High Maintenance - General Discussion

[Meredith Quill]

Discuss Here!

[Meredith Quill]

Your Media Topic!

[Tara Ariano]

Quote

The Guy makes an uncomfortable delivery to a macho client and his friend; Max and Lainey's co-dependent relationship begins to wane after Max spends time with a new group of friends.

[Primetimer]

The popular web comedy is now on actual television boxes on HBO, as well as its streaming platforms. It won't take more than 420 minutes of your time, so is it worth watching?

View the full article

[scrb]

Here's a review of the upcoming HBO season:

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/09/high-maintenance-is-a-shaggy-empathetic-triumph/500306/

And Emily Nussbaum's review of the web series from a couple of years ago:

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/06/09/tasters-choice

 

Not seeing too many other reviews from the name critics.  Maybe HBO burying it on Friday nights is lowering expectations, as well as the summary of the show as being about the adventures of a pot seller in NY.

[scrb]

He's the only character that has appeared on every web episode but is he the lead character?  He was only featured in the one where he's trying to get his niece visiting from out of town to a Broadway show and that one weekend retreat in the country.  But even in the latter one, he was kind of in the background, one of many characters.

He's in some ways a narrative device, to tie all these stories together.  All these characters lean on him to facilitate their routine.

Will he stay mostly in the background with the longer HBO episodes?

[scrb]

Not sure about this as a replacement for Girls. The webisodes don't have glamor shots of NY that Girls or even Bored to Death featured. But maybe with higher budgets, that will change.

It seems HBO is just dipping its toes though, relegating it to late Friday nights and only ordering 6 episodes. Maybe they think the show will be perceived as some stoner chronicles and not have as broad an appeal as their Sunday shows.

[msani19]

I started watching this show on Vimeo when it was showed there and I was immediately in! I was super nervous when HBO picked I up because I was afraid it would change the tone of the show and steer it in a different direction. Based on this episode, I think that I'm optimistically cautious. One never knows but with only 6 episodes, I'm hoping the show maintains its voice. I enjoyed this episode with throwbacks to favorite characters like Chad and the Assholes. Even being 30 minutes long, they managed to separate the stories into different vignettes. 

[Morbs]

Damn the macho guy was hot.

[Nightbaron]

I enjoyed the first part with The Guy and the macho client, but the whole Max thing with the Meth was just bizarre and didn't seem to fit the premise of the show.  I haven't seen the Web Series so not sure if the Max stuff was in there, but I could have done without it (though I did appreciate the hooking up scene with him and the guy who was in AA.)

[formerlyfreedom]

A place to discuss the episodes of the show High Maintenance. Please note, there are other topics in the home forum to discuss characters, media, and more!

[scrb]

Interesting look into two subcultures, a Muslim family where the niece is conforming to tradition but is busting out of the strictures whenever she can and the other, their hipster swinger neighbors throwing theme swinger parties and in this case, serving as the connect for the niece who needs to smoke to deal with the pressures of school and adhering to conservative customs and expectations.

Maybe viewers weren't suppose to realize these people were neighbors until the end?  Or maybe some made the connection when the girl was looking down the skylight to see several naked people, as one might see at one of the swinger parties they planned until the guy dropped the chlamydia bomb.

Two subcultures at almost opposite ends when it comes to lifestyles but they intersect because of pot ...

[scrb]

Well season 1 is over.

Ratings must be poor, not much discussion.

Lot of little slice of life tales of quirky characters but maybe it's perceived as a "stoner" show?

so far, no jokes about munchies.

[pasdetrois]

I'm not an imbiber, but I love this series. It's unlike anything else I watch. I love the characters and how their stories are interwoven. I like seeing new actors, some of whom are very talented. And we see real slices of NYC, beyond the predictable restaurants, Times Square, Housewives' apartments, etc. In the episode with the grieving son, we were shown how some of the characters are related in an organic way; the can-collector from a previous episode resurfaced.

[lidarose9]

I am surprised there's not much discussion here -- this is such an interesting show! I am only up to episode 4, but each episode keeps me glued to the screen. Some very brave choices. The episode with the dog blew my mind.

[scrb]

It certainly doesn't show the glamorous side of NY as other shows based in the city do.

You see cluttered apartments, not much in the way of chic restaurants or aerial shots of the skyline or Central Park.

