The Shrine

Anyone else catch this on AMC last night? The first episode was 1.5 hours of awesome. Based on the graphic comic series, it seems to be a more serious look at a zombie apocalypse which, since its a show, should lead to some real good character development, too.

I did and I loved it. They are taking their sweet time, in 1.5 hours, they're about 20 pages into the comic.

Yeah at this rate it's going to take like 15 seasons just to catch up.

Mully wrote:I did and I loved it. They are taking their sweet time, in 1.5 hours, they're about 20 pages into the comic.

Like every other AMC show out there, it moved SLOW AS FUCK.

But I am willing to wait it out for half a season or a full season before I write it off as "just another AMC show". But man, the rest of the eps better not move that slowly

I liked it moving slow. Its one of the reaosn i like drama TV shows like this soooooo much more than movies, which have no time to develop people, atmosphere, and mood. I thought it was well done and i was glued for the entire 90 min. Well, i did pause the DVR once to get a snack.

Flip wrote:I liked it moving slow. Its one of the reaosn i like drama TV shows like this soooooo much more than movies, which have no time to develop people, atmosphere, and mood. I thought it was well done and i was glued for the entire 90 min. Well, i did pause the DVR once to get a snack.

Slow for a while is fine....as long as something is happening. But there is an epidemic with AMC shows where they essentially put filler in their shows as opposed to actual depth camouflaged as "tension" or "drama" where you get either nothing happening for 20 minutes other than manufactured or a repeat of prior "issues" that goes nowhere.

Like I said, I have a little more hope for Walking Dead since it is Darabont who's behind it and won't be making a final judgment 'til closer to the end of the first season. But it will require them breaking from the mold of Breaking Bad and Rubicon, shows that I follow but don't really love 'cause of how they're done

A friend of mine who has read the comics said the same thing. Essentially, 'it will take 18 seasons if they keep that pace' so maybe they just wanted to draw out the beginning and all hell will break loose by the middle of the season.

Hahaha. The Walking Dead has comparable, if not more, futzing about than Breaking Bad. Certainly more than Rubicon. It's so you can develop emotions for all the characters that he throws at you. Still, other than Rick and his son I've only grown to care about maybe a few other characters. Should still be worth watching a few seasons before his writing got to be more about the drama than the zombies. Still, it's very possible that they could quicken the pace and just forget about some of the stuff from the comic. I can't see it ALL going by fast, though. There's certainly some amazing material the comic has churned out through the years.

It's also a little further than 20 pages into the comic - arguably it's more like 40ish. About half-way into the second issue.

Could be, I counted page turns and not actual pages.

Ah, okay, I did the individual pages like a lunatic.

Absolutely loved this show. Cannot wait for the next episode.

Only 3 full days left to episode 2. Geesh, I don't think I've ever been this pumped for the second episode...of the series.

Finally watched it last night. I enjoyed it but agree it went too slow. I'll give it a couple more episodes to grab me, if they can pick up the pace a bit I'll be happy

Watched the first ep this weekend, good cinematic quality, but I have issues with the story. Like how long he was in the hospital in a coma unattended to and how he is still alive. The extremely cliche scenes, etc.

Hopefully it gets better though.

There's some reference in the comic about the wife leaving him with strangers (I assume nurses) or some such. It's possible that the nurses only recently died and his IV kept him hydrated a little longer... long enough for him to wake up.

Kind of disappointed with the second episode. Almost nothing happened in it that was taken from the comic. However, if you're in love with the survival horror aspect you'll probably enjoy it.

Shrinweck wrote:There's some reference in the comic about the wife leaving him with strangers (I assume nurses) or some such. It's possible that the nurses only recently died and his IV kept him hydrated a little longer... long enough for him to wake up.

Kind of disappointed with the second episode. Almost nothing happened in it that was taken from the comic. However, if you're in love with the survival horror aspect you'll probably enjoy it.

What the fuck? So, they praise the source material when they are talking about the movie, but then they shit all over it after they have their hook? And then they drag it out for 90 minutes without covering all of the 20 pages of material?

That's not to say that I didn't enjoy the slower pace, but if you're going to do that, then fill it up more with source material.

I wouldn't say shitting all over it.. it basically has to end up going the way it did in the comic starting in the next episode. Them putzing about in this one was just very odd.

I like the deviations from the comic book so far. It has to be slower from the comic standpoint, for movies you have a finite timeline (give/take 2 hours) time limit, so it's going to be fast paced and action packed. For tv, you have basically an infinite time limit...take your time and build story. We will care much more about the characters in the comic.

However since you have a lot of time to develop the story/extra story, but don't spend tooooooo much time developing stories (a good point of reference would be to see the prison by the end of first season, but also this season is only 6 episodes instead of 13), don't stray too far from the source: aka don't make the zombie's talk or communicate (like in Romero's Land of the Dead), don't change the infection rate or reason for turning into a zombie (don't want to spoil the comic, but the true meaning of "the walking dead"); also don't be too clichéd,

There is no way they're getting to by the end of this season. I will eat my hat. At the most I see them getting to (do not read this if you haven't read the book)

Shrinweck wrote:There is no way they're getting to

Spoiler: show

the prison

At the most I see them getting to (do not read this if you haven't read the book)

Spoiler: show

Hershel's farm

I double agree. Good observation.

Yeah it's a good place to end the first season since when they first get there

That is a big chunk of time, the whole 3rd year in fact, but I like where you're going.

I just cant wait for:

We have a slight debate here at work. Has Lori and Shane's "relationship" start before or after the zombie apocalypse?

I've hidden this in spoilers to protect any spoilers...i don't think there are any and it doesn't spoil anything I think, but someone may think so.
Seems like it just started to me.

