TV news and views

[DavidCroquet]

Wally Brando was peak, I can agree with that.

[Eric Cartman]

Invincible has weirdly slow pacing and I don’t get why. It’s relatively faithful to the comic but everything drags on longer than it should. There’s no energy to it. The old superhero cartoons like Batman and Justice League managed to do it all in 23 minutes. Invincible episodes often push past 40 minutes and there’s less happening.

Think part of it is trying to have “natural” dialogue. Reading the comic, a dialogue heavy scene is a page of speech bubbles. You can read through it in seconds. The show adapts it as a five to ten minute scene of slow talking with pauses. Holding on blank expressions of cartoon characters.

the unstated premise is "what if spiderman, but as superman X goku?" so DBZ pacing is in its DNA as much as expository monologuing in the middle of a fight is

[Polident]

Why do I love everything Dexter?

Original sin was such a great fan show. 

I have a theory that my girl hates, that Deb’s friend ends up being Doakes and that’s why Doakes hates him.

Started watching this. It’s fun. Patrick Dempsey with a mustache looks like my uncle. Hopefully he’s not the secret season long killer.

[Cauliflower Of Love]

Rewatching prison break, another ridiculous show.

[Polident]

The cast playing younger versions of these Dexter characters are all pretty good. My only thought is how did they clone the dude playing Batista. It’s freaky.

[Besticus Maximus]

Any of you watching the Mussolini show? This guy might be the best actor ever born

[Cauliflower Of Love]

So I finally decoded severance. It's another love story by ben stiller.

[Potato]

Diego Luna here to rescue Star Wars.

Great trailer. I cannot stress how much anyone even vaguely interested in Star Wars should watch Andor. 

I hope this season lives up to my expectations. Sadly this is going to be the last one.

[Potato]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/star-wars-kathleen-kennedy-lucasfilm-1235282440/

[killamajig]

Now if we can just get a straight white man in there to take the job everything will be back to normal.

[chronovore]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/star-wars-kathleen-kennedy-lucasfilm-1235282440/

Who will be tapped for replacing Kennedy? Favreau?

[Potato]

I hope not. Him and Filoni have been neck deep in the sillyness of modern Star War shenanigans.

They should throw whatever money they need to at Tony Gilroy and hope he can rescue what's left of the franchise's credibility.

[Polident]

Severance s2 is great and I believe there’s one episode left. Don’t think it can wrap up everything in that time but it’s also feeling like it is at that point. Apple Prime seems willing to let popular shows die and I’m too lazy to fact check. I’m assuming one last season. Hopefully with a shorter turnaround time.

[Polident]

Dexter Original Sin was good. I’m seeing there’s a sequel mini series in New York with the original cast, but I’d like another season of this set in Miami. It can go either way because the ending can be read as open until season 1 of Dexter.

[Besticus Maximus]

Fear on prime. Don't really know what possessed me to watch this shit, maybe some hammy Martin Compston acting, which it delivered in buckets.

Working class glaswegian fella (Compston) has become a fancy architect with a fit london wife and 2 weiner kids. He's bought some awesome auld mansion in glasgow and moved them all in. But wait! Kyuuji lives downstairs and has taken a shine to his wife, and started making bold claims about their fitness as parents loudly. Shenanigans ensue.

There's a twist ending that is as pointless as it is silly. 

This is some proper tv bollocks and no mistake. Despite this, I kind of encourage you all to watch it, as an artefact of our times.

[Eric Cartman]

Watched the first season of Slow Horses which has somehow flown under my radar, which is weird because I fucking love spy shit, especially the gritty tradecraft based morally compromised realpolitik type shit, and goddamn this ticks alllllllllll of the boxes.

The spoiler free gist is Gary Oldman (EVERYONE!!!) is the boss of Slough House (the eponymous Slow Horses), a spook HQ for spooks who've really fucked up somewhere to do the shit details and be miserable until they get retired out / quit / maaaaaaaybe get rehabilitated back into the 'real' service and for various reasons are responsible for an op involving a muslim student who has been kidnapped by white supremacists who are going to behead him live on the internet in 24 hours time.

[Eric Cartman]

Also, as a weird parallel, I watched Creature Commandos because I'm curious where the new cinematic DC Universe is headed, which although very tonally different is also about a bunch of surprisingly competent when it matters losers and fuck ups doing unsanctioned black ops stuff nominally for the greater good.

Its pretty good! Could have easily been a movie rather than a TV show in terms of runtime, but the TV format lends itself to giving each of the characters a chance in the spotlight and an examination of who they are how they got there. It also dwells on the fact that the Dc universe must be a pretty fucked up and terrifying place for normies, which gives a lot of justification for the existence of a super powered black ops squad.

The setup is that post The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker Season 1 (which are both worth watching!) Taskforce X has been shut down pending congressional review, so - obviously - Amanda Waller has a Plan B, which is that if shes not allowed to use super criminals for operations, she will just make a different department made up of non-human operatives because thats totally different and none of them have any legal rights anyway.

My favorite character is GI Robot, a literal nazi killing machine, who just fucking loves killing nazis with his buddies, god bless his robotic heart. Lots of deep cuts for DC fans throughout too.

