Lots of TV this month outside of the week I spent up at the cabin, where I watched nothing and loved it.
65 thoughts on “Third Monday Movie Day”
Been watching some of the postseason so that's impacted our ability to watch television.
Halt and Catch Fire had another strong season. It was thankfully renewed for one more season. However, it wasn't renewed until the day before the season finale(s) so the finale has a definite feel of a series finale.
We both want to watch Westworld but haven't had the time yet. There's now a slot open in the week so maybe we'll be able to catch up before the season ends.
I hadn't really paid attention to the idea of Halt and Catch Fire, but then it had "Cold Light" by the Operators in one of its TV spots, which made me pay attention a bit more. It looks like something I'd be interested in.
Each season has been better than the last. Unfortunately, the ratings have not followed the quality.
With my wife working now, I've found there is even less time to watch things (and apparently much less time to clean.)
I did watch all of Luke Cage. I enjoyed it, but put it behind daredevil and Jessica jones. If gets bonus points for being pretty typical, though, and both Luke and the main bad guy are pretty interesting characters.
I also finally watched Seven Samurai Saturday night. For a three and a half hour movie made sixty years ago, the leaving is pretty great. I can understand why it's so influential and I'm proud of myself for recognizing the lead actor from Yojimbo.
A clean house is very low on my priority list in life.
Luke Cage is on my list. Do I need to plan on watching the second season of Daredevil first? Or Jessica Jones?
Need to? No. But I'd put both ahead of it anyway. And Jessica Jones is probably a good "watch before" regardless for some small plot points.
bless you for watching Seven Samurai -- too many people are ignorant of the movie giants that influence the industry so greatly.
I love Seven Samurai, but man it takes a certain mood for me to be able to watch a 3.5 hr movie.
This.
Yeah that one took me a whole weekend, but I enjoyed it immensely
Huh. My coworker also stops a movie partway and returns to it on another day. I absolutely cannot do that.
Which is probably why we watch so few movies these days...
Well, I fell asleep, so it wasn't a conscious choice
The Seven Samurai is my favorite movie, as I've no doubt mentioned here. And indeed, I am also the type who would never break up a movie intentionally. It's hindered my ability to watch movies often. I've owned The Hateful Eight for months but it has a similar runtime.
Since we're on it, I watched Kurosawa's feudal Japan version of King Lear, Ran. It's beautiful, of course, but there are buckets of blood that's all too brightly-colored to pass as blood, and man, does it distract at times. The performances are mostly wonderful and I think I would have been legitimately stunned by the plot points if I didn't know King Lear.
I went on an early-in-the-relationship date to see Ran when it came out. I loved it, she didn't. The relationship didn't go anywhere.
I haven't seen the movie since. I should probably check it out again. Not sure if current GF will appreciate, so maybe see it solo.
There is definitely something about an early date disagree on a movie thing. One time on a second date I cried during a movie and the girl just glared at me like, "Are you kidding you sap?" That didn't last long either.
I went on an early-in-the-relationship date to see Ran when it came out. I loved it, she didn't. The relationship didn't go anywhere.
Making you an Also-Ran?
Re: Luke Cage.
I loved the first half of the show. Possibly my favorite of the Netflix Marvel bunch. But the second half... oy. It was not good.
I finally finished Justified. I was a little disappointed in the finale. And then I read Sepinwall and realized how much I'd missed.
It wasa good series overall. I'd put it a tier below Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad.
I just re-watched the "Justified" pilot the other day. I love that show, but the ending did fall slightly flat to me too.
I watched the first episode of Lillehammer a week or two ago and found myself amused enough to continue when time & inclination overlap. I've been slowly chipping away at Netflix's Chef's Table, which is quite excellent. I've also been fitting in the occasional episode of Keeping Up Appearances.
Recent additions to my to-watch list: Luke Cage, Marseille, What Happened, Miss Simone?, The Little Prince, & Chef's Table: France.
Started watching The Office. Almost done with season 3. Not near as consistent as Parks & Rec, and if it weren't for Jim/Pam I would have probably given up on it. Relies too much on cringe-humor, but appears to be relying less on that as it goes along.
I'm an early bird and a night owl. So I am wise...and I have worms!
Also started Game of Thrones. Two episodes in. I like Dinklage quite a bit. We'll see.
