I'm watching with closed captions ON. It's confusing enough sorting the dream images from the present without not being able to catch the dialogue.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one complaining about the sound quality — so true of many programs. I do not have a premier sound system but I have a sound bar with a woofer, which should be adequate.
I’ve been intrigued enough to watch both episodes and agree with another review that this is a story about Camille with the murders as a backdrop. Intriguing enough. However, I’ve been drinking most of my adult life, though not an alcoholic. My late brother was an alcoholic so I’ve seen that end of it. I’m not a prude about drinking but I’m really tired of movie/TV characters depicted drinking enormous amounts of alcohol and not appearing to be anything more than buzzed. Also, Camille drinks many times a day and I cannot imagine her doing her job — it was already established in episode one she is not an especially talented writer so I imagine she needs all of her faculties to do the job — and drive a car! That said, Amy Adams is terrific and I want to see where she goes with the character. Of course the writing needs to make sense — why on earth would she leave the motel and stay at mom’s place?? She left town years before because it held bad memories for her, mother is awful to her, and she did not want to come back to do the story — so what’s the point of her staying at the terrible childhood home?? It ONLY makes sense to create scenes between Camille, half sister and step dad.
1
Why do all the characters mumble so much? There are plenty of people in the world who aren't low-talkers, and it might be nice to get a few on camera once in a while. Also, what's with the dim lighting? The first episode did prompt my husband and me to have a lively discussion about how much Camille would reek from all that alcohol seeping out of her pores. Other than that: too slow, too mumbly, too dimly lit. We'll give it another week.
4
I'm late- but I have to turn the sound up to 60 on my TV to hear important dialogue and then quickly turn it down to 20 when when HBO decides to up the music to wake people up. I have neighbors in my high rise and this just bites!!!
So far the shows a yawn to me...but I'll hang in for awhile. Why is the sound quality allowed to be so lousy in these productions? Poor production values...HEY Showtime & HBO-your just pushing us all to streaming!
8
Two things.
One, glad to hear others complaining about the sound. I use CC more and more these days, but it's interesting how seeing the words on screen before the actors speak them robs the whole thing of spontaneity. And it reminds me that we're all reading a script together. It removes any and all feelings of realism.
Two, can we PLEASE, for once, forget about the book and what you all know but (wink, wink) won't reveal? This is not a book, it's a TV drama. Different medium, different rules. If you read this book, congratulations, enjoy the show or not but please keep that aspect of it to yourselves.
9
Is Maker’s Mark (“the good stuff”) an advertiser or sponsor of this series? Talk about product placement, if not promotion. With all the whiskey drinking going on in the first episode, I’ll be sure to have a shot ready for the second episode! Cheers!
The older I get, the more I realize I have diminished patience or tolerance of stories of murder and depravity, if they lack any redeeming characters of note.
Good series usually have an opening episode which really hooks you, even if the story falters in subsequent episodes.
Sorry, but this sad story and it’s sad town made me want to run in the other direction from ‘Wind Gap’. No wonder I could not recall the book, which I read. Forgettable
1
"Cut! Print!"
2
Perhaps we need an anti mumble core movement. I'm getting so tired of feeling like I can't watch anything without going back a few frames. Aren't there editors who care, or is this some trend that only makes sense to Tv execs?
15
I watch most shows with the CC subtitles now. I was tired of missing half the dialogue, between the mumbling and bad sound mixing.
21
I could not understand a lot of the dialogue. Makes it hard to enjoy the show.
4
My wife hates the subs, which we used to only use for some British shows, but they are more necessary lately I agree!
5
Loved your recap, thanks: made clear some points I wasn’t sure of and picked up things I’d missed all together. Am looking forward to consulting your take on each episode. The first episode was superb in my view and has me thoroughly hooked. I love its gothic feel, the way it’s lit and Amy Adams is living the part. Wonderful!
13
If Johnson&Johnson isn't already a sponsor, they're missing the perferct show to advertise Band-Aids on.
6
I like how the audience members (i.e. me) cannot tell whether Camille is the heroine or the anti-heroine. As a former journalist, I identified with the simultaneously marginalized yet centered position of Camille as a journalist. Her mother's paranoia about preserving appearances rather than facing reality is priceless. It rings of "A Streetcar Named Desire." I am a lover of spoilers so I know the ending, and I wish that more was done with the romance between Chris Messina's character and Camille, since the upcoming ending sounds regressive. But I will wait to see how it plays out.....
