HBO's Task

I'm sad this series isn't getting more attention. So wonderfully, written and directed. Though, admittedly, the complexities of the plot are not so easy to follow. But I find if I just keep with it, the details reveal themselves.

And Fabien Frankel, a young Brit playing a Pennsylvanian gumba policeman, is so hot! Actually, half the leads seem to be either British or Irish.

I never miss an HBO mini-series starring Mark Ruffalo. Also, I've been a fan of Tom Pelphrey's work since OZARK.

I thought Fabien Frankel look familiar. So good in House of Dragons.

Loving the show so far.

[quote] gumba

Goomba?

As this series has the same creators and setting as Mare of Eastown I wonder if the origins of it were a sequel to Mare that ultimately went off in a different direction.

I loved Mare. But Task is boring. I could less about the people. I am also sick of stories about drugs, cops, and losers. My God. If you can't think of something more original. Americans love shows about drugs, the mob, and anti- hero cops. Please is your life so boring in Middle America that you need to relax with fake drama. How about a show about middle class people trying to survive- without drugs. I live in a drug free world, all of my friends are drug free, what is so attractive about watching drugs being the center of a show. When will crime be over? That's why you have a mobster for a president. It is all so romantic.

I tried but it's dark. I don't want to spend time with these folks.

Grimdark Streamer

misery porn

Rotcore

ruinporn

They've had 2 great cliffhangers for 3 episodes. The first was the reveal of the young boy. And this last one brought the suspicion that one of Ruffalo's team is a spy.

I agree it's very dark and verges on depressing but I guess the intent is to show how the great poor unwashed are forced into crime through their unremitting poverty. Decent people gone bad.

as I said, misery porn.

I've seen the first two. I thought it was impeccably written, directed and acted. But I just can't make myself watch more.

I love dark, moody shows. But the world is too dark and moody right now. I already feel hopeless as it is.

Problem with Task, as much as I like it, it's depressing. All of them are just a sad mess, including Mark Ruffalo. The locations are depressing. The sun never shines.

Yes, r11. It's a well-made show but I haven't enjoyed the three episodes I've seen. I'm not sure I'll stick around to watch the bikers murder someone in a disgusting way.

R1- Hollywood has been outsourcing their actors for a good 15 years now. In a country of 350 million people it would not be hard to find enough decent American actors to play the roles of Americans in tv series and movies- I HATE this trend. I should not be surprised since EVERYTHING else in the United States has been going that route since ca. 1980.

Taking the kid in is a bright spot. They're not complete monsters.

Unless they decide to kill the kid in a later episode. I thought the woman was going to drown him in episode 3.

No no no! The kid is definitely there to show us how humane they all are.

I'm surprised they left the corpse of their accomplice at the crime scene. If they threw the body in the trunk and left then the cops/bikers would have zero leads.

I'll probably keep watching.

There was NO time to collect that body in the rush of everything, r17. They barely got out without getting shot themselves.

What I haven't been able to figure out - is the young biker with the (almost) shaved head related to the Tom Pelphrey character (with the pony tail)? I thought they were seen together when the younger sister was looking through a box of family photos. But they have different last names.

All the people with guns were dead, r17. It was a bad situation but they definitely had time to drag away their dead accomplice. It's not like bullets were flying at them and his dead body weighed 400 pounds.

r20, we as the audience may have known everyone with guns were dead but how would they have known that (especially in that commotion)?

Or that the police weren't notified by neighbors and on their way?

They didn't rob a 10,000 sqft mansion, r21. If there was another biker with a gun in that shitty house then they wouldn't have waited to reveal themselves. They would have jumped in on the action when the robbers were killing the either of the two bikers or the biker girlfriend.

It also doesn't take that long to drag a 130 pound corpse to the car, r22. Both robbers were in-shape

From a writing perspective, I understand that they needed to leave the body for the cops/bikers to trace it back to them and for the show to have tension. I'm saying it didn't make sense for the characters to fuck up that badly, especially since they planned the robbery carefully and remained pretty calm even while it was going to shit.

