I love this show, too, ecarle, and it's great reading your thoughts on it. I saw "Deadwood" back when it aired on HBO and think it's one of the best shows ever made. The language is so rich, the storytelling impeccable, and the performances are top notch across the board.
But Ian McShane's Al Swearengen steals the show for me. He can be so brutal and merciless, but he's also deliciously funny, and he has a moral code. Catching that rare glimpse of humanity in him grounds the whole series in my opinion, and makes him someone I even wanted to see succeed.
PS. The sacrifice of the blonde hooker ties into a stinging aspect of "Deadwood" that seems even more powerful a decade later as Hollywood collapses in a sea of sexual harrassment cases: how men devalued women from the start, all the time. Except here, Trixie and the Molly Parker character, are, ultimately, valued by Swearingen and the other men.
I see this aspect of "Deadwood" as underscoring what has so often been true in Hollywood and society, and that is the economic, social and sexual power that many men wield over many women. Swearengen and the town's protection of Alma and Trixie also serves as a reminder of the women's powerlessness. Strong-willed and strong-hearted as they are, none of the female characters in "Deadwood" rise above the will of men in power.
I think of how Alma Garret is married off to Whitney Ellsworth in response to the taboo of unwed motherhood, and later sells her gold claim to George Hearst to prevent bloodshed. How Joannie Stubbs is let go by Cy Tolliver, only to open up her own brothel (can we consider that to be much of a liberation?), then ultimately sells her business to another man, Al Swearengen's friend Jack Langrishe. And how Trixie (who doesn't have the dignity of a surname) remains ever beholden to Al Swearengen and his mercies, whether he cares for her or not. These women had little to no power, and, in the case of Alma and Joannie, whatever power they did manage to acquire, they ultimately gave it up to men of greater means. Woeful lot these women had!
Maybe one exception to this is Calamity Jane. She seemed to operate outside the social structure, but she also had no social status, as far as I could tell.
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
I think of how Alma Garret is married off to Whitney Ellsworth in response to the taboo of unwed motherhood, and later sells her gold claim to George Hearst to prevent bloodshed. How Joannie Stubbs is let go by Cy Tolliver, only to open up her own brothel (can we consider that to be much of a liberation?), then ultimately sells her business to another man, Al Swearengen's friend Jack Langrishe. And how Trixie (who doesn't have the dignity of a surname) remains ever beholden to Al Swearengen and his mercies, whether he cares for her or not. These women had little to no power, and, in the case of Alma and Joannie, whatever power they did manage to acquire, they ultimately gave it up to men of greater means. Woeful lot these women had!
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I will confess to only having viewed Season Three in full, thus far. Crazy, huh? I have to GUESS what brought Trixie and Alma Garrett to where they are now. (And I'm not sure exactly how Trixie fits in, tell you the truth. She's with John Hawkes? She's with MacShane? But I wanted to see the Hearst/MacRaney arc first. The way I figure it, the show never travelled a full arc of seasons, anyway.
The show makes the most of depicting the men as in control of the women, but finds a little something in each woman to rebel by. And there is that big moment in Season Three where, when the bad guys shoot NEXT to Alma -- scaring her, could have hit her -- that's enough for Swearington to enact bloody revenge on the guy what done it.
"You don't mess with the womenfolk." Or the merchandise.
I did find Trixie's ploy to shoot Hearst rather female in its daring -- basically show off her "private areas" to get his attention. Too bad, she's a bad shot. But the shoulder wound was satisfying.
Calamity Jane is her own force of nature....
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
That IS crazy! I shouldn't have presumed you'd seen all of the first two seasons.
Regarding Trixie, maybe in another life, had she been of higher station, she would've married Sol Star. But Al Swearengen had taken her in as a prostitute for his brothel long before Sol came along, and there's a dependence and closeness between Al and Trixie that's evolved too far to be severed, it seems. That's how I remember it, anyway...
