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Thread: Oz (hbo)

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    Oz (hbo)

    Didn't see a thread for this or a general HBO one, for that matter

    Did anyone watch this when it was on? It was that first-of-its-kind prison drama series that started in 1997 on HBO, before the Sopranos paved the way for cable dramas in the 2000s

    I just started in on the third season and it's quickly becoming one of my favorite all-time series, right up there with The Shield and Breaking Bad. The storylines are some of the most dense I've seen since Deadwood, and the character development has been fascinating. Harold Perrineau (the guy who played Mercutio in the '96 Romeo + Juliet remake) is outstanding as the paraplegic narrator dude, and others like Ryan O'Reilly, Simon Adabesi, Kenny Wangler, Miguel Alvarez and the character played by the main agent guy from CSI are equally as amazing. I literally can't wait to see what happens next each week when I watch this.

    I hear all sorts of unbelievable shit starts happening in the fourth season, which is twice as long as all the other seasons? It's crazy how literally nobody is safe on this show. I almost fear getting too attached to some of them..

    Fucking top-notch shit, so far. Highly recommended!

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    Used to watch this late night on Showcase when I was a teen. There was nothing else like it. Like that episode where the one nazi puts a spoon in the other nazi's butt hole. Luke Perry shows up as a disgraced priest. JK Simmons was terrifying.

    I remember thinking that the last season felt like they were trying to kill everyone off.

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    Quote Originally Posted by mfte View Post
    JK Simmons was terrifying.
    I still maintain that Schilinger was the scariest villain I have ever seen on a TV show. He made Gus Fring look like Santa Claus.

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    Schilinger so far hasn't been too over the top crazy to me. I mean, he's nuts, no question. That part when he Spoiler: has the priest crucified to the floor of the gymnasium is undoubtedly ghastly. I'm guessing he gets much worse as the series goes on?

    The episode I watched Sunday night was another great one. The female CO McManus was screwing freaked out on him in front of the inmates, and Adabesi requested to be moved to the infirmary, for pretty chilling reasons. Only the second episode of the season and things are already getting heading into the red..

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    a fuck ton of notable TV actors are in this show. too many to site.
    zelijko ivanek (sp?) is my favorite. he plays the governor in 'oz.' and was great in other HBO shows like 'big love' and 'true blood.'

    i loved this show when i binge watched it a few years ago. i tried to re-visit it again a while back, and just felt disturbed by it. i guess it's a show that only required one viewing from me. there is only so much i can take in from dramatized (though well done) prison life.

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    i watched this show when i was a teenager, and then i binge watched it again last year.
    it's fucking great, but there is this kind of this grim predictibility about it where NOTHING GOOD CAN HAPPEN, EVER.

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    @elevenism I think that "nothing good can happen, ever" atmosphere is one of the things that draws me to the show so much, especially when this was one of the very first cable TV dramas of its kind back then. It's prison life and nobody is there for doing good. It fascinates me in the sense that it's almost like a chess match of survival, and I gauge who my favorite characters are by how resourceful and resilient they turn out to be. I thought Beecher was toast by the end of season 1 when Spoiler: Schilinger had him dressing up like a woman, but look at where that went..

    Also, I was practically dismayed to learn at the beginning od season 2 that Spoiler: Scott Ross was in fact killed during the prison riot because he was one of my favorite guys on the show: nothing special about him, he was just plain psychotic. Not cold and calculating like Adebisi, but just generally unhinged.

    The different personalities of the inmates and how life on the inside recreates their psyche is what draws you in and makes the storylines so twisty-turny..

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    Easily my favorite show of all times. Never could get my friends to watch itthough, they found it too "dark". Such amazing characters, Adebisi has to be one of the best villains in the history of television.
    I've probably re-watched the entire show 3 times now. you're in for a treat dude

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sallos View Post
    Easily my favorite show of all times. Never could get my friends to watch itthough, they found it too "dark". Such amazing characters, Adebisi has to be one of the best villains in the history of television.
    I've probably re-watched the entire show 3 times now. you're in for a treat dude
    I'm on the penultimate episode of Season 3, and Season 4 (the 16-episode season) is waiting on the shelf.

