my guess is Naz is going to be found not guilty, but as many of us expect, he'll probably have paid the price anyway, by either:
1) committing a crime in prison that keeps him there
2) becoming a hard core drug addict
3) gets convicted of GTA for taking the cab and gets prison time
4) comes out of prison "working" for Freddy
5) gets set up by Freddy to keep him in prison
RE: Going to be on a Jetblue flight to Vegas for the entire show Â
my guess is Naz is going to be found not guilty, but as many of us expect, he'll probably have paid the price anyway, by either:
1) committing a crime in prison that keeps him there
2) becoming a hard core drug addict
3) gets convicted of GTA for taking the cab and gets prison time
4) comes out of prison "working" for Freddy
5) gets set up by Freddy to keep him in prison
it’s been brought up in recent weeks but so no point in rehashing. Her not questioning the defense’s to make them irrelevant was a cheap way to make things shorter.
The end wasn’t too much of a surprise and i feel like using the financial advisor as the guy who did it was a bit of a crappy way to go off path.
with such strong characters, great writing, strong visual narration...and a slew of reluctant/damaged heroes....i would not hesitate to be a fan of another season, plus, the most likely guilty villain is free and unencumbered from paying for his vicious crime. tons of room for more back story and expansion of all of the leading characters. so many other series run for years with much less going for them. it started out slow, but offered up just enough interest to keep up its intrigue, then expanded on many levels.....glad i followed it.
with such strong characters, great writing, strong visual narration...and a slew of reluctant/damaged heroes....i would not hesitate to be a fan of another season, plus, the most likely guilty villain is free and unencumbered from paying for his vicious crime. tons of room for more back story and expansion of all of the leading characters. so many other series run for years with much less going for them. it started out slow, but offered up just enough interest to keep up its intrigue, then expanded on many levels.....glad i followed it.
The BBC show it was adapted from, Criminal Justice, is an anthology series in the mold of True Detective or American Horror Story, meaning each season is a standalone story. I doubt we see it again, but if we do it will in all likelihood be a different, unrelated story.
I also thought, at times, it was entertaining, but totally unrealistic. Last nigh's finale was awful, it was not only disappointing from a plot perspective--the accountant did it, great who cares, but it took every cliche of dirty laundry that happens infrequently in the criminal justice system and threw it into the pot.
but I was bothered by the obvious misses by defense and by Box like why wasn't he covered in blood? He had zero blood spatter on his body or clothes and that crime scene was a mess. And if you imagine that he could have killed her, washed, and then gotten dressed they would have found blood in the drains because they check.
Also, if that crappy steak knife was used to stab her 22 times it would have had a bend, or a dent, or a ding and it was pristine.
I know it's stupid but it seemed too obvious to miss.
I also didn't know you could hold up an unprotected (assumed) murder weapon in court like that. I assumed it would have either been in a plastic bag or protected. Seems gross. I thought the first two episodes were the best.
but atleast it continued to keep you guessing and it wasn't expected. Most people went in thinking Naz would be either found guilty, found innocent but did something in prison to stay anyway, or be murdered in prison. I actually liked that he got off and the audience didn't get what they expected. The final 10 minutes after he's free and goes back to Riker's you are thinking he's definitely getting shanked. Then he gets out and walks to get food, and someone's definitely going to kill him.
It wasn't the show I thought it would be but that's alright. I give in an 8/10 as a whole.
As usual, I have some nitpicking to do after last night's finale:
* I guess it was supposed to seem heroic that Box was struggling with Naz's possible innocence and started looking into other possibilities. But shouldn't he have done that all along?
* Surprise! The boyfriend (possibly) did it! Lazy enough writing for ya?
* If Weiss (the prosecutor) bought into Box's suspicion about the boyfriend, why did she have to privately tell a retired Box, "Let's get him"? Why not get active NYPD involved right away?
* Stone's son...any resolution to that odd subplot? The last time we saw Gooden, he seemed embarrassed of his sad. End of story?
* I guess the "He's from New Jersey!" line was supposed to be a tribute to James Gandolfini, John Turturro's real-life friend and executive producer of the show. But in the narrative context of the episode, it sounded ridiculous.
* When the music started swelling during Stone's closing argument...oh man...I was looking for a CBS logo in the corner of the screen and expecting to cut to a commercial for a Toyota Sales Event any second.
