Deadwood Season 1 completed: My thoughts

As I have mentioned before Deadwood is one of those series that a lot of people hold in very high regard and yet I have tried on a number of occasions to watch it, but simply lost interest and put it on the back burner, only to not really be all that enthusiastic about turning it back on and just walking away from it. I had the DVD box set for season 1 and loaned it to someone and simply forgot that I had done so. This has happened with a lot of my DVD's and these days, I don't even have very many DVD's and the only DVD player that I have is inside my Playstation - which I never use for that and actually rarely use at all.

src

I finished season 1 of Deadwood last night and as one would expect, they wrapped up a lot of things that they had been working of for the 11 hours of episodes that came before it. I feel like they did a pretty good job of character establishment and some of the storylines seem like they are just getting started, which I am sure was the intention.

There will be spoilers ahead, although I will try to limit this as much as possible.

So far, I would say almost all of what we have seen on screen was a 12-hour establishing of characters and an establishment of what the real "bread and butter" of these characters are going to be in season 2. There were not a great many things that got moving and resolved in Season 1 and if they were they were kind of issues that were meant to bring on more important happenings probably in season 2.

One of the major things that the entire show kind of revolves around, is where is it that the main character (if there is one) Al Swearengen and whether or not he is a good guy, or a bad guy. This role is brilliantly played by Ian McShane and to me anyway, is one of the roles that he is likely best known for.

This guy can be a tyrant, but also can be a savior. He has a shady past that he spends a lot of time and murders several people over keeping hidden, but at the same time he does some very generous things, some of which are completely selfless, for the benefit of the entire city. One of the main instances of this happening is when he identifies an issue with smallpox appearing in the camp, then spends vast amounts of his own resources obtaining a vaccine and then distributing it for free.

Later, he also forms a government of sorts including various positions inside that local government like mayor and sheriff, yet he never so much as even suggests that he should hold any of those roles. We do kind of figure out that he doesn't actually need to be any of these things because he is so influential and powerful in the camp/town that he realizes the real power doesn't come from titles or positions, but in the influence that one already holds outside of these official positions. Despite the fact that at least up to this point he holds no official titles, nobody really feels as though they can pull anything over on him.

Then we look over at the other main character Seth Bullock who is played by Timothy Olyphant.

src

Olyphant, the actor, is one of those faces that when you see him, you think to yourself "I know this guy from somewhere but am not sure what it is." Well, it is probably Deadwood or Justified, both of which were quite popular series. It's funny to me that in both he played some sort of moral law-enforcement type although in Deadwood he doesn't really want this position so much as he takes it on after others do such a poor job of it.

These two characters are considered the central ones in the story and while I do think that Olyphant does a good job as Seth, he is completely overshadowed by the epic performance of Ian McShane.

Other characters are interesting but they are outside characters who do play some part in the overall story, but you can tell that they are headed at some point in the future, to some sort of fitting end.

src

E. B. Farnum is played really well by William Sanderson, and much like many other people in this series, he is one of those faces that you probably almost recognize. E.B. is a sniveling snake and comes across as a coward who is trying to sneak his way into wealthy and influence by riding the coattails of people that are more talented and charismatic. He annoys others more than he actually demands respect, and Sanderson' portrayal of this sort of person is spot on. I knew a couple of people in my real life that were like this, and Sanderson really does a good job of playing a total pussy who thinks they are in a position of power. When the time comes to elect a mayor, he nominates himself and nobody contests. He takes this as a sign of respect and admiration by the others but it is actually because the truly influential and powerful people in the camp don't give a damn about titles.

There are a ton of supporting roles and some of them come and go a lot quicker than you would expect and I feel as though this is done in a sort of shocking way that is meant to keep the viewers always guessing about who could die in the next episode.

src

Wild Bill Hickock is introduced as a major and central character only to have himself get rather unceremoniously murdered in a very quick scene that I guess if you know more about frontier history than I do, you would have seen coming. In our real world, this real person was genuinely murdered by being shot in the back while playing poker. I guess it is my fault for not knowing about that, but I do recall hearing about aces and eights being the "dead man's hand."

Other side characters that appear of great importance such as the preacher were pretty fantastic and at first glance you don't really understand their purpose in the overall story.

src

The preacher is tolerated by the camp's inhabitants because well, because he is a holy man. But he becomes very ill and starts to kind of annoy people with his prophetic ways. He is seriously suffering and eventually Al Swearengen puts him out of his misery not because he is annoying him, but because he can see that his life is simply one of pain and very little other purpose. It is an act of mercy that makes us feel that perhaps Al is a good guy at heart, but also ruthless when something gets in his way.

Al has a soft side when it comes to a lot of things and I think this is a major point of the entire first season. He is established as a ruthless murderer early on, but as the season goes on there are several things that happen to show that he has a very humanistic side and is empathetic to the plight of others, he just doesn't allow himself to show it very often.

As Season 1 concludes, there are many characters that are kind of pushed aside and forgotten, and there are others that are being pushed towards the "main stage" if you will. There is a rather obvious showdown brewing between Al and his main Saloon competitor Cy Tolliver, which is a character that is loosely based on a real person as well.

src

Although they are kind of easing into it, you can tell that this person is going to become more and more of a thorn in the side of Al as time goes on, and while I do not have any proof of this and have avoided future spoilers myself, I can see his death being something that happens eventually. You can't just open a competing saloon across the road from Al Swearengen and not have trouble come your way eventually.

---

If you found that to be filled with spoilers I did in fact warn you at multiple times before you got to this point. I did try to keep them at a minimum.

I do this this series is ok but I have to be honest and say that I don't really think that this is as outstanding of a series as history would have us believe. At the time of its release in the early 2000's I would imagine it was just amazing to see given the scope of it, but by my own standards and I suppose the reduced attention span of today's people (including me) things do move awful slow in this. We have gone through 12 hours already and honestly, not a great deal has actually happened.

I suppose from an artistic standpoint this is actually better. They are doing to a "show don't tell" approach as far as things are concerned and thus far, unless I completely missed something because I was zoning out, there hasn't been ANY narration of any sort yet, which it actually quite refreshing to see.

I have heard from friends that season 2 is where things get truly entertaining, and I will start on that today.