Fair City [News, Spoilers and Discussion v7] Read Post #1 Before Contributing

Wanderer2010

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

I read about this Katy story getting abuse online and on Joe Duffy's show and don't get the hatred for it. Yes, this storyline has annoyed and frustrated me over the last while, and at times has also been genuinely entertaining. I know Ciaran's character is not well developed and one minute, he's acting like Blofeld and the next he is crippled by guilt. I know the story has gone on for too long and drifted from its roots.

I could think of far WORSE fare on RTE that deserves to be complained about. I'd watch FC whereas I don't watch Tubridy or D'Arcy unless they have something decent on (which is very rare these times). I abhor all these reality shows ranging from Stetsons and Stilettos to Dragon's Den. Only good thing is they toned down a lot of this political drivel like The Frontline and it was wise to get rid of this mess.

Staying in FC, I could also think of storylines that were much worse than the Katy one. Orla and the screeching baby, the Condors, Laura and the pills, and most of the stories involving that Nina one come to mind. Also, other storylines that could have been interesting were too quickly shut down. Dean and the fighting is an obvious one. At least, they made an effort to try something different with the Katy storyline. It is far from perfect, is inconsistent and is often poorly paced and thought out, but at least it is something different.

I also really enjoyed the early part of the kidnap storyline, before it got painfully repetitive to watch. A lot of the frustration towards FC is the complete lack of accountability and these nameless and faceless script writers can just shred perfectly decent storylines and rewrite them to add completely implausible and downright incorrect facts just to suit the story and nobody ever has to answer for their rubbish. Why cant we get a senior script writer who has worked on storylines the last year to come on here and provide some simple answers to some simple questions.


And it doesn't have to be as part of the despicable "roaring mob" mentality with their ignorant rants and pitchfork raising. There is no need to be rude or unfriendly to them, just point out that a lot of the recent storylines have been ruined by factual errors like Paul only finding out 4 months late that his account was empty, despite having multiple businesses that relied on direct debits and dozens of workers waiting on their wages? Dermot checking himself out with zero follow up from the hospital staff or Guards? Zoe on a 6 month long Christmas holiday? If they cant give acceptable answers they should be replaced by a more talented team, simple.

And this rubbish on Twitter etc about fans of FC being mindless idiots who are too stupid to appreciate real drama is offensive. I'm a university-educated license payer and it doesn't matter a jot to me who is in a soap or who writes it. If its written well and acted well, I enjoy watching it.

The Talking Bread

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

I read about this Katy story getting abuse online and on Joe Duffy's show and don't get the hatred for it. Yes, this storyline has annoyed and frustrated me over the last while, and at times has also been genuinely entertaining. I know Ciaran's character is not well developed and one minute, he's acting like Blofeld and the next he is crippled by guilt. I know the story has gone on for too long and drifted from its roots.

I could think of far WORSE fare on RTE that deserves to be complained about. I'd watch FC whereas I don't watch Tubridy or D'Arcy unless they have something decent on (which is very rare these times). I abhor all these reality shows ranging from Stetsons and Stilettos to Dragon's Den. Only good thing is they toned down a lot of this political drivel like The Frontline and it was wise to get rid of this mess.

Staying in FC, I could also think of storylines that were much worse than the Katy one. Orla and the screeching baby, the Condors, Laura and the pills, and most of the stories involving that Nina one come to mind. Also, other storylines that could have been interesting were too quickly shut down. Dean and the fighting is an obvious one. At least, they made an effort to try something different with the Katy storyline. It is far from perfect, is inconsistent and is often poorly paced and thought out, but at least it is something different.

What is your obsession with Stetsons and Stilletos!!! There was a handful of episodes! ! Ha! Not 4 times a week, 52 weeks a year!!

And I think political programming is vital for a national station to air!

Grandeeod

I'm watching episodes of Buffy 20th anniversary. Holy Fook, they still make more sense than this FC muck. I wouldn't shame myself into discussing last nights one hour special of utter sh!te. The end is nigh though.:D

Strazdas

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

I read about this Katy story getting abuse online and on Joe Duffy's show and don't get the hatred for it. Yes, this storyline has annoyed and frustrated me over the last while, and at times has also been genuinely entertaining. I know Ciaran's character is not well developed and one minute, he's acting like Blofeld and the next he is crippled by guilt. I know the story has gone on for too long and drifted from its roots.

I could think of far WORSE fare on RTE that deserves to be complained about. I'd watch FC whereas I don't watch Tubridy or D'Arcy unless they have something decent on (which is very rare these times). I abhor all these reality shows ranging from Stetsons and Stilettos to Dragon's Den. Only good thing is they toned down a lot of this political drivel like The Frontline and it was wise to get rid of this mess.

