Sun Records - General Discussion

[nodorothyparker]

I grew up on that kind of gospel music, so all I could do was laugh as Jerry Lee made "When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder" more and more jump billy in the beginning and had all the girls up dancing.  No, that wouldn't go over very well in a lot of denominations.

Because it's been that kind of week, I ended up not getting the chance to watch this until after the finale.  I'm glad I caught it though, because what a showcase for Drake Milligan.  He's just so terrifically dead on in all those first young Elvis performances.  The show did a nice job capturing just how profound the generational shift was with Elvis's coming while all poor Hank Snow could do was stand there in his sequined jacket and watch the girls walk out.  Loved Bill and Scottie smirking about Elvis's road strange.

The montage of Jerry Lee and Johnny both being terrible door to door salesmen was silly but still nicely done.  Kevin Fonteyne finally seems to be growing into the role of Cash, or maybe it's just that the show seven episodes in is finally giving him something to do that promises to tie back into the main story.  All I could think in that ending Marion and Earl scene was you're both adults and neither of you has an apartment or house to do this in until it became apparent they were tying Sam's earlier advising Elvis that "Good Rockin' Tonight" is about sex into them taking it to its logical conclusion.  Thank you, show, for finally giving us a glimpse of Lansky Bros.

[Angeltoes]

I got a big kick out of Jerry Lee and Jimmy playing the piano together.  The brothers that play them seemed to be enjoying it themselves.

[Sarah 103]

2 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

 Thank you, show, for finally giving us a glimpse of Lansky Bros.

Yes! I was very happy with the way it turned out too. I love that they showed Elvis asking for permission to buy clothes, when we know in a few years he would be able to shop there and buy stuff like it was candy. 

[Sarah 103]

5 hours ago, Razzberry said:

They can't stop now, we haven't even seen the big four jamming.  

That was my reaction. I was so upset. If you weren't going to end with the Million Dollar Quartet, what was the point of including Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and the Carl Perkins cameo. If they had just had another episode or two, this could have ended with the Million Dollar Quartet session and it would have been awesome. Right now the only word I have to describe my feelings about this is cheated. 

4 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

If it was intended as a series finale, I would be left wondering what was the point of including the Jerry Lee story at all since he has yet to venture anywhere near Sun and hasn't figured into the larger story at all.  Johnny Cash's story finally feels like it's moving in a way that he's recognizable now as the icon he'll become and the actor seems to finally be growing into the role, but he hasn't gotten there yet either.  

This was my problem with the finale. They had 4 (Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Elvis, and Sam Philips) storylines, and Elvis was the only one of them that was resolved. I could make an argument for Sam's storyine being resolved, but it would be hard since the question is what does he do with the money?

There had better be a season 2.  

[nodorothyparker]

I found the Carl Perkins cameo pretty amusing.  Both times we see him, he's fighting to be heard over all the Elvis business and Sam and Marion's personal drama.  It feels like a sly bit of commentary on how while he was one of the big four with a long respectable career he never quite achieved that legendary larger than life status of the other three.  He's the only who didn't have a story line at all in this.

[Sarah 103]

35 minutes ago, nodorothyparker said:

He's the only who didn't have a story line at all in this.

That's because they ended it before they could get to his storyline. Elvis's version of "Blue Suede Shoes" overshadowed the original Perkins recording/release. Perkins never got the career and level of stardom he thought he should've had. Would it really have been that much more expensive to make it 10 episodes instead of 8? 

[nodorothyparker]

That's why I think they had to have been fairly optimistic about getting a second season, for all their billing this as a limited series.  I can live with this as a season finale with the idea that the other guys' stories will kick in more as Elvis moves on to bigger things except for periodic cameos, but if it really is a series finale it's just a mess of pacing and unresolved story lines that didn't really interconnect at all.  As you said above, Elvis is the only character who got any sort of resolution.

