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ShoogarBear
03-22-2008, 11:19 PM
First two episodes were pretty damn good.

I knew Giamatti was going to be great. The big surprise is David Morse as Washington. He hasn't had much to do yet, but they did a excellent job with the makeup and Morse has nailed it so far. The guy they got to do Jefferson is a stiff, though (which may be historically accurate).

I've seen 1776 about a bazillion times and it was kind of funny comparing that to the second episode of JA (which covered the same timeline but I presume was more accurate).
spurschick
03-22-2008, 11:24 PM
I'm going to have to catch up through On Demand. I've caught bits and pieces and it looks like it's great.
ShoogarBear
03-22-2008, 11:32 PM
I pretty much have to use On Demand for most HBO shows now, because I don't get everything the first time through.

Oh, and Tom Wilkinson is killin' it as Ben Franklin, but then Franklin always gets the best lines.

I haven't read the David McCullough book, so I don't know how many liberties they've taken with the truth. I presume Forrest Adams was never actually present at both the Boston Massacre and the Battle of Concord.
mrsmaalox
03-22-2008, 11:35 PM
I'm glad I accidently caught the first one or I'd have never known; I turn the TV on about 2x per week, and rarely find anything I'm interested in. A friend of mine told me she was so happy to see this succeed "The Wire" after we were SO disappointed in that "John From Cincinnati" after "the Sopranos".
TheTruth
03-22-2008, 11:36 PM
Yeah Shoog, everytime I'm close to canceling HBO something great comes out. More great TV. Almost forgot about The Wire being gone.
O-Factor
03-22-2008, 11:58 PM
Tom Wilkinson is a damn good actor. I've always enjoyed his work and am really enjoying watching him potray Franklin. Giamatti is at the top of his game with this performance. But I do feel Laura Linney, though a fine actress, is a bit miscast. I don't see much on screen chemistry between her and Giamatti.
peewee's lovechild
03-23-2008, 05:25 PM
I've seen the first two episodes as well.

Giamatti and Wilkinson are amazing. I agree with Morse. I was afraid that the were going to make Washington so over the top heroic, but Morse is playing him well.

As for Jefferson, that's exactly how he was. I'm speaking of course from a historical viewpoint, I wasn't there to prove he was that way. But, he was a bit low key and hesitant before he became President. And, even while President, and afterward, he kept to himself quite a bit.

I need to check out the rest of the series.

How many more episodes are there going to be?
peewee's lovechild
03-23-2008, 05:26 PM
But I do feel Laura Linney, though a fine actress, is a bit miscast. I don't see much on screen chemistry between her and Giamatti.

I saw a preview for this week's, maybe next week's, episode. That chemistry thing is going to change a bit.
CubanMustGo
03-23-2008, 06:09 PM
I've seen the first two episodes as well.

Giamatti and Wilkinson are amazing. I agree with Morse. I was afraid that the were going to make Washington so over the top heroic, but Morse is playing him well.

As for Jefferson, that's exactly how he was. I'm speaking of course from a historical viewpoint, I wasn't there to prove he was that way. But, he was a bit low key and hesitant before he became President. And, even while President, and afterward, he kept to himself quite a bit.

I need to check out the rest of the series.

How many more episodes are there going to be?

I think there are seven.

Isn't this based on David McCullogh's biography of Adams? If so, they started with damned fine material.

Adams' crucial role in the American Revolution has been overlooked for too long. Jefferson and his cronies did an amazing hatchet job on Adams - while Jefferson was Adams' VP, no less - that greatly influenced how history remembered Adams.
O-Factor
03-23-2008, 06:57 PM
yeah its a 7 part series
O-Factor
03-23-2008, 06:57 PM
I saw a preview for this week's, maybe next week's, episode. That chemistry thing is going to change a bit.

Does he bang her?
ashbeeigh
03-23-2008, 09:24 PM
This week's episode was pretty awesome. I can't wait for next week.

I accidentally caught the second one yesterday afternoon and figured I'd catch up and now I'm sucked in. I may have to read the book. He is, after all, my 2nd cousin 12 times removed. :lol
peewee's lovechild
03-23-2008, 09:37 PM
This week's episode was pretty awesome. I can't wait for next week.

I accidentally caught the second one yesterday afternoon and figured I'd catch up and now I'm sucked in. I may have to read the book. He is, after all, my 2nd cousin 12 times removed. :lol

You lie.

But, tonight's episode was pretty damn good.

Next week is going to be kick ass.
He and Jefferson will be going head to head.

I'm looking forward to how they portray that dynamic.
Evan
03-23-2008, 10:23 PM
What an awesome treat this series is. I didn't think HBO had anything coming out for awhile.