But the pot dealer who delivers is something which could only exist in NYC.

[Lemons]

There are more than a few delivery services in most big cities.  Great writing on this show, best of HBO.  I hate to think that Divorce is more popular just because it has actors that people know.  I love watching shows with unknown talent.

[Corgi-ears]

I really liked the series. I can take or leave the "these characters are interconnected" trope, though. The show doesn't strike me as needing it. It already portrays its characters (human or canine!) with so much empathy and compassion that each vignette already makes the implicit argument for how human these people are, so the "...and we all also share this common humanity" just seems a bit clichéd and unnecessary.

Nevertheless, great "debut" season, with the finale being my fave episode. I would in fact rank the episodes thus: Ex > Museebat > Grandpa > Tick > Method > Selfie.

[AllAboutMBTV]

I think I watched every episode twice. Very glad it's been picked up for a second season.

[EtheltoTillie]

On 10/23/2016 at 5:22 PM, Lemons said:

There are more than a few delivery services in most big cities.  Great writing on this show, best of HBO.  I hate to think that Divorce is more popular just because it has actors that people know.  I love watching shows with unknown talent.

But there are some big stars popping in too, such as Stanley Tucci and Dan Stevens.  And Gaby Hoffman playing herself!  Anyway, I love it too, and I'm glad it was picked up again.  I haven't been able to watch more than the first episode of Divorce.  I was hoping that one was good.

[Jesse]

I've been telling people to watch the show, but don't have much to say about it, really. One question: did the guy take off a wedding ring in the last episode before he knocked on his ex's door? 

[AllAboutMBTV]

The Guy has said that he wears the wedding ring to appear more trustworthy to his clients.

I just finished watching the original webisodes (also available on HBOGo), and I wish I'd seen them first before watching the HBO episodes. I would have had a leg up on some of the characters and their... foibles. Still enjoyed the series, though, and am glad we'll be getting another.

[Jesse]

Ah, thank you!

[Milburn Stone]

Three episodes in, and loving it. I like how the show is normalizing pot, which is a paradox since I'm drug-free myself and don't necessarily "approve" of others doing it. I like how every episode is unpredictably different from every other episode. I like seeing superb actors (whom I don't see everyday) getting believably individualistic characters to play. I like the NY slice of life. Sometimes at the beginning of an episode I'm not sure this one is winning me over, but it always does.

[zentropa]

I love that the episodes seldom turn out the way you expect, in subtle ways. We are trained by 30 minute sitcoms to expect a certain path, but this one always veers off. My favorite gotcha was Meth(od). I was dying!

But I think my favorite episode was Tick. 

[atlantaloves]

Okay guys, just watched the new episode...somebody clue me in, was the really bad news that the country was going through, especially in NYC the fact that Drumpt was elected? This episode was gross, but I kinda enjoyed it. 

[msani19]

Just watched it and yes that's exactly what I think people in the episode were reacting too. 

And holy what the eff! Wow. I want to say I didn't expect that but really how could I have expected that!

But the purple balloon made me smile. 

Edited January 21, 2018 by msani19

[scrb]

One of the reactions was that there are evil people in the world, so I don't think it's about the election.

Seems like a departure from season 1 and the webisodes in that it didn't center on one customer but went from person to person and then back to the Guy again.

Is Globo the Spanish word for balloon?

[msani19]

When I rewatched it, they were deliberately vague about the event. I guess my take was that it was the election which shows where my head is.

[Milburn Stone]

In the end credits, with the woman in the shower, do you think she was scrubbing and rescrubbing to cleanse herself of her regrets over her day's "activities," or to try vainly to cleanse herself of the terrible news? (Or both?) I think it was deliberately vague and interpretable either way; just interested in what others thought.

[scrb]

I don't think she has regrets about her activities.

Maybe just relishing the time she finally has to herself.

They covered a lot of ground in one episode, because they didn't focus on just a couple of characters.

[Milburn Stone]

15 minutes ago, scrb said:

They covered a lot of ground in one episode, because they didn't focus on just a couple of characters.

Yeah, I thought it was a great way to help us process, through art, how insane, full of dread, and through-the-looking-glass that day felt. (As you can see, one thing I thought wasn't ambiguous, at all, was what the news was about.)

[Corgi-ears]

On 1/24/2018 at 4:58 AM, scrb said:

I don't think she has regrets about her activities.

