's just not swinging for the fences or taking any risk and will likely peter out in a luke-warm and forgettable way.

Ultimately I came for Jean Smart and I will finish the season for Jean Smart.

TL
Jan 16, 2006

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world

Fallen Rib
I'd watch an episode that's just Jean Smart playing Fruit Ninja for 55 minutes.

Bird in a Blender
Nov 17, 2005

Just hoping everyone has fun.
Just finished episode 5. Boy nearly everyone in this town is some sort of rear end in a top hat. Mare really can’t turn the cop part of her brain off, no matter what I guess.


I was not expecting Zabel to bite it immediately. I also hate the trope of Mare beating the guy down, and then she just runs away. Hit the dude another time, and take his gun, where are you going? Maybe next time make an excuse to leave and come back with some backup, or just wait for the dude to leave the house and grab him.

No clue who Erin’s killer is. I figure it’s one of the uncles or Dylan, but it’ll probably be someone I’m not expecting.

Hub Dirt
Apr 26, 2008

TheOmegaWalrus posted:

This captures my main complaint with the show. It seems like they were swinging for something edgy and raw but the intensity was lost to a committee somewhere down the line.

It's just Delco. Pretty much all of episode 5 was Marcus Hook which is a far cry from Ridley or, god forbid, Swarthmore. Even if they are 15 mins up the road. Don't even start about the mainline.
It may seem like they cast a big net, but all of us substance abusers on the hook are just as much Delco as the blue bloods in Wayne. It's why you see such a switch in property.
Mare doesn't live in the same town she's investigating, just the same county.

sticksy
May 26, 2004
Nap Ghost
Goddammit, this show is real good but also makes me feel bad

Memnaelar
Feb 21, 2013

WHO is the goodest girl?

Bird in a Blender posted:

Just finished episode 5. Boy nearly everyone in this town is some sort of rear end in a top hat. Mare really can’t turn the cop part of her brain off, no matter what I guess.


I was not expecting Zabel to bite it immediately. I also hate the trope of Mare beating the guy down, and then she just runs away. Hit the dude another time, and take his gun, where are you going? Maybe next time make an excuse to leave and come back with some backup, or just wait for the dude to leave the house and grab him.

No clue who Erin’s killer is. I figure it’s one of the uncles or Dylan, but it’ll probably be someone I’m not expecting.



Hm, wrestling a bigger man with a gun in hand when you've taken a bullet through your own hand and have a bum leg seems like a great way to get shot. Take another swing at him while he's down and maybe he gets a chance to collect himself and you've got another great way to get shot. Also, you're in shock from just watching your partner take a bullet through the brain so you're also maybe not doing the best calculations on great ways to be shot.

I agree - it's a horror/suspense cliche, but in this case, I didn't think it was a writing flaw.

CeeJee
Dec 4, 2001
Oven Wrangler

Bird in a Blender posted:




I was not expecting Zabel to bite it immediately. I also hate the trope of Mare beating the guy down, and then she just runs away. Hit the dude another time, and take his gun, where are you going? Maybe next time make an excuse to leave and come back with some backup, or just wait for the dude to leave the house and grab him.


There is a good chance he would kill the girls as soon as Mare and Zabel left to get backup. Once they knew and he knew they knew there was no easy way out.

TheOmegaWalrus
Feb 3, 2007

by Hand Knit
I looked into the production of this show, and apparently Gavin O'Connor (Warrior, The Accountant, The Way Back) created the show and was set to direct before Craig Zobel took over.

Craig Zobel has directed a smattering of TV episodes, but nothing consistent until this show. He's much younger and less experienced, and has mostly a comedy corpus. He did help create Homestar Runner, which I enjoyed years ago.

I believe I have found the crux of my complaint, and can now only resign myself to wondering what could have been.

Bird in a Blender
Nov 17, 2005

Just hoping everyone has fun.

CeeJee posted:

There is a good chance he would kill the girls as soon as Mare and Zabel left to get backup. Once they knew and he knew they knew there was no easy way out.

Ah yea that’s true. I shouldn’t even criticize it that much, it was a hell of an episode ending.

Looten Plunder
Jul 11, 2006
Grimey Drawer

DogsInSpace! posted:

He's ok. He has to be. People survive that all the time. <sniff sniff> Please.

Potential IMDB spoilers he's credited as being in 7 episodes and I don't think he was in episode 1 so maybe that means he pulls through?

