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Carnivàle - Season 1 (2003)

4,27 147 votes

Alternative title: Carnaval

IMDb score: 8,4 (46.759)

Episodes: 12

Playing time: 12 hour

Developed by: Daniel Knauf

Stars: Nick Stahl, Clancy Brown and Michael J. Anderson

Origin: United States

Releasedate: Sunday 14 September 2003

First aired on: HBO (Verenigde Staten)


Carnivàle plot

1934. The Dust Bowl. The last great age of sorcery. In a time of titanic sandstorms, horrific plagues, droughts and epidemics - signs of God's wrath and harbingers of the Apocalypse - the ultimate conflict between good and evil rages on. The battle takes place in the heart of an empire called America. The protagonists are Ben Hawkins, the tormented healer of a traveling circus, and Brother Justin Crowe, an Evangelical preacher. And when the battle is over, man will forever exchange wonder for reason.

Episodes Season 1 (2003)

  1. 1. Milfay

    14 September 2003 (1 hour)

  2. 2. After the Ball is Over

    21 September 2003 (1 hour)

  3. 3. Tipton

    28 September 2003 (1 hour)

  4. 4. Black Blizzard

    5 October 2003 (1 hour)

  5. 5. Babylon

    12 October 2003 (1 hour)

  6. 6. Pick a Number

    19 October 2003 (1 hour)

  7. 7. The River

    26 October 2003 (1 hour)

  8. 8. Lonnigan, Texas

    2 November 2003 (1 hour)

  9. 9. Insomnia

    9 November 2003 (1 hour)

  10. 10. Hot and Bothered

    16 November 2003 (1 hour)

  11. 11. Day of the Dead

    23 November 2003 (1 hour)

  12. 12. The Day That Was The Day

    30 November 2003 (1 hour)

Reviews & comments

avatar van Animosh_mm

Animosh_mm

  • 264 messages
  • 114 votes

Better than Twin Peaks, but it also shares its flaws.

Carnivàle is often compared to Twin Peaks, and rightly so. Like Twin Peaks, Carnivàle has a mysterious and foreboding atmosphere at its best with plenty of suspense that makes for some fantastic scenes (Justin's monologues are particularly memorable). Slowly but surely you discover the deeper roles of the characters in the "battle of good and evil", and that development is interesting to follow, especially in the more subtle and less clichéd first season.

But as with Twin Peaks, the "main storyline" is only a small part of the series. For a large part of the series you follow the series' fringe characters, each less captivating than the other. They are provincial types, who carry on boring dialogues while dealing with their everyday worries, such as some "romantic" adventures that lead to tension. It also doesn't help that the main character, Ben, is a peasant type who tries hard all season to do nothing. Understandable, but boring.

And in the second season, the series' weaknesses only come to the fore. The series becomes more explicit, less mysterious, and the characters lose their complexity. Sofie's development is captivating, but the other characters are fighting over who fits best.

So Carnivàle is not as good as I hoped. It has some very atmospheric scenes, some nice characters and a pretty fascinating main story, but like Twin Peaks, the series spends way too much time on the forgettable entanglements of uninteresting characters, making real highlights scarce. A lot of people complain that the series ended prematurely, but I especially think it's a shame that the two seasons it had weren't better spent. More focus and less filler would have done the series well. 3.25*

dutch flagTranslated from Dutch · View original

avatar van voskat

voskat

  • 1023 messages
  • 1087 votes

Slightly overrated. Just a very interesting series that unfortunately was never finished.

I think comparisons to Twin Peaks are unfair and too easy, perhaps because Carnivale dates back to a time when surrealistic elements were still rare on TV.

dutch flagTranslated from Dutch · View original

Gast

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