John Adams

I saw the first episode last night and thought it was great. One question though for anybody else who saw it -- when Adams was riding his horse through that field in the first scene of the first episode and walked past those bodies hanging from a tree with "Join or Die" written beneath it, were those actual hung bodies left there or were those merely effigies (similar to the ones seen later in the episode in the parade)?

Really looking forward to the other episodes of this.

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Very well done thus far.

BTW, Giamatti and the made-up David Morse, aside from being fantastic actors, bear striking resemblances to Adams and Washington, respectively.
 
DalTex,

They looked like actual hung bodies to me. I was very impressed. I really like the sets and the costumes as well as the story. The Pox freaked me out a little bit.
 
I thought both episodes were fantastic. Def a history buff's kind of series though.

Agree on the pox freaking me out. I did not know you could inoculate with actual Smallpox. I thought you did it with Cowpox.
 
Ended up staying up late to watch the second run on one of the other hbo's and then made the mistake of looking up John Adams on Wikipedia. Damn I was linking all over the place till like 3 in the morning.
 
It is good. But as for the history buff part you have to have good knowledge of the subject to appreciate much of what is going on...such as what the Boston Massacre was really about and who was the black man who he saw shot (Attucks). They don't do a good job at filling in the holes of the history for others who do not have the background.

I would have lilked to see a little bit more about his early years. The jumps seem very quick. One scene he is just a lawyer...next he is defending the British in the Boston Massacre (didn't a couple of the soldiers actually get charged with manslaughter, didn't see it in the movie)...next he is at the 1st and 2nd continental congresses...next they are forming and passing the Declaration of Independence.

That is a span of 6 years all total. But goes by very fast in the movie and nearly seems like it takes place in a year or two.

I believe Adams lives longer than any of the other framers.

It is simply amazing how many great men there were back then in politics.
 
I saw part of episode 1 and all of episode 2 last night. I paused several times to explain the situation to my non-American boyfriend, and we both liked the show alot. Couldn't figure out why they made the South Carolina guy out to be such a homo though.
 
I highly recommend McCullough's biography of Adams. I learned a great deal.

John is my boy for many things, but he was smart enough to recognize we needed a navy, that for the Constitution to make it abolition had to wait (not a good thing mind you, just wise), and that we needed to kick British ***. Not too shabby for a son of a farmer. He's my man when some idiot spouts off about the Founding Fathers being rich white dudes. Adams was no TJ.

TJ could write, but man, he wasn't worth a whole lot otherwise. Funny how he and Adams were buddies, became fierce enemies over their presidential face offs and then friends again late in life.
 
Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis is an excellent book and the last chapter describes the reconciliation of TJ and Adams and the letters they exchanged the last few decades.

I hope this HBO series shows how badly Jefferson stabbed Adams in the back and helped kick off the ugly side of US Partisan politics.
 
I started watching this the other day. I'm usually not big into movies or shows about that time period cuz i usually hate the way people talk but this is very interesting to see how our country was formed, I'm assuming this is all accurate.

I like the scene with TJ, B Frank, and John boy writing the Declaration.
 
Yes.

I am very fond of HIs Rotundity, John Adams. How can you not love the founding fathers, especially when they are cast in the light of this mini-series? A handful of rebels fighting the worlds superpower, England.
 
Franklin is an interesting character. Can someone recommend a definite biography? There's hundreds out there, but surely one is considered best.
 
My only gripe about the show is how fast it moves. There seem to be large gaps in the timeline that sometimes make it hard to follow if you aren't paying 100% attention.
 
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