Staying in FC, I could also think of storylines that were much worse than the Katy one. Orla and the screeching baby, the Condors, Laura and the pills, and most of the stories involving that Nina one come to mind. Also, other storylines that could have been interesting were too quickly shut down. Dean and the fighting is an obvious one. At least, they made an effort to try something different with the Katy storyline. It is far from perfect, is inconsistent and is often poorly paced and thought out, but at least it is something different.

The Katy being kidnapped and held hostage in a makehift cell by a nutjob storyline was absolutely fine and was even quite daring for a soap opera. The only problem was / is the pacing. You cannot just depict a girl being held hostage in a cell for a year with very little happening and keep the viewers interested.It needed to move along much more quickly.....they could have shown Emmett being kidnapped by Ciaran a good six months ago.

BuilderPlumber

Strazdas wrote: »

The Katy being kidnapped and held hostage in a makehift cell by a nutjob storyline was absolutely fine and was even quite daring for a soap opera. The only problem was / is the pacing. You cannot just depict a girl being held hostage in a cell for a year with very little happening and keep the viewers interested.It needed to move along much more quickly.....they could have shown Emmett being kidnapped by Ciaran a good six months ago.

That's it exactly. I feel this storyline has dragged on and often has been dragged places it should not have been dragged to but when it returns to its Ciaran hates Emmett roots, it provides some good stuff.

I fear that there will be nothing to replace it with when the Katy story is finally resolved. Katy's grandmother and her possible Alzheimers and so on won't be a compensation. I do remember that FC prior to the Katy storyline was in between major stories and the most interesting of a poor lot of stories was Doug and Ama's friendship. So, let's hope they can build up a Cathal story or something to replace the Katy one.

BuilderPlumber

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

I also really enjoyed the early part of the kidnap storyline, before it got painfully repetitive to watch. A lot of the frustration towards FC is the complete lack of accountability and these nameless and faceless script writers can just shred perfectly decent storylines and rewrite them to add completely implausible and downright incorrect facts just to suit the story and nobody ever has to answer for their rubbish. Why cant we get a senior script writer who has worked on storylines the last year to come on here and provide some simple answers to some simple questions.


And it doesn't have to be as part of the despicable "roaring mob" mentality with their ignorant rants and pitchfork raising. There is no need to be rude or unfriendly to them, just point out that a lot of the recent storylines have been ruined by factual errors like Paul only finding out 4 months late that his account was empty, despite having multiple businesses that relied on direct debits and dozens of workers waiting on their wages? Dermot checking himself out with zero follow up from the hospital staff or Guards? Zoe on a 6 month long Christmas holiday? If they cant give acceptable answers they should be replaced by a more talented team, simple.

And this rubbish on Twitter etc about fans of FC being mindless idiots who are too stupid to appreciate real drama is offensive. I'm a university-educated license payer and it doesn't matter a jot to me who is in a soap or who writes it. If its written well and acted well, I enjoy watching it.

I agree with this. I feel the scriptwriters' efforts should be co-ordinated better. Some are better than others and there are too many writing at the one time. Let one deal with a story and get it coherent and another deal with a different story.

Like you, I am educated and agree with you on the Twitter rubbish. FC can make very good viewing when it has a good storyline. There were some daring ones in the period 2001-2011 for example. We had gangland storylines, racist murders, psychotic bikers and violent wifebeaters and a violent husband burner among others. Characters like the Bishops when used to their full potential are always worth looking at too. The Lucy, Paddy Bishop and Cathal stories are examples of good ones from more recent times.

What annoys me the most with FC is those annoying filler inner stories. That Condors story was annoyingly used at the height of the Cathal/Flynn/Debbie hotel story. I think that a couple of good solid stories at a time would work out better than padding things out with things like that Condors. FC is at its very worst when the focus is on stories like Orla and the screeching baby. That is definitely the worst story I ever remember that was a main story.

BuilderPlumber

The Talking Bread wrote: »

What is your obsession with Stetsons and Stilletos!!! There was a handful of episodes! ! Ha! Not 4 times a week, 52 weeks a year!!

And I think political programming is vital for a national station to air!

You'll find that S&S may be on just 6 episodes. Add Room To Improve, Dragon's Den, The Voice of Ireland (or Dancing with the Stars), etc. and you have all this reality stuff on more than 4 times a week 52 weeks a year. Give me FC anyday. Even the screeching babys era of FC would be better than that reality drivel.

Political programmes are grand when done properly. But not when it is the same old thing flogged to death. The Frontline and The Week In Politics were/are boring and the former was just a vehicle for Pat Kenny.

