At The Movies

At The Movies: New Year New You

59 Comments

I was wondering the other day about how the pandemic era will be used in future shows and movies. For example, I was wondering about actors wearing masks in scenes in such. Like, the director calls for the scene to get ready and all the extras put their masks on for an exterior scene.

Just a random thought. What have you been watching?

59 thoughts on “At The Movies: New Year New You”

  1. Ted Lasso wasn't as good as everyone was telling me it was, but it's still a fun little series. A bit heavy on the cheese, but a nice, feel good story for the times. 7/10.

        1. That's probably my favorite Nilsson song.

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      2. And now I watched the first two episodes of WandaVision. I'm definitely missing something, or for the show's sake I hope I am. Wherever it's going, it's taking a long, slow path to get there.

        1. I don't enjoy it but my two high schoolers did.

          I agree. Two episodes in and I don't feel like I know any more about this show than before I started it.

        2. I have consumed almost all Marvel properties over the years (at least, since Disney), and have enjoyed most, but I have zero desire to watch WandaVision. Those two are so boring.

  2. I kept putting off Broad Church based on the subject matter. It's much more on the investigation and personalities than it is murder porn so I've really enjoyed it. It's one of those shows that ends every episode with new information so very addictive.

  3. Started watching The Watch, knowing that it's been a disappointment to reviewers and readers of the Discworld series. Still, it's entertaining, and the most recent episode will probably be the peak.

    ST: Discovery third season has been the best by far, but the start of the season was shooting much higher than where things finally wrapped.

    Europe from Above on Netfix has been a nice diversion for Mrs. Runner and I in the evenings. Also, I've gotten into The Misery Index and watch both seasons it's been around.

    The Mandalorian season two continued the fine storytelling, but I found the ending a little too fawn-eyed fanboy gush.

    The latest season of The Expanse continues to rule. It's been a bit different with the main characters spread out in their own (related) stories, but still quite good.

    1. The penultimate episode of the Mandalorian was my favorite of the season. The confrontation in the lunch room was solid.

      I enjoyed season 2 quite a bit, but your critiques of the final episode, especially, echo my own.

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      2. I kind of get that, but then again the first episode introduced us to Baby freakin' Yoda so I think we should have been prepared where it was going.

      3. I was about three episodes into season 2 (Always love seeing Timothy Oliphant in westerns) when I had the ending spoiled.

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  4. My wife and I have had the same thought. It's sort of jarring watching things that you know were filmed after March 2020.

    * Safety Not Guaranteed. I had a Friday off and opened up Netflix, and this recommendation had been staring me in the face for probably eight years. It was decent. Aubrey Plaza is sort of an acquired taste, but she's sort of the anti-April Ludgate in this one in that she really cares and wants to believe in what's happening. The end bumps it up a couple notches.

    * Sonic the Hedgehog. Saturday movie night has returned to the Nibbish household after the holidays. Newbish LOVED this. I... didn't hate it? It was fun watching Jim Carrey in rubber faced ham mode, and while I don't condone crunch, the character model changes they made to the main character made the movie watchable. Funny enough to sneak out a chuckle or two, sappy enough to make me roll my eyes hard enough to snap my optic nerves. A mixed bag.

    * Return of the Jedi. We made our way through all three of the original Star Wars movies over the past couple of months. This one is way more of a step down in quality than I had remembered. The whole Jabba sequence is pointless, and it takes FOREVER*, I assume because a) they needed an excuse for Han Solo coming back, and b) without that sequence, the whole first half of the movie would've been nothing but exposition. The Ewoks are kinda cheesy, but they're nothing compared with the terrible pacing problems (all this coming as a direct sequel to one of the best paced movies I've ever seen, in Empire Strikes Back). Newbish, of course, loved it.

    * I was a little concerned with how Newbish would handle the rancor scenes. Those scenes were actually scarier than I remembered....and Newbish thought they were fine and happily smiled through the whole thing. Yet a zombie in Minecraft reduced him to a shuddering wreck at 1am. Kids are weird.

    * The Queen's Gambit - Just started. Seems good.

    * Crazy Ex-Girlfriend - Just finished. Was good.

