Peter Laviolette:
“We are not a conservative team, we are a let’s fucking giddy up and go type of team.”
And with that, the season of 24/7 Flyers-Rangers is underway. Lavs F-bomb counter at 1.
Moments later, we’re treated to another Laviolette gem in the opening montage:
“Play fucking hard. Play for each other, support each other. Come back to the bench fucking dripping tired with fucking sweat and exhaustion. Put your foot on the fucking gas.”
Lavs F-bomb counter: 5.
The first full segment focuses on the Rangers, their – surprisingly nice – Madison Square Garden accommodations and Sean Avery looking like he gives a shit. Bonus points for Henrik Lundqvist letting in three softies to start the show. His John Lennon jacket is proud.
To Philadelphia… er, Voorhees.
We’re greeted by an upbeat piano tune as the orange and black striped walls of the Flyers SkateZone lead us into a shot of a deceptively large-gutted Laviolette. Apparently, HBO has decided on Muppets music for the Flyers practice montages. Incredibly, it fits Scott Hartnell just perfectly.
Thankfully, we didn’t have to wait long for our first Paul Holmgren sighting: What are these fucking cameras doing here?! Didn’t anyone tell you this was sacred ground?
I kid. Homer came across fairly well.
Next, we’re introduced to the newcomers, including Jarormir Jagr* and Ilya Bryzgalov.
*Narrater Liev Schreiber – whose scenes playing a fucking lunatic in the Manchurian Candidate I can’t get out of my head – has clearly been saying the name "Jaromir" in front of a dimly lit mirror all week long– Yarr-o-mihr.
Bryzgalov is the early star, as seen here. Producers focused on his quirky nature, with Lavs perfectly setting up Bryz’s speech about the universe. The full text, for your edification:
"Right now, I’m very into the universe. You know, like how it was created. You know, like, what is it? You know, solar system is so humungous big, right? But, if you see our solar system and our galaxy on the side, you know, like, and you see it and it was so small. You couldn’t even see it, our galaxy is like huge, but if you see the big picture, our galaxy is like small, tiny, like, dot in the universe, like. You think, we have some problems here on the earth we worry about, compared to, like… nothing. Just be happy. Don’t worry, be happy right now."
So deep.
That is followed by the obligatory melodramatic Chris Pronger scenes, which include staged shots of lonely equipment hanging in an empty locker room.
Back to NY, where Henrik Lundqvist’s tight pants, Lennon jacket and teammates take a few inner-city youths to see the Christmas show at Radio City Music Hall in an “exotic limo.” It’s a move that says, “see, kids, when you’re famous hockey players, you don’t go just to see the Rockettes in a limo… you put them in the back with you.”
This would be the first of two (Gary Bettman mandated?) inner-city kid-hockey player bonding moments (as you might imagine, Wayne Simmonds was coincidentally chosen for the second one). Still, though, it was a touching scene that led right into…
Sean Avery modeling.
Somewhere, Schreiber just tossed a script at a producer. I thought this was hockey?! HBO? Not Bravo. You better get out of here with this modeling bullshit. I was in X-Men, dammit!
The scene was saved, partially, thanks to watching Avery reminisce about being sent down to the minors earlier in the season.
Back to Philly, where the storyline turns to former Penguins Max Talbot and Yarr-o-mihr Jagr. Talbot greets his former coach, Dan Bylsma, one of the stars of last season.
Jagr loves Philly: “I never thought I’d like it so much. I picked Philly just for the hockey.”
That quote is followed by our first shots of your typical Flyers fan… a Czech dude screaming nothings into the camera. Dead Joey Vento is seething.
Lavs pre-game speech:
“Just a couple reminders here– you either put it wide with speed and put it behind the net, or you put it behind them and you grind the piss out of this team, because that’s the strength of ours. Play to our strengths and against their weakness. Let’s make sure we have a great start, a great first shift. Have a great game. A must-win here. Let’s kick some ass.”
I just punched a candle.
Matt Cooke reacts to Hartnell on the ice: “Hartnell, you fucking piece of shit.”
Hartnell: “You’re the dirtiest player in the league, bud. Great job.”
Intermission speech brings the Lavs F-bomb counter up to 7, trending toward the under for the evening, but it will be close.
Flyers win and here comes the highlight: the Flyers’ post-game anthem is… Mac Miller’s Knock Knock.
Ladies and gentlemen, Dry Island.
Back to NY, where the HBO tries to focus on Brad Richards’ rematch with his former team, the Tampa Bay Lightning. Unfortunately, Richards is terribly uninteresting, so that went away rather quickly. Also, it turns out Tortorella loves mock turtlenecks. Who knew?
