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**Official** Hell on Wheels (1 Viewer)

snogger

snogger

Footballguy
Looking forward to the start of the Western series onslaught :thumbup:

Wheels spins around Cullen Bohannon (Anson Mount), a former slave owner who, just after the Civil War, finds work on a railroad crew purely to seek revenge on the former members of Gen. Sherman's army responsible for murdering his wife. Rap singer Common plays Elam Ferguson, a former slave who forms an uneasy bond with Bohannon on the prairie.

Construction of the railroad, touted as healing the rift between north and south by linking east to west, "hasn't been explored much in fiction," says Tony Gayton (Faster), who created the show with his brother Joe. "It seemed like a really cool new way to explore a Western. We kind of describe it as an 'Eastern,' or an industrial Western: Our idea is to have 'hell on wheels' — that's the movable tent city — to feel like an urban development, and to juxtapose that with the big wide-open western vistas (and) the Native Americans."

Mount, a Tennessee native, says, "It's not a show about the creation of a railroad, it's a show about the building of a nation. It's a group of people from different backgrounds, different cultures, different races, who have a shared dream of creating something that's seemingly impossible."

Connecting the coasts "was like saying we're going to put a man on the moon," he says. "And it's not a pretty story: There's a lot of graft, a lot of corruption, a lot of hatred. Cullen is a guy who's hellbent on revenge, and he keeps losing that battle because he gets distracted by a sense of obligation and duty elsewhere."
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:popcorn:
 
Looking forward to it also. My home town (Cheyenne) was founded by the Hell on Wheels folks, so I'm interested in the history here as well.

 
Pretty high dialogue to action ratio, but not in a good "Deadwood" way.

Still enjoyed it and I hope the excessive dialogue is just early on to fill in all the characters and backstory.

:hopeful:

 
Caught it just now. Like Da Raiders just said, I'll hang in there, but I wasn't wowed by any means.

Maybe in the pre-Breaking Bad era, I might be impressed. :shrug:

 
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One thing that bothered me about this show a lot is every person had perfect teeth - from the slaves to the guy that got killed by the indian to his wife, etc...

 
'guru_007 said:
One thing that bothered me about this show a lot is every person had perfect teeth - from the slaves to the guy that got killed by the indian to his wife, etc...
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Except for the buxom whore who talked to the preacher with plans to build a church. Her teeth were gross. Still probably would have, though.
 
'SmoovySmoov said:
'guru_007 said:
One thing that bothered me about this show a lot is every person had perfect teeth - from the slaves to the guy that got killed by the indian to his wife, etc...
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Except for the buxom whore who talked to the preacher with plans to build a church. Her teeth were gross. Still probably would have, though.
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Was just going to post that, and yes, I would have too :thumbup:
 
I wanted to like it, but I didn't really care for it. Part of the problem might have been that I found myself comparing it to Deadwood too often, which is a bit unfair.

 
I watched the first 45 minutes before my kid needed to go to sleep, but I thought it was "meh". It's well filmed, but I didn't get any perspective of what was going on or who I was supposed to care about. I realize it was the first episode, but outside of the train builder being greedy and the main dude shooting a guy at first I don't have any context as to why I should care about what happens to any of these people.

 
'Abraham said:
I watched the first 45 minutes before my kid needed to go to sleep, but I thought it was "meh". It's well filmed, but I didn't get any perspective of what was going on or who I was supposed to care about. I realize it was the first episode, but outside of the train builder being greedy and the main dude shooting a guy at first I don't have any context as to why I should care about what happens to any of these people.
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To be fair, the last 15 minutes does add a bit more context (about the main character, at least). Like most others here, I wasn't wowed, but I'll keep watching for now. It's AMC and it's a great concept for a show. The pilot wasn't terrible. I could see it getting good very quickly.I wasn't hooked on Breaking Bad or Mad Men after 1 episode either.
 
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all the meh's made me think it would be meh. I liked it. The Indians were cool and I hope to see more from them. Will have to check out Deadwood.

 
Deadwood is nothing like this show. The only similarity is that they both take place in the old west. It's like saying "If you like Happy Days you should check out Mad Men."

 
It was just okay. I really wanted to like it a lot, but just wasn't too into it. I will give it a few more episodes to see where it goes. Problem for me is that there are no characters that I am too interested in.

 
Hard to judge a show based on one episode..

The first 45 minutes was "slow" in regards to explaining the back story..

Kept thinking.. "move along, give a reason to "care" about the characters".. :yawn:

But the last 15 minutes started the building the back story as well as where they are heading with the overall show and I can't wait for next week. :popcorn:

 
I thought it was more bad than meh.

Laughably 2D predictable clichéd characters and plot.

Why not just let Chief O'Brien grow a moustache to deliver his moustache twirling robber baron villain monologues? The only second where I thought it might not be 100% predictable was when the ex-Confederate soldier anti-hero said he actually owned slaves... but then we find out minutes later that no he freed them and fought for honor :bleh:

Unfair to compare it to Deadwood but everyone including me is still going to.

:thumbsdown:

 
'TeamDingo said:
I thought it was more bad than meh.Laughably 2D predictable clichéd characters and plot. Why not just let Chief O'Brien grow a moustache to deliver his moustache twirling robber baron villain monologues? The only second where I thought it might not be 100% predictable was when the ex-Confederate soldier anti-hero said he actually owned slaves... but then we find out minutes later that no he freed them and fought for honor :bleh:Unfair to compare it to Deadwood but everyone including me is still going to.:thumbsdown:
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So it would be less predictable for the former Confederate soldier to have owned slaves and not been bothered by it?
 
'SacramentoBob said:
'TeamDingo said:
I thought it was more bad than meh.

Laughably 2D predictable clichéd characters and plot.

Why not just let Chief O'Brien grow a moustache to deliver his moustache twirling robber baron villain monologues? The only second where I thought it might not be 100% predictable was when the ex-Confederate soldier anti-hero said he actually owned slaves... but then we find out minutes later that no he freed them and fought for honor :bleh:

Unfair to compare it to Deadwood but everyone including me is still going to.

:thumbsdown:
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So it would be less predictable for the former Confederate soldier to have owned slaves and not been bothered by it?
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I guess you don't recognize Western movie cliches when you see them?http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheAmericanCivilWar

Several tropes therefore became standard in older Civil War movies:

•Other than Quantrill's Raiders (Missouri guerrillas whose ranks include Jesse James, the Dalton Brothers, and other famous outlaws) Confederate soldiers are almost always shown as as heroic and respectable. Where individual Confederates were villainous, there would be noble Confederates around as contrast. Confederate officers are gentlemen, Confederate enlisted men are tough, have thicker accents, but are very loyal to their officers.

•Confederate soldiers are superior to Union soldiers in every way. They are braver, more clever, more noble, and just more tragic. This occurs even if the Union soldiers are the heroes of the movie or television episode.

•Union soldiers and politicians are thuggish and venal. If motivation is brought up, they are likely to wonder why they are in the army, and why there is even a war going on. The black soldiers are the exception, since they know exactly what they are fighting for, and - conscious of the good example they must set - act with the utmost discipline and valor.

•Race and slavery is seldom, if ever, mentioned as a motivation for the war. If slaves are involved in the story line at all, some or all of them will be loyal to their masters, and there is often a Loyal Slave scene in which they protect the family home from Yankee invaders or aid their masters to outwit the Yankees or escape them. There may even be a one-off scene where southern generals or gentlemen sit down and have a talk about how the conflict is definitely not about slavery.

 
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