    1. I enjoyed Sonic. It had some legit lol's in it. Also, one of the screenwriters is from MN.

  5. We did something shocking and bought a TV. We haven't had one since 2011 or so, and that one was a hand-me-down, so I have to say it's quite the upgrade in terms of picture quality. It was stashed at my parents' house until the day winter break began--the boys were totally surprised!

    It was surprisingly nice to watch a few things as a family over winter break. Sure, it's still screen time, but there's a family bonding element rather than everyone being immersed in their own devices.

    Hilda season 2: The boys had loved season 1, and season 2 is a total delight. It's such a weird and wonderful animated show that has moments of real tension but is also soothing to watch.

    We also watched Mary Poppins and the first Harry Potter movie together--the peperoncino is VERY into HP at the moment. I sincerely doubt anyone needs my opinions on these. 😉

  6. Cobra Kai: Through two seasons. Very hammy. Makes fun of itself, but not as well as it could. Kind of soap opera like at times. Still, good fun.

    Sarah & Duck: For my wife's birthday I bought sixty episodes. My favorite children's cartoon of all-time and probably one of my Top 20 shows of all-time.

      1. Holy Moley. Just googled Matt Lecroy. Matt Lecroy doesn't even look like Matt Lecroy. Players who were active during my technical adulthood aren't supposed to look that much like they're nearing Medicare eligibility.

  7. I started "The Expanse". I'm really enjoying it. I'm hoping book 3 comes available at the library before I get caught up on episodes. IRL buffering 😀

    I also finally saw "Knives Out" and I really liked it too.

  8. Watched "Downfall" over break. Very good, long, but I was enthralled. Timely. I had visions in my head what the furherbunker looked like, was interesting to see what I expect was a reasonable facsimile, since one of the people who was in there collaborated with the movie. The famous meme scene is earlier in the movie than you would expect. Having seen that a couple of dozen times (at least!) before that kind of takes the drama out of it, but it's still pretty powerful.

  9. More classic comedies...

    It Happened One Night was pretty good, but also about the third or fourth time we've seen the same story about right girl trying to flee her family's expectations only to find love unexpectedly. By watching the movies from 100-1 on the list, sometimes we see the more recent "take" on the same story which makes the original fall a little more flat. This was one instance of that.

    Mon Oncle was pretty much ridiculous. This was our second Monsier Hulot movie, but the focus on technology made this one much funnier.

    The Gold Rush was excellent. Now I have finally seen the movie with the classic dancing potatoes.

    I had never heard of Withnail and I, but it had some fantastic moments.

    I laughed A LOT at The Party, but Peter Sellers's brownface sure hasn't aged well.

  10. Oh, I also decided it had been too long and started my fourth or fifth rewatch of The Wire. Every time I watch, I am much more sympathetic to Ziggy (after completely hating him the first time). That poor douche would have been cheating off his frat brothers and partying like crazy in College Park if he had been born with a different dad.

  11. I saw the Doctor Who holiday special. It was--well, not awful, I suppose, but it struck me as rather formulaic and joyless. You had the standard Greedy Businessman, the standard Power-hungry Politican, the standard Naive Genius. The return of Captain Jack Harkness was nice, but they didn't really do anything with him. Even his reunion with the Doctor lacked any sort of spark. As for specifics:

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    I think Jodie Whittaker could have been a good doctor, but she's been let down terribly by the stories she's gotten. I hope the next season will be better, but I'm not counting on it.

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      1. I didn't like that either, especially since it seems to have been done to no real purpose. It would be one thing if they rewrote the Doctor's backstory because it opened up a whole bunch of great stories. This seems to have been done for no reason other than because they could.

  12. Watched the new Wonder Woman with a friend tonight via Screener. I'm very glad that I had the opportunity to snark about it with someone, because it's kind of a mess.

    The tone is all over the place, the pacing is atrocious (it takes almost an hour and a half before anything of consequence happens, and the whole thing starts out with a fifteen minute scene in WonderWomanLand that has very little to do with the rest of the movie).

    The last hour or so is pretty decent, but all in all, I'd say it's one of the more disappointing sequels since Matrix Reloaded.