And my biggest issue overall was my struggle with finding a point to the show at all. It seemed like it was trying to say a bunch of different things at once and not saying any of them well. The style of the show even seemed to change a bit. Too disjointed for me.
Oh well. I gave it a shot. It wasn't terrible. It just was nowhere as good as I thought it would be.
as it left open numerous possibilities. There were so many possible outcomes which kept the viewers guessing. By introducing so many possible other suspects it was certainly though provoking as well.
The cat was an obvious metaphor for Naz but I must have missed some of the other references.
What was with the Deer's head and why did they keep showing it if had nothing to do with the crime?
there were major flaws in realism. People point to the lack of blood spatter evidence, but that was not a problem for me. It is that very lack of evidence which leave the prosecutor and Box not 100% convinced of Nas' guilt, and their doubts were important to the story.
It was the courtroom scenes that were so unrealistic that they detracted form the plot line. If it interfered with the drama they were setting up, then court rules were disregarded.
otoh, the acting was good and the overall take from the story read for me. The justice system doesn't solve a lot of problems, it simply adjudicates the cases that come before it.
One final comment about courtroom realism. The prosecutor turning to Box and saying let's get this finance guy is a pipe dream. Once you choose a defendant for a crime, it is almost impossible to try to convict someone else for the same crime. It's the definition of reasonable doubt.
I'd watch another season if the correct team was in place. I watch a lot of TV, but I'm more selective now since I don't have the time I used to. I don't think the show will be back but if they did, I'm hoping for an original story by a sought after writer. I'd also love a dedicated director. So many shows have multiple directors and I really don't understand that, must be something about the business that makes filming like that advantageous but I have no idea what it could be outside of money. The cast is almost tertiary at this point. There's so many good shows with no name actors because the writing and directing are great.
to fully flesh out the story and was surprised to see the BBC version was just 5 episodes. Maybe it being that short hits you quick and never stops, leaving much more acceptance for any errors or liberties taken in the legal proceedings. I may have to check it out one day and find out for myself.
but got worse and worse as time went on. So many flaws and unfinished issues as others have mentioned above. Some great acting but overall the writers were not up the to the task here. I expect better from HBO.
Before the episode started, I anticipated that the season would end the way seasons in The Wire end and that's exactly what happened.
John Turturro was terrific, but so was the actor who played Nasir. Watching his physical transformation and the way he changed his stance, his posture, everything. He communicated so much with his eyes and did a tremendous job.
I disagree with Mr. Bungle's opinion about Box. I think it gets lost just how much the circumstantial evidence at hand pointed to Nasir from their perspective. He stole his dad's cab, he refused to pick up the two guys, he picks up the girl, he's high on drugs, he has sex with the girl . He admitted that he was there that night and during the entire time period during which she was murdered. He had a gash on his hand. He had a history of violent outbursts. He fled the scene, he took the drugs with him and took a 5'inch knife covered in blood which he had on him in the station. And the only thing he said during the time was "is she dead?"
I am not surprised at all that Box and the prosecutor were so narrowly focused on Khan.
I disagree with Mr. Bungle's opinion about Box. I think it gets lost just how much the circumstantial evidence at hand pointed to Nasir from their perspective. He stole his dad's cab, he refused to pick up the two guys, he picks up the girl, he's high on drugs, he has sex with the girl . He admitted that he was there that night and during the entire time period during which she was murdered. He had a gash on his hand. He had a history of violent outbursts. He fled the scene, he took the drugs with him and took a 5'inch knife covered in blood which he had on him in the station. And the only thing he said during the time was "is she dead?"
I am not surprised at all that Box and the prosecutor were so narrowly focused on Khan.
But consider the character as a real person. Box was a 33-year veteran on the force, in NYC. You'd have to think he's seen it all. And that would include (for me, anyway) cases where it looked like the first suspect was a stone-cold lock...but ended up being the wrong guy. Instead, Box seemed to have the experience and mindset of the average TV viewer -- "It really looks like Naz did it, so who else could it be?"
The fact that bottom-feeder defense attorney Stone and young, inept Chandra could fairly easily find three other people worth questioning on the stand (and then Box himself found a fourth person of interest) just compounded Box's failure, for me.
When the show started, we were supposed to believe that Box was a superstar homicide detective. By the end of the show, we were supposed to believe that Box was playing the role of a last-minute justice hero. I just didn't buy into either message about Box. If Box had done a thorough job from the get-go, Naz may never had been indicted in the first place.