Questionable plotting or lazy verisimilitude, so soon, is not a good sign. Or are you the guy who does that in every series he watches?

I *think* the young biker killed the brother of the Tom character, who was also the father of the female who’s been looking out for the young boy.

Oh my. I thought the young woman looking after the children was the younger sister of the kids' father (Tom Pelphrey). So she's actually his niece?

Very confusing.

Exactly. And how did the poor niece end up taking care of 3 kids (2 from her uncle and one who was kidnapped, none of whom are hers) and her uncle? What happened to her mother and his wife? They left because it was so dreary?

Plus the Mark Ruffalo family drama is equally convoluted - one adopted son in jail for killing the mom of the family, and the other adopted daughter wants to testify on her brother's behalf but the rest of the family don't want her to. The dad is an alcoholic and the real daughter is a bitch.

They are starting to do the same thing with the members of the task force - they are a mess.

I'll stick with it, but it's already not as strong as Mare of Easttown because we know who committed the crimes and are just waiting for them to be arrested and/or killed.

DL fave Roman Todd has a featured role in episode 4!

The masks they wore would be great for Halloween.

R27 you forgot to mention Ruffalo 's character is a former priest.

r30, you forgot to mention that Mark Ruffalo is wearing exaggerated tummy padding.

I found tonight's episode to be too brutal for me. Beating a person until he's almost dead and then wrapping cling wrap around his head and face to finish him off is a bridge too far.

It was a good episode though. Gruesome death, I agree. Now. I have questions. First, the bad guys, the motorcycle club guys, their top guy believes there was an informer leaking info to the robbers, right? So he went to see the girl who was heating on Jayson and menaced her asking her if it washer. But OTOH, doesn't the task force also believe someone is leaking information, too? Like, what happen when they had all the cops staking out the park, and the dope guys were in an entirely other location? And WTF is that gorgeous cop bothering with that ditzy fuck up girl cop?

It was suggested that Martha Plimpton (the cop who set up the task force) is the leaker to the gang. But that makes no sense why she would want to help a gang and rat out her police force.

It also was not clear how the drop-off was changed by the gang without the police knowing.

It's kind of grim police porn. There's only 3 more episodes.

There are two leakers. One from the Dark Hearts (which we know to be Eryn) is leaking to the robbers (Robbie and Cliff) and someone from law enforcement (we don’t know who yet) is leaking to the Dark Hearts.

My questions are: How was Cliff texting with the Dark Hearts and not the Task force? Is the leaker supposed to have switched out the burner phone? And where did the gun and holster that Perry pulled out at the end come from?

I have the very same question you posed, r35.

I was totally transfixed with the episode but there were more than a few confusing moments, including the hot hairy-chested Italian cop suddenly losing his hard-on. Though with that ditzy girl, I can hardly blame him.

I suppose the Martha Plimpton character could be leaking info for a big cash pay-off from the drug dealers though that does seem far-fetched.

Poor Raul Castillo (interesting that character was called Cliff Broward, an un-Hispanic name) has come a long way from Looking.

Good location choice to show the dark, miserable, working poor who are made more miserable by seeing the extreme affluence around them. Philly suburbs have some of the most extreme have /have-not juxtapositions in the United States. Beautiful wealthy neighborhoods near run down, desperate communities of people barely surviving and doing drugs and drinking to numb their misery.

These shows I have to watch slowly as they are good but too bleak to watch continuously. For example, I loved Breaking Bad but had to take breaks.

Now it’s harder to watch shows like this when our news cycle is also filled with self serving criminal sociopaths.

R35 wasn't that the gun Cliff Broward had with him? I remember he had it on the seat and then picked it up to make sure it was ready to use. After the car wreck I guess Perry retrieved the gun when they took Broward. Mark Ruffalo's character was eyeing his task force crew after the botched stake out. I hope the leaker on the cops' side isn't the hot cop.

Martha Plimpton is Jason’s mother!

Is the hot Italian cop also part of the local PD or is he FBI? Because IMO, he's my candidate as the Leaker. And if not him, than the ditzy ,incompetent girl cop.

