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What TV are you watching and how would you rate it? [Revive from FRDB]

Warrior Nun, 7.5/10, Netflix

Although there were a couple of weaknesses (e.g., somewhat annoying voice-over), I found this a very enjoyable watch with some good characterization, decent action sequences, and beautiful scenery. I hope they have their mythology well thought out or it could all fall apart in Season two.
 
Jack Ryan, Season 1 7/10 Amazon Prime

I read all of Clancy's novels, up to about half way though Executive Orders. I thought the writers did an excellent job of capturing Clancy's style and story telling. The action was decent, the mysteries unfolded well, and I thought the secondary story about the drone operators was pure Clancy, even though the payoff of that story line was underwhelming. There were nice callouts to the books, especially "Sum of All Fears". The main problem I had was with the villain - I kept waiting for there to be more depth or nuance to the guy, but there really wasn't - I thought it would turn out that he was only using the trappings of Islam to further some even more insidious plot, but in the end, he was just another disaffected radicalized mid-easterner bent on punishing the US and the west for not giving him a job.

Jack Ryan, Season 2 0/10 Amazon Prime

The stupid! It Burns!!!!!
 
Dirty John, season 2 The Betty Broderick Story, 7/10; An eight episode series on the US Network about the double murder of Dan Broderick and his wife Linda by Dan's estranged ex wife. A true story that takes place mostly in San Diego, CA. After a lot of hard work and change of career, Dan Broderick is a successful lawyer and Betty a devoted "housewife/homemaker" but the marriage starts to fall apart as Dan becomes distant from Betty. Betty is totally reliant on her husband for everything and is stunned when Dan tells Betty he is leaving her. It turns out he has been having an affair with his assistant. The divorce and custody battle is ugly and drives an already unstable Betty into a constant state of rage culminating in the double murder. Christian Slater stars as Dan Broderick but Chris Mason does a fantastic job of playing the young Dan Broderick. Eight episodes is probably two too many but it's an interesting and tragic true story.
 
Yellowstone - 2/10 Dripping with testosterone and old world.values. I loathe it.
 
Cursed. 7.5/10

The story of the woman who would become the Lady Of The Lake. Nimue is a fae, a creature of magic, but her tribe looks pretty much human, but even members of her own tribe denounce her as a witch for her abilities. A religious order called the Red Paladins is trying to eliminate magic, slaughtering all fae that they find. When the Paladins find her village Nimue’s mother gives her a special sword, telling her to bring it to Merlin.

Pretty interesting take on the legends, twisting the stories a bit. Everyone wants the sword, but it might be cursed. Seems like the more you use it, the more you tend to solve problems by just killing them. Merlin apparently has pissed off everyone he has ever met. Looking forward to a second season
 
Harley Quinn 10/10

This show is just insanely fun. The voice acting is fantastic and perfect for every character, Bane and Dr. Psycho crack me up every time they speak. All the characters have personalities and motivations that guide their actions throughout the series. And some episodes also really hit you in the feels, especially when the show is focused on the relationship of Harley and Ivy.

I cannot recommend this show highly enough. It should be coming to HBO Max in a few months if you don't want to spring the dollars to watch it on DC Universe, but it's worth subscribing to either one to watch the two seasons that are available.
 
Is anyone else here irrationally fond of Survivor?

I admit it - I've been watching Survivor since the first season, just over 20 years ago. Amazingly, the last season (season #40) was the best yet. It featured twenty of their million dollar winners competing for a 2 million dollar prize. The gamesmanship was "whole other level" from previous seasons, which wasn't particularly surprising given that every participant was a proven high-level player. It might only be fascinating to someone who has watched the game evolve over its decades, but it certainly has my vote as the only reality show worth watching for other than utterly mindless entertainment value. It might have to do with how absolutely certain I am that I would suck at it; not so much because of the physical challenges, but because deceit and duplicity coupled with charm and credibility is a set of attributes I don't think I could muster, at least with the required consistency.

So anyhow, I just learned and am now lamenting the fact that the network pulled Survivor from its fall 2020 lineup. :(

Season 41 was initially slated to film starting March 24 in their usual location of the Mamanuca Islands in Fiji. However, due to growing fears from the coronavirus–and caution towards Survivor’s hard-working international crew of 400–production decided to push back filming until after the season 40 finale. But as the cases worsened in the United States, even that date grew more impossible. Several weeks after the postponement, production was put on hiatus, with everyone who was out on location told to return home for the time being.
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In addition to causing worldwide suffering and despair, the Trump Virus is now officially a pain in my ass. I wish I could kick Cheato off the island!
 
Just started season 4 of "The Wire" (yes, from 2006; yes, we're way behind). It's been a bit amusing to learn the marketing techniques the corner drug dealers use to attract customers, including giving a brand name to their product. In a previous season, the crew working for the main bad guy were selling "WMD". This season, I was surprised to learn that the new brand is called "Pandemic". No shit. According to David Simon, who wrote much of the series, it was around the time of an Ebola outbreak.

I also learned from the interview that a brand name used later in the series is, god help me, "Trump Tower". Must be Kool-Aid.
 
