S01.E08: Foxhead

[Cheezwiz]

7 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I think the pacing has been fine, it wasn't until episode 7 I started to lose patience. I realize HBO has to make as many episodes as makes sense financially but I think the problem is there isn't really enough story to fill 10 of them. Eight would have worked better IMO.

I agree with this as well. I think this could have been compressed into 8 episodes and it would have been perfect. After watching a bunch of British cable series, it's become apparent to me that brevity can be much more effective. US shows are all about more is more. Or more for the bottom line? I don't know the reasoning.

[Cheezwiz]

2 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

I hope that Andy and Holly hitting it off leads to a happy ending, and not Andy being tragically killed for maximum angst. 

Alas, I fear Andy is toast. He is the proverbial expendable character (aka Star Trek red-shirt). I've already heard (read) rumblings they want to do another season of this show, so Holly can't be distracted by trivial things like romance! I think the nervous Iraq War veteran who guilted himself into re-joining the investigative team at the last minute is also probably a goner.

But I could be completely wrong of course!

[Rickster]

13 hours ago, WaltersHair said:

It just occurred to me that Cuco used Maitland to lure the first boy. There was an established trust.

Claude Bolton is from that cave area originally and El Cuco is breaking protocol by not finding someone who trusts or knows him.

True about Maitland, but we don"t know how it worked with the prior dopplegangers in Dayton and NY and earlier, so we don't know what the protocol is.

[terrymct]

11 hours ago, Arcey said:

What/who was the monster eating both times?

The fisherman who was killed by Jack (the bad detective) and a deer (also killed by Jack).

[humbleopinion]

7 hours ago, Cheezwiz said:

Alas, I fear Andy is toast. He is the proverbial expendable character.

But I could be completely wrong of course!

Cheez and crackers, HBO...let Holly have one emotional relationship...her mother died and she is all alone, except for the bartender near her building...

Andy likes her...Holly Gibney quirks and all....she is interesting enough to have her own series adapted from the Bill Hodges Trilogy

[Arcey]

9 hours ago, Dowel Jones said:

The last meal shown was a deer, I think, from the looks of the legs.  The first one was that fisherman that he shot and killed?

Thanks, Dowel Jones. I didn't even remember that the fisherman was killed. Did Jack kill him?

I just noticed that Ben Mendelson will be the guest today with Terry Gross on Fresh Air on NPR.

 

Edited February 26, 2020 by Arcey
weird double post

[iMonrey]

Quote

The fisherman who was killed by Jack 

When did Jack kill a fisherman? How did I miss that?

[izabella]

3 hours ago, humbleopinion said:

Holly Gibney

Why do people call her that all the time?  It's not like they use other people's full names, or use their names at all (which makes it really hard to keep track of who all the guys are).  But for Holly, it's always Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney.  It's not like there are any other black women named Holly anywhere in showverse.

Edited February 26, 2020 by izabella

[Dowel Jones]

26 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

When did Jack kill a fisherman? How did I miss that?

There was a very short scene of a fisherman walking through the brush by a creek.  He came up to a couple of cars, one of them being his, I suppose, and a pistol shot rang out.  He collapsed and the scene closed.

[patty1h]

I'm still confused by:   1) the incident in the prison, where we kept seeing Heath sharpening an eyeglass lens.   We see another prisoner enter Heath's cell, and next thing is Heath slitting his own throat.   I understand he was under the influence of El Cuco, but the whole thing seemed prearranged - didn't a guard unlock the door?   I don't get why that prisoner went into Heath's cell to confront him and how did this impel Heath to take his life in front of that guy when Heath could have cut his own throat any other time? 

2)  Heath's cousin Terry, who did a suicide by police.  I saw that Terry had the blisters on his neck, so I guess we're to infer that Terry was struggling against El Cuco (like Jack is) and set himself up to be killed because he couldn't do it?   Was that the gist of it or am I missing "the bigger picture"?

