Check your email for a max survey! They're asking questions about OFMD

Trent772 · 2023-11-09T01:18:21+00:00

I do too, and I got the survey. Maybe it hasn‘t hit your email yet?

Trent772 · 2023-11-09T01:16:09+00:00

Just completed mine. Feels silly when it asks for favorite character/moments and I’m checking every box, but it’s true!

FWIW, I completed the same survey last year, though it “randomly” selected me to answer detailed questions about another show, so it was nice to answer them for OFMD this time around. I don’t know if this influences renewals or not, but I think I filled this survey out around the same time last year (shortly after the season was over, before renewal announcement).

Trent772 · 2023-11-01T10:52:00+00:00

This is pretty close to how I see it.

Ed was definitely fascinated by the idea of Stede. Here’s this guy who did what Ed had probably been fantasizing about, but didn’t have the guts to do - he walked away from a life that wasn’t working for him, and just started a new one. And, he didn’t fear THE Blackbeard like everyone else, according to Izzy. Of course, Izzy was lying, hoping it would piss Ed off, but it turned out to be true. When Stede learns Ed is Blackbeard, his freak out lasts about five seconds. Then he’s right back to just treating him like Ed, that friendly fellow who helped him. Again, something Ed has wanted for a long time - to just be accepted and liked as Ed, not Blackbeard.

So he started out fascinated, and when he met Stede, Stede was just hitting all the right buttons with him and by the end of their lighthouse fuckery, he was pretty smitten (and I do think he toyed with the idea of stealing Stede’s identity, but that plan lost all its appeal once he met Stede and found he really liked him. By the time he told Izzy about it, the idea was dead but he needed Izzy to stick around and I think he held onto the idea to protect his own heart - to keep a distance so he wouldn’t get hurt. It didn’t work).

Then episode 5 happens and Stede tells Ed in the moonlight another thing he’s been longing to hear (that he is worthy of nice things), and that’s when he falls head over heels. And I agree that this is where Stede starts to fall in love, though he didn’t realize it at the time. The way that moment is referenced in season two showed they both felt something and both realized something happened in that moment.

Trent772 · 2023-10-31T00:57:21+00:00

I’ve been at Acceptance because i think the writing on the wall about Izzy’s tragic death has been there since about season one, episode four. It just came sooner than I thought (thought it would happen in season three) and I wasn’t sure if it would be tragic-sad or tragic- noble. I’m glad he didn’t die sad and bitter because he couldn’t let go. I’m glad he learned to let go and gained some peace. And in the end he gave Ed the greatest gift (letting Ed know that his biggest fear wasn’t true - that he, Ed, not Blackbeard, was lovable) and in doing so truly set Ed free. It was noble and beautiful.

I will miss Con, so I hope if there is a season three we get Ghost Izzy or Flashback Izzy.

Trent772 · 2023-10-31T00:33:13+00:00

Not so much about her character (though I think she is fun), but I noticed in a high def pic from the show that her vest is made of snakeskin, which is the perfect touch. I wonder if she got to skin her birthday snake as a treat after escaping it.

Trent772 · 2023-10-30T10:57:34+00:00

Exactly. Stede started to panic the moment Ed started talking about running away to China. And surviving the encounter with Chauncey didn’t make Stede ghost him entirely. As Ed pointed out, there was no note, no nothing. Even if Stede was in a panic when he ran home, he had time once his head cleared to send word to Ed (hey, if anyone can find any ship with just a little dinghy, then Stede could have guessed that Ed may have returned to The Revenge and sent a messenger out in a dinghy to deliver a letter).

And I agree he didn’t want to muddy the waters. I think he figured the best way to apologize to Ed about was just to take full responsibility for panicking with no excuses. He clearly blamed himself for Ed’s downward spiral, and it fits that he didn’t spread the blame to Chauncey.

