Love/Hate [** Spoilers **]

Macy0161

You have to remember regarding John Boy, that (as far I recall anyway), the were working series to series. The last renewal was the first time they got a multi series renewal. End of the first 3 series could've been the last Love/ Hate at the time of writing and filming.

If they'd known from the start it'd go 5 seasons, and that they could guarantee the availability of all actors, it might have been different. Again, iirc, Sheehan's availability was never really guaranteed season to season either.

Wolf Club

It must be difficult for Carolan when some of the actors start to get international recognition, I know Gillen and Sheehan were already well established, but did the actress who played Mary get a bigger job as well? The whole "Darren's sister doesn't talk to him anymore" thing was a bit lame and seemed forced as opposed to an production decision.

Regarding John Boy, I think it's no harm that he's gone. Nidge is a much better character in the boss role, I think the only way it would have worked would have been if Nidge broke off from John Boy to start him own gang, but that probably would have prevented the IRA conflict in season 3.

heyheyhey1982

I think a voice over would be a great addition to the show.

KKkitty

heyheyhey1982 wrote: »

I think a voice over would be a great addition to the show.

No it wouldn't. Might work for US based shows but not here. I hate voice overs and find them to be slightly distracting at times.

morebarn2

Wolf Club wrote: »

It must be difficult for Carolan when some of the actors start to get international recognition, I know Gillen and Sheehan were already well established, -but did the actress who played Mary get a bigger job as well? The whole "Darren's sister doesn't talk to him anymore" thing was a bit lame and seemed forced as opposed to an production decision.

Regarding John Boy, I think it's no harm that he's gone. Nidge is a much better character in the boss role, I think the only way it would have worked would have been if Nidge broke off from John Boy to start him own gang, but that probably would have prevented the IRA conflict in season 3.

The actress who played Mary, (Ruth Bradley) , went to America, as she had some very good offers of work there. Stuart Carolan confirmed this in his radio interview last week. He stated that he definately would have liked to keep her in the show, but she just was not going to be available, so he had no choice but to write her out of the storyline.

MrVestek

I've seen the girl that plays Rosie pop up in alot of other American stuff too. She was in World War Z and I spotted her in a trailer for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D recently too.

Riskymove

KKkitty wrote: »

No it wouldn't. Might work for US based shows but not here. I hate voice overs and find them to be slightly distracting at times.

whilt it works sometimes, its generally used to explain thigns to american audiences

the voiceover in the original Blade Runner is a good example

ectoraige

Bacchus wrote: »

How's is Nidge's life ... any different at the end of season 4 than it was at the start of the season? Lots of stuff happened, but nothing changed.

Also, WTF was with that ending? Didn't make any sense for Nidge to act like that.

The ending was the answer to your first question - Nidge's life has changed as his paranoia has transformed into a belief that he is unstoppable, that the universe will sustain him. The season showed us how this happened.

dinneenp

ectoraige wrote: »

The ending was the answer to your first question - Nidge's life has changed as his paranoia has transformed into a belief that he is unstoppable, that the universe will sustain him. The season showed us how this happened.

I'm not too sure.
He's doing it to either pis$ off the cops, just annoy them.
Or else he wants to be in a cell for a while- he said he doesn't get any peace, rest anywhere. So in the cell he's left to himself and can (firstly) let out his anger/vent his frustration and then chill for a while...

Ash.J.Williams

The guy who i believe nidge is based on is up in court at the minute and he is well known for antagonising cops.

Jason Todd

I never understood the massive love for Aiden Gillen either. His acting seemed 'off' at times, and his accent varied wildly over the two seasons. Thought Brian Gleeson as Hughie was great though, genuinely terrifying. Surprised we haven't seen more of him since he left the show.

What would John Boy be doing now anyway? His death has seen the rise of Nidge which has been class, so no complaints from me.