Also started Blunt Talk. I love Patrick Stewart so much. I'm glad he got to do a raunchy comedy; he seems to revel in it. So far I'm enjoying myself; I fear too much humor will rely on shock-value, but it has Stewart, so. To give you an idea, the first episode has Stewart
a news anchor, soliciting a transgender prostitute, using uppers and downers, and when he's caught by the police, he ends up on top of a squad car shouting out lines from Hamlet.
The Office seasons 2 and 3 were, at one time, two of my favorite seasons of TV. I wonder if I'd like them as much now that I've seen Parks and Rec, where the cast chemistry was so much better.
They're still really good. Especially Season 3. I watched a fair chunk of that again recently.
But we've also become more accustomed to the ground that they were breaking in that show, so they don't hold up perfectly.
In the last month-plus, EAR and I watched all of season 1 of Quantico (which reminds me of How to Get Away With Murder meets Blacklist. I'm quite surprised it's not from Shonda Rhimes.)
Watched season 3 of Blacklist, which went a bit off-track at the beginning, but tightened up towards the end (with some enjoyably Alias-like undercover scenes), and heading exactly where I thought it was going to.
After those, EAR and I were a bit adrift looking for our new favorite thing. A couple of things we've sampled haven't grabbed us. I can't even remember what. Something from the BBC.
She settled on The New Girl, which I enjoy as well, though I have no problem missing episodes here and there. We're wondering if there's more or less sex (and partners) than Friends. Someone online probably has a definitive list.
Another "season" of Luther showed up on Netflix and I watched them quickly. Complaints: only 2 episodes? I wonder if the big plot-turning pivot will turn out to be similar to that on the Blacklist season.
Season 2 of Mecha Anime series Kuromukuro is also up and I keep falling asleep watching it. I've also gotten the story confused with Aldnoah.Zero (another Mecha Anime), to the point where I almost want to re-watch the second half of season 1 to get the story straight.
I watched half of The Monkey King, which I thought was a prequel of kinds to Stephen Chow's Journey to the West, but it appears it isn't. It was OK, but I don't think I'll finish it.
I'm wondering if I should give new series Falling Water a try. Looks like a blend of Fringe and Inception.
That is a heck of a combination.
* X-Men: Apocalypse: I liked this less than the other two of the "rebooted" X-Men series. I liked the idea of the bad guy more than the execution, and it felt like it took nearly the entire runtime of the movie getting the pieces into place to do something, then the ending just all of a sudden happened.
* Neighbors 2: I laughed quite a bit. Rogan and Blunt have good chemistry, and I really like the fact that she's just as petty and willing to stoop to the goofy shenanigans as he is. Plus, it's weirdly progressive with its worldview. I liked it more than I expected to.
TV is mostly baseball right now, but we started "This Is Us" together. It's schmaltzy, and I don't think I'll be able to stick with it, but it has its moments. I'm just curious if it will hold up at all once it runs out of "gotchas".
I only just saw the first Neighbors last month. I really dug it, and like you, primarily dug the scenes between Rogen and Blunt. She really does come off as real, which makes there relationship work so, SO much better than the tired "man cave idiot - serious wife" dynamic.
Edit: Byrne, not Blunt. nibs steered me wrong!!! Then he corrected it via Google Hangout and all is forgiven.
We've started watching This is Us as well. I thought it would've worked better as a movie, at least the pilot. I'm like you, I'm thinking it will start to lose steam once it runs out of twists.
ARQ - A Netflix movie. I wanted something sci-fiy. I got that. But overall, meh. Luke Cage - As described above, brilliant first half. But the second half of the show was not good. The Force Awakens - Started rewatching this for the first time last night. I remembered loving it, but it has surpassed my memory. Yay. Amanda Knox - Documentary covering the Knox trial. Pretty much what you'd expect, but it was interesting for me as I'd followed that story pretty closely. The Grinder - Started this series staring Rob Lowe. It's... okay. I'm 3 episodes in, and I think it's earned another few, but the premise could wear thin, quickly. Mascots - The new Christopher Guest movie. I stopped half way through. Will probably finish the second half someday, but the characters are just... too pathetic. Even for a Guest movie.
My wife just started watching Mascots. She said the first 10 minutes were hilarious but then she stopped it so we could watch together.
There are some very funny lines, but I'm not really hopeful for any of the characters, like I was with, say, Best In Show or A Mighty Wind.
the premise could wear thin, quickly.
looks like it did: canceled.