I feel that Season Three takes things in a different narrative direction from the first two seasons. To me S3 is about Deadwood growing up and facing the reality of the approaching era of government and corporate interests. And with it the upheaval of the social hierarchy, the diminishing of authority and influence of people like Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen. Hearst was a sign of things to come.
I'm partial to the first two seasons, because I loved the earlier seasons' sense of possibility, of the untamed make-it-as-you-go frontier, where good and bad guys alike relied almost solely on sheer skill, nerves and luck. Also, Keith Carradine as Wild Bill Hickok is a highlight, and I feel like the resolution of his storyline is a watershed moment, that complements that unforgettable confrontation between Dan Dority and Captain Turner in Season 3 .
(cont.)
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
That IS crazy! I shouldn't have presumed you'd seen all of the first two seasons.
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I'll tell you why I did it that way. I came to Deadwood long after it went off the air; I'd liked a few episodes when it was on but never "dug in." But I wanted to watch the series recently. So I read some reviews that noted the coming of Gerald McRaney as George Hearst was the "big showdown" of the series, complete with a horrific man-to-man fight to the death in there -- and I said "I'm gonna watch that season first."
I'm now about four episodes into Season One, and its like the old movie habit people had of "coming into the movie late and staying in the theater to see it from the beginning." I can see the origins of Calamity Jane and Utter with Wild Bill Hickock, and the "first meetings" of seething straight-arrowhood with Bullock and the oratorical practical evil of Swearington and...its kind of fun to "do it backwards."
THAT said, I think it is rather surprising how little Bullock and Swearington and the others changed in three seasons. But I guess people don't much change. At the end, Bullock was still seething and straightarrow; Swearington was now a "nicer person" but ready to kill an innocent women to spare a less innocent woman's life. (With a knife to the throat; the show makes the point that Swearington doesn't know how to shoot, so ALL his killings are with a , blade, and hence brutal, intimate , and gory.)
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
That fight to the death was indeed horrific, too. It's not easy depicting violence that graphic and making it humanizing and appropriately traumatizing rather than desensitizing, but the cast and crew did a great job with that scene.
"its kind of fun to "do it backwards."
Another nice thing about that is, since you already know that you like how it turns out, you can just sit back and enjoy the ride, knowing it's not going to go wrong.
"I think it is rather surprising how little Bullock and Swearington and the others changed in three seasons. But I guess people don't much change."
Yes, I feel that that's true to life, how people change to a certain extent with experience and circumstances, but the essence of them doesn't usually change. You can still see what makes them who they are. I loved that about this show, how it kept its characters true to themselves and its character arcs credible. (When characters start going in a different direction seemingly for mere plot convenience or out of writers' whim is when I start thinking a show is going pear-shaped.)
That said, I did some reading about "Deadwood" in light of our conversation, and found that the show was formatted so that "each season portrayed two weeks in the life of Deadwood, with each episode representing one day," with some passage of time between each season. Comparing the series' events against the history of the real-life Deadwood, I think the show takes place from around June 1876 to sometime before March 1878 (when Deadwood's first telephone lines were installed). Certainly Season 3 concludes before the fire of September 26, 1879.
So with a timeline of less than two years, three tops, that could be another reason Seth and Al and company remain very much the people we see at the outset (and thank goodness, for Seth; I do like to speculate that he gets to relax a little.)
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
the show makes the point that Swearington doesn't know how to shoot, so ALL his killings are with a , blade, and hence brutal, intimate , and gory.
Interesting, I hadn't noticed that. It fits the character, too. He strikes me as having his own moral code, and believing in accountability in his own perverse way. I can imagine that someone like him might even prefer to use a knife, as though to pay for his cold brutality and willingness to murder with the burden of doing it up close and getting his hands bloody.
Or maybe he just plain doesn't know how to shoot. Could be he doesn't want to scare away the business downstairs, either.
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
Regarding Trixie, maybe in another life, had she been of higher station, she would've married Sol Star. But Al Swearengen had taken her in as a prostitute for his brothel long before Sol came along, and there's a dependence and closeness between Al and Trixie that's evolved too far to be severed, it seems. That's how I remember it, anyway...
