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House of Cards - Season 2 on Netflix - *Spoilers for all of S2*

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nampad

Member
Episode 1:
WTF?

Damn, that was a great opening of the season. Can't remember the last time I was so thrilled by a season opening.
 

Tristam

Member
Holy shit. Just finished watching the first episode. First off, i need to go back and rematch the last few episodes of S01 to make sure I know what's going on. But one hell of a start.

When Underwood pushed Zoe in front of the train, I lost it. She was getting too close to Underwood though, I can see why he had to do it but fuck.




In the ending scene, the bedroom, Clair walked pass the tv which was broadcasting her death I thought. I don't think she's making it.

Yeah, she definitely died, no doubt about that. I'm just saying that someone hit by a Metro in DC is not a 100% assured death. More like 95%, from what I've heard/seen, but man...even 5% is a MASSIVE FUCKING margin when you're murdering someone.
 

jtb

Banned
man, is this hacker storyline terrible or what? I don't even know why anyone ever bothers when it always comes off as embarrassingly anachronistic, even if it is mildly correct
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
I'm still not sure what to think about this show. I can see why critics consider Orange is the New Black to be the better show, because a lot of what makes House of Cards interesting is the soap opera "what happens next" element of the story rather than anything in particular that the characters go through.

I enjoyed it, but like with the first season, I don't know if there's really any reason I would ever need to revisit the show. It doesn't say anything about the nature of ambition that hasn't been done better, nor does it reveal anything about politics that isn't just your standard cynicism play. If the first season was novel, the second season was just spinning its wheels. Hell, the fact that they announced a season three right before this started basically spoiled how this season would end.

I don't know. If nothing else, I loved how they solved one of the major problems of the first season. It's just too bad that it became the worst storyline in the second season.
 

Tristam

Member
One more thing about ep 1.....
Frank walked back toward the escalator/exit right after pushing her. He was the only person besides Zoe who was hanging out in that back area. So wouldn't the camera have (1.) captured his walking *to* that area, and never coming *out* until (2.) immediately after Zoe "fell" in front of the train?
 
One more thing about ep 1.....
Frank walked back toward the escalator/exit right after pushing her. He was the only person besides Zoe who was hanging out in that back area. So wouldn't the camera have (1.) captured his walking *to* that area, and never coming *out* until (2.) immediately after Zoe "fell" in front of the train?
Still episode 1
not if he took the same way out as he did in
 
Critics think Orange is the better show?

I like it a lot but I don't really see it as super sharp or anything. It's fun but idk that's weird.
 

RatskyWatsky

Hunky Nostradamus
Episode 1:
what what what

did that just really happen?!

what the fuck?!

Oh yeah, and
Frank's closing monologue was sublimely fun to listen to. :D
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Critics think Orange is the better show?

I like it a lot but I don't really see it as super sharp or anything. It's fun but idk that's weird.
Yeah, in terms of top ten lists, at least of the people I pay attention to, Orange is considered the best Netflix show of 2013 and the best "original" that they've done.
 

fallengorn

Bitches love smiley faces
Episode 1:
what what what

did that just really happen?!

what the fuck?!

Oh yeah, and
Frank's closing monologue was sublimely fun to listen to. :D

Just finished Ep 1. Seriously...
that was like Eddard Stark's death on steroids.
Excellent start. Onto the next one!
 

KingKong

Member
Yeah, in terms of top ten lists, at least of the people I pay attention to, Orange is considered the best Netflix show of 2013 and the best "original" that they've done.

Id agree with that, as much as I enjoyed House of Cards season 1, Orange was the better show in pretty much every way

House of Cards would have probably been better off as a 8 or 10 episode miniseries
 
One more thing about ep 1.....
Frank walked back toward the escalator/exit right after pushing her. He was the only person besides Zoe who was hanging out in that back area. So wouldn't the camera have (1.) captured his walking *to* that area, and never coming *out* until (2.) immediately after Zoe "fell" in front of the train?
He walked out the other way. The camera didn't show the area he walked out and i assume in
 

RatskyWatsky

Hunky Nostradamus
Episode 2:
Bahaha the PlayStation product placement continues!

Also, "Hope you like Stella!" (or whatever it was he said about Stella)

And shit's getting real now that they're going deep into the interwebz :O

Ep 1 and 2
is anyone bothered by the fact that frank is bothered by rape but not murder?

Episode 2:
He's bothered because it happened to his wife. He wouldn't have any qualms about raping someone himself or hearing about the rape of some random person.
 
S02 E01
They at least seem to recognize some of the problems of S1, quickly raising the stakes even higher (s1 in comparison had none until the end) and doing away with one boring goddamn character, but there's still the problem of not a single interesting person on the whole show. "Likable" isn't what I'm looking for, likable isn't essential for this kind of thing, but I don't find anyone compelling to watch and I'm not invested in any of their situations.
I'll give it a few more episodes seeing how it's just kind of there, but I'm not confident that it's going to become the kind of show I'm interested in.

Our Roku 3 often takes up to 10 minutes to snap into HD, but this is staying at 480 pretty much indefinitely. Just going to bring the playstation downstairs, this is unbearable.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Id agree with that, as much as I enjoyed House of Cards season 1, Orange was the better show in pretty much every way

House of Cards would have probably been better off as a 8 or 10 episode miniseries

The thing with these anti-hero shows, and one that is probably much more influenced by Richard III than say, The Shield or Breaking Bad, is the inevitable karmic retribution that the character faces. Hell, it's built right into the name of the show - we're all waiting to see when the "House of Cards" will fall in on itself. But after Breaking Bad, I realized that there's really only so much they can do with an arc like that and make it satisfying.

Perhaps what makes this more interesting, and perhaps more Shakespearean, is the fact that Underwood is a character that drips charisma. The fact that he's allowed to break the fourth wall and directly "charm" the audience only helps you get on his side, because he's letting you in on how much smarter he is than the other people in the room - and by association, through dramatic irony, you are also smarter than all of them as well. You're in on the crime, complicit in everything that Underwood chooses to do throughout the 26 episodes.

The problem is that a character like that can only win, because the only time he truly loses is going to be when the series finally concludes. Which is fine, as Breaking Bad and The Shield and maybe even The Wire has shown. The problem is that I don't think Frank as interesting as any of those other characters, and the cast that surrounds him are equally two-dimensional.

Perhaps fitting in the entire story into a single season would feel a bit unrealistic, and while I think the final arc of season 2 is much stronger than its opening 6 episodes, I think by the time more people get around to watching the whole thing, they'll feel that there's a lot of fat that really didn't need to be there.
 
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