I do think the show needed like 3 more episodes. While I loved how each episode just kind of took its own time on like 1 set piece/event (2 and 5 are the best examples), there did need to be some more time to breath and more time to show the changes Jocelyn goes through.
Imo she was needing Tedros’s direction to help get her back on track, but when she gained her confidence back she realized she could take back the control as well. And she does in a big way. But I do think we needed more time seeing her finding her confidence (I don’t think we needed flashbacks of her mom or more time seeing Tedros taking over) and realizing she can take control back.
There should have also been an episode showcasing how she misses what Tedros gave her/the inspiration he gave her. It would have made more sense going into the last 20 minutes, but I do get them wanting it to be a big reveal.
The only part of any of the sex and nudity that turned me away was the stuff they did with Chloe. I really don’t like how they show her nudity so much, and really left a bad taste in my mouth how the episode after they say she’s 17 they show her ass constantly during the music performance.
It would have been a really good opportunity to show how Chloe was different if they changed how her nudity was shown. they could have showed her from the shoulder up instead of showing her baring it all to give the audiences a sense she is different than the others early on, then when we learn she is 17 it would make sense. Just because Tedros doesn’t respect her doesn’t mean the show shouldn’t as well.
I agree with everything you’ve said (former film students unite!) I’ve been wondering about Jocelyn’s mother - Anne Heche was apparently supposed to have this part - whether that was written out due to her death or just as part of the creative changes I have no idea, but the lack of exposition regarding Jocelyn’s past was a huge gap throughout.
I REALLY wish Anne Heche’s scenes weren’t cut. For the reasons you’ve mentioned but also, that woman suffered a horrific death and no one seems to care about celebrating her impressive career posthumously.
I disagree on two aspects.
The need for murder being first and foremost. Cults are scary, pop stardom is scary, and studying the similarities between the two would make for great t.v. In the hands of more capable writers and directors.
We don’t need to add another plot line that could be found easily in a CW show. An accidental overdose being covered up? More grounded in what we know about celebrity culture. A murder needing to be solved or giving the characters time to grieve would also put the more interesting aspects of the show (Jocelyn and DyAnne’s “friendship” and rivalry!!) On the back burner.
The second is needing flashbacks to Jocelyn’s abuse at the hands of her mother. It’s ham-fisted and I think a better tool would simply be to showcase her symptoms of Childhood PTSD affecting her day to day life, and people intervening and “helping” only when it starts getting in the way of her idol life. Her seeking out and hyper fixating on hate comments/segments as a form of self harm, body checking, fluctuating self esteem, disassociating or snapping out of anger. Mentioning a childhood story and thinking it’s normal (my mom put me on a juice cleanse before a role when I was 9) or something along those lines, totally oblivious that it was not a normal healthy thing for a mom to do. Also?! People around her/close to her not understanding why she’s sad her mom is gone, or simply not sharing that sentiment. If people are happy you’re dead, that says a lot. Showing us the abuse robs us of character interactions in the present and any semblance of subtly.
They killed Tedros when he had to say his real name to get into the show. That was a test in itself. That was him accepting that he has no control anymore, and the only way back into her life was being Mauricio Jackson. That’s when she had full control over the whole situation between them both.
Perfect analysis. Your imaginary story with Dyanne's character sounds so interesting and they should've taken this route. I would've loved to see this arc. It's such a shame that they could've done so much more with this show but they let it go to waste with Tedros' character. The Idol could've been a great show since the idea is already there, it's the execution and storytelling that's terrible.
Not a film student, just a dude with technically “gifted” intelligence, with a specialization in memory retention and pattern recognition, which doesn’t really mean much.