[Raja]

5 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

That's why I think they had to have been fairly optimistic about getting a second season, for all their billing this as a limited series.  I can live with this as a season finale with the idea that the other guys' stories will kick in more as Elvis moves on to bigger things except for periodic cameos, but if it really is a series finale it's just a mess of pacing and unresolved story lines that didn't really interconnect at all.  As you said above, Elvis is the only character who got any sort of resolution.

It seems like the plan to me, do the big gun first followed by a greater focus JR Cash then Jerry Lee Lewis, since they both had the big biopics made about them. 

[nodorothyparker]

A lot of that has to do with the chronology of when events took place.  Elvis was Sam's first big discovery, which in turn put Sun on the radar of other acts trying to get their foot in the door as one scene illustrated one of these last episodes.  Historically, selling Elvis's contract gave Sam enough money to keep the studios afloat long enough to discover Cash and Jerry Lee and the rest.  That's at least accurate, but it doesn't resolve the pacing problem the show overall exhibited without being fairly sure of a second season.

[nodorothyparker]

The Memphis media's final take:  They think a second season was envisioned too and are mostly satisfied with the accuracy of the telling of selling Elvis to RCA.

http://www.commercialappeal.com/story/news/local/the-901/2017/04/14/901-sun-records-season-finale-recap/100456898/

[Sarah 103]

On April 16, 2017 at 0:54 PM, nodorothyparker said:

Historically, selling Elvis's contract gave Sam enough money to keep the studios afloat long enough to discover Cash and Jerry Lee and the rest.  That's at least accurate, but it doesn't resolve the pacing problem the show overall exhibited without being fairly sure of a second season.

That was my big problem with the series. All they needed to do was end two months later with the Million Dollar Quartet session. To me, that's what was so frustrating, we weren't years away from it, we were 2 months/8 weeks away. You could have started the series a little later, or done a few more time jumps within an episode or between the episodes. 

[matty101]

Hi Folks,

Does anyone know whether there will be more episodes of the series? There was no finality whatsoever at the end of episode 8, and neither Johnny Cash nor Jerry Lee Lewis have yet developed into performers. The series should at least end with the jam session in '56. 

[nodorothyparker]

Moved your question into the main episode thread as you can see it's a topic we've discussed here.  The short answer is that we don't know.  CMT has made no official announcement yet and so far none of us are happy about how they've left things either.

[msrachelj]

i guess this show is not returning?

[Sarah 103]

On 4/16/2017 at 1:01 PM, nodorothyparker said:

The Memphis media's final take:  They think a second season was envisioned too and are mostly satisfied with the accuracy of the telling of selling Elvis to RCA.

Here's my problem with this. If they wanted the focus to be Elvis and his early years (Sun to RCA) then why bother including/devoting so much screen time to Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and any screen time at all to Carl Perkins. It felt like with two more episodes, they could have gotten to the Million Dollar Quartet Session. 

[nodorothyparker]

7 hours ago, Sarah 103 said:

Here's my problem with this. If they wanted the focus to be Elvis and his early years (Sun to RCA) then why bother including/devoting so much screen time to Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and any screen time at all to Carl Perkins. It felt like with two more episodes, they could have gotten to the Million Dollar Quartet Session. 

Yeah, I'm with you on that.  If they wanted to just tell the story of selling Elvis to RCA they could have easily done that without throwing the others into the mix at all, or at least limiting the ones who were actually around at the time to cameos toward the end.  There would have never any reason to include Jerry Lee Lewis in any of it beyond name checking him and the sheer entertainment value of the portrayal since his story had yet to intersect with any of them.  

I'm still disappointed it didn't get another season to develop those other stories it seems it clearly intended to tell.

[Sarah 103]

6 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

I'm still disappointed it didn't get another season to develop those other stories it seems it clearly intended to tell.

I am convinced even though I have absolutely no proof that they were given 10 episodes and scripted 10 with the end point as the Million Dollar Quartet session than at some point during the production process the order got cut to 8 episodes with the vauge idea of maybe we'll do a second season.