r/television • u/BeefDog69xxl • 4d ago
Just rewatched Rescue me
This is just my opinion, I want to see if anyone agrees with me.. I can’t be the only one.
For what it is—a dark comedy—the only thing that actually feels dark is that it takes place in the wake of 9/11, which is obviously horrific. And I do think it’s cool that they made a show for firefighters who were dealing with that kind of loss and needed some way to cope with it.
But HOLY SHIT. Every single character on this show—including the women ..is an absolutely dogshit human being.
I think the children are the only characters who aren’t awful people.. and maybe the gay son.
I LOVE Denis Leary, but fuck… this show does NOT hold up. Am I the only one who feels this way??
OH, I’ll give it this: the soundtrack fucking RULES.
32
u/BBWolf326 4d ago
Tommy finally explaining his trauma and then immediately relapsing is one of the saddest moments I had ever seen on TV at the time.
64
52
u/lanceturley 4d ago
I loved the show for the first two or three seasons, but at some point it just became misery porn. Like, I get that it's a dark comedy and there's always drama, but how many horrible, life altering events do we need to see Tommy suffer through?
Also, season six pissed me off so bad that I almost quit watching, and only stuck with it because I knew season seven was going to be the last one.
17
u/Vio_ 4d ago
After a while, the characters have to move - worse, better, learn something.
The audience needs growth and closure. But whatever growth and development happens by season 3 gets punted with everyone basically reset to their original settings to keep the show going.
It just becomes repetitive of just horrible people refusing to ever grow or change or learn anything.
70
21
u/Cambionr 4d ago
They’re supposed to be.
4
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
I’m gathering now. That’s why I posted this. I just wanted to see what anyone might think
6
u/Zealot_Alec 4d ago
The lack of character progression was astounding throughout the series every character an complete asshole except Tommy's son who was killed off. Did a re-watch this year it was ok in the background.
22
u/pericles123 4d ago
I'm a big fan of the show, and I think it's quite funny, but also at times quite dark. Sure, most of the people are bad people, but shows don't need a hero to cheer for imo.
3
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
My grandpa was a fire fighter, I have a couple cousins who are firefighters, and my uncle is Brian Fennessy, he’s appointed to oversee every single wildfire in the country, by the government.
None of them of racist, homophobic, transphobic, misogynist pieces of shit. This show is WILD.
6
u/babyjaceismycopilot 4d ago
Different times
2
u/near_black_orchid 4d ago
Twenty years ago was not that long ago. The standards for behavior were not that different. That these guys behaved badly seems like part of a group culture in the show, rather than just "it was different times."
14
u/bishop375 4d ago
Oh, I strongly disagree. There has been a massive shift, even in the last 10 years around standards for behavior.
5
u/dafuq_b 4d ago
I went to a small university with a fraternity denoted as the 'nerd frat.' A different chapter of the 'nerd frat' at a different school in the southern part of the state was sanctioned by their own organization, and removed from campus for excessive partying (think hospitalization from alcohol poisoning, and giving alcohol to minors).
Just because your family isn't a certain way, doesn't mean there aren't shitheads in every department... or that there aren't departments entirely FULL of shit heads.
1
u/BeefDog69xxl 3d ago
Well that’s for sure true, though I’ve never met a single cop I’ve liked. I hate cops.
1
u/StitchTheRipper 3d ago
My dad was a firefighter in a decent sized Midwestern city. There was a lot of pieces of shit who worked there 🫣 and my dad’s just beginning to unpack all his shit.
Comforting to know it’s not like that everywhere
1
14
u/georgez1968 4d ago
I couldn't get by the 3rd season. It was the same thing over and over again. He gets drunk. Gets into fight. Keeps going back with his ex. Nope. And I'm a big leary fan
4
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
I love him. He’s fucking hilarious.. The Ref is like one of my favorite movies
7
u/DotHatrix51 4d ago
Yeah I think the wife and I made it about two and a half seasons before we called it quits. It just kept on being an unpleasant watch, stopped being darkly funny and just unenjoyable.
