What I Have Been Watching: A Catchup Post

I said many times recently that I am not currently writing about TV. As my brain is powered on whim, I decided to write "watching" post, but not in the adopted Kent Method (1-1-1) but just my old catchup kind of post where I write a paragraph or two on shows I recently watched, or I am currently watching. Its a blather-on kind of post. It will skip ones from way back when.

Dropping stubs; to be filled out.

9-1-1, Season 8, Disney+

We used to download this show as it came up, but eventually our dedication to the show waned, so we now just wait for it to appear on Disney+, where they are actually dropping weekly episodes. They just finished off Season 8. 

Given I am not using the 1-1-1 format, I will just blather on a bit. 

This was the season they killed off not just a main character, but the main character -- Captain Bobby Nash. In a two part episode about a crazy epidemiologist who releases a mutant virus, and infects some members of the team, Bobby sacrifices himself to save one -- Chimney. There's no fake out, no walk back with a miraculous cure. He dies, horribly, quickly. And it tears apart the people present. This show has always been good at trauma, less the people they are supposed to be saving, and more the members of the 118 Station House. I mean, this year, 911 Operator Maddie Han had her throat slashed by a serial killer who had kidnapped her. But she survived, unlike every other throat slashing on TV which is played out as insta-death. But the show is silly and melodramatic and over the top and near-deaths are the norm. Real Death is not and it was really really tragic. 

Also, on a less traumatic note, the hunky hunk Buck came out as Bi; oh wait, that was last season. Also, yes there was a season opening episode about bees.

Andor, Season 2, Disney+

Likely the best thing I watched in the past year. Definitely the opposite of the last show given it is smart, well written and deftly paced. Never has there been a show which successfully had me rooting for the Bad Guy, and not in an ironic way, but growing to actually like them. Begrudgingly, grumpily so. Not entirely, and not for the usual quippy Buffy-Spike reasons, but because they are played as such strong characters with strong motivations. But they remain the Bad Guy. And I commend the show for having them remain a Bad Guy until the very end, not shoe-horning in some redemption arc, despite giving us openings. Such. Good. Writing.

The tailoring of this season through 3 episode arcs that cover one year's period, counting down to Cassian Andor leaving the rebel base, to begin the movie Rogue One, was brilliant. Utterly brilliant. It allowed build up, in degrees, and also resolution, in degrees. It also allowed us to fill in some details, build out the characters, establish some utterly engrossing moral dilemmas and sum up some things that just had to be summed up. More precisely: the establishment of Yavin as the Rebel Base, the rise and fall of "necessary evil" Luthen Rael, the rise and fall of aforementioned Bad Guys Syril Karn & Edra Meero, 

Doctor Who, Season 2, Disney+

I am still kind of annoyed at the rebranding of this as a new series (i.e. the 'season 2' component) and also somewhat disappointed that Ruby Sunday only truly lasted one season as the main companion. While I really like Belinda Chandra as a companion, I just haven't really warmed to the season. Just nothing stands out, at all. I watch, I mildly enjoy and then I burp, and its gone. 

The show definitely continues the "piss off the anti-woke folks" being more gay, more brash statements than any other series, which is kind of gleeful unto itself. The episodes which were blatant send-up's on incel rhetoric were a hoot. And, they have been having some fun extending the pantheon related storyline from "first" season, but I am just ... not invested.

Doctor Odyssey, Season 1, Disney+

I wanted to watch this for two reasons: I have an odd fascination with alternative cruise ships, i.e. the more akin to classic, smaller ships than they mega-ships run by companies (ironically) like Disney -- see Death and Other Details. And because it seemed it would be in the vein of 9-1-1 with a "situation of the week" wherein the mains have to deal with something dramatic and tense. Alas, it more devolved into personal politics, which I am not adverse to in theory, but the whole love-triangle (full blown, let's have a threesome triangle stuff, between a "boss" and co-workers) between the mains just had me rolling my eyes.

I have just stopped watching.

Murderbot, Season 1, Apple TV / Download

Based on a scifi book series I just started reading ("just started" at my snail pace and attention span means I read the first book over a year ago) and enjoyed. But for some reason, they have positioned the TV show as a straight up comedy, something I did not attach to how the free-willed cyborg behaved in the books.

A Security Unit, a cyborg that is more weapon/tool than person, is assigned to a hippy-dippy group of scientists. Unbeknownst to them, this SecUnit has devised a way to break their "governor module", the device that keeps them from thinking for themselves. But it, and it most definitely identifies as "it", doesn't want to be found out, so it has to play the part. Exceeeept, its doing weird, more human things.