My only gripe...WTF is with the tilted camera? I feel like I am watching Batman from the 60's at times.
TheTruth
03-24-2008, 08:49 AM
Yeah, great episode. Those crazy fucking french. I was hoping the welcome dinner for Adams would turn into an orgy.
mrsmaalox
03-24-2008, 08:53 AM
Yeah, great episode. Those crazy fucking french. I was hoping the welcome dinner for Adams would turn into an orgy.

Right. With all that nightmarish make-up it would be right out of "Eyes Wide Shut".
TheTruth
03-24-2008, 08:59 AM
I'm gonna have to go and buy the book now. I'm not ashamed to say that I didn't know SHIT about John Adams before this show.

Tom Hanks sure does produce some great TV. From the Earth to the Moon, Band of Brothers and now John Adams. I can't wait for The Pacific to come out. Him and Spielberg recreating WWII is magic.
ShoogarBear
03-24-2008, 05:39 PM
"Oh, to be seventy again!"
AlamoSpursFan
03-24-2008, 05:44 PM
I missed the beginning of this, but I set the DVR to get the whole series. Only problem is it lists the episodes in the order it recorded them. Which one came first?

I guess I could go to HBO's site and find an episode guide or something.
boutons_
03-24-2008, 05:52 PM
Tom Wilkinson was great in The Patriot as the entitled, supercilious, aristocratic Lord Cornwallis, telling colonial terrorist Benjamin Martin "shoot my men, but don't shoot my officers!" :lol
AlamoSpursFan
03-24-2008, 05:52 PM
Didn't find an episode guide, but there's a Message Board (http://boards.hbo.com/category/Hbo-Films-John/1900000003?ntrack_para1=feat_main_text)...
AlamoSpursFan
03-24-2008, 05:55 PM
Scratch that...found it.

http://www.hbo.com/films/johnadams/index.html
Ginofan
03-24-2008, 08:34 PM
I didn't think I would be into this show too much, TheTruth is way more of a history buff than I. But I'm loving this series!

I also didn't know a whole lot about John Adams before watching this show...but it's great learning it now. Who else had to turn away when they were sawing that guys leg off that got jacked by the cannonball?? Jesus that was gross!
Mark in Austin
03-24-2008, 08:58 PM
I'm gonna have to go and buy the book now. I'm not ashamed to say that I didn't know SHIT about John Adams before this show.

Tom Hanks sure does produce some great TV. From the Earth to the Moon, Band of Brothers and now John Adams. I can't wait for The Pacific to come out. Him and Spielberg recreating WWII is magic.


Agreed on Hanks making great HBO. I didn't realize that The Pacific was still going to happen. I was thinking with Spielberg producing Flags of our Fathers, that they had moved on to other projects. I would love to see The Pacific made, though.
BonnerDynasty
03-24-2008, 09:00 PM
Wasn't really interested in watching this show but once I caught it I am hooked.
Spuradicator
03-24-2008, 09:51 PM
Im really enjoying this series
AlamoSpursFan
03-26-2008, 11:52 AM
Just wanted to bump this thread.

I'm all caught up and hooked as well. Who knew Ben Franklin was such a dick? :lol

Almost as good as Band Of Brothers...Tom Hanks should quit starring in movies and just make historical mini-series for HBO!
Evan
03-26-2008, 12:01 PM
When episode 3 ended with John Adams sweating out a fever in bed I almost screamed at the TV....time just flies during that show.

Only 4 more...

Paul Giamatti was born for this series and Laura Linney is doing something for me...44 and looken fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine.
CubanMustGo
03-26-2008, 12:11 PM
Just wanted to bump this thread.

I'm all caught up and hooked as well. Who knew Ben Franklin was such a dick? :lol

Almost as good as Band Of Brothers...Tom Hanks should quit starring in movies and just make historical mini-series for HBO!

There are, of course, many different takes on who was and wasn't a dick during the revolution. McCullough's treatment of Adams is among the most favorable; biographers of others, such as Jefferson and Franklin, are less so. I recently read a book covering Franklin's time in Paris, where he was sort of a ambassador without portfolio during the Revolutionary War, and there it was Adams made out to be the dick. With some justification.

The truth is likely somewhere in the middle, but there is no doubt in my mind that Adams' role in the American Revolution has been overlooked by too many for too long.
Evan
03-26-2008, 12:17 PM
There are, of course, many different takes on who was and wasn't a dick during the revolution. McCullough's treatment of Adams is among the most favorable; biographers of others, such as Jefferson and Franklin, are less so. I recently read a book covering Franklin's time in Paris, where he was sort of a ambassador without portfolio during the Revolutionary War, and there it was Adams made out to be the dick. With some justification.

The truth is likely somewhere in the middle, but there is no doubt in my mind that Adams' role in the American Revolution has been overlooked by too many for too long.

