Past Purges
Halt and Catch Fire "FUD"
Ooo, this is not looking like a show I care to watch based on the second episode. The episode is shot to look cool. Not pretty. Not interesting. Cool. Lee Pace as Joe MacMillan is intense and the intensity is trying too hard to drive his interest. I'm not all that interested in his backstory yet because I don't know what he's bringing to the table in the present other than chaos. I audibly ground when Gordon initially hid that Cameron was a girl. While I still think it opens up a lot of plot directions I have no desire to see, they did make up for it by having him fess up to Donna later on. Cameron is still 1983 Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I'm waiting for a shade of her that hasn't been done before. I did like when she went clothes shopping and tried out some "proper" work attire. She's not all rebel in there. The summer is light enough that I'm in no hurry to drop it. I am hoping that future episodes step things up a bit.
Louie "In the Woods"
That was a hell of a thing. FX has really given C.K. the freedom to do anything, including a mini-movie about young Louie's experience with pot. It's a rather immersing episode and is a great reminder of how much of Louie's work on the show is beyond the performance, because the show still feels exactly like Louie even though C.K. is mostly not in it. On that note, I have to say that was good casting with the kid playing young Louie. I completely bought that performance. Great casting all over, really. Apparently Phillip Seymour Hoffman was originally cast in the episode, so the dedication was another sad reminder that he's not around. Jeremy Renner plays the weird, menacing kind of character I prefer for him. F. Murray Abraham gets some recasting as Louie's dad, not his uncle. That's one of those things with Louie that you simply have to get used to. Amy Landecker gets a return stint as his mother and did a fine job with it. The thing I enjoy about the episode is how small and real it felt. Even if the story wasn't autobiographical, I'm certain that's exactly how his middle school felt. It was a very personal episode, if not a funny one. What sold it for me was when we finally get his response to Lilly about it all ("I love you and I'm here.") because it basically means, he doesn't know what to do, but he knows that fighting it all can only make it worse.
Fargo "A Fox, A Rabbit, and A Cabbage"
Lester is the worst. Until as recently as last week, I found myself rooting for Lester, not necessarily to get away with things, but to get some small victories. As it turns out, he's the "little guy" that gives "little guys" a bad name. He has completely reshaped his entire life in the past year to be the life he's always wanted. He is successful, with a beautiful and adoring wife, but he can't help himself. First, he picks an answer finally to Malvo's question and it ends with three innocent people dead. Then, after she's been willing to lie to Molly for him, and after a heartbreaking speech about how she always liked Lester and she'd been waiting for a man like him her entire life, Lester sacrifices his wife to be killed by Malvo. He's a complete dick. At least Malvo knows what he is doing. This episode is certainly the one that I noticed the directing the most. Something like the scene at the diner was so good and so tense, that I didn't really even care that it used the perfect timing coincidence to avoid a blood-bath (normally something I can't stand). Heading into the finale, it's clear that we have a The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly situation with Molly, Malvo, and Lester playing the parts respectively and I couldn't be more excited about it. I have one rule for the finale: Gus and Molly need to live. That's not too much to ask for, right?
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