Preview spoilers also, considering how she's being thrown quickly back on to the case, surely he survives. There is no way they'd let an already traumatized and unstable cop back on a case after her partner gets killed in front of her

Escobarbarian
Jun 18, 2004


Grimey Drawer

Looten Plunder posted:

Potential IMDB spoilers he's credited as being in 7 episodes and I don't think he was in episode 1 so maybe that means he pulls through?

Preview spoilers also, considering how she's being thrown quickly back on to the case, surely he survives. There is no way they'd let an already traumatized and unstable cop back on a case after her partner gets killed in front of her

The show is only 7 episodes long

TheOmegaWalrus
Feb 3, 2007

by Hand Knit
When Jim stole Pam from Roy, we should have seen this coming.

Put yourself in Roy's shoes, a simple though passionate man. You've got a sweet shipping job in the recession, you're punching up with a new engagement, the American dream is becoming yours against all odds. You can practically taste the water skis.

Enter Jim Halpert. A snake-in-the-grass failure with 0 muscle mass who has nothing better to do all day than crack wise and steal your girl. Jim did Roy raw, bending a man well past the point of breaking. Roy was plunged into a shadow world, a photographic negative of a man, unable to put trust in a cruel duplicitous system he became lost in the grey Pennsylvania fog where there is no truth and everything is permitted.

Torn up bars. Assault. Divorce. Knocking up teenagers then 86'-ing them when things got too real.

Halpert strikes again. Roy never stood a loving chance.

TheOmegaWalrus fucked around with this message at 11:29 on May 21, 2021

straight up brolic
Jan 31, 2007

After all, I was nice in ball,
Came to practice weed scented
Report card like the speed limit

:homebrew::homebrew::homebrew:

The Mare of Easttown has done it again. also it’s not Billy, it’s John, which is why they didn’t show the photo

ghostinmyshell
Sep 17, 2004

straight up brolic posted:

The Mare of Easttown has done it again. also it’s not Billy, it’s John, which is why they didn’t show the photo

I bet it's even more wacky...

It's Kevin and Erin, and he didn't commit suicide after all which is why the bros are covering all this up.

Bananaquiter
Aug 20, 2008

Ron's not here.


straight up brolic posted:

The Mare of Easttown has done it again. also it’s not Billy, it’s John, which is why they didn’t show the photo

John is certain try to wrap up everything to pin on Billy, but he has to realize that they will still DNA test that baby? Right? Maybe the baby daddy plot has nothing to do with the murder. I have no idea what is going on really.

Escobarbarian
Jun 18, 2004


Grimey Drawer
I’m very sure brolic is right but that doesn’t explain Billy confessing to John when they’re alone. I wonder what’s going on there.

Problematic Pigeon
Feb 28, 2011

Escobarbarian posted:

I’m very sure brolic is right but that doesn’t explain Billy confessing to John when they’re alone. I wonder what’s going on there.

That conversation sounded less like a confession and more like John coaching Billy into saying it.

OldSenileGuy
Mar 13, 2001
My guess is something like Billy and John did confront Erin out in the woods for [reason], and Billy shot at her and maybe shot her finger off which explains the blood. Then Billy fled, and John followed her into the woods and finished her off. John went back to Billy and told Billy that he couldn't find Erin and got rid of the gun. Then when Erin shows up dead, John tells Billy that someone else must have found the gun and killed her, which Billy doesn't really believe but goes along with anyway because he's weak. Then when Billy sees the gun in the tacklebox, that just confirms his suspicions that John didn't really get rid of it and killed Erin, which is why he's giving him the death stare for that whole trip.

Doesn't really explain wtf is up with Dylan though.

UNRULY_HOUSEGUEST
Jul 19, 2006

mea culpa
I'm 99% certain now that John is DJ's father, his son Ryan tried to warn Erin off to protect the family and ended up killing her, John and Billy covered it up. Now Billy's knowingly taking the fall for Ryan's sake but John plans to stage his suicide anyway to keep his own involvement secret. Billy's figured out he's in danger and Mare is going to gently caress it up by mistakenly holding Billy at gunpoint and probably getting his rear end killed. I still think Dylan tried to destroy the record of DJ's actual father so he can keep DJ, he's nothing to do with the murder

To be honest I'm finding the merits of this show are getting a little buried under the sheer weight of red herrings, although Kate Winslet's still doing great work.

Vishass
Feb 1, 2004

The show wants you to think it's trying to trick you into blaming Billy but knows you know it's John so you feel smart

But actually somehow it's going to be Siobhan

Bananaquiter
Aug 20, 2008

Ron's not here.


