@Pizzamorg It was very good, I'll give it that. A little bit uneven in the second half, I thought, but easily the best franchise entry in this millennium... maybe even since Ridley Scott's original, especially when looking at the "horror" elements of it. Some of those creatures were pure nightmare fuel, but that was maybe a bit of the problem I felt the show had: The main xenomorph was maybe the least interesting part of it. It should be the big bad, IMO.
@FuriousMachine I do wonder if the smaller role of the Xenomorph is just a budget thing, kinda like how so many shows and movies about werewolves have about 10 minutes of werewolves in them during their entire run time. Like here it felt like they kinda frontloaded the show with the big special effects action heavy episodes and they became more minimalist as they went along.
@Pizzamorg Yeah, could be. But also, while the first episodes managed to keep it scary and threatening, the back half sort of turned it into an anti-hero almost... or worse, trained pet. Anyway, these are all minor quibbles for me, I'm definitely game for a second season, should they renew it (I'm guessing they will)
@FuriousMachine Have you ever seen/or are you a fan of Samurai Jack ? I've watched the first three episodes so far and think it's fantastic. I loved the action sequences in particular, I know that so far it's only been a case of, and probably will continue to only be a case of violence against aliens and robots, but it's still a spectacular spectacle when the combat occurs. Highly recommend if you're not already familiar.
"Preoccupied with a single leaf, you won’t see the tree. Preoccupied with a single tree, you’ll miss the entire forest. Don't be preoccupied with a single spot. See everything in its entirety...effortlessly. That is what it means...to truly "see." "
@BlAcK_Sw0rDsMaN No, never did get around to that one. I didn't care for that animation style so I just let it pass. Being an Adult Swim series, it may very well be my kind of humour, so I might check it out one day, should I find myself looking for some animation. Thanks for the reminder
Just watching Sacred Symbols and they’ve convinced me to finally try The Rehearsal. Found it on Sky, so I’m downloading the first episode now… anyone watched it?
Watched season 1 of The Rehearsal and I was really enjoying it initially. It gives the impression that it’s real… like the main guy (Nathan Fielder) is dealing with real people but it quickly started to become apparent that all of the supposed real people are actually improv actors pretending to be real people and working from a loose script. I still enjoyed it to some degree… but I did struggle to get passed that once the realisation dawned on me.
The Foundation - season 3: really good!. It’s a pretty deep sci-fi space-opera and I always struggle to remember what the hell happened in the previous season initially. Even with a recap it’s just so dense that it tends to just wash over you with out embedding… but after the first ep I started to reorient myself with the various players and their aims and it is very good. Best sci-fi show since Ronald D’s Battlestar for me.
@graymamba Been curious about The Foundation. When I scroll through Apple TV+ it and The Invasion have been tempting as potential Sci-Fi shows to try. Dark Matter also. I think Apple TV seems to have some of the best stuff right now.
How does The Foundation compare to The Expanse? I started Expanse a couple years ago and made it through most of the first season, and while I was enjoying it, the pacing was a little on the slow side and for me it suffered some of what you mentioned about the density and the difficulty keeping up with what’s going on, a common issue I think with epic Sci-Fi.
I actually opted to go with Andor Season 2 instead for my Sci-Fi fix and honestly it also has the same issue — I think I probably should have rewatched season 1, but chose to just do the recap instead and I’m not sure if it’s my own narrative laziness, or if it’s the writing, but it’s been pretty hard to follow. I have a decently strong background in Star Wars lore and I’m struggling to keep track of all the storylines and especially the double (and triple and quadruple) crossing of the characters and their motivations. I’m halfway through the season and I think I’ll stick with it but I have to admit it’s been a slight disappointment. Again, maybe a “me” problem because I haven’t invested time and effort in going back to remember season 1.
