froghawk on 13/5/2020 at 12:32
Better call saul keeps getting better and better imo. Took a couple seasons to really find its footing but the last 3 have been top notch.
SubJeff on 13/5/2020 at 15:31
I really liked BCS. Nacho and Lalo especially. Oh, and Kim is great.
Watching The Good Fight S03 atm. The Good Wife was really good, this is better. Micheal Sheen's character :cheeky: He's almost as good as Wags in Billions.
rachel on 18/5/2020 at 09:59
I finally bit the bullet and signed up for Disney+ to check out The Mandalorian. I'm liking it so far, it's nice. I like that they take a semi-serious tone, not too gritty but but not cartoonish. They made Jawas look pretty badass, of all things! On the artsy side, I love that the end credits show story-board art from each episode's production, that's very cool.
Pyrian on 18/5/2020 at 16:31
We all know about Death of the Author, but what about Murder by a Contestant? I dunno, seems kind of weird to yank the shows on that, unless the victim was also part of the show or otherwise a direct connection?
rachel on 18/5/2020 at 16:48
Speaking of murderers on TV, The Jinx was a spectacular series I finally got to watch recently. However, I lost a lot of respect for the director when I found that they had doctored the ending "confession" to make it sound more damning. The real transcript is equally chilling and I can only think they did that for the sensationalism, in spite of their protests of wanting to do the right thing and all that... It was pretty bad form and crossed the line from documentary to opinion piece.
Tocky on 20/5/2020 at 01:17
I still find it ironic that Robert Blake killed his wife and got away with it since his one big hit was Baretta which opened with a song that said "don't do the crime if you can't do the time". But I wish all so called reality show people would kill each other in a glorious blood bath of knives and axes. I picture Kim Kardashians head flying through the air in lovely spirals of blood. They are like a joke that wasn't funny on the first telling being told now for the hundred thousandth time. Only war and demons crawling forth to claim them can make things right at this point.
Speaking of demons, I finished Witcher. No damned reason they should have jumped back and forth in time the way they did. I have seen stories where that made sense but this one was more as if the writer hadn't figured out yet how to fill in the missing information. They did a decent enough job of filling it in though. The story is interesting enough to follow. As hard as they try and as broad a palate magic provides I haven't yet developed much feeling for the characters. It's easy enough to recognize which characters they want you to feel for because they all wear colored contacts but despite the pathos of Yennefer her story was too hodgepodge for any great empathy. The Witcher himself is the most interesting character. He has a certain disdain for himself and others that somehow comes off as charming. It mitigates all the manly shit he does. I want to see where the story goes though. That's enough to pick back up on it when it comes on again.
All caught up on Outlander too. This one has a less scattered story telling style that I prefer though the characters bump into each other too often in a deus ex machina way. Our running joke about it is whenever a new character appears we wonder when they will try to fuck Jamie. Poor Jamie, everyone wants to, women, men, horses, goats, some even succeed. Not the horses and goats. It has happened so often that when he meets his daughter for the first time (while pissing no less) he tries to fend her off saying he is a married man. Misunderstandings and evil characters abound throughout naturally. These last seasons they have taken to North Carolina and even settled near Grandfather Mountain, a place we love, though in reality it was shot somewhere in Scotland with a background pasted in. Somehow they make it feel like those days and that area. Each episode has both a concluding story arch and a continuing one that leaves off on a cliffhanger of some sort that makes you want to see the next and that is good writing no matter the feminine slant it most definitely has. These characters I feel for. Not always in a positive way but moreso than any in Witcher thus far.
Other than that I've watched every Ray Bradbury Theater though I had read all but one of the stories and about half of the Outer Limits (latter one) and Monsters series that I had missed back in the day. Dust is also on Roku. Quite a few things are. It's a nice platform for free stuff and Netflix type things as well.
Starker on 20/5/2020 at 14:02
Won't You Be My Neighbor?, a documentary about Fred Rogers, a popular US children's entertainer. I was vaguely aware that he was a beloved figure in US culture, but I had no idea that he was also a controversial figure who inspired such seething hatred in some people that they were protesting at his funeral. I think the film does a pretty good job at showing some of the complexities around that -- you get a glimpse of his self-doubt and some of his darker thoughts, but also of his unmistakable sincerity and conviction. It certainly makes a convincing case that he was far from being the naive fool the right-wing reactionaries try to paint him as. And some of the things he did were undoubtedly radical -- such as trying to teach children how to deal with and take control of their emotions or assuring them of their self worth. And, of course, the idea that a child should get unconditional love without having to do anything to earn it rubs some people very much the wrong way.
Quote:
I don't think that anybody can grow unless he really is accepted exactly as he is. 'Cause if somebody's always saying to a child, "You're going to grow up and you're going to be fine--" There's so much of that in this country anyway, that a child is appreciated for what he will be not for what he is. He will be a great consumer someday. And so, the quicker we can get them to grow up, and the quicker we can get them out of the nest so that they will go out and buy--you know, set up their own home at twelve, maybe--then the better.
Another thing that impressed me was how the documentary was paced -- for this short amount of time, it was necessarily going to have to be a cliff notes version of his life, but the film takes its time and has a very leisurely tempo. I thought it suited Fred's own use of silence very well and it was a stark contrast to the very frantic pace US television has usually. I think half of the reason why I appreciate pundits like Rachel Maddow or Chris Wallace is that they seem so calm and measured compared to the usual rapid fire delivery of US shows and their pandemonium of having multiple people on at the same time talking over each other. Also, probably a not insignificant part of why I love books so much is that being able to move at your own pace gives you as much time as you need for reflection.
[video=youtube;gEeEEc_djco]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEeEEc_djco[/video]
Thirith on 20/5/2020 at 14:20
That's a good description of the film and of Mr Rogers. It's an impressive documentary to watch.
Starker on 20/5/2020 at 14:40
Yeah, I was initially a bit wary about the high ratings and awards, but it really is an excellent documentary. A lot of the time it just presents its material without comment and lets it stand on its own -- like when it shows people cynically mocking him and questioning his manhood after having shown the immense effort he took and the adversity he faced to produce the shows... having to write all the scripts and songs, compose all the music, and address tough questions in the backdrop to the dark times he lived in.
One of the impressive things he accomplished that I thought was a bit of a shame that it was clipped so short in the film was when he testified to Congress when Nixon wanted to cut funding to public television and managed to convince the senator at the hearing to save PBS:
[video=youtube;fKy7ljRr0AA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKy7ljRr0AA[/video]
Tocky on 21/5/2020 at 04:20
I liked when someone asked how he kept his persona separate from his real self and he said he didn't understand the question. What you saw was what he was.