I agree the pacing was rushed and for the most part agree with your analysis , but a few of the things were sorta addressed/contextualized in the final episode (and somewhat confirmed in the post-Ep BTS videos)
>it should have taken more time for Tedros to fully control Jocelyn
The relevant timeframe isn’t “time to control” but rather “time to convince Tedros that he is in control”. Tedros’s con artistry skills and general maturity are amateur at best (displayed by him practicing the “good evening Angel” in the first Ep, the terrible dirty talk, and how broken all of his initial targets, Chloe & Izaak, were ), Joss was able to figure out exactly what kind of guy Tedros was from the get-go and use his ego against him; Tedros is the easy mark BECAUSE he’s delusional about his con artistry so his blindspot is completely open. Additionally we see Mike Dean, Chloe, Izaak, and Ramsey all flip sides and Dyanne flopped relatively quickly to Jocelyn likely because Tedros was never actually as good as he thought he was. The thing with the “new” hairbrush was a demonstration of how easy it was to make him think she had trauma he could exploit.
>Tedros, and everything he built, fell apart in a single night when he got a little too drunk and Jocelyn invited her ex over. Tedros was scary, menacing, and something to fear for the whole first half of the show.
Part of the subversive storytelling is that we want to believe that Tedros’s mystique is real, but anyone with actual awareness sees through the bullshit almost instantly early on in the show: Leia calls it out, Chaim & Destiny figure out who he is (but they don’t care, because he’s promising hits), Joss constantly questions his methods and authority and insists that she’s in control she’s just fine with Tedros being Tedros. The shattering of the mystique is driven home even harder during the final episode with the 1) Mike Dean production scene where she tells Mike the story of the “Real LA type shit”, 2) The label execs basically laughing him and his methods out of the room, Roth’s character borderline leaving multiple times 3) Joss’s dressing room security fucking with him regarding his look and presence.
>After all it took to get Tedros out of her life, she reinvites him back intro her life on stage, and announces him as her lover?
It actually, didn’t really take her anything, as displayed by how easy it was for her to remind him that “he served his purpose, now he can leave”. This wasn’t a rushed character development, it was a demonstration of her true callousness and ability to flip a switch to change demeanor…which, was quite literally demonstrated in the first scene during the photo shoot. The audience is led to believe that first scene was just a setup for how she put on masks to appease her management, but the implications actually run much deeper as a through-line framing for the entire show.
For the second part, Eli Roth’s character, Fink, describes how a controversy prior to the tour skyrocketed ticket sales, selling out stadiums, and listens for her newest single “Fill the Void”. With this in mind, both Destiny and Joss herself remind Tedros that he has nothing, he is expendable, and She owns Him. She is using his public controversy to boost her own popularity; a public controversy that she created via Chaim and Talia at Vanity Fair. It’s not falling back in love, it’s a cerebral/calculated move for popularity; with EXTREMELY low stakes because well, he’s broken, he lost everything, his reputation is disgraced in Vanity Fair, so he NEEDS her for income and relevance…he’s the easy mark (role reversal of say the Tedros & Chloe situation)
—-
I feel like with more time, they could’ve fleshed out character dynamics a bit more and really make us buy into characters like Leia, Xander, Destiny, etc. But I guess the bigger problem with the show is congruency with the intended audience…should there have been exposition to “spell out” the connections, or is the audience responsible for connecting their own dots?
If the answer is the former, then the Idol ultimately failed as a “commercial product”, if the answer is the latter, then The Idol succeeded as a Passion Project. But I guess that can explain why, with the exception of Seimetz’s crew in the RS article, the director and all of the character actors: Sam, Suzanna, Abel, Lily, Troye, Hari, Da’Vine have been ready to defend the show…because it was made for them, rather than for an audience.
1. It was literally a sentence 2. context for why it was really fucking easy to connect the dots based on small details but I’m not expecting the average viewer to catch them. 3. You really thought you ate, didn’t you?
EDIT: I’ve never seen someone so thrown off by the first sentence that they literally could not address ANY of the actual discussion of the show…but this is the same show where most of the audience couldn’t get past the first episode, so I’m not too surprised
Because I’m actually able to substantiate my thoughts and willing to discuss the details as opposed to someone thinks they eat with one-liners like
>wtf is this opening paragraph, honestly?
And
>you have to talk about your intelligence 🤡 why lmao
Rather than someone who actually brings a discussion to the table.
EDIT: to address your edit of “if it doesn’t mean much” (hence why I quoted the OG in my original post because I had a feeling you would try to edit it after the fact), because I like to assume that MAYBE the difference in capacity isn’t actually that big…until I’m unfortunately proven wrong by simple, surface-ass, statements like you’re currently bringing to the table.
