For my adaptation series I have been watching Trueblood which is based of the Sookie Stackhouse Series by Charlaine Harris, I’m very interested in how television creators handle images in adaptations. What specifics from the text do they find paramount to include and what do they find expendable? Trueblood is an interesting case because violence and sex are major parts of the story. Trueblood could never be shown on a cable or network station. (Although some might argue that is you shed Trueblood of it’s sex and gore, you would have Vampire Diaries, which is doing alright for itself). Fortunately HBO does not have to adhere by the guidelines of propriety that other channels must. However, for me I think that Trueblood does something with it’s images that Hell On Wheels, in my opinion, could never get quite right. The amount of gore. Vampires drink blood. And on occasion explode into a pile of bloody remnants. However in Trueblood I am not constantly bracing myself for the gore in the way I would for Hell on Wheels. Trueblood uses gore, for the shock value but also to enhance the plot. Hell on Wheels seemed to use it frivolously without cause.

Promotional material for the show highlights only Cullen and Elam. Both have guns, both are dressed in a similar manner. A partnership for the two seems very likely, and barring other contractual obligations or conflicts, I would be very surprised if either left the show after this first season. That said, we can recognize the difference between the two in the current narrative, so the show must resolve how these two end up in “equal standing.”

The action itself will drift away from Hell on Wheels, simply because the railroad has a destination to be built to, and Cullen has a piece of his vengeance to attend to in the setting. Both of these are shaping up to be season-long arcs, concluded in the finale, because to take any longer would almost necessarily stretch these two goals to be second season arcs. Cullen killing his target and somehow sticking with Hell on Wheels (assuming the railroad isn’t finished) would be a piece of narrative acrobatics, knowing as we do that Cullen’s target is a man of some prominence within the railroad town.

The advertising and title suggest to me that after this season, Cullen and Elam will become “hell on wheels” (well, horses,) as Cullen’s quest takes them away from the railroad and on to more varied locales. Then again, my theory is sunk by the rest of the ensemble cast: they can’t all travel wherever Cullen goes, and I don’t think a show like this can maintain scattered POV.

After our class discussions last week I approached episode three with the intent of focusing in on all things visual. Yet, even as I watched for visual hints of plot, narrative, and character development, I still felt that Hell On Wheels fell short. Although parts of this episode were especially beautiful, moving, and really transported the viewer into a sense of what the conditions of daily life in the 1860s would be, most of the dialogue got in the way. The dialogue seemed to do lots of telling and leave no opportunity for showing, which in my opinion took all potential power and intellectual stimulation away from the audience. The repetition of images, such as mud, dirt, and filth, I found to be a positive visual aspect that kept setting the scene and time period, however instances of repetitive dialogue, most notably with characters Elam, Cullen, and Durant, took away the audience’s credibility and replaced it with an overtly spoon-fed version. The opening scene with Cullen searching through Johnson’s things and coming across the photo of all the men involved in his wife’s murder was aesthetically pleasing at times, but overall seemed too overdone, too slow, and repetitive as if to make sure in cause the audience missed the first five opportunities to understand the plot we were given another five more chances to catch it…and all before the opening credits. The “western genre” involves drama, mystery, morality, and intensity, but Hell On Wheels is not providing many of the expectations I have (and want) of the genre; instead, it is fulfilling many gruesome stereotypes, especially when it comes to Native Americans, and does not allow for much prediction because it is all laid out for us.

Thomas Durant’s solitude and loneliness re-defines the role of the powerful capitalist in this episode of Hell on Wheels. We are finally witnesses to a different side of Durant, a more human character with an emotional past. His wife rejected his ambitious dream of going West, and stayed behind in New York while her husband seeks to satiate his hunger for progress. Later in the episode, he walks the settlers’ camp alone, then attends the Irish brothers’ makeshift picture show, again without company. What does this say about the villain?  He’s changed as I’ve grown sympathetic to someone whose ideals are so twisted.

Joseph Blackman, the “saved” savage denies his past role of a member of his tribe, the band of his brother. In the scene, while cutting his hair he looks into the cracked mirror, a symbol his jagged sense of self. Even as a baptized Christian and “civilized” rescuer of Lily Bell, the fair-haired maiden of the West, he is subject to endless scorn and prejudice from the white settlers.