Two thoughts, as not much has happened two episodes (30 minute-r type episodes) in, but: since "it" is played by Alexander Skarsgård, it will soon, inadvertently become "he". And when reading the books, I somehow identified it as she. And I really like that they "let" David Dastmalchian display his vitiligo. Not overtly, but at least its not all covered up.

The Bondsman, Season 1, Amazon

Horror/Comedy show about a hillbilly bail-bondsman who is murdered by his ex-wife's new criminal boyfriend, and then is kicked out of Hell to act as a demon-related bounty hunter, for Hell. Its a long line in ?killing demons for Hell" shows we have watched, and weirdly enough, they are almost comedic in tone.

Kevin Bacon, who plays main Hub Halloran, is ten years older than me!! Jeezus the guy looks good for over 60. And he just moves well, considering its an action role and he's likely playing a guy in his 40s.

The show itself unfortunately dials down some of the stock elements of these shows. He has a handler, who helps him "identify" the types of demons he is hunting, but really, other than it presenting some flair for the demons, it doesn't play much into his interactions with them. Most of the drama of the show plays up his dysfunctional family situation, and the reasons he went to Hell in the first place. 

It was not bad, but I doubt it will get renewed.

MobLand, Season 1, download

This is another Guy Ritchie series, right? Its very dialogue heavy violence heavy in the Richie-an style. It covers an Irish mob family syndicate in London who get broiled in a war with another family syndicate after their shit grandson murders another shit grandson. Tom Hardy tags along as the unflappable fixer for the main family.

But alas, no, it's not direct Guy Ritchie, just has him in to direct an episode or two. 

It has just started and horrible people are doing horrible things to each other, but I am convinced that the matron of the Harrigan family, Maeve played by Helen Mirren, is plotting to bring down her own family just for the spite of it.

Poker Face, Season 2, download

Yay! Charlie's back! 

When season one ended, she had finally met up with her nemesis, mob boss Sterling Foster Sr, who had had his mook Cliff chasing her all season, pretty much a year's worth of bad hotels, bad food and near misses. But he finally caught her and sat her down in front of Foster. But the year had softened him to the ideal Charlie represented. What got her in trouble in the first place was the cluster-fucked deal Foster's son tried to strong-arm her into, using her lie-detecting ability to con high-roller gamblers. Foster Sr offers Charlie the same deal; except Cliff has turned on his boss, likely due to  the shit job he had been on for a year, and kills Foster. Cliff tries to frame Charlie for it, but fails.

Season Two starts with Charlie being offered the same deal by Beatrix Hasp, a boss of one of the "five families", but Charlie turns her down, and is on the run again. The first few episodes play out like a speedy version of season one, with Charlie solving a murder, and then running from mob goons with guns. BUT pulling an Andor out of their butt, they end that chase quickly having Hasp turn informant on the mob. Now Charlie, having become used to the idea of stopping in town to town on her windy-bendy trip around the US, solving murders, continues the ideal.

They have changed showrunner for this season, and the quick opener sum-up was a surprise. Time will tell whether we enjoy this season as much as the first.

The Last of Us, Season 2, download

The popular, critically acclaimed mushroom-zombie series based on a video game returns and actually does the shocking thing that the sequel game, that the season is based on, did -- killing its main character! Well, one of them. I was shocked that they took the second game, which pissed off the fan-base for the first game to the n-th degree, and are following it pretty much verbatim. Not having finished the second game, it will eventually diverge from my memory, but having played out the primary element, with heart-wrenching results, they seem just as invested in legitimacy.

Ellie has aged, Ellie has come out, Ellie is very very VERY angry. With the murder of Joel, the season quickly shifts from her being an annoying teenager with daddy issues to a Quest for Vengeance. It leads them west to a Seattle where a war is being waged, a war into which Ellie and Dina blunder.

This season is going to be all about the moral dilemma of violent response. Joel killed each and every Firefly because he couldn't sacrifice Ellie for the "greater good". After the death of his daughter he devolved into Not a Good Man, and during his travels with Ellie, he gained some of his pre-apocalypse viewpoint back. But the ruthless murders come with their own consequences. Not only does Ellie, when she eventually finds out, find it hard to forgive him, to believe he was that man, but also the children of those Firefly leaders he killed finally, many years later, put two and two together, and lay the blame squarely on his shoulders. And they track him down, and they most brutally kill him in front of Ellie. They leave Ellie and Dina alive with that memory.

Ellie understands what they have done, and why they have done it. But in a mirroring of Joel's choices, she sets out with Dina, against the wishes of all in their community, to find and murder Joel's killers. The same kind of vengeance for the same kind of reasons. The daughter becomes the father. 