      1. I texted a friend who I knew had seen WW84 and said "Which exec saw Cats and said 'We gotta get some of this!'"?

        I've always thought Kristen Wiig was very attractive, so I thought (admittedly rather objectifyingly) that making her character's wish to be confident and sexy was the best part of the movie.

      2. I think I might be a little more kind to the ending than the movie deserves, simply because...

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        And all of these meandering plot points could probably be forgiven if the movie was FUN, but it really isn't. They feint at going in a cheesy, fun direction in the beginning, then abandon it. They seem to go out of their way on multiple occasions to be as little fun as possible -- for TWO AND A HALF HOURS.

        The more I think about this movie, the less I like it.

  13. I mostly agree that it was limited. Captain Jack was fun, and Chris Both chewed a lot of scenery as the bad guy. But the resolution was silly and contrived. The send-off of Ryan and Graham might have been the best part of the show, but losing Graham seems unfortunate.

    2. I agree that I'll miss Graham. Ryan, on the other hand, never seemed to have much to do or any real purpose in the show.

      1. Yep. I was impressed by the actor's ability to feign not being able to ride a bike, however.

  14. We have been charging through Schitt's Creek (now 3 eps into Season 3). Good for laughs every episode and, at what, 22 minutes? You can zip through three in just over an hour.

    I will be campaigning for The Expanse, however, when this is over.

    1. That's around where I stopped. I try to pick it up every so often and get a couple episodes further but it's just to redundant for me.

  15. I've been watching Ozark while I'm on the bike this Winter. It's decent. Saw Ma Barker on Netflix over the weekend. I was hoping it was more about the music.

    Halfway through Lovecraft Country.

    My parents, who are near 80, just finished Breaking Bad. They liked it.

      1. I asked my son if Minnesota state politics is as scuzzy as Missouri politics from Ozark. He just laughed.

        1. I've had to attend way too many Zoom calls for work with colleagues of your son in the past month.

  16. Last weekend I watched The Lighthouse and thought it was fantastic. Love a good descent into madness. Right after watching that I re-watched the first two Terminator movies and they both still slap. Whatever faults he might have, James Cameron can do a third act like nobodies business.

    I also got a new tv last week (stimulate that economy, yo), a 65" TCL 4K QLED. For a test drive, I watched Fury Road. Rad movie, rad tv.

    1. That reminds me, when I was sick with COVID I watched a bunch of the Alien movies including Prometheus. That one was stunning to see on my 55" 4K. The Alien movie that came after that was really bad.

      1. I've only ever seen Alien and Aliens, and I also re-watched those recently and they are still incredible.

  17. Last night I watched Love And Monsters, and I thought it was excellent. It is refreshing to see an original film, not derived from a comic or something else. And it was a really cool world they built, with some nice twists and compelling characters. It moved quickly enough, and I would love to spend more time in this world, whether with the same characters or completely different ones. Though, at the same time, a sequel would be derivative, wouldn't it?

  18. Anyone see Ready Player One? I really enjoyed it and was much more entertained than by any recent MCU, Star Wars, DC, etc film.

    Also One Night in Miami on Amazon Prime is very good.

    1. I watched it with Runner daughter; she wasn't that disappointed with how RP1 translated from book to movie. There was a lot left out in the gang "finding each other" apparently, but she didn't see how that could have worked within the time limitations anyway.

  19. My wife is now watching Imposters on Netflix. Due to the pandemic, I am kind of stuck watching it with her. If it comes across your screen and you are tempted, I would recommend passing on it. It's about a group of grifters, which I tend to enjoy as a subject matter. But, this show is very shallow in it's writing, doesn't really have much of a story arch in either season so far, and some of the characters are just silly.

  20. Big Mouth: Watched the new season. Best one yet. They somehow pushed the gross factor up even higher but also the sentimentality.

    Saved By The Bell    : Loved it. It's referential to the original but also addresses systemic racism, sexism, ableism, and the shows own issues with all those things in the past. It constantly makes fun of itself and the young actors are mostly great.

  22. Finished up Queen's Gambit last night. Very good show. Good lead performance , great music (both score and some nice needle drops), and excellent wardrobe. Highly recommended.

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