Six Feet Over (RIP)

There is nothing much good on TV - and even less that has any depth to it.

24 is a good rough-em up shoot 'em show. I don't watch "reality TV" -I watch 24 because it is unreality at it's best.

Six Feet Under is up there with I, Claudius and Hill Street Blues as TV about as good as it can get. Since it was HBO, they can swear and show peckers and boobies and talk about things that the corporate right wing sponsers of traditional American network television would never allow. There is a gay couple in the middle of it all, tons of drugs and booze, and abortions - all the things that bible-thumpers hate.

The Fishers and the supporting characters run a funeral home, so death is foremost a topic. What impresses me most about the series is when the characters react to something - and of course, do so in a really poor way - you know, just like real people often do. Or, they make great changes in their lives only to see this has no effect on their lives at all, or, even makes things worse. Tolstoy comes to mind as a great author who created characters and let them live on their own without his interference.

The writing was great and the acting was amazing.

Brenda is the character you hate loving to hate. Until you get to know her family and then you wonder how she managed not to be even more messed up than she is.

There are no white or black hats. Even sweet little Quaker Maggie has to deal with the fact that she fucked Nate to death.

The "guest" list of actors was none too shabby: "Ileana Douglas, Mena Suvari, Kathy Bates, James Cromwell, John Billingsley and Patricia Clarkson to name a few.

In this 24 world where flash is valued over substance, to have a series where plot was minimal and character was king was an achievement.

TF