#mark liston

Unless you already know better, it’s difficult to tell if he’s trying to treat them fairly, or if he’s actively trying to bait you in to having hope for them only to fuck them up the most (ie. going for the film version’s ending in this case) until you know that he’s actively trying to bait you in to having hope for them only to fuck them up the most.

First, he has Deran screw that business association asshole (semi-good for the character, though, the scene was noticeably more censored than any of the show’s straight sex scenes and he still wants his money/bad for shippers), then, he has Adrian clearly trying to give Deran a second chance and then them having a mature and honest conversation in which the thing with the business association asshole is easily exposed, and, therefore, defused, with out any bullshit drama (both very good for the characters and shippers alike), but Adrian is supposed to be seen in only one more episode this season (and the series has yet to be renewed for an other season) and that’s Episode 11 of 12 (and we’ve got two more before that) ...

Yesterday, I watched the film version of Animal Kingdom to ‘re-familiarize’ myself with the overall storyline and gain a stronger sense of where the series might be heading, and it turns out that I actually hadn’t seen it before. In the unknown movie about a family of criminals that my mind was confusing it with, the gay character is the only one who’s sent to prison, with, as I recall, only one other member being killed by the police. Alternatively, in Animal Kingdom, Darren (let’s take a minute to appreciate that they changed his name for the show to a less traditional spelling seemingly just to exhibit how Deran is the type of guy who can’t give enough fucks to correct you when you mispronounce his name like Mark repeatedly did at the business association meeting) is the only uncle to not die, nor doesn’t he end up in prison, either, and it’s not even confirmed that Darren is gay, Pope just picks on him by asking if he’s gay because he wore a pink shirt to a funeral (again, kudos to the show for throwing that reference in, and flipping it to Pope wearing a purple shirt for a date instead). The film itself baffled me, because my tastes are normally on-par with Aussie entertainment, and it’s regaled as this masterpiece of Australian cinema, but I thought that it was a miss, unfortunately. It had things happening with out any thing really being discerned by them, I found Smurf to be much less captivating (probably being she was never in charge of the criminal activity, though, I do adore Jackie Weaver), and the pacing was tiresome. My initial reaction after viewing the film was wondering how they thought they could make a series out of this story, seeing as we never got the excitement of actually seeing any of the heists and none of the major plot points were met with the feeling of proper resolution, but then I thought about it as that being exactly it could be a series - adding the pacing, gravitas, and frenzy of it all. I’m saying that there could actually be some hope that Deran’s life isn’t about to go to shit, because this story isn’t what I thought it was, and they’ve made some very progressive changes from the source material already, but many of us have previously learnt the M.O. of this production team, and are wise enough not to hold our breaths.

*Watches tonight’s episode* ... Deran’s going to be mulling drugs for Marco?