HBO's "Carnivale" Sucks!!!! And This Is Why

[Yavin4]

First, let me say that I'm a huge fan of the show. I watch it every Sunday night, but I've grown completely frustrated with the show's narrative. I've watched every single episode, and the multiple story lines have not advanced one iota. The audience is still in the dark as it was from the beginning.

Now, I know that some of you will defend the show by saying that I should be patient, and that I should appreciate the ambience of the show and it's unconventional story telling. That's all fine. I don't need to be spoonfed a story, however, there's a fine line between unconventional story telling and not having a well-defined narrative.

The writers have introduced so many multiple story lines that almost anything can happen with any character. This isn't creative story telling. This is non-committal story-telling. The writers want multiple story lines because they can't decide which story line they want to tell.

We've seen this kind of writing before with The Sopranos, The X Files, and Twin Peaks. On each of these shows, the writers just could not decide what in the hell that they wanted to do with the show. Story lines were started and dropped left and right.

When I put time into a story, I want the story to have some sort of resolution. I don't want the narrative to wander off in multiple directions.

[flamingyouth]

1. I watched the first two episodes

Then the show started to lose me. I mean, I'm not an idiot or anything, but I was really losing track of what was going on. Now I just read a book while my husband watches it. Oh well, it's just not my cup of tea, I suppose.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

2. Last episode, I was thinking (SPOILER ALERT) that the writers

probably began with the ending. Hence the Knights Templar. They are building (IMHO) to a major fantasy/scifi ending in which the roads all began in 15th Century mythology.

We finally learned that Management is a he, that the psychic girl's powers are growing, the preachers powers are far stronger than expected...

We know that this is a 12 episode series, so I don't want too much resolution yet. I am enjoying the charater development.

[demgrrrll]

4. I love it. Wouldn't miss the show for the world. It is a microcosm of

the universe of human nature. We all have elements of dark and light but which prevails? They are alluding to some resolution, some will stay some will go. I want to see the last three episodes.

[Susang]

3. I disagree with your assessment

Carnivale is an ongoing series with a new set of shows set for next season. The whole point is to keep the plot lines going, kind of like a particularly well acted (and written) soap opera.

I also don't believe that the character development has gone nowhere in the episodes that have aired. If that were true, how would be know that Brother Justin (and his sister) were mysterious Russian immigrants, that Sofie was the product of a brutal rape, that Ruthie slept with Ben's father, that Ben's father was a member of the Knights Templar, that Rita Sue had been carrying a torch for Jonsey, that Libby dreams of going to Hollywood to escape, etc., etc........ If you think of where the characters were at the beginning of the series and look at how much we know about them and their histories and motivations now, you'll see that the show's characters have really come a long way from the start.

The story's the thing here, not the ending.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

5. I read on the HBO site that it's a 12 show series.

Only three left. Sigh. I wish it was a series.

[Susang]

8. According to one of the creators it is coming back

I've read this on quite a few sites, but here's a link to an interview with one of the producers that states that Carnivale will be back

snip:
Ronald D. Moore, co-executive producer of HBO's supernatural drama series Carnivale, told SCI FI Wire that the upcoming final first-season episodes will answer some questions raised by the offbeat show—but not all of them. "By the end of the first season you're going to understand a lot more about 'Management,'" Moore said in an interview. "You'll know who's running the carnival." The show deals with the strange performers in a Depression-era traveling freak show.
Moore—who is also executive producer of the SCI FI Channel's upcoming original miniseries Battlestar Galactica—added that audiences will understand more about Ben Hawkins (Nick Stahl) and Brother Justin (Clancy Brown) and why they are connected. "Even though those two characters aren't going to meet in the first season—which is a non-traditional way, that the hero and the villain aren't going to meet year one at all—you're going to understand that they're both players in a much larger story," Moore said.

http://www.greatlink.org/dcisV2.asp?url=http://www.greatlink.org/shownewsitem.asp?item=2749

[Yavin4]

6. Those Are Very Minor Plot Points

that don't really add up to anything, which is the show's problem, a lot of little things that don't really mean anything. We've known from the first show that Brother Justin has supernatural powers, and we've learned that he and his sister are immigrants. Yet, after nine shows, that's all that we know about them. What was the purpose of having him in the mental institution other than to show us what life was like in a mental institution in 1930.

I understand that this is a series, but you don't see wandering story lines on "Six Feet Under" nor on "The Wire". Both shows takes us deep into the lives of their characters and everything that we learn about them is later tied into a real story line or plot point. IOW, both shows have a strong narrative and the writers have a clear idea of where they want to take the show.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

7. It's not a series, it's essentially a 12 hour movie. Or a mini-series,

if you will.

