Arrested Development…worth it?

[Phil]

Hey sexy!

I have a question for you. I’ve heard lots of good things about the show Arrested Development but I haven’t seen it. Obviously it’s got a lot of hugely talented people in it, but, for whatever reason, I never thought to sit down and watch it while it was free.

But now I see I can get full seasons for around $20. Which is pretty cheap. Is it worth buying on a whim?

A lot of you already know my basic tastes in television so you can make a pretty educated guess, but I’m just curious if there’s an overall consensus.

Topic

[Phil]

“Comments by people who haven’t seen all 15 episodes should be ignored”

That…seems a little unfair. Unless somebody is dismissing it outright and saying the entire season isn’t worth watching due to their being underwhelmed by some early ones, I don’t think a comment that suggests they’re still feeling it out deserves to be ignored. Folks are entitled to opinions.

[si]

Ignore this comment. I’ve never seen an episode of Arrested Development in my life.

*wanders off to look at next thread*

[JamesTC]

That…seems a little unfair. Unless somebody is dismissing it outright and saying the entire season isn’t worth watching due to their being underwhelmed by some early ones, I don’t think a comment that suggests they’re still feeling it out deserves to be ignored. Folks are entitled to opinions.

Of course folks are entitled to their opinions. I’m just warning that they shouldn’t be taken on-board because you need to have seen the whole thing (or at least to the middle of the season) to appreciate how brilliant the intricate writing is and to appreciate many of the jokes. Including appreciating everything in the first few episodes.

As I’ve said, I think the first few episodes are a little lacklustre as AD goes at first, but they are significantly improved with the hindsight of later episodes. This is why I think it is better to read a review of somebody who has seen the whole thing rather than get the wrong impression of the whole.

I should point out, as now that I re-read what I’ve written right after yours, my comment was not a slight on what you written just before. It was a comment on some negative comments I’ve seen from people who are only talking of the first few episodes. I’d have written exactly the same as you after the first 3 or 4 episodes. After the second episode I really was starting to wonder whether they had made a big mistake.

[Pecospete666]

Reminds me of Mary Hartman! Many of you not even a gleam in your parents eye :)

https://www.google.com/search?q=mary+hartman&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari

[Phil]

“my comment was not a slight on what you written just before. It was a comment on some negative comments I’ve seen from people who are only talking of the first few episodes. I’d have written exactly the same as you after the first 3 or 4 episodes.”

Ah, clarification appreciated. :)

I’m now half way through.

I’m…still deciding.

[Joey TORDFC]

I watched one and a half episodes with this lovely lot on Monday, I wasn’t enamoured with the first episode, but I’m going to stick with it. Of course everything prior was pure genius.

[Phil]

Review: “Flight of the Phoenix,” Arrested Development season 4, episode 1

I’m going to review each of them. This one is actually a strong contender for my favorite so far.

[Ian Symes]

Just finished it. That ending was… odd…

[Phil]

I’ve got about four episodes left.

I’ve more or less decided.

[Phil]

The ending was indeed odd. This definitely wasn’t for me.

[MANI506]

Any more Noiseless Chatter reviews Phil? I’m up to episode 7 and I’m enjoying it although I’m only laughing two or three times an episode.

[Phil]

Yep! I didn’t post all the links here but I’ve published reviews of the first three episodes. Here they are for ease of clicking:

Review: “Borderline Personalities,” Arrested Development season 4, episode 2

Review: “Indian Takers,” Arrested Development season 4, episode 3

I’ll definitely be doing the rest of the season. I’ve got a lot to say about a few upcoming episodes in particular.

[MANI506]

Cheers! I’ll look now….

[MANI506]

I’m on episode 8 but this has been a useful reminder as to what is going on. I think one of the reasons I’m not laughing so much is because seasons 1 and 2 were watched with a group whereas these episodes I’m watching on my own. We abandoned season 3 a few episodes in I remember.

[Stephen R. Fletcher]

Finally got to the end tonight. I do agree that the ending was odd. It took a while for me to settle in to the new format, really; I’d say each character having their own story has its pros and cons (Far too little of GOB in the first half of the season for one thing, IMO). Some episodes felt a little underwhelming and the first episode was disappointing on first viewing, but I have a feeling that I will probably like it more and others I didn’t initially like, after now seeing the whole season and understanding what they’re doing. Once I got that, I enjoyed it a whole lot more and it made me look forward to repeated viewings as I knew I would be rewarded.

Ben mentioned this and I had this fear, too, that it would go the way most revived shows have gone where they repeat old jokes and self-reference themselves far too much (I still love Futurama but I do think that they’ve done a little too much of this since coming back) but it only does a tiny bit of that, then mostly moves on and in some way, tries to be it’s own thing.

[Ben Paddon]

One constant complaint I’ve seen expressed by people – including Phil – is “Tobias isn’t a pedophile, so why is he a pedophile in season 4?”

And the answer, obviously, is that he isn’t. What happens to Tobias is a natural and believable extension of his unique way of speaking. Tobias is utterly oblivious to just how loaded his words can be, and what they could possibly mean in another context.

I am amazed by just how many people aren’t getting that.

[JamesTC]

What don’t people get about that? He goes home and asks Maeby to help him get his rocks off (the literal rocks he was wearing) and that made the police think he was a paedophile because of the way he worded it. As you say, it is a natural extension of the joke about the way he speaks. I thought it was one of the funniest moments this season.

[Phil]

>including Phil

I thought I made it clear that my concern was that I wasn’t sure why they were mining pedophilia for humor when they had so much else to work with. It didn’t seem like a natural punchline for the character…I absolutely didn’t think that he was a sexual predator. I actually spent a lot of time deconstructing that scene to make my concerns clear but, well, if you didn’t get that from my write-up then I hope I at least made it clear now.

It’s not a case of not getting the joke…it’s a case of not finding it very funny.

[Ben Paddon]

Ah, I get it now. Your review of “Smashed” rather simply describes Tobias as “a pedophile making musicals of comic books,” which is a bit of an oversimplification of his story in this whole chain of events. Rubbed me the wrong way, I guess.

Mind you, I have seen people say, “But he’s NOT a pedophile! Why are they doing this to his character?!?!?!?!” which is even more baffling and frustrating.

For what it’s worth I think they’ve handled Tobias rather well, and writing the musical serves as a logical extension of both his idiotic desire to be an actor and, where DeBrie is concerned, holding on to someone who is supportive of his stupid dream. Honestly the only thing that didn’t work for that whole arc was…

…(and, obviously, spoilers for those who haven’t seen it yet)…

…Lucille’s involvement. Which felt a little forced.

[Phil]

>Your review of “Smashed” rather simply describes Tobias as “a pedophile making musicals of comic books,” which is a bit of an oversimplification of his story in this whole chain of events

Admittedly it is! But that’s the third (or so, going by memory here) episode in which it came up, and I described it in a lot more detail in the previous ones. It’s a simplification, but only because we already covered it elsewhere.

The Lucille bit gets posted on Wednesday. ;)

[Ridley]

There’s a recut, too, of the fourth season, just to make it airable on TV. They’re like the old ‘Arrested Developments.’ We redid all the narration and reshot a few little things. Now we have 22 episodes, and they’re delightful to watch and they’re much less work than the Netflix series. My hope is we’ll find a place to air those.

Please recut it so Lindsay never gets to actually sleep with Marky Bark as his face blindness means he instead keeps hooking up with Cindy the ostrich by mistake.

[Author]

Replies