That should make both deciding to complete the series and cutting bait easier to do.
Yeah, Rob Lowe has already moved on to "Code Black."
I went to Shin Godzilla last week, and it was pretty much everything I'd hoped for. It was directed by Hideki Anno, the director of Neon Genesis Evangelion, who is a gigantic nerd for kaiju movies and basically anything else nerdy. The film had a fairly perfect mix of Godzilla wrecking everything and the folks working to save Tokyo figuring out how to stop him. The effects aren't as pretty as the 2014 Godzilla flick, but this was a way more fun movie. I'm super excited that we had it playing here, even if it was only for a couple of days. If you can catch it before it goes away, or when it comes out on video, I highly recommend it.
I'm four and a half seasons into Bob's Burgers. It started fine. By season three I was laughing a lot and it just keeps getting funnier. I look forward to moments from literally every single character.
I'm halfway through about fifteen other seasons of things, as always. I think I'll probably finish season six of The Walking Dead, though I kind of know what the Negan storyline is all about so I'm having a hard time actually looking forward to it. After that I'll probably continue with season five of Game of Thrones. That should be a feel-good palate cleanser after good guys die in The Walking Dead.
Sour Cream and I watched the entirety of Phineas and Ferb (almost entirely over the summer, fittingly). It's maybe the most consistently funny show I've ever watched.
Luke Cage is up next, maybe? I've also noticed stuff I want to see is starting to get buried, like Justified, Bloodline and The Get Down. Someday...someday. Part of the problem is that I'm becoming ever more obsessed with Survivor and Big Brother and am watching seasons from all over the world.
I may have said it before, but the Tina's birthday/Bob's taxi episode was the moment I realized that show was on the right track.
And I know I've said this before, but the stable of guest voices they have on that show is amazing.
Gene as Little Bob might be the funniest thing I've ever seen.
I saw on Reddit that the Australian version of Survivor this past season was pretty good. Have you watched that one? How does one watch seasons from other countries?
I watch it on iffy sites because I have no legitimate way to watch it. I am indeed caught up on this season of Australian Survivor (five players are left). It's good, although it's basically just a season of American Survivor. It's the same production with the same sets, challenges and sayings from the host. It was a little twisty early on for my tastes, but it's been fun, and I've loved the chance to see more "uninitiated" people learn the game, though a few of them are superfans of the American version.
I only watched the first season of Bloodline. I thought the feel of the show and south Florida were really good. It wasn't enough for me to move on to season 2.
I love damn near everything about it, though I've been stalled for a couple of months.
I won't say anymore until you're done.
EAR and I loved Bloodline and waited for Season 2, but, like How to Get Away With Murder, it's built on a season-long reveal story with bits of the end of the story the whole way. So when season 2 came around, I quit both after the first episode (as in, didn't come back).
One of my coworkers is working through the series and just finished season 3 of Bob's Burgers. Talking about it with him made me go back and rewatch a bunch of the episodes. It's just so, so, so good.
The jalapeno has been enjoying Phineas and Ferb lately and I had a hilarious conversation with him in which I tried to explain that the characters are referring to the "tri-state area." He absolutely refused to believe me; he's convinced it's the "dry state area."
Whoops, apparently tristate is one word, no hyphen.
As I mentioned here before, the oldest is obsessed with the Moon. The youngest's bedroom has some glow-in-the-dark stickers of celestial objects from a previous (or further) occupant that barely work. He likes to watch the moon glowing. We also have morning glories around our mailbox that he likes to look at. Filter both through a three-year-old's ears and we soon had morning glories on the ceiling and moon glowing on the mailbox. I think he has them straight now but for a few weeks they would get interchanged. Some of that may have been on purpose.
I suppose I would be remiss if I didn't also mention that I watched the first three episodes of MTV's "Scream." I really loved the first movie, so I guess it's still got its hooks in me.
The cast is gorgeous. That's not a compliment; it's distracting. Every character is an Adonis or a goddess (except for the nerd, who's merely very good looking). It's just...almost intimidating. It's also the type of beauty from high-fashion magazines. These people are emaciated. Their best hope to survive is to turn sideways so Ghostface can't see them.
Also, my favorite character was killed in the third episode, which sort of turned me off. I wasn't surprised that she went so early (she isn't Caucasian) but it really sucked the life out of the show for me. To that point, I was more interested in her survival than anything. Much of the cast has at least some talent, but the lead actress is atrocious.
