Carnival Row (Amazon Prime Video)

EoinMcLovin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7hwd3eaAVc

Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne star in Carnival Row, a Victorian fantasy world filled with mythological immigrant creatures. Feared by humans, they are forbidden to live, love, or fly with freedom. But even in darkness, hope lives, as a human detective and a faerie rekindle a dangerous affair. The city's uneasy peace collapses when a string of murders reveals a monster no one could imagine.

Releases in August 30th

Slydice

OK.. OK!

I haven't watched the trailer yet cos I said I'd do a quick google of who's involved!

WOW!

BRB, still reading!

Slydice

Looks like Amazon have just thrown money at this... or maybe just used a good budget really well..

I don't know this universe but the combo-trailer gives me a feel for it.

I suppose, Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne should've been big enough hints but like, this has loads of names in it the cast and crew:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnival_Row
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489974/fullcredits/

Yer man Jared Harris from Chernobyl is just one of the permanent cast!

Directors
I'm not sure about the lead Director (Jon Amiel). He has past experience with Sevond Seconds, Marco Polo and Hemlock Grove which feel like a decent fit to the trailers:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000750/

They've also got the Director of Underworld: Blood Wars (Anna Foerster) so it feels like they'll be able to hit the world building well:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0283816/
Anyone know outlander, were those good episodes?

Also the Director (Andy Goddard) who did first season of The Punisher episode where he interrogates Micro and has the Kandahar battle scene:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0323758/
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5690500/

Cast
Ack! Don't look up the cast listing.. there may be a spoiler in how it's laid out.
Like obviously I mentioned Orlando Bloom, Cara Delevingne and Jared Harris... but also names who've been involved in Star Trek, Interstellar, Annihilation, Rome and Game of Thrones

Tamzin Merchant was almost Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones and was apparently in the series pilot:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamzin_Merchant

Indira Varma was Niobe in Rome. She married Lucius Vorenus:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0890055/

Writers
They've got René Echevarria who has Star Trek experience:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0248404/
He had involvement with All Good Things!
Many DS9 resistance episodes too.

and somehow Guillermo del Toro got involved with the first episode:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0868219/

pixelburp

I couldn't imagine a less charismatic duo of leads than Bloom and Delevingne, but that trailer looks properly impressive. Very epic in scope and execution, though I'm not sure I could sit through an entire season of laboured slavery / race metaphors - presumably with humans being the greatest monsters of all (gasp!)

Between this and The Witcher, you really see Netflix and Amazon ramping up the budgets and their intention towards 'blockbuster' TV - with other adaptations like Tolien & The Culture still to come from the latter. Hard to see how many 'traditional' networks can remotely compete.

Slydice

Is it them fighting it out or having a like an immune system reaction to Disney+ entering the streaming ecosystem?

pixelburp

Slydice wrote: »

Is it them fighting it out or having a like an immune system reaction to Disney+ entering the streaming ecosystem?

I would say the latter: Disney (and, maybe Apple?) are potential big rivals to eat into their respective market shares & while I'd say Netflix & Amazon were happy to be the Big Two, those new arrivals really shake things up. Disney are steaming in with the two biggest franchise in cinema with Star Wars & the MCU.

The number of IPs Amazon has scooped up in the last 12 months alone has been eye-watering (not just ONE major Fantasy franchise, but TWO with both Middle Earth and Wheel of Time), while Netflix seem to be doing their own trawl of niche or cult comic studios.

HBO have also left the mark of course, with their run of 'prestige' TV and maybe with GoT finishing the services are trying to carve out their own "viral", blockbuster TV sensation.

Could have done with paying for some better leads mind you - though Delevingne's mock Irish accent isn't entirely awful, to be fair.

EoinMcLovin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jin2bdU5dmk

EoinMcLovin

Already renewed for a second season

pixelburp

A lot of these genre shows seem to be getting preemptive renweals; wonder how these streaming services work that decision out. Social media enthusiasm maybe, or do they have test screenings themselves.