9
Loved the book and thought the first episode effectively captured the protagonist's difficult situation and the taut atmosphere. Looking forward to see how the plot unfolds and the characters develop -- good storytelling doesn't need to be -- shouldn't be -- defined by genre.
5
So, getting murdered is better than getting molested as a child? Probably the writer did not mean that but it came across ....
1
I think Gillian Flynn was criticizing the father who was more worried about his daughter getting raped than getting murdered "peacefully." Flynn was puncturing the weird father's take on his daughter's disappearance and Camille was also weirded out by this strange father.
9
That was the character saying that.
4
Did anyone notice the words "dirty", "bad", "wrong", and "girl"? I actually thought some were continuity mistakes, then I remembered the book and realized what they were doing. I think it's pretty cool.
6
Why in all these shows where main characters are well educated hard liquor to excess and smoke (by the way only around 15% of adult Americans smoke in US now). Is it because they are supposedly troubled. But troubled is not stupid. Terrible role models when famous actors in these roles continually chain smoke and drink. We have seen less smoking and drinking in regular TV series. But again should the media not reflect reality on this positive decline in smoking.
5
Ring of Fire was performed by Johnny Cash, but was written by June Carter Cash and Merle Kilgore.
7
I’m in until we are subjected to long scenes of Camille cutting herself... or being cut. Then I’m out.
7
At least based on this episode, the show doesn’t seem quite sure of the kind of story it is telling. Is it a solid murder mystery that invites us to speculate on who did the crimes and why? Is it a psychodrama about the inner torments of the Amy Adams character, which the actress conveys with an obviously actorly, mannered, overly emotional performance. Or is it yet another example of the big bad things that happen in small Southern towns? The show needs to find its focus soon.
1
Can’t be all three?
12
@Mark Siegel
I think it’s way more about Camille - where she was and where’s she going. The percentage of time spent on solving the murders isn’t very much if the intention was to make that part of the story first and foremost. At least that’s my opinion after only two episodes but it could change, I suppose.
1
Can Camille's liver hold out? The flashes back in time are blunt instruments to a coherent narrative. I cannot become accustomed to the television tropes that interrupt a narrative and contribute nothing significant until further information is somehow revealed.
The flashbacks are "legible" but add no coherency to the narrative, but just "wonder".
Another "mumble core" (see Ebert) show, so turn on the cc.
Gillian Flynn's fiction and this program require a degree in "post-modern" literary fiction. This show makes me want to sluice down as many little bottles (the airline ones) of vodka as Camille. Maybe these "mysteries" are more comprehensible when slurring one's words.
7
Frankly, almost every show on HBO is an example of mumble core. Sometimes the actors are to blame, but HBO's "style" of sound design has become unacceptable. I've tried to research this, but haven't found the source of the problem.
27
Camille changes to big bottles of vodka soon enough; pouring them into empty water bottle to disguise, but is only seen downing one mint. Surely every pore emanates alcohol?
3
The thing often ignored or not understood when characters like this are deployed is that even if they can act sober, they will smell like booze. Breathmints, mouthwash, whatever, the breath will smell of alcohol, because they smell comes from the blood in exhaled breath, not in the odor of the drink. Yet no one seems to notice.
1
Led Zeppelin! Perfect choice of music for this character. Excellent episode.
5
Adams is good as usual, but once again HBO is just trying to hard. Oh look, another self-destructive protagonist. Yawn. Why does a certain costal "creative" class always seem to mistake tired nihilism for "adult prestige"?
9
Was the volume on the show low, or am I just losing my hearing? I had to keep upping the volume to make out key passages/dialogue. Anyone else have that issue?
Also, did the raised "V-A-N-I-S-H" on Camille's arm "come into view" or was it there all the time? I saw it kind of "appear" -- but it happened rather quickly.
33
We also kept raising the volume! (we used to have the same problem with True Detective-maybe it's an HBO/Southern thing...)
4
Sometimes the only answer is closed captioning, although that is a distraction.
1
I have consistently had problems with HBO's sound for the last several years. I have a sound bar connected to an HD tv, but I've wondered if perhaps my soundbar is out of date and is not capable of receiving what HBO is sending out. I have also noticed that some newer soundbars advertise special controls to up the center channel for dialog. My soundbar has this but it never raises it to a good enough level and frequently the reviews of newer soundbars do not mention the ability to raise dialog channels. So when I watch HBO, yup, it's always with the closed captions.