season 2 was horrible. I mean it was a labor to get through. It had no direction, didn't explore any character development outside of a little bit with Rodrigo in Mexico. I thought the acting was bad with some characters and I outright felt sad for Malcom McDowell for how silly his role was.
shareCompletely agree. Made me sad because I enjoyed season 1 very much and had been looking forward to season 2, but it was really a mess.
shareInteresting, because I've just started watching this series and I'm five episodes into Season 1 and I find it supremely disappointing. Written like an immature daytime soap opera, clumsily directed, poorly acted (by everyone, including McDowell, Bernal, and Peters, who are much better than this), and really embarrassing when they try to film these people actually doing something musical (playing an instrument, conducting, dancing, whatever). It just all looks like a really amateurish attempt to get into the classical music world that nobody connected with the series knows anything about.
God forbid if Season 2 is worse. Maybe I should quit while I'm ahead?
And don't even get me started about the Golden Globe wins last night. Sheesh!
Did you end up continuing? I just finished S1 E5 and was about to bail out myself, but then I checked ratings and saw this graph: http://graphtv.kevinformatics.com/tt3502172 So now I'm gonna watch the next couple episodes for sure, then maybe skip to the season finale and call it good.
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My top 250: http://www.flickchart.com/Charts.aspx?user=SlackerInc&perpage=250
If you rescale the Y-axis of that graph from 0-10, there is not much change from the beginning to the end of a season.
shareRight, but that's because hardly anyone really uses 2-5 (and a lot of people don't use 6 or 7, I think).
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My top 250: http://www.flickchart.com/Charts.aspx?user=SlackerInc&perpage=250
I completely agree. Loved season 1, but so disappointed in 2. It was all over the place.
shareHate to sound monotonous, but yes I agree. And 3/4 through season 1 I started to feel it's conventionality. I felt annoyed by it's overplay of the typical soap opera dramatics. I'm still pulling for you MiJ. But I might be better off catching an episode here and there. & buying the soundtrack. Same formulaic dysfunctional tv relationships in new packaging.
shareI thought season 2 was OK, but just OK. The negotiation scenes were kind of a bore and the Dermot Mulroney episode plot seemed really of place to me.
shareI guess I am in the minority here. I enjoyed Season 2. I thought it was better than "just okay." I enjoyed Season 1 also and I would not say 2 was better than 1, but I did like 2 a lot.
shareYou're not alone. I'm one (see my post above) who didn't see much at all to like in Season 1. Very amateurish all around.
But I just finished watching Season 2 and I have to say it was a big improvement over the former. Much more mature writing, the character clashes were interesting without resorting to soap opera cliches, and the actors seemed to have grown into their roles so I saw much less forced "acting" and more real folks dealing with issues. Not a top-notch season by any means, but so much better that the first one.
I liked season 2 but I agree that it lacked direction
shareI started watching it out of curiosity after the Golden Globes. Everything I was reading said, This is not the best comedy. And a lot of them said, and it's actually not very good. So I was curious about the dichotomy.
As for season 1, for me it was watchable. Enough so to view the whole season. I agree with the posters above who say it was pretty soapy and predictable: the brash young enfant terrible (to use imaginary Mozart's term from the show) conductor replaces the old warhorse, for one. But, you know, it was OK. I know taste is subjective, but I really don't get the people who say they LOL'd during the show; I wonder: What specifically did they find funny?
I'm up to the Latin American tour of season 2, the episode where Warren Boyd's violin is stolen; having a hard time getting through it. It just doesn't hold my attention.
I was never much of a Bernadette Peters fan, but I will say that she is very good in it. And Wallace Shawn is fun to watch (the scene where he's playing the former maestro's score, the way he delivers the line: "Sound familiar?").
I love Veep and Silicon Valley; to me, they are much better shows, certainly comedies.
I liked season 1 more but I didn't dislike season 2.
I did feel like it ended too soon though, like it had just hit it's midway point. Longer episodes would have helped things move along more quickly and the ending wouldn't have felt so flat.
Could have done without the relationship between Cynthia and the lawyer(there really was no point to it), and although I really enjoyed Malcom Mcdowell's portrayal of Thomas I could have used less of his loony biz.
I agree that the appearance of Gretchen Mol and the lesbian story were pointless. Maybe it was to reinforce the free-spiritedness of Cynthia? I don't know. The whole point of this show was to focus on the drugs, sex, rock and roll of the classical music world, so maybe they had to throw in the obligatory, HBO-style lesbian edge to it.
I read a few comments that didn't like Malcolm McDowell's Thomas, usually mentioning he was too much of a buffoon. Maybe I'm a sap but I really liked watching Thomas and Rodrigo bond as hermanos. Malcolm McDowell hasn't fully shown his range of skills since A Clockwork Orange. If there were other works of his that were incredible since A Clockwork Orange, I must have missed them. I actually enjoyed Thomas' buffoonery and Season 2; McDowell was very aware that was a melodramatic pathos to his character, but it was still tongue-in-cheek, keeping the comedic tone of the show. Most outstanding series with great season 1's usually begin to bomb by Season 2, but I didn't lose interest in Mozart in the Jungle Season 2.
transcendcinema.blogspot.com
I was offended by how the "bisexual character" was portrayed. Someone who is loose and sleeps with a married man? come on!
I have been in orchestras for 18 years and there have always been quite a few gay people in every orchestra I have been in. They really could have done better than that.
I'm trying to wrap my mind around how a bisexual person could be loyal to a partner. By definition, that person is interested in both genders or sexes (not sure the right word these days) so wouldn't it make sense that they are sexually active across gender and marriage lines? I'm not trying to be obnoxious or challenging, but I'm wondering how this works. I'm also an orchestral musician, and every bi musician I have known was fairly promiscuous. But that's a lifestyle too. And the single person who's active with a married person isn't at fault, they're not violating a contract. The married person is. And there's a mistress for every straight married conductor in every orchestra that guy leads every season. A girl in every port. And then there's Bernstein.
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I much preferred season 1. I somewhat enjoyed season 2, but you're right, it's somewhat directionless and silly at times.
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