    I love this show more and more as it unfolds. Adebisi is still my favorite on the show, but Ryan O'Reilly, Keller, Kenny Wangler and Miguel Alvarez are all up there as well. Part of the joy of this whole show has been watching my love/interest for the characters develop as their storylines play out, waiting to see the depths these guys will go to just to satisfy their agendas. It's going to be hard for me when they inevitably start dying, lol

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    Thank you for creating this thread. I fucking loved this show. Watched it for probably the fourth time this last summer. Really an underrated show, in my opinion. So incredibly raw and gripping. I feel that a lot of people are put off by the graphic ways in which it displays rape and other unsightly things many people aren't comfortable talking about. But that's kind of the point. IT'S FUCKING PRISON. Some of the worst human beings imaginable. It's not gonna be a tea party. It's one reason I can't get myself to watch OITNB. I've seen clips that friends have shown me. It just seems so incredibly watered down. I always tell them: Watch Oz.

    So many great characters in this show. No matter how many Mayhem ads he does, when I look at Dean Winters, I will always see Ryan O'Reily. Such an arrogant prick. How can you not love him?
    Last edited by Bachy; 02-26-2017 at 07:43 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by theruiner View Post
    I still maintain that Schilinger was the scariest villain I have ever seen on a TV show. He made Gus Fring look like Santa Claus.
    "Sieg Heil, baby!"

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sallos View Post
    Easily my favorite show of all times. Never could get my friends to watch itthough, they found it too "dark". Such amazing characters, Adebisi has to be one of the best villains in the history of television.
    I've probably re-watched the entire show 3 times now. you're in for a treat dude
    Him detoxing in solitary after he riot with all the pillow feathers, singing "Alua!" probably one of the funniest moments for me.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bachy View Post
    So many great characters in this show. No matter how many Mayhem ads he does, when I look at Dean Winters, I will always see Ryan O'Reily. Such an arrogant prick. How can you not love him?
    It's my Sunday night show, so I'm watching it again tonight. O'Reilly is one of my absolute favorites so far, especially when he's coercing with Adebisi. The way he is manipulating his poor brother right now, and Spoiler: manipulating the boxing tournament and the prison drug trade...I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop. So many great characters on this show, with new ones joining and dropping off all the time.

    Like you, when I see Dean Winters, I can't help but see Ryan O'Reilly. I watched the first season of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles a few months back, and he played a kind-hearted paramedic who assists the main cast members, and I'm just like "this guy is like the complete polar opposite of O'Reilly on Oz" lol

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bachy View Post
    Him detoxing in solitary after he riot with all the pillow feathers, singing "Alua!" probably one of the funniest moments for me.
    ...with his hand down his pants, jerking himself off while he's singing, to the revulsion of the guard

    I was afraid at the end of the second season when they introduced the voodoo-tribe inmate guy that Adebisi was going to go soft, but he's back to his wicked ways in the third season. That part when Spoiler: he dumps the boiling vat of water on Wangler's gang and literally broils them alive was beyond reproach. He's one sick, cold-hearted mofo..

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    Quote Originally Posted by NYRexall View Post
    So many great characters on this show, with new ones joining and dropping off all the time.
    Just wait for Jericho.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bachy View Post
    Just wait for Jericho.
    Somebody offline was telling me about this. It's the sock puppet alter ego of Cyril O'Reilly's, or something? That's all they would say, except that things get way out of hand once it starts happening. I can't wait for this shit!

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    Quote Originally Posted by NYRexall View Post
    Somebody offline was telling me about this. It's the sock puppet alter ego of Cyril O'Reilly's, or something? That's all they would say, except that things get way out of hand once it starts happening. I can't wait for this shit!
    Yeah, I'm not going to spoil anything. Suffice it to say that you will enjoy that character.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bachy View Post
    Yeah, I'm not going to spoil anything. Suffice it to say that you will enjoy that character.
    I'm going to take a not-so-wild stab and guess that it somehow ties in with that stupid show they're always watching in the community room, with the big-breasted girl and the two puppets? I figured that was going to evolve into a deeper subplot at some point..