Agree with what seems to be the general sentiments here Â
of it's 2 lead actors, Ahmed and Turturro. Ahmed really sold the complete change of Naz.
My biggest negative was that the female characters, with the possible exception of Naz' mother, were all stereotyped and poorly characterized. What they did with Chandra was almost inexplicable.
My favorite parts from the finale were Stone's closing argument (and Naz' "Thank you") and the reaction of the guy at the animal shelter when Stone returned the cat.
I thought it could have been cool if at the very end while Naz was smoking that shit by the river they showed him having memories of actually killing the broad.
I thought it could have been cool if at the very end while Naz was smoking that shit by the river they showed him having memories of actually killing the broad.
Same here, my exact thought when watching. Flash backs to him doing it and cutting to black.
I was thinking that a police lights were going to Â
suddenly start flashing and he was going to get arrested. Then again I thought the whole time he was leaving Rikers he was going to get shanked and the whole time he was in the restaurant with Stone he was going to get jumped.
And yes, the Cat was there at the end. WTF kind of conspiracy theory is that???? lol...
I thought they were hinting it was the cat that was actually helping Jack Stone's eczema. Then again I was wrong about the undertaker and financial planner.
I thought the show was a good example of excellent story-telling... Â
...that deserved a better story. It's the TV version of a perfectly-blocked running play that only gains four yards. Nice work, guys. Big f*cking deal.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
was the last thing we saw in the finale and in episode 1.
Some other things I liked.
- "They should make a show about a detective clocking out and then sleeping like a log" cutting to a few scenes later of Box unable to sleep in a bunk bed at the station.
- The callback to "Call of The Wild"
- Stone's desperate kitchen sink approach with the eczema. I thought his breakdown and then closing arguments were some of the best work Turturro has done, going back to his performance as Herb Stempel in Quiz Show.
- The shot of watching Nasir leave the prison and hug his father. It was shown from above, framed by a rectangular prison window. It was a great parallel to the security camera footage we've seen.
- I love James Gandolfini and Robert DeNiro, and I"m sure the character would have been written differently, but I think Turturro was the best fit for the role.
- The defense did a very good job creating reasonable doubt with creating the motives for other suspects. But I loved that the DA destroyed Nasir on cross. You don't see that often, where an innocent main character gets out-maneuvered all in an above-board fashion.
- The defense did a very good job creating reasonable doubt with creating the motives for other suspects. But I loved that the DA destroyed Nasir on cross. You don't see that often, where an innocent main character gets out-maneuvered all in an above-board fashion.
Asking Naz whether he killed her was fine - unavoidable, really - but he needed to answer honestly: "I don't know." Professing his innocence - when his whole story revolves around him blacking out - just set him up to get shredded.
And yes, the Cat was there at the end. WTF kind of conspiracy theory is that???? lol...
I thought they were hinting it was the cat that was actually helping Jack Stone's eczema. Then again I was wrong about the undertaker and financial planner.
ah...that makes sense.
RE: I thought the show was a good example of excellent story-telling... Â
...that deserved a better story. It's the TV version of a perfectly-blocked running play that only gains four yards. Nice work, guys. Big f*cking deal.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
Funny I finally watched the original movie about a year ago since it's one of those iconic movies, so to speak. I went in aware of the era it was made in and prepared myself for it but I couldn't get past Richard Benjamin...he was god awful in my view. Back then his performance was probably ok, if not very good but it didn't stand up to time when I watched it.
...that deserved a better story. It's the TV version of a perfectly-blocked running play that only gains four yards. Nice work, guys. Big f*cking deal.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
Definitely looking forward to it. This is the kind of movie that could benefit from a remake (from the trailers "re-imagining may be more accurate). It was a good idea poorly executed and limited by the technology of the era. Fast forward 40 years, give it a solid cast, and it's got great potential.
so rarely takes the stand in his own defense. A half-decent prosecutor can make any innocent person look guilty. Chandra should've been fired for doing that, all by itself.
B+ the rest of the way, with a good ending that shows how things will never be the same for Nas and his family. Never gonna forget how tense the start of this show was. It just felt like things moved a little too fast and 2 more episodes wouldve helped. Didn't like what they did to Chandra, just made her look terrible which was the only way to set Turturro up for his closing argument. He had a good performance and so did most of the cast.