I've made the mistake of watching this and BLACK RABBIT on Netflix at the same time. I'll need a spate of dumb romcoms after finishing these two shows.

BLACK RABBIT is, unfortunately, as overwritten as OZARK became.

Is it as self-important and dreary as Mare of Easttown?

I’m crying as I type this

Far, far drearier, R43.

I'm a resident of the Philly area, so I know Delaware County (where Task is set and filmed).

But even I have a hard time believing every other Delco resident is a long haired, bearded, inked, pathological drug dealer prone to violence.

Fabien Frankel gives my penis life.

This series is all over the place. Something tells me the black female cop on the task force is the leaker. At this point I don't really care. It's one of those series you start watching and feel committed to stick with, even though it sucks.

Would anyone on the law enforcement side be a leaker for any reason other than cash pay-offs?

I get why anyone wouldn't want to binge this series (the bleakness and violence) but I do find having to wait a week between each episode is very hard on my old memory.

That's one you need a "previously on..." Especially if you take two weeks between episodes.

But the plot is so complex a 3 minute review of last week doesn't really do it for me a week later.

I don't find the plot that complex, but I do have a job trying to keep up with the characters. I think I finally figured that part out this week. So you have these three guys who are losers who work as garbage men and pull armed robberies. They are loser criminal types. Then you have the motorcycle gang who are stone thugs and deal drugs. So one of the motorcycle gang's women hooks up with a loser thug garbage man and gives them tips on who to rob. The Task force is looking at the motorcycle gang but also trying to get a lead on the robbers, especially since some guy got shot. I think his name was peaches? And the man and woman in the house got murdered during the robbery. And the little boy Sam is the child whose parents got murdered. His father was a member of the motorcycle gang. There was supposed to be drug money in the house but instead there were drugs but no money. So the losers are trying to get rid of the drugs and get paid and then one of the losers goes to the park to make the deal with the motorcycle gang guys, and they beat him and kill him instead. So now there's one loser guy left and he has the kid. And the motorcycle gang leader, Perry was given orders to kill Jayson who's wife cheated and leaked to the robbers. Now. Did I get it right or what???

Was it a new reveal last episode when Perry was studying the photos in his album and saw Tom Pelphrey's (Bobby's?) sister/sister-in-law/niece/whoever she is....in a photo hugging Jayson?

Tom Pelphrey = Robbie

Also, doesn't Pelphrey look like a rough-ridden Timothy Hutton?

I've haven't seen so much cigarette smoking in a TV series in a long time. I thought that was being outlawed.

OK. I have watched the first 4 episodes and I have come to the conclusion the Task force leak is Martha Plimpton. Seriously.

[quote] I have come to the conclusion the Task force leak is Martha Plimpton. Seriously.

Well it certainly could be her but they made her behavior so obvious in the moat recent episode that it screamed RED HERRING!

Yeah, I feel if it's Martha they've erred in tipping us to that character way too early.

R55 HBO probably said fuck off. They have power.

[quote] Did I get it right or what???

R52, your summary follows my understanding of the show so unless we are both wrong it looks good to me!

I am not convinced Martha Plimpton is a Red Herring. There's only two more episodes. We are suspicious of her, but Mark Ruffalo is not and he keeps telling her shit. It builds tension. Also as I Went back and rewatched these first 4 episodes, first thing Martha said was that she was leaving and only just found out the night before she told Mark Ruffalo. OK. If it's not her, then it has to be the hot g uy, Grasso. He was part of an organized crime unit before he came to the task force. And my third choice is the ditzy white girl Stover.

[quote]Hollywood has been outsourcing their actors for a good 15 years now. In a country of 350 million people it would not be hard to find enough decent American actors to play the roles of Americans in tv series and movies- I HATE this trend.

Or, Hollywood realized that entertainment is changing. The line between film and TV is gone. The identity and importance of big, legacy production companies is in the past.

British actors. Spanish actors. Argentine actors. Italian actors... In many places outside the U.S. you can find better actors whose performances have interest and dimension and subtlety and an immediacy that few American actors exhibit.

