Rescue Me

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flyonthewall2983
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Rescue Me

#1 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Thu Jun 07, 2018 2:17 am


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Murdoch
Joined: Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:59 pm
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Re: Rescue Me

#2 Post by Murdoch » Thu Jun 07, 2018 10:11 am

I never did finish this show but I maintain that the opening to season 3 (4? I'm not sure) where Tommy is plunged into a hellish 9/11 nightmare, complete with fallen firefighters marching into a white light, is the most surreal thing I've seen on TV outside of Lynch's Twin Peaks revival. This show was very hit-and-miss and I ended up ditching it since spending hours with Denis Leary playing Denis Leary isn't my idea of a good time. Still, it approached some heavy subject matter in ways I haven't seen since, like the Chief's gay son and the explicit portrayals of his sex life, along with the scene where one of the firefighters is raped by his girlfriend and her male roommate.

It may not have aged well (I'm not sure, I haven't revisited it and I'm not keen on going back), but this show got away with a lot and it's really an artifact of that time when cable channels like AMC and FX first started pushing out the prestige television and testing the censors on what they could do.

flyonthewall2983
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Re: Rescue Me

#3 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:46 pm

Nip/Tuck went to similar extremes as far as pushing the censors I believe.

I think that dream sequence you described was in the fourth season. I didn't finish it either, I think the last time I checked in on it is when Michael J. Fox appeared late in it's run. It lasted 6 seasons, and I can think of a few shows in this recent era that did well to stretch itself out for that long. But this one didn't, mainly because Leary is not as great a lead as people or himself thought. I didn't even bother with his last show where he played a rock star, though I'm interested in the fact he might be a supporting regular now on TNT's Animal Factory.
Last edited by flyonthewall2983 on Sat Nov 10, 2018 5:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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swo17
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Re: Rescue Me

#4 Post by swo17 » Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:52 pm

All I remember about this show is that in every episode, on top of everything else, one of Denis Leary's kids died.

beamish14
Joined: Fri May 18, 2018 3:07 pm

Re: Rescue Me

#5 Post by beamish14 » Tue Jun 12, 2018 5:09 pm

Murdoch wrote: ↑
Thu Jun 07, 2018 10:11 am

It may not have aged well (I'm not sure, I haven't revisited it and I'm not keen on going back), but this show got away with a lot and it's really an artifact of that time when cable channels like AMC and FX first started pushing out the prestige television and testing the censors on what they could do.
Absolutely. Basic cable channels can air anything they want in America; the self-censorship they continue to engage in is a reflection of their
need for advertisers. FX is arguably the only one to ever approve of material that HBO wouldn't.

flyonthewall2983
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Re: Rescue Me

#6 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Tue Jun 12, 2018 5:57 pm

The line is definitely getting blurrier with even other channels. Basic cable up-and-comer Viceland has a show about sex called Slutever that manages to get away with a lot, while censoring nudity and the major cursewords. It's likely to do with the fact that we're upon a generation of parents that have finally mastered the chip technology that can block out stuff based on ratings now.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: Rescue Me

#7 Post by Roger Ryan » Wed Jun 13, 2018 8:20 am

flyonthewall2983 wrote: ↑
Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:46 pm
...I didn't even bother with his last show where he played a rock star...[/i]
I thought Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll was pretty good, actually. As creator, co-writer, and executive producer, Leary was generous enough to make the show an ensemble piece which often used his amusing "Johnny Rock" to support storylines emphasizing other characters. And "rock star" is not the way to describe Leary's character who's painfully aware he's beyond has-been and is often unrecognized. At its best, the show was like Spinal Tap played a little more seriously with inside music business jokes and witty song genre parodies.

flyonthewall2983
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Re: Rescue Me

#8 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Wed Jun 13, 2018 9:46 am

I might give it a chance then.

flyonthewall2983
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Re: Rescue Me

#9 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Sat Nov 10, 2018 5:50 pm

Blu-ray.com review. 2.5 for video, hopefully this isn't indicative of Mill Creek's upcoming release of The Shield.

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