Arsenic Lullaby Blog- DEADWOOD TOP 10 MOMENTS part1

After many long years , rumors and raised hopes...there will be a new Deadwood movie.
Deadwood, in my estimation, is the greatest tv show of all time. I've watched the entire series roughly 60 times. That's a conservative estimate.

It was recommended to me..I watched an episode or two and said "feh!"...no thanks, not for me. Then, some time later, I gave it another try. There is a bit of a learning curve to watch this show because the language is very jarring. It's very eloquent and wordy...but also filled with vile profanity. It kind of keeps your brain steering left to right wildly to catch up. But after you get used to that, once you are able to catch up to what's being said at your normal speed of understanding...it...is...AWESOME.

It's brilliantly written, the characters are fascinating and compelling and the plot is filled with intrigue. It's not really a "western" per say. It's a drama about the early foundations of organized crime in frontier America just after the civil war, and a town that has sprung up during the gold rush slowly becoming a legitimate United States Territory...while the bulk of it's inhabitants are outlaws, degenerates, and people who have come there for greed or to run from something.

HBO ended the series abruptly before it was finished...although the ending was about as perfect as any show has ended even with months and years to plan for it. The last line, in fact, could not have been more perfect or poetic.

While I was completely satisfied with the series and the ending...I am sure as hell not going to thumb my nose on a new two hour Deadwood movie.

SO...our regularly scheduled Arsenic Lullaby content will be pre-empted as I celebrate this upcoming event to give you MY top ten favorite Deadwood moments.

spoilers? I'll not be giving anything major away but I am covering a wide swath of the series so you have been warned

These are in random order and my personal favorites...meaning that they may not actually be the ten best moments, just my top ten.

I'll give you five, with my reasons for each, today...

No 10- Deadwood is a dangerous place

One of the many things this show does well, is get to the point. This opening scene in the Deadwood camp establishes everything you need to understand about the tone, the reality, the world they are living in.
Al Swearengen proprietor of the Gem saloon/whorehouse is having a pleasant conversation at the bar with patron Ellsworth, when a whore shoots someone in the head. The response is Al telling him to pour his own drinks while he attends to the incident, and Ellsworth replying calmly and in the affirmative.
It's all just the usual bloody unpleasant business that has to be dealt with in between creating civilized commerce. The very foundations of the show are all set up in 2 minutes without seeming forced, anything feeling out of place, or the viewer noticing what the real point of the scene was.

No.9 Johnny Burns is a bad man

Johnny Burns up to this point was comedic fodder, a dimwitted hired hand of Al Swearengen...in most shows, that's all there would be to the character in depth and use. But there is a reason he is in the good graces of a frontier crime boss, as Saul and Charlie and the audience learn here...everyone in Deadwood is dangerous.

No.8 The Mayor and Hearst have a moment of understanding

Another of the many things this show does well, is demonstrate that human relationships and dynamics are not static...two people who loath each other, will at one time or another have some small thing in common, and be united in that for however brief a time.
In this case George Hearst and Mayor Farnhum, two people who could not be much more different or at odds with each other. In fact their last private interaction was Hearst angrily threatening to murder Farnhum. However, Hearst has long understood that by any common measure he himself might be considered crazy, as he believes that he can understand the earth speaking too him. Farnhum's nervous happen-chance admission of coming unglued, is followed by a long pause ...followed by Hearst's response here.
The beauty of this again is all in the delivery of the lines...Hearst's reply conveys someone who completely understands Farnhum's confusion and reassures him without mocking or acting as though it a strange thing to mention. Wondering if you have lost your mind is completely reasonable to Hearst but daily business must continue to be dealt with.

No.7 Seth takes Hearst by the ear

This one for the fantastic delivery of the line by the Sheriff - frustration, anger and genuinely not quite believing what was just said. This also demonstrates one of the primary themes of the show...the conflict both internally and externally of the two kinds of people descending on the town as it becomes legitimate- men and women who are used to the law of might makes right, who's lives have been filled with violence and people who are used to a welding different kind of power.

No.6 Jack Langrishe's entrance/introduction

Somewhere along the way, hack TV and Movie writers managed to convince the general public that "character development" meant a character changing during a story arch.
As though it is an action taken by the character - to develop- and not an action taken by the writer - revealing and showing the depth and personality of the character

This scene here gives equal development to the character of Al as all the adventures and choices and murders and danger he has been involved in so far.

Think about this- how do YOU get to know a person in real life? You spend time with them, AND you get to know other people that know them or knew them before you or knew them under different circumstances. You can know someone for ten years, and suddenly have a whole knew understanding about them when you meet their brother, or old friend.

Having someone from Al's past show up, who is not dower but upbeat and busting Al's chops right from the start gives another facet to AL. That fact that this old friend is not a criminal, murderer, nor looking to advance some nefarious plot and has nothing in common with Al on first glace, makes both of the characters that much more interesting. Jack runs a traveling theater group of all things. Why the hell would these two get along? We learn why, over the course of the season. Not from life threatening trails they must face together, but from them simply....getting along. They are friends for the same reason any of us our friends with someone. They just like each other and are on the same mental wave length.

I'll give you the rest next time.

Later