TV Series On The Television

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Mothra
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Mothra » Fri Oct 14, 2022 12:07 pm

Really enjoyed Midnight Mass a lot. I didn’t care for the last ep, which is a lot and just kind of a boring mess, but everything leading up to that is really fantastic and enthralling.

I would say the more you learn about the nature of the supernatural element, the less effective the show gets, and the more the show turns into “I am going to directly quote the Bible at you for a while” - I think it’s a good idea that this wraps up after 7 episodes. Probably should’ve been 5.

Great acting, great pacing, cool mystery.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby KingRoyal » Fri Oct 14, 2022 12:46 pm

Absolutely loved Midnight Mass. Succeeds because it isn't about a town terrorized by some horrific force, but instead is about how different people react to a given horror. Such well-developed characters, it's easy to understand how they all view and interpret what's going on based upon their belief systems

I had never heard of Hamish Linklater before this, but damn does he give a great performance, and Samantha Sloyan makes Bev just the worst
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Fri Oct 14, 2022 1:14 pm

I haven't seen Midnight Mass, but Hamish Linklater was great on Legion and Fargo.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Niku » Sat Oct 15, 2022 4:52 pm

Niku wrote:i do think it's basically inevitable that sometime near/at the finale we see kevin in the real world and shit's a lot more real than it seems. overall i give the show a thumbs up and it keeps me watching but i do get a bit frustrated by it not living up to its potential and its (really realllllllly good) cast

i also constantly get distracted by how much kevin looks like jeff gerstmann


they stuck the landing. overall i definitely recommend kevin can fuck himself; two seasons and done now, so it's not a massive time commitment and i think the second season overall is stronger and more cohesive than the first (despite having some clear signs that they accelerated their story timetable a bit in places).
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:02 am

Watched the first episode of Willow and thought it was solid even if it was slow-burn table-setting stuff (if you'll pardon the mixed metaphor). Introduce the cast, who are a bunch of stock fantasy tropes; set up their arcs, which is that they're a bunch of unlikely heroes who are going to discover their true strength along their journey. We've seen all this before, but this formula is a formula for a reason; it does its job.

My favorite part was the opening narration, with Sorsha recapping the events of the movie, where she gets to Madmartigan and describes what a rogue and a scoundrel he was and then concedes that she married him. "I was young." The mix of emotions in her delivery, that combination of wistfulness and ruefulness -- it works well enough in-universe, but of course it's got a few more layers of meaning if you know that Val Kilmer is Joanne Whalley's real-life ex-husband.

And speaking of, I guess I've got mixed feelings about how thickly they're laying on the "what happened to Madmartigan?" mystery. On balance I guess it beats the alternative; I'd rather they find a way to keep him front-and-center in the proceedings even if Kilmer's not up to being a principal actor than just brush him off and not talk about him. It's bittersweet that they've had to write a major story around his not being available, but it also feels like they're celebrating him and his importance to the movie. I'd be very surprised if he doesn't show up in a small role before it's all over.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Niku » Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:07 am

the actress who plays the princess feels like she fell ass-backwards out of like, fucking boy meets world into a gentle fantasy romp. her dialogue is awful and anachronistic even for a series where everyone clearly said "fuck it, do whatever accent you want" and erin kellyman deserves way better than her.

almost all of that bad will is made up for by every scene between warwick davis and his daughter though. i liked the second episode much more than the first overall, because it has about 95% more warwick davis per capita instead of the first episode being almost an hour of "when are we gonna get to the willow factory?"
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Mon Dec 05, 2022 12:57 am

Niku wrote:the actress who plays the princess feels like she fell ass-backwards out of like, fucking boy meets world into a gentle fantasy romp. her dialogue is awful and anachronistic even for a series where everyone clearly said "fuck it, do whatever accent you want" and erin kellyman deserves way better than her.

Yeah, it's not the actress's fault, it's a script problem. The anachronisms are pretty heavy, from someone using the phrase "force field" in the first episode to Willow citing the law of conservation of energy in the second. Given that the second episode closes with a '60s standard, I have to chalk it up to deliberate choice rather than sloppiness.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Tue Dec 06, 2022 3:21 pm

Wednesday is fun, albeit familiar.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Mon Jan 02, 2023 5:34 pm

Thad wrote:
Niku wrote:the actress who plays the princess feels like she fell ass-backwards out of like, fucking boy meets world into a gentle fantasy romp. her dialogue is awful and anachronistic even for a series where everyone clearly said "fuck it, do whatever accent you want" and erin kellyman deserves way better than her.