Happyman42

Vinny's view.
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/the-love-hate-portrayal-of-scumbags-fails-to-read-causes-of-violent-behaviour-1.1592359?page=1

The ending was flat and confusing on Sunday night, some of the storyline seemed undeveloped and there was a sense nobody knew where the series was going. But Love/Hate was magnificently written, shot, directed, produced, edited and acted, for which Stuart Carolan, David Caffrey, Dermot Diskin, Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, Peter Coonan, Charlie Murphy, Aoibhinn McGinnity and Killian Scott and all others involved deserve great credit. RTÉ, the impecunious station that commissioned the series and paid spectacularly for it, also deserves credit, albeit with some reservations, mainly to do with the politics of Love/Hate and the politics of RTÉ and of much of the media in reporting, commenting and portraying criminality.

‘Scumbags’
The series underscored the sense that criminality, in the main, is associated with an assortment of “scumbags” (in the airhead lingo of some crime journalism), “scumbags” emerging from communities that have no care for the welfare of children, for education, for the rudiments of decent living, for normal civilised behaviour. At times, it is conceded, these “scumbags” may be charming, even charismatic, but they embody a violent gene, bringing fear not just to their victims but also to society in general and in particular to the societies in which they operate. It is implied that they deserve to spend their lives behind bars, irrespective of the niceties of the legal system.
There is hardly any reflection in RTÉ, TV3 or elsewhere in the media that the kind of criminality depicted in Love/Hate derives in large part from the dysfunctional society we have allowed to evolve, where there are deep inequalities not just of income, wealth, power, influence, health, education and longevity but of respect and self-worth.


In Understanding Limerick: Social Exclusion and Change by Niamh Hourigan, she writes of men who get caught up in criminality: “Economically excluded, culturally stigmatised and insecure in their position as fathers and partners, these men have no legitimate source of pride or esteem available to them. Yet their need to achieve status, to be admired and respected, is the same as everyone else’s. As results they have created a different system of status. This status is linked to being a ‘hard man’ who embodies toughness and capacity for violence, as a figure who then elicits fear in his more vulnerable neighbours.”
Niamh Hourigan goes on to quote the sociologist Richard Sennett as claiming how lack of respect is one of the most significant “hidden injuries of class”.
Gangland culture is founded on both fear and status. It is through the gangs that many men find status and respect otherwise denied to them by society and it is a combination of fear and a desire for status that draws teenagers and young men to gangs and criminality.

Niamh Hourigan writes: “For a child who is growing up in an area where the ‘disadvantaged of the disadvantaged’ are clustered, the likelihood of embracing the fear-based respect model is much greater. Evidence of the ‘hard man’ culture will be visible daily on the streets, even in the posturing and street language of young children”.
If all that income and wealth inequality were confined to the arenas of income and wealth it might be tolerable, but, insidiously, income and wealth inequality seep into all other areas of life and society. Those with income and wealth can use that to gain power and influence; they can corral preferential health and educational resources; they can more readily avail of career opportunities through networks and elite training; and they have access to the courts denied to others without the means of affording access. Most of all they can gain power over others and, in doing so, earn status and respect, in the process denying others status and respect.
The injury of inequality is brilliantly portrayed in the seminal work The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. They show child wellbeing is better in more equal societies; there is less hard drug abuse in more equal societies; children do better academically; there are fewer teenage pregnancies; and there is less crime, imprisonment, status competition, individualism and consumerism.



Inequality of respect
The focus on poverty misses the point: it is inequality that matters for, crucially, inequality extends to respect, and inequality of respect is corrosive, lethally so.
There is a further point that emerges from Love/Hate: the “war” on drugs. This “war” has done far more damage than the drugs themselves, although of course the drugs too have done terrible harm.
More lives have been devastated by the criminalisation of hard drugs than by the drugs themselves. We could at least have greatly minimised the harm caused both by drugs and the “war” on drugs by ending the “war” and treating the harm of drugs, through health care and, more significantly, through more equality.
But it won’t happen. Nidge and his likes will be in business for a long, long time.

power pants

Temaz wrote: »

Even if Gillian was only available in a limited role I would not have killed John Boy off.

