Happy Valley is even darker than I had imagined. I get Top of the Lake vibes from it in that we see people taking heinous actions amongst some rather pretty scenery. Kind of cool to see a middle aged woman as a deeply flawed but still kickass protagonist, though.
Annika - Not for everyone but I loved this Nicola Walker (Annika) show, a light-hearted police procedural. Annika talks to the audience often, and while Walker doesn't have a gift for comedy, the show is a pleasant change from the Unforgotten series. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annika_(British_TV_series)
We
own this City ended this week with an impassioned plea to end the war
on drugs. Worth watching, esp if you liked The Wire. Felt too much like a
documentary for my taste but I’m glad I watched it.
Hacks
season 2 ended well. The show creators say there will be future
seasons. If you like (female centric) comedy, give it a try.
The second season of Hacks was great, I liked it more than the first season which was also really good.
I think the second season was fully-formed and knew what it was doing from the jump, so that made it more focused. The ending of the first season really topped the ending of the second for me. Then again the second definitely has more heart throughout. So your mileage may vary.
We're in the middle of this God's Favorite Idiot show and it's a lot of fun. Feels kind of like Good Omens meets a kind of Office Space-y feel.
I started watching this but it felt too mean spirited for me. The way they are just the absolute worst people in the office and constantly talk shit about everyone made it feel like they were going for an Always Sunny thing but it wasn't working for me. Does it change at all after the first few episodes?
Just binged Severance inlets than 48 hours, sandwiched around a 12 hour shift, and he OTC pods mixed in.
Finished that off this morning, an got up to season 2 premiere of Ted Lasso today.
nice! what did you think of Severance? and thoughts thus far on Ted Lasso S2?
Well due to needing to watch a Cardinals game on AppleTV a couple months ago, I learned I had 3 month trial via my PS4.
Sp I specifically waited until For All Mankind to return before activating it, with the sole purpose to semi-binge Severance over a week or two. Soo I was pretty into that show. The first 6-7 episodes were like this mundane addictiveness. (The interior of Lumen was the mundane part).
The Terminal List - Until recently, Amazon has been mostly miss, not hit, with its action shows; Jack Ryan and Without Remorse being awful. Then Reacher surprised by offering solid if basic entertainment. Terminal List continues that trend as a solid action thriller. Chris Pratt does well in his role, which I wasn’t expecting. Like Reacher, this is mostly turn your brain off fare but it’s not trying to be anything more. The cinematography is bright enough but the story itself is quite dark/downbeat.
Yellowjackets fans, the actor who plays Shauna’s husband has a role in this; to say more would spoil part of the story.
Also enjoying Dark Winds, For All Mankind, The Boys. Ms Marvel is OK.
I cannot recommend enough The Bear on Hulu. Very entertaining yet raw and honest dialogue. The best portrayal of what how a restaurant kitchen looks and sounds. Between this and Severance, the two best new shows and best shows of 2022, period.
I cannot recommend enough The Bear on Hulu. Very entertaining yet raw and honest dialogue. The best portrayal of what how a restaurant kitchen looks and sounds. Between this and Severance, the two best new shows and best shows of 2022, period.
I was just about to recommend The Bear. The only thing I didn’t like was that the episodes flew by so quickly that I couldn’t believe it was all over when the season ended. Having worked in a restaurant, the show did such a great job depicting the different personalities in the kitchen (and inevitable clashes among them), the grime, the continuous cleaning, the relentless pace, etc. I need more seasons as soon as they can churn them out.
But I am getting a little tired of 6 Episode seasons. 6 Episodes is not a season, it's a long Movie.
Understand your preference but for me, having seen some 4 hour movies (LOC Kargil, for ex.) they feel very different than a TV show to me. I like shows not stretching to fill episodes (a big problem with some of the Netflix Marvel shows/seasons). British TV has had shorter seasons for a while. With the move to streaming, shorter seasons seem more viable for US TV too.
With Dark Winds, maybe they could have padded the episodes with more Indian slice of life moments and stretched to 7 episodes but would that have been better?
Came here to see if anyone is watching ‘Players.’ It’s a 30 for 30-style show about competitive gaming. I have so much enthusiasm for the show despite not being a fan of League of Legends or competitive gaming in general.
It’s a bummer that the show has been absolutely buried into obscurity on Paramount Plus. I’d love to hear what J&A have to say about it - I’m tempted to commission a podcast. But really I just want to get the word out because goddammit, it’s a work!
Came here to see if anyone is watching ‘Players.’ It’s a 30 for 30-style show about competitive gaming. I have so much enthusiasm for the show despite not being a fan of League of Legends or competitive gaming in general.
It’s a bummer that the show has been absolutely buried into obscurity on Paramount Plus. I’d love to hear what J&A have to say about it - I’m tempted to commission a podcast. But really I just want to get the word out because goddammit, it’s a work!
you should totally bring this up on the next lunch!
@Chinaski Will do. I have to believe with A. Ron being fatigued with all the dystopian TV that he’d be down with something more positive. That’s why I’m digging it. I hope y’all check it put if you haven’t.