EoinMcLovin

pixelburp wrote: »

A lot of these genre shows seem to be getting preemptive renewables; wonder how these streaming services work that decision out. Social media enthusiasm maybe, or do they have test screenings themselves.

I wonder if it's so filming can start sooner meaning less gap between seasons. Would make sense for The Expanse as its not airing until December but they could had waited a month for Carnival Row to air

JP Liz V1

Reminds me of Penny Dreadful

Mr Crispy

Yeah, I was thinking Ripper Street meets Bright (me being prone to lazy analogies), but Penny Dreadful works too.

cdgalwegian

Looks great. Jared Harris is in it, so very promising. But...Cara Delevingne, 👎- maybe, hopefully, she will surprise.

EoinMcLovin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnNXTAmKbZM

Mr Crispy

I didn't like that trailer and my expectations have been dampened somewhat again... I don't know if it was the choice of music or what, but it just set a completely different tone to the earlier trailer I had seen.

Agent Coulson

Got to say I didn't like that trailer at all.

Cara Delevingne is just so off putting whenever she is on screen.

pixelburp

See, if you are going to tell a "forbidden love" story in a grim land, you absolutely, 100%, gotta hire some charismatic leads with chemistry and energy the audience will root for.

So first step, you DON'T hire Cara Delevingne & Orlando Bloom to fulfill these roles.

Dr Bob

pixelburp wrote: »

See, if you are going to tell a "forbidden love" story in a grim land, you absolutely, 100%, gotta hire some charismatic leads with chemistry and energy the audience will root for.

So first step, you DON'T hire Cara Delevingne & Orlando Bloom to fulfill these roles.

Looks like Cara Delevingne's trying to do an irish accent in this ...that is ....not good.

Slydice

Irish Accents ain't bad by standard of American tv shows trying to do Irish Accents.

Homelander

Cara Delevingne isn't as bad as she's made out to be but she doesn't really do great with lead roles. For example even though her acting was reasonable in that Luc Benson sci-fi abomination recently, she just didn't have the charisma to really pull it off. This looks OK, reminds me of Penny Dreadful.

Agent Coulson

This dropped today andy chance it?

GottaGetGatt

Five episodes in. It's good, Something different.

Slydice

1:

Some Dark God!

:eek:

What's with the Magical Headshots with every weapon?

Old muskets and like even a hammer

.. really?

Slydice

2: Real hard no to think it's not going to be some reference to

Cthulhu down in the sewers

Anyway.. A bullet that missed! :eek:

Slydice

3: Oh

Well, that's a bit of backstory. Explains the headshots (someone mentioned

sharpshooters

I think)

I get the feeling the Pact will be coming for the Burgue at some point.

An airships battle might be cool.

I wonder did they ever consider using parts of this episode for the first episode.

cdgalwegian

Watched an episode and a half this morning, but found it too slow, and a bit clunky- acting wasn't great either. Though the scenery is generally very dark, it's shot nicely enough. The world-building in it is good though.

Slydice

4: Fyckin ell. A lot happened in that episode the more I think about it. A lot of messed up stuff.

I know René Echevarria produced Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and The 4400 and it feels like there's an influence of combining many stories together like they did here. It's only episode 4!

Anyway.. the episode..

I can't see the

Vignette and Philo split lasting

but who knows.. Those

Ravens have dropped a lot of bodies but I guess they feel safe once they only do Fae

.

Also:

not Cthulhu! just a Gholem!

Alright then.

Slydice

5: I.. I didn't see it coming. Well done show!

Like.. now that they shown us she's his mother, it makes sense but I didn't even think they were going in that direction with the story. All kinda makes sense now.

A bit during this episode reminded me a little of how complex the boardwalk empire story was. This ending felt different though.

Slydice

6: Right, someone else is gonna

have to die for him to get released. He's probably out of the police either way though.

Actually now that I think of it,

that's him and Vignette both in Jail. Who's this gonna come down to?

It's hardly gonna be something with the Breakspear and Longerbane kids, is it?
Maybe an attack by the Pact?

Slydice

7: Hrrrrmmmm... hrmm hrmm hrmm
He's

hardly the Dad is he?