I don't think she had regrets about the threesome, just that it was with two men who turned out to be biological brothers.

Edited January 25, 2018 by Corgi-ears

[Milburn Stone]

8 hours ago, Corgi-ears said:

I don't think she had regrets about the threesome, just that it was with two men who turned out to be biological brothers.

Yes, that's the skeeviness I had in mind, to explain why she felt the need to cleanse herself of the experience so vigorously.

[FoundTime]

On ‎1‎/‎25‎/‎2018 at 2:06 PM, Milburn Stone said:

Yes, that's the skeeviness I had in mind, to explain why she felt the need to cleanse herself of the experience so vigorously.

I think it was a combination of that + she'd had an awful lot of flesh-on-flesh contact + (because I think of a good shower as "cheaper than therapy") just wanting to feel clean of whatever The Big Event was.

Thought the news was deliberately left vague, and I'm okay with that. I think a lot of things about Trump, but oddly enough, "evil" isn't one of them. I did think it was an interesting demonstration of how we rely on our phones for the breaking news of the day and then how we collectively mourn either in social media or IRL. Kind of about connectedness too.

[scrb]

I was wondering who those women were in the second half of the episode.

Here it seems they're gently ribbing the quirky, alternative types that they sometimes feature.

The guy is out of the mainstream but those women were ridiculous about male energy ruining their gathering.

The parents were fun, tried to conceal from their daughter that they bailed on the Airbnb she arranged for them once Fagin was out of the tank.

Thai sticks definitely used to be a thing right?

[The Solution]

SNAKE CLUB, BEEYOTCH!!!!

 

Best.line.evah!

On 1/21/2018 at 8:41 PM, scrb said:

Is Globo the Spanish word for balloon?

Yes.

[scrb]

 Nameste showed a couple of aspects of living in the city.  Gentrification into black neighborhoods, with Regine making real estate deals to facilitate the gentrification as well as improving her own situation.

She certainly improved her pot dealer situation but how is she going to get the Guy qualified for a loan when she couldn't make the deal for her clients because he couldn't provide income verification?

Then the couple who gets into the posh Brooklyn building on low-income status.  Wonder if that's a real thing, to have poor and high income people live in the same building, run into each other in the elevators, with luxurious amenities for the NSRs.

Ben Button has to sign in and they really can't smoke in the building?  Is that a real thing?

But what neighborhood was Regine in and the low-income couple are in Green Point?  Seems like they'd be very far apart.  Does the guy go to all the boroughs except Staten Island?  Even going between Brooklyn and the upper parts of Manhattan would be a lot of ground to cover on a bike.

What happens when the weather turns too cold and wet or too hot and humid?  Is the GUI going to ride for an hour to make a $50 sale?

And he usually hangs out, smokes with his buyers.  So he's going to go say 5-10 miles, hang out for an hour or two, go to his next client?

I think there was one episode where one of his regulars moved out around Prospect Park for a bigger property and got the Guy to come out once but he wasn't going to go out there again.

[Jesse]

6 hours ago, scrb said:

Then the couple who gets into the posh Brooklyn building on low-income status.  Wonder if that's a real thing, to have poor and high income people live in the same building, run into each other in the elevators, with luxurious amenities for the NSRs.

Ben Button has to sign in and they really can't smoke in the building?  Is that a real thing?

The other option to running into each other in the elevators is the poor door. 

And sure, signing in as a guest and non-smoking buildings are pretty common. 

Also, I'm pretty sure the Guy just stays in Brooklyn and doesn't even cover most of Brooklyn.

[Lemons]

On 1/21/2018 at 8:41 PM, scrb said:

One of the reactions was that there are evil people in the world, so I don't think it's about the election.

Seems like a departure from season 1 and the webisodes in that it didn't center on one customer but went from person to person and then back to the Guy again.

Is Globo the Spanish word for balloon?

It was the election.  It got more clear as the episode went on.  Especially at the bar when she said the Hispanic is in a panic.  And how us immigrants have to stick together.  

On 1/21/2018 at 9:04 PM, msani19 said:

When I rewatched it, they were deliberately vague about the event. I guess my take was that it was the election which shows where my head is.

It was subdued the day after the election with people hugging, etc.  the phone call the guy had with his mother was identical to the one I had with my mother.  Reassuring her “it’s going to be ok”. 