A USDA stamp on one's ass doesn't make for a better actor (no more than it necessarily means a worse actor). I don't get the "Buy American" actors grumbling. The "cream" that rises to the top among American actors is rarely the best. Now they have to compete with international casts of actors, fresh faces who know how to act (rather than just pose to show off their best angle), no wonder they're bothered. But it's a better deal for the viewer (who isn't predisposed to that "Proudly Made in the US of A" business.

Do you bitches really think I'd take on this ugly dykey role if I weren't the informer??

[quote] I never miss an HBO mini-series starring Mark Ruffalo.

I never miss a musical starring Liv Ullmann!

Think about this. Mark Ruffalo's task force is a real motley crew. The young Black FBI agent is excellent, but seems young. Grasso is a mystery except he was assigned to organized crime before Ruffalo got him. And the Ditzy state trooper is just a totally unreliable fuck up. Of course Ruffalo is not exactly a star agent. He was passing out brochures before he got the Task force assignment. He's a drunk who's wife was killed by his mentally ill adopted son, who is awaiting sentencing. It's a shit show all around. Plimpton is leaving. I think Plimpton thinks she can easily hide behind all these very flawed people nd get way with a nice little pay off as she exits.

R35, how did you not understand that the FBI task force commanding officer, played by Martha Plimpton, is the leaker? She literally picked up the phone and called Jason, the moment Ruffallo walked out of her office.

As an aside, I cannot believe that’s actually Martha Plimpton!

Martha, back when she was the IT Girl…

I've worked with Martha and she is very unpleasant. When she's unhappy she wants everyone in the room to be unhappy.

R68, back in the 80s, she was notorious for being a total cunt in the NYC club scene.

Drugs. LOTS & LOTS of drugs.

Ruffalo and Pelphrey were very good in tonight's episode.

This is turning out to be really good. Especially tonight, although I am bummed about the informer.

I want to see Emmy nominations next time for those two.

Martha Plimpton has always been on point with her acting.

For the love of Pete, don't kill Robbie off, HBO.

Somehow I think the informer will be vindicated as some kind of double agent.

Great episode! I really wish HBO had ended the series with a two part finale tonight.

Pelphrey is an amazing actor, actually making us sympathize with Robbie, even after all he's done. Also, have to credit the writers for that, of course.

He is and I also find him hot.

Pelphrey was a total find when he landed Guiding Light for 5 years. He went toe to toe with Kim Zimmer.

Pelphrey's having my career!!!

Great episode but didn't it seem odd that Plimpton suddenly abandoned her interview with Maeve and was driving the other cops to find Ruffalo??

Cops stick together.

I was disappointed they named Grasso as the informant. It doesn’t make sense why he would help the gang to commit crimes including a murder. Otherwise it was a great episode of acting and writing.

r82, as I said just upthread, I'm betting Grasso's seeming complicity with the bikers will be a far more complex relationship and he'll somehow be vindicated as a good guy infiltrating the gangs for info.

I could be totally wrong but the writing here is never that simple.

R83, I was thinking the same thing. Hoping that he will turn into the more sympathetic version of Matt Damon's character in The Departed. I see him killing Jayson, and the older guy. And when I fisrt mentioned "the informer " was careful not to say who it was, since it just aired last night and maybe people haven't seen it yet. Oh well.

I'm not r82 but, please, everyone - don't come to this thread if you aren't up to date with each aired episode. In my upthread comment at r75 I didn't reveal the so-called informant.

I mentioned the informer at R71 but did not identify.

Maybe Grasso is undercover with FBI and made a deal with Jayson to try and return the stolen drugs, in return for some kind of leniency. Maybe he doesn’t know about Jayson’s murders. But it’s seeming like a stretch of reason unless they can explain it. The writer said Grasso was in over his head.

If the teens hadn't been listening to their music so loud, they would have heard the woman screaming.

R88, you are a fucking genius!!!!

The girl friend who was drowned - who was she spying for? I guess, a cut of money could explain it......

She was spying for Robbie since they both hated Jayson for killing his brother who was her lover.

Ah, of course! I guess I knew that but the relations and history are so complex.

