Deadwood (2004)

Watchseries; I rewatch it and am astounded every time. Just a fantastic show.

I rewatch it and am astounded every time. Just a fantastic show.

Deadwood watchseries. This is a stunning achievement. Performance, writing, direction, casting, design, everything about it is of the highest quality. It seems so obvious and in your face at first with little in the way of compelling traditional story (ie each episode has a 'plot') but every layer has another layer beneath and they all build into an amazing portrait of this moment in time. (real or fictional it makes no difference to me) For all the apparent lawlessness and depravity on display it is about love and responsibility being forged against the most brutal of times. Ian McShane is a stunning revelation and Timothy Olyphant is superb as the calm fury at the centre of the storm. Cannot praise it highly enough. Better than Sopranos - and that's saying something.

Judging by other comments, the realistic portrayal of the crude language and immorality may be a bit too much for those used to tame, glossy horse operas where the Good are very, very good and the Bad are very, very bad.

As for the language being "over the top," anyone who's spent time in an Army unit or aboard ship in wartime knows this is EXACTLY the kind of language young men under stress use, and probably even worse back in the late eighteenth century when most of them were uneducated, illiterate and had a projected life span of around 30. If they were lucky.

Most people familiar with authentic Western history will recognize this as a very accurate portrayal of Deadwood, or any other frontier boom town, with all its ugliness and warts. Like it or not, it's history. I think they did a superlative job so far (first two episodes).It also looks like it's going to be the most accurate version of Bill Hickock's death -- which was far more than just the simple barroom murder usually portrayed -- ever put on film.

The number of truly spectacular actors here is simply staggering. Ian McShane's riveting performance is no surprise for "Lovejoy" fans; he was long overdue for something equal to his talent. Who else stands out? Damn near everyone. Calamity Jane, Tolliver, Farnum, the Doc ... there aren't enough "supporting actor" awards from any source that could do justice to such a large, stand-out cast. For those of us who despair of the putrid crap in the theaters, peopled by actors who should be doing dinner theater in Dubuque, well... now we have hope. And DEADWOOD truly puts the lie to the propaganda about public broadcasting being necessary to provide "quality programming that commercial television just can't or won't do." In the entire history of public radio and TV they have NEVER reached this level of excellence even once -- yet cable (once referred to disparagingly as 'pay TV') pulls it off on a shoestring budget. Score one for capitalism.

Hands down the best show ever written! Sopranos, Breaking Bad, The Wire are fantastic, well written shows as well but Deadwood beats them all hands down. The Deadwood movie premieres tomorrow night. I'm sure it won't disappoint.

I felt I needed to write after reading the comment made of the show. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but the individual the wrote the comment "Falls Short" does not know anything. I live in Deadwood and with the exception of stuff added by Hollywood to quicken the story it is quite close to our history. None of the characters are fictional, the all lived at one time. I admit the show in vulgar but cleans up as the show continues and the town grows from a miner's camp to a town. Don't let the first few episodes scare you off. The show is very good and quite close to the truth. If you like old west history you will love Deadwood.

Perfect is a word that should pretty much never be used. Yet, this series Deadwood is indeed perfect (in my opinion of course).

The long-awaited movie sadly doesn't meet the original series' tenacity or energy, As perfect as the series is, it too sadly fell prey to being cancelled before its time. Anyone who's watched it in full will know what I'm talking about, but anyone yet to watch it, I won't spoil it for you.

I watched Deadwood when it was originally airing back in 2004, when I was 15, and often found it hard to understand everything they were saying lol, due to it's Shakespearean eloquence that for many native English speakers requires English subtitles. I revisited the series in 2014 when friends of a friend starting talking about it, and so that late friend of mine (God rest his soul) and I re-watched it all on his projector screen, and we couldn't stop laughing and cussing and using the term "cocksucka!" in every other sentence of our every day conversations, haha!

I'm re-watching the first episode as I type out this review, and my god is it truly awesome.