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

Another Thursday, another episode of The 100, and another week of "well they couldn't possibly go darker than last week's ep...oh, wait. Yes they can."


This show started out as Lord of the Flies in Space as presented by the CW, but lately it has been a show that makes the bleakest seasons of the Battlestar Galactica reboot seem like H.R. Puff'nstuff.
 
The increasingly poor decisions of Todd Margaret 7/10

I love David Cross. But it's pretty obvious he wrote it himself. The jokes are good, but repetitive. Also not as polished as I'm used to expecting from Cross. So I suspect there was a lot of compromise necessary to come in under budget. It shows. Todd Margaret says incredibly stupid things and is taken advantage of by his assistant. His assistant is pure evil. A complete bastard. And Todd is incredibly naive.

First episode is on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QNaG4gHhQA&list=PL2A37373AE2AC70D9
 
Watched 3rd season finale of Sleepy Hollow. Was very disappointing. They killed off an extremely popular character and if the series is not renewed then it had closure, if not, then it goes off in a different, more X-Files direction than what made the series popular which was its historic colonial gothic-ness.

Sad.
 
Started on the Walking Dead recently. Didn't have high hopes, the genre seems to be over done, but it turned out to be a well done zombie apocalypse series.
 
The Expanse

The best SF TV series ever - it entered with the silence of vacuum and I almost missed it. If you don't understand physics and space science, you may be a bit lost, which is a good thing. I like Jane's character, too - he pulls off the love of julie mao. But the UN undersecretary steals the show. Did she spend 50 years smoking clove cigarettes to get that voice?

The Outs (vimeo)

Great stuff, real gay life, not modern family shit. plus, the way the episodes are chronologically reversed, and how well this works, is great. Hot guys, too.

Shannara

I can't believe I like it, but i do. elf ears are sexy. it's cheese, but it's elf sexy cheese.

the x-files - i couldn't watch it. gillian anderson has had so much work done she's unrecognizable and david looks like a stubbed out cigarette butt.
 
Sense8 8/10

I really liked it. Slow and contemplative, and has a lot to say about humanity and human nature.
 
Impractical Jokers 4.2/10

Impractical Jokers is about four fat guys who think they're funny . Sal is a Cuban asshole who laughs too much. They all laugh way too fucking much. Brian is a white dude, a New Yorker like the rest. Brian is the likable geek, but not a smart geek. He's just an awkward and funny looking dude. He had a small Role is 12 Monkeys recently. He is a bad actor. Joe is Italian and he is funny looking in a scary way. He looks creepy but it makes me laugh. James is very white. He is the most odd looking of the four, and probably the most unstable. James isn't fat, actually. He's got a strange looking head that doesn't look right on his body.

Together they are hilarious. They have a good energy. The reality of the show is "hey go tell that teen girl you want to sip her bath water, I dare you to". They use ear pieces and microphones to give each other commands. They make fools of themselves and it is fun to watch. They keep a tally of who refuses to say a disgusting and perverted thing to an elderly or disabled person, then punish the "joker" with the worst score.

The punishments are usually stupid.

I'm wondering how they can pull off this show now that most people in downtown New York recognize them. That could become a problem.

These guys are immature losers but they are funny. Their personalities are getting a little stale but they have been on the air for a while and that was bound to happen. Not a bad show, considering what we have to choose from.
 
House of Cards.


At the end of Season 3, I thought the show had pretty much jumped the shark. Three episodes into season 4, I was confident in that assessment.


Well damned if the show doesn't still have some life left.
 
Ford said:
House of Cards.


At the end of Season 3, I thought the show had pretty much jumped the shark. Three episodes into season 4, I was confident in that assessment.


Well damned if the show doesn't still have some life left.
Click to expand...
I was also positively surprised by season 4, but for some reason, the more I watch this, the more I miss West Wing.
 
Fear the Walking Dead

Tonight I watched the first episode of season 2. It still sucks. In TWD, I don't really ever remember wanting so many of the main characters to be killed off so quickly. But in FtWD, I can't wait for the young girl to get eaten, the young kid to get munched on, the drug addict to have his innards torn out, and ... that only leaves four other characters--five if you count the woman who's about to turn.

These people just do too much stupid shit. Part of the appeal of the early Walking Dead was that the characters seemed to do things that weren't stupid--except for Carl--but he was a kid and kids do stupid things. Plus he's all fucked up from what he's seen. So Carl, even though still annoying as JoHo's on a Sunday morning, never deserved a horrible death.

But the young people in this show are angsty little morons. I won't provide any spoilers though. Some people do actually like this show.

As to Victor Strand, he's the only mysterious thing in the show. My money is that he worked as some kind of muscle for the guy who owned the house and the yacht rather than being the owner. But whatever he is, he's the only chance the show has to be interesting.