I guess I viewed the episode different because I thought it clearly showed both to be asses but Adams more so.

But by the time Franklin went to France he was a legend already and quite full of himself.
AlamoSpursFan
03-26-2008, 12:40 PM
When he walked in on Franklin and that French hag in the tub playing chess, I think I threw up in my mouth a little...

:lol
Evan
03-26-2008, 12:45 PM
When he walked in on Franklin and that French hag in the tub playing chess, I think I threw up in my mouth a little...

:lol

hahaha...that was awesome.
BonnerDynasty
03-26-2008, 07:00 PM
It's pretty freaky to think that not too long ago the French used to dress up like that.
Evan
03-26-2008, 07:05 PM
They looked so uncomfortable.
TheTruth
03-26-2008, 07:05 PM
It's pretty freaky to think that not too long ago the French used to dress up like that.
Not too long ago? I'm sure they still do.
peewee's lovechild
03-26-2008, 07:35 PM
There are, of course, many different takes on who was and wasn't a dick during the revolution. McCullough's treatment of Adams is among the most favorable; biographers of others, such as Jefferson and Franklin, are less so. I recently read a book covering Franklin's time in Paris, where he was sort of a ambassador without portfolio during the Revolutionary War, and there it was Adams made out to be the dick. With some justification.

The truth is likely somewhere in the middle, but there is no doubt in my mind that Adams' role in the American Revolution has been overlooked by too many for too long.


The series is showing John Adams to be a hot headed, pretentious dick. His wife, Laura Linney, even got on his ass in the first episode for being so pretentious. Adams was extremely intelligent, and he liked to show it.

As for Franklin, most historians would agree that he was a bit of a dick. He was a genius, and he knew it too.

I would agree on your sentiment that Adams' role has been overlooked, but only because he opposed seccesion at first.
CubanMustGo
03-26-2008, 10:25 PM
I was referring to McCullough's book, not the series which unfortunately I can't see since we don't have HBO. But yeah, Adams did like to show everyone who smart he was, and since he was smarter than most everyone he tended to piss everyone off.
ShoogarBear
04-15-2008, 06:56 PM
Last episode this Sunday. Seems like they could have alloted twice as much time as they did.

I think Giamatti is even better as old John Adams than he was young JA. Great job on the makeup.

Morse knocked George Washington out of the ballpark. And the guy playing Jefferson has done a good job.

I crack up every time they're doing a scene and suddenly there's some random flies buzzing.
remingtonbo2001
04-15-2008, 07:51 PM
The mini-series is fantastic. I've caught the first 4 and have seen parts of the 5th.

Props to Laura Linney and her portrayal of Abagail Adams.
boutons_
04-16-2008, 12:49 AM
"the French used to dress up like that."

17th and 18th E U R O P E dressed like that, including the Europeans in n. America. (there weren't Americans then)

Laura Linney is one of my favorites, not the typical Hollywood/cable news bimbo fluff, sort of attractively plain, and credibly an adult woman.

She's 44, and still working in show business!
AlamoSpursFan
04-16-2008, 07:26 AM
I think I remember seeing somewhere that HBO is going to replay the whole series in sequence...maybe before episode 7.

The book is fascinating. Reads more like a textbook than a novel, but I guess most biographies do. :lol
boutons_
04-21-2008, 10:01 AM
always "fun" and informative to snoop around:

"Adams did a great deal to earn the devastating assessment that has trailed him ever since Benjamin Franklin first quipped it in 1783: "He means well for his Country, and is always an honest Man, often a Wise One, but sometimes and in some things, absolutely out of his senses." "

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/18/AR2008041802526.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

So what's HBO's corporate objective here?

Try to expose the man as he really was, document history, or something else?

Since HBO doesn't have to sell audiences to corporate advertizers, the accuracy of the John Adams presentation is completely on HBO.
jcrod
04-21-2008, 01:55 PM
Saw every one and loved it. I too accidently stumbled onto the first show and was hooked. I too didn't know how much Adams played a crucial role. It's a shame he's not reconized more.
AlamoSpursFan
04-21-2008, 07:01 PM
Just watched the last one on DVR.

Everybody dies.

Didn't see that coming...

:lol
ShoogarBear
04-21-2008, 07:24 PM
It was all good until that cornball ending.

Adams and Jefferson both die on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration? Gimme a break. :rolleyes
shelshor
04-22-2008, 10:52 AM
It was all good until that cornball ending.

Adams and Jefferson both die on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration? Gimme a break. :rolleyes

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction: Jefferson & Adams really did both die on 4 July 1826--50 years after the signing

Part of Adams' being ignored by history is also due to his son John Quincy, who won the Presidency in a contoversial decision over the vastly more popular Andrew Jackson when the election was thrown into the House of Representatives