It probably won't get too much love when people write their 'Top-10 Shows' list - though it certainly will from me. But a truly great show, a haunting show, one of the great horror shows I've ever seen, ended this past Sunday - a show that in a weird way showcased the real world version of the more ballyhooed fictional show that came back the same night (Succession). The Loudest Voice showcased Roger Ailes's rise, dominance and quick fall, and it did it so damn well.
You can hate characters, you can fear characters, and you can enjoy the underlying performance. I don't know if there will ever be an example protraying a real-life character than Russell Crowe's magnificently evil protrayal as Roger Ailes.
All of it was so damn haunting, especially since even Ailes's infamous ouster from FOX News, the channel still grew to be a hate-filled, fake-news spouting monstrosity. The scene where Ailes was diumped on his ass was still so cathartic, so earned to see this terrible, misogynistic, racist, predatory monster be fired, that you beleived that maybe, just mabye, FOX would go to new heights under leadership that didn't kowtow or turn a blind eye. Again, that definitely has not happened, but at least Ailes left fired, devasted and dead.
A weird example to draw that I did mentally was between this show and FX's great The People vs. OJ Simpson (my #1 show in 2016). That too was a real world story, re-enacted with real actors playing real people, also detailing a national horror - that of OJ Simpson's murder. But while in that show the monster was arguably the weakest character (Cuba Gooding as OJ Simpson), hthis time the monster was the star. Russell Crowe was so good.
But then again, so was the character than played Ailes's witch wife, or the people that played the Murdoch's, or Ailes's assistant, or Gretchen Carlson, or even Seth McFarlane playing one of Ailes's early FOX lackeys. It was all so good, so well cast, but while the running sense of People vs. OJ Simpson was how much fun everyone was having, this was more about how serious everyone played it.
Just like People vs. OJ Simpson, this was based off of source material - namely Gabriel Sherman's 'The Loudest Voice in teh Room' book released to partly expose his sexual assault history. Of course, they probably overdramaticized a bit, but it was so harrowing watching a man with so much misplaced, idiotic rage just ruin the world with his direct-focused line to make america great again before that was a thing.
The best episodes honestly were the middle ones - before it transitioned fully to parallel stories of Sexual Assault allegations with Trumps Rise. Those middle episodes focused on Ailes turning FOX News squarely into a channel of biased hate as Barack Obama launched his campaign, won and then won again. Again, once must say none of the dialogue was verbatim, but you can imagine a burned Ailes saying the exact same stuff.
This show was endlessly entertaining, endlessly suspenseful, and endlessly scary and sad. Watching this man basically tear America apart, et us to the point we are now, just because at the end of the day people will watch his network, and give him the ratings to fight for power - power that would allow him to grope, bang and assault all his female employees? Yeah, that is a horror story - just one with amazing active from Oscar winners and others.
You can hate characters, you can fear characters, and you can enjoy the underlying performance. I don't know if there will ever be an example protraying a real-life character than Russell Crowe's magnificently evil protrayal as Roger Ailes.
All of it was so damn haunting, especially since even Ailes's infamous ouster from FOX News, the channel still grew to be a hate-filled, fake-news spouting monstrosity. The scene where Ailes was diumped on his ass was still so cathartic, so earned to see this terrible, misogynistic, racist, predatory monster be fired, that you beleived that maybe, just mabye, FOX would go to new heights under leadership that didn't kowtow or turn a blind eye. Again, that definitely has not happened, but at least Ailes left fired, devasted and dead.
A weird example to draw that I did mentally was between this show and FX's great The People vs. OJ Simpson (my #1 show in 2016). That too was a real world story, re-enacted with real actors playing real people, also detailing a national horror - that of OJ Simpson's murder. But while in that show the monster was arguably the weakest character (Cuba Gooding as OJ Simpson), hthis time the monster was the star. Russell Crowe was so good.
But then again, so was the character than played Ailes's witch wife, or the people that played the Murdoch's, or Ailes's assistant, or Gretchen Carlson, or even Seth McFarlane playing one of Ailes's early FOX lackeys. It was all so good, so well cast, but while the running sense of People vs. OJ Simpson was how much fun everyone was having, this was more about how serious everyone played it.
Just like People vs. OJ Simpson, this was based off of source material - namely Gabriel Sherman's 'The Loudest Voice in teh Room' book released to partly expose his sexual assault history. Of course, they probably overdramaticized a bit, but it was so harrowing watching a man with so much misplaced, idiotic rage just ruin the world with his direct-focused line to make america great again before that was a thing.
The best episodes honestly were the middle ones - before it transitioned fully to parallel stories of Sexual Assault allegations with Trumps Rise. Those middle episodes focused on Ailes turning FOX News squarely into a channel of biased hate as Barack Obama launched his campaign, won and then won again. Again, once must say none of the dialogue was verbatim, but you can imagine a burned Ailes saying the exact same stuff.
This show was endlessly entertaining, endlessly suspenseful, and endlessly scary and sad. Watching this man basically tear America apart, et us to the point we are now, just because at the end of the day people will watch his network, and give him the ratings to fight for power - power that would allow him to grope, bang and assault all his female employees? Yeah, that is a horror story - just one with amazing active from Oscar winners and others.