3/10
 
They are pretty stupid. Especially the hot girl with the tat. She is attractive and probably the most attractive person on the show. I'm wondering what male sex idol they have to choose from. Strand is wicked and he could hit any chick on that boat, but he is black. He is poetic and amazing, so as soon as we fall in love with him - dead. Come to think of it, the boat is way too racially diverse. Everybody can die in a pandemic containment and that is the reassuring fear that should cross all boundaries. It is aired worldwide. Watch as they die. Unlikely races will float through the plot and cycle through a few humanizing gestures before their graphic deaths. Cliff Curtis has a questionable racial identity. He can appeal to a cluster of people who look slightly like him. I suppose LA would be a good place to end up with exactly what made it to the boat, racially. The race of the cast and why they are arranged in the way they are arranged, dead end. They do come off as annoying, huh. I want Frank Dillane's character to go into full on detox and die on the deck of that fucking boat. He wouldn't be nearly as chipper if he was in detox, and he isn't playing the pain of DT very well. Maybe the adrenaline rush replaced the pain, and that is the reasoning behind totally avoiding the subject his addiction in the s02 premier.
 
tantric said:
The Expanse

The best SF TV series ever - it entered with the silence of vacuum and I almost missed it. If you don't understand physics and space science, you may be a bit lost, which is a good thing. I like Jane's character, too - he pulls off the love of julie mao. But the UN undersecretary steals the show. Did she spend 50 years smoking clove cigarettes to get that voice?

The Outs (vimeo)

Great stuff, real gay life, not modern family shit. plus, the way the episodes are chronologically reversed, and how well this works, is great. Hot guys, too.

Shannara

I can't believe I like it, but i do. elf ears are sexy. it's cheese, but it's elf sexy cheese.

the x-files - i couldn't watch it. gillian anderson has had so much work done she's unrecognizable and david looks like a stubbed out cigarette butt.
Click to expand...
How are you watching the Expanse? It's not on Netflix....
 
I, Claudius 8/10

A made for TV drama from 1976 about the life of the unlikely Roman emperor Claudius. A man who took power because nobody thought he was worth the effort of murdering. This is really a stage play and comes across as it. The budget is low and the acting is top notch. Always fun seeing a young Patrick Stewart acting. This time he has hair.

Worth keeping in mind is that modern historians question many of the details. Whenever there's some sort of dynastic shenanigans traditionally scheming women tend to be blamed. And so it is here, Livia and Agrippina. And that's the story Tacitus wrote, which is the only historical source we have. So that fact alone makes it unlikely to be true. This series is based on Tacitus version. Still, a good story.

Best news, it's available on Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gfxt9zKeNL4
 
DrZoidberg said:
I, Claudius 8/10

A made for TV drama from 1976 about the life of the unlikely Roman emperor Claudius. A man who took power because nobody thought he was worth the effort of murdering. This is really a stage play and comes across as it. The budget is low and the acting is top notch. Always fun seeing a young Patrick Stewart acting. This time he has hair.

Worth keeping in mind is that modern historians question many of the details. Whenever there's some sort of dynastic shenanigans traditionally scheming women tend to be blamed. And so it is here, Livia and Agrippina. And that's the story Tacitus wrote, which is the only historical source we have. So that fact alone makes it unlikely to be true. This series is based on Tacitus version. Still, a good story.

Best news, it's available on Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gfxt9zKeNL4
Click to expand...

It's an excellent drama, however, isn't it based on a novel by Robert Graves, who may in turn have used Tacitus writings as a foundation but did use some artistic license.
 
TSwizzle said:
DrZoidberg said:
I, Claudius 8/10

A made for TV drama from 1976 about the life of the unlikely Roman emperor Claudius. A man who took power because nobody thought he was worth the effort of murdering. This is really a stage play and comes across as it. The budget is low and the acting is top notch. Always fun seeing a young Patrick Stewart acting. This time he has hair.

Worth keeping in mind is that modern historians question many of the details. Whenever there's some sort of dynastic shenanigans traditionally scheming women tend to be blamed. And so it is here, Livia and Agrippina. And that's the story Tacitus wrote, which is the only historical source we have. So that fact alone makes it unlikely to be true. This series is based on Tacitus version. Still, a good story.

Best news, it's available on Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gfxt9zKeNL4
Click to expand...

It's an excellent drama, however, isn't it based on a novel by Robert Graves, who may in turn have used Tacitus writings as a foundation but did use some artistic license.
Click to expand...

Aren't you the well read one. Yes. Yes, it is. He follows Tacitus closely. Fun fact; this is Robert Graves' most famous work, and a commonly seen as a masterpiece, but he considers it a trashy whore job he only did to pay his bills.
 
Harry_Bosch said:
tantric said:
The Expanse

The best SF TV series ever - it entered with the silence of vacuum and I almost missed it. If you don't understand physics and space science, you may be a bit lost, which is a good thing. I like Jane's character, too - he pulls off the love of julie mao. But the UN undersecretary steals the show. Did she spend 50 years smoking clove cigarettes to get that voice?