    It never dawned on me until this evening watching this show that Cyril O'Reilly is played by the same guy who played the pompous asshole sweater-wearing guy that Matt Damon tells off in Good Will Hunting. He's also Dean Winters' brother in real life, just as he plays on this show. I knew I'd seen him somewhere before the moment he showed up in season 2, but never bothered to investigate where until it suddenly clicked tonight..

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bachy View Post
    Him detoxing in solitary after he riot with all the pillow feathers, singing "Alua!" probably one of the funniest moments for me.
    And asking Shirley for a blowjob was pretty fun too.

    "you liek yo cake?"

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    Finished Season 3 tonight. Goddamn, this show is just the greatest thing. Even when the season ends on a whisper, as opposed to a bang. Adebisi is absolutely nuts and is a joy to watch in every scene he steps into, as is Ryan O'Reilly. It's going to be like a title fight to see which characters outlast others in this series.

    I know Season 4 -- twice as long as the other seasons -- is going to be nothing short of mental, especially with Lance Reddick and Luke Perry joining the cast. So crazy to see some of these characters from The Wire showing up when I've been watching them on that show for years, even though Oz predated The Wire for nearly its entire lifespan..

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    Tbh season 4 was when the show kinda started to lose it's touch for me. I hope you enjoy it and I'm not gonna give anything anyway but it definitely started getting pretty weird in a not really great way in terms of it's plotlines around this point. I thought the show got better again towards the end of the series though.

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    McManus was a fuck machine

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    Quote Originally Posted by mfte View Post
    McManus was a fuck machine
    In the literal sense, or..?

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    Quote Originally Posted by NYRexall View Post
    In the literal sense, or..?
    Yeah wasn't he always having sex with someone? Eddie Falco and the that really butch CO.

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    Midway through Season 4 and I'm ready to admit that this is the greatest fucking television show I have ever seen, in terms of quality, plotlines and ensemble casts are concerned. How this show is so slept-on, unheralded and criminally overlooked 15 years after it ended is stupefying to me.

    Spoiler: Adebisi's rise to the top of Em City has been nothing short of breathtaking, and the guest actors on this show are beyond great. They have everyone from Lord Jamar of Brand Nubian to David Johansen of the New York Dolls on this shit. All the dudes from the Wire who keep popping up are tailor made for this saga, too.

    There are still 25 episodes left in the series, from where I'm at right now. I can't even begin to imagine what kind of crazy shit lies ahead. @eversonpoe, @october_midnight, @Self.Destructive.Pattern and @neorev, I checked out Carnivale; do yourselves a favor and scope this shit..

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    Quote Originally Posted by NYRexall View Post
    Midway through Season 4 and I'm ready to admit that this is the greatest fucking television show I have ever seen, in terms of quality, plotlines and ensemble casts are concerned. How this show is so slept-on, unheralded and criminally overlooked 15 years after it ended is stupefying to me.

    Spoiler: Adebisi's rise to the top of Em City has been nothing short of breathtaking, and the guest actors on this show are beyond great. They have everyone from Lord Jamar of Brand Nubian to David Johansen of the New York Dolls on this shit. All the dudes from the Wire who keep popping up are tailor made for this saga, too.

    There are still 25 episodes left in the series, from where I'm at right now. I can't even begin to imagine what kind of crazy shit lies ahead. @eversonpoe, @october_midnight, @Self.Destructive.Pattern and @neorev, I checked out Carnivale; do yourselves a favor and scope this shit..
    i caught one episode when it was originally on and i was relatively young...it really upset me. i don't do well with prison dramas. i've heard it's a really incredible show, i just don't think i'll ever be able to watch it. kinda like game of thrones.

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    Spoiler: Simon Adebisi is dead. I'm utterly heartbroken. One of my favorite characters on the entire show, and all because he went off to film some shitty movie he didn't even have that big of a role in at the time.

    FUCK.

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    Quote Originally Posted by NYRexall View Post
    Spoiler: Simon Adebisi is dead. I'm utterly heartbroken. One of my favorite characters on the entire show, and all because he went off to film some shitty movie he didn't even have that big of a role in at the time.

    FUCK.
    That one hit me hard. Thank you for bringing this show up. I have no one to talk about it with till now.

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    I kinda wish Dino Ortolani stuck around for more than one episode. Really interesting character, and an all around badass.

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