Just like the game's release itself, the season is pissing off, or at least it is fueling the unhinged rage that anti-woke Internet has for.... well, pretty much anyone who is not a straight, white male. I know the Angry Internet has awoken significantly in the past decade or so, when they used to hide in the 4Chan holes to only share with each other, but part of me still wonders/hopes is the online rage is fabricated (to a degree) by foreign/local parties that just want to foment disruption. An unstable world is easier to control, and we do know how much this utter clusterfuck of a situation down south (of Canada) is about controlling the utterly stupid masses. I am just so fucking tired of it all. Can't we just enjoy something good because it is well done, instead of finding ways to bring it down? If anything, the review bombing will not stop the people who enjoy it from being the people who enjoy it.

Watching: The Lincoln Lawyer S3

2024, Netflix

I am tempted to not write about this show that I thoroughly enjoy, even so far as to anticipate that I am on season 3, in an era where so much I enjoy gets cancelled after season one. But the problem is that I am not watching any particular reason (a crime to solve, brilliant lawyer antics) but for the characters. I just so much like the characters, and I never stop talking about how I like shows with likeable characters. And the more the climate of the world makes all parties playing unlikeable, and the more my own toxic work environment makes me wonder if "niceness" is a myth, the more I gravitate towards decently written, decent people.

As I have said before, its hard to do these TV posts about later seasons, because.... do I explain the premise all over (dude, its not "all over again" because you have never actually written about the show before), or forget about all of that and just talk as if you already know everything? 

What 100. Last season ended with Mickey (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Pedro Páramo) taking on new client Julian La Cosse (Devon Graye, Nope), a tech mogul accused of killing Giselle Dallinger, who turns out to be Mickey's old client Glory Days (Fiona Rene, Tracker), who he assumed had left her prostitute life and returned to Hawai'i. Mickey is determined to defend La Cosse, but also find out who actually killed Glory, and why. Meanwhile Izzy (Jazz Raycole, The Quad) is replaced by an old babysitter Eddie Rojas (Allyn Moriyon, acting debut), as driver of the Lincoln(s) while Lorna preps for and passes the bar exam, to become Mickey's partner in the firm. Mickey's attempt to have a relationship with rival lawyer Freeman, but fails.

1 Great. To be honest, for me, the entire season was about Mickey's case manager & legal assistant Lorna (Becki Newton, Love Bites), who happens to also be his ex-wife (second ex-wife) getting her law degree. Lorna is portrayed as a bit of a ditz with flashy clothes and a cliche LA attitude -- an easily dismissed woman. But she was also always portrayed as whip smart and its no surprise she, despite some imposter syndrome, passes the bar exam on first try, with flying colours. And immediately Mickey installs her as a partner (fellow lawyer?) in his firm, but not without using the offer letter she typed up for him. She's fearless and fierce and I spent the entire season rooting for her.

1 Good. (look at you, using the format properly) The continuity and connectivity to previous seasons and characters. The show could take on the "case of the week" aspect, but being a Netflix series and not broadcast network, it has to have a more contiguous feel. Reaching back to season one for characters to expand upon the dangerous circles Mickey runs in felt like the showrunners know this show, and its characters, and its world.

1 Bad. The fridging of secondary characters for a bit of into and mid season drama. The season has to start with a shock that Glory Days has been murdered, which is annoying. But later on, they have introduced a character that I frankly didn't trust for most of the season, having expected him to emerge as some sort of mole or having an ulterior motive. Instead, they kill him off in a flash of violence, to remind Mickey and the viewers how dangerous the people he is going up against are. It was upsetting for the sake of drama.

Watching: Star Trek: Lower Decks S1-5

2020-2024, download

For some reason I was biased against this show when it first aired. More likely I was biased against the comedic stylings of the show, lumping it into the same category as many other prime time animated shows I don't care for, e.g. Bob's Burgers. But then Marmy started watching, and I walked in a few times, and I was amazed -- you see, she doesn't like Star Trek and will barely tolerate me watching it, let alone enjoying it herself. But at the same time this is a legit Star Trek show, it is also gently mocking everything, and it has a wonderful lampooning of all things Star Trek, particularly a focus on TNG.

What 100. It is chronologically happening just after the TNG series, and we are onboard the California-class starship Cerritos. Our main characters are not the bridge crew, like every other show, but the lower ranks crew from the "lower decks", as in literally the bottom of the ship, where they all live in bunk beds in a hallway, not cabins of their own. The ship's assignment is "second contact", after all the glorious work is done with, to get papers signed. Buuut, because they are a show they end up getting mixed up in ALL kinds of major events, usually blundering into them.

