I just bought the first season of this show on DVD and it's GREAT!!!!!! Check it out if you haven't already.

Season two is available on DVD now too I believe.

Chris

YES!!!! I can't stop watching this show. Thanks Chris

Yup!

It's a Crying Shame that HBO pulled the plug on this great show!

=Frank=

HBO didn't advertise the show enough, people started watching it from the middle and were lost, since it's one of those shows that you need to watch from the begining.


Brett.

I really wanted to like Carnivale, but found it fell so very short. The whole good/verses evil thing did nothing for me. There is more than enough in the way of story material within the life of a traveling carnival or a tent revival meeting troupe. There is no need to add in a slow moving David Lynch/Stephen King knock off story line.

The only thing I really like about the show was that they paid my old friend Johnny Meah a good chunk of change as technical advisor to make certain the carnival setting looked good.

Ditto...and they paid my buddy David Markham (The Miracle Man http://Laffpro.com ) to be the Fire Eater/Sword Swallower.

It was a maddening show to watch due to it's Theater Obscura approach...and of course it all fell apart when they couldn't complete the Satan/Jesus story arch as nobody watched to get picked up for another year.

Facinating on many levels...but ultimately frustrating as to how much potential it just tossed away to be whacked out Lynch like. Dead on Todd.


and Craig...I watched it from thje beginning...in fact each episode twice and I still didn't know what the hell was going on half the time.

Hey Mr. Higgs,

get your names straight! jeeze!

Brett.
(not Craig)

A sign of...aging. LOL

Brett...I would appologise but Danile botched that. Felix Unger to both of you.

Actually I was on the phone talking ABOUT Craig when I typed that...not a sign of aging as much as a sign of multi tasking without proper training.

I hate to disagree with you guys. I bought the dvd and this show has me hooked. It sucks it won't play out because it was cancelled......I love the armeggedon vibe ....and the battle between good and evil is cool to me ( I love the bizarre). They even have a mentalist. When have you ever seen a carnival lifestyle shown like this? Maybe Freaks? The banners are great....did Meah paint those? One other interesting thing is where the term "mark" might come from. In one episode, a guy would watch the "customers" and when anyone would have a wad of money, he would mark their back with chalk. That way, all the carnies would know where the money was! We need more shows like this...even if it wasn't perfect.

I'm glad you like Carnivale. It just wasn't for me.

The problem is that now that the series has ended, people (including myself) pitching carnival/sideshow based TV projects come up against development people saying, "HBO tried something like that. It didn't work." They then turn down the new project. I wish this wasn't the case, but it is the mentality of TV execs. It will take someone with a bit of vision to agree to air another show with this setting. If that show works, then every network will want a sideshow TV series. That's the way it will work. The question is, where the heck is that one TV exec with vision?

Johnny did not do the banners.

Todd,
Do you know who painted them, they are most def not the "meah" style. I don't recognize them at all.


Brett.

Todd.....you're right, TV execs only follow what's been.....instead of learning from that situation and taking it to the next level. It's also the promotion on carnivale.....I never knew it was on. I just saw it in best buy and bought it out of curiousity.

TV exec with vision.... HA! Either way (if you liked it, loved it or loathed it), I would have like to see the package finished up and wrapped properly. All we have is 2 seasons of DVD's with an open storyline and no ending.

I agree. The problem w/ most of the "morality play" type series over the past few years is that they have been cancelled before any type of conclusion. I would have liked to have seen BRIMSTONE, MIRACLES, and AMERICAN GOTHIC played out to a more complete ending. (Maybe I'm the only one and that's why they all met an early demise.)

I also missed the ending to KINGDOM HOSPITAL. I'm told that ABC yanked it from the airwaves before the miniseries ended, but USA picked up the last few episodes. I'm not sure if this is true, but it disappeared from my market before its conclusion.

And, unfortunately, even though the carnival was the backdrop for the surrealistic storyline, it does muddy the waters for future pitches of any storyline involving similar settings.

Chris

Have ya'll got the 2nd season on dvd? I can't find it.....was it released?

They're selling "Season 2" and "Season 1 and 2" editions right now. The first place I saw the S2 only DVD at a Target. You might check the database at a Best Buy or similar electronics store to see if it is an order-only or an item that they stock.

Some of the S2 and S1&2 DVDs have been up for sale on eBay, but not nearly as many as I've seen of the S1 set.

Chris

Thanks.....I saw the one on ebay but it was coming from Thailand, so I figured it might be bootlegged. I'm fiending for the next season