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I can see that by connecting her in Season One(thus far as I've seen it) and Season Three. A woman that two men sort of "share." That happens more than you would think.
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I feel that Season Three takes things in a different narrative direction from the first two seasons. To me S3 is about Deadwood growing up and facing the reality of the approaching era of government and corporate interests. And with it the upheaval of the social hierarchy, the diminishing of authority and influence of people like Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen. Hearst was a sign of things to come.
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Yes, I see that. Hearst (or someone like him) was probably inevitable as America grew. People always want to take over and run things; they like the power as much as the riches. It is done today in America, but with less bloodshed. For instance, how Hearst "rigged" the election at the end is pretty much done legally today -- the party in power "cuts the districts so that they stay in power"(gerrymandering, its called.) It has the same "unfair" effect as what Hearst did more nastily on Deadwood. And yet today's parties would say "we have every right to cut the districts to help us."
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
I'm partial to the first two seasons, because I loved the earlier seasons' sense of possibility, of the untamed make-it-as-you-go frontier, where good and bad guys alike relied almost solely on sheer skill, nerves and luck.
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I guess in seeing Season Three first, I lost some of that "sense of possibility," given that I know the show is headed to "outside domination of the characters," but it is still interesting to watch the series from the beginning. One thought I have is that the characters were pretty much the same in Season One as in Season Three -- three seasons isn't really enough time to massively change characters anyway. Swearington's initial willingness to kill that little girl(to save his own skin after his complicity in the slaughter of her family) is the stuff of evil, but I can't say he's much "nicer" when he kills that hooker in Season Three. Perhaps more resigned to having to submit to Hearst rather than see the whole town burned down and everyone killed.
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I guess Also, Keith Carradine as Wild Bill Hickok is a highlight, and I feel like the resolution of his storyline is a watershed moment, that complements that unforgettable confrontation between Dan Dority and Captain Turner in Season 3 .
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Four episodes in, I'm liking Carradine. He's got the same "guest star charisma" playing an almost-good guy that Gerald McRaney has playing a pure bad guy. Funny, I didn't think Young Skinny Keith Carradine had much charisma in the 70's(Nashville, Emperor of the North), but age gives it to some people. A great voice, too -- so many of the actors on Deadwood have great voices.
I'm wondering if Season Two has a guest star with the charisma of Carradine and McRaney...
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
> > Swearington's initial willingness to kill that little girl(to save his own skin after his complicity in the slaughter of her family) is the stuff of evil, but I can't say he's much 'nicer' when he kills that hooker in Season Three. Perhaps more resigned to having to submit to Hearst rather than see the whole town burned down and everyone killed.
I think Swearengen is a pragmatic and political individual in the sense of always seeking to maintain his own power and position (and mostly apolitical in the sense of moral principles). While I think that he'd grown to care for some of the people of the town and maybe even the community itself, I think a lot of his motive for killing that woman to save the town is that, without Deadwood, there would be no context for his power and his livelihood. He'd have to move and start over. And what a pain that'd be to him!
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
> > Four episodes in, I'm liking Carradine. He's got the same 'guest star charisma' playing an almost-good guy that Gerald McRaney has playing a pure bad guy. Funny, I didn't think Young Skinny Keith Carradine had much charisma in the 70's(Nashville, Emperor of the North), but age gives it to some people.
I think some people acquire a nice gravitas over time, that gives them charisma. Confidence is another thing I think some people gain with time that translates into charisma.
You know what I find even more pleasantly surprising, though, is when actors reveal strengths or depths I didn't suspect, seemingly by virtue of just being given the chance. John Hawkes among the "Deadwood" cast is an example for me. I like him fine in this show, but he really shined within the next 5 years in things like "Winter's Bone" and "Martha Marcy May Marlene." It makes me wonder how many more actors are capable of much more than people may have seen, and how often it's just a question of opportunity. I also think there are more quality actors than quality roles and films, so I feel that many actors are probably better than we know or can know. (Maybe not all, but I won't name names!)
