Banshee - Season 2

For those of you who haven’t caught the Cinemax TV show Banshee yet, you should.

I discovered Banshee last year when a couple of episodes had already aired and after watching one episode I was hooked and had to catch up with the episodes I had missed.

An action packed, sex romping, bullet flying array of twists and backstory that never fail to excite is how I would describe Banshee. Cinemax really have got a good one here. The executive producer of the show is Alan Ball, famed for writing American Beauty and HBO series True Blood, the reason I mention this is that there is one major similarity between True Blood and Banshee. Those of you familiar with True Blood will know the character Lafayette played by Nelsan Ellis, a sassy black man who is androgynous as well as being out and proud, for me he was the best thing about True Blood, his laugh out loud one-liners gave an element of comedy which the show needed. In Banshee there is a very similar character played by Hoon Lee named Job (pronounced Jobe). Job is a transvestite computer hacker who is handy with a gun and can kick ass whenever needed, he also as Lafayette has some cracking lines that have me in stitches. I love both these characters and find it hard to pick a favorite as they are so similar but in completely different worlds. It’s also worth noting that these LGBT characters are both ethnic minorities adding a double hit for liberal TV.

I have just finished season 2 of Banshee, which held up well against the first, nothing worse than a good first season followed by a shit sophomore season after a year of waiting. Banshee came back and had me addicted from the start. More violence, sex and story that make it a TV show that is very easy to binge on. The show also adds additional new characters that look as if they are going to have a bigger role in season 3.

Banshee also deals with many issues a favorite of mine of which is the coming of age aspect of people in the Amish community and the rebellion that sometimes occurs. Issues of Native Americans are also shown in the series notable the hierarchy of the tribes and their chiefs. There is also the subject of people from different backgrounds and beliefs integrate in the melting pot that is the United States of America and the possible repercussions of this happening.

I easily think that Banshee is on-par with shows like Breaking Bad, The Wire, True Blood, Game of Thrones etc… but I don’t think Banshee will have the following of these shows, but I cannot figure out why. It is as well written as these shows, it has an incredible cast, it’s beautifully shot and is edited in a unique and very clean, crisp way.

At the moment Banshee is my personal favorite TV series on right now and I urge anyone who hasn’t seen it yet to begin watching it.

Trash Daytime TV

I am currently between courses and between jobs. So when I’m not reading I tend to pick up on the bag of dog shit that is daytime TV. There’s one show in particular that is utter trash, without naming it directly, it’s the one with the silver fox and all the reality show rejects reading out the most mental of people’s tweets about the show. To think that there are people who sit there watching this shit and then want to join in by tweeting bullshit about it makes me realize that this generation is full blow fucked!

Anyway the last couple of times I’ve been unlucky enough to turn my TV on to this tripe, I’ve seen stories about a 30-year-old guy who has multiple girlfriends and in a massive twist to the story it turns out they are all 60+ women, some as old as 90. Sick fuck they branded him a “cougar chaser” which I suppose is less offensive as “pervert”. This guy was like the opposite of a pedophile, and I couldn’t help but sit there and wonder why the granny snatcher was the way he was and what he gets out of it? You know apart from all the hard candies and the fact that they’ve probably got a free bus pass so it doesn’t cost them anything to meet you. Thinking about it I think they were all American so I have no idea as to whether they would have free bus passes, but I’m guessing the hard candies things still the same.

Just when you think they’d sunk as low as low can be with trash TV. This morning I caught the end of what appeared to be a woman who collects these creepy dolls with china faces and that… wait for the major plot twist again… they all have the spirits of dead people living in them. I don’t know what to say apart from maybe this woman should be sectioned? I mean I guess she’s not harming anyone except the viewers many of whom probably felt dumber having watched this shit, which I know I certainly did.

Other stories I have caught in the past have been; a couple who think they’re vampires and drink human blood, “mmmm hepatitis” and a couple that drank their own piss, “mmmm asparagus”. How do ‘stories’ like these get put on TV? I mean can you imagine being the guy who choses what gets put on the show? “Now there’s a guy who eats food by shoving it up his ass or a woman who thinks her Labrador is the reincarnated spirit of Anne Frank, it’s a tough one but lets go with Anne Frank the Labrador”.

This show is so infuriatingly awful that I find myself having to watch it from time to time just to see what crazy ass holes they’ve rounded up. This said I do feel dumber every time I watch it and thus feel obligated to read a few chapters of a book directly after as a sort of mental redemption in the hope that there is no lasting damage, in fact I prescribe that for every ten minutes of this shit you watch, you read a chapter of a book, preferably something factual that is challenging and that you will learn something from and expand your mind.