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I just finished the first season of Treme, and holy hot DAMN it was some of the most amazing TV I've ever seen. It's one of those rare shows that actually qualifies as Proper Art (of the others, Mad Men is probably the only one I've gotten into; I'll accept the arguments that The Wire is brilliant, but I couldn't get past my own triggers enough to enjoy it).
Treme is also by David Simon, and has some of the same elements that worked so well in The Wire: city-as-character, heavily stylized dialogue, a diverse cast of characters, many of whom are poor and marginalized, and a sprawling, inept bureaucracy that fails its citizens. It's substantially more optimistic even as it's heartbreaking—the characters, for the most part, are fighting battles they're destined to lose—but one never gets the sense of nihilism and despair that made it so difficult for me to watch The Wire.
But enough of comparisons—those are for critics, and I'm a silly fannish genre person. Treme is post-apocalyptic fiction about a ragtag band of survivors. It's just that the apocalypse in question is a very real one: the destruction of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and the struggle for the city's culture and identity in the aftermath. (It's also arguably a musical, but that's entirely necessary given the setting.)
So! Some of the things that are great about it:
( spoilers )
Oh, and the music is fantastic, and the cinematography is breathtaking. Here's a trailer, which probably conveys more than my early-morning, under-caffeinated ranting ever could:
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rohmie: Okay, I can now talk spoilers for season 1; just don't tell me about season 2 yet.)
Treme is also by David Simon, and has some of the same elements that worked so well in The Wire: city-as-character, heavily stylized dialogue, a diverse cast of characters, many of whom are poor and marginalized, and a sprawling, inept bureaucracy that fails its citizens. It's substantially more optimistic even as it's heartbreaking—the characters, for the most part, are fighting battles they're destined to lose—but one never gets the sense of nihilism and despair that made it so difficult for me to watch The Wire.
But enough of comparisons—those are for critics, and I'm a silly fannish genre person. Treme is post-apocalyptic fiction about a ragtag band of survivors. It's just that the apocalypse in question is a very real one: the destruction of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and the struggle for the city's culture and identity in the aftermath. (It's also arguably a musical, but that's entirely necessary given the setting.)
So! Some of the things that are great about it:
( spoilers )
Oh, and the music is fantastic, and the cinematography is breathtaking. Here's a trailer, which probably conveys more than my early-morning, under-caffeinated ranting ever could:
(
rohmie: Okay, I can now talk spoilers for season 1; just don't tell me about season 2 yet.)