Vishass posted:

The show wants you to think it's trying to trick you into blaming Billy but knows you know it's John so you feel smart

But actually somehow it's going to be Siobhan

I don't know anything about guns, was the gun in the tackle box an old cop gun or is Mare's mom the killer? :magemage:

sticksy
May 26, 2004
Nap Ghost

Bananaquiter posted:

I don't know anything about guns, was the gun in the tackle box an old cop gun or is Mare's mom the killer? :magemage:

It was the old man’s who confessed at his wife’s wake that he’d banged Mare’s mom.

AFewBricksShy
Jun 19, 2003

of a full load.



Bananaquiter posted:

I don't know anything about guns, was the gun in the tackle box an old cop gun or is Mare's mom the killer? :magemage:

The old cop gun would be a revolver not an auto. I specifically rewatched the part when they talked about the gun because I thought the same thing.

CornHolio
May 20, 2001

Toilet Rascal
The very last scene is going to be Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson showing up (because remember the chief is getting the FBI involved) and they congratulate Mare on being a True Detective as they haul the true killer, DJ, away for good.

Bird in a Blender
Nov 17, 2005

Just hoping everyone has fun.
drat like everyone is an rear end in a top hat in this town. Not quite sure what Dylan’s deal is. He keeps digging himself into a bigger hole.

Also leaning towards John being the real killer. Possibly he egged Billy on to do it, but my guess is Billy did something, regretted it, and then John finished it.

Riptor
Apr 13, 2003

here's to feelin' good all the time
I am so glad the little boy was okay in the bathtub

Hub Dirt
Apr 26, 2008
I honestly hope Mare comes out of all of this with her poo poo together. The last three episodes really hooked me.

Rats Tossbag
Jan 16, 2014

Riptor posted:

I am so glad the little boy was okay in the bathtub

Jesus Christ that scene was awful. Made me feel sick.

CornHolio
May 20, 2001

Toilet Rascal

Riptor posted:

I am so glad the little boy was okay in the bathtub

I was absolutely not OK leading up to that. I remembered the scene where the mom was warning her she had to be careful and extra-vigilant during bathtime and just felt something bad was coming... I'm thinking it scares the poo poo out of her and she declines custody for now.

TL
Jan 16, 2006

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world

Fallen Rib

CornHolio posted:

I was absolutely not OK leading up to that. I remembered the scene where the mom was warning her she had to be careful and extra-vigilant during bathtime and just felt something bad was coming... I'm thinking it scares the poo poo out of her and she declines custody for now.

It took me a while to realize that she fell asleep because she was overtired from working so many jobs. My first instinct was that she was on drugs again and nodding off."

Problematic Pigeon
Feb 28, 2011

TL posted:

It took me a while to realize that she fell asleep because she was overtired from working so many jobs. My first instinct was that she was on drugs again and nodding off."

It's like an anti-Just Say No PSA. If your coworker offers you some uppers, you should say yes, or else your kid might drown in the bathtub after you nod off.

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Something_Hazy
Sep 21, 2019
So some random thoughts I'd be curious for other's opinion's on: If John is the killer like the show seems to be making fairly obvious, what is Dylan and crew's involvement in this whole situation? The scenes with him and DJ seems to exist entirely to show he's not quite as much of an absolute poo poo stain as he seems, thus ruling him out as the killer. On the other hand, if we've wasted this much time watching a bunch of scenes with him just for it to be a gigantic red herring it'll be pretty stupid. It seems pretty obvious that John is baby daddy, Billy feels guilty because he knows (or perhaps they both slept with Erin and the whole incest thing is gonna be even more hosed up than I anticipate). Him being covered in blood seems like another red herring to me, like he somehow got to Erin as she was dying and got covered in blood while trying to save her. Or maybe John orchestrated some crazy scenario where he, Ryan and Billy were all present and somehow manipulated into murdering Erin together, i dunno. Regardless, it seems to be heading towards Mare confronting the two, witnessing one murdering the other (probably John killing Billy somehow) and then killing the remaining brother, thus losing her best friend and forever being traumatized and perhaps forced to ultimately leave the community that is so important to her identity. Also possible that the ultimate knife twist is that Mare's ex-husband knows/is involved in some way, again I just feel like he's been featured too much to have no involvement at all. I've really only stuck with the show this long because of the quality of the acting so I'm prepared for a pretty silly ending.

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