[iMonrey]

Quote

Why do people call her that all the time?  It's not like they use other people's full names, or use their names at all (which makes it really hard to keep track of who all the guys are).  But for Holly, it's always Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney.

This isn't a spoiler but I'll tag it just in case.

Spoiler

Holly Gibney is apparently a recurring character in more than one Stephen King novel, although this version of her does not reflect how she is portrayed in those books.

Quote

I understand he was under the influence of El Cuco, but the whole thing seemed prearranged - didn't a guard unlock the door?   I don't get why that prisoner went into Heath's cell to confront him and how did this impel Heath to take his life in front of that guy when Heath could have cut his own throat any other time? 

Heath was not under the influence of El Cuco - he was the model for the doppleganger. That's different. Terry Maitland and the other accused murderer were not under his influence either. Nor is Claude. They just had the misfortune of being scratch by him so he could copy their DNA.

So Heath took his own life because someone believed he was a vicious child murderer and they were going to shiv him, and probably more.

Heath's cousin Terry was the one under the influence of El Cuco, with the bubbling rash on his neck. Just like Jack. 

[humbleopinion]

2 hours ago, izabella said:

Why do people call her that all the time?  It's not like they use other people's full names, or use their names at all (which makes it really hard to keep track of who all the guys are).  But for Holly, it's always Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney, Holly Gibney.  It's not like there are any other black women named Holly anywhere in showverse.

The characters called her Holly Gibney even though Holly would be sufficient.

Both names befits the character.

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

When did Jack kill a fisherman? How did I miss that?

The camera lingers on a close up on the bloodied hat the fisherman was wearing as Jack in a blur drives away from the river bank in the dead man’s vehicle.

[izabella]

30 minutes ago, humbleopinion said:

The characters called her Holly Gibney even though Holly would be sufficient.

That's what I was asking.  Why do they always call her by her full name?  No one else is ever called by their full name, or any name most times.

31 minutes ago, humbleopinion said:

Both names befits the character.

I don't understand what that means.

[pasdetrois]

Quote

Mendelsohn is a phenomenal actor...he's totally working for me in this role as well.

Even though the slow pace and his shambling around and staring off into the distance could be very boring, he does it so well and always stays in that character. I'm gonna be on the lookout for his future work.

I also struggled with a child that age wandering off with a masked stranger in this day and age. Perhaps he's from a small community where kids are more trusting and naive?

Recently in my community a man with a white van tried to entice two young middle-schoolers as they walked home from school, and they both ran away while screaming like hell. All that training kicked in, thank goodness.

[Cheezwiz]

4 hours ago, pasdetrois said:

Even though the slow pace and his shambling around and staring off into the distance could be very boring, he does it so well and always stays in that character. I'm gonna be on the lookout for his future work.

If you haven't seen "Bloodline" on Netflix yet, I highly recommend it - quite a contrast from his role in this series.

[raven]

On 2/25/2020 at 9:25 AM, blixie said:

Holly has stated repeatedly that she believes the creature is vulnerable while it is transforming, none of  them are aware of any evidence that led them to believe it's eating animals/people along the way OR that Jack/minions are procuring them for the entire 24-27 day cycle. 

I agree and think she definitely put some thought into it.  She also thought that by providing Claude's alibi it would further weaken the creature since it would not be able to act as Claude - at least, I think that's what she was saying.

They are desperate so any plan is a good plan and they didn't know where the creature or Jack were.   Claude is their only connection.

I enjoyed all the quiet scenes with people talking - it was a contrast to the violence and stress of the Jack/creature scenes.   I thought it was interesting that the creature told Jack to give him the picture cube hanging in the car after Jack was looking at it and feeling remorse.   We also got the tidbit that Jack didn't qualify to be a sharpshooter because he couldn't pass the final psych eval.    Jack's mental state seemed to make him vulnerable to the creature.

That makes me wonder about the boy - the whole time they are walking through the crowd, the creature has its hand on the boy's neck.  I wondered if somehow that's what was making him so compliant.  He also did seem dazed after the creature was stopped, though I guess he could have been just startled.