I remember looking up Keith Carradine after seeing him as Wild Bill Hickok, wondering if he'd done other similar work, and was surprised to see he'd mostly been known in musicals! I haven't seen any of his other work, but he's been recognized in a drama called "Chiefs," so I'm curious about that. "The Duellists" is also on my list.
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
> > I'm wondering if Season Two has a guest star with the charisma of Carradine and McRaney...
I thought McRaney and Carradine were great in guest star roles representing something larger than just their characters. I don't recall Season Two having an equivalent type of character, but it does have one of my favorite character actors Garret Dillahunt, who plays a chilling Francis Wolcott. (He also pulls off another great casting feat, which I would never have suspected and only discovered when I had looked up his resume specifically.) Brad Dourif is another great actor here throughout.
> > A great voice, too -- so many of the actors on Deadwood have great voices.
I especially loved the rich tones of Powers Boothe, Ian McShane, and Keith Carradine. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that Carradine has been known for musicals, after all!
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
> > A woman that two men sort of "share." That happens more than you would think.
Yes, shared is a good way of putting it.
> > Hearst (or someone like him) was probably inevitable as America grew. People always want to take over and run things; they like the power as much as the riches. It is done today in America, but with less bloodshed. For instance, how Hearst "rigged" the election at the end is pretty much done legally today -- the party in power "cuts the districts so that they stay in power"(gerrymandering, its called.) It has the same "unfair" effect as what Hearst did more nastily on Deadwood. And yet today's parties would say "we have every right to cut the districts to help us."
Yes, we can also see it in the way the party in power heads up various government agencies (the EPA, the Department of Education), nominates judges, writes the tax bill, you name it. There's policy, and then there's politics. Fortunately there are people in office and people who vote who still know and act as though there's a meaningful difference.
> > One thought I have is that the characters were pretty much the same in Season One as in Season Three -- three seasons isn't really enough time to massively change characters anyway.
Yes, and after reading more about the show and comparing it to the real-life history of Deadwood, it seems to me that Seasons One through Three cover the time period from around June 1876 to perhaps March 1878. Not long.
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
I didn't much like the encroachment of powerful outsiders in the third season. Maybe it was David Milch's intent to create some audience frustration, because it's too bad seeing Deadwood's leading denizens, whom we've come to know and love (or love to hate), knocked back on their heels as they're outmaneuvered by "The Man" at almost every turn. At the end of the season, they may have [spoiler] managed to get Hearst out of town and out of their lives, but the manner in which they secured this outcome only highlighted how powerless they are, how the real victor is the kind of power and money and corruption represented and wielded by people like Hearst.[/spoiler]
I did find Trixie's ploy to shoot Hearst rather female in its daring -- basically show off her "private areas" to get his attention. Too bad, she's a bad shot. But the shoulder wound was satisfying.
Yes, though I also see this as another metaphor! For how the people of Deadwood can try as they might, in the best ways they each know how, to fight "The Man," but they can't prevail. Like the [spoiler] righteous Bullock losing the sheriff's election (thanks to Hearst's probable vote-rigging), like the mean and unprincipled Tolliver finding himself impotent (unwilling or unable to shoot Hearst as he pompously leaves the camp), and like Swearengen figuratively and literally brought to his knees cleaning the stain of his compromised morals, [/spoiler] Trixie too finds herself ineffectual against Hearst.
Quite a cynical and downbeat way to end the show, in my opinion! However I don't think it was David Milch's intention to conclude the series there. According to wikipedia, for what it's worth, HBO had declined to pick up the options of the actors for a fourth season, and Milch has written a two-hour
Deadwood movie instead to continue the story, which HBO hasn't greenlit.
I'd love to see it if it ever happens!
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
I didn't much like the encroachment of powerful outsiders in the third season. Maybe it was David Milch's intent to create some audience frustration, because it's too bad seeing Deadwood's leading denizens, whom we've come to know and love (or love to hate), knocked back on their heels as they're outmaneuvered by "The Man" at almost every turn.