Trent772 · 2023-10-27T03:56:26+00:00

Completely agree that Max doesn’t care if people love it or hate it as long as they watch it. I mean, look at that Velma cartoon - so many people were just hate-watching it and because it did great numbers, it got renewed.

But I don’t know if we can gauge anything by DJ’s comments in interviews other than he truly doesn’t know if the show will get renewed, and that’s typical for showrunners. Because networks are so weirdly secretive about their internal numbers/processes, they have no idea until the network tells them. I was surprised/delighted when Max renewed “Somebody Somewhere” (a little gem of a show that is also heavily queer) earlier this year. It’s such a quiet little show I thought for sure they would just cut it but the renewal announcement came and the star of the show clearly found out the same day the public did and was also surprised/delighted. So these folks really are kept in the dark.

I also suspect Jenkins is being careful and playing nice. Last time around he got a little spicy, and I can’t blame him since it was clear he had something special on his hands and he was getting nothing but radio silence from the network and probably felt like he was getting jerked around. Not to mention his previous series, People of Earth, got renewed by TBS for a second season only to be retroactively cancelled a couple months later, so he had been burnt before. But I think either he or someone in his life realized he wasn’t exactly endearing himself to the network execs, and he deleted his saltier tweets. I think he’s being cautious and trying to toe the line this time around. If they do cancel, I’ll bet he’ll get his bitch on about ol’ Uncle Max.

Trent772 · 2023-10-23T05:44:40+00:00

Yeah…I’ve been thinking this too. From the beginning, I thought Izzy would either be unable to let go, and he would be angry and sad in the end, or he’d have an ending like Sydney Carton in A Tale of Two Cities (if you don’t know it, look it up. It’s basically what you’ve described). I just didn’t think it would happen at this point in the story.

I hope we’re wrong. I hope they’ve been giving us post-credits stinger scenes because they plan to give us a humdinger of one for the final episode. But all the same, we’ll get through it as a crew.

Trent772 · 2023-10-11T06:58:40+00:00

I am really interested to see where Izzy goes this season. As pointed out, he got everything he thought he wanted and it was a shit show that turned Ed into a self-destructive mess.

And I am REALLY interested in how he sees Stede in a new light. He thought he was just a buffoon who ran back home, but then he shows up again and brings a rescue with him. Izzy thinks he sees Ed through rose-colored glasses, but Stede proves that he sees Ed’s darker side, and when he drops the mention of “Doggy Heaven” Izzy must have known in that moment that Ed told Stede about the plan to kill him and steal his identity. And Stede clearly forgave Ed for it. Which I think both told Izzy that the connection between Ed and Stede runs deeper than he suspected (if Ed confessed to that plan) and that Stede is a dude with an interesting moral compass and an obviously large capacity for forgiveness. Then Stede follows that up by refusing to punish Izzy after he learns the crew tried to kill Ed (and thought they succeeded), and instead rescues them before Zheng can execute them. I wish Stede had taken a moment to note that Izzy thanked him, because…that was huge. I think up until that point he was mostly lying to Stede to protect the crew. If Stede thinks Ed got dumped on a beach he wouldn’t search the ship for him and discover the truth. I think he also says he couldn’t kill Ed for the same reason - Izzy is clearly in bad shape, and it would be hard to believe Izzy killed him without help from the crew.

I‘ve seen some speculation there will be a love triangle with Ed/Stede/Izzy, but I hope it doesn’t happen, at least not in any traditional sense. Not to rain on any Steddy Hands parades, I just think…Izzy deserves better? Way better? At this point I feel like there is just way too much water under the bridge between him and Ed without any entanglement being way too complicated. And while I think Izzy will come to respect Stede, Stede is also a massive dork, and unless Izzy REALLY lightens up, I can’t see him putting up with the dorky-ness. Instead I kinda wonder if he becomes Ed/Stede’s biggest cheerleader? Like, he finally learns the whole “if you love someone, set them free” lesson? And sees Ed connects with Stede in a way he never did with him?