There are quite a few shows putting the election into their programs and typically not very flattering.  The X files was a recent one.  

[scrb]

Derech - S02E04:

Baruch didn't get any shiksa booty but he did get more than he bargained for with that sandwich.

Cool look at the Hasidic community.  Didn't know that people leaving that way of life was a thing, though he was looking for "kosher jobs" like being a cashier and shipper at Adorama?

[nycapa]

I live in Brooklyn (in fact, quite close to Ben and we've seen him in the neighborhood on multiple occasions) so thought I'd chime in to answer some of the regional questions people have asked.  Regarding Namaste and the low-income housing - that is absolutely a thing and Greenpoint is a target neighborhood for it, with several building conversions that turned factories into condos or high-end rentals.  Many of these buildings have a low-income quota which affords the owners massive tax exemptions, and it's very common for the low-income residents to not have access to the luxury amenities or, as Jesse noted above, an actual "poor door".  Also, non-smoking buildings have increasingly become the norm.  

As for Regine, looked like Fort Greene or possibly Bed-Stuy to me, which would be less than a 30-minute bike ride from Greenpoint, it's maybe 5 miles.  I've seen every ep of the show including the pre-HBO ones and I believe he's only ever delivered in Brooklyn.  Predominantly north Brooklyn (Williamsburg/Greenpoint/Bushwick) but that could have as much to do with convenient shooting locations as anything else.  Lots of shows like that part of Brooklyn because it's logistically easier to deal with production than, say, brownstone Brooklyn (Girls is almost exclusively shot up there).  I've also seen multiple locations in my area (Brooklyn Heights/Cobble Hill/Downtown/Carroll Gardens/Boerum Hill/Park Slope).  I used to live in Williamsburg and frequently biked to my brother in Cobble Hill and it's an easy ride.  He's also been around Sunset Park/Bay Ridge (I think the park Beth takes Grandpa to is one in Bay Ridge) and of course there's the Ditmas Park ep, but doesn't he actually comment about how deep into the borough that hood is?  I seem to remember him commenting on it like he had never been there.  It makes complete sense to me that he would pretty much cover the bulk of the western part of Brooklyn.  Oh, at the end of Grandpa they are actually in Tompkins Square Park, which is in the East Village in Manhattan, but he was clearly not working in that scene. 

Regarding Baruch - people leaving the Hasidic or ultra orthodox community is definitely a thing.  Not a huge thing but it happens and there are non-profit groups that work to help people who are trying to leave that life and integrate into the rest of society.  They are completely cut off from their families and it makes complete sense that friend groups with that common background would exist, how could they not?  They are so culturally isolated that entering the larger society is a massive shock.  That Baruch would be looking for a kosher job suggests that although he does not want to live in the ultra orthodox community anymore, he is still a practicing and religious jew.  My husband used to do some work with a non-profit legal group helping people leaving those communities and it is far more common that they remain religious than completely reject that.  We've been to passover seders with exactly these types of people - they reject the extreme isolation of ultra orthodoxy but choose to remain in a wider religious community.

[scrb]

Thanks, that's great info. for us non New Yorkers.

Scromple was good episode too.  That opening scene, just to set up the Guy getting hurt.  I call that patient the poor man's  Clare Danes, with the perpetual crying face.

The Guy must like the girl a lot to let her have access to his inventory, while he's stuck at hospital.

Seems to have good health care for someone with an unconventional job.  I know he went to an emergency room but I don't think they'd give him a hospital bed (actually don't really any other patient in his room) to heal up from a broken wrist.

[Corgi-ears]

On 2/21/2018 at 10:48 AM, scrb said:

Seems to have good health care for someone with an unconventional job.  I know he went to an emergency room but I don't think they'd give him a hospital bed (actually don't really any other patient in his room) to heal up from a broken wrist.

The show addressed that when The Guy's ex-wife revealed that they weren't technically divorced yet, so he's still on her health plan.

[scrb]

Renewed, along with Crashing.

 

http://deadline.com/2018/02/high-maintenance-crashing-renewed-season-3-hbo-1202298793/

[scrb]

So a lot more revealed about "Googie."

Seems kind of lonely and it seems he may have split with Beth because of what he does, which is not so much only about making money but a lifestyle, hanging out with others who smoke.