The Wire, after the first episode I'm wondering how in the hell am I going to want to watch the rest of this. And then the next couple of episodes just suck you in. It is really good at manipulating how you feel about people you may have not liked earlier. An odd National Geographic feeling to it (cheering for the gazelle escaping the cheetah one week, the cheetah getting the gazelle the next).
 
The Alienist. 8/10. Great sets, good acting, good script, good story, and great, strong female protagonist.
 
Finally got around to watching Dexter. Great show. Very exciting and suspenseful and ridiculous. Also gory. The first season made me think it was a "case of the week" format, where there's an overarching story for the series and for each season maybe, but also a complete story per episode, like the X Files and most of the legal/police and medical shows. But somewhere in season 1, it seemed to drop the "monster/case/alien of the week" format, if it truly had that at all, and just stick to the arc and some ongoing side stories about various characters in the ensemble.

I don't know how to rate Dexter really because the format and formula almost always work well. It's gotten so that brilliant TV is the norm now storywise and as long as you've got talented directors and actors, it's going to be a hit. At least that's how it looks from where I'm sitting.

All that said, I'm thoroughly enjoying Dexter, particularly how the show manipulates the viewer to sympathize with a cold blooded killer. But the Doakes story arc in season 2 really brings me back to a more normal and critical view of Dexter. Not completely turning on him, but challenging how easy it was for me to be ok with murder in the first season. Season 2 is a relief for me in that it brings me back to a place of moral struggle rather than easy, comfortable rationalization of murder. And I've really enjoyed noticing all of this in my own mind from the first episode.
 
DrZoidberg said:
bigfield said:
Vikings (no rating yet)

The show is interesting but the dialogue is painful shit, like constipation, and Travis Fimmel is just fucking woeful. He sounds like he has a speech impediment and his body language makes no sense, and these make him completely unbelievable as a viking leader (or probably any character for that matter).
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Being of viking ancestry I really looked forward to this. Especially since they're using historical names and real people from history. Nope. It's a LARPing series. They couldn't be bothered to do even the most superficial research. Which is bizarre since:

1) Nobody has yet to make a historically accurate TV-series of actual viking history. The lowest hanging fruit.
2) Real viking history is interesting. These were some very colourful people indeed.
3) It'd be cheap to make since historical Vikings had very basic and equipment and led frugal lives. No fancy swords, or sophisticated armour. Just spears and chain-mail. Vendel style helmets are incredibly basic and easy to churn out. Very basic linen or wool shirts. Wool socks/boots. They had none of that fancy shit in the Viking TV-series. Especially not the complicated designer leather wear they all walk around in.

There's a reason Game of Thrones is so fun to watch. It's based on historical European dynastic conflicts. Viking historical dynastic conflicts are even more fun with bizarre twists, back stabbing and revenge killings. The Vikings TV series is bland porridge in comparison. So boring. Ragnar Lothbrok from the tv series is the lamest simplistic hero character. His most interesting feature is his washboard stomach.

I only made it to the end of series 2. Couldn't force myself to keep watching.

*end of rant*
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Have you watched "Norsemen" on netflix? It's a spoof on the show Vikings, but with good production value. It doesn't correct the historical problems your concerned with, but it's pretty funny, giving the characters occasional meta-awareness of their place in history.
 
WAB said:
CJW said:
WAB said:
The Alienist. 8/10. Great sets, good acting, good script, good story, and great, strong female protagonist.
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Just started season 1. are you rating season 2?
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Sorry, I should have been specific . I am rating all that I've seen so far, which I believe is all of the two seasons.
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Thanks - I'm 3 episodes in on the first season.
 
I think it's entirely appropriate that the main theme of Lovecraft country is more about racism than monsters. I'd argue that racism was the main theme in the original work as well. It's all about xenophobia.

BTW, I love Lovecraft
 
The Expanse - Season Four

Well, what I love about The Expanse is the writing. The story knows where it is heading, and like the other top sci-fi/fantasy show out there, Babylon 5, knows how to create the next conflict via the solution to the last. Season Four is kind of expositional, like a soft restart, but within the series. It feels a bit more like Season One where you really don't know what is happening. This is the point where a series can lose its direction, but this hasn't. It is definitely interesting and very entertaining!
 
The Boys

I rewatched season one in preparation for the upcoming release of season two. It is a very entertaining and very cynical take on superheroes in the modern age. Antony Starr as Homelander is exceptional and watching everyone around him in total fear of his sociopathy is tense and riveting. I hope they can keep up the quality in season two.
 
DrZoidberg said:
I think it's entirely appropriate that the main theme of Lovecraft country is more about racism than monsters. I'd argue that racism was the main theme in the original work as well. It's all about xenophobia.

BTW, I love Lovecraft
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I've watched the first two episodes of Lovecraft Country. While some of it is interesting, it seems poorly edited; I get the feeling that small but important pieces are missing.
 
Reckoning, 7/10; A Netflix 10 episode crime drama which plays out somewhere in Northern California but I think it was actually filmed in Australia, probably cheaper. Anyway, a young girl goes missing from a small town community which makes the local police think that the serial killer "RRK" may have resurfaced. RRK was responsible for the gruesome murders of young girls a few years earlier but was now assumed to be dead. It is entertaining most of the time but too many of the characters are dysfunctional and have peculiar quirks.
 
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