[TV] HBO's The Night Of

[Independent voter]

So you're invited to this big party in the city and you're the kind of straight A student who never gets invited to parties. The guy you were hoping to drive you there can't make it so you decide to "borrow" your dad's cab. You meet this beautiful girl who hailed you cause you were driving a cab which is just as good as you were lost and don't have any hope of finding that party.

Things are looking up as the girl seems really into you.

Then things go horribly wrong.

It's a little slow but it's a very realistic crime drama, the accused is Muslim. It's almost documentary like as he navigates his way though the legal system.

I'm really enjoying it so far.

[Nellise]

The first episode was slow, but interesting. Then it sort of turned into a bad version of Oz+Law&Order with an overdose of eczema, and everybody is stupid.

Only still watching because I know it only has 1 episode left and I want to see how poorly they wrap it up.

[ravenmoon]

if you're American and this feels a bit strange for a US society, that's because it's actually a critically acclaimed British show that has been adapated to America. Don't see why americans have to always adapt British shows, why dont' they just show them, they're in English afterall and quite often very good hence why they take them over.. but the networks there just have to @americanize it all huh

[Independent voter]

The first episode was slow, but interesting. Then it sort of turned into a bad version of Oz+Law&Order with an overdose of eczema, and everybody is stupid.

Only still watching because I know it only has 1 episode left and I want to see how poorly they wrap it up.

Yeah, the prison scenes were sort of weak, the acting was good but I had a hard time believing the situation. Too cliché I guess.

I like all the main characters, the lawyer with eczema, the grandmother prosecutor, the detective who retires, all of them are older, passed middle age and very believable. Even the parents were well done.

The cat will prove his innocence, I think, it's something about how allergic they are to cats.

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if you're American and this feels a bit strange for a US society, that's because it's actually a critically acclaimed British show that has been adapated to America. Don't see why americans have to always adapt British shows, why dont' they just show them, they're in English afterall and quite often very good hence why they take them over.. but the networks there just have to @americanize it all huh

Were the accents pretty heavy? I had to get subtitles to watch The Office BBC version. What was funny is that English subtitles were easy to find.

[Nellise]

Yeah, the prison scenes were sort of weak, the acting was good but I had a hard time believing the situation. Too cliché I guess.

I like all the main characters, the lawyer with eczema, the grandmother prosecutor, the detective who retires, all of them are older, passed middle age and very believable. Even the parents were well done.

Well the whole thing lost me this week where Naz and his lawyer kiss, and I'd already been losing interest before that. Then Naz essentially helps commit a murder anyway so who cares if he gets off on the trial, he's still a murderer.

[ravenmoon]

Were the accents pretty heavy? I had to get subtitles to watch The Office BBC version. What was funny is that English subtitles were easy to find.

yeah we always broadcast subtitles for the hearing impaired, always. We're quite sensitive to people with disabilities etc, or we try to be anyway, that's hwy the parap olympics was such a smashing success over here.

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Well the whole thing lost me this week where Naz and his lawyer kiss, and I'd already been losing interest before that. Then Naz essentially helps commit a murder anyway so who cares if he gets off on the trial, he's still a murderer.

they kiss? . i haven't followed the series after episode 2, will eventually, i take it he is no longer with the white male lawyer. one of the interesting things is that the american version used an islamic man, a pakistini american, while the brit version was your typical middle class white english lad, caught up in the horror

[Independent voter]

Well the whole thing lost me this week where Naz and his lawyer kiss, and I'd already been losing interest before that. Then Naz essentially helps commit a murder anyway so who cares if he gets off on the trial, he's still a murderer.

Yeah, I didn't buy that kiss either. The lawyer doesn't seem like a girl who would run around falling in love with possibly violent criminals who may never get out of jail.

In that situation in the prison, where people were violently attacking him and he had to go to work for the prison "warlord", I can kind of see him doing those things to survive. Then again, black gang members aren't going to befriend an outsider like Naz no matter what.

