Turned in one of the most intense and most successful Frontier Partisans Biathlons in the storied annals of that endeavor this morning. Both high volume and high tempo, which I don’t do too often anymore. Conditions were perfect, and the shooting was about as good as I am capable of doing — which is gratifying.
I went out deliberately to go hard because I desperately needed some isolation and focused, hard physical work. My introvert meter is pegged in the red, mostly due to newspaper work, and I found myself in a state of dark dudgeon at the prospects the near future holds for our Republic and our kind. On the “gigantic melancholies” end of the Cimmerian spectrum.
In other words, I was unfit for civilized company and needed to sound my barbaric yawp. So I did, and it was good.
I tried to stay off any form of media — but one of mi compadres sent up a smoke signal, and a dutiful scout must report:
Larry McMurtry’s classic Lonesome Dove novel is returning to television as a Netflix series. The streamer has greenlighted the Western drama from Zoe Kazan and Jeb Stuart, co-showrunners of Netflix’s upcoming East of Eden limited series, and Teton Ridge Entertainment.
That’s from Deadline.
“After our singular experience on East of Eden, we are thrilled to be teaming with Netflix again, along with Teton Ridge Entertainment, to bring Larry McMurtry’s western classic to life,” Kazan and Stuart said in a statement. “We come to this material with love and respect, and can’t wait to hit the trail with Gus and Call and the rest of these beloved characters. Yee-haw.”
Yee-fuckin’-haw.
I’ll make allowances for my dark mood here, and simply say that I don’t think we need this and I wish they wouldn’t do it. There are many, many great frontier stories to tell, and I honestly don’t see how they can tell this one better than it’s already been told.
That said, I have been intrigued by the imagery from the forthcoming East of Eden.
So… we’ll see. If these people can reach the high bar set in the original cinematic depiction of Gus and Call, if they can do proper honor to McMurtry’s classic anti-Western Western classic, well, Crom will be pleased and I will happily slide right on over to the “gigantic mirth” end of the Cimmerian spectrum.
Now, I must return to the Mohawk Valley…
Quixotic Mainer says
To paraphrase Boromir; Gondor has no Lonesome Dove remake. Gondor needs no Lonesome Dove remake.
Maybe I’ve been streaming too much Sean Ryan, but the soy temu quality remakes and sequels to almost every property I love almost seem like intentional psy op vandalism.
But I’m a bit in the yawp mode myself!
JimC says
“Reimagined for a modern audience” is a red flag. There’s just too much of it to dismiss the idea that it is intentional vandalism out of hand. If you love and respect the original work, you don”t need to “fix” it.
Matthew Ilseman says
“Reimagined for a modern audience” means “reimagined for the values of a hollywood producer” usually.
The Black Tyrone says
Shades of ‘Penny Dreadful’ from Showtime? Looks interesting though I suspect my comparison.
deuce says
I have ZERO trust in these people. I just mentioned to a friend in TX that LONESOME DOVE is the “ALMOST great, mythic ‘American Novel’ “. Of course, it truly is NOT, because such a thing cannot be achieved. That said, McMurtry–an ERB and REH fan–did one hell of a job.
Our moral superiors out in Hollywood need to keep their filthy mitts off of actual American content.
Hammer says
Robert Duval will ALWAYS be Augustus McCrae. Full stop.
That said, there are more people than not at this point who were born well after McMurtry’s opus, and have no tell of it. If it brings them around, I suppose there are worse things.
And indeed I’m working hard to be charitable here, because otherwise my dudgeon knows no bottom of late. But I have a moose tag in my pocket, and will soon be wandering the mountains above m home, and that has never not been therapeutic. Find solace however you can, Partisans. We’re gonna need it.
JimC says
Man, there seems to be a theme here. Enjoy that hunt!