The stay in the asylum served as a cathartic experience where he (Justin)honed his powers right after learning that he had killed a man with them as a child. We just found out that they were Russian immigrants in the previous episode as he was "wandering the wilderness.

Hey, I guess it's really just a matter of taste. I love convoluted plots and themes stories that remind me of a 'chason de geste.' This is a bonanza for me. Others enjoy more straightforward linear story telling. Both are great forms.

[Khephra]

16. Read above

and if not, trust me--it's an ongoing series. This is just season one. It's not a mini.

[Susang]

19. Thank you!

I was starting to think that nobody was listening to me. And I actually do know what I'm talking about for once! :-)

[Susang]

9. I still don't agree

If you personally don't understand something it doesn't mean that it is meaningless. I've had no troubles understanding Carnivale and where it's going. And I would hardly call finding out that you were a child of rape or discovering your father was a member of the Knights Templar minor plot points. To each their own, I suppose.

[JCMach1]

10. Post-Modern Frustration of narrativity

The writers are playing the post modern game where plot simply isn't the point (in a sense).

What sucks is not having Carnivale in the UAE!

[Yavin4]

11. The Writers Don't Have A Story To Tell

They're too caught up in the ambience of the period than they are about telling a story.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

12. They are telling a story. Some people cannot follow non-linear

story lines.

One of the best examples of a non-linear story in film would probably be Memento. This is nowhere close to Memento and is more linear than not, but the number of character and the commitment to being a character driven film might make it difficult to follow for some.

Guess that's why some people like James Joyce and others like Danielle Steel.

[JCMach1]

14. Precisely, you have to be willing to play

the post-modern game in order to enjoy it.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

15. Play the post madern game???? You have a Victorian

narrative in the form of Ben (The main Character).

Andreas Huyssen's work makes clear that the widespread use of the term "postmodern" has led to a crisis in the whole notion of historical and artistic periods. Every distinguishing feature of postmodernism can be located in an era prior to our own. Periodization begins to seem a rhetorical creation, a way of constructing a historical "other" that allows us to define a desirable present by contrasting it to a past (or to denigrate the present for being inferior to a past). Within such a view, what is distinctive about postmodernism is not something new but our attention to and interest in features of the past that until recently were most often ignored. Postmodernism, then, is just part of the very complex rereading of history taking place in the current climate of a critical questioning of the Western tradition. Paradoxically, most of the materials for a radical questioning can be found in the tradition itself if we look in different places (noncanonical works) or with new eyes at familiar places. But there is also a concomitant interest in non-Western voices that offer different perspectives on the West's image of itself and its past.

Considering that this is a Western work and if you apply the concepts of French postmodernism or even deconstructuralist theory to the work, it cannot hold for very long or in it entirety as a postmodern work. It is a gothic romance in every Victorian sense of the word.

There are so damn many schools of literary criticism that have evolved in the last fifty years that virtually any can trump another simply by virtue of the quantities of time the critic is willing to spend on his argument.

[JCMach1]

28. Only in terms of plot...

Other elements are pastiche??

Please keep in mind I only viewed the first episode so far. It will be awhile before it lands here in the UAE.

We have Six Feet Under, for example, but it is a year behind.

[imax2268]

13. waiting for

the last three...I like how it's progressed so far...that blonde woman has nice ti....anyway...

This is the first HBO series that I am actually watching in it's entirety...so far so good...although certain things grab me as odd...but like I said...so far so good...

[Yavin4]

17. Adrienne Barbeau at 56 Years Old

is still pretty damn hot! I will give the show that much.

Moreover, I do enjoy non-linear story telling. I thought that Momento was very well done, but this aint Momento.

There's a huge difference between non-linear story telling and writers that have no idea of what they really want to do with their characters, and they have no idea of where they want to take the story. Nothing is ever explained. Thus, everything could be a possibility. You could make an argument that Brother Justin's sister is management.

I'm sorry, but if you write a story whereby anything and everything is a possibility, do you really have a story?

[Susang]

20. How do you know they have no idea what they really want to do?

Like I said before, just because you don't understand what they're doing, doesn't mean that it is meaningless. I'm pretty sure I have a good understanding of where the characters and the narrative are going. What does that make me? What does that make all the people I watch it with every Sunday night? We all seem to get it (as well as enjoy it). We also love the time it's taking for the story and characters to be revealed, particularly in this era of instant gratification and short attention spans.