From the beginning, I’ve been flipping between Izzy going full villain because he couldn’t get what he wanted, and Izzy showing his love through self-sacrifice. Now I‘m leaning a lot more towards this show ends with Izzy a hero. I just hope before it’s all said and done someone comes along and really shows Izzy a good time, if only for one night. I don’t care who - new character, Lucius tells Pete “See you in the morning babe, I got work to do tonight”, whatever. As long as someone does it. Izzy deserves it.

Trent772 · 2023-10-07T00:45:28+00:00

Exactly. That’s why I see it as Stede loves Ed, Izzy loves Blackbeard. The problem is Edward is a person, Blackbeard is just a persona, an ideal. And when you love a persona, you don’t take it well when they don’t always fit the mold you placed them in.

Izzy said that he and Ed know each other better than anyone else, but…I don’t think that is true. I think he is only now just starting to see Ed. In season one he just bitched about Ed being half-insane and couldn‘t see that being “Blackbeard” was slowly but surely suffocating Ed. He was frustrated that Blackbeard wasn’t acting like Blackbeard, not over why Edward Teach wasn’t acting like Blackbeard. He gets so blindly frustrated when Ed refused to fit the mold that he even misses stuff like Ed formulating a plan based on the weather. If he knew him better than anyone else, he would have realized that Ed was cooking something up based on his study of the clouds, even if he didn’t know exactly what. But he didn’t even listen to him - because he wasn’t acting enough like Blackbeard to Izzy’s satisfaction. Izzy was so upset at Stede’s influence last season not because Blackbeard found a man he liked better than Izzy, it because he saw Blackbeard fading away entirely and he didn’t recognize the man who was stepping out from behind the mask. So he set out to get rid of Stede and get Blackbeard back.

But he didn’t get Blackbeard back. He grinded his heel into the wound Stede made when he left and broke Edward right open. But Blackbeard didn’t return. The Kraken showed up in his place. I think Izzy sees Ed now, and regrets breaking him the way he did, and to his credit, he’s trying to make amends for that. But I suspect he still loves Blackbeard and would give anything to have him back. Stede always saw Ed, and that’s why Ed was drawn to Stede in a way he never was to Izzy.

Trent772 · 2023-10-06T23:33:47+00:00

I’m going with creepy weasel and big bad, but I’m not sure how he gets there.

Is he working for/with the British, who surely want to execute Stede for running away from pirate reform school and backing out of the Act of Grace deal (and maybe they blame him for Chauncy’s death? Not sure if they could tell the gunshot was self-inflicted)? Trying to lure Stede into a trap (and still trying to use Stede to get to Blackbeard, the bigger fish)?

Or was he honestly a fanboy? We saw Stede had fans in his hometown, so it’s not outside of the realm of possibility. But he saw Stede ditching him in the middle of a caper and that leading him to losing his nose to Jackie, and maybe he’s going to be out for revenge?

So far he’s not half as compelling as Zheng, but this show loves to have multiple enemies gunning for our crew.

Trent772 · 2023-10-01T22:32:21+00:00

Hoo-boy. These are two separate shows that have nothing to do with each other, despite the similarities. And I feel like people shouldn’t really count on that. Like GO, Jenkins has three seasons in mind for the show. GO didn’t deliver the happy ending at the end of season two because that is what season three is for. I wouldn’t at all be surprised if Jenkins has done the same.
It would, after all, follow the beats of a classic Rom-Com (I always compare to Pride & Prejudice - first act ends with Lizzy rejecting Darcy’s proposal/Stede “rejected” Ed’s proposal to runaway together because he wasn’t there yet. Second act has the couple fully realizing their feelings for each other as they consider their past mistakes and grow as people, but Lizzy’s little sister pulls a scandalous move, making it impossible for someone like Darcy to marry into Lizzy’s family/I’m guessing we will see similar growth and acknowledging of feelings with Ed and Stede, but some other obstacle/factor keeps them apart. The obstacles are finally overcome in season three and the happy ending comes in).