John Boy could have got a shortish jail term for any number of things, controlling things from a mobile in his cell but his death was some of the best drama on an Irish programme I have ever seen.

shooting john boy in the pub is what put the series into the big time, great twist and tension at the time

dinneenp

don't know if this was posted already- link

Mr Caffrey told the Irish Independent this was the first year the team went into production knowing another season would be commissioned by RTE.

As such, he said creator Stuart Carolan didn't feel the need to "book-end the finale with a dramatic moment".

"The mindset was that we'd make something to run over 12 episodes, as opposed to six," Mr Caffrey told this newspaper.

"We're expanding the storylines over a longer period of time and we didn't want to do a 'shoot them and gun them all down' thing again this year because we've everything signed up and ready to go for season five."

He continued: "Apart from Debbie, none of our long-running characters saw their demise, but we couldn't keep doing the same thing over and over again and playing that same tune."

heyheyhey1982

Next year's love hate should start of with Waynes grand mother finding out he's "Brown bread"

"Ah jaysuus they clipt pur aul wayne"

FloatingVoter

tatli_lokma wrote: »

Controversial here, but I didn't rate Gillen very highly at all as John Boy - in fact I thought he was one of the weaker actors. I just didn't buy him as a gangland boss and his acting style didn't suit the role IMO. I thought he was great in queer as folk but in Love/Hate I was very unimpressed.

I don't think Aiden Gillen can act at all - however we all have a place in the world. That said, the "not quite there uninterested stoner" suits him perfectly. In any other role, he's just a bored looking guy who's waiting for a bus. He is the Irish Keanu Reeves but even he had Point Break / The Matrix yawns.
But it is on record that Gillen contracted to do one season and agreed to go along for one more with no future contractual obligations. From a money / career point of view Love/Hate is just a small local project ... not GoT.

Wolf Club

FloatingVoter wrote: »

I don't think Aiden Gillen can act at all - however we all have a place in the world. That said, the "not quite there uninterested stoner" suits him perfectly. In any other role, he's just a bored looking guy who's waiting for a bus. He is the Irish Keanu Reeves but even he had Point Break / The Matrix yawns.
But it is on record that Gillen contracted to do one season and agreed to go along for one more with no future contractual obligations. From a money / career point of view Love/Hate is just a small local project ... not GoT.

Out of interest, in what does he play the "not quite there uninterested stoner" role? I think he's very good in Game of Thrones, as he was in the Wire. I did think his portrayal of John Boy was fairly poor by the other two's standards though, he probably just saw it as a bit of a nixer.

Atlantic Dawn

Room To Improve - Love/Hate Style...

http://www.todayfm.com/player/podcasts/The_Ian_Dempsey_Breakfast_Show/The_Ian_Dempsey_Breakfast_Show/6611/0/gift_room_to_improve

FloatingVoter

Wolf Club wrote: »

Out of interest, in what does he play the "not quite there uninterested stoner" role?

Love / Hate - JohnBoy.

biggebruv

Aiden Gillen was really bad in dark knight rises anyone else think this??

all his lines where delivered so cheesy
"was getting caught part of your plan"
"if you take that off will you die"

i don't think the lines are cheesy but how he delivered them was just cringy and awfull

deise08

The mirror were quoting yesterday peoples reactions to love/ hate yesterday. was expecting to see a few familiar names from here on it builderplumber ashj Sunglasses floating rorymc to name but a few.
but no not one mention... didn't realise there was a whole other place other than here. Thought this was the official be all and end all place that opinions were voiced. Apparently not. any one hear of Twitter ha ha ha

Jason Todd

Jason Todd wrote: »

I never understood the massive love for Aiden Gillen either. His acting seemed 'off' at times, and his accent varied wildly over the two seasons. Thought Brian Gleeson as Hughie was great though, genuinely terrifying. Surprised we haven't seen more of him since he left the show.

What would John Boy be doing now anyway? His death has seen the rise of Nidge which has been class, so no complaints from me.

I liked Gillen myself. I think he plays the Machiavellian role really well in everything and John Boy was very Machiavellian. That said i dont think the show has suffered as a result. I felt Hughie was absolutely superb too and like yourself im shocked Brian Gleeson hasn't got more work. A very talented actor. You were on edge every time he appeared on the screen. As Tommy correctly called him 'a complete head the ball'

MJ23

Just watched King of the Travellers. Fran is good in it as Bags Moorehouse.
The young lad Wayne from Love Hate is in it for a minute too.