And to finish out the Sci-Fi talk, since you mentioned it (I think that was your reference with Ronald D.), I have tried watching Battlestar Gallactica and got through season 1 and part of season 2, but I didn’t stick with it. It suffers less from the the Sci-Fi ‘density’ issue and is more casually watchable, but I ended up not caring enough about the characters and their plight. Maybe I’ll return to it one day, but I don’t know. Perhaps I was expecting too much. Now reading all this I see that I’ve grown to be quite hard to please! Sorry about that — I had no intention of just dumping on your favorite shows! 😅 I’m not sure what I want anymore.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
@Th3solution 😂 no worries, it isn’t for everyone but I loved it for sure.
I didn’t click with The Expanse either. The missus and I watched the whole thing as there was so much buzz about it but I thought it was pretty mediocre in all honesty. I liked the lore… you know, the animosity between an over-populated Earth, the militarised Mars beginning to emerge from under mother-Earth’s thumb and the totally marginalised outer-rim… but I thought the execution was poor for the most part. It reminded me a little bit of Babylon 5 (which I loved as a teenager but has probably aged terribly) but far worse.
The best advice I could give you about The Foundation is to wait for the whole thing to air so that you can blow through it. From what you’ve mentioned about Andor (and I felt similarly tbh), you’ll struggle to get into a new season after a two year break. Theres just so much going on… that, it can be really distracting for the initial couple of episodes. It’s really good once you get into it though!
@graymamba That sounds like good advice. I do prefer for a show to be complete before watching it, but doing so always makes me feel behind the times. Waiting until a series is finished also means that it can often get really long and then the sheer volume of episodes is daunting and often keeps me from trying it.
That, and some TV series don’t have an end and just keep going, which is also annoying.
There’s a fine balance between delivering a comprehensive and effective plot with enough time and attention to character development and yet not becoming too bloated and wandering into the weeds with the lore and tangential exposition. The art of editing has changed with the advent of streaming TV. Shows don’t have to keep you hooked quite as tightly as when they were week-by-week. There’s probably data on it, but I reckon the average viewer will give a streaming show several episodes to win them over, since they can just binge them. As a result, the storytelling become slower and more time consuming. I don’t know, maybe it’s a good thing. But for the time limited people out there who have gaming and sports and other life experiences competing, I find I can’t be bothered if a show is going to have 8 seasons and 100 episodes, especially if there’s no end and no clear narrative goal.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
@Th3solution I think you’re right in regards to shows having less pressure to hook an audience straight off the bat now, as people can binge a good few eps to gauge whether they think it’ll click. I personally do think it’s a good thing, as I’ve always loved earned pay-off’s in my entertainment… so as long as I feel some confidence that it will work, I’ll put I my time until it does. Everyone sees things differently though… and I’ve had quite a few conversations with people who wish tv would go back to weekly episodic airing, at the same time each week. It takes all sorts.
I'm up to episode seven, Season One, of Samurai Jack, and I have to say everything since episode three has been little disappointing, the action scenes have been less prolific, and he's been using his sword a bit less too, plus the action scenes in the latter episodes just haven't reached the same epic proportions of those in the first three episodes. Hopefully things will pick up a bit as I continue to progress through the series.
"Preoccupied with a single leaf, you won’t see the tree. Preoccupied with a single tree, you’ll miss the entire forest. Don't be preoccupied with a single spot. See everything in its entirety...effortlessly. That is what it means...to truly "see." "
I have one episode of Shōgun to go. I really wanted to finish it last night, but my eyes were shutting in spite of the tense set up. It is rather good television!
My initial thoughts when I first started the series were that it was very good, even if Cosmo's accent made me think he was just doing a Tom Hardy impression and it was distracting the hell out of me. I'm used to it now, but still 😅 the show has only gotten better.
The cast is all-round phenomenal, but Asano, who allows the most changes in expression of the japanese cast, is possibly my favourite to watch on screen. Everyone else is superb in more stoic roles; Sawai, Sanada, Nishioka (as Toda) but he contrasts well against that as Yabushige. And i've since discovered, not only is he in Marvel movies as one of Thor's crew, he has starred in a Japanese TV production of The Long Goodbye 😅 i'm assuming that will be impossible to track down, but i'd like to see how he plays the Marlowe role vs the Elliot Gould portrayal.
