Boardwalk Empire Pilot

Boardwalk Empire

An $18 Million production budget,  with Academy Award Winning Director, Martin Scorsese doing the almost 2-hour pilot episode, for Emmy Award Winning Writer, Terence Winter's series creation --- Boardwalk Empire is expectedly a series of high calibre. It matters little whether it does well with ratings, in spite of its ambitious budget. For this is on HBO (cable), and they don't normally compete in that aspect. They do compete with awards. With a team like that, I guess awards should be expected when the Emmy's roll next year.

The pilot episode, which premiered the other day, starts off slow but it's hardly disappointing. You don't see everything happening in the pilot, anyway. The series showed me enough to make me want to watch it again in the weeks that will follow.

It's unsettling to imagine Steve Buscemi in the title role because I think that he works better as supporting to the lead character.  He does alright, being central to the story.  As Nucky, the city's treasurer who runs an illegal ring of liquor smugglers, he carries the show quite well.

But I think I will like the layers to this Jimmy Damody character even better.  The pilot episode suggests Jimmy as going over to the dark side. I predict that as the show progresses, Jimmy, who serves as Nucky's driver and boy friday, will become his ultimate competition, his biggest headache.

I have this fascination for mobs, gangsters and organized crimes, as depicted on films and TV because they're such interesting human studies. They have this inner conflict, this weakness to be evil even when they may have this innate goodness in them.  I find it interesting that they can do stuff above the law and then justify the act because it gratifies and benefits someone (e.g. killing a battered woman's abusive husband as it was in Boardwalk Empire). This is the kind of conflict we will see a lot on this show.

Boardwalk Empire is touted as one of this season's best. I can't argue with that. It's been satisfactory, so far.