Bowlardo

Does anyone think this is a bit rich from the facebook love hate page???

Love/Hate Series 4


So Love/Hate Series 1,2,3 was the best thing ever on tv and now we've done Series 4 and you think it's the worse Program on tv, everyone has opinions on all of the Series so if you're not happy with Love/Hate then why watch it? All people involved in all Series put in amazing effort & time to get to where they are now.

Haters ➜ Unlike the Page
Lovers ➜ Like Love/Hate Series 5

Thanks to everyone for supporting the page

BuilderPlumber

morebarn2 wrote: »

The actress who played Mary, (Ruth Bradley) , went to America, as she had some very good offers of work there. Stuart Carolan confirmed this in his radio interview last week. He stated that he definately would have liked to keep her in the show, but she just was not going to be available, so he had no choice but to write her out of the storyline.

With and Mary and also Rosie gone, the whole Darren storyline was going too. Yes, like Darren being caught between the ruthless gangland hitman and the person his girlfriend and sister saw.

Series 1 and 2 were dominated by Darren and his love and family life. Series 3 moved away from this (Darren was more often than not seen as a reliable hitman and a loyal friend to his gangland pals). By series 4, Darren was dead and only appeared twice in it (his dead body in episode 1 and a flashback to series 2 in episode 5) as well as a mention in episode 6. Series 3 and 4 were all Nidge's really of course and even series 2 saw Nidge emerge as the dominant force anf people's choice. Fran has also emerged as a very popular character since he was introduced in season 2.

What if Mary had stayed? Then, I'd predict series 3 could have been very different. The IRA would still be included without doubt as it was such a strong storyline (even if John Boy was left live, this would still be there with the IRA taking advantage of a rivalry between JB and Nidge maybe with JB/Dano/Lizzie aligning against Nidge/Fran/Tony). Luke would definitely have survived season 2 and would wind up dead by the IRA with the rape of siobhan and murder of Git pinned to him instead (making Git the hero and Luke the rapist who then killed Git after the latter 'rescued' Siobhan). Darren could have ended up in season 4 alive.

But, It wasn't to be. The last time we saw Mary was she driving around the locality and seeing a missing person poster of Luke. Mary was conveniently written out by her not talking to Darren in season 3 and she did not even make the radar of season 4 (or 5 I'm sure).

BuilderPlumber

dinneenp wrote: »

don't know if this was posted already- link

Mr Caffrey told the Irish Independent this was the first year the team went into production knowing another season would be commissioned by RTE.

As such, he said creator Stuart Carolan didn't feel the need to "book-end the finale with a dramatic moment".

"The mindset was that we'd make something to run over 12 episodes, as opposed to six," Mr Caffrey told this newspaper.

"We're expanding the storylines over a longer period of time and we didn't want to do a 'shoot them and gun them all down' thing again this year because we've everything signed up and ready to go for season five."

He continued: "Apart from Debbie, none of our long-running characters saw their demise, but we couldn't keep doing the same thing over and over again and playing that same tune."

I think this is true. Episode 4 was the finale I thought as said before and closed the door on Dano (Dano was a great character and sad to see him go but I guess only one of him or Nidge could survive and, along with Fran, Nidge is Love/Hate). Debbie's character seemed to have run her course and was integral to the John Boy storyline and to Tommy before his 'accident'. But she had no real role left.

Wayne and the dentist saw unexpected violent ends so clearly were set up as season 4 only characters. Both were really interesting: Wayne could be the new more immature Darren and Andrew the dentist could have been explored as the professional turned bad (but Breaking Bad had that idea done already).