[Potato]

Watched Agatha All Along with my daughter. It was ok. Watchable, but ultimately forgettable. One of those shows where I got to the final episode and still didn't know most character names.

[Snoopy]

Watched the first season of Slow Horses which has somehow flown under my radar, which is weird because I fucking love spy shit, especially the gritty tradecraft based morally compromised realpolitik type shit, and goddamn this ticks alllllllllll of the boxes.

The spoiler free gist is Gary Oldman (EVERYONE!!!) is the boss of Slough House (the eponymous Slow Horses), a spook HQ for spooks who've really fucked up somewhere to do the shit details and be miserable until they get retired out / quit / maaaaaaaybe get rehabilitated back into the 'real' service and for various reasons are responsible for an op involving a muslim student who has been kidnapped by white supremacists who are going to behead him live on the internet in 24 hours time.

Wait until Shirley turns up. One of the best characters.

[Polident]

Daredevil the new one

It’s odd. It feels they’re trying to copy the grittier style of the Netflix show only there’s a bunch of awkward CGI thrown in. Maybe it’s a reference to the Ben Affleck movie where he turns into a rubber cartoon man doing parkour. The first episode he’s growing pains of explaining shit from other disney marvel shows, where I’m treating it as a continuation of the Netflix series. But all that aside, pretty good!

[Snoopy]

I've been watching The Sopranos again. I've always thought Tony's peyote trip in the Vegas desert should have been the show's final scenes

[DavidCroquet]

I finally watched season 1 of Severance after putting it off for ages. 

It's...kind of bad? I was really surprised: very naked cliffhanger-bating all over the place. The whole show seems confused about whether it wants you to consider the severed floor as sort of an...emotional metaphor or like, a real concrete place the audience can conceivably believe might exist in a grounded reality.

I'll just read a summary for S2.

[chronovore]

Watched Agatha All Along with my daughter. It was ok. Watchable, but ultimately forgettable. One of those shows where I got to the final episode and still didn't know most character names.

I forgot that I was watching this, and forgot that I hadn't finished it until I saw your post. Wow.

[killamajig]

I finally watched season 1 of Severance after putting it off for ages. 

It's...kind of bad? I was really surprised: very naked cliffhanger-bating all over the place. The whole show seems confused about whether it wants you to consider the severed floor as sort of an...emotional metaphor or like, a real concrete place the audience can conceivably believe might exist in a grounded reality.

I'll just read a summary for S2.

I liked it but I'm with you on I'm not sure what I'm watching.
I just started rewatching S1 before I watch S2. I'll let you know if it goes anywhere. I'm kinda like you. I'm not sure where it's going but I have the time to waste to see if it goes anywhere.

[Cauliflower Of Love]

I finally watched season 1 of Severance after putting it off for ages. 

It's...kind of bad? I was really surprised: very naked cliffhanger-bating all over the place. The whole show seems confused about whether it wants you to consider the severed floor as sort of an...emotional metaphor or like, a real concrete place the audience can conceivably believe might exist in a grounded reality.

I'll just read a summary for S2.

its like you hate good shows.

[DavidCroquet]

its like you hate good shows.

it was cute! they obviously spent a lot of money on it. 

But it often feels like they don't spend enough time with the characters AND don't spend enough time with the "cosmology" of the severed world. It's like the show itself fears commitment.

Aside from that, I think Benji said something about modern shows just being a series of coincidences because modern writers don't bother with good writing...not sure if I agree with that entirely, but I certainly felt it applied here.

I mean...

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

the "overtime" protocol initiating specifically when Mark is talking to Cobel in the 'real world'...who was only there because she insinuated herself as a lactation consultant to his sister....and outie-Mark went out of his way to encourage her to attend the party while she was clearly having some sort of life crisis and not planning to attend...give me a break. And then telling on himself because Cobel--uniquely among all characters in the entire show--uses a different name outside of Lumon.

[killamajig]

I bailed on Severance during season 2. I fast forwarded just to see what was going to happen. Glad I bailed and not wasted my time.

Season 2 spoilers 

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

I get Mark going back to try and find his wife but I can't get on board with all the other excuses they came up with in the first season 2 episode. Also this season gives backstory they could have included last season instead of the camera following characters down white hallways for 5 minutes constantly. I get it, Apple wants Emmys but when they did the slowmotion hallway walk to look badasss in season1 I almost turned it off there. 

I checked the Wiki to read the episodes to see if I missed anything, nope. If S1 wasn't to one's liking S2 won't change your mind. 

I'm just going to wait until the end of the show. Too many shows nowadays shit the bed in the last season because of shit writers.

speaking of shit writers 

The writer/creator's resume is....
Severance 
Lip Sync Battle (Preshow) 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Erickson
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm9772311/

[Polident]

I’m still enjoying it but it feels like they had two seasons of material and it’s being stretched to three.

Speaking of milking popular shows, they’re making a new season of Ted Lasso. I never watched the third. Heard it was bad.

[Potato]

I've enjoyed all of Ted Lasso

[Alpacx]

I've enjoyed all of Ted Lasso

The "Male feminist coaches football in England" show?