True Detective - HBO (1 Viewer)

[Jerry Twig]

You and the law, one hopes.

...and Emily Nussbaum

 

[washingcattle]

Now I'm aware I can't convince you otherwise because you're only interested in what you take away from things, end of, but I'll give it a shot anyway:

Criticism is not about telling people your opinion nor is it about ticking the boxes of a cliché, e.g. "this is a feminist critique therefore I'm here to tell you that women are treated bad in this work."

Criticism is there to encourage you to think about art in different ways. A good critic is like a good artist in that they apply their training to their work and can illuminate a piece of art in a way that allows you, the reader/viewer/listener/whatever, to consider it from a different perspective. If art illuminates life then criticism illuminates art. Sometimes art says life is ugly and sometimes criticism says art is ugly. It's not there to supplant art nor to make value judgements on whether art is 'good' or 'bad'.

For me, most of my favourite art hits me in a gut-way that I initially can't explain and I may turn to criticism to help me both understand the art and, in turn, myself. I think one would be foolish to assume that they understand everything in the world and therefore have no need for criticism or, indeed, for art.

Of all the articles written about this show I've found the New Yorker one the most convincing partly because it's been the best written one, i.e. a superb piece of writing; a piece of art.

I think the main thing in that article which rubbed me up the wrong way was the writing. Firstly once a writer mentions themselves in a review it becomes a piece about themselves, their experience and their agenda rather than an unbiased piece about the subject. I know this because I do it all the time, I have my own agenda and I have no problem being that narcissistic here she refers to herself as "the cool girl" then references other shows which she has watched and obviously feels as though they to have worn her down. In other words this article isn't about True Detective it's about the accumulated effect of thinking critically from a feminist stand point about contemporary television. The problem for me is that the shows she's mentioning all come from the same kind of genre i.e crime, top tier business etc, all the main characters are male and to an extent all of the shows are about maleness.

So when she says things like "Though the show has movie-star charisma, it reeks of macho nonsense" she's missing out on the very important point that any discussion of maleness, which lets not kid ourselves if TD is about anything it's about masculinity, and a massive aspect of masculinity is that self same macho nonsense.

I think she basically put's her foot in it big time by saying

"Which might be O.K. if “True Detective” were dumb fun, but, good God, it’s not: it’s got so much gravitas it could run for President."

I really can't stand that attitude. It's everything I hate about academia. This is the kind of thing that ends in discussions like "old James Bond was grand because it was the 60s and they were having a laugh but new James Bond is a rapist because it's directed by Sam Mendes who should know better"

In short that article sounds like the kind of thing I write about how much I fucking hate Irish films about how awful it is to be working class. The only difference is that I know I'm a biased narcissist with an agenda who is taking pot shots at a wide range of films while she seems oblivious to the fact that she's writing about her own tiredness rather than anything which is as massively problematic as she makes out in the one subject she's writing about. What's more worrying is that if she were to take a step back for a second and think about why she's tired of casual misogyny in films and TV she'd probably realise that it's "dumb fun" which is the real problem and that by letting that off the hook she's doing herself and her audience a disservice.

 

[washingcattle]

I was talking in general sense of the internet, not in reference to this thread.
People being assholes because they are hidden behind a screen.

Ha, some people are just assholes 24/7.

Asshole and proud of it.

 

[Jill Hives]

Ha, some people are just assholes 24/7.

Asshole and proud of it.

I respect those who admit it.

 

[7 - No tomorrow]

I respect those who admit it.

Do you?

 

[Lili Marlene]

@washingcattle do you want to just agree to disagree or should we start another thread? I have a massive response all typed up but I really feel I've wrecked this thread enough as it is.

 

[7 - No tomorrow]

@washingcattle do you want to just agree to disagree ?

Do you even know this guy?

 

[Jill Hives]

Do you?

Of course I do.
I was once your friend, wasn't I?

 

[7 - No tomorrow]

Of course I do.
I was once your friend, wasn't I?

Were you?

 

[Jill Hives]

Were you?

That answer probably exists in a True Detective MEME.

 

[7 - No tomorrow]

Of course I do.
I was once your friend, wasn't I?

This is probably the nicest way that I've ever been called an asshole.

Like being beaten to death with a club made of feathers.

 

[washingcattle]

@washingcattle do you want to just agree to disagree or should we start another thread? I have a massive response all typed up but I really feel I've wrecked this thread enough as it is.

Yeah I suppose we can agree to disagree, to be honest we're actually probably on the same page about more of this stuff than it would appear given our back and forth here, you liked her article and I didn't really is the crux of our discussion, rather than misogyny ok/not ok. So PM me your response if you want.

To be fair whether we wrecked this thread or took it to a whole new level is probably worth discussing too

 

[hugh]

Lili Marlene - you haven't wrecked this thread. Washing Cattle - I have this gut feeling that you are wrong but am to tired and drunk and inarticulate to explain why. Everyone else - there's no way Marty is the Yellow King. Too fucking obvious, surely?

 

[washingcattle]

Washing Cattle - I have this gut feeling that you are wrong

Ha,

Me - "I don't like her article and here's why"

Response - You are wrong.

Okay so I do like her article ? Or my opinion is invalid ?

I can't wait til you sober you and explain how I'm wrong.

 

[hugh]

Ha,
Me - "I don't like her article and here's why"
Response - You are wrong.
Okay so I do like her article ? Or my opinion is invalid ?
I can't wait til you sober you and explain how I'm wrong.