Gangs of London - The fight choreography is spectacular and made me move The Raid films to near the top of my "To Watch" film list. The story... is a bit more mundane. I don't know if I'll watch season two, though there are a couple of characters I'd really like to see go down, so maybe. Depends on how much is out there to watch.
Ms. Marvel - Just delightful in so many ways. I think it's my favorite of the Disney+ Marvel shows, though the bar honestly wasn't that high. A star-making performance for Iman Vellani.
Obi-Wan Kenobi: In spite of its flaws, Ewan back as Ben is just perfect. Throw in Darth Vader and a delightful performance by Vivien Lyra Blair, I had a good time. Star Wars can get back on track if it makes solid little minis like this one. The Andor trailer gave me hope.
Good Omens - With The Sandman right around the corner, I decided to finally jump into this one and got through it nice and quickly. And, yeah, it's only partly a Gaiman work. I've only read The Sandman, American Gods, and this book in Gaiman's work, but I'd imagine much of the humor from the book and show are Pratchett's contribution while much of the mythology was probably provided by Gaiman. Whatever the case may be, the season was mostly very fun, the adaptation was faithful, and the performances by Tenant and Shannon were sublime. Whenever season two shows up, I will happily to check it out.
The Spectacular Spider-Man - I've been waiting for this show to come to some streaming platform for years. At long last, it's on Netflix. And it's pretty darn good. Now, to be fair, I don't have the deepest Spider-Man experience. It's limited to the 90s show, the Raimi trilogy, the first Amazing, and the MCU. So there's that background, and there's the critical acclaim. And from that, I can say that it is very good. Especially early on, when it surprised me a little. To me as a 90s kid, the best animated superhero show will probably always be Batman: The Animated Series. And at the beginning of this show, they did something that that show did very well: make Spidey's Rogues Gallery human, sympathetic, and in some cases, tragic.
The most intriguing thing to me us is that they made Eddie Brock into Peter's buddy/big brother figure at the beginning of the season. I was super excited to see where they would go with that.
And, in my opinion, that's the only stumble the show has had so far.
What started as a slow build up to Eddie becoming Venom became a "Oh no! We need to make him into more of a jerk" near the end, when Eddie was finally going to meet his alien destiny. I've already seen the "Eddie Brock is a jerk" origin multiple times. Eddie as a more tragic story would have been interesting, plus could have more naturally led to the Anti-Hero status Venom tends to be these days.
Besides that, though, this show is fantastic. I would have loved to see their eventual plans for Gwen Stacy, especially because this show came out so many years before Spider-Gwen debuted.
Gangs of London - The fight choreography is spectacular and made me move The Raid films to near the top of my "To Watch" film list.
The action choreography is certainly there. I think it's interesting that everyone views the films only as action movies but I feel The Raid movies are really more horror films. You can see what you think.
Grace, season 2 - Much improved over the uneven season 1.
Just finished The Witcher, Season 2 to get myself back into that fantasy mindset. I'm not entirely sure why A.Ron hated this season so much that he didn't even want to talk about it (or maybe finish it). It has its issues, particularly in trying to adapt so many storylines, making a few feel thin and half-baked by season's end, but I still enjoyed it overall, especially the Geralt/Ciri dynamic. It's probably a show that would have benefited from a weekly format rather than the binge model, though, because there's an emotional payoff at the end of the season that feels somewhat rushed after only eight episodes of development. I had a good enough time, though.
The Bear - Not for me, but I can see why people like it. There's a compelling combination of flawed characters, all the kitchen rules, and loving shots of food.
That ending though, WTF? I understand the ending, it just seems to come from way out of left field. Wouldn't it be better to leave 50 grand of clean money in a bank account than 300 grand of mob debt in tomato cans which could be thrown out/sold off since they're changing the menu and may end up not doing spaghetti?
I remember reading somewhere that they changed up the show a bit and cut out some of the plot to focus on the kitchen vibes and the day to day stuff so maybe some of it was lost in that. It was strange, but the show is such an experience I kinda don't care what they do to move whatever story they feel they need forward.
I just watched Season 1 of Jamestown. It’s a BBC production. Obviously not as good as Rome but I was surprised how well they took actual stories of the Pamunky Native Americans and other tribes, settlers and historical figures and made a decent drama out of it.
Comments
I started watching this but it felt too mean spirited for me. The way they are just the absolute worst people in the office and constantly talk shit about everyone made it feel like they were going for an Always Sunny thing but it wasn't working for me. Does it change at all after the first few episodes?
Also enjoying Dark Winds, For All Mankind, The Boys. Ms Marvel is OK.
It’s a bummer that the show has been absolutely buried into obscurity on Paramount Plus. I’d love to hear what J&A have to say about it - I’m tempted to commission a podcast. But really I just want to get the word out because goddammit, it’s a work!
Will do. I have to believe with A. Ron being fatigued with all the dystopian TV that he’d be down with something more positive. That’s why I’m digging it. I hope y’all check it put if you haven’t.
That ending though, WTF? I understand the ending, it just seems to come from way out of left field. Wouldn't it be better to leave 50 grand of clean money in a bank account than 300 grand of mob debt in tomato cans which could be thrown out/sold off since they're changing the menu and may end up not doing spaghetti?
Sounds like the Bay Area lol. They did make those sandwiches look really good though.