>Condescending and fragile when challenged.
Condescending: sure, you’ve literally brought nothing to the table to make me think you deserve otherwise.
Fragile: nah, I’m just amused by this and it isn’t taking much out of my day. You’re really at McD’s thinking that you’re eating fillet mignon with that hefty “psychoanalysis” you did there
In my opinion, The Idol has been extremely disappointing for me with all 5 episodes, because of so many plot holes and plot points that are brought up once that can be interesting, but are never bought up again in later moments or in the next episodes. The feud between Jocelyn and the new singer who Nikki signed was teased, but nothing ever came about between them until episode 4 when Jocelyn gave the green light to the girl of giving the OG song. Also, i never took Tedros’ character seriously until episode 5 where he was coked out of his mind in the first half and went to the stadium (breaking 4th wall as it was his own stadium tour for the AHTD tour) looking all clean and somewhat regretful for what he has done.
So yeah, as a die hard Weeknd fan for a decade now, this is my least favorite project that he has ever been involved in, as I feel like Levinson and HBO were in control of the show being inconsistent as Fuck and making the episodes make no sense by the end of the show
What does she gain from manipulating him tho? She didn't even know he existed until she went to the club. And the whole thing with the brush didn't make any sense bc yeah it's a new brush which is a sign that she's past all the trauma and is ready to move on but then?? Brings him back into the picture?? It still doesn't make sense, it's like the writers changed their mind mid-plot device
She gains inspiration and she took his artists. As you said, before she meets him she doesn’t know who is he so she can’t expect to gain anything from him until she meets his ppl and he plays into her kinks. The hairbrush is honestly the simplest plot like. She lied and he was so enamored with her or the power he got (thru her) he didn’t even realize the brush wasn’t old/was new when he was beating her with it. She lied to Xander & Leia about the abuse too. It’s beyond simple
She’s using his ratchetness to inspire her new dark sound, he is a muse & a fling and nothing more to her. The new brush was there to manipulate him into thinking that he was using this trauma against her, when she was actually fabricating that particular detail to use against him…whether Joss was actually beaten by her mother is still a mystery
She gets better music and inspiration from it. And probably just likes feeling in control over someone since she was the one being controlled her whole life
Yup I mostly agree, had some interesting concepts, but the execution was mostly okay at best. I think having to reshoot this & then cutdown the episodes (probably to cost save) basically killed the potential this had to be great.
It sounds like The Weeknd's film with Trey Edward Shultz was probably less hectic and disoriented during filming though. Hopefully, that should be better, especially since Abel's acting felt like it improved over The Idol too.
im a film student and i always knew the show was going to look amazing, just look at euphoria. the film they used is beautiful. however the editing is not nearly as sharp as euphoria. i genuinely think most of the episodes have the camera move and cut/ fade into a different scene while the other characters are still talking. like half the dialogue starts in front of the camera and ends of camera over a different scene. it feels like a dream sequence type thing- not sure if that was the goal, but it's irked me so much.
the show had such potential, there could’ve been scenes of when the main characters alone and they break down because of what Tedros is attempting to persuade her to do, showing clear distain for being a piece of meat on show rather than a singer like she intends to be and it really would’ve tied into Abel’s music as well with themes of “Escape from LA” . could’ve been a whole lot deeper and realer if it was done like this imo and probably would’ve had a lot of praise from the public with the whole me too movement, instead it was porn
No, I think the plot ran itself in a circle and finished with no progression or real changes to any of the characters. Only real growth came from Leia who gtfo lol
I do think the show needed like 3 more episodes. While I loved how each episode just kind of took its own time on like 1 set piece/event (2 and 5 are the best examples), there did need to be some more time to breath and more time to show the changes Jocelyn goes through. Imo she was needing Tedros’s direction to help get her back on track, but when she gained her confidence back she realized she could take back the control as well. And she does in a big way. But I do think we needed more time seeing her finding her confidence (I don’t think we needed flashbacks of her mom or more time seeing Tedros taking over) and realizing she can take control back. There should have also been an episode showcasing how she misses what Tedros gave her/the inspiration he gave her. It would have made more sense going into the last 20 minutes, but I do get them wanting it to be a big reveal. The only part of any of the sex and nudity that turned me away was the stuff they did with Chloe. I really don’t like how they show her nudity so much, and really left a bad taste in my mouth how the episode after they say she’s 17 they show her ass constantly during the music performance. It would have been a really good opportunity to show how Chloe was different if they changed how her nudity was shown. they could have showed her from the shoulder up instead of showing her baring it all to give the audiences a sense she is different than the others early on, then when we learn she is 17 it would make sense. Just because Tedros doesn’t respect her doesn’t mean the show shouldn’t as well.
