This seems like it might be a new show to watch. A small Arctic town, brimming with strange characters and unclear motives. There’s murder done and infidelity and a frozen carcass of some sort of possibly prehistoric animal being dug up and a pig in an oxygen chamber and…yeah, I dunno what’s going on. I’m hooked, though.
If you need more: cast members include Stanley Tucci, Christopher Eccleston, Michael Gambon (Dumbledore, for a time), Sienna Guillory (I know her as Luther’s love interest from season 3 of Luther), and Sofie Grabol (the lead from Forbrydelsen, aka the original show that was remade by AMC as The Killing).
I do recall seeing an ad for this and thinking it looked interesting… and then dismissing it when I saw what channel it was on. I should keep a more open mind!
Jeebus, this show is absolutely mesmerizing, both visually and narratively. Make sure you make it to end of the second episode – when a certain character arrives – before making up your mind whether to stick with it.
It’s pretty densely packed, too. There are character relationships and motivations that are presented in the opening two-parter that I didn’t actually grasp until episode 3, and plenty that’s been hinted at that I still don’t.
For some odd reason, DirecTV shows Pivot in SD, but the video on demand is in HD, so I’ve got to download each episode from VOD to watch it. If you say “so what” then it’s obvious you don’t have the same kind of crappy internet access I have! Not to mention that the VOD episodes expire around 10 days after they’re downloaded, so I can’t store the entire thing up and binge watch it.
I don’t know if anyone else is still watching this, but man, it keeps getting stranger and more fucked up. And six episodes in, I -still- can’t swear one way or the other about whether there’s something supernatural going on. There seems to be some sort of illness going around that could be that decaying mammoth…or a poisoner…or aliens or demons or something, I don’t know. The way the murder went down has had more light shed on it but I think we’re still well short of the full picture and the little boy’s behavior is really fucking weird even if what happened after the camera departs the scene isn’t what we’re being led to believe (and I suspect it isn’t). Gambon wants some sort of shamanic talisman created but there’s nothing to say such a talisman will actually do anything…
In a way, it’s odd how much has been revealed. We’re half-way through the season and I feel like I have a pretty good sense for who did what to whom and even why. But you’re right about what seems like an intentional gap in terms of the mutilation of Christopher Eccleston, so we’ll see what happens there. And I’m not sure what to think of the Teutonic looking school teacher and his pudgy wife. At first, I thought they were supposed to be a sort of rube Greek chorus, but it looks like there’s something sinister there.
It’s still absolutely mesmerizing, and Stanley Tucci’s performance is such a joy to watch.
Is it that good then? As a Brit I’m naturally skeptical of any original Sky content (historically they’ve been absolutely shit at making their own TV as opposed to buying rights). I’ve got Now TV, so it would be “free” for me to check it out, but I’m also way behind on a bunch of other shows.
I’ve watched the first five episodes and was also wondering if anyone was still watching… Not just here, but anywhere! I went to Wikipedia at one point to see a summary of episode three after I’d watched it and found out the page had nothing for a summary. I’ve never seen a TV show that’s on the air not have current Wikipedia entries.
I find myself hooked on it still. I love Stanley Tucci’s character, and all the various personalities and machinations are great.
Yeeeah, I think that answered the “genre” question pretty handily. Also I think we know what happened to Eccleston now and why they didn’t show it. Yikes.
I’ve been trying pretty hard to dance around spoilers because clearly this thread is better off as an ambassador for the show than a spoilery discussion thread for like, three people.