1 Great. For me, it was the callouts to all the Star Trek mythos: an ExoComp, from TNG episode where Data discovers utility robots have become sentient, who calls herself Peanut Hamper, Lt Dayshon, a Tamarian ("Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra"), assigned as Security Officer, Boimler gets a "transporter clone" who ends up playing a role all the way to the final episode, the crew uses a magical-techno doohickey to prank call Armus, the oil blob that killed Tasha Yar, apparently Mariner was in the academy with Wesley Crusher, Sito Jax and Nick Locarno and they even call out how much Locarno looks like Tom Paris, Ensign Olly who is descended from the Greek Gods who appeared in an Original Series episode, and of course, the opening credits to each show which depict a battle between The BORG and an continually increasing number of Star Trek villains/characters, including V'Ger, a Crystalline Entity and the Big Green Hand, from the aforementioned Greek Gods episode. The callouts are done both as fanservice and as continuity commentary on ALL Star Trek series, including the Animated Series.

1 Good. The Lower Decks crew we follow who include: Becky Mariner, a disruptive, insubordinate Ensign who has been kicked off a bunch of ships and ends up on the Ceritos, captained by her mother, but who is also the cliche "good at everything" typical Trek character; Bradward Boimler, who is basically a nerdy, Star Trek super-fan who probably would have been promoted long ago if he wasn't so annoying; D'Vana Tendi an Orion who prefers science over piracy, and Samanthan Rutherford, an ensign with a cyborg implant who also happens to be a great engineer. The show is really about friendship and the ties it creates, as the characters become close, sometimes romantically so sometimes not -- the tie between Mariner and Boimler is the strongest of any characters in the show and neither has any romantic interest in the other, usually eliciting an "ew" if brought up. All the characters get to grow, eventually becoming the bridge crew they spend so much of the series complaining about.

1 Bad. If I could say anything was bad about the series it was that it had to have the main characters end up being promoted up from The Lower Decks into "bridge crew" officer roles. I get that this has to happen in order for a series to progress, as you cannot spend entire season after season focusing on the elevator pitch for the show, but I felt it could have continued to explore the unexpected, unknown aspects of being on a Federation starship, instead of becoming "the Next Generation with humour" it evolves into.

Further META: The show ended after five seasons with some wacky "multiverse" hijinks that added to the whole "mirror universe" mythology which I really hope plays into OTHER Star Trek series, and considering they have already done a cross-over episode between it and Strange New Worlds (where they don't call out that Kirk is not TOS Kirk), there might be some fun to be had in future series.

Watching: Hysteria!

2024, download

Taking a brain-break from all the watching of Hallmarkies and the writing about Hallmarkies and posting something that didn't make it out of the Drafts. I think I am back on a "write about TV" hiatus, as we finished a number of shows, and I just haven't bothered to post a stub. I could blame this on the season (which despite my enthusiasm for the aforementioned Hallmarkies) I find quite ... mentally draining. Add to that my flu bug which came with major brain fog, and I just wanted to Watch, not Write.

Matthew Scott Kane turns up out of the blue as a showrunner for a series that doesn't need a season two as it does everything it requires in one. I was a shade disappointed that a show about "Satanic Panic" didn't even mention D&D but I understood that it had to focus on one thing (heavy metal music & culture) that the pop culture audience would understand.

What 100. Its 1989 in small town America. Two teens are kidnapped by strange, masked men. One turns up dead, the other finds her way home. Meanwhile a trio of high school friends are trying to figure out how to put their heavy metal garage band on the map, when the Pretty Popular Girl suggests they are part of a Satanic Cult. They decide to run with it and it... well, increases their popularity. Meanwhile the rest of the town spirals out of control over the death of the teen, and the idea that a Satanic Cult has come to their safe little place.

1 Great. Surprisingly, it was the deeper than usual characterization. In a show about heavy metal and 80s Satanism, I was expecting nothing but broad trope strokes for all the characters. Sure, it had more than its fair share of exaggerated characters but it needed them to play their parts. BUT for each of them it went just a bit further. Jordyn Stanwyck, or Jordy, is the goth girl in the band who at the beginning appears to have an unrequited love for main character Dylan. But a the show progresses and Dylan shows himself to be shallow and easily manipulated, her romantic attraction wanes while her friendship & loyalty increases. Dylan's father Gene starts as the usual kind of slow, unflappable father, unwavering faith in his son and family, but as his wife goes further and further down the Panic rabbit hole, you see him unravelling in small but increasing ways. Police Chief Dandridge starts as your typical small town cop, suspicious and authoritarian but as the Satanism comes to Happy Hollow he wants to curb the panic, but also cannot ignore what is happening (or is not happening) right in front of his eyes.