Yeah, it's not the actress's fault, it's a script problem. The anachronisms are pretty heavy, from someone using the phrase "force field" in the first episode to Willow citing the law of conservation of energy in the second. Given that the second episode closes with a '60s standard, I have to chalk it up to deliberate choice rather than sloppiness.

It's increasingly clear that the problem with Willow the TV series is that it's trying to be like ten different contradictory things, only one of which is a sequel to Willow the movie.

Like, it's possible to do a snarky, postmodernist take on a familiar genre that's also an exceptional example of that genre and that manages to work despite some massive tonal shifts; Hot Fuzz did it. It's possible to take a sequel to a film in a completely different direction than the original and use that as a starting point for a snarky, postmodernist followup; Gremlins 2 did it. It's possible to pull some familiar property out of the nostalgia well and bring it back with an ironic, postmodernist twist; The Brady Bunch Movie did it. And it's possible to take a Lucasfilm property and, within a loose arc structure, play with an episodic format that does a different genre pastiche every week; The Mandalorian did it.

But it requires a strong vision, a real mastery of craft, and a massive amount of focus and cohesion to do any one of those things. Willow doesn't have any of that, and it seems to be trying to do all of them. It has some good individual moments, usually involving the cast of the original film, but it has no idea what it is or even what it wants to be. The tone isn't consistent from one scene to the next; the way the characters talk isn't even consistent from one scene to the next.

It's still better than the books.


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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby KingRoyal » Fri Jan 13, 2023 7:17 pm



Well I'll be damned
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Niku » Fri Jan 13, 2023 11:37 pm

i've been crawling through season three of harley quinn because it has not been very uh ... good

but goddamn episode 6 "The Killing Vote" aka an episode all about joker running for mayor of gotham so he can be the best stepfather possible is maybe the best one they've ever done. it might single handedly redeem the season for me.
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Mothra » Sat Jan 14, 2023 4:14 am

Good to know... I keep trying and stopping to get through S3. Gonna power on.

I watched all of From and it SUCKED of course but I really enjoyed it. It's a terrible, fun watch.

Watched all of Midnight Mass, it was fucking fantastic. The ending is a bit much, but, it doesn't ruin the great stuff that came before it.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Upthorn » Sat Jan 14, 2023 5:18 am

I had some thoughts on From, and even wrote them up, but forgot to share them here.
I suppose I could link to the place where I actually posted them.

Bullet point summary:
  • Interesting concept/themes
  • terrible character writing
  • not sure they know where they're going
  • is this about Covid?
How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby beatbandito » Sat Jan 14, 2023 6:57 am

Holy shit, I watched most (if not all, maybe?) of From and had already completely forgotten it existed. Pure prime time thriller schlock.
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Upthorn » Sat Jan 14, 2023 7:23 pm

I can't keep track of what shows goes in what threads anymore...

It's technically not on broadcast television, but has anybody else checked out Severance?
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Sun Jan 15, 2023 1:22 am

Niku wrote:i've been crawling through season three of harley quinn because it has not been very uh ... good

but goddamn episode 6 "The Killing Vote" aka an episode all about joker running for mayor of gotham so he can be the best stepfather possible is maybe the best one they've ever done. it might single handedly redeem the season for me.

Yeah, "The Killing Vote" was fantastic.

I liked the midseason finale, too, even if the jokes about Batman's secret identity being kind of obvious aren't exactly fresh observations.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby sei » Sun Jan 15, 2023 5:37 am

Upthorn wrote:I can't keep track of what shows goes in what threads anymore...

It's technically not on broadcast television, but has anybody else checked out Severance?

Great show; awesome premise.
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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby Thad » Mon Jan 16, 2023 10:47 am

Now, you might think ending the first season of Willow with Money for Nothing is jarringly inappropriate to both the setting and the theme.

But only if you think the theme is something other than '80s nostalgia.

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Re: TV Series On The Television

Postby IGNORE ME » Mon Jan 16, 2023 11:53 am

Every quarter of a second there is a new soul created on this planet Earth and it is fucking imperative that they learn about Game Boy and E.T., or else they might start coming up with new ideas.

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