Deadwood lightens up

When Deadwood premiered last season on HBO, I gave it a shot. The dark, dramatic western was beautifully produced, but the content was crude and mean. Fitting for the people and time it's portraying, but it was like a lead weight to watch every week. And the language! I'm no prude - hell tivogirl has been known to let 'er rip with shocking frequency - but when every other word is a blisterer, it's just plain distracting. I made it through about three episodes, then stopped watching regularly. It was just too darn serious all the time to be entertaining.

This all brings us to the second season premiere last week. Since tivoguy is a fan of the show, I decided to give it another viewing. I'm glad I did. Sometime since the last episode I saw, the show gained a much-needed sense of humor. It's still dark, raw and foul-mouthed, but there are - relatively speaking anyway - lighthearted moments in the mix. It makes all the darkness that much starker but also easier to take.

Out of curiosity, I counted just the bad words that came out of Ian McShane's mouth last week. The average came out to MORE than one per minute - and that was just one character! He spat out the f-word, or a variation thereof, 46 times, said my personal favorite c*cksucker five times and uttered a dozen more lovely phrases in the span of the 50-minute show. It's quite a feat!

Posted by tivogirl at 6:08 PM