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Its a downer story, reminiscent of all those 70's movies -- like Chinatown and The Parallax View -- where the good guys lost and the power brokers came out on top and invincible.
I'm not sure such stories sell so well in the 21 Century. But Milch went for it.
And, I suppose, in its own way, Deadwood ended in as much frustration as The Sopranos -- with a horrible feeling of defeat in our gut(underlined by the final sacrifice of the innocent whore) and "the ending cut off"(with a supposed four final episodes not allowed to be made, by one party or the other -- did Milch refuse or HBO revoke?.)
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
"I'm not sure such stories sell so well in the 21 Century. But Milch went for it."
I'm not sure, either, but they've gotten due recognition when done this well. Another superb series that ran around the same time (2002-2008) that blurred the line between the good guys and the bad guys and the right and wrong in making its social commentary was "The Wire." Happily, it got to complete its run as its creator David Simon intended. I love stories like these.
(with a supposed four final episodes not allowed to be made, by one party or the other -- did Milch refuse or HBO revoke?.)
My understanding is that, first, in May 2006 HBO declined to pick up the actors' option contracts for a fourth season of Deadwood, but did offer Milch a short order of 6 episodes. Milch declined that order and instead agreed to make two 2-hour television films. Things went into development limbo from then until August 2015, when HBO and Milch resumed talks, this time with HBO green-lighting in January 2016 a script for a Deadwood movie, and Milch submitting in April 2017 a script for one two-hour movie. So the ball's back in HBO's court.
At this point, if HBO stalls, I wonder if Milch could just keep trimming and pitch a 55-minute pilot episode for another round of Deadwood instead. Ha!
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
I did find Trixie's ploy to shoot Hearst rather female in its daring -- basically show off her "private areas" to get his attention. Too bad, she's a bad shot. But the shoulder wound was satisfying.
Yes, though I also see this as another metaphor! For how the people of Deadwood can try as they might, in the best ways they each know how, to fight "The Man," but they can't prevail. Like the [spoiler] righteous Bullock losing the sheriff's election (thanks to Hearst's probable vote-rigging), like the mean and unprincipled Tolliver finding himself impotent (unwilling or unable to shoot Hearst as he pompously leaves the camp), and like Swearengen figuratively and literally brought to his knees cleaning the stain of his compromised morals, Trixie too finds herself ineffectual against Hearst.
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Great analysis. Each of our "tarnished heroes" tried to take on Hearst in their own way, and failed in their own way.(Trixie's embarrassing nakedness backfired on her; maybe it threw off her shot.)
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Quite a cynical and downbeat way to end the show, in my opinion! However I don't think it was David Milch's intention to conclude the series there. According to wikipedia, for what it's worth, HBO had declined to pick up the options of the actors for a fourth season, and Milch has written a two-hour Deadwood movie instead to continue the story, which HBO hasn't greenlit.
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Oh, a clarification of what I thought above.
We're over ten years out now, I doubt anyone would make this movie. Sex and the City got it right -- coming out with a movie fairly soon after the closure of the show. And the movie(s) felt like a "tacked on anticlimax" to the long series, anyway.
I dunno...I suppose "the end is the end."
I don't see Deadwood suddenly turning into a "happy ending rout of George Hearst." We know the real Heart survived to sire Citizen Kane.
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bravo_bravo (187)
7 years ago
> > Great analysis. Each of our "tarnished heroes" tried to take on Hearst in their own way, and failed in their own way.(Trixie's embarrassing nakedness backfired on her; maybe it threw off her shot.)
Thanks! Good point, Trixie probably wasn't exactly in the zone.
> > We're over ten years out now, I doubt anyone would make this movie. [...] I don't see Deadwood suddenly turning into a "happy ending rout of George Hearst." We know the real Heart survived to sire Citizen Kane.