This is the game where Artem Anisimov becomes our second unintentionally hilarious Russian of the night. He scored a goal and turned his stick into a shotgun, firing it toward the Lightning goalie. He would later receive an approving grin from Avery and explain it as a move he learned from “the guy who scored all the goals in Russia.”
It’s Friday morning in Philadelphia, and Lavs is walking into his microscopic office at the SkateZone. Seriously, it’s a closet. Craig Berube plays his sounding board as Lavs explains – not to the surprise of Chief – his intent to play… the hot goalie.
Berube is bringing nothing on this Friday. Their convo:
“I like Bryz in there tomorrow.”
“Yep."
“Keep him going.”
– nods head –
“Is that four in row for him?”
“Yeah”
“I thought Jags was really good for back-to-back.”
“He was strong.”
Thanks, Chief. We’ll look forward to more on the bonus content of the DVD.
Lavs takes his unflattering sweater to the locker room to remind the team of the Christmas party, which is mandatory, according to the “Big Boss.” Presumably Snider.
Sweater aside, Lavs is coming across as very impressive thus far.
Obligatory shot of Wayne Simmonds driving his black Infinity through the hood to help Snider open his ice rink for the Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation. Thankfully, HBO restrained themselves and didn’t add ground effects in post-production.
Rangers head to Buffalo– lots of shots of Buffalo native Ryan Callahan and his family.
Back to Philly for Saturday night’s game against the Lightning. Get to see a little behind the scenes, um, scenes following Giroux’s concussion. He appeared fine going back to and in the locker room, but cameras weren’t allowed to follow him in for testing. JVR checks with Giroux after the game, G says he’s OK.
Flyers beat writer Randy Miller is envious of the access:
HBO provides a lot more on Giroux than rest of us covering #Flyers got on Giroux concussion … access is a beautiful thing
— Randy Miller (@RandyJMiller) December 15, 2011
The next morning, Giroux is laying on the massage table. Bryz jokes about what a bad day it was for Giroux, likely referring to both the car accident and concussion.
Lavs stops by to check on G, who said he feels no better. We’re later treated to some more shots of Giroux slaying his concussion test.
Philly Sports Daily beat writer Ryan Bright:
Claude Giroux was connecting the hell out of those concussion dots. I expect full recovery.
— Ryan Bright (@philabright) December 15, 2011
HBO scrambled to work the concussion storyline in, and mentioned the update from Tuesday that said Giroux was out indefinitely. Nice work there.
Bryz on killing tigers:
Good God, he’s going to get an Emmy.
They finish the Flyers portion of the storyline with scenes from the team’s Christmas party on Sunday and interviews from the train ride to D.C.. We’ll leave you with the return of Max Talbot and ugly sweaters:
Lavs F-bomb counter: 7.
Videos copyright of HBO via FlyersinHD on YouTube
24 Responses
Upbeat piano tune in the beginning for the Flyers was “Moneygrabber” – Fitz and the Tantrums. Unlike on the show, it has lyrics.
Awesome show. Bryz is the man. Callahan’s grandmother made it great too.
Bajeebus! Why not just go ahead and embed the entire episode on your blog?
But I’ll preemptively come to your defense. Nobody dare complain about the lack of a spoiler warning. If you can’t figure out it’s implied based on the title of this article, then you are too stupid to be using the Internet.
Was it me, or was the initial barrage of F-bombs by Laviolette a premeditated one? Not necessarily scripted, but perhaps it was a subliminal way of him to imply that he can out-fuck both Tortorella and Boudreau combined. If so, that’s fucking awesome.
Interesting John Lennon reference regarding the Lundqvist suit. The first think that came to my mind was that Dr. Evil made another clone, and this time he didn’t botch it–at least physically–like he did with Mini-Me. Also, Lundqvist’s sparkling helmet is pretty ridiculously flamboyant. Is there really a Mrs. Lundqvist?
I now found a Ranger to hate less than the others. How can anyone not be moved by Callahan’s 95 year-old grandmother? And for a Buffalo/Rochester boy, thankfully it appears that he hasn’t “skated” in the same circles as that cabbie-beater Patrick Kane.
And I pity Artem Anisimov. I don’t think he was trying to belittle the Lightning. On that note, besides the Canadiens and the Sabres, Tampa is turning into one of the biggest bunch of pussies in the league. Maybe Pittsburgh too, given that epic bitch-fest by Matt Cooke. Although it looked like the other Penguins were just smart enough not to come to his defense. They’ve no doubt figured out by now that he’s a nothing but a newly self-righteous asshole.