Craig Rullman says
In the reimagining, Blue Duck is a vegan socialist enraged that GLP-1s are an attempt to “genocide fat people”, Gus offers a land acknowledgement prior to stealing Mexican cattle, Newt leaves the cattle drive in Dodge City to start a gay dance troupe, Deets demands reparations, and Jake Young, who has decided that he is actually a woman, is allowed to walk for killing sodbusters because the cowboys are conflicted about Jake’s claims of postpartum depression. Boom. Reimagined in a modern context.
JimC says
You have a career waiting at the Babylon Bee.
Craig Rullman says
Dream job.
Matthew Ilseman says
That was hilarious.
Matthew Ilseman says
Since this will probably be crap, here are some videos to take your mind off it.
A video on Apache running
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMn9ZWki324
and a video on the Lord of the Rings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMn9ZWki324
deuce says
Thanks, Matthew! I was just discussing Apache running with my mom last night.
Quixotic Mainer says
I actually tried the Apache run where you have to hang on to a mouthful of water once. That was terrible, but I can see how it would train the lungs fast.
Travis Slusser says
“Live through it,” Call said. “That’s all we can do.”
Wayne says
What’s next? A remake of The Searchers? Blasphemy!
J.F. Bell says
Much as I dislike remakes…I would be willing to entertain a verion of The Searchers that stuck some closer to LeMay’s book and had a little less of the classic Hollywood cheese, and the eclipsing factor of John Wayne, and was possibly set somewhere that looked passable like the old Comancheria vice Death Valley.
Opinions vary – and sharply at that – on how the Coen Brothers’ take on True Grit stood in relation to the original (I favored the remake). Different story for the Magificent Seven. In similar vein, albeit off our range some, I’ve long thought The Caine Mutiny could have done with an overhaul, given how much was cut or made footnote between book and movie. That said, between the current state of Hollywood and the lightning-in-a-bottle perfection that was the original, the ONLY, Lonesome Dove, I don’t see much percentage in going back around.
Significantly, were three attempts to fill the boots of Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones after the series; Comanche Moon came closest in showing us the characters in younger days…but suffered from aimless direction and a lackluster story that did little and went nowhere. The original was an event in many regards – it largely brought back the western genre from celluloid death, it booted Larry McMurtry into the spotlight (I’m about fifty-fifty on this somedays) and above all…well, it was put together by people with pride in their work, and maybe best of the lot, it was just enjoyable to watch.
I don’t think we’ll be so lucky again.
Greg Marshall says
Such a bad idea. Like the remake of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, a better version cannot be made.
Why not just go back, clean up the original source material, re-digitize, reformat and actually STREAM the ORIGINAL.
Justwatch.com says there’s no source for streaming, although I could buy a Blu-ray.
I last watched it on from my dad’s VHS tapes just before they went into the bin, along with the player.
JimC says
Ugh. I had forgotten about the Magnificent Seven remake — must have blocked it out. I also did not care for the remake of 3:10 From Yuma.
Cooter Brown says
Lonesome Dove is streaming on Tubi. There are commercials but Tubi is very good about not cutting anything, and when they come back from a commercial they actually go back a couple of seconds in the scene.
Clay says
Lonesome Dove is a great book and a great series.
Just don’t watch the new version.
Rick Schwertfeger says
Remakes are highly problematic. Even first attempts at bringing a novel to the screen frequently are. In one case: I never have watched the movie of All the Pretty Horses. The novel is my A#1 most favorite. And McCarthy’s novel is tremendously cinematic. I have the whole thing seared into my mind. I don’t even know how good the movie is. I just can’t watch it!
The movie East of Eden is one of the very greatest American movies ever made, IMHO. I, too, wish that they wouldn’t do it. BUT, it was just one year ago that I first read Steinbeck’s magnificent masterpiece. And it was eyeopening, because the whole first approximately half of the novel is not in the movie. I understood right away: It is too big an epic for one movie to include it all. So, I will be interested to see how they present the first part.
JimC says
The movie of All the Pretty Horses is not good. At all. Except for the soundtrack. That is very good.