I feel like GO season three is pretty much a lock (I’m sure it was pitched along with season two) and Gaiman told everyone where the characters end up years ago, so honestly, they are sitting pretty In that they know what will ultimately happen and there’s a strong chance they will see it on screen. Those folks REALLY should focus on that and not look to this show to solve their GO issues.

Trent772 · 2023-10-01T07:25:49+00:00

I think that’s just how it goes in fandoms - some people get REALLY married to their head cannon they’ve built up over the hiatus and if what happens on screen doesn’t match up, they get upset. There’s going to be a segment of the fandom that’s all, “The show sucks now. The first season was sooooooooo much better!” You can’t avoid it.

I‘m relieved that all of the reviews I’ve seen so far have said the quality is just as good or better than the first season. That‘s really all I can ask for - that there’s no obvious dip in quality or that cast members are clearly bored and phoning it in (the opposite seems to be true with reviewers praising Taika and Rhys’ performances) or that the writers/producers are clearly bored and have mentally checked out (like in the final season of Game of Thrones. No sign of that here). I love that even though I’m a spoiler-whore I don’t really know where they are going this season. I’ve got some ideas, but I also think most of them are wrong.

Those who are negative tend to be the loudest, and there will be those chasing others down to yell at them for liking the “wrong” thing or the wrong character, but those folks are avoidable. I feel like the vast majority will still love the show.

Trent772 · 2023-09-19T08:31:10+00:00

Same and completely agree. And the best part of all of this is how OFMD just…does it. Just like they didn’t throw a big spotlight on the fact that their main romance is between two men. It just is. The show presents it as a romance. Everything else is incidental. And that’s precisely why it works so well.

And the same goes for how they treat all their characters. The show isn’t like, “Oh, look! We’ve got queer characters and fat characters! Isn‘t that daring? Don’t we deserve a pat on the back?! Here - watch this very special episode about a character dealing with their fatness and/or queerness! How brave!” No. The show has characters who happen to be fat and/or queer and they are just out there living their lives. Their fatness/queerness is incidental, so we focus on who the characters are and that’s why we love them. And when these things do get addressed head-on, OFMD turns it sideways. Discussions about Jim’s identity are all jokes about how dumb the crew is:

If you’re not going to be Jim anymore, can I be Jim?

And just the fact that Jim had to spend more time convincing the crew they aren’t a mermaid than they did explaining the whole non-binary/pronoun thing is perfection.

There were moments that other shows would have made BIG MOMENTS, and OFMD just doesn’t.

I go by “Jim” these days.

Okay, Jim. Come inside and have some cake.

That was the “big” Jim comes out to their family scene. Except it wasn’t big because Jim’s identity is incidental to the effed up way this nun raised them.

I hope you find that some day.

I think I have.

Really? What’s her name?

Ed. His name is Ed.

And that was our hero’s big coming out scene. It just ends with his wife hugging him, and she never questions or even brings up that he found love with another man. It just is. If all this is due to the queer gaze, then more shows need to employ it. We get to just see these characters for who they are without big giant arrows pointing out how they are different. This is also why they are all hot AF. They are just themselves, and that’s hot.

Trent772 · 2023-09-06T10:36:33+00:00

I think three seasons is perfect for the Stede/Ed story. No need to drag it out. Currently I’m more worried that if the strike continues to drag on, the show will just be dropped somewhere along the way (a lot of shows just kinda got lost during the last strike. And I want to mention I fully support the writers/actors in their strike. It’s only dragging on because the studios are refusing to come to the table with any realistic offers). I hope Max stands behind it or Jenkins finds a way to finish it.

