Misstify

I didn't think Betsy was dead, only because I haven't known anyone with cancer to be standing up one minute and dead the next. Unfortunately she may be transitioning to a new phase of lying in bed getting sicker. Unless the experimental drug did her in...

I agree--I think I started to dislike the mom from the first scene she was in, where some guests were begging her for their favorite room and she said it was impossible this weekend. Sissy Spacek just seemed a little bit smug, with her perfectly beat-up ol' straw hat. Now, I can understand making a decision as a family when it's a family business. But not the way the dad just left it up to John, Meg, and Kevin--who know Dad has all but disowned Danny. Dad tried to make them take the heat, and at the same time, John turned it around and let Dad take the heat (by letting Danny think it was Dad's decision). Very believable patterns of behavior.

The psychological games and the watery setting have been reminding me of Cape Fear (the 90s version). Especially with Danny playing off the teenage daughter's rebelliousness, and the fact that everyone has glass doors! Yeah, click that lock on your glass door. I totally expected Danny to rise up out of the water at the end. Still waiting to see how & why he ends up wearing the seersucker. A Weekend at Bernie's -like ploy?

I agree, but I'm also a little confused by it. Wouldn't the coast guard have noticed the burning boat? The dad is obviously tormented by the loss of his daughter, and the sight of Danny is a constant reminder. I think that's why he's banishing him--not to punish him, but to try and get some peace. Which of course won't work, because the banishment of Danny is going to be a painful process in itself. For everyone. And all of this is not even taking into consideration the blowup that's going to happen when law enforcement (presumably!) figures out Danny is on that security footage.

Just started watching this show. The mood reminds me of Top of the Lake. I can't figure out if Danny is really dead in the flash-forward scenes we've seen. I'm hoping not--mostly because I enjoy storytelling where things are not what they seem to be. I'm a little hung up on a couple things about the storyline with the will, though. I get that Meg is conflicted about not having fulfilled her dad's wishes, but: 1. Wouldn't the dad (before the stroke) have known that he had never signed a new will changing his estate? I mean, this is not all on Meg--if he asked her to change his estate, and then she never gave him anything to sign, he has to be aware of that. She should just leave things alone now. 2. It seems like the will question has taken on new urgency because of the possibility that the dad won't recover, but...the mom is still alive. Wouldn't someone's will normally split up their estate among the kids only if the other spouse was dead? Maybe this will all be cleared up in the later episodes, since there's clearly a slow unrolling of details going on.

Thank you! I definitely missed the dad's line, and the 1988 subtitle.

There are a few points I'm confused on, and it may be that I missed a few lines of dialogue. Maybe someone can help me out... --Did the missing red nail-polished buzzer button indicate that Norma was in the wrong building? Or is she just unable to find the right button to press? If it's the latter, wouldn't it have made more sense to count the number of buttons down from the top? Am I over-thinking this? --What happened with the phone call in the ob-gyn office? Did her boyfriend have an asthma attack, get shot, or what? Was it stated? --Does anyone know how much time has passed in episodes 1-2? Am I correct that the pregnant woman started out not pregnant and in fact just met her boyfriend for the first time in the beginning of the episode? If so, then I guess she's our approximate time-passage-indicator. I also didn't know that was Catherine Keener until I saw her name in the closing credits of the 2nd hour. I had a moment where I knew her voice, but couldn't place it. (We had just been referring to her character as 'Tootsie'. I don't know most of the characters' names yet--since it's a mini series, I better speed up my learning curve).

I think Elliott had no idea his dog was microchipped, and was silently aghast. He had just been purging his electronics of every trace of him, and the whole time, his dog has a RFID. Oh man, I hope this doesn't lead to some scene where he thinks he has to remove the chip--or worse. (I don't really know why he would, since all it does is identify the dog as belonging to his therapist's ex-boyfriend, and he just confessed all of his interference in her life). The thing about "she won't know you're doing this to help her" or however the vet phrased it--a commentary on Elliott's habit of "helping" women?

I thought that was a thermostat--not a card reader? They were going to use the Raspberry Pi to control the thermostat. Unfortunately, Steel Mountain has backups of everything in China, and the Dark Army backed out of destroying the Chinese copy, so destroying everything in the New York Steel Mountain facility will be pointless now. That text they sent to the Steel Mountain supervisor was too weird. "I'm in the hospital. It's what we always feared." Who says that??

After Piper got Alex sent back to jail, and got Stella sent to Max right before she was to be released, I hope no one else is dumb enough to become Piper's girlfriend! One thing that was interesting about the private corporation was their lack of interest in long-term consequences. It was stated a few times that the CEO and other bigwigs only planned to make some big bucks in the short term, then job-hop to some other corporation. This made it impossible for anyone to have any leverage against them. Risk of possible lawsuits? Who cares--the bigwigs will be gone.

OMG. Cindy called the New Testament "fan fiction". She should get a special meal just for that.

When Donut guy was getting chewed out by Caputo for being late, at first I thought Pennsatucky had set him up, as a result of his creepiness with the whole dog role-play thing. Sadly, that was not the case. Lolly is really, sadly, crazy, isn't she? Just about everyone had a sad storyline in this one. I still hold out hope, however, that Cindy will succeed in getting on that kosher meal list. She is persevering.