The ex smoked too sometimes but she had a job she seemed to dig, whereas the Guy is always getting high and as he said to his would-be partner, the best part is going inside the apartments of his clients, hang out and get high.

Fun scenes, he's watching HBO Go using his parents' account, on an HBO show.

The being high on shrooms scenes were cool, especially in the bike shop.  Made good use of surround sound.  Not sure if being on shrooms is so disorienting but seems like a good way to render it.

[Lemons]

On 2/20/2018 at 4:10 PM, nycapa said:

I live in Brooklyn (in fact, quite close to Ben and we've seen him in the neighborhood on multiple occasions) so thought I'd chime in to answer some of the regional questions people have asked.  Regarding Namaste and the low-income housing - that is absolutely a thing and Greenpoint is a target neighborhood for it, with several building conversions that turned factories into condos or high-end rentals.  Many of these buildings have a low-income quota which affords the owners massive tax exemptions, and it's very common for the low-income residents to not have access to the luxury amenities or, as Jesse noted above, an actual "poor door".  Also, non-smoking buildings have increasingly become the norm.  

As for Regine, looked like Fort Greene or possibly Bed-Stuy to me, which would be less than a 30-minute bike ride from Greenpoint, it's maybe 5 miles.  I've seen every ep of the show including the pre-HBO ones and I believe he's only ever delivered in Brooklyn.  Predominantly north Brooklyn (Williamsburg/Greenpoint/Bushwick) but that could have as much to do with convenient shooting locations as anything else.  Lots of shows like that part of Brooklyn because it's logistically easier to deal with production than, say, brownstone Brooklyn (Girls is almost exclusively shot up there).  I've also seen multiple locations in my area (Brooklyn Heights/Cobble Hill/Downtown/Carroll Gardens/Boerum Hill/Park Slope).  I used to live in Williamsburg and frequently biked to my brother in Cobble Hill and it's an easy ride.  He's also been around Sunset Park/Bay Ridge (I think the park Beth takes Grandpa to is one in Bay Ridge) and of course there's the Ditmas Park ep, but doesn't he actually comment about how deep into the borough that hood is?  I seem to remember him commenting on it like he had never been there.  It makes complete sense to me that he would pretty much cover the bulk of the western part of Brooklyn.  Oh, at the end of Grandpa they are actually in Tompkins Square Park, which is in the East Village in Manhattan, but he was clearly not working in that scene. 

Regarding Baruch - people leaving the Hasidic or ultra orthodox community is definitely a thing.  Not a huge thing but it happens and there are non-profit groups that work to help people who are trying to leave that life and integrate into the rest of society.  They are completely cut off from their families and it makes complete sense that friend groups with that common background would exist, how could they not?  They are so culturally isolated that entering the larger society is a massive shock.  That Baruch would be looking for a kosher job suggests that although he does not want to live in the ultra orthodox community anymore, he is still a practicing and religious jew.  My husband used to do some work with a non-profit legal group helping people leaving those communities and it is far more common that they remain religious than completely reject that.  We've been to passover seders with exactly these types of people - they reject the extreme isolation of ultra orthodoxy but choose to remain in a wider religious community.

I live in a city building like the one in Greenpoint and there are people on subsidized housing there but they are treated like everyone else.  Their apartments are smaller, but that's it.  They use the gym, pool, and everything else.  That's just twisted if that's true.  Are you sure they really can't use the amenities?

[Corgi-ears]

The first segment of "Ghost" was more horrifying than Black Mirror's "Arkangel," and then the second was devastating in a different way. 

[StatMom]

I did not enjoy the dancer part of the "#goalz" episode. The shots of her dancing alone went on WAY too long. We get it: she was decompensating. But I didn't mind the payoff with The Guy having some hand in causing her failure, especially alongside his spoiling of the other client's surprise.

My issues with that storyline aside, overall I enjoy what makes HM a unique show. I hope they don't revisit past storylines much more than they already have. It must be tempting, but limiting us to these brief glimpses means we are always seeing something new.

[scrb]

I think they may struggle with writing stories long enough to fill 30 minutes so maybe they have these vignettes.

You don't find out until the end that the woman who was being harassed had said something which angered the supporters of a certain politician.

i guess besides the dance marathon woman, the guy who wanted to tune out had a fire in his apt. to show for his efforts.