I have this weird feeling that I typed all of this last month. If so, I must have been pretty drunk then. Or I guess maybe I am now. Either way.
When I heard someone was adapting the Shannara material, I was interested. Then I heard it was MTV.
I wasn't aware of this and just watched the trailer. Hmmm. I will give it a quick try. I first read the Shannara series back in college. I have read countless fantasy books/series since. I revisited the Shannara a few months back with much excitement. I ended up being disappointed. After reading Jordan, Sanderson, Erikson, etc, Brooks just doesn't do it for me anymore. I only got through the first 3 books before I bailed out. Very imaginative story, but the world building just seemed so shallow.
I've lost interest in fantasy writing over the years. I think I made it through 3 Shannara books, but eventually the premise got old (some shred of an iota of a dust mote of Evil survived and is still loose in the world!)
I think fantasy writing has evolved. Jordan and Sanderson did a great job getting inside the heads of the agents of evil. How did they become evil? What turmoil still lurks in their consciousness? A lot of the earlier fantasy writers focused more on just following the "quest" from the hero point of view. Not a huge Game of Thrones fan, but I do admire Martin's ability to paint some redeeming qualities in those who we think are pure evil. There is a little evil in most good people I know, and a little good in most bad people I know. The World is not black and white. Lots of gray area that makes life messy. I love how a lot of literature has reflected this over the past 3 decades or so.
Miyazake does this a lot in his films.
Very much so. No way an American movie has Sen inviting No-Face along after what he had done.
I watched that and liked it enough. I might have said something like:
"Surprisingly adequate given what I expected from MTV."
Caveat: I've never read the books.
I'm just curious as to whether anyone's watching "Pitch" and what they think of it. I'm not, but then I rarely watch any TV shows. The basic premise seems really unbelievable to me, but I'm sure it could still be entertaining if done well.
from what I've heard is that they do a pretty good job at trying to keep things realistic within the unrealistic premise. Which is to say the baseball feels real. Though I haven't heard much from a "this is entertaining" standpoint
I finished watching Mascots. The second half was very strong. Either I was just in the wrong mood when I watched the first half, or there were two very different parts to that movie. But yeah, I can recommend it now, when I didn't before.
The Boy just took a job working on a new CBS show (something donuts something). So I guess we will be DVRing that one....
Been watching some of the postseason so that's impacted our ability to watch television.
Halt and Catch Fire had another strong season. It was thankfully renewed for one more season. However, it wasn't renewed until the day before the season finale(s) so the finale has a definite feel of a series finale.
We both want to watch Westworld but haven't had the time yet. There's now a slot open in the week so maybe we'll be able to catch up before the season ends.
I hadn't really paid attention to the idea of Halt and Catch Fire, but then it had "Cold Light" by the Operators in one of its TV spots, which made me pay attention a bit more. It looks like something I'd be interested in.
Each season has been better than the last. Unfortunately, the ratings have not followed the quality.
With my wife working now, I've found there is even less time to watch things (and apparently much less time to clean.)
I did watch all of Luke Cage. I enjoyed it, but put it behind daredevil and Jessica jones. If gets bonus points for being pretty typical, though, and both Luke and the main bad guy are pretty interesting characters.
I also finally watched Seven Samurai Saturday night. For a three and a half hour movie made sixty years ago, the leaving is pretty great. I can understand why it's so influential and I'm proud of myself for recognizing the lead actor from Yojimbo.
A clean house is very low on my priority list in life.
Luke Cage is on my list. Do I need to plan on watching the second season of Daredevil first? Or Jessica Jones?
Need to? No. But I'd put both ahead of it anyway. And Jessica Jones is probably a good "watch before" regardless for some small plot points.
bless you for watching Seven Samurai -- too many people are ignorant of the movie giants that influence the industry so greatly.
I love Seven Samurai, but man it takes a certain mood for me to be able to watch a 3.5 hr movie.
This.
Yeah that one took me a whole weekend, but I enjoyed it immensely
Huh. My coworker also stops a movie partway and returns to it on another day. I absolutely cannot do that.
Which is probably why we watch so few movies these days...
Well, I fell asleep, so it wasn't a conscious choice
The Seven Samurai is my favorite movie, as I've no doubt mentioned here. And indeed, I am also the type who would never break up a movie intentionally. It's hindered my ability to watch movies often. I've owned The Hateful Eight for months but it has a similar runtime.