It was a very wise decision to keep Nidge, Fran, detective Moynihan, Tony, Lizzie, Ado, Elmo and Tommy all alive for future purposes if needed. However, there are a number of characters introduced in season 4 to watch: Noelie Hughes for one, that prowler intimidating the garda as well. Then, there's the pipebomber (albeit not strictly season 4: he had a minor role in season 2 for a pivotal purpose that has been raised in season 4 and will dominate season 5). Also, Ado's girlfriend (I think again she was in series 3 as a minor character): will she follow well in the Siobhan (poor: she only did it to save Tommy and hated doing it) and Debbie (convincing) footsteps as mule. Finally, another minor season 3 character that was a major season 4 one was Janet: what will happen to her and Nidge? Nidge seemed to tire of her the last couple of episodes in favour of his wife, Trish, who Nidge ultimately confides in when he really needs comfort.

BuilderPlumber

Bowlardo wrote: »

Does anyone think this is a bit rich from the facebook love hate page???

Love/Hate Series 4


So Love/Hate Series 1,2,3 was the best thing ever on tv and now we've done Series 4 and you think it's the worse Program on tv, everyone has opinions on all of the Series so if you're not happy with Love/Hate then why watch it? All people involved in all Series put in amazing effort & time to get to where they are now.

Haters ➜ Unlike the Page
Lovers ➜ Like Love/Hate Series 5

Thanks to everyone for supporting the page

I noticed that there is a picture of Darren on this site along with the others! I know I know that this is just a promo for all the Love/Hate favourites past and present but here are some fun and not so fun ways of bring Darren back:

1. A prequel series: the formative stages of the likes of the Nidge man, Darren Dazzler, Tommy, John Boy, Fran, Ado, Elmo and Dano.
2. An episode or part of one set in the past relating to a significant revived issue. It is a possibility to fill in issues with regard to the pipe bombing attack. Perhaps to show Darren told Tommy?
3. And the most infamous! Remember the Dallas dream where Bobby Ewing came out of the shower, wasn't really dead and the contents of the last season was a dream? The seventh episode of series 4!! Hardly likely, but here is what would happen:

Reality ends when Nidge has deal done with Tony. Nidge dreams about his mission to kill Darren. He dreams all the subsequent events from there: Darren's missed assassination by Nidge's allies, Lizzie's killing of him, Dano's and Lizzie's continued pursuit of Nidge, Nidge's disarming of Wayne, the second deal with Tony, Dano's death, Tommy's recovery, the Fran issues, the Janet affair, Debbie's death, and the cops closing in on him/Nidge in the cell. A whole lot of characters are then just part of the dream: Wayne, Glen, Andrew the dentist, the actual cops involved, etc. Then, we see Trish sitting in her house (no sign of Nidge who is in the 'cell' we believe) and hear a knock on the door. Trish opens and it is Darren who says 'I want to see Nidge'. To be continued flashes up on our screens!

Episode 1 season 5: Trish tells Darren to follow her in and they go into the sitting room to call a wrecked Nidge tired from his meeting with Tony earlier. Nidge looks at Darren surprised and looks around him to see a sitting room and not a police station cell. He says to Darren and Trish: 'I just had an awful dream'. Then, the rest of the episode transpires: does Nidge kill Darren? Or send him off to Spain with money? What does Darren want to see Nidge for? And what of the IRA? Will Nidge tell Tony that Darren fled the country? At least, no cops or paranoid Fran, no Paddy the pipebomber, the cat is still alive, so is Dano and Debbie, and Tommy is still unconcious. Well, one is still correct!

AnonoBoy

deise08 wrote: »

Does Carolan really have to spell out every single little thing??

Of course not.

But some people, despite their protestations that they 'understand' writing, clearly don't get how the f*ck somebody puts a TV show together or the concept of the audience filling in blanks themselves or even storylines continuing on into the next season.

They just want everything tied up in a neat little package and explained to them so they don't have to think about it. And when they don't understand something they just wail and cry about it and say it's bad writing instead of thinking about it and maybe figuring it out for themselves.

Honestly I think these people would be better off watching CSI Miami.

It was hilarious and then it got ridiculously pathetic and now it's gone full circle and is hilarious again.

Mr E

Thread was coming up on 10k posts, so it had to be locked. I've moved the last page of posts from this thread to the new one to maintain the flow.