Again, Hell on Wheels plays with the idea of stereotypical characters and identity in the “old West”.

However, after the music and smoke and fire landscapes of the opening credits faded away, once again Hell on Wheels lost me. The show is shot gorgeously and the art direction is flawless, but the actual content of the plot leaves so much to be desired.  The last shots of the episode, where Lily and Bohannon are shown on horseback in a wide panoramic view of the horizon, was evocative of old John Ford westerns like Stagecoach, and it’s scenes like this that continue to give me false hope in the show. There was another scene this week which particularly stood out in terms of cinematography. When Bohannon comes across Joseph tending to Lily Bell, he takes a moment to remove the remainder of the arrow from her wound, drinking continuously from his flask as he does so (also: how about cleaning the wound with that flask instead, Bohannon?). The scene is shot in a more interesting way than the rest of the episode, with the camera angled throughout the sequence to show Lily’s feverish perspective. I’m far more engaged with the camerawork and the landscapes and the period details than with anything the writers have presented (Colm Meaney’s perfectly bombastic Shakespearean speeches notwithstanding), and if the plot was able to bring something more interesting to the table, I would have been sold on Hell on Wheels weeks ago.

What I do find very interesting in terms of the visual aspects of Hell on Wheels are the costumes and wardrobe – I find that not only is the show great at researching the clothing that people wore during the time period that the railroad was built, but I also appreciate the symbolism that goes along with the wardrobe of the characters. For example, our main character Cullen is always donning his pistol. This pistol, we find out in the first episode, is a standard issued revolver of the Southern army and is a much larger firearm than any of the weapons used by other workers on the railroad. This revolver represents Cullen’s past, and perhaps the only thing that will allow him to move on from it will be avenging the death of his wife. On the other hand, Elam, the slave, always dresses in a suit and dress hat despite the fact that he’s working in the dirt. His character dresses this way because he is trying to move on from the pre-Civil War era, and would like to be respected the way a white man is.

These representations are going to play larger roles, in my opinion, as the show continues. I feel that the show has a great setup for only having three episodes thus far – all of the characters have motivations, and have very complex relationships. This is a good formula for a show, we must simply wait to see what it has in store for us.

One of the more visually, emotional scenes occurs when a fellow worker confronts Elem and accuses him of wanting to be white. The camera follows a line of black workers as they shovel dirt from the ground. The diegetic sound of some 100 workers digging into the earth provides an added authenticity to the scene. With each passing dig, the viewer can see the escalating frustrations of the workers. Finally, tensions reach a boiling point when a worker puts down his tools and refuses to continue. Elem quickly confronts the man in a face-to-face stare down. In the background, an explosion occurs, followed by a large cloud of black smoke. This visual serves as a representation of the explosive anger that both men feel and epitomizes the potential for damage that might ensue.  Here, the use of special effects adds another layer of richness to the story and helps establish the emotions of the scene.

Though Hell on Wheels remains a visual stunning program, the non-diegetic sound fails to add value to the program. As another blogger has stated, the soundtrack often feels like its playacting towards the audience’s emotions rather than to  “an honest relationship with the story being accompanied.” I agree that the result can take the viewer out of the story and often feels like the show is trying too hard to generate emotions for it audience by using a soundtrack. Thus, I believe, that if the show could introduce a more realistic sound from the era, the result could be a stronger reaction to what is depicted in the scene.

Visually, the show is very striking. A lot of money has obviously been thrown its way to make sure of this fact. The show’s reliance on visceral imagery, like blood, gore, death, disease, and dirt all help to paint a picture of a bleak, depressing place. Obviously, some of these visual characteristics come part and parcel with the nature of what the show’s trying to depict. The mud and dirt of the town Hell on Wheels makes sense, as it’s a hell hole pop-up town with no actual amenities what so ever. The blood is not a necessity of a rail road town, however, and thus it is the blood that is the most visually striking component of this visually striking show. For whatever reason the show’s colors are dulled. I think this is supposed to make it feel “old timey”? But even so, the red of blood stills manages to stand out. Blood is the most color that gets added to this show. When you see it you immediately know something’s wrong.