Heartland - Paradies für Pferde

I confess this show is one of my clearly-no-longer secret pleasures. The stories of Heartland resonate with me in quite a different way then most of the pablum I watch on television. The travails of a multi-generational country family, the mix of urban experience and back to the horse-manure land operation, the western motif and the youthful tales of love, of coming of age, of environmental concern, well I find some comfort and a strong sense of just about lost values in the telling. Above all else, the story of the young horse whisperer is almost mystical. If it borders on trite from time to time, it is easy to forgive this creative slight. A very pleasant TV experience.

Living where I am in Buffalo, New York I'm fortunate to get a few Canadian television shows from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation which is on my cable package. If I didn't I wouldn't be seeing Heartland which I'm informed is Canada's longest running television series.

Family patriarch is Shaun Johnston who is a man of the land and in his way of living land means you grow things and or you feed animals off the things you grow. He's a cowboy and still a working one at that. But he's smart enough to bend with the times and part of his land is now a dude ranch for dudes who want to pretend. Not thrilled with the idea, but it's an income and the family works at it as a family enterprise.

My favorite of the characters is Chris Potter who is best known for the role of Peter Caine in Kung Fu - The Legend Continues. He's Johnston's errant son-in-law, a former rodeo star who can't forget the roar of the crowd and hasn't quite matured. As this series is almost a decade old Potter and the rest have really honed their characters pretty good.

Heartland is a really nice product from Canada and we Americans who can see it should be grateful.

Love watching the show. My daughter and grand daughter love it too. Grand daughter is 2 and says horsey show mama. She would have it on all the time. Too cute. Wish we had more heart warming shows like this. I like the values it teaches. Family is so very important, and this shows a family's struggles and victories. Sleepless nights I turn on Heartland and have a marathon till morning. Wishing episodes 6-8 were available here. I will just have to wait. The story line and cast are excellent. Awesome family show. Makes me want to get baby girl a pony. Would love to see Calgary someday. It truly is beautiful. Would recommend watching this series, it will fill your heart with joy. Grew up with horses at grandfathers. So the story falls right in with all I remember growing up.

Heartland is a heartwarming, and exciting family series. My daughters and I love the show - it has become a real mother - daughters time for us. We love horses and the "Healing Horses / Healing Hearts" theme is really inviting and enduring to us. We have a large number of friends and family that share our feelings and interest in the show - which makes watching it even more exciting because my daughters love going to school the next day to talk with all of their friends about what happened on the last episode. We just finished watching the season finale and my daughters begged me to go online to find out if the first season will be coming out on DVD and when the second season will possibly start. We find the show very well acted, and extremely well written - the story line is infuriatingly enticing (we can hardly wait to see what will happen to the characters next). The fact that it is based in the Canadian Rockies is just a bonus and certainly must make filming the beautiful landscapes easier. The camera angles and lighting certainly create the right mood for the moment and really make the characters and setting believable. It is hard to believe that a story based on such a tragedy can bring such feelings of love and happiness to the surface, but this show really pulls it off. There is just the right combination of action, drama, romance and comedy to make it enjoyable for everyone watching. We look forward to the next season (we are saddened that the first season is over already). We surely hope that the first season will be brought out on DVD very soon as it is the type of show that one can watch over and over again.

First off, I'm a 32 year old man living in Upstate New York. I drive a truck and have seen a horse up close maybe 3 times. I love this show. The acting is great and the script is written very well. Every now and then, you can predict something, but very rarely can you be specific. Everyone talks about the horses and the heartwarming tales. I agree with all of that. I'm writing this as of the completion of the 8th season. Ty's character was my favorite. I loved Amy as well, but Ty is the kid with the troubled past. I enjoyed how his past became relevant more than once. It's not like he moved and everyone back home forgot about him. He grew as a person and a man. Great things were portrayed in this show.

Also the message Heartland and nature portrays. There is more to live than city living. There's more out there. And it's a richer life.

I strongly recommend this show.