Television: The Black Donnellys

[butterfly]

After reading a couple of recs on my flist, I caught the repeat of the pilot tonight and loved it to pieces. We start out with an unreliable narrator in the form of Joey "Ice Cream", who is telling us the story. If you've ever seen the episode The Mistake of House, some of the same nifty editing and storytelling techniques that were in that episode are used here -- things pop out when Joey remembers that they weren't actually there, the screen freezes or reverses, all sorts of fun things like that.

And then there's the wonderful reveal of just what important thing Joey is telling us about the brothers. Even in the cut-tag, I won't spoil it, because it was perfect just the way it was shown. Suffice to say, I adored it.

I also loved the brothers, all four of them. They make sense, they fight, they play, and they love each other. Tommy is especially a jewel, but Kevin kicked ass as a second, Sean was believably adorable as the 'baby' of the family (and seeing him hurt broke my heart!), and Jimmy's actions make so much sense, as we find out more about him. All of them do.

Also, Tommy, Kevin, and Sean are all extremely hot (Jimmy isn't my kind of hot, though -- not enough hair).

Things I will say outside the cut-tag:

One of the creators of the show is Paul Haggis, who also created due South.

The series centers around four Irish-American brothers -- Tommy, Jimmy, Kevin, and Sean.

It airs on Mondays, ten o'clock, on NBC. I'll be watching next week (and jic -- it reminded me a lot of The Boondock Saints).

On a completely different topic: Today was Self-Injury Awareness Day. It's been a couple of months since the last time I cut, but it's still always there for me, as an possibility. Whether I feel stressed or hurt or overly emotional, cutting comes to mind as a way of feeling better. It probably always will be something that I consider as an option. So, yes. Self-Injury Awareness Day. There you go.

Comments

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I kinda want to see The Black Donnellys now. Even though it means being disloyal to Sorkin (who, quite frankly, doesn't deserve it atm). I figure, two brothers together in Supernatural is joyful-making. Four brothers must be twice as fun!

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

I'd give it a try, yeah. Though I can't speak as to loyalty to Sorkin, as I'm not sure I've ever watching anything of his (never saw The West Wing or Sports Night)!

The brothers in TBD are, so far, very joy-making. There's even an emotional hug!

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

I haven't really been enjoying Studio 60, but The West Wing ate my brain in November 2005 and I've never really recovered ;) Seriously, it is a brilliant, brilliant show with so much joy and passion and humanity. It is right up there with Buffy and Angel for unparalleled television -- I really can't recommend it enough!

(Sports Night is a great show too, but it doesn't have TWW's epic-ness.)

Also, TWW is the fandom that really got me writing fic, so it holds a special place for me :)

I'm gonna see if I can get my hands on the pilot ep of The Black Donnellys, try to watch it relatively unspoiled...

[castalie.livejournal.com]

So glad you enjoyed that episode too! I'm glad I went into completely spoiler free because it did make the twist so much more enjoyable. It was intense and heartbreaking and really worth it. I think we might have another winner with that one; in any case, it looks really promising :-)

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah! I've very glad that I had no clue about the big reveal. It was really amazing to have it all click at the end. I really hope that the series lives up to the promise of the pilot, because if it does, it'll be spectacular.