Since we're on it, I watched Kurosawa's feudal Japan version of King Lear, Ran. It's beautiful, of course, but there are buckets of blood that's all too brightly-colored to pass as blood, and man, does it distract at times. The performances are mostly wonderful and I think I would have been legitimately stunned by the plot points if I didn't know King Lear.
I went on an early-in-the-relationship date to see Ran when it came out. I loved it, she didn't. The relationship didn't go anywhere.
I haven't seen the movie since. I should probably check it out again. Not sure if current GF will appreciate, so maybe see it solo.
There is definitely something about an early date disagree on a movie thing. One time on a second date I cried during a movie and the girl just glared at me like, "Are you kidding you sap?" That didn't last long either.
Making you an Also-Ran?
Re: Luke Cage.
I loved the first half of the show. Possibly my favorite of the Netflix Marvel bunch. But the second half... oy. It was not good.
I finally finished Justified. I was a little disappointed in the finale. And then I read Sepinwall and realized how much I'd missed.
It wasa good series overall. I'd put it a tier below Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad.
I just re-watched the "Justified" pilot the other day. I love that show, but the ending did fall slightly flat to me too.
I watched the first episode of Lillehammer a week or two ago and found myself amused enough to continue when time & inclination overlap. I've been slowly chipping away at Netflix's Chef's Table, which is quite excellent. I've also been fitting in the occasional episode of Keeping Up Appearances.
Recent additions to my to-watch list: Luke Cage, Marseille, What Happened, Miss Simone?, The Little Prince, & Chef's Table: France.
Started watching The Office. Almost done with season 3. Not near as consistent as Parks & Rec, and if it weren't for Jim/Pam I would have probably given up on it. Relies too much on cringe-humor, but appears to be relying less on that as it goes along.
Also started Game of Thrones. Two episodes in. I like Dinklage quite a bit. We'll see.
Also started Blunt Talk. I love Patrick Stewart so much. I'm glad he got to do a raunchy comedy; he seems to revel in it. So far I'm enjoying myself; I fear too much humor will rely on shock-value, but it has Stewart, so. To give you an idea, the first episode has Stewart
The Office seasons 2 and 3 were, at one time, two of my favorite seasons of TV. I wonder if I'd like them as much now that I've seen Parks and Rec, where the cast chemistry was so much better.
They're still really good. Especially Season 3. I watched a fair chunk of that again recently.
But we've also become more accustomed to the ground that they were breaking in that show, so they don't hold up perfectly.
In the last month-plus, EAR and I watched all of season 1 of Quantico (which reminds me of How to Get Away With Murder meets Blacklist. I'm quite surprised it's not from Shonda Rhimes.)
Watched season 3 of Blacklist, which went a bit off-track at the beginning, but tightened up towards the end (with some enjoyably Alias-like undercover scenes), and heading exactly where I thought it was going to.
After those, EAR and I were a bit adrift looking for our new favorite thing. A couple of things we've sampled haven't grabbed us. I can't even remember what. Something from the BBC.
She settled on The New Girl, which I enjoy as well, though I have no problem missing episodes here and there. We're wondering if there's more or less sex (and partners) than Friends. Someone online probably has a definitive list.
Another "season" of Luther showed up on Netflix and I watched them quickly. Complaints: only 2 episodes? I wonder if the big plot-turning pivot will turn out to be similar to that on the Blacklist season.
Season 2 of Mecha Anime series Kuromukuro is also up and I keep falling asleep watching it. I've also gotten the story confused with Aldnoah.Zero (another Mecha Anime), to the point where I almost want to re-watch the second half of season 1 to get the story straight.
I watched half of The Monkey King, which I thought was a prequel of kinds to Stephen Chow's Journey to the West, but it appears it isn't. It was OK, but I don't think I'll finish it.
I'm wondering if I should give new series Falling Water a try. Looks like a blend of Fringe and Inception.
That is a heck of a combination.
* X-Men: Apocalypse: I liked this less than the other two of the "rebooted" X-Men series. I liked the idea of the bad guy more than the execution, and it felt like it took nearly the entire runtime of the movie getting the pieces into place to do something, then the ending just all of a sudden happened.
