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Masters of Sex - Michael Sheen & Lizzy Caplan - Sundays on Showtime

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C

Cornballer

Member
- Sepinwall's Review: Michael Sheen & Lizzy Caplan shine in Showtime's 'Masters of Sex'
"Masters of Sex" is the best new show of the fall by a very long stretch. It's also a refreshing anomaly: a prestige cable drama that doesn't feel like a recombination of elements from 15 shows that came before it. It's not another Bastard Son of Tony Soprano like "Ray Donovan" and "Low Winter Sun," and even though it begins in the late 1950s, the only resemblance to "Mad Men" involves the clothes and the quality.
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C

Cornballer

Member
- USA Today: 'Masters of Sex' is an unexpected pleasure
Like all great TV, Masters is most interested in what drives its characters - in who they are and might yet be - and it draws that picture in ways that make you laugh one moment and cringe in empathy the next. A few plotlines look rocky, and a few lines of dialogue stumble, but based on the first six episodes, we're being introduced to a show that can enlighten, entertain and contend for Emmys, all in the same breath.
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- NYT Review: Late Nights? Please, Dear, It's Science
Like sex, “Masters of Sex” gets better as it goes on. But without an extra dimension, or a broader glimpse of a world beyond St. Louis, the series eventually grows a little claustrophobic and thin. Yet the series is not without a sense of humor, especially about the ignorance of men who think they know everything about women and never thought to ask.
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- NPR: 'Masters Of Sex' Get Unmasterful Treatment On Showtime
But Masters of Sex is missing Mad Men's ruthless clarity and sense of detail. Michelle Ashford, appears worried lest her show seem too serious, too grown-up, too unlikable. Clumsily juggling tones, she interlaces genuinely powerful scenes with silliness and cliches.
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C

Cornballer

Member
- TV Guide: Weekend Playlist
Describing Showtime's period drama Masters of Sex (Sunday, 10/9c) as the fall's most stimulating and satisfying new series sounds like a double entendre, but that's what you get when the kinky and the clinical so provocatively collide. There is no more fascinating, or entertaining, new series this fall season.
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- LA Times: McNamara's Weekend Picks
Sheen is a chameleon, though the repressed scientist doesn't sit quite comfortably on him -- we keep waiting for the grin we know is lurking in their somewhere. Caplan, on the other hand, is a marvel, creating a dishy, dignified and a thoroughly modern woman who winds up helping millions to become something similar.
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- Slate: The Joy of Watching Sex
Masters of Sex is the best new show of the fall season
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B

BertramCooper

Banned
I definitely plan to check this out, but it's hard to get too excited for a Showtime show because their management is so stupid and meddlesome.
 
R

royalan

Member
I was wary of this show from all the previews they've shown.

It just seems like a show with such a "WOW!" premise that I had a hard time imagining how they'd hold my interest once the initial "Wow! Studying sex in the 50s!" excitement wore off.

But all of these glowing reviews make me think I need not worry. Definitely looking forward to this.
 
C

Cornballer

Member
More reviews:
- SF Chronicle:
The performances, nurtured by such A-list directors as Michael Apted and John Madden, are extraordinary. There isn't a clinker in the bunch.
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- Newsday:
Humor is also key in the capacious pilot hour directed by John Madden ("Shakespeare in Love"). Subsequent episodes echo its deft balance of epic scope and whimsical humanity.
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- Boston Globe:
It’s an inviting, beautifully acted, and smartly written period drama set in the 1950s
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- Rolling Stone Interview: Michael Sheen
 
C

Cornballer

Member
- Maureen Ryan: Worth Watching, Even When Everyone Has Clothes On
"Masters'" deep, sincere desire to illuminate the mental and physical barriers that keep people from being happy -- and from being themselves -- is laudable. The series gains strength and dramatic momentum as it progresses, finding individual and idiosyncratic ways to tell stories of self-denial, awakening and discovery. Through it all, Sheen and Caplan do a fantastic job of conveying the burning curiosity and sense of discovery that drove Masters and Johnson.
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bengraven

bengraven

Member
Clevinger said:
Huh. I didn't even know about that. :p
SPOILERS
In the pilot Masters' wife's infertility is a big part of the story, and she becomes friends with Virginia. I'm talking about the fact that he eventually divorces his wife and marries Virginia.
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I was actually shocked to find out they ended up married for 20 years. An adult show with a happy ending?! shocking.
 
U

UrbanRats

Member
So the first two episodes were pretty good.
A few scenes felt a little too predictable, given the usual cliches, but over all, i liked it and i can't wait to see more.
Sometimes it feels almost anachronistic though, especially in terms of score (although it's very good in its own right) and
that Space Adventurer comic didn't look much like a comic you'd expect to see in the 50s.
Very good performances, nice writing and decent cinematography so far.

I can see it turn into an insufferable soap-opera in coming seasons, hopefully they have good show runners.
 
Schrade

Schrade

Member
This is actually a really good show so far. I love how strong Lizzy's character is.

Lots of funny moments and "fuck yeah, Science!" moments too!
 
P

pizza dog

Banned
I really enjoyed it; dunno how long they can keep it going, what with being a true story and all, but seems like it has legs. Will keep an eye on it.

I don't know who they think they're kidding passing that set off as Washington University
probably everyone, but that's my alma mater and nope
.
 