I'm DVR-ing it, but still would like to see it on the flight if I can.
1) committing a crime in prison that keeps him there
2) becoming a hard core drug addict
3) gets convicted of GTA for taking the cab and gets prison time
4) comes out of prison "working" for Freddy
5) gets set up by Freddy to keep him in prison
I'm DVR-ing it, but still would like to see it on the flight if I can.
Looks like I'm SOL on HBO on the flight, maybe I'll catch it on HBO at the Venetian.
1) committing a crime in prison that keeps him there
2) becoming a hard core drug addict
3) gets convicted of GTA for taking the cab and gets prison time
4) comes out of prison "working" for Freddy
5) gets set up by Freddy to keep him in prison
I would add a #6 -- dead before verdict
The end wasn’t too much of a surprise and i feel like using the financial advisor as the guy who did it was a bit of a crappy way to go off path.
The BBC show it was adapted from, Criminal Justice, is an anthology series in the mold of True Detective or American Horror Story, meaning each season is a standalone story. I doubt we see it again, but if we do it will in all likelihood be a different, unrelated story.
Yup, and Errol Childress from True Detective was the judge. Top notch constitutional.
Makes sense since Sesame Street is on HBO now.
Also, if that crappy steak knife was used to stab her 22 times it would have had a bend, or a dent, or a ding and it was pristine.
I know it's stupid but it seemed too obvious to miss.
I also didn't know you could hold up an unprotected (assumed) murder weapon in court like that. I assumed it would have either been in a plastic bag or protected. Seems gross. I thought the first two episodes were the best.
It wasn't the show I thought it would be but that's alright. I give in an 8/10 as a whole.
As usual, I have some nitpicking to do after last night's finale:
* I guess it was supposed to seem heroic that Box was struggling with Naz's possible innocence and started looking into other possibilities. But shouldn't he have done that all along?
* Surprise! The boyfriend (possibly) did it! Lazy enough writing for ya?
* If Weiss (the prosecutor) bought into Box's suspicion about the boyfriend, why did she have to privately tell a retired Box, "Let's get him"? Why not get active NYPD involved right away?
* Stone's son...any resolution to that odd subplot? The last time we saw Gooden, he seemed embarrassed of his sad. End of story?
* I guess the "He's from New Jersey!" line was supposed to be a tribute to James Gandolfini, John Turturro's real-life friend and executive producer of the show. But in the narrative context of the episode, it sounded ridiculous.
* When the music started swelling during Stone's closing argument...oh man...I was looking for a CBS logo in the corner of the screen and expecting to cut to a commercial for a Toyota Sales Event any second.
And my biggest issue overall was my struggle with finding a point to the show at all. It seemed like it was trying to say a bunch of different things at once and not saying any of them well. The style of the show even seemed to change a bit. Too disjointed for me.
Oh well. I gave it a shot. It wasn't terrible. It just was nowhere as good as I thought it would be.
The cat was an obvious metaphor for Naz but I must have missed some of the other references.
What was with the Deer's head and why did they keep showing it if had nothing to do with the crime?
It was the courtroom scenes that were so unrealistic that they detracted form the plot line. If it interfered with the drama they were setting up, then court rules were disregarded.
otoh, the acting was good and the overall take from the story read for me. The justice system doesn't solve a lot of problems, it simply adjudicates the cases that come before it.
One final comment about courtroom realism. The prosecutor turning to Box and saying let's get this finance guy is a pipe dream. Once you choose a defendant for a crime, it is almost impossible to try to convict someone else for the same crime. It's the definition of reasonable doubt.
Id give another season a shot.
John Turturro was terrific, but so was the actor who played Nasir. Watching his physical transformation and the way he changed his stance, his posture, everything. He communicated so much with his eyes and did a tremendous job.
I disagree with Mr. Bungle's opinion about Box. I think it gets lost just how much the circumstantial evidence at hand pointed to Nasir from their perspective. He stole his dad's cab, he refused to pick up the two guys, he picks up the girl, he's high on drugs, he has sex with the girl . He admitted that he was there that night and during the entire time period during which she was murdered. He had a gash on his hand. He had a history of violent outbursts. He fled the scene, he took the drugs with him and took a 5'inch knife covered in blood which he had on him in the station. And the only thing he said during the time was "is she dead?"
I am not surprised at all that Box and the prosecutor were so narrowly focused on Khan.
And yes, the Cat was there at the end. WTF kind of conspiracy theory is that???? lol...
I am not surprised at all that Box and the prosecutor were so narrowly focused on Khan.
But consider the character as a real person. Box was a 33-year veteran on the force, in NYC. You'd have to think he's seen it all. And that would include (for me, anyway) cases where it looked like the first suspect was a stone-cold lock...but ended up being the wrong guy. Instead, Box seemed to have the experience and mindset of the average TV viewer -- "It really looks like Naz did it, so who else could it be?"
The fact that bottom-feeder defense attorney Stone and young, inept Chandra could fairly easily find three other people worth questioning on the stand (and then Box himself found a fourth person of interest) just compounded Box's failure, for me.
When the show started, we were supposed to believe that Box was a superstar homicide detective. By the end of the show, we were supposed to believe that Box was playing the role of a last-minute justice hero. I just didn't buy into either message about Box. If Box had done a thorough job from the get-go, Naz may never had been indicted in the first place.
My biggest negative was that the female characters, with the possible exception of Naz' mother, were all stereotyped and poorly characterized. What they did with Chandra was almost inexplicable.
My favorite parts from the finale were Stone's closing argument (and Naz' "Thank you") and the reaction of the guy at the animal shelter when Stone returned the cat.
Same here, my exact thought when watching. Flash backs to him doing it and cutting to black.
And yes, the Cat was there at the end. WTF kind of conspiracy theory is that???? lol...
I thought they were hinting it was the cat that was actually helping Jack Stone's eczema. Then again I was wrong about the undertaker and financial planner.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
Some other things I liked.
- "They should make a show about a detective clocking out and then sleeping like a log" cutting to a few scenes later of Box unable to sleep in a bunk bed at the station.
- The callback to "Call of The Wild"
- Stone's desperate kitchen sink approach with the eczema. I thought his breakdown and then closing arguments were some of the best work Turturro has done, going back to his performance as Herb Stempel in Quiz Show.
- The shot of watching Nasir leave the prison and hug his father. It was shown from above, framed by a rectangular prison window. It was a great parallel to the security camera footage we've seen.
- I love James Gandolfini and Robert DeNiro, and I"m sure the character would have been written differently, but I think Turturro was the best fit for the role.
- The defense did a very good job creating reasonable doubt with creating the motives for other suspects. But I loved that the DA destroyed Nasir on cross. You don't see that often, where an innocent main character gets out-maneuvered all in an above-board fashion.
- The defense did a very good job creating reasonable doubt with creating the motives for other suspects. But I loved that the DA destroyed Nasir on cross. You don't see that often, where an innocent main character gets out-maneuvered all in an above-board fashion.
Asking Naz whether he killed her was fine - unavoidable, really - but he needed to answer honestly: "I don't know." Professing his innocence - when his whole story revolves around him blacking out - just set him up to get shredded.
Quote:
but I loved every minute of it.
And yes, the Cat was there at the end. WTF kind of conspiracy theory is that???? lol...
I thought they were hinting it was the cat that was actually helping Jack Stone's eczema. Then again I was wrong about the undertaker and financial planner.
ah...that makes sense.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
Funny I finally watched the original movie about a year ago since it's one of those iconic movies, so to speak. I went in aware of the era it was made in and prepared myself for it but I couldn't get past Richard Benjamin...he was god awful in my view. Back then his performance was probably ok, if not very good but it didn't stand up to time when I watched it.
Hoping the new adaption kicks ass.
I did enjoy the ads for Westworld though. Should be fun. The original movie had the opposite problem from The Night Of...": Fantastic premise from Crichton, schlocky execution. Crighton tried to direct his own adaptation, with little experience and predictable results.
Richard Benjamin? James Brolin? Really??? Now subtract the ABC Movie-of-the-Week cast and neophyte director (and Yul Brynner - RIP), and plug in Abrams, Hopkins, Wood, Harris, Newton, Marsden, Santoro, etc. etc. To be fair, Brolin wasn't bad, and Brynner was Brynner, but the new version looks kick-ass,
Definitely looking forward to it. This is the kind of movie that could benefit from a remake (from the trailers "re-imagining may be more accurate). It was a good idea poorly executed and limited by the technology of the era. Fast forward 40 years, give it a solid cast, and it's got great potential.
And her morals took over.
I enjoyed it and yes Turroto was great, best work from him since a Bronx Tale