* Neighbors 2: I laughed quite a bit. Rogan and Blunt have good chemistry, and I really like the fact that she's just as petty and willing to stoop to the goofy shenanigans as he is. Plus, it's weirdly progressive with its worldview. I liked it more than I expected to.
TV is mostly baseball right now, but we started "This Is Us" together. It's schmaltzy, and I don't think I'll be able to stick with it, but it has its moments. I'm just curious if it will hold up at all once it runs out of "gotchas".
I only just saw the first Neighbors last month. I really dug it, and like you, primarily dug the scenes between Rogen and Blunt. She really does come off as real, which makes there relationship work so, SO much better than the tired "man cave idiot - serious wife" dynamic.
Edit: Byrne, not Blunt. nibs steered me wrong!!! Then he corrected it via Google Hangout and all is forgiven.
We've started watching This is Us as well. I thought it would've worked better as a movie, at least the pilot. I'm like you, I'm thinking it will start to lose steam once it runs out of twists.
ARQ - A Netflix movie. I wanted something sci-fiy. I got that. But overall, meh.
Luke Cage - As described above, brilliant first half. But the second half of the show was not good.
The Force Awakens - Started rewatching this for the first time last night. I remembered loving it, but it has surpassed my memory. Yay.
Amanda Knox - Documentary covering the Knox trial. Pretty much what you'd expect, but it was interesting for me as I'd followed that story pretty closely.
The Grinder - Started this series staring Rob Lowe. It's... okay. I'm 3 episodes in, and I think it's earned another few, but the premise could wear thin, quickly.
Mascots - The new Christopher Guest movie. I stopped half way through. Will probably finish the second half someday, but the characters are just... too pathetic. Even for a Guest movie.
My wife just started watching Mascots. She said the first 10 minutes were hilarious but then she stopped it so we could watch together.
There are some very funny lines, but I'm not really hopeful for any of the characters, like I was with, say, Best In Show or A Mighty Wind.
the premise could wear thin, quickly.
looks like it did: canceled.
That should make both deciding to complete the series and cutting bait easier to do.
Yeah, Rob Lowe has already moved on to "Code Black."
I went to Shin Godzilla last week, and it was pretty much everything I'd hoped for. It was directed by Hideki Anno, the director of Neon Genesis Evangelion, who is a gigantic nerd for kaiju movies and basically anything else nerdy. The film had a fairly perfect mix of Godzilla wrecking everything and the folks working to save Tokyo figuring out how to stop him. The effects aren't as pretty as the 2014 Godzilla flick, but this was a way more fun movie. I'm super excited that we had it playing here, even if it was only for a couple of days. If you can catch it before it goes away, or when it comes out on video, I highly recommend it.
I'm four and a half seasons into Bob's Burgers. It started fine. By season three I was laughing a lot and it just keeps getting funnier. I look forward to moments from literally every single character.
I'm halfway through about fifteen other seasons of things, as always. I think I'll probably finish season six of The Walking Dead, though I kind of know what the Negan storyline is all about so I'm having a hard time actually looking forward to it. After that I'll probably continue with season five of Game of Thrones. That should be a feel-good palate cleanser after good guys die in The Walking Dead.
Sour Cream and I watched the entirety of Phineas and Ferb (almost entirely over the summer, fittingly). It's maybe the most consistently funny show I've ever watched.
Luke Cage is up next, maybe? I've also noticed stuff I want to see is starting to get buried, like Justified, Bloodline and The Get Down. Someday...someday. Part of the problem is that I'm becoming ever more obsessed with Survivor and Big Brother and am watching seasons from all over the world.
I may have said it before, but the Tina's birthday/Bob's taxi episode was the moment I realized that show was on the right track.
And I know I've said this before, but the stable of guest voices they have on that show is amazing.
Gene as Little Bob might be the funniest thing I've ever seen.
I saw on Reddit that the Australian version of Survivor this past season was pretty good. Have you watched that one? How does one watch seasons from other countries?
I watch it on iffy sites because I have no legitimate way to watch it. I am indeed caught up on this season of Australian Survivor (five players are left). It's good, although it's basically just a season of American Survivor. It's the same production with the same sets, challenges and sayings from the host. It was a little twisty early on for my tastes, but it's been fun, and I've loved the chance to see more "uninitiated" people learn the game, though a few of them are superfans of the American version.
I only watched the first season of Bloodline. I thought the feel of the show and south Florida were really good. It wasn't enough for me to move on to season 2.