Sorry, "wrong" was the wrong way to put it. What I really meant was that I've been reading this back and forth that has been going on and, even though I mostly agreed with you initially, the more it went on, the more I was leaning towards Lili Marlene's view on this, and I'm trying to figure out why. Lili Marlene has articulated it really well, so I'm not sure I have anything to add.

Except maybe this ...

"The massive irony in all of this is that The New Yorker and the rest of these types of magazines want to discuss the problems in high brow work but at the same time they're funded by advertising which is by far the worst culprit when it comes to misogyny and any "ism" you can think of. So you can read this article and side by side there will be a glossy full page advert where a blonde with massive breasts tries to sell you beer."

This is a really good point but it's kind of unavoidable given the nature of media channels and advertising and so on, right? I would prefer that the New Yorker contained articles that challenged this kind of culture than if it just threw its hands in the air and decided there was no point because it's so deeply implicated in it anyway.

You said something similar earlier about how these writers should be going after more serious transgressors i.e. why spend so much time having a go at Scorcese when you have the likes of Michael Bay strolling around making the most misogynistic shit imaginable. Well, surely it is more interesting to critique the critically lauded than it is to point out that Top Gun or something might just be slightly sexist in nature? I want people to poke holes in stuff in this way. To me, it's not about some kind of "PC-policing" of content in TV shows or films and it's not about some kind of Plato-style ethical view of art where its function is to teach us the correct way to think or to live (I want Sodom and Gomorrah too). It's about pointing out where ideology might be at work in places where we might not normally expect it to be (i.e. critically lauded TV shows and movies).

One of your core points is along the lines of (I'm going to paraphrase badly here and apologies if I misrepresent your point of view) "this shit's pretty obvious ... it's a genre cop show about serial killers ..... I don't need yet another article pointing this stuff out to me ... I'm not an idiot". And that's fair enough. But I still think it's a valuable thing for someone to stick their head up and say "guys, you do realise you are all going completely nuts over a show where all the women are there to either (a) get murdered (b) get fucked or (c) make the dinner. Why is that?".

So, in short I'd prefer that the critique exists, and then that, if necessary, the critique is critiqued. I don't want to see it shut down (I know that's not what you are doing). I understand though that many people are not interested in this, and that that does not necessarily mean they are not aware of, or care about, what is at stake.

 

[Unicron]

You said something similar earlier about how these writers should be going after more serious transgressors i.e. why spend so much time having a go at Scorcese when you have the likes of Michael Bay strolling around making the most misogynistic shit imaginable. Well, surely it is more interesting to critique the critically lauded than it is to point out that Top Gun or something might just be slightly sexist in nature? I want people to poke holes in stuff in this way.

I kind of agree with WC on this point to be honest, not that "good" stuff should be let off the hook, but that trash is and it shouldn't be. The writer made reference to Banshee at the end of her piece, which is a show that I watch and enjoy but it's total brain candy crap. It's ridiculously hyper-violent, with tits and fucking everywhere, each new episode is like a 1 hour 90's Van Damme movie. There's parts of it, much like with parts of True Detective that I could do without, but they're far more present in Banshee* but it's given more of a pass because it knows what it is, whereas True Detective, as it aspires to be more should be more heavily criticised for it's problematic content. I'm not saying that parts of TD that someone might have a problem with should be ignored and I agree with a lot of the New Yorker piece but I don't think that just because it's of a higher standard it should be held to higher standards.

* For example Lili Simmons, the actress who plays the ex-hooker in TD that Marty was sleeping with in the most recent episode also has a prominent role in Banshee, as an amish girl gone bad who was expelled from her community and ...

Spoiler

There's this weird sub plot throughout the show where she and her uncle have incestuous desires for each other. In a recent episode there's a lengthy scene where she's masturbating to the thought of having spied on her uncle as he had sex with another woman. It's icky icky icky and to my mind more offensive than anything involving her in True Detective.

 

[hugh]

I'm definitely checking out this Banshee thing now ...

 

[7 - No tomorrow]

I'm definitely checking out this Banshee thing now ...

I have the first season downloaded, never got to it.

Also, it's gonna be -15 for the whole weekend here. Sounds like a plan.

 

[washingcattle]

Another thing which has barely come up yet is that the two main characters are murderers, and that's fine. No problem with evil men killing men that's not an issue.

The whole thing is ridiculous to me. You can write a character that's evil, you can make a show that's completely misanthropic where the characters core values are skewed to the most abhorrent degree all that's fine so long as you're very careful about how you portray women and mens relationship with women.

It's ridiculous to me. That article was written by a myopic journalist with an agenda and the target she's picked is essentially the most asinine one possible.

Does something need to be said about misogyny in TV/Film. Sure it does. Is this the show to prove the point? No. For all the whore/mother/victim/other rhetoric in that article it missed so many valid points pertaining to what is actually going on in that show that it's ridiculous. You can pick anything in art strip away the context and say look here is racism or sexism or whatever. I could watch an episode of Girls in this manner and say it's misogynist. I could argue that the work of Francesca Woodman is misogynist. Any character in any film or novel anywhere that is stupid or vapid or weak and happens to be a woman that's misogyny. You know it's possible and you know better than to just take me at face value.

 

[Lili Marlene]

I'm sorry the article wasn't about the things you want to talk about Washingcattle. It's still allowed exist though.