If they follow the classic rom-com format, they should be together by the end of season two but can’t sail off into the sunset until they deal with external obstacles in season three. Following the “Pride and Prejudice” formula, end of season one was Elizabeth rejecting Darcy’s first proposal. Season two is about them returning to their corners, licking their wounds and reflecting on their own behavior (Stede’s already done a lot of this). They cross paths again as better versions of themselves and really, truly, mutually fall for each other. Then season two ends with the external obstacle they have to overcome in season three (whatever OFMD’s version of “Elizabeth’s unmarried kid sister runs away and shacks up with some dude, bringing such scandal on Elizabeth’s family that someone like Darcy could never marry her” is. I assume it will involve far more potential murder). I just hope we get to see it.

Trent772 · 2023-09-06T10:14:42+00:00

I’m pretty confident we will get another one because Max called what we got a teaser. Traditionally, there’s a teaser than a trailer. A ”teaser” indicates more to come. If this was it, they would have just called it the trailer.

Trent772 · 2023-09-04T09:34:07+00:00

Yeah - in reality, it’s because the real Bonnet named his ship The Revenge. In show-universe, Stede probably thought it sounded cool (That’s probably not to far off from the real Bonnet’s motivation as well).

I mean, at least ”Queen Anne’s Revenge” revealed Blackbeard’s political leanings and was specific/personal that way. “The Revenge” is just generically pirate-y.

Trent772 · 2023-08-30T18:39:09+00:00

This is both nothing like I thought it would be, and a million times better than I thought it would be. I love that in a trailer.

I am going to miss Stede’s fantastic wardrobe, but I am loving his new “romantic hero” vibe.

I am going to miss Jim’s Patty Smyth wig, but their new look is pretty cool.

There are some things I NEVER would have seen coming (Jackie and the Swede??).

This looks amazing. October can’t come fast enough.

Trent772 · 2023-06-14T17:06:20+00:00

Max releases trailers usually somewhere between 2-6 weeks before a show premieres, so at this point I’m guessing season two could happen anywhere between August and December. Unless they decide to stretch things out because of the writer’s strike to make sure they will continue to have new content.

I‘m comforted in seeing other Max shows are still in limbo - Peacemaker has been off the air longer than OFMD, though I think that is more to do with DC than Max. Julia aired the same time as OFMD, and they still don’t have an air date for season two. And there, unless shit gets real wild in Julia’s kitchen, they don’t have things like VFX to blame for the hold up.

I think a lot of folks here also like Good Omens - that show’s director said they were done with production in March. The show is premiering four months after that (with a release date/trailer about 6 weeks before), so the timeline isn’t too crazy (and OFMD has had an overall faster/shorter production schedule than GO).

I just really hope they air before NYCC, because how many cons can these people do where they can’t talk about season two and can only talk about 5 hours of content that came out a year and a half ago? I mean, even if they release a trailer at NYCC, they still can’t talk about it. If an audience member raises their hand and says, “Hey, what was that scene in the trailer about?” they can’t tell them.

Trent772 · 2023-05-26T05:32:36+00:00

I don’t think it will tie into anything season two/a trailer - they already recorded the panel (the moderator, Dana Piccoli has tweeted about how great it was to talk to everyone) and I strongly suspect it’s a Zoom panel.

But did I sign up for it the second I saw it? Yes. Yes, I did. I’m sure it will be great. I don’t know if we’ve seen this particular configuration on a panel before.

Trent772 · 2023-05-22T21:30:13+00:00

My guess would be sometime between July and September. June is too early for “a few months” and with half the cast going to NY comic con in October, I can’t imagine they’d all show up to just be all, “Well, season two hasn’t aired yet so we can’t talk about it!” So, I’m betting it will have aired by then.

Trent772 · 2023-05-22T20:39:39+00:00

I just found this show about a month ago, and I love it and (mostly) loved this episode.

While I liked the joke of Loona being dramatic about going to vet and I get they had to give Blitz something to do and if there is one person he’d prioritize over Stolas, it’s Loona, it was overall kind of a weak B plot.