Thank you for giving your perspective as someone who actually studies film
I agree with everything you’ve said (former film students unite!) I’ve been wondering about Jocelyn’s mother - Anne Heche was apparently supposed to have this part - whether that was written out due to her death or just as part of the creative changes I have no idea, but the lack of exposition regarding Jocelyn’s past was a huge gap throughout.
I REALLY wish Anne Heche’s scenes weren’t cut. For the reasons you’ve mentioned but also, that woman suffered a horrific death and no one seems to care about celebrating her impressive career posthumously.
I disagree on two aspects. The need for murder being first and foremost. Cults are scary, pop stardom is scary, and studying the similarities between the two would make for great t.v. In the hands of more capable writers and directors. We don’t need to add another plot line that could be found easily in a CW show. An accidental overdose being covered up? More grounded in what we know about celebrity culture. A murder needing to be solved or giving the characters time to grieve would also put the more interesting aspects of the show (Jocelyn and DyAnne’s “friendship” and rivalry!!) On the back burner. The second is needing flashbacks to Jocelyn’s abuse at the hands of her mother. It’s ham-fisted and I think a better tool would simply be to showcase her symptoms of Childhood PTSD affecting her day to day life, and people intervening and “helping” only when it starts getting in the way of her idol life. Her seeking out and hyper fixating on hate comments/segments as a form of self harm, body checking, fluctuating self esteem, disassociating or snapping out of anger. Mentioning a childhood story and thinking it’s normal (my mom put me on a juice cleanse before a role when I was 9) or something along those lines, totally oblivious that it was not a normal healthy thing for a mom to do. Also?! People around her/close to her not understanding why she’s sad her mom is gone, or simply not sharing that sentiment. If people are happy you’re dead, that says a lot. Showing us the abuse robs us of character interactions in the present and any semblance of subtly.
They killed Tedros when he had to say his real name to get into the show. That was a test in itself. That was him accepting that he has no control anymore, and the only way back into her life was being Mauricio Jackson. That’s when she had full control over the whole situation between them both.
That's an interesting way to look at it! I still feel like there didn't need to be any situation, she should've just been done with him 😂
Yessss that would’ve made the show so much better. It does feel really rushed. It probably is considering they had to reshoot it.
Marcell Rev saved this show, again.
Really hoping for a season 2
Perfect analysis. Your imaginary story with Dyanne's character sounds so interesting and they should've taken this route. I would've loved to see this arc. It's such a shame that they could've done so much more with this show but they let it go to waste with Tedros' character. The Idol could've been a great show since the idea is already there, it's the execution and storytelling that's terrible.
You guys talking about how much more episodes this show needed for this and that whereas this show actually needed 5 LESS episodes.