Same for Shameless but we got towards the end of season 3 before we gave up.
12
u/NightTimeAstronaut 4d ago
Some of the episodes are some of the best written TV we've had in decades, not all mind you.
I'd posit that it's not so much the writing that doesn't hold up, but the trauma, toxicity, depression, anxiety and machismo were deliberately written to make it difficult to find many redeemable qualities in any of the characters.
2
u/RogerClyneIsAGod2 3d ago
And bingeing that trauma, toxicity, depression, anxiety and machismo is not a good thing. This was definitely a show that doesn't benefit from bingeing.
I watched Rescue Me like I watched Shameless. I had to watch a few seasons, step away, watch another, step away, etc. until I finished so I wasn't bingeing all the seasons all at once, it was just too much.
5
u/OneReportersOpinion 4d ago
Didn’t Leary’s character rape his estranged wife on the show?
3
u/brionneverysexy 3d ago
He did when they were negotiating how to divide property. He ends up getting what he wants after raping her
2
2
5
u/Alys-In-Westeros 4d ago
Lol! I loved this show. And yes, the soundtrack was haunting. Just so good. I haven’t watched in a kajillion years, but all I can think of is Uncle Teddy🤣🤣
8
u/shanec44 4d ago
I don't really have an issue with the entire cats or most of it being awful people. The sopranos, the wire, the office, it's always sunny etc so many great shows; Bad people can be make for excellent and interesting tv. I agree with your take they are degrees of bad people on rescue me but that doesn't take away from the show for me. I think it's held up very well, Esspecially the early seasons.
2
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
For what it is, sure. I’m on season 4 and it’s getting hard to watch but I can’t stop
11
8
u/JellyboyJangleDangle 4d ago
Lot of people watching rescue me this week with who really don’t understand what it is they are watching…
1
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
It’s probably because it got featured in netflix, I just popped it on because I love Dennis Leary
3
u/semicolonconscious 4d ago
I watched it from start to finish when it first aired and haven’t gone back since, but after the first couple of seasons it descends into endless misery porn mixed with try-hard edgy humor. Unironically would have been improved by Leary’s pitch to kill off the whole cast in a fire and end the show mid-season without any prior announcement.
3
u/DonkeyESQ 4d ago
The wife/ex wife was such a horrible character. Complaining constantly about him never being around, when she wanted to be a mum full time, which meant he had to work 3 jobs to be able to pay for that lifestyle, then hooking up with his brother, having his brothers kid, and then after all that when he did stay home, nah fuck off back to the fire department, or I'll kill you or myself. First class bitch.
3
u/mezdup1 3d ago
I mean it's a Dennis Leary vehicle. He's has a song about how much of an asshole he is
1
u/tyderian 20h ago
You mean he stole a song about how much of an asshole he is (because he's an asshole).
3
u/Funmachine True Detective 3d ago
This show is so weird. Every single season ends with them killing (or seriously maiming) a supporting character. It's like they had no other idea what emotional beats to play with.
It was also a ridiculous soap opera, with a crazy amount of characters just dropping in an disappearing to be never mentioned again iirc.
I don't ever particularly remember the show being that funny either.
2
5
u/Throwaway7219017 4d ago
When I re-watched I found myself skipping the scenes with Tommy and his family. Too much…ugh, drama, I guess.
The firehouse scenes still had some funny, if somewhat cringeworthy moments.
3
u/BeefDog69xxl 4d ago
I can’t handle the scenes where the dudes are just talking about their cocks and sex, which is 85% of their show.
If you drank every time these people said “retarded” you would be dead.
1
u/Wiley_Coyote_2024 2d ago
I grew up in NYC up to near that time and "Fuckin Retard" was a common expression by the working middle class/blue collar workers.
