22h ago

What popular TV show did not do it for you and you quit watching?

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Never got the appeal of these ones. They aren't bad shows, but they did not do it for me.
Game of Thrones
Lost
Better Call Saul
Peaky Blinders
Breaking Bad
- Shit. That's exactly my list.
  I didn't even watch GoT long enough to see Emilia Clark in the buff. But, then, I'd read the first two books and absolutely loathed them, and didn't find the TV series improved the story much.
  I liked the first season of Lost, but the second felt like the writers were like, "oh shit... we got a second season? Shitshitshit..." Like they were just making it up as they went, and the writing and plot was just... bad.
  I didn't watch BCS because I didn't like
  Breaking Bad. I mean, I like scenes from BB, but the show itself suffered (for me) from this tendency in the past decade to base entire shows on tense anxiety. Boardwalk Empires was another that used this mechanism, as did
  Peaky Blinders. Great writing. Great acting. But it's just constant tension, and it's simply not fun.
  It's like directors got ahold of this one technique and just beat it into every fucking show in the past decade. It's tired, overused, and you'll notice it's a common trait of many of the shows you and agree on. You have to have tension, but I didn't need every god damned minute to be wondering if someone's going to get their throat graphically slashed with a straight-edge.
  
  Oh man! You just put to words why I couldn't stand Breaking Bad, and Boardwalk Empire.
  I watched the first simply because a lot of people love it, and I try to watch everything that seems worth seeing. The second I saw some clips from that I really liked, but then I just didn't stick with the actual show.
  In both cases, the series left me on constant edge, in a really bad way.
  Now I realize that I kept waiting for the shows to grant me some kind of catharsis, but it just never happened. Or it happened rarely and in ways that quickly gets brushed away as inconsequential.
  
  Y'all are trippin, the gus storyline in Better Call Saul/BB is likely my favorite villain of all time.
  Fair enough though, I was scared I was gonna see these shows listed in here and here we are!
  
  You're still allowed to enjoy them.
  
  How could I after this
  
  Fair point. You probably shouldn't like or enjoy things that other people subjectively don't like.
  My condolences.
  
  I'm not fond of the perpetual tension. Just awful.
  
  this tendency in the past decade to base entire shows on tense anxiety.
  Yup. I call it the "drama of paranoia," and it's exhausting after a while. It also gives you a veneer of "prestige" without having to make characters I give a shit about or plots that fit together at all. As a good example of a show that realized this, Mad Men always struggled with a certain early-season plotline until they finally just ripped off the band-aid and said,
  
  What worked about that show had nothing to do with "ONE BIG SECRET."
- This, plus The Sopranos, The Office, Parks & Rec, IASIP, 30 Rock, etc.
  I get that they're well liked, and they are the source of lots of meme material, but I could never manage to get through a whole episode.
- I have watched any of those except the first couple of Breaking Bad. It was too real for me so I just couldnt.
- I lasted 5 minutes with Peaky Blinders. The loud music drowning out the dialogue did my head in.

224 comments