As huge fans of Yellowstone and its initial prequel 1883, the missus and I made a start on 1923 last night. Not gonna lie, I wasn’t sure after the first episode had wrapped. I really struggle to watch Harrison Ford in stuff these days. I used to love him back in the 80’s & 90’s… but I just find him really distracting since he got old for some reason. And Helen Mirren is playing her co-lead pretty much exactly like she played Maeve in Mobland (accent and all)… which also brought me out of the show pretty much every time she was on screen.
By episode two I started to get over my initial misgivings though… thankfully. There was a lot less Ford… and Mirren began to soften a touch. Most importantly though the narrative strand of WW1 hero Spencer Dutton as a hunter-of-hunters in sub-Saharan Africa was really surprising and engaging… and his romance with the aristocratic but adventurous Alex oozes opposites-attract chemistry.
By the end of the evening we’d blitzed through the first 5 episodes and can’t wait to get back into it. I’ve said it before but I’ll day it again, Taylor Sheridan is on another level. He just doesn’t miss. Brilliant show!
We finished off season 1 of 1923 yesterday… and then stayed up until 3am watching the whole of season 2 too! 😅 Damn was that **** emotional at it’s conclusion! I remember 1883’s end was incredibly emotional too… but this might’ve had it beat (in the raw emotion stakes at least).
Overall, it probably falls just under 1883 in terms of the full two-season narrative… as I felt that the ultimate crescendo, which had been signposted pretty much from episode one was held off a little too late and crammed into the final episode. Personally, I think it might’ve worked better if the show got there with 3 or 4 episodes left and then the culmination of all of the narrative strands lasted a little longer.
Ultimately though, a brilliant show that will live long in the memory.
I noticed last Thursday had potentially the best lineup at 9PM on UK channels in a long, long time possibly even beating recent Christmases. It’s more an indictment than something to celebrate to be fair, given the actual lineup. BBC One had Celebrity Traitors, BBC Two and ITV had international football, Channel 4 had Taskmaster, Channel 5 had All Creatures Great and Small, BBC Three had Drag Race UK and ITV 2 had Big Brother. Now, your mileage will vary considering that half of them are reality shows and the other half is live sports but what you have to consider is that every other day of the year, you’re lucky to have 2 or 3 actually new programs across the main channels at 9, or ‘big’ programs at that.
There you had what’s undoubtedly going to be the biggest show of the year, Celebrity Traitors (it’s been brilliant so far), Taskmaster, which has a long-serving dedicated fanbase and both Drag Race UK and Big Brother have their own superfans and dedicated culture surrounding them. All Creatures Great and Small being a drama in its 6th or 7th season means it also has an existing fanbase and is probably Channel 5’s biggest show/one of the few actually worth a watch on there. Then the international football being World Cup qualifiers for home nations means that they probably had a decent chunk of viewers too. The only one out of them I didn’t watch is Big Brother tbh and I can respect it’s a decently large program so I just thought it was a bit mental that 7 major channels were showing genuine programs and all competing for viewers, UK TV is in a precarious position and it’s a positive sign. Now if only the controllers of the main channels weren’t insanely out of touch and actively sinking the industry on a daily basis.
Randomly started The Shield yesterday, as I had a spare hour to myself and I knew the missus wouldn’t want to watch it. I watched the whole thing around 15 years ago and really enjoyed it… but fancied giving it another watch for some reason. It holds up well fair play… two eps in and I’m already in!
Two seasons down on The Shield… and holy **** it’s better than I remember (& I remember loving it!).
It’s so good that the missus has actually become intrigued enough by the odd episode that she’s caught this passed week… that she’s in for season 3! ****ing brilliant!
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