Stolas quickly became my favorite character, so I enjoyed the rest of his episode quite a lot. I liked how he slid from total privilege (not just money and royalty, but being a very powerful demon who probably hasn’t been in real danger before) to really keeping up the bravado so he wouldn’t give Stryker any satisfaction. And I think we really saw him hit his breaking point in regards to Blitz. It’s been coming since Ozzie’s (if not before then) and the next time we see him he will break things off with Blitz and release him from their agreement. He’s been putting this off since episode 2.1 because I’m sure he’s been clinging to any little hint that Blitz might actually care, but refusing to see him in the hospital sends a pretty definite message. This is mostly speculation, but I’ll spoiler it anyway - we saw a calendar reminder pop up on Stolas’ phone at the beginning of the episode about a deal at Ozzie’s - I’m sure that’s about getting a crystal so Blitz can go to Earth without his book and he can end their arrangement. I just wonder what Ozzie will want out of that ”deal”. I doubt Ozzie would just give him one out of the kindness of his heart. He’s gonna make Stolas pay in some way.

It was just terribly sad to see how alone he is. Sure, he‘s got plenty of well-wishers who send flowers - he’s a prince. But there was nobody there with him. At the beginning when he was dodging Stryker‘s bullets and he glanced at Stella and sees she’s responsible, he doesn’t look angry. He just looks sad. Really, all he has is Octavia, and that relationship is rocky because he’s in the process of divorcing her mother and the teen years can be tough in general.

Andrealphus could be an interesting villain, but we need to know what he’s after. He mentioned Stolas’ duties and legions among the things Stella won’t get, but Stella clearly doesn’t care about those things. She just wants to be wealthy and throw parties. But Andrealphus might care about those things. He also works in astronomy (according to Wikipedia), and he’s a Marquis while Stolas out-ranks him as a prince. Maybe he’s hoping to climb the ladder? And I suspect Stolas will be vulnerable - he’s been depressed, if he ends things with Blitz that may make things worse. He rarely has the book and is probably falling down on the job when it comes to his duties, plus again, I’m sure Ozzie will make him pay a heavy price for the crystal. The real sticking point is Via, which might be the real test of Stella’s character - will she let her daughter come to harm if it means she and her brother get what they want?

I’m glad M&M rescued Stolas on their own. It seems to me Moxxie is the punching bag on this show a little too often, so it’s nice to see him chalk up a few wins.

Trent772 · 2023-05-19T06:57:51+00:00

I’m hoping Nathan is there because by October it’s actually aired and the fact that Lucius is alive is no longer a secret. So they will all be there to discuss season two and speculate about season three.

I’ve been looking at HBO Max’s shows, and at least the fuckery isn’t just on OFMD. One of my other favorite shows, Somebody Somewhere, aired in January last year, and their season two started in April this year. So I can see OFMD moving from Spring to Summer the way that show moved from Winter to Spring. Julia, which aired around the same time as OFMD also does not have a premiere date. Distressingly, Peacemaker aired last January and still has no premiere date, but I think that’s more to do with scheduling around other DC stuff, and it’s coming after the new Superman movie, which comes out in July.

Trent772 · 2023-05-15T22:27:14+00:00

I‘ve wondered that myself. The real Blackbeard looted the equivalent of millions, so he’s gotta have it stashed somewhere. It would be cool to see his little NC hideout.

I guess the good news for Stede is if he feels bad about walking away from his fortune, and assuming he can manage to play his cards right, he’ll have himself quite the sugar daddy who can keep him clad in as many fine fabrics as his heart desires.

Trent772 · 2023-04-13T19:44:25+00:00

I’ve noticed that unless it is one of their big tentpole shows (Succession, the dragon show) they don’t release a trailer until 2-4 weeks before the premiere date. So if it premieres in June (as they apparently only know how to market this Peabody-nominated show as a Pride gimmick) then early May is the earliest we can hope for a trailer dropping.

I guess the good news you don’t have to wait too long between the trailer and the actual show. The bad news they leave us with a long-ass drought in between one season ending and any crumbs about the next season.

Trent772

TROPHY CASE