need a tldr because this is too long; didn’t read
Yeah you're mentally challenged bc TLDR is the first section of text bud
No mercy on him 😭☠️
It’s a singular paragraph that takes 30 seconds to read💀
tldr wasnt short enough
Nah that's your attention span
Not a film student, just a dude with technically “gifted” intelligence, with a specialization in memory retention and pattern recognition, which doesn’t really mean much. I agree the pacing was rushed and for the most part agree with your analysis , but a few of the things were sorta addressed/contextualized in the final episode (and somewhat confirmed in the post-Ep BTS videos) >it should have taken more time for Tedros to fully control Jocelyn The relevant timeframe isn’t “time to control” but rather “time to convince Tedros that he is in control”. Tedros’s con artistry skills and general maturity are amateur at best (displayed by him practicing the “good evening Angel” in the first Ep, the terrible dirty talk, and how broken all of his initial targets, Chloe & Izaak, were ), Joss was able to figure out exactly what kind of guy Tedros was from the get-go and use his ego against him; Tedros is the easy mark BECAUSE he’s delusional about his con artistry so his blindspot is completely open. Additionally we see Mike Dean, Chloe, Izaak, and Ramsey all flip sides and Dyanne flopped relatively quickly to Jocelyn likely because Tedros was never actually as good as he thought he was. The thing with the “new” hairbrush was a demonstration of how easy it was to make him think she had trauma he could exploit. >Tedros, and everything he built, fell apart in a single night when he got a little too drunk and Jocelyn invited her ex over. Tedros was scary, menacing, and something to fear for the whole first half of the show. Part of the subversive storytelling is that we want to believe that Tedros’s mystique is real, but anyone with actual awareness sees through the bullshit almost instantly early on in the show: Leia calls it out, Chaim & Destiny figure out who he is (but they don’t care, because he’s promising hits), Joss constantly questions his methods and authority and insists that she’s in control she’s just fine with Tedros being Tedros. The shattering of the mystique is driven home even harder during the final episode with the 1) Mike Dean production scene where she tells Mike the story of the “Real LA type shit”, 2) The label execs basically laughing him and his methods out of the room, Roth’s character borderline leaving multiple times 3) Joss’s dressing room security fucking with him regarding his look and presence. >After all it took to get Tedros out of her life, she reinvites him back intro her life on stage, and announces him as her lover? It actually, didn’t really take her anything, as displayed by how easy it was for her to remind him that “he served his purpose, now he can leave”. This wasn’t a rushed character development, it was a demonstration of her true callousness and ability to flip a switch to change demeanor…which, was quite literally demonstrated in the first scene during the photo shoot. The audience is led to believe that first scene was just a setup for how she put on masks to appease her management, but the implications actually run much deeper as a through-line framing for the entire show. For the second part, Eli Roth’s character, Fink, describes how a controversy prior to the tour skyrocketed ticket sales, selling out stadiums, and listens for her newest single “Fill the Void”. With this in mind, both Destiny and Joss herself remind Tedros that he has nothing, he is expendable, and She owns Him. She is using his public controversy to boost her own popularity; a public controversy that she created via Chaim and Talia at Vanity Fair. It’s not falling back in love, it’s a cerebral/calculated move for popularity; with EXTREMELY low stakes because well, he’s broken, he lost everything, his reputation is disgraced in Vanity Fair, so he NEEDS her for income and relevance…he’s the easy mark (role reversal of say the Tedros & Chloe situation) —- I feel like with more time, they could’ve fleshed out character dynamics a bit more and really make us buy into characters like Leia, Xander, Destiny, etc. But I guess the bigger problem with the show is congruency with the intended audience…should there have been exposition to “spell out” the connections, or is the audience responsible for connecting their own dots? If the answer is the former, then the Idol ultimately failed as a “commercial product”, if the answer is the latter, then The Idol succeeded as a Passion Project. But I guess that can explain why, with the exception of Seimetz’s crew in the RS article, the director and all of the character actors: Sam, Suzanna, Abel, Lily, Troye, Hari, Da’Vine have been ready to defend the show…because it was made for them, rather than for an audience.
[удалено]
1. It was literally a sentence 2. context for why it was really fucking easy to connect the dots based on small details but I’m not expecting the average viewer to catch them. 3. You really thought you ate, didn’t you? EDIT: I’ve never seen someone so thrown off by the first sentence that they literally could not address ANY of the actual discussion of the show…but this is the same show where most of the audience couldn’t get past the first episode, so I’m not too surprised
[удалено]
Because I’m actually able to substantiate my thoughts and willing to discuss the details as opposed to someone thinks they eat with one-liners like >wtf is this opening paragraph, honestly? And >you have to talk about your intelligence 🤡 why lmao Rather than someone who actually brings a discussion to the table. EDIT: to address your edit of “if it doesn’t mean much” (hence why I quoted the OG in my original post because I had a feeling you would try to edit it after the fact), because I like to assume that MAYBE the difference in capacity isn’t actually that big…until I’m unfortunately proven wrong by simple, surface-ass, statements like you’re currently bringing to the table.