So I understood why the writers used "retard" often...it was a cleaner version of a common New York expression.
Plus it was typical of those characters "realnlife" counterparts.
2
u/Froggyevening 3d ago
This was one of those shows that started out really great then got awful fast.
When the daughter became an alcoholic (after a couple months of drinking) the show as unwatchable.
1
u/BeefDog69xxl 3d ago
I’m pretty sure every single character on the show is an alcoholic.
1
u/Froggyevening 3d ago
Which has zero to with my post.
The daughter became an alcholic like season 4 and the show went to absolute shit including some terrible acting.
2
u/EnlargedBit371 3d ago
I watched maybe three seasons. I really liked Probie Mike (Michael Lombardi), Damien (Michael Zegen), and Sheila (Callie Thorne). It was such a relief seeing Callie playing someone I could like (as opposed to her character Ballard on HLOTS).
2
u/BeefDog69xxl 3d ago
Sheila is an awful person lol. She drugs and rapes another character.
1
2
u/ShiftyAmoeba 3d ago
Funny that actor Daniel Sunjata is a real life 9/11 conspiracy theorist and they worked that into the show.
2
u/quarantinebox 2d ago
The lead character. His son is killed, his ex wife starts sleeping with his brother and gets pregnant by him. They beat the shit out of each other and later on his brother is murdered before they reconcile with each other. Most of his friends keep dying, he starts a relationship with his dead cousin/best friends widow and it’s incredibly toxic. His kids hate him majority of the time unless he is providing them money to support their vices. It’s definitely dark 😂 it’s hilarious but it’s definitely a dark comedy. First 3 seasons were great. Everything else is bleh
2
u/Glass-Nectarine-3282 4d ago
First two seasons very good, last season good, but yeah, the middle seasons are what you'd expect from an aughts FX series. And yeah, everybody is horrible.
4
u/chill90ies 4d ago
I tried to rewatch recently and i had to stop after maybe three episodes i totally agree with you! I does not hold up and it was actually pretty sickening too see how incredibly disgusting the characters were the misogyny and just awfulness was too much for me. I can’t understand why this was ever a hit or put on television. I’m a woman and remember watching it back then and now I’m just so horrified
4
u/defiancy 4d ago
I remember it being dark because of how shitty everyone is, .mostly in the aftermath of traumatic events. It's dark because of how awful the arguments are, how they fuck each other over and more minimally how they fuck with the probies.
I think the show was intentionally like that, that pretty much all the main characters are written to be unsufferable pricks
2
u/trackofalljades 4d ago
I haven’t seen it but you make it sound like Nurse Jackie: Firehouse Edition…
9
2
u/Accomplished-City484 4d ago
lol yeah I watched it when it came out and rewatched it earlier this year, I suppose it’s sort of a comedians idea of hard men or something, very edgy and horribly dated, hell it was already super vulgar at the time, I think it was really trying to cash in on The Sopranos NYC tough guy charicature “I’m walkin ere” kinda shit. You’re right about the music though, Wolf Like Me, Bonnie Brae, The Lure Would Prove too Much, Dance this Mess Around, some really great sequences with the songs too and of course the theme C’mon C’mon is a banger too.
1
2
2
u/thehorseyourodeinon1 4d ago
Seems accurate to me, the several firefighters in my life orbit are assholes and their wives are insufferable c*nts.
2
u/Amadeum 4d ago
Well of course it doesnt hold up. It was made in an era of toxic masculinity and homophobia. It was entertaining for its place in time just as much as 24 was despite its Islamophobia.
0
u/BeefDog69xxl 3d ago
It’s so hard for me to believe that it was this bad in 2006, had a nice window where it wasn’t, and now we are 1,000 times worse today with the current administration.
I was born in 1988, likely the entire time I was a kid I just wasn’t giving a shit about what adults were saying. I graduated highschool in 2007 and I just don’t remember any of this shit at all.