I just saw a 3 minutes preview for the next episode, they are probably going to just keep the whole story very loose from the comic books.

BTW, not a fan of the use of 'geek' for the zombies, really hope they adopt roamers and lurkers soon.

I know geek was a term used for freak shows... but eh

I was a fan only when Glenn used it. IF he was the only "geek" user, I thought that was fine, but now everyone is using it and its not cool.

You know what? If the show wants to go in a different direction with certain side stories - let it. Kirkman let some of the plot just drag and go to shit. As long as it preserves the comic's best moments then I won't mind. If it's just another slow drama that meanders and actually does end up giving the middle finger to the comic book.. then I guess I'll just have to stop watching. So far I've liked Rubicon more any way.

Mully wrote:I like the deviations from the comic book so far. It has to be slower from the comic standpoint, for movies you have a finite timeline (give/take 2 hours) time limit, so it's going to be fast paced and action packed. For tv, you have basically an infinite time limit...take your time and build story. We will care much more about the characters in the comic.

Yeah, but you have to make sure it doesn't end up like Naruto or Bleach with the pacing. Hell, Naruto starts out going too fast a pace (which was definitely awesome), then they hit a brick wall when they ran out of material, so you ended up with about 50-75 episodes of shitty filler. When they started back up, the pacing was REALLY SLOW, like DBZ level slow. Bleach appears to have had similar problems, just not as drastic.

See, the Japanese have been translating manga to anime for years and years, so they are at least familiar with the problems of pacing (even if they don't solve for it all the time). Americans, not so much.

Good point with DBZ. Forgot about episode 32 - 36 scripts, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

I will certainly say that episode 2 was far superior to episode 1 in terms of pacing. My AMC fears were a little premature. If the rest of the season turns out like this, I'll be happy.

Really? By my count only a few things happened in that episode. I guess it's better for pacing than the Breaking Bad fly episode.

Shrinweck wrote:Really? By my count only a few things happened in that episode.

Spoiler: show

Rick got out of the tank. Rick got trapped in a building. Rick escaped and left someone trapped on the roof. Music montage. Fade to credits.

I guess it's better for pacing than the Breaking Bad fly episode.

Pacing isn't all about tearing through a volume of plot points. That episode actually moved, they were always doing something, looking for something, or revealing something with very little filler. That's good pacing. There's nothing wrong with character development but you first have to have characters you care about or situations which call for development

The Fly episode from Breaking Bad was exactly like non-manga filler from Naruto. You can remove it from the series entirely and miss absolutely nothing. It was pure filler in every sense of the word and the worst example of AMC-ing a show

Ah, okay, I see. I think I'm just having trouble getting over the fact that almost no material from the comic was covered.

I don't know what to think about them doing an exact remake of the comic. I hope they take it in a different direction because I know what is going to happen.

Shrinweck wrote:Ah, okay, I see. I think I'm just having trouble getting over the fact that almost no material from the comic was covered.

I don't know much about the graphic novels but I was under the impression that they were following it pretty closely. Are they deviating that much?

It's official: Season 2 of Walking Dead coming, this time to be 13 eps instead of just 6

http://www.mania.com/walking-dead-gets- ... 26303.html

Basically none of the stuff in episode 2 happened in the graphic novel. It goes so far that Rick didn't even go INSIDE of the tank in the novel. There was one he walked by... The two major events that happened in the graphic novel as well are

This is a really good thread. It seems like everyone has been involved some way.

Episode 3 = good episode. Not in the comics, but I like it.

Yeah, my thoughts as well, even if I thought the episode was going to end the way it did from the opening scene on.

Mully wrote:Episode 3 = good episode. Not in the comics, but I like it.

Episode 3 was a "we need to get this out of the way" ep. I didn't hate it but I'm happy they just did it all at once and got it over with.

Downloading...so I know what the hell you guys are talking about and so I don't finally get into the series right when they cancel it (My name is earl, legend of the seeker, etc).

Btw - Why isn't this in Music & Movies? Damn it...

Fixed that. Sorry, I tend to look at "The Shrine" view nowadays.

Legend of the Seeker is cancelled? Well, good riddens I guess, but I never heard about an official announcement.

SineSwiper wrote:Fixed that. Sorry, I tend to look at "The Shrine" view nowadays.

Legend of the Seeker is cancelled? Well, good riddens I guess, but I never heard about an official announcement.

I dunno, I liked it. At least the last season when Cara came into the picture. But then I'm not familiar with the books, so I was free from being a nitpicky fanboy grasping to the source material. Like everything Sam Raimi touches, the casting choices were odd...probably what kept me away initially when I channel surfed past it. But once I gave the show a shot, it worked and I enjoyed it...for what it was.

As for The Walking Dead, I chain watched the first 3 eps just now. You guys sure talk alot. It's a zombie/apocolypse show...apparently based off some novels I'll never read (like it matters, they are all the same no?). I liked it. /shrug

kali o. wrote: Btw - Why isn't this in Music & Movies? Damn it...

Because its TV, not music or movies.

What i think sets this apart from the allllll the cheesy zombie movies is that this series has yet to crack a joke or have an insanely cliche moment (expect maybe when they rubbed zombie guts all over themselves and the rain came). The mood is more real feeling. A movie shot like this would have been cool, too, but none of them are any good.

Flip wrote:The mood is more real feeling. A movie shot like this would have been cool, too, but none of them are any good.

You mean the mood from 16mm film? Yeah, movies shot like that are cool, too bad digital has sucked the life out of everything.

Anarky wrote:

Spoiler: show

BRAVO! So glad they were actually able to kill people off (TV doesn't do what it needs to at times). Maybe I was wrong about where the season will end. I think they will be getting to Hershals farm in the finale. I still have some doubts about them killing off Shane.

Theory on how that episode ended:

What do you think?