I love damn near everything about it, though I've been stalled for a couple of months.
I won't say anymore until you're done.
EAR and I loved Bloodline and waited for Season 2, but, like How to Get Away With Murder, it's built on a season-long reveal story with bits of the end of the story the whole way. So when season 2 came around, I quit both after the first episode (as in, didn't come back).
One of my coworkers is working through the series and just finished season 3 of Bob's Burgers. Talking about it with him made me go back and rewatch a bunch of the episodes. It's just so, so, so good.
The jalapeno has been enjoying Phineas and Ferb lately and I had a hilarious conversation with him in which I tried to explain that the characters are referring to the "tri-state area." He absolutely refused to believe me; he's convinced it's the "dry state area."
Whoops, apparently tristate is one word, no hyphen.
As I mentioned here before, the oldest is obsessed with the Moon. The youngest's bedroom has some glow-in-the-dark stickers of celestial objects from a previous (or further) occupant that barely work. He likes to watch the moon glowing. We also have morning glories around our mailbox that he likes to look at. Filter both through a three-year-old's ears and we soon had morning glories on the ceiling and moon glowing on the mailbox. I think he has them straight now but for a few weeks they would get interchanged. Some of that may have been on purpose.
I suppose I would be remiss if I didn't also mention that I watched the first three episodes of MTV's "Scream." I really loved the first movie, so I guess it's still got its hooks in me.
The cast is gorgeous. That's not a compliment; it's distracting. Every character is an Adonis or a goddess (except for the nerd, who's merely very good looking). It's just...almost intimidating. It's also the type of beauty from high-fashion magazines. These people are emaciated. Their best hope to survive is to turn sideways so Ghostface can't see them.
Also, my favorite character was killed in the third episode, which sort of turned me off. I wasn't surprised that she went so early (she isn't Caucasian) but it really sucked the life out of the show for me. To that point, I was more interested in her survival than anything. Much of the cast has at least some talent, but the lead actress is atrocious.
I have this weird feeling that I typed all of this last month. If so, I must have been pretty drunk then. Or I guess maybe I am now. Either way.
When I heard someone was adapting the Shannara material, I was interested. Then I heard it was MTV.
I wasn't aware of this and just watched the trailer. Hmmm. I will give it a quick try. I first read the Shannara series back in college. I have read countless fantasy books/series since. I revisited the Shannara a few months back with much excitement. I ended up being disappointed. After reading Jordan, Sanderson, Erikson, etc, Brooks just doesn't do it for me anymore. I only got through the first 3 books before I bailed out. Very imaginative story, but the world building just seemed so shallow.
I've lost interest in fantasy writing over the years. I think I made it through 3 Shannara books, but eventually the premise got old (some shred of an iota of a dust mote of Evil survived and is still loose in the world!)
I think fantasy writing has evolved. Jordan and Sanderson did a great job getting inside the heads of the agents of evil. How did they become evil? What turmoil still lurks in their consciousness? A lot of the earlier fantasy writers focused more on just following the "quest" from the hero point of view. Not a huge Game of Thrones fan, but I do admire Martin's ability to paint some redeeming qualities in those who we think are pure evil. There is a little evil in most good people I know, and a little good in most bad people I know. The World is not black and white. Lots of gray area that makes life messy. I love how a lot of literature has reflected this over the past 3 decades or so.
Miyazake does this a lot in his films.
Very much so. No way an American movie has Sen inviting No-Face along after what he had done.
I watched that and liked it enough. I might have said something like:
"Surprisingly adequate given what I expected from MTV."
Caveat: I've never read the books.
I'm just curious as to whether anyone's watching "Pitch" and what they think of it. I'm not, but then I rarely watch any TV shows. The basic premise seems really unbelievable to me, but I'm sure it could still be entertaining if done well.
FanGraphs is doing weekly recaps of them. I am vaguely interested but it's too far down the list so I doubt I'll ever watch it.
from what I've heard is that they do a pretty good job at trying to keep things realistic within the unrealistic premise. Which is to say the baseball feels real. Though I haven't heard much from a "this is entertaining" standpoint
I finished watching Mascots. The second half was very strong. Either I was just in the wrong mood when I watched the first half, or there were two very different parts to that movie. But yeah, I can recommend it now, when I didn't before.
The Boy just took a job working on a new CBS show (something donuts something). So I guess we will be DVRing that one....