Another thing that came to mind is that we saw that the

witch knows she'll be killed. She also mentioned that the Darkasher could share eyes with it's owner. His Darkasher is in a Jar in her shop. Maybe when she is killed, he'll see who did it. This came to mind as I watched him with the hood over his head in the carriage.

For the overall plot.. I dunno.. Maybe it's

just the Darkasher this season.

Just two episodes in, okay so far. A lot of the scenery and some of the music is very reminiscent of the Dishonored games.

Slydice

8: Well, that was a surprise! Though, ever since the

premonition about killing the Haruspex played by Alice Krige (Star Trek - Borg Queen), I started thinking they might well try cutting down the higher costing cast for a second season. Sure enough, it wasn't just her but also Piety (Indira Varma - Rome) and Absalom (Jared Harris - Chernobyl)

.

Towards the end there,

the city started looking a little Pact-like... so again thinking it could be an infiltration

.

Overall:
I thought the show had a lot of high quality detail put in to get the audience into the world.
They must have paid a fortune for the cast.
They sure managed to cram in a lot of sex for 8 episodes!
What an intricate and complex set of plot arcs
If I could mesh up a few shows, it felt a bit Ripper Street, Bright, Lord of the Rings and Boardwalk Empire.

I wouldn't mind seeing more

about the state of the world / history of the war with the Pact.. but I guess the show is named after a street/area in the city so maybe they won't be pushing that direction too much

.

As for it's future. It had season 2 greenlit from before release so I'm expecting that will surely arrive. There's a lot of stuff I'm not sure would hold an audience. Like Game of Thrones worked it's way slowly to include so much magic but this jumps right in at the deep end.
I'm not sure if it'll hook enough people for the budget that it looks to be spending. Also I'm not sure if season 2 will

be replacing the cast who died. It really does feel like Amazon spent a lot of money on the show.

Slydice

Actually, just checked IMDB and RT. It's early days but it's gotten into the 80s!
Unsure if it's just early days with an audience into the type of universe though.

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/tv/carnival_row/s01

88%
Audience Score
User Ratings: 213

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489974/

8.1/10
3,134

Walter Bishop

Overall decent, nice world building, interesting parallels to the real world on some things, it did fizzle a bit in episode 8 but generally good.

And kudos to Cara Delevingne for the most convincing Irish accent I think I've ever heard on screen (from a non-Irish actor).

sweetie

Really enjoyed this overall. Shame some of my favourite characters didn't make it.

Sleepy

Two episodes in and enjoying it so far.

JP Liz V1

Carnival Row to end with season 2 at Amazon

EoinMcLovin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119846185#Comment_119846185

I wonder if part of the reason is due to the large gap between filming and release. Season 2 filming was completed in September 2021 and is not releasing until February next year. First season aired in August 2019. some of the actors could have moved on to other projects

CastorTroy

I'd say all the delays affected things and as you said, people move on to other projects. I'm sure they don't want to be tied to projects with long production times.

Hope they knew it was going to end when they made it so we have an ending.

Will have to rewatch season 1 before it airs.

Slydice

Nah I'd go with my gut from my earlier post and say that just not enough people watched it for how much it cost.

EoinMcLovin

https://youtu.be/P4LepVMlIZI

----

Slydice

Yeah. Think I'll need to watch a recap of season one.

Almost 4 Years since I've seen an episode!

EoinMcLovin

https://youtu.be/_4Z1INuxxfg

____

Slydice

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120246846#Comment_120246846

At about 19 minutes, that's a long recap.. but by the end I felt I needed it. An awful lot happened in season one!

Slydice

2.1: There was a recap at the start! 🙂 Worked well with the longer recap above.

Spoiler Warning

Solid intro .. again.. caught up on all the characters. There's a big story in the background I think, a medium? level story for the season and lots of character stories. Feels like a consistent build on the last season.

Not sure on where the character stories are going. Maybe Vignette to become leader of the Black Ravens.

The middle story I think is for the season, for a mystery monster like season one, the monster that killed the guard and I guess for Philo to catch.

