TV βοΈ House of the Dragon
09/10/2024
π imdb.com
Another one I initially didn't like but loved after giving it another chance. We watched three episodes of this last night to finish up season one, and I was gripped the entire time. Loved everything about it, except the dicey ageing of some characters, but that's hardly enough of a negative!
That's the second thing this week that I've really enjoyed after giving it another chance. Should I be giving things more of a chance? Probably won't.
TV π€· Those About To Die
09/01/2024
π imdb.com
There's plenty to like about this, and I would say there's an almost equal amount to dislike.
I liked the silliness of it, the story was so shallow that all the twisting and turning (which would usually annoy me) kept me interested, some good performances made even better up against some hilariously terrible performances, and Jojo Macari acted his little heart out (which did look very funny in places, next to...well, lethargic performances).
I disliked the absolutely godawful CGI. Whoever was in charge of the animation should be shown some videos of humans doing things because I don't think they've ever seen that. Some of the dialogue is dreadful, and some of the background acting reminded me of that episode of Futurama where Zoidberg's uncle keeps screaming at people to emote. On more than one occasion, a guard walking in the background completely pulled my attention in a comical way.
The story reminded me of a 6-year-old telling you what they did at school, and they can't focus on the main thread of the story so they keep going off on tangents and forgetting where they were, and filling in things they can't quite remember with some clearly fabricated nonsense. It's mildly entertaining but by the end there's a mutual feeling of relief.
TV βοΈ Dark Matter
08/04/2024
π imdb.com
Starts out quite weak, in my opinion, but I started as soon as I put the book down. Took a little break, came back, and actually ended up liking it a lot. I still prefer the book but there's a couple of very nice visual elements and some good screen adaptation.
TV π€© The Man in the High Castle
07/16/2024
π en.wikipedia.org
There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that watching this at 6am five days a week had an impact on my state of mind. The brutality, iconography, futility are all tonally very similar to The Handmaid's Tale, and it's tough to watch at times.
I feel like the last season rushes in places to tie things up (they knew they were getting cancelled) but it never felt inconsistent. It just moves a lot quicker than all the other seasons, but I suppose a slow rebellion wouldn't be very effective.
I don't know. I enjoyed it but maybe filling your head with that much Nazi symbolism at 6am isn't good for you. Watch it in the evening instead!
TV βοΈ The Lazarus Project
05/21/2024
π imdb.com
Solid time travel story with some absolutely brutal story arcs. I think the story goes off the rails towards the end of series two, but 1. I might be wrong and 2. it's to be expected of time travel. Solid casting, but Caroline Quentin still manages to overshadow everyone; I think she's brilliant.
TV βοΈ Fallout
05/06/2024
Every time I watch a show like this, it reminds me of Lost. I've never seen Lost but I do know they dragged it out and tacked a disappointing ending onto it. This feels like the sort of show that could go episodic like that. They try to find Vault-Tec, some other faction shows up and then they spend a whole season on that conflict and they've got one more season out of it.
But, not to focus on the negative, I felt like this captured the character of the games very well. The mixture of brutality and humour is done well, without going too far into Borderlands territory. It's a fun story, good characters and acting. It's all very Fallout and it did make me want to pick the game up.
There is a lot of filler though. In 8 episodes they still manage to pull out one whole episode where nothing happens (episode 4 I think?). I do still feel like it's worth watching overall, but a little disappointing that there wasn't enough story to spread out to 8 episodes.
TV βοΈ 3 Body Problem
04/13/2024
π imdb.com
Massive spoilers for both the books and the Netflix show here. If you're planning to ever read or watch either, please don't read this. If you have read the books and watched the show, forgive me any mis-remembering here, I guess!
Enjoyed this way more than I expected to. In places, especially with regard to character development and introduction, the book sometimes suffers from being planned as it was being written, I think. The absolutely crucial, pivotal character Luo Ji being unceremoniously inserted after the first book (I had to go back and check that Wang Miao and Luo Ji weren't the same character) was very jarring, and one of many symptoms of poor foresight and character development in the books.
Having all of the main character concepts visible from the start was a good move by the writers of the show, in my opinion. It allows them to be developed for longer, and to form proper attachments to them. I love that there's evidence of all the characters and their function in the story, spread across the whole cast. I see elements of AA and Cheng Xin in both Jin and Auggie, as well as Auggie obviously adopting most of Wang Miao's formative storyline in terms of nanotechnology. The story flows very well in the new Netflix characters.
I feel like these character adaptations must have taken such a long time to unpick and adapt, but it was worth doing, for me. It means that they left the story alone and focussed on how do we tell this story with these characters? What they've achieved there is quite remarkable. And the casting is excellent as well. Knowing what happens to Wade, Saul (Luo Ji), Auggie and Jin (Cheng Xin and AA), and Will (Yun Tianming), I feel like that's all going to be fun to watch and will make the central friendship group dynamic a lot more powerful by the end of Death's End.
The low-key star of the show is still Benedict Wong as Clarence (Da Shi). My reading of Da Shi was a lot higher energy than the resigned, sarcastic Clarence, but it works well for the tone of the character.
I hope Netflix renews this to cover the rest of the story. The visual implementation of the Panama Canal was absolutely amazing and I am excited to see what they do with the probe's first contact, the shadow colonies, 4D space collapse, Yun's resurrection and meeting with Cheng Xin, and the Neptune capsule.
TV π€© Gen V
04/02/2024
I loved The Boys, and this somehow stands on its shoulders. Incredible storytelling and I love this universe. I was skeptical about this purely because of how much I enjoyed The Boys but no more. I will watch anything they put out relating to this. Best superhero show/anything ever.
TV βοΈ The Gentlemen
03/18/2024
π imdb.com
I was skeptical about this, largely because I haven't seen anything half decent on Netflix for what seems like years. At least I know this was somewhat written by humans. At the very least it was conceived by humans.
But I liked it. I mean it's extremely contrived in that way that Guy Ritchie does best, and it has one or two glaring holes in the form of absolute liabilities you just would've sacked or killed, but it was fun. I don't think I'll watch it again when I could watch the film, though.
TV π€© Succession
02/14/2024
I think about this show at least once a day. Absolutely beautiful retro paranoid sci-fi thriller.
TV βοΈ Reacher
01/30/2024
Super American, and a mercifully short first season. Stuff like this has a tendency to get dragged out and serialised and I'm glad this doesn't suffer from that (lookin' at you; Mentalist, Numb3rs et al).Β Decent story with some good twists and turns. Nothing too thinky going on.
TV π€© Mad Men
01/30/2024
There's going to be a couple of obvious and not-recent TV shows here (definitely didn't just write this to get the ball rolling in this category!) but whenever I think about my favourite TV shows, this is always so high on the list.
If you haven't already seen it, I suppose it's pretty unlikely that I'm going to convince you here, but it's the perfect period drama. The characters, costumes, and story are all absolutely wonderful.
The first time I started watching it, something about it made me uncomfortable and tense and I didn't get further than the first few episodes, but I watched it again on my turbo trainer and turned my unease into a calorie burn and ended up absolutely loving this show.