I also think Aussie model is the hitman. What else is that character doing there? Now that they've shown Lolly apparently tracking Alex's movements and possibly stealing a big chunk of broken glass, she has to be a red herring. I also agree that Leanne was never meant to be Amish from day 1, but I enjoyed the story anyway. I certainly don't think that every flashback portrays the characters as victims of circumstance. Cindy, Morello, Rosa, Gloria, Piper, Alex, Nicki, Red, and Chang (to name a few) all clearly chose to do what they did. The back stories allow us to get to know them better. On the other hand, I do think Taystee and Daya didn't have much of a chance at a crime-free life…they were brought up by parental figures in the drug business. But they are the only two I think about that way. Love that Chang's movie references are all from the 80s. Sure, "Witness" was an obvious choice, but it had to be Chang who said it. She's been in a looong time.

I was thinking really dark Big Lebowski. If the mansion had been missing a rug, if Aspen had been named Larry...

We totally thought there was going to be an Indecent Proposal.

I think Claire was vomiting because she's disgusted that she had to demand a recess appointment (instead of getting Senate approval on her own merits). As for the eggs...weird symbol for the Underwoods, but they definitely hammered us with eggs. Black eggs. Cracked eggs. Two eggs together in a frying pan. Probably not a harbinger of goodness & light?

Favorite moments of the 2nd half: "Where's Wallace? Where's the boy, String?" …and the crushing moment when you realize D'Angelo's mother is going to flip him back to the Barksdales' side. Moments of humor: --Santangelo consulting a psychic; --Lt. Daniels meeting Day-Day at a party: "Mostly I just go by Lieutenant." --Finding out that Bunk played lacrosse

I'm rewatching season 4 now & psyched that there are threads! I'd add to the "kids"...the one who keeps driving (stolen) SUVs is Donut. He's supposed to be in 6th grade. Also: my favorite line in this episode goes to Jay: "Marimow does not cast off talent lightly. He heaves it from him with great force." (I feel like the actor who plays Marimow has been showing up in everything I watch lately--House of Cards, Boardwalk Empire, and now my rewatch of The Wire...)

Thank you all for sucking me back in. Had a lot of non-Wire stuff going on lately. Just reading the new comments makes me feel like I'm right back in season 2. Rinaldo, I also love the scene at Bea's house. At some point in the past, Bunk told McNulty, "You're no good for people." McNulty knows it is true. Maybe someday he'll stop being no good for people, but right now, he's a mess and he's self-aware enough to stop himself from dragging Bea and her kids into it. Possibly the first time we've seen McNulty make a good parenting decision (in a way)?

Nutmeg, this Wikipedia article includes a photo of a newspaper ad from 1921 for brown skinned dolls (and mentions that American companies manufactured them starting around 1910; some European companies did it earlier). There are probably better sources of info, but I just wanted to make a quick inquiry. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_doll

To be honest, I was always a bit perplexed by the duck. I get the metaphor, but why in the heck does Ziggy buy a duck, buy a diamond collar for it, and bring it to the bar? Do we chalk this up to Ziggy being full of bad ideas (such as his $2000 ugly coat, dealing drugs, stealing from the docks, or trying to fight Maui)? Is it more like "I can't be a success at anything. So why not just spend my money on a diamond collar for a duck"? I love the scene where McNulty crashes his car twice. The second time, I think--based on how he eyes the scene and seems to be calculating the physics of it--is to prove that he can take that curve without crashing. Because McNulty always has to be right. He will do the damn stupidest things, mess with his own career, mess with his friends' casework, and become obsessed with following a lead to the point where he has his kids tailing a drug dealer, just to prove something (either to himself or others). The phone company can't keep a secret. Nor can the police department.

This episode has a great little comedy caper within it: the sequence of events leading up to the creation of CI Fuzzy Dunlop. I love this. From the start, it's just such a classic bad idea to put the surveillance mic on Carver's credit card (Herc's being conveniently maxed out) with the intent to return it in 48 hours. Then, the look on Carver's face when Frog chucks the tennis ball is priceless…the desperate attempt to save the tennis ball…and then it doesn't just get run over by an ordinary vehicle, but an 18-wheeler. While Carver is still in shock from being out $1250, he realizes that Herc is pronouncing the name "Sobotka" in relation to the drug supplier they just surveilled. "Yo, Beavis. That's the name of the guy we're supposed to be working." Even the comic moments are integral to the whole story.

No problem. For me, this is a rewatch--already seen all five seasons, which means I can catch more dialogue than the first time around when I was busy trying to keep up with what was going on. But there are definitely still some bits I'd forgotten and it's fun to be surprised now and again. I've seen him in a few episodes of the British detective drama Luther (AFTER seeing The Wire), but that show wasn't my cup of tea. I wish all the Wire actors could be in awesome new shows. (Boardwalk Empire has actually quite a few of them now--maybe they can find a role for Idris Elba, except it's that show's last season).

When Stringer confers with the man who arranged the deed (the scene where they are talking in the truck), the man asks him if Avon knows, and guesses, "You're on your own, right?" Stringer tells him it's none of his business...and that it better not reach Avon's ear. I didn't see any hint that Brianna knew what was coming, or that she knows it wasn't suicide.

The laundry basket guy & guy who won't come out of the house were two stash house robberies. They were two different guys. Not giving anything away, here's what happened in those scenes: In the first one, Omar was explaining to his companion that a guy comes out of a certain house twice a day with a laundry basket, with the day's take in it. Omar plans to come back that night and rob him, but just as he's speaking, two women run up and rob the laundry basket guy (Omar: "Now that's something you don't see every day."). The second one was a guy named Stump who has a steel door and does not come out of the house (making him more difficult to rob). Omar explains that Stump lives there, so he never has to come out if he doesn't want to. Because of the steel door, Omar and friend can't just storm in. They team up with the women, who trick Stump into opening the door.