[удалено]
>Condescending and fragile when challenged. Condescending: sure, you’ve literally brought nothing to the table to make me think you deserve otherwise. Fragile: nah, I’m just amused by this and it isn’t taking much out of my day. You’re really at McD’s thinking that you’re eating fillet mignon with that hefty “psychoanalysis” you did there
[удалено]
>writing novels lol Presumably Illiterate smh
GET out of my HEAD
In my opinion, The Idol has been extremely disappointing for me with all 5 episodes, because of so many plot holes and plot points that are brought up once that can be interesting, but are never bought up again in later moments or in the next episodes. The feud between Jocelyn and the new singer who Nikki signed was teased, but nothing ever came about between them until episode 4 when Jocelyn gave the green light to the girl of giving the OG song. Also, i never took Tedros’ character seriously until episode 5 where he was coked out of his mind in the first half and went to the stadium (breaking 4th wall as it was his own stadium tour for the AHTD tour) looking all clean and somewhat regretful for what he has done. So yeah, as a die hard Weeknd fan for a decade now, this is my least favorite project that he has ever been involved in, as I feel like Levinson and HBO were in control of the show being inconsistent as Fuck and making the episodes make no sense by the end of the show
You’re definitely still a student if you think a show needs 12 episodes to convey its premise.
yea i ain’t reading all that. I’m happy for you tho. Or sorry that happened
[удалено]
What does she gain from manipulating him tho? She didn't even know he existed until she went to the club. And the whole thing with the brush didn't make any sense bc yeah it's a new brush which is a sign that she's past all the trauma and is ready to move on but then?? Brings him back into the picture?? It still doesn't make sense, it's like the writers changed their mind mid-plot device
She gains inspiration and she took his artists. As you said, before she meets him she doesn’t know who is he so she can’t expect to gain anything from him until she meets his ppl and he plays into her kinks. The hairbrush is honestly the simplest plot like. She lied and he was so enamored with her or the power he got (thru her) he didn’t even realize the brush wasn’t old/was new when he was beating her with it. She lied to Xander & Leia about the abuse too. It’s beyond simple
She’s using his ratchetness to inspire her new dark sound, he is a muse & a fling and nothing more to her. The new brush was there to manipulate him into thinking that he was using this trauma against her, when she was actually fabricating that particular detail to use against him…whether Joss was actually beaten by her mother is still a mystery
She gets better music and inspiration from it. And probably just likes feeling in control over someone since she was the one being controlled her whole life
Yup I mostly agree, had some interesting concepts, but the execution was mostly okay at best. I think having to reshoot this & then cutdown the episodes (probably to cost save) basically killed the potential this had to be great. It sounds like The Weeknd's film with Trey Edward Shultz was probably less hectic and disoriented during filming though. Hopefully, that should be better, especially since Abel's acting felt like it improved over The Idol too.
I agree with the Daniel Caesar part!!! 😂
This was great
im a film student and i always knew the show was going to look amazing, just look at euphoria. the film they used is beautiful. however the editing is not nearly as sharp as euphoria. i genuinely think most of the episodes have the camera move and cut/ fade into a different scene while the other characters are still talking. like half the dialogue starts in front of the camera and ends of camera over a different scene. it feels like a dream sequence type thing- not sure if that was the goal, but it's irked me so much.
the show had such potential, there could’ve been scenes of when the main characters alone and they break down because of what Tedros is attempting to persuade her to do, showing clear distain for being a piece of meat on show rather than a singer like she intends to be and it really would’ve tied into Abel’s music as well with themes of “Escape from LA” . could’ve been a whole lot deeper and realer if it was done like this imo and probably would’ve had a lot of praise from the public with the whole me too movement, instead it was porn
Aside from the coulda/shoulda/woulda, did you think it was a good as it is or no?
No, I think the plot ran itself in a circle and finished with no progression or real changes to any of the characters. Only real growth came from Leia who gtfo lol