But still, what it does well, it does well, like how Naz isn't the good boy everyone thought he was.

[melodramocracy]

I like this show quite a bit. What I don't like is the pacing, considering the number of episodes. They have one episode left to wrap up an awful lot, and it feels like a show that should have at least 4 more to go.

If they're hinting at a serial killer with the second dead body found (or this helps prove that Duane Read did this), it's going to be very rushed to set that up in an hour. I had also thought that the cat would be a key, due to it not being able to get back into the apartment on its own somehow, but it seems like it won't go this way.

My guess is that the case is thrown out for a technicality such as evidence tampering etc, and Naz either stays in jail due to be an accessory to murder, or gets killed there before he is able to leave.

[Nellise]

If they're hinting at a serial killer with the second dead body found (or this helps prove that Duane Read did this), it's going to be very rushed to set that up in an hour.

I thought that was just a comment on the fact that a black woman got murdered and there wasn't going to be any news coverage at all, not that it was the same killer. It was a lazy attempt to make fun of Nancy Grace type shows that focus on pretty white women in trouble rather than all the other crime that should be equally important. If it does end up being a serial killer then I'll never watch anything done by this writer/creator again.

[Hexian]

Finale tonight! Loved this show, but felt like they wrapped it up with little redemption

[kail]

Man that was very strong series. Could it have been better? Absolutely but that would require more episodes as I was hoping to see the trial of the accountant and get a clear visual of how the girl was murdered. Regardless, everyone played their role splendidly and so much focus was put on little details to keep this drama as authentic as possible. From all the cinema I've seen with John Turturro, this was his strongest performance by far.

[Nellise]

So that ended about as stupidly as I had feared. They put in a bunch of stuff that looked to be important but then never mattered, so why show it at all? Like that deer head they showed 50 times and then had nothing to do with anything. And then they cheesed out the trial with the jury decision. I'm a bit annoyed I wasted my time with this show, and I have a lot of time to waste.

[Halicia]

My biggest issue is that it all seemed to boil down to a really, really, REALLY hamfisted commentary on the effects and nature of the justice system.

I don't think its a commentary, so much as a reality.

Reality is, everyone has a job to do, and they are promoted/fired based on the results, not on the humanity of the choices.

This is a really great show with a lot of humanity in it. In reality, most stuff isn't relevant... and this show did a good job of presenting that without detracting from the characters.

Even up to the end, I was left with that *little* doubt in my heart that Naz *may* have killed her... but I was hoping they wouldn't go that way for some cheap dramatic effect.

The cat at the end was awesome.

[Acidz]

I thought it was ok, but nothing spectacular. First few episodes were very interesting, the latter ones not quite as much. The way they tied the show up felt underwhelming, although it does leave open several storylines to pursue in an upcoming season.

[Independent voter]

I don't think its a commentary, so much as a reality.

Reality is, everyone has a job to do, and they are promoted/fired based on the results, not on the humanity of the choices.

This is a really great show with a lot of humanity in it. In reality, most stuff isn't relevant... and this show did a good job of presenting that without detracting from the characters.

Even up to the end, I was left with that *little* doubt in my heart that Naz *may* have killed her... but I was hoping they wouldn't go that way for some cheap dramatic effect.

The cat at the end was awesome.

The acting was first rate, the story had some clichés here and there. If you could ignore the clichés which I could, it was a good series.

Naz smoking heroin at the end. Yes and the cat.

[Halicia]

Naz smoking heroin at the end. Yes and the cat.

Yeah, I loved that bit with the heroin too. Like a lot of the show it left me asking myself how much of that was part of him before "the night of", whether it was a one-off form of coping/mourning, or whether it was a more permanent addiction.

I don't think you're gonna be able to get through *any* legal drama without running into some form of cliche or another, its such a popular genre that if you try to completely avoid cliches, then it doesn't 'feel right'.