Perry, the old guy who killed Jayson's woman? I watched an interview with the actor and he described the character as like an alligator who is swimming silently along, tracking his prey, then snap! Boom he gets them. Lethal and predatory.

I need Grasso to set up the bad guys! He can still do it. He has time. And the way this last episode ended? You have the FBI guys out numbered and possibly getting ambushed. How the hell can Grasso lead his own people into an ambush? Talk about a fucking cliffhanger.

In fairness, in Mare of Easttown, the novel thing about it is that the world-weary cop with a shitty home life who thinks the rules don’t apply to him was played by a woman.

Otherwise, it’s a crime drama like any other.

Pelphrey was scorching hot as Jonathan on Guiding Light. So much anger and resentment. He’d rage and all you could think was how hot a fuck he’d give. Damn.

Unless I missed something, Tom didn’t recognize Maeve as the woman he’d talked to at the strip mall, did he?

Good catch, R96. I didn't even think of it. Unless I missed something that's a snafu.

Pelphrey and Kaley Cuocco have a child together and plan to marry.

Did Tom encounter Maeve in the latest episode? I don't think so.

R98 Tom’s going to be very rich marrying her.

Why does Robbie use a flip phone? I didn't know they were still made.

That flip phone is something I'd bet a million dollars the actor thought up and requested and the producers indulged him.

OK. Can anyone think of scenario where Grasso can extricate himself? Perry, Jayson and their crew are tracking Bobby. Mark Ruffalo and the FBI task force are tacking Bobby. At some point there has to be a confrontation and a shoot out. Now the question becomes: How can Grasso alert his FBI colleagues they're about to get ambushed, without him giving himself away? And if he doesn't, is he giving the motorcycle gang a heads up? WTF. This is a nail biter.

The cast is a little too large.They could have made the task force a bit smaller. The size of the cast makes the plot seem more complex than it really is. It’s a show that forces you to pay attention.

I like the idea of setting it in white trash suburbs. Not really recognized although a lot of places have them—the suburbs S and E of LA that are mostly Hispanic were like that for a couple generations; parts of Prince William County near DC is like this, parts of Lake County, outside of Cleveland has this quality.much more interesting than the backwoods or some badly portrayed city.

When Grasso met Jason under the bridge, I have expected them to make out to blow everyone's mind. That Jayson actor is hot. But it's bugging me that Grasso is doing anything with Jayson who is a psychopath. I half expect them to pull out that they grew up together as children.

[quote] Did Tom encounter Maeve in the latest episode?

He’s shown her photo.

R104 It was shot in the Philadelphia area.

We got them types in rural Georgia and the "distant" suburbs.

I agree ithe cast is a bit excessive. Too many unnecessary subplots. It’s like a Stephen King novel.

Does anyone think Robbie is going to end up majorly undercover or have I not caught up enough?

I think he'll end up dead. I won't like it and still hold a grudge HBO of how you brutally killed off Joel in The Last of Us. He was a beloved character and though Robbie isn't at the same level of beloved, we all like him.

We know Robbie is gonna die because he already told Mark Ruffalo's character to see about his kids. It was a foreshadowing... My prediction is that Perry and Jayson and the dirty cop, Grasso, are all going to survive, along with Mark Ruffalo.

Who will adopt Sam? Tom?

I really did not want to watch this show. But I am glad I stuck with it. I loved the last episode. Damn it was tense!

R107: At this point, we all know that, and someone even got defensive because it makes Delco look trashy when only part of it is.

OK. So I have been reading recaps of thi last episode, and Decider insists that Grasso is not the only informant the Dark Hearts have. In fact they're pointing to Martha Plimpton. We shall see. Everyone is praising Pelphrey and Ruffalo for their scenes together. This series is going to get some nominations. Writing, Directing and acting.

What are we to make of the coitus interruptus between Grasso and the dumb girl cop?

R117, I was thinking about that. It seems so....fake. I feel like he is playing her. He knows the young Black woman agent is sharp. Smart. Misses nothing. But Miss Ditzy is someone who may be useful? I just don't see how she'd be useful.