[Yavin4]

22. I Completely Understand The Numerous Plot Lines

It's just that there's no real connection nor story development from one plot line to the next. The writers are just creating multiple story line possibilities without making a committment to a strong narrative.

Momento, as was mentioned earlier, had numerous plot points, but they were all connected into a narrative. That was a tremendous example of unconventional story telling, but it had a definite direction.

Carnivale just lurks from one idea to the next. Take Sophie's character. First, she's with Ben. They scrap that. Then she befriends one of the Coochie dancers. Then, she may become a Coochie dancer. They scrap that. Now, she's gaining her mother's telepathy powers. Come on. This is not good story telling. This is writers who cannot decide on what to do with a character.

Just answer me this, why would Sophie's character ever entertain the idea of becoming a Coochie dancer AFTER she sees that one of the dancers was killed by townspeople, and AFTER, she was almost raped herself by townspeople, and AFTER the other dancer that she befriends want to leave. At that point in the story, why would her character want to do such a thing. It just doesn't make any sense.

[Susang]

25. It doesn't make any sense to *you*

I'm sorry you don't seem to get what's going on with Sofie, but it's painfully obvious to me. She's a young woman who, in spite of having grown up in the carnival environment has been incredibly sheltered due to caring for her invalid mother. She was briefly and supericially involved with Ben. She was told to stay away from him by her mother. Yet, she still feel rebellious and is starting to experiment sexually.

She loses her virginity to a married man during a dust storm. After finding it less than stellar, she finds herself attracted to Libby and her family, obviously since they appear to be so open sexually.

She and Libby get very emotionally close in the way young women often do, lesbian overtones being somewhat of a given. She decides to try to be a cootch dancer for a couple of reasons. First, her new best friend's mother manipulates her into thinking that it would help LIbby get over her sister's death. Secondly, she is attracted to what Libby is and thinks she would like to be more like her. The fact that her mother doesn't like Libby makes it all the more appealing. She even rebuffs Jonesy because he criticizes Libby and her family's profession.

After the debacle on the evening of her debut, she begins to reevaluate her recent decisions and even reconciles with Jonesy to some extent. She's also becoming disturbed by the fact that her mother's thoughts and visions are becoming more visable to her. She blames it on her mother's declining mental health, but the possibility also exists that her psychic powers are increasing, corresponding to her recent sexual awakening.

I'm sorry, but it seems like they know exactly where they are going with Sofie's character. Her motivations are all there if you take the time to consider her actions as a whole, not as random acts. This is NOT bad writing, quite the contrary. It's subtle and insists that the viewer take an active involvement in the characters and their lives. The writers are actually treating their audience intelligently for once and not cramming obvious cliches and pat resolutions down our throats.

[populistmom]

18. I was trying to get into it.

I like so many of the HBO shows (in fact it's about the only TV I watch, other than PBS kids shows), and I was a big Twin Peaks and X-Files fan, so I thought I'd like it. It's okay, but it's just not quite hooking me. I want my Six Feet Under again! Wahhhhh! :cry:

[kentuck]

21. I thought I was the only person that watched this show !

:) The characters are very interesting to me. The time around the Dust Bowl with the desperation and the religious connotations. The bearded Lady, the flashbacks, the freaks! How could one not be mesmerized by such characters?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

23. I missed a couple of episodes and lost the thread

so one of these days, I'm going to go back and view it from the beginning again. (I have HBO on Demand on my cable system.)

Coming back after missing two episodes was totally confusing.

[Yavin4]

24. I've Seen Every Episode And There Really Is No Story To Tell

It's just a mis-mash of aborted plot lines.

[Khephra]

26. I've only seen the 1st ep so far

I loved it, but I missed two and three.

However, for those people who say the Producers don't know where they're going, I think you're not giving them enough credit.

They've already said the main villain and hero won't meet until season two. They're doing the Babylon 5 thing-- LONG planned out archs of stories.

In season one of B5 nothing seemed to come together, but by season 2 and 3 EVERYTHING clicked. I think the producers and writers of Carnivale are doing the same thing.

It's only 12 episodes a season. Watch the entire season and the start of the next. If something is interesting you, it might get better on season two.

SF/Horror/fantasy shows have a history of Season two being their best.

[Susang]

27. I think HBO's showing them all back to back

I recall seeing a commercial about it while watching Carnivale this past Sunday. Check their website, you might be able to catch up. There are some really great episodes. I've managed to catch them all, on time and in order. I love when television becomes an event. It reminds me of when I was much, much younger. Sigh...........