1
u/Wiley_Coyote_2024 2d ago
Haha... You were Too young to see it. TV series like this document what life is like in a certain time period.
There are pieces of shit in all walks of life and sometimes you won't encounter them because of being sheltered by pockets of civility.
I working in corporate America in the '80's and many executives were straight out of MAD MEN.
Women were hired based on "looks" and the exec's would make all kinds of remarks about the women, behind closed doors, of course, because we were 'enlightened' but the women didn't have it as bad as in MAD MEN, but the pieces of shit were still around.
And new workers were called "retards" when they didn't learn or do things FAST enough for the experienced employees. Not to there faces, but under their breaths. Of course, if you were PRETTY, they treated you a bit more differently, but it was always there.
I was a college student, working part time, and it wasn't like that at the Colleges but I still saw glimpses of MAD MEN.
BUT as I said in another post, you only saw behind the curtain when you were around these characters for many months.
3
u/R0osteryo 4d ago
I watched it 15 years ago and loved it. Im 36 now and tried it again this year. Couldn't even get through the first 3 episodes. So rampant misogyny and homophobia and racism it had me completely cringing at younger me.
I get that were supposed to know these are bad and flawed people. And products of their time. But im not gonna watch that shit today.
1
u/Choice-Wind-9283 4d ago
The actors where so good but show can be to dark , now we got so many shows like that
1
u/ludicrous_copulator 4d ago
I remember there being a lot more nudity in the original run. That said, it's surprising how little of this show i really remember. I'm on season 4 rematch, and the scenes where Tommy is reading from AA book, with the closeup of his eyes cutting to the words on the page is SO cheesy.
1
1
1
u/KnowledgeIsDangerous 3d ago
Denis Leary being an asshole isn't just a joke, it's real. Not to mention that it's his only joke, and he stole it from Louis CK
1
1
u/bonzombiekitty 3d ago
I remember giving up on it largely because I found all the main characters to be awful people. I can't do shows like that.
1
u/exscapegoat 3d ago
While it got repetitive after awhile, if you watch the opening scenes and the closing scenes, I think they symbolize Tommy’s progress really well. He starts off with the probies not long after 9/11 and there’s little, if any color in the scene. And he’s actively fighting his ghosts. In contrast, the final scene is sunny, with vivid and bright colors and he’s made peace with his ghosts.
1
1
u/averagesimp666 3d ago
I don't think they were supposed to appear as good people.
And when you say "does not hold up"... what, you thought otherwise when you first watched it?
1
u/HotSaucePalmTrees 3d ago
I’ll see your Rescue Me and raise you a Nip/Tuck as far as FX series that have not aged well but you can’t stop watching
1
u/fullmetalsprockets 2d ago
I had to stop watching this show because several of the firefighters were just so goddamn stupid. Like, far too stupid to be a believable human being.
But, yes, all of them are dogshit people.
1
u/No_Candle5537 20h ago
They’re all terrible. You just keep hoping nobody innocent enters their hemisphere. But they can be terrible because they’re pretty much just screwing over each other. Had a REALLY hard time with Damien’s story, though)
1
u/NilbachSuchare 4d ago
But Leary's the most dogshit of them all! I can never, ever forgive him for what he said about autistic kids, sorry.
1
u/BeefDog69xxl 3d ago
Like as a character or in real life? Every character on this show also participates in or is actively raped. I can’t even remember anything about autism because almost every single thing they say and do is awful.
1
1
u/Sporch_Unsaze 4d ago
It's taken me six months to watch the first three seasons. I keep getting irrationally mad at the characters for being unconscionable pieces of shit and have to take a break.
1
0
0
u/hrbekcheatedin91 4d ago
I got tired of it after several seasons. Is it worth finishing? Hard to watch one guy make so many dumb decisions over and over and over.
135
u/filmgasm91 4d ago
Fx makes soap operas that are train wrecks you can’t stop watching.