The biggest failure of the night was that Kimmo was pretty much left-out. Hopefully this isn’t the case for the remaining episodes. OK, he’s not only diminutive in stature (relative to the average height of the players in the NHL–he’s still a few inches taller than I am), but also in outgoing personality, but he is the backbone of the entire defense. Hence, he’s the entire foundation for the whole team. No story is complete without showing the viewers how important he is for the Flyers. Well, we all like how he’s the unflappable silent type who also happens to be eternally unbreakable. “Speak softly and carry a big stick.” But I’d just like to see him get his rightful honors in the team narrative.
Also, I’m hoping they somehow portray Danny Briere’s interesting homelife, and his unconformable arrangement of cohabitation with his junior teammates over the last couple of seasons.
Thanks! I cancelled HBO and keep forgetting to sign back up for it for then 24/7 show. I was so bummed not to see it, thanks for the summary!
Show was fucking great, loved Bryz!!!!
Flyers should upgrade their locker room.
Great recap Kyle!
Now we know Homer knew all along about G’s concussion. Whiplash, my ass!!!!!
breez was the star. really interesting look on giroux after the hit, it just goes to show how much B.S. holmgrem feeds everyone after an injury. giroux wasn’t ‘feeling better’ as holmgrem stated, in fact he said he was feeling worse.
i thought this would make me hate the rangers more, but it did just the opposite in the first episode. the teams reaction to anisimov’s sniper celebration was pretty funny. besides avery, there isnt too much to really hate on them… yet. i was expecting some more jody shelley/brandon dubinsky fireworks or trash talking, but there is one more game between the flyers and rangers right before the winter classic.
totally fuckin awesome. whole thing gave me goosebumps
Imagine how hungover the single guys were at that mandatory sunday afternoon x-mas party.
Starting to really like Scott Hartnell.
Anyone who calls out Matt Cooke is all right in my book.
Wow. Three posts about this show. What gay drink were you drinking while watching it?
Actual exchange during scenes of Sean Avery finding his inner David Beckham:
My wife – He’s kinda cute.
Me – Okay.
My wife – Too bad he’s an asshole.
Me – Yup.
Second year that Talbot sweater has made an appearance.
Love it! My husband, who by the way detest hockey and won’t even talk about hockey, was watching this last night saying it was really good. Maybe I can get the hockey package in the 2nd half after all!!!
If anyone is reading this at 9:58 AM 12/15 and you haven’t seen 24/7 yet, “hypergirl74” posted four complete parts on youtube, all episode one. Get to it before it’s removed!
proud of you Kyle, you almost had 3 posts in a row without the mention of “richards”…almost. had to bring brad into it, danm.
Apparently if you kill a tiger in China…you’re dead
Sean Avery is a fucking faggot… Who kills time by modeling? What a self-loving piece of shit… I hope Hartsy buries him in the WC.
Really “Joe”??? I actually am a “fucking faggot” and love hockey and this blog. Don’t ruin it with diminutive slurs posted from the comfort of your couch. Avery is a dirty hockey player, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t get to fuck women you can only jerk off to in a Victoria’s Secret catalogue.
Hey Michele, if yer old man hates hockey, why the fuck did you marry the doofus? Tell him I said “Hi” Unless you already got kids, it’s never to late to call your lwayer to get yer half and then get together with a real hockey fan hahahahah
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And Iron Schlong McShyteheel, that’s some in-depth commentary ya got there. Why not just take the easy road and keep impostering meself, instead od wasting time coming up with that big piece of shyte you posted?
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The Real IBMcG—Often imposterered, never outclassed.
http://www.fannation.com/truth_and_rumors/view/319922-rangers-take-early-lead-on-247-stage?eref=sihp&sct=hp_bf2_a8 —Apparently Sports Illustrated feels that the Rangers won the first episode.
Ah, Pete, fuck SI (and ESPN). They’re all pansy-arsed homers for all NY sports.
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The Real IBMcG—Often imposterered, never outclassed.
Really “Joe”??? I actually am a “fucking faggot” and love hockey and this blog. Don’t ruin it with diminutive slurs posted from the comfort of your couch. Avery is a dirty hockey player, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t get to fuck women
We’re greeted by an upbeat piano tune as the orange and black striped walls of the Flyers SkateZone lead us into a shot of a deceptively large-gutted Laviolette. Apparently, HBO has decided on Muppets music for the Flyers practice montages. Incredibly, it fits Scott Hartnell just perfectly.
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