2 Good. That this was a show where I honestly did not know where it was going to go. I mean, technically it went exactly how I thought it would go, but every episode it had be doubting myself. Was it actually supernatural or just hysteria? Is it a double-bluff? The show skillfully left you questioning every scene. Were people actually seeing demons, or were they just suffering from mass-hysteria? What about the unexplained quake? It reminds unexplained. Why do they all see the same demon? I mean, that means there has to be a real demon, right? Why are normally stable, even keeled people going off the deep end? Are they playing at being a cult, or are they somehow actually mixed up in real Satanism? Is the deprogrammer / exorcist actually pulling demons out of people, or is he just a normal evil man torturing children? So many times, I thought it was going to take a turn right, and it screeched the tires and pulled left. Metaphorical directions, not political affiliations.

3 Bad. If anything fell, its that the show was all over the place. Yes, this was intentional, but often it felt like there wasn't really as much focus on the main characters (the metal kids pretending to be a cult) as there should be, and in doing so, it sacrificed more exploration of them as people. I wanted to know them more, sympathize with them more.

Watching: Only Murders in the Building S4

2024, Disney

Oh yeah, I didn't put in this stub when we finished. Not that it matters; the post will still appear long after the season ended. I also didn't even write about season 3, because reasons, but Kent did. Apparently neither of us wrote about season 2 only Kent wrote about season 2, but I did write about season 1, but for some reason my fondness for it did not come through in the post, likely because I waited too long to write it... like this post. Suffice to say despite on occasion feeling lukewarm about the show, its one of the few things I anticipate returning. Go read those posts to understand what the show is about. This post is only for the season in question.

More Meta. Not to be confused with Mabel Mora. Of note, I am wondering about all our old "formats" and "tags", especially the "I Saw This!!" and "What I Have Been Watching" and how I so often mashed them up into a big giant post. I guess, for the sake of more consistent writing, I have abandoned 'long form' for these shorter more frequent posts.

That's a different meta than Kent's meta.

Also, "more frequent" ? Heh.

What 100. Unbeknownst to the mains, Charles' (Steve Martin, Grand Canyon) stand-in and best friend Sazz (Jane Lynch, Two and a Half Men) was murdered in his kitchen, but knownst to us as we saw it last season, the body hidden, evidence cleaned up. The trio are flown to Hollywood to meet with execs about a movie adapting their podcast's first season, with Eugene Levy (Eugene Levy, Schitt's Creek), Zach Califragilisticexpialidocious (Zach Galifianakis, Muppets Most Wanted) and Eva Longoria (Eva Longoria, Brooklyn 99) playing Charles, Oliver (Martin Short, Inherent Vice) and Mabel (Selena Gomez, Sprin Breakers) respectively. Yeah, even Hollywood is weirded out by Mabel hanging out with two old farts. When they get back, they discover Sazz was murdered, again by someone in the building, and begin investigating, as they are wont to do.

1 Great. It's a toss up between Mabel and Sazz as to who I enjoy more on screen. Of course, everything Sazz is via flashback so we get a bit more insight into what she was all about, and of course, she is jus delightful -- supportive, open and warm with people. I like good people. Her unwavering support of Charles even when she was starting to show the signs of being an aging stunt person made me angry at Charles a bit, but the memories/talking-with-ghosts between her and Charles showed she held no grudge. Meanwhile Mabel is a bit unmoored (pun intended) threatened without a place to stay, not really sure if these murders are a proper "career" and deeply distrustful of the whole Hollywood thing. Her usual millennial dismissal of everything isn't serving her as well, but still, she navigates it well. And the number of times they would cut away, and we would see Selena smirking in the background, shows she was having a lot of fun which made me love her all the more.... moor... Mora?

1 Good. The guest star shenanigans. So many guest stars. More guest stars than mains? Mos def. I can only assume that the stereotypical outfits first seen on our "Hollywood mains" Eugene as Charles in hat & coat, Zach in a purple coat with scarf, and Eva in the iconic first episode fuzzy coat, toque and headphones meant someone did a magazine spread or photo shoot with the trio? Cuz they had an audio podcast (I hate when people call YouTube channels "podcasts") and it is unlikely anyone knew what they looked like first season, but still... fun shenanigan. And then we get the return of Paul Rudd, and Melissa McCarthy as Charles sister, in a role I didn't hate (character is another matter), Molly Shannon as the Hollywood exec, Kumail Nanjiani as a across-the-courtyard neighbour and a few other recognizable faces. 