Yes, I doubt that whatever David Milch had or has in mind is much different in tone or direction from Season 3—the series evolved as it should have—but it felt to me like there were loose ends, and I'd love to see what else he wants to cover here. The real-life Deadwood fire of 1879 and the rebuilding of the community, for one, would be interesting to see. But yes, the ending as-is is also a fine and fitting one.
I'm not yet betting on a movie happening, either, but for what it's worth, word has it that a Deadwood film might start filming fall of 2018*, and that HBO is just waiting on Milch to "make it happen,"** as he's also currently working on an adaptation of Peter Matthiessen's "Shadow Country" with Jeff Bridges, also for HBO. (That sounds great, too.)
I think now is as good a time as any, if it's going to happen, with the show's co-lead Ian McShane going strong right now with both the "American Gods" series and the "John Wick" films.
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* http://deadline.com/2017/11/deadwood-hbo-movie-david-milch-ian-mcshane-casey-bloys-1202206774/
** http://www.slashfilm.com/jeff-bridges-shadow-county-adaptation/
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
Great analysis. Each of our "tarnished heroes" tried to take on Hearst in their own way, and failed in their own way.(Trixie's embarrassing nakedness backfired on her; maybe it threw off her shot.)
Thanks! Good point, Trixie probably wasn't exactly in the zone.
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Her own nakedness probably threw her off, but the bottom line is: shooting to kill takes a lot of intestinal fortitude and skill.
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> > We're over ten years out now, I doubt anyone would make this movie. [...] I don't see Deadwood suddenly turning into a "happy ending rout of George Hearst." We know the real Hearst survived to sire Citizen Kane.
Yes, I doubt that whatever David Milch had or has in mind is much different in tone or direction from Season 3—the series evolved as it should have—but it felt to me like there were loose ends, and I'd love to see what else he wants to cover here. The real-life Deadwood fire of 1879 and the rebuilding of the community, for one, would be interesting to see. But yes, the ending as-is is also a fine and fitting one.
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I would like to add here that that other HBO series -- The Sopranos -- posited that even as Tony vanquished foes out to take over his empire in every season -- the next season, ANOTHER foe would show up. From Uncle Junior to Richie to Ralphie to Feech to Sack to Leotardo -- one by one they took Tony on, and one by one he -- or fate -- foiled them.
So I suppose that Deadwood could keep bringing more antagonists into town to take on Swearingen and Bullock, Season after Season.
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ecarle (14979)
7 years ago
I'm not yet betting on a movie happening, either, but for what it's worth, word has it that the Deadwood film might start filming fall of 2018*, and that HBO is just waiting on Milch to "make it happen"** as he's also currently working on an adaptation of Peter Matthiessen's "Shadow Country" with Jeff Bridges, also for HBO. (That sounds great, too.)
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Your link raises hope in me -- I suddenly realize that "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" arrived more than ten years after the TV series went off the air. Of course, the motion picture was pretty bad and dull -- but I have higher hopes for Deadwood as a movie of grit.
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I think now is as good a time as any, if it's going to happen, with the show's co-lead Ian McShane going strong right now with both the "American Gods" series and the "John Wick" films.
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Ian McShane can be seen as a rather sweet-faced pretty boy back in the 1973 whodunnit "The Last of Shiela," but as with a lot of handsome male actors, the years added character and gravitas and now he's spectacular in his seasoned old middle age. Seeing him in the first John Wick was like a reunion with Deadwood. Seeing him in the second John Wick..he was about the only human being IN it. (En route to Deadwood, an aging McShane was a tough gangster villain in "Sexy Beast" -- almost as evil as Ben Kingsley in that film.)
And I recently saw Brian Cox in a trailer for "SuperTroopers 2," which is embarrassing of itself but get this -- SuperTroopers 1" was 16 years ago. You CAN come back! (More fodder for a Deadwood movie.)
Alas , Powers Boothe has died, but Deadwood has more great voices where his came from.
I'm now much more hopeful that a "Deadwood" movie could be a reality. I'll be first in line!
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