C

Cornballer

Member
- Andy Greenwald for Grantland: Let's Talk About Masters of Sex, Baby
Sex is far more prevalent in American life than violence, though you wouldn't know it from our entertainment. Audiences cheer when heads explode in geysers of vermilion, but filmmakers themselves blush and titter when it's time to depict the ordinary things that happen between the sheets. Masters of Sex isn't a great show yet — though the potential is certainly there for it to grow into one — but it feels like an important one. It's a series about adults — consenting adults — that doesn't need to censor its ambition with faux-somberness or genre puffery. And if you, like me, care about the future of TV and the types of stories it's willing to tell, that alone should be a giant turn-on.
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K

Karl2177

Member
Watched the first episode on Showtime's YouTube channel, and I don't get Showtime at my apartment. Wish there was a way I could watch future episodes, because it was surprisingly good.
 
C

Cornballer

Member
- IGN: Masters of Sex: "Pilot" Review
Each character is afforded a rich psychology, and the cast is more than up to the task of bringing these fascinating, nuanced creatures to life. Masters of Sex reflects just as much about the time it takes place in as it does our world, today. I do recommend you stick with the first several episode as they only get better.
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- The Atlantic: Masters of Sex Is Just the Right Amount of Sexy
A smart new Showtime series about sex researchers William H. Masters and Virginia Johnson examines inherently eye-popping subject matter without exploiting it.
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D

dead souls

Member
Good to see the continued praise for this. It's the thing I'm the second most excited to watch this Sunday after a certain series finale of course.
 
X

xenist

Member
I hope Lizzy Caplan doesn't get naked a lot in this. It seems like a great show and I'd want to watch it but I think I'd have an aneurysm if I saw her naked a lot. I couldn't handle it.
 
O

oatmeal

Banned
xenist said:
I hope Lizzy Caplan doesn't get naked a lot in this. It seems like a great show and I'd want to watch it but I think I'd have an aneurysm if I saw her naked a lot. I couldn't handle it.
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image.php


Don't ruin this for the rest of us.
 
D

dead souls

Member
RatskyWatsky said:
The pilot is up on youtube, so why not watch it now?
I'm gonna watch it tomorrow.
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Eh, I just prefer to wait and watch things on TV. I'm going to watch Homeland, this, and Breaking Bad on Sunday. I'll save the two hours of HBO stuff for another day.

xenist said:
I hope Lizzy Caplan doesn't get naked a lot in this. It seems like a great show and I'd want to watch it but I think I'd have an aneurysm if I saw her naked a lot. I couldn't handle it.
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Wait, what?

I hope I never get to the point where I'm complaining about super hot people of the gender I'm primarily attracted to getting naked.
 
U

UrbanRats

Member
dead souls said:
Wait, what?

I hope I never get to the point where I'm complaining about super hot people of the gender I'm primarily attracted to getting naked.
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Depends if it's detrimental to the story.

So far it wasn't, in this show.
There's some nudity and sex, but given the subject, it was used with a purpose, as opposed to something like Game of Thrones.
 
Vigilant Walrus

Vigilant Walrus

Member
MASTERS OF SEX stars Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan as real-life pioneers of the science of human sexuality, William Masters and Virginia Johnson. Their research touched off the sexual revolution and took them from a midwestern teaching hospital to the cover of Time magazine and multiple appearances on Johnny Carson's couch. He is a brilliant scientist out of touch with his own feelings, and she is a single working mother ahead of her time. The series chronicles their unusual lives, romance, and unlikely pop culture trajectory.
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What does "trajectory" mean?



Sorry, i'm mind numblingly dumb.



The show sounds really cool though!!
 
D

demon

I don't mean to alarm you but you have dogs on your face
Vigilant Walrus said:
What does "trajectory" mean?



Sorry, i'm mind numblingly dumb.



The show sounds really cool though!!
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Direction.


I skimmed through it on youtube late last night for Caplan's ta-tas and was not disappointed.
I'm such a child.
 
E

efyu_lemonardo

May I have a cookie?
From Wikipedia:

As well as recording some of the first physiological data from the human body and sex organs during sexual excitation, they also framed their findings and conclusions in language that espoused sex as a healthy and natural activity that could be enjoyed as a source of pleasure and intimacy.
The era in which their research was conducted permitted the use of methods that have not been attempted before or since: "[M]en and women were designated as 'assigned partners' and arbitrarily paired with each other to create 'assigned couples'."[8]
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And they wonder why science is less appealing to kids today than it was in the 1960s?
 
R

RatskyWatsky

Hunky Nostradamus
dead souls said:
Eh, I just prefer to wait and watch things on TV. I'm going to watch Homeland, this, and Breaking Bad on Sunday. I'll save the two hours of HBO stuff for another day.
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Fair enough. I'm going to watch Low Winter Sun right before Breaking Bad just for dat contrast. The rest of the night will be spent reading/skimming thorough the thread, reading reactions and reviews and the like.
 
C

Cornballer

Member
Series premiere tonight:
Pilot

Dr. William Masters runs a successful medical practice and conducts a secret study of human sexuality; a former nightclub singer proves to be an asset to Masters' work.
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Note that the premiere is already available on youtube, Showtimes's website, and on demand. Check the OP for more details.
 
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