1 Bad. Was there anything bad about the season? I am never all that jazzed about the actual murder mystery itself. Its good, its fine but it never really has intrigued me since the first season. I guess the one bad is that in order to tie this season's murder to more emotional connection they killed off Sazz? Bleah, I liked Sazz a lot. I hope Ghost Sazz continues to visit Charles next season.

Watching: Over the Garden Wall

2014, download

I am often, in my head and on this blog, whinging about how most things are just "meh" or on occasion, "OK". But on rare occasions something comes along and I yell, as I did on social media (FB, cuz yer old), "OMG, how am I just hearing about this?!?!" And I heard about it from Marmy, who saw the 10th Anniversary Short on YouTube. That was followed by me finding the original short film, or pilot if you wish, called "Tome of the Unknown". And after that, a quick run for the full mini-series, which is commented on below.

And that's a rock fact !!

What 100. Wirt and Gregory have become lost in the Unknown, basically a fairy tale forest. A bluebird named Beatrice, a cursed girl, joins them and the three have a bunch of adventures while trying to find their way out of the forest. The Unknown is a weird place full of fairy tale monsters, a woodsman cutting down haunted trees, a stalking Beast, Mississippi river boat frogs, American folksy vegetable people, etc. Its an odd mashup of Americana circa the 40s-50s and traditional magical stuff that plays out like a shroom dream. Eventually we learn what's really going on, and that's a bit disappointing.

1 Great. The dynamic between Wirt, a worrisome teenage boy, and his utterly bonkers little half-brother Gregory is probably the best thing about the show. Wirt tolerates Gregory's scatter brained, always optimistic approach to the world, and while he seems to genuinely seems to care for his brother, the kid's clearly ... odd. There is no explanation as to why Greg walks around with a tea pot as a hat and carries a frog he constantly renames, nor why Wirt kind of looks like a attic trunk wizard, until there is... and again, that's a bit disappointing. And while we are in a fairy tail like environment, the characters are clearly from modern times, though not really out of sorts with the idea being in a fairy tale... they just need to get to the other side of the Unknown and everything will be alright.

Wirt calls him "Greg" for the most part, but really, he's a Gregory.

1 Good. The weird mashup of Americana with fairy tale is fun and weird and disjointing. And along with that ideal comes a ton of music & songs, which are all sorts of folksy, quirky jazz diddies, which are, to quote Elijah Wood, "if this show were a record, it would be played on a phonograph." I am sure that for music nerds there is a whole breakdown as to the stylistic choices made, and the musicians chosen to score the show and write & perform the songs.

1 Bad. Honestly, I didn't care that the show "explained" away the weird and wonderful world Wirt and Greg were travelling through. I like my weird to be weird for weirdness sake. But, given that there were obvious hints as to the why's and how's, I cannot begrudge the idea they did that episode. Also, along the same line, the "pilot" was a short on its own, and it was just a few shades weirder / more magical than the show itself. I wish it had embraced that odd stylistic choice and doubled down on it, instead of softening it a bit to make an entire season. 

SPOILER.

But, as a meta aside, like the show turned out to be just a dream / transportation to a magical world while the kids were drowning in an icey lake, once I woke up from the show (finished watching it) it kind of fade, like a wonderful dream you just want to get back to. I hope it can find a permanent spot somewhere in my brain so we can return each Autumn for a rewatch.

Watching: Bad Monkey

2024, download

We are always on the look out for a "new crime show". I have been a fan of noir, but later in life I gained a great fondness for certain procedurals. Not everything. Its hard to define what attracts us to what crime show. We loved Longmire but have never got into Justified despite trying. We watch The Rookie but not Chicago: P.D. I am always on the look out for a new Luther but we have tried a number of times to watch Broadchurch and failed.

When this came along, I was curious. I am not a fan of Vince Vaughn, but also not bothered by him; he's just in that vein of comedy that generally never attracts me. I do currently have a thing for Florida, the Keys in particular. Not sure what it is, but it has replaced that desire to run away to a tropical island. 

What 100. Andrew Yancy (Vince Vaughn, Freaky) is disgraced Miami cop sent to do health inspection duty in the Florida Keys. He's a bit of a dick, but a lovable dick with a good heart, and he never lets anything go. When a severed arm shows up, Yancy can't let a good mystery go unsolved. It drags him into a somewhat low-key conspiracy involving con man Nick (Rob Delaney, Deadpool & Wolverine) and Eve (Meredith Hagner, Search Party), his sociopath wife, but travels around a lot with a bunch of supporting characters, including a Bahamian witch called "The Dragon Queen" (Jodie Turner-Smith, Nighflyers), the Miami coroner who Yancy falls for, and the socialite (Michelle Monaghan, Source Code) Yancy had an affair with.

