Tudors on Showtime

JenNipps · Jul 24, 2007

I can't believe I haven't found a discussion about this yet.

Did anyone else watch The Tudors on Showtime? I just saw on www.sho.com that it'll be back for a second season.

Ol' Fashioned Girl · Jul 24, 2007

Alas... I don't have Showtime! But I did watch the first couple of episodes on the website.

MMcC · Jul 24, 2007

I loved 75% of it. The last few episodes were starting to annoy me. Yes, okay, divorce, yes, angry, yup, okay.

It needs to pick up the pace.

scarletpeaches · Jul 24, 2007

Would that be the thing with the luscious Jonathan Rhys Meyers?

Can't wait 'til it shows here...*drool*...

scarletpeaches · Jul 24, 2007

Oh dear Christ. That voiceover.

The Tooders? Please.

And I don't believe Anne Boleyn slept with him before they married...just read Joanna Denny's book.

Justin91 · Jul 24, 2007

Not a bad show...I really liked the first few episodes I have watched...I need to watch the rest.

CheshireCat · Jul 24, 2007

So you think Elizabeth was an 8-month baby?

Math isn't my strong suit, but if Anne and Henry married in late January 1533, and Elizabeth was born the first week in September of that same year ...

It doesn't seem to have been an age when premature babies were at all likely to survive.

I enjoyed the first season of The Tudors, though I think many of the actors and actresses were miscast. Including (the admittedly luscious) Rhys Meyers; he's Henry in attitude and arrogance, but many of the other actors towered over him physically and that bugged me the whole time I watched it.

Mind you, it won't stop me from watching the second season.

childeroland · Jul 24, 2007

When is the second season debuting? This wait between seasons is terrible -- now I know how 'Soprano' fans felt.

scarletpeaches · Jul 24, 2007

CheshireCat said:
So you think Elizabeth was an 8-month baby?

Their public wedding was in January. Their private one was in December, in Calais.

Anne Boleyn always said she would only ever marry in England as she would otherwise feel the wedding was not valid, but in 1532, Calais was part of England, though now French. It was Henry's daughter Mary who 'lost' it to France. (She was quoted as saying, "When I die you will find Calais engraved on my heart.")

But even then, eight month babies are perfectly possible. Yes, even in the 16th century. But now, I know a woman who had a son, then twin girls eight months later.

JenNipps · Jul 24, 2007

I don't know when the second season will start. I just saw the notice about it right before I posted the first post.

I agree with the need to pick up the pace.

Admittedly, I didn't get to see that last couple episodes because I was out of state and had no access to a TV with Showtime.

Shadow_Ferret · Jul 24, 2007

I don't get showtime, but even so, a show about Tudors doesn't sound very interesting.

Now if it was about Cape Cods...

CheshireCat · Jul 24, 2007

Oh, they sexed it up. And they didn't allow at least a few historical facts to get in the way of telling a good story. But you'd probably need to have some interest in the Tudors to find the series compelling.

Scarlet, not arguing with you. I've read differing accounts myself, but I always felt Anne probably gave in to Henry before either wedding, at least partly because he'd been fighting to get his divorce for a long time by then, and patience wasn't his strong suit, and she'd already kept him on the hook longer than anyone would have predicted. Didn't look like anything was going to change, unless she could get pregnant quickly and give him a new motive to marry her.

"The Tudors" handled the did-they, didn't-they question ... interestingly.

Calla Lily · Jul 25, 2007

Liked it a lot--our cable teased us with the first 2 episodes. CBC (Canada) is going to show it starting September, yay! Sam Neill is old and chunky now, but he's still good.

aadams73 · Jul 25, 2007

I think it's totally fab, although it will never replace my beloved Rome (*sob*).

Jonathan Rhys Myers has a real cruelty to his looks that works really well for the role of King Henry.

jodiodi · Jul 25, 2007

My husband and I watched it. He finds it fascinating because my father's family goes back through several different lines, to the Norfolks. Every time it comes on, he says, "Honey, here are your people." I always say, "Yeah. Most of my people got their heads cut off. That'll make your mama proud."

I was a little confused on Henry's sister Margaret and the King of Portugal. Then again, it's not a documentary.

kristin724 · Jul 25, 2007

We watched the Tudors, oh yeah.

My honey doesnt' know much about the history and I do, but I didn't find their liberties that much of a problem. I did think the series ended on a weak note, but I'm looking forward to the dvds and season 2.

Yes, I love JRM. Although I am more obsessed with Sean Bean at the moment. My jealous hubby actually likes SB more than JRM, because "Jonny just looks like an a$$hole!" So sayeth my Jason.

aadams73 · Jul 26, 2007

jodiodi said:
I was a little confused on Henry's sister Margaret and the King of Portugal. Then again, it's not a documentary.

Seems like I read at Wikipedia that they combined Henry's sisters and made a bunch of stuff up.

JenNipps · Jul 26, 2007

That wouldn't surprise me.

If I remember correctly, I think it was only intended as a test run, of sorts, for one season. It'd be hard to fit the scope of everything into only 10 episodes. Heck, I'm not sure it could all be fit in if it were to be a long-running series.

Even if they did try to fit everything in, would it be watchable?

CheshireCat · Jul 26, 2007

aadams73 said:
Seems like I read at Wikipedia that they combined Henry's sisters and made a bunch of stuff up.

Well, once I knew the writers were the same guys that gave us Cate Blanchett's "Elizabeth" I knew the historical facts would be, at best, muddied, and at worst discarded as unimportant.

Cate's performance aside, that movie still makes me nuts.

kristin724 · Jul 26, 2007

The main creative give is Michael Hurst I think he was the man behind the movie Elizabeth. Each episode is supposed to be a year of Henry's reign, so the 10 episodes were 10 years.

They really hyped Gabrielle Anwar as Henry's sister, but she wasn't even a regular and she was kind of a dead end plot. After combining the historical two sisters, I think they wrote themselves into a wall. Now GA is on Burn Notice anyway.

I'm curious to see how Peter O'Toole plays out in Season 2.

childeroland · Jul 26, 2007

That whole thing with her killing her decrepit husband and then kvetching at Suffolk till she died was obnoxious. I love me some Gabrielle Anwar, but yikes.

ccarver30 · Jul 27, 2007

I have loved Henry Cavill for a long time. It was nice to see him nearly nude.

scarletpeaches · Feb 19, 2009

Just finished watching the entire first season on DVD so decided to resurrect this thread.

My reasons for saying Anne didn't 'give in' to Henry before they were married still stand; no, patience wasn't his strong suit but then...don't you think that argues against pre-marital sex? He tired of his lovers quickly and if he'd had sex with Anne before they married it's more likely that he would have thrown Anne over for someone else.

Good things about the series:

Henry Cavill.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers.

Jeremy Northam.

Also, I adored Sam Neill's performance in episode ten. The prayer, just before...[highlight to read spoiler]he killed himself, which didn't happen in real life, so that pissed me off...[end spoiler] was touching indeed. I almost felt sorry for the poor blighter.

What I didn't like was the policy of not letting the truth get in the way of a good story. So much was wrong, wrong, wrong and I couldn't see that it served the story any better to have, well, lies woven throughout the series.

This was all, however, nothing in comparison to the alarming regularity with which the lookers got their kit off, so it's to the media store for me, to pick up Season Two!

Empress_Isis · Feb 22, 2009

Jonathan Rhys Meyers. OMG.

scarletpeaches · Feb 22, 2009

Heh. Yeah. What she said ^^^.

Tudors on Showtime

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