I like Ralph and I think the moment when he finally accepts things was really well acted but I did wonder why everyone thinks it's important to have him around.  I understand why he wanted to go and why he can't let this case go but everyone (except Holly) seeming to defer to him before he was on the creature train just seemed out of place.  I guess because he's our main protagonist!

Oh and Holly doesn't like elephants, who knew??

[yourmomiseasy]

On 2/24/2020 at 2:00 PM, meira.hand said:

What really disturbed me was that they were taking care of the copied man by providing him with an alibi, while essentially waiting for another kid to be murdered. They knew what the killer will look like and that he was hunting for kids and yet did not even try to do anything about it. Also did not try to find and stop the killer "helper" from providing new bodies for it. There is zero urgency in what they are doing while people are being killed.

It bothered me that their plan was "let's sit around and wait for a kid to get murdered" but also that they thought all of them being with that guy was going to be a better alibi than Terry being at a conference with tons of witnesses filmed by a TV crew.  It was all around not a very good plan.  I was pretty angry about it the entire episode.

On 2/26/2020 at 2:01 PM, izabella said:

That's what I was asking.  Why do they always call her by her full name?  No one else is ever called by their full name, or any name most times.

I don't understand what that means.

Some people are full name people.  I know a few that get called by their full name a lot of the time and I am one.  

On 2/26/2020 at 12:09 PM, patty1h said:

I'm still confused by:   1) the incident in the prison, where we kept seeing Heath sharpening an eyeglass lens.   We see another prisoner enter Heath's cell, and next thing is Heath slitting his own throat.   I understand he was under the influence of El Cuco, but the whole thing seemed prearranged - didn't a guard unlock the door?   I don't get why that prisoner went into Heath's cell to confront him and how did this impel Heath to take his life in front of that guy when Heath could have cut his own throat any other time? 

2)  Heath's cousin Terry, who did a suicide by police.  I saw that Terry had the blisters on his neck, so I guess we're to infer that Terry was struggling against El Cuco (like Jack is) and set himself up to be killed because he couldn't do it?   Was that the gist of it or am I missing "the bigger picture"?

On the prisoner entering the cell thing, that's how it is done in prison, at least on TV.  You pay off a guard and they will arrange a shanking opportunity.  It was a fairly elaborate scheme though as we saw someone pull a shank out of their leg instead of just sharpening a toothbrush handle or whatever.  

[Milburn Stone]

On 3/1/2020 at 6:09 AM, yourmomiseasy said:

It bothered me that their plan was "let's sit around and wait for a kid to get murdered" but also that they thought all of them being with that guy was going to be a better alibi than Terry being at a conference with tons of witnesses filmed by a TV crew.  It was all around not a very good plan.  I was pretty angry about it the entire episode.

That part made sense to me. Someone can dismiss a video as "not really him, just someone who resembled him," and a bunch of conference eyewitnesses as unreliable. (Eyewitnesses actually are notoriously unreliable.) A bunch of federal, state, and local cops swearing to Claude's whereabouts is harder to hand-wave.

Edited March 4, 2020 by Milburn Stone

[yourmomiseasy]

It isn't a bunch of cops though. Isn't it just a single local LEO on leave and a single statie, both of which were recently involved in questionable decision making which resulted in the incident that caused the leave and the death of someone in custody, neither of which have any real reason for hanging out with Claude, and both of which are outside their jurisdiction?  Then there's 2 PIs, a defense attorney, and whatever the kinda-boyfriend is.  Not only is the local LEO on leave, but he's getting mandated psych treatment -- his word might not be gold right now.  And keep in mind, if this follows pattern, there's going to be a ton of physical evidence conflicting their statements.  Also, in Terry's case there was actual physical evidence putting him at the conference, corroborating the eyewitness statements.  I don't think the word of a cop is stronger than physical evidence, but maybe that's just me.