And a bad monkey.

1 Great. Surprisingly, it was Yancy himself. As said, I am not a huge Vince Vaughn fan but what I do like is when humour is used to make the characters in the show laugh. Yancy is always cracking wise, but he never looks happier than when he makes coroner / new-GF Rosa Campesino (Natalie Martinez, The Fugitive) smile or chuckle. He's also just a good guy. Despite wavering towards fuck-up, he cares for people, even strangers.

1 Good. The locales. I love me some sitting in a comfortable chair looking out at the water, sipping on a tasty beer. When the series spins up, you have two characters, Yancy and Neville (Ronald Peet, Dicktown), both who have their Happy Places on the beach, one in Florida, one in the Bahamas. Neville wants nothing to do more than get back to that, while Yancy does yearn for more, as long as he can come back to his comfortable bungalow on the beach. The show contrasts this ideal against the "villains" who want big, expensive, gawdy and superfluous, and will stop at nothing to get it. Florida is usually the villain in fiction, but I have always had a fondness for warm sea air, even if I have never experienced it. I am from the Atlantic Coast far beyond any "warm sea air" but my desire for a place on the beach is always in the back of my head.

1 Bad. Any bad? That it ended, and that unlike ten years ago, with only a few exceptions, pretty much anything I enjoy only gets one season, and is then cancelled? This was a neo-noir (which is odd to say considering almost the entire show is in the bright sunlight) show about good people going up against bad people, and I am not sure the affability of Yancy fits today's climate. 

Alternative version of my own post is Kent's own, because we completely agreed.

Watching: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

2024, Amazon

I am just going to assume the writeup for the first season got eaten by my great TV Writing Malaise, which was not as bad as The Dark Year but does contribute to my "really, I didn't write about that?" reflections.

Kent did though. And this season as well. I am entirely fine with them making this series even if they don't attempt to be faithful to any Tolkien writings. For me, and my currently short attention span, simultaneously easily amused / bored by everything brain, just watching Tolkienest swords & sorcery play out on the screen is worth whatever travesty they are causing. Oh look, cool looking elves with sword & bow. Oh look, nasty orcses getting chopped. Oh look, a known Tolkien character! And another one! I am fine with it all. Marmy is not and she refuses to watch. But remember, she is the one who held a viewing party for one of the original movies and started it all with a background primer to the world. She knows her Tolkien and cannot abide the bastardization.

What 100. When we last left our liberal interpretation of the pre-LotR Tolkien world, a lot of shit had happened. We now find ourselves with Sauron (Charlie Vickers, Medici; sorry, but they need an actor with a more intimidating name than "Charlie" for such an evil figure) finding a new identity and a new patsy in Celebrimbor (Charles Edward, The Crown), vain smith of the elven city of Eregion. The survivors of Mt Doom flee the orcs back to the ruins of Pelargir. The rings have already started corrupting bearers and Durin's dad (Peter Mullan, Baghead) is fully engulfed. Galadriel (Morfydd Clark, Dracula) is at odds with Elrond (Robert Aramayo, Behind Her Eyes) about what should be done next. And not-yet-Gandalf (Daniel Weyman, Foyle's War) is separated from his not-yet-Hobbits but meets Tom Bombadil (Rory Kinnear, Men). Oh yeah, Númenor is fucked.

1 Great. To be honest I find it hard now, at least 5 weeks since I completed it, to remember anything actually great about it. I enjoy watching just about everything but nothing really digs in deep. I guess if there could be anything, it is the continued depiction of the dwarves. I have always loved everything dwarf and even the slightest bit of world building satisfies me greatly. The mirrors that bring in outside light to allow the gardens to grow! The appearance of other dwarves lords from other realms! The dwarven market place! Love it all, give me more please.

1 Good. Tom Bombadil. An almost unrecognizable Rory Kinnear as the cheerful, wise, always humming a tune side-character is just grand. He is there as a reminder that the wizards of the Tolkien world are not a bunch of normal guys who went to a school and learned stuff, but almost divine beings in their own right. 

1 Bad. I was not at all interested in the power-corrupts story of Númenor. I always balk at stories where an entire people can be entirely invested in their beloved "Queen" one day, only to be led down a garden path of "kill her! kill her!" the next day. Sure, if we currently look south of the border, utter lunacy is happening IRL but Númenor did not have social media and fake news, and to be such a power in the Tolkien world, they must have had more than a couple of people with backbone willing to stand up against obvious corruption. Its just tired story telling to me.