The Talking Bread

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

You'll find that S&S may be on just 6 episodes. Add Room To Improve, Dragon's Den, The Voice of Ireland (or Dancing with the Stars), etc. and you have all this reality stuff on more than 4 times a week 52 weeks a year. Give me FC anyday. Even the screeching babys era of FC would be better than that reality drivel.

Political programmes are grand when done properly. But not when it is the same old thing flogged to death. The Frontline and The Week In Politics were/are boring and the former was just a vehicle for Pat Kenny.

Depends what bores you. Political analysis in a democracy is pretty important. They aren't meant to be entertainment. They approach important issues and allow the public access to topics that affects their lives. These programmes are vital.

I don't get what you mean by "reality drivel?" All the shows you cited are completely different genres of shows?
A national broadcast station can't just buy in dramas and fiction and soaps and play them all day. They are obliged, due to the terms of the money they receive from the Government, to cover different topics like arts and culture, childrens, film, sport, homegrown production (non drama), drama, music, agriculture, political, pop culture, current affairs etc etc.


Read this: http://www.rte.ie/documents/about/public-service-broadcasting-charter.pdf

BBC is the same if you look down it's programming listings except they have a far bigger budget so the quality of the programming and the shows they can produce and buy in are better.

I just don't get what you mean by "reality drivel"?

What changes would you make to the types of programmes RTE shows every day every week.

unknowngirl!!

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

You'll find that S&S may be on just 6 episodes. Add Room To Improve, Dragon's Den, The Voice of Ireland (or Dancing with the Stars), etc. and you have all this reality stuff on more than 4 times a week 52 weeks a year. Give me FC anyday. Even the screeching babys era of FC would be better than that reality drivel.

Political programmes are grand when done properly. But not when it is the same old thing flogged to death. The Frontline and The Week In Politics were/are boring and the former was just a vehicle for Pat Kenny.

Awh now.. Room to Improve is great!

The Talking Bread

unknowngirl!! wrote: »

Awh now.. Room to Improve is great!

I love those programmes! Although lately they seem to be tailored to a very upper class and high budgeted demographic!

I am waiting for someone with a budget of €500,000 to upgrade the under the stairs toilet episode!!

I had chloroform once. We had to put a budgie to sleep. She had been poisoned by a gas heater leaking and was bleeding from every possible place. The chloroform itself was about 80 years old, it had come from my grandfather's chemist shop.

Now I got you all on a downer there, well, I was very interested to see where they were going with the Emmet being poisoned thing! I imagined they'd go the same way as an old James Bond movie I recall where they had barrels that said "Chemicals" on the side. I was gonna assume Ciaran had a bottle labelled "Poison". I'm glad it wasn't "poison" because I would've gone mad going "WTF is it?"

I'm thinking of stopping watching now, before Katy is returned. Because honestly now I realised it's going to be at least one more week, I am DONE.

I'll see you guys around other threads, around other forums... some of you take up Geocaching and come join me in my echo chamber!

BuilderPlumber

Deleted User wrote: »

I had chloroform once. We had to put a budgie to sleep. She had been poisoned by a gas heater leaking and was bleeding from every possible place. The chloroform itself was about 80 years old, it had come from my grandfather's chemist shop.

Now I got you all on a downer there, well, I was very interested to see where they were going with the Emmet being poisoned thing! I imagined they'd go the same way as an old James Bond movie I recall where they had barrels that said "Chemicals" on the side. I was gonna assume Ciaran had a bottle labelled "Poison". I'm glad it wasn't "poison" because I would've gone mad going "WTF is it?"

I'm thinking of stopping watching now, before Katy is returned. Because honestly now I realised it's going to be at least one more week, I am DONE.

I'll see you guys around other threads, around other forums... some of you take up Geocaching and come join me in my echo chamber!

For a time I was sure we were going to get a James Bond moment. Emmett would grab the glass of stuff, which we were lead to believe was motorbike fuel, and fire it at Ciaran's eyes and then Emmett would attack him and tie him up and demand knowledge about Katy. Instead, he just drank what was probably some of the beer we later see him drinking when laughing and sat there like a zombie. Emmett is no James Bond anyway we can say whatever else he is!

Is petrol that poisonous? I know it would rip the insides out of you and make you puke and sh1t all over the place, but it's not "poison", surely Emmet is old enough too to say "Hey Ciaran that's petrol". Like I said I'm glad they didn't go down the poison route, because I would want to know what is it? Where did he get it? True enough chloroform is pretty much impossible to get now, where is the back story to explain where he got it?

Niall_76

How long ago did Ciaran get notice he needed to leave the lockup. Feels like years but maybe it was just a few weeks

mickdw

Niall_76 wrote: »

How long ago did Ciaran get notice he needed to leave the lockup. Feels like years but maybe it was just a few weeks

They have forgotten about that it seems.