The big story.. now this I think caught my attention. The pact coming to the burgue, the pact airship coming over the boat at the end, the pact being in all the recaps. Could be the season will wrap with a Pact invasion about to start. So.. not the worst closing cliffhanger of a series that's not been renewed .. if they can at least wrap the monster story.

Budget wise.. Cast working fine. Locations all look solid. Most practical effects and make-up check! Some computer effects solid. So I think there were some cuts but the folks looking after the show look to have put in a good bit of effort to preserve what they could from season one.

Spoiler Warning

Big win I thought was Vignette hugging Philo and the wings wrapped around him.

First thing that threw me was the centaur being picked up in the street. His head section looked.. kinda taxidermy-teddy-bear-ish.

The boat at the end, when they panned out and had the full boat, that was a bit cheap computer generated lookin. Might have been better to leave it to peoples imaginations as the rest of that scene seemed grand.

From season one, I'd miss

Spoiler Warning

Jared Harris all the same. His pressence makes a boost to all recent shows I remember him being in.

Slydice

2.2: Only two episodes in but wow! what a well woven story! There's so much going on but it's not hard to follow. I wonder if they are having to pull lots of future planned stories into a shorter time since they only have this season for it.

Spoiler Warning

lol, the pact have a revolution going on! I totally misread what was going on at the end of the first episode

Sophie Longerbane has that bigger plan of pitting the new dawn against the pact endlessly but also, how she seems to be controlling the businessmen to her own ends of getting rich.. that was well done!

then this monster of the season! playing off both sides in the burgue! that's someone smart doing that. hardly the advisor to Jonah Breakspear maybe? using the Philo thing as a cover.. maybe being a .. bigger? .. mastermind all along

Alice Krige! This role! She's doing great in it I think. Reminded me of her as the Borg Queen in Star Trek a little

Varik

Philo's plan

Spoiler Warning

Did anyone else think it was a stupid plan, reveal you're the last chancellors son and then the current one who's your supposed half brother loses his position on the chance the next chancellor is nicer which they inevitably won't be. Anyone running would come out even stronger against them.

That Pact guy seems to have noticed philo.

Pact seem to be part Prussian part Russian.

Slydice

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120265110#Comment_120265110

I think it's got to be that

Spoiler Warning

he's being played somehow. Someone is pulling strings from somewhere

Slydice

2.3: Still can't figure out the bigger plan. Coming soon though looks like..

Spoiler Warning

Black Raven maybe going to kill that copper? Then the coppers all come in like in Tourmalines vision and lot of folk in the row going to die.

Big EWEEEE gross moment when

Spoiler Warning

Ezra killed Feargus and then puked but then.. dangly puke hanging out of his mouth .. and like... did he half kinda play around with it with his finger and then leave it there?!! eewwwwee yuck!

Wasn't half as grossed out with the guts being pulled out of the body.. wierd

Slydice

2.4: I like how Tourmalines story is going. I'm not sure that I've got the order of events solid in my head...

Spoiler Warning

because I'm working off that vision Tourmaline had where Fae were all being slaughtered with knives. When the coppers came in at the end of this, I was thinking maybe that's the slaughter stopped by Philo and instead just a lot of broken bones. Though I'm not sure about Black Raven deaths.

Anyway, Tourmaline looks to be at a crossroads. She might well choose to embrace the dark magic and become a witch.

The feet / hooves bit earlier on was funny 🙂

Slydice

2.5: Good episode! That was a great scene between the Chancellor and Sophie Longerbane at the dinner table!

Spoiler Warning

WTF! He killed Sophie Longerbane! 😲 He was gonna off Runyons head too!

It didn't click with me about Runyon working with Sophie Longerbane until this episode when the Chancellor made him. Then it all made sense. Especailly that 'trust me' moment he had with Philo earlier on at Carnival Row.

Then got eaten alive too! 😱 That thing has so many teeth!

That's got to be a Fae controlling it! Looks like it freed Vignette. Hardly that Tourmaline finally figured out how or maybe was doing it unconsciously all along?

Anyway.. roll on the next episode!