Watching: Kaos S1

2024, Netflix

Ended up semi-binging this series about Greek mythology but set in .... modern day Greece? I was hoping it was actually shot in Greece, lending itself to the ideal that countries hurting economically can invite Hollywood over to make shit in their country purely for the money the industry brings in, but alas, it was mostly shot in Spain. Anywayz, at least it wasn't shot in the Hamptons.

My elevator pitch for this series would be, "Think Baz Lurman's 'Romeo + Juliet' but doing for Greek Mythos what he did for Shakespeare."

What 100. Zeus's an ass (Jeff Goldblum, Jurassic Park). His best friend Prometheus (Stephen Dilane, Game of Thrones) is chained to a stone wall but is regularly teleported in for chats, usually about his existential crises. But something is actually awry in Zeus's reign. There is a prophecy that he will fall. And Prometheus is bringing forth said prophecy via other players: Zeus's hedonistic half-god son Dionysus (Nabhaan Rizwan, Station Eleven), rock-star Orpheus (Killian Scott, Secret Invasion) and his wife Riddy (Aurora Perrineau, Westworld) who dies by accident, Zeus's brother Hades (David Thewlis, Wonder Woman) who is fucking with the life/death cycle at Zeus's request, Hera (sister/wife; Janet McTeer, Ozark) who is also fucking his brother Poseidon (Cliff Curtis, The Meg), and pretty much all the players we read about. 

1 Great. Yeah, its the gimmick that is the best thing about the show, the idea of turning Greek Myths on their head, set in modern times and applying many aspects of current culture & politics to a world where all-power gods control most of life. The defeated city / culture of Troy is represented by a downtrodden, traumatized Trojan people under the jackboots of President Minos (Stanley Townsend, Blackshore) who is dealing badly with his own prophecy while being manipulated directly by the gods. Amazonian Caeneus (Misia Butler, The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself) born female, in a mandatory all-female culture, realizes he is male in adolescence, and has to deal with the fallout of that realization, and he is played by an IRL trans actor. The ferry to the afterlife looks like one of those ferries used to bring fleeing refugees from Europe to the US during WWII. They have so much fun just depicting the nuances of Greek Myth culture in the modern environment.

2 Good. The performances. I just liked how present everyone was in their weird roles. Sure, Goldblum is doing his usual schtick, hand gestures and pauses and all, but add in some entirely chilling psychotic behaviour and he is the perfect Zeus. I always thought of Dionysus as an uber-sexy, slick like lube kind of character, but playing him as an annoying millennial-type only interested in his own self-gratification and desperate for daddy's affection was actually perfect. And he's a demi-god, so he's only so affected by the activities of the humans he spends all his time around. Rizwan just embodied all this. We all know the story of Orpheus loving his dead wife so much that he went to Hell to get her back, but playing Riddy (Eurydice) as a lonely, disaffected wife of a rock star, just tired of being his muse, all "did I ask you to come to Hell to get me?!?!" was spot on. Yes, I realize I am merging the performances and the roles they were playing but I enjoyed it that much.

3 Bad. I knew they would have to do it but (SPOILER!) they had to have Zeus kill the kitten didn't they. Also bad, its not likely going to get a second season because Netflix sucks. You know, dudes, not everything is going to be The Witcher or Stranger Things, which is weird saying out loud, because a lot of people have utter hate for The Witcher and yet I guess it hits the numbers Netflix Purple Suits need?

Watching: A Good Girl's Guide to Murder

2024, Netflix

Generic British investigatorial shows are sort of our bag, albeit with a desire for something different, something more creative. Subbing the whole sub-genre into a highschool environment was supposed to do that. Not sure it succeeded but we persevered with middling satisfaction.

What 100.  Based on YA mystery novels, Pip Fitz-Amobi (quite the name) focuses her EPQ (some project thingy UK high-schoolers do) on the unsatisfactorily solved murder of a classmate five years prior. Unsatisfactory because Pip liked the guy accused of the murder, who then confessed and committed suicide. Nobody wants her dredging up the painful past, as in her small village almost everyone had personal ties to the murder. But against common sense, considering she is receiving threats almost immediately, she runs down every rabbit hole investigating the crime, and eventually uncovers some rather unsavoury aspects to her pastoral village life.

1 Great. Pip Fitz-Amobi (Emma Myers, Wednesday) herself. As a high-school kid, Pip floats somewhere on the spectrum of known, popular kid to quirky introvert, but is definitely seen as the titular "good girl". She's likeable, smart, but not Sherlockian, as she gets lots wrong, and more so solves the crime through tenacity even when dealing with heartbreak and tragedy. Myers does an impