Visitors Review

writesromine (2012-05-26 02:35)

The Killing - Whoo Killed Rose Lawson

The most intriguing, unique, and impressive show in years, this isdestined to be a breakout hit. You will see Emmy gold and you can quoteme on that. So why does this crime drama stand out from the rest?The Killing follows the police investigation of the murder of a younggirl, tying together three interlocking stories as investigators chasea variety of leads.Sounds pretty standard, almost a mix of 24 and Twin Peaks. The castconsists of a list of no-named actors. The only mentionable billingwould be Michelle Forbes, who is brilliant in her portrayal of themother of Rose Lawson. The main character, Sarah Linden, is the lead detective in the case.The only evidence of a crime is a bloody pink sweater. It is Sarah'slast day on the job having decided to move to sunny Sonoma. Herreplacement, Detective Stephen Holder arrives and joins her on thislast case. So why do I love this show? It is set in Seattle, so the weather isdark and gloomy. The filming is movie-esque and the writing is subtlypoignant. The writers allow the characters to move the story alongwithin the portrayal rather than through dialog alone. Not only doesthis take an amazing amount of trust on the writer's part, but anincredible cast to pull it off. The mood of the show is somber, you arelooking for the light at the end of the nightmare. There are glimpsesbut they are few and far between. The plot gives you everything youneed to remain glued to the screen, but yet they also give you nothingleaving you feeling empty and begging for more. I compared this to 24, as it has several intertwined plots moving atthe same time. The reactions, due to the writing are raw andbelievable. You find yourself guilt ridden as if you were watching thishappening to real people. This is my insight into the first two hours of the show, which countsas two episodes. The show has an infinite number of possible courses atthis point. If it stays on the same path as it is headed, it will layout a beautifully intricate story that will keep us at seat's edgethrough it all. If for some horrid reason the writing is changed, itwill most likely not survive. This show's writing is palpable and theactors are able to ride the wave of the plot with ease, to change thiswould create a fissure that will not maintain the illusion it hascreated. My hopes are so very high for this new drama. If you have not seen it,watch it. It is worth the hour every week. You will see nothing like itanywhere else and you do not want to miss it. Be on the crest of thewave, it is coming I guarantee it.

philquiram (2012-05-25 14:00)

Suspenseful , keeps you guessing, a departure from the 'law and order' formula

If you started watching this show thinking it was going to be anotherregurgitated "law and order/CSI" formulaic show, you will bedisappointed. If you wanted a super hot, charismatic, sassy/funny, hard edged femaleheroine that seems to have all the answers and keeps her perfect lifein balance while solving murders, you will be disappointed.If you are looking for a weirdo techy with tons of piercing and rainbowcolored hair that can be counted on to do impossible feats withcomputers, you will be disappointed. There are a hundred of thoseshows, I could give myself arthritis listing them all. I for one am sick of those shows, they all seem to be the same: Theshow opens on some people having a good time, that happen to stumbleupon a dead body, or they themselves get murdered. The detectives find1 little piece of evidence that leads to the most obvious suspect. Letscall them "Miss Direct", who always seems to have a rock solid alibithat clears them of any wrong doing or involvement. Throw in a couplemore pieces of evidence, or perhaps Miss Direct pointed us to the nextsuspect, and the next suspect and so on. Then the 1 amazing piece ofevidence brings us back to Miss Direct and they were our murderer allalong. The Killing is not like the shows I explained above. It is a morerealistic look into the lives of a murder victims family, thedetectives solving the crime, and the people trying to cover up theirwrong doings.Everything is not always wrapped up into a nice little package, justlike in real life. I applaud the writers efforts to keep me guessing.Usually with a crime drama, I have it solved in the first 10 minutesbecause they are see-through and their writing is formulaic as Imentioned above. So if you are looking for a departure from "Law and Order" and you wanta more complex crime drama, The Killing is for you.

jimpi (2012-05-23 22:07)

Better than the reviews indicate

This series is extremely well done. It is very character driven and hasgreat production values. Some people were very disappointed that thecase was not fully solved at the end of the first season. I had noproblem with this. I was glad that there would be more exploration ofthe characters explored in the first season. If you like solidcharacters and a great show, this is one of the best on TV. If youinsist on having rigid expectations about how a detective show shouldproceed toward its goal then this is not for you. I actually waspleased with the ending of the first season. Very creative. The twomain characters are well played and both of them have some serious butrealistic problems that make sense based on their personal history. Theplot gets pretty complex drawing in political figures, corruption, andthe personal lives of many of the people in Seattle that get involvedin the case. The family whose daughter was killed is fleshed out with anumber of characters. The series shows in detail how this family copeswhich is unusual for a series. I am looking forward to seeing how thesevarious characters respond to future events. However, there are alsomany unknowns about these interesting characters that I am lookingforward to discovering.

Greyling5 (2012-05-23 11:17)

Finally, someone saying that this TV is boring

The one thing that keeps bothering me about this program, is how littlethey spent on wardrobe. I don't know how Stan can tolerate those crotchtightening overalls. The second thing is, how huge Rosie's bedroom is. My parents builttheir own home in the burbs of a large city, and even our rooms werenot as large as Rosie's above a garage. The third, I don't know how a single mom could make detective. Myhusband was a detective in a very small suburb of Chicago, 4 squaremiles, and he was called out all the time. Middle of the night, duringchurch on Sundays, Saturdays. How can Linden be a single mom and be adetective in a large city with no spouse/babysitter?I watch, but have a lot of "sorry, not believable."

rumor1234 (2012-05-23 01:30)

the killing

Best show on TV !! I must admit a slow start on the pilot but its akeeper. The 2nd episode was great. Can't wait for next week. I believethat the show slow burn method is the best part. Another side of theshow its keeps your attention is dark bleak look. The angle of 3different groups of people being affected by this one death. Thehardest thing about losing someone is fact its easy for the one whodies.Or gets taken. Its always worse for those left behind. This showshows this fact. The way everyone is involved keeps you hooked. AMCwill do well keeping this alive. A another season is a the best ideayet. Too many great shows die because of all the crap on so manychannels.

ttron2000 (2012-05-22 10:00)

...terrific! shame on all the whiners...

this is a great show. i had next to no interest in yet another showthat centers primarily around a single murder. it seemed tedious, butAMC hasn't disappointed me yet (breaking bad, the walking dead, madmen), so i gave it a shot. the pilot pleasantly surprise me, so I stuckaround. now i'm hooked and eagerly await the second season. veryinvolving, i loved the story, the mood, and especially theperformances. mirelle enos and joel kinnamen, as the investigatingdetectives, provide awesome chemistry, despite their characters beingso radically different. while not perfect, the show's pretty awesome.if there's anything that irritates me about this thing (and it's noteven the show's fault), it's the moron naysayers who whine about theexcessive rain, which provides an excellent mood. and while there'sbeen backlash in regards to story, it sucks that people are suchclose-minded. this is good stuff and i hope people give this the properlove, cuz i'm thinking this is gonna be worth the climax. definitelyworth the shot.

Vivian M. Grey (2012-05-21 05:16)

The C..r..a..w..l..i..n..g...

Meh.. What else can i say about this, apart from that it's just OKAY,if nothing else is on. The Killing Crawled its way from the AMC networkto the viewers' bandwidths with some predictably lazy writing and afair number of uninteresting characters. The themes are sadness,depression, recklessly crappy police investigations, inability to letgo and over repetitive character stereotyping long after theirdevelopments. The "Yes yes yes I know the mother is SAD, enough of thatalready!" came to mind several times, but I guess if it took sixepisodes to bury the girl, then perhaps she'd stop crying after the 5thseason. So now like I said... I'm okay with it (I'll just have to copit). There are of course internet surfing and android gaming in themeantime while the show is running, in case you needed extra action.Stargate Universe sets the depressing theme for this show, while JarJar Binks gets the roles of all the oxygen wasting political charactersin the story, both stupefying and dragging things far beyond theirentertaining lengths. If the question "What are you selling here AMC?"was asked, then the obvious answer would be "The same things newspaperssell... Blank empty spaces."

ivko (2012-05-20 11:41)

Dark and brilliantly introspective.

When I was twenty-four, I was the foreman for the jury of a murdertrial. There was plenty of evidence, including eye witness testimony,that indicated the young man's guilt. After two days of deliberationsand endless discussions, we voted to convict. On our way out of thecourtroom, I remember distinctly the high spirits we were all in. Wehad done our job as citizens. We had helped take a bad man off thestreets. We helped get justice for a murdered individual. There were alot of smiles and handshakes and back-pats. Then on the way out wepassed the convicted man's eight-month-along pregnant wife. She wassitting, alone, on a bench outside the courtroom, sobbing. Theimplications of our decision for her and that unborn child hit me allat once as we passed. I wasn't smiling anymore; none of us were. Thething is, I still believe we did the right thing. It was our job tovote on the evidence and that's what we did. But even so, I'd be lyingif I said I slept soundly that night.The reason I mention that long-winded story is to illustrate a point.Real life is messy. Even when we make what we truly believe are the"right" decisions we don't always feel all that good about them.Sometimes to do what we think is right we end up hurting, albeitunintentionally, someone else. Even worse, sometimes we hurt someonedoing what we think is right and then find out later that we werewrong. And that, as Aristotle would say, just plain sucks.But it is the imperfect, wonderful world we all live in. Which bringsme to AMC's fantastic 'The Killing'. A Danish import, 'Killing' followsthe murder investigation of young woman in Seattle, Washington. Thestory is told in thirteen 1 hour episodes through the perspectives ofthe people whose lives are impacted by the murder and subsequentinvestigation, with special emphasis on lead investigator Sarah Linden(played picture-perfect by Mireille Enos). Amazingly, despite a fairlylarge cast, there is nary a flat character to be found. All the playersare fleshed out, fully realized people with deep complexity andback-story. This allows the show to rise above a simple whodunit policeprocedural and really delve into just what a murder means to the peoplein the victim's life. It is alternately dark and gritty, inspirational,and heart breaking to watch these people cope with the loss and fearthat surrounds this girls murder.And that brings me back to my original point. The reason I love thisshow so much is because, unlike the many many many police proceduralsout there, it is no fairy tale with all the bad guys punished and goodguys victorious. It makes you wallow in the mud with the characters,encouraging you to feel all the frustration and confusion that theyfeel. It makes you want what they want, only to remind you that evengood people and good decisions have consequences that are far less thanideal. This is the kind of show that you think about after it's over,asking yourself if you would have done this or that differently. Butthat deeply unsettled feeling you get is the digestive price you payfor such a rich, not-written-for-kids storyline, and is so worth it.There is really nothing quite like it on TV right now; I highlyrecommend it.

Viking354 (2012-05-18 10:23)

One of the best crime series I've seen

I saw the original Danish series (Forbrydelsen) a few years ago andback then I just couldn't wait another week for a new episode – It wasone of the most suspenseful series I had seen.Now I've seen the first two episodes of the American version and I amnot disappointed. If anything the American version is even bettertechnically, especially the cinematography. The characters are greatand don't look artificial like in so many shows nowadays. There is alsosomething interesting about the artistic look and overall feel of theshow, but I can't really put a finger on what it is. One thing isobvious though and that is that in many scenes they have put a lot ofthought in how to build the shots. I can mention the interrogationscene in the second episode where they are interrogating witnesses intwo adjacent rooms. I would also like to mention the scene in thesecond episode where the body lies on the examination desk in thecoroner's office and the water drips from the body's hair.I can wholeheartedly recommend these great series to anyone looking fora top notch storyline, believable characters and nerve wreckingsuspense.

sevenof400 (2012-05-17 19:38)

A great three episode show...

...that has been stretched out far too long. It seems as if the writersmust have had a contest to see how many characters or story lines theycould include and the over / under is around 500. In the businessworld, there is a theory that postulates that for most workers, theavailable work will fill the available time. The writing and producingstaff of The Killing seem to have used this same theory when writingand producing the episodes for this show. Too bad someone with reviewauthority didn't streamline this series a bit. It is a series worthwatching but you will feel like the pace of this show is far too slow. I am amused by those people who are citing the dark aspects of thisshow. Scenes filled with rain shot at night do not make a series dark.If you want a dark series, consider watching Millennium (also shot inthe same general area) - a series which really delved into the darkaspects of human behavior.I don't want to leave you with the impression that The Killing is badviewing - it clearly isn't. It just meanders along far too slowly to beconsidered anymore than average television.

badajoz-1 (2012-05-16 07:33)

Far Too Poor a copy of original

Having avidly followed the original Danish version, I can say the USversion is very much second best. It started out very faithfully, whichof course meant it was rather boring for those of us who had followedthe original. the only real difference being the new sidekick cop, whowas so 'methody and twitchy' that he became unwatchable!! Theover-emphasis on the teacher/moslem storyline completely unbalanced theprogression of the series and various (admittedly not all successfulred herrings) of the original subplots got ditched to the detriment ofthis version. We had the rain and misery in spades and the mother/sonrelationship overegged to the nth degree (get over the Spielbergianconvolutions of family, please America!). I stopped watching in themiddle and came back at the end perfectly able to keep up - not a goodsign! The ending was absolutely ridiculous - hey, we can get a secondseries out of this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! - and totally unbelievable - yetanother unseen figure in a car manipulating a shock cliff hanger - ooh!And what was worse, leading ladies on US TV have to get thinner andmore groomed as a series becomes more successful, so the main lead goesprancing around in more figure-hugging stuff!!! who to blame - thedanish for being still in control, or the US writers sticking to thebland conventions of their small minded TV values? Remember we did notget the dead girl working as a hostess in a bar, or the fact that shewas in love with another moslem!!! Or did I miss it? Go back to theoriginal.

Jim Armstrong (2012-05-15 20:09)

Sets a new standard for American TV

AMC continues their quest for out of the ordinary fare and reallyscores with this program. Too real, too gritty, too illuminative ofhuman faults and foibles.I hate it.I watched Mad Men and got hooked. The portrayal of real life highlycompetitive business and the effects on the characters was riveting.I didn't like Breaking Bad at first but eventually got interested eventhough the main plot is hardly grounded in reality. Dead or Jailedafter a couple weeks would be far more likely.. but hey, there werestill facets of the plot that showed sparks of humanity and likabilityin the characters.I saw none of that in the first three episodes of the Killing, so.. Iquit.Someone said it was a mix of Twin Peaks and 24 and I cant argue muchwith that. With the grit of the Da Vinci Inquest and City Hall thrownin. In other words it LOOKS like Vancouver production values.And it's certainly true there's no ridiculous quick-solve CSI crap init either. In fact it's the opposite, this is going to be drawn out sothat the obligated viewer -the spouse or SO of a fan- will feel likehe's been subjected to the Rack.Will definitely appeal to those who admire Nietzsche and nihilistartistic expression. Which I don't.There's a market for this genre but it's not me who likes to enjoy whatI watch for some reason. Seriously... there was no one in the threeepisodes I thought would be interesting to know. Let alone would liketo be around. Certainly NOT the heroine detective. And that is thedeparture from reality. If that character was on Law and Order, she'dbe dragged off duty and assigned 5 days a week with the departmentalpsychologist.My rating of it is on artistic value alone. If I was to give an overallrating it would be 3.

chopendoz (2012-05-15 09:37)

Watch the original

May contain spoilers .... As has been mentioned, 'The Killing' is aCanadian adaptation (albeit set in Seattle) of the Danish TV series'Forbrydelsen'. Having watched all 20 episodes of 'Forbrydelsen', Ifeel compelled to draw comparisons between it and the Canadian version.Seen for the first time, 'The Killing' comes across as 'brilliant' and'the best thing on TV' etc. but it pales by comparison to itsScandinavian ancestor. One of the reasons is that the Danish actorswere unknown to me and that added a greater sense of realism to thecharacters. The Canadian actors that I had seen before came across as... just actors. It's not their fault but it detracted from theirperformances (from my perspective). I would recommend that Americanviewers get hold of the original series as opposed to watching a badimitation. I found it hard to understand the writers whose adaptedcharacter, a 'detective', shared drugs with schoolgirls. If this isreality, I'm not surprised that the female detective is asked to stayon the case. Also, I am at a disadvantage in that I already know whothe killer is (if the adaptation remains true to form). In fact Ipicked him quite early on in the original series. It does seem to methat 'The Killing' relies heavily on mood music to set the tone and thecharacters are, so far, undeveloped - as opposed to the original where(for example)the father of the dead girl was painful to watch. Bottlingup all his emotions and trying to remain strong. Will we be treated toother adaptations of foreign series because American writers have lostall their imagination and/or creativity? How about other Scandinavianseries like 'Irene Huss' or 'Van Veeteren' - or the brilliant Frenchcrime series 'Engrenages' (Spiral) now showing on BBC in the UK? Moregrist for the mill?

abfabflorist (2012-05-15 00:29)

Acting okay, but the Danish version is much better.

Why copy something that is perfect? This is what has occurred with thisAmerican version of the wonderful Danish drama 'The Killing'. At firstI thought this show was dubbed with American voices. It was reallystrange. I don't think it was but the sound was a bit surreal. The samesuspenseful music which, perhaps if you had not viewed the Danish onefirst would not be considered kitsch. Possibly would watch the Americanversion again but as the original Danish version is being repeated onanother channel at the same time I will probably end up watching thatto tie up some loose ends which often occur in a complex drama such asthis. American version second best by a long shot.

hojer112 (2012-05-13 08:32)

The Killing

Actually the Series is the remake of a Danish series not Swedish andalso written by Danes , all due respect to the late Stieg Larsson. Lotsof good things coming from Scandinavia these days which is DenmarkNorway ,Sweden, Finland and Iceland.Not only Sweden , just think of therecent best foreign film winner at the Oscar "In a betterworld".However the series is great. set in the US version in Seattle ,which is a very good choice. Casting is excellent and very true to the"original" in my opinion. Cant wait to see the rest. I was glued to myseat.I can not wait to see the development of the series and if thekiller is the same as in the original. You just can not guess it, sincethere are so many twists and turns to the story. I remember that thestreets in Denmark were swept for people when the series wereshown.Hope for the same success in the US , truly deserved since it isnot as predictable a series and story as so many are these days. If youhave seen 1 episode you have seen them all, not so with the Killing.Enjoy!!!

Imran Ahmed (2012-05-13 05:13)

A hidden gem

I am writing this after the first season finale, and I came to thiswithout expecting much and what a shocking pleasant surprise it was andabsolute gem of a thriller.I rarely give a rating of 10, there would always be some part thatwould be missing and something goes wrong in any department, nothingever went wrong with this.The whole first season is one murder case, so you can expect some slowpace, and slow pace doesn't always mean a drag, and "The Killing" isthe best example for that, the pace is deliberately set to slow, to letall emotions, settings to sink in, the show gives you very subtle cluesand you would swear that know who killed "Rosie Larsen" and think it isyour idea, which is most often first proved right then wrong :) Theacting, direction, screenplay, music a absolute top notch, a lessenthat other crime thrillers (CSI, Criminal Minds, Suspect Behavior et.al.) should take a note of this epic of a thriller.If you haven't watch it yet you are missing an epic.

red_identity (2012-05-11 22:22)

Atmospheric, intriguing, and suspenseful

The Killing just concluded it's first season, so now I can fully reviewit. The Killing's first season was ultimately another success for AMC. Ithink that visually it is magnificent and definitely has the type oftone and atmosphere that is needed. The actors in the show are alsopretty great. Mireille Enos proved that with a still face she canconjure a lot of different expressions and her character is secretivebut we are still able to sympathize with her, even though she clearlyhas flaws. Another strong lead that can stand up against both Hamm andCranston in Mad Men and Breaking Bad. Joel Kinnaman and Billy Campbellare also pretty strong when they have story lines to chew one. Michelle Forbes... hmm, Michelle Forbes. Don't get me wrong, she wasactually magnificent in truly great scenes, but they were very few inbetween. Forbes could have actually been the stand-out together withEnos by the end of the season because she was very believable in herrole, but the problem is how the writers handled her. Actually, here wego in The Killing's problems. The flaws are in the writing. There wereso many unsatisfying story lines that really didn't do much for theseason overall. The show never really bored me, but throughout some ofthe middle of the season it didn't do much for me either. The reason?It tried to handle too many story lines at once, and didn't achievemany of them successfully. The show reached actual greatness in episode11 "Missing", because it showed us that when it just focuses on thecharacters that do matter the show could stand it's own with AMC'sbest. Hopefully the writers take note and improve upon this nextseason. And that is why I brought up Forbes, since her character wasprobably the most annoying of the season. All in all, though, flaws and all, I still recommend this series forsure. It makes for ambitious, absorbing story-telling, even though attimes I felt myself shaking my head at some of the writing. Also, theentire ensemble cast is pretty magnificent.

ronniepmillar (2012-05-11 14:25)

Not as good as the original Danish version

I watched the Danish version and thought that this version may bebetter because there would be no subtitles, but alas it was a poorimitation. Somehow this version lost a lot of the tension which was akey feature in the original Danish version. Also in general the actingwasn't as good, however the detective Sarah was the best actor in theseries. It was not as nail biting or addictive as the Danish versionand so I didn't continue to watch the whole series. Anyone who hasn'twatched the original should make an effort to see it. It is great incomparison. It's a pity but this is a very disappointing copy of a goodstory!!!!

jlt3201-1 (2012-05-06 09:49)

The best show in years

THE BEST SHOW IN YEARS (and I mean it in caps!! Could not figure out how to make it bold) Thestory and the twists - brilliant. The writers actually develop the plotand the characters The acting - superb. The Seattle setting -atmospheric ala film noir. Incredibly realistic. The Killing is qualityTV!! It makes the standard one hour drama (CSI, Criminal Minds) looklike insipid want-to-be's. (I am still addicted to all the Law andOrders, except for that Los Angeles one...for that they took off theoriginal???) The Killing may not play to the masses, it is many stepsabove the traditional station's offering. (Thank goodness for cable!)It is reminiscent of the quality TV 'back in the day', intelligent,makes one think, keeps you on the edge and memorable. I will neverforget this story. Can not wait for the second season!!

hkramb-1 (2012-05-06 08:10)

AMC can do no wrong

I had to watch this twice, the two hour premiere that is. I think whatstruck me most was the calm and slow storytelling. When TV is drowningin unrealistic CSI's et al (where investigators cook up fingerprints totechno music in dimly lit rooms), every time we pass a CSI on channelsurfing my husband always says 'don't they ever turn on the freakinlights in that office?' and we both laugh.This is police work as it really is, plodding, unexciting, procedural,a lot of driving, mixed with a bit of clever intuition, slammin good.Every character is a suspect, the story can go anywhere, so promising.If anyone was worried about the state of the serialized TV drama goingtoo far down the f-word/porn route, all arguments that onlysubscription HBO or Showtime dramas were good bc they used nudity orcursing bc 'that's how real life is'...this is yet another AMC showthat shuts them all up. Don't get me wrong, I love my Trueblood andhuge fan of Sopranos et al, but this show isn't a 'guilty pleasure',its just a pleasure.