Hitchens

Too much graphic violence huh? Emmett got beaten up, punched and kicked, but not a drop of blood to be seen.

Strazdas

Ratings were excellent for Sunday's double header, an average of 539,000 viewers watched.

I sense this was also the cause of the big backlash on social media though. Looks like everyone expected that Katy would be freed at the end of the episode, what with the dramatic trailer and everything.

walshb

Hitchens wrote: »

Too much graphic violence huh? Emmett got beaten up, punched and kicked, but not a drop of blood to be seen.

The absence of blood doesn't take away from the violence.

The Parish Priest.

walshb wrote: »

The absence of blood doesn't take away from the violence.

Ah ffs, you'd see more violence in an old Timothy Dalton James bond movie which are regularly shown on a Sunday afternoon.

The Talking Bread

The Parish Priest. wrote: »

Ah ffs, you'd see more violence in an old Timothy Dalton James bond movie which are regularly shown on a Sunday afternoon.

Watch the Ulster Championship! You will know all about the rough and tumble of it all!!


But, yes, do all action films need a warning! What about the news, the Olympics boxing! Where does this PC nonsense stop! My barely 3 year old nephew knows that acting is acting! He doesn't get pleasure out of it but he doesn't get emotionally distressed by it! There are definitely lines that can be crossed but Sunday's episode, whilst a warning announcement was simple and not out of place, shouldn't be cited as going over this threshold.

Also that episode was well plugged. If protective parents didn't cop on that there may be a few struggles in it (if they saw the promo -which was hard to avoid), they are pretty naive.

The Talking Bread

walshb

The Parish Priest. wrote: »

Ah ffs, you'd see more violence in an old Timothy Dalton James bond movie which are regularly shown on a Sunday afternoon.

I am not denying this. I am simply saying that the absence of blood does not take away from the violence in Sunday's episode.

walshb

The Talking Bread wrote: »

I love all those old cartons. Some of the violence in them was crazy. Not a sniff of a warning either...:pac:

I have a two year old, and only since having him I can see how much they take in and what can upset and scare them. The most silly things to adults is a lot different to young children, hence why good parenting is essential, but also, tv programmes and shows do need to sometimes give a heads up. Parents won't always get it right.

Example: I was watching a wildlife show with him and out of nowhere came a scene of a hyena attacking a deer. Sacred the life of him. He could see that what happened was bad and not nice. It was only a brief second or two with no blood, just a bit of noise. It made me aware just how impacting images can be for children.

Now, I wasn't really expecting the wildlife programme to issue a warning before it aired, but I would expect warnings here and there in general for some programmes.

The Talking Bread

I agree really wildlife programmesightings a bit also. Kids know these are real images and kids love animals (well most of them!) So it can be upsetting very much to see that

Flippyfloppy

Waterford whispers news report that an irate fan is on the grounds of RTE threatening all sorts to end the storyline!!
https://www.facebook.com/WhispersNews/posts/10158861980330195

qo2cj1dsne8y4k

walshb wrote: »

I am not denying this. I am simply saying that the absence of blood does not take away from the violence in Sunday's episode.

It's an episode in relation to a mentally ill person and a kidnap. It's nearing the conclusion. It's reasonably foreseeable to assume it's not going to be full of puppies and kittens, or with peppa and George helping mummy pig bake a cake. There was a cert in the opening credits advising people who it was suitable for.

walshb

LexieOnRale wrote: »

There was a cert in the opening credits advising people who it was suitable for.

Ok, problem solved. I wasn't aware of this. That was the right thing tho do.

BuilderPlumber

The Parish Priest. wrote: »

Ah ffs, you'd see more violence in an old Timothy Dalton James bond movie which are regularly shown on a Sunday afternoon.

Timothy Dalton's second Bond film Licence to Kill was relatively violent. I do not understand why TV become afraid to show violence and try and tone down things. I remember the Sunday before last, I caught the start of Diamonds Are Forever on ITV/UTV and noticed how severely cut the pretitle sequence was. The part where Bond fires the knives at the bad guy and blood was shown was cut as was the part where Bond is strangling the woman to get information on Blofeld.

My attitude is that if people don't want to watch violent content, then do not watch films, TV series, etc. that has it. ITV/UTV have a habit of tampering with films and they often ruin the feel of them by doing so. Fair City and all soaps are at their best when it has violent and dark storylines.

freshpopcorn

If I was a conservative parent I'd be more concerned that the program I was showing my children showed the characters spending hours every day in the local pub!

pjohnson

LexieOnRale wrote: »

It's reasonably foreseeable to assume it's not going to be full of puppies and kittens, or with peppa and George helping mummy pig bake a cake.

ffs will ya use spoiler tags