The Outs (vimeo)

Great stuff, real gay life, not modern family shit. plus, the way the episodes are chronologically reversed, and how well this works, is great. Hot guys, too.

Shannara

I can't believe I like it, but i do. elf ears are sexy. it's cheese, but it's elf sexy cheese.

the x-files - i couldn't watch it. gillian anderson has had so much work done she's unrecognizable and david looks like a stubbed out cigarette butt.
Click to expand...
How are you watching the Expanse? It's not on Netflix....
Click to expand...

Just checked and it's on netflix DVD.
 
11.22.63

Postmortem.

Episode 1 was great.
Episodes 2 through 6 were awful.
Episode 7 was better.
Episode 8 was solid.

Maybe if I hadn't read the book I wouldn't think so poorly of this effort, but I did, so I do think poorly of it. The medium of TV/Movies are obviously not the medium of books, and so thing have to be changed, characters combined, etc. But what always seems to ruin book-to-TV/Movie is the addition of utterly unnecessary shit.

For example, a character of minor importance from the book was given a large role when instead, that time could have been used to more fully explore the world from the book by keeping the focus on the main character and how time is, as is said so many times in the book, obdurate. It was a strong running theme throughout the book, but only popped up noticeably in two or three out of eight episodes. And what that did was remove the greatest force that was constantly working to prevent the main character from completing his quest. In the book, Time comes across as this immensely powerful, cunning force that governs human events and history, while in the TV series it comes across as an occasionally feisty pain in the ass. It really destroyed the intrigue of the book.

But whatever. Like Dune, if you want to see a visual interpretation of it, you can sit through most of it, but only because it's the only one out there.

4/10

P.S. Critics seemed to have really liked this series. Fuck them. They're wrong.
 
DrZoidberg said:
TSwizzle said:
It's an excellent drama, however, isn't it based on a novel by Robert Graves, who may in turn have used Tacitus writings as a foundation but did use some artistic license.
Click to expand...

Aren't you the well read one. Yes. Yes, it is. He follows Tacitus closely. Fun fact; this is Robert Graves' most famous work, and a commonly seen as a masterpiece, but he considers it a trashy whore job he only did to pay his bills.
Click to expand...

LOVE this.

The acting is top notch all the way around.

Great quotable lines. One of my favorites:

[crowd outside the palace is hostile against the emperor, for believing a favorite of the royal family was poisoned]

Tiberius [agitated, speaks to his mother, Livia]: Has it ever occurred to you, mother, that it's you they hate and not me?

Livia: There is nothing that occurs to you that hasn't occurred to me first. That is the burden I live with!


Other line:

Mother of Claudius has just discovered incriminating papers that she wants to send secretly to Tiberius to implicate the murderers. She asks to use Claudius' new manuscript on the History of Carthage to disguise it. He refuses,

"It's got elephants on it." An unwanted decoration to the scrolls by the printers - Claudius is upset with it since he considered it a serious work.

His mother glares as him: "You are the stupidest son a mother was ever cursed with. Who cares about your history of Carthage? No one is going to read it, especially not Tiberius. He'd only read it if you drew naked women all over it, and then he'd only look at the pictures!"

Love it.
 
Shadowy Man said:
Harry_Bosch said:
How are you watching the Expanse? It's not on Netflix....
Click to expand...

Just checked and it's on netflix DVD.
Click to expand...

Speaking of Netflix, we just binge watched Bloodline. Holy crap, great great show. Immediately went close to the top of one of my favorite all time dramas. Great acting. Amazing scenery and sound affects. Good story. Highly recommended. 10/10
 
Horace and Pete 8/10

Louis CK switches from comedy to tragedy. And wow this is tragic. Still some laughs. But the darkest and blackest humour I think I've ever seen. It's fundamentally about a family with terrible communication skills. The action is centred around their family owned and run Brooklyn bar. It's interesting for a number of reasons. First off, he's taking so many chances and doing so many brave cool takes on the genre that he has to get respect for it. I haven't seen anything like it. And I heard in an interview (with Mark Maron) that this was about taking creative chances. I tip my hat to him. Acting is tremendous. Writing superb. Jessica Lange plays an amazing drunk who just doesn't give a fuck. Alan Alda plays the most horrible and vile old person imaginable. Just great. Steve Buscemi plays a really well written character. He's a schizophrenic. But unlike other shows focusing on mental illness, this focuses on how it is to live on medication, rather than the illness itself. His Tourettes-suffering friend is hilarious. The best part with that is that everybody around her is understanding and pretends like nothing, which makes for bizarre scenes where she's insulting everybody around her and nobody reacts to it.

The only thing that annoyed me is one thing with the writing. The various characters voices aren't different enough. Whenever a character shifts to giving some complex thought across it most often slides into Louis CK's voice. So sometimes it feels like everybody is playing the same character. But that's a fairly minor issue. And sometimes it just doesn't work. Some parts of it are just boring.

https://louisck.net/show/horace-and-pete
 
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