Coach Taylor (Kyle Chandler) is John Rayburn, the #1 (but not oldest) son of the Rayburn clan. Linda "Good God, I was annoying on ER" Cardellini is Meg, his sister. They have two brothers, Danny and Kevin. The show is set in south Florida, with the Rayburns being the wealthy owners of some kind of resort hotel down there. On the surface, they're the All-American family. But things are not quite what they seem. "We're not bad people. We just did a bad thing", John says. And the show spends just about all of the 13 episodes of season 1 getting around to that bad thing. This is a reaaaaaaaaaaallllly slooooooooow burn of a show. Lots and lots and lots of build. Lots of hint at past issues in the family that are sloooooowly revealed. Lots of meaningful glances, sentences with double meanings and so on. That's mixed with a sometimes confusing structure that mixes dreams, flashbacks, looks forward, and so on in a way that sometimes isn't real clear. And all of that adds up to a show that might just lose a lot of its audience along the way. The pacing is pretty glacial but it does pay off eventually (you can argue whether that payoff is worth it or not). The cast, which also includes Sissy Spacek as the Rayburn mom and MTV alum Jacinda Barrett as John's wife, is stellar. I was entertained but this isn't quite the home run I'd hoped for. And the big reveal at the end of season 1 to set up season 2 was pretty laughably obvious, which was a letdown. Still, I liked it and I want another season. 7/10.
Monday, March 30, 2015
Bloodline
Coach Taylor (Kyle Chandler) is John Rayburn, the #1 (but not oldest) son of the Rayburn clan. Linda "Good God, I was annoying on ER" Cardellini is Meg, his sister. They have two brothers, Danny and Kevin. The show is set in south Florida, with the Rayburns being the wealthy owners of some kind of resort hotel down there. On the surface, they're the All-American family. But things are not quite what they seem. "We're not bad people. We just did a bad thing", John says. And the show spends just about all of the 13 episodes of season 1 getting around to that bad thing. This is a reaaaaaaaaaaallllly slooooooooow burn of a show. Lots and lots and lots of build. Lots of hint at past issues in the family that are sloooooowly revealed. Lots of meaningful glances, sentences with double meanings and so on. That's mixed with a sometimes confusing structure that mixes dreams, flashbacks, looks forward, and so on in a way that sometimes isn't real clear. And all of that adds up to a show that might just lose a lot of its audience along the way. The pacing is pretty glacial but it does pay off eventually (you can argue whether that payoff is worth it or not). The cast, which also includes Sissy Spacek as the Rayburn mom and MTV alum Jacinda Barrett as John's wife, is stellar. I was entertained but this isn't quite the home run I'd hoped for. And the big reveal at the end of season 1 to set up season 2 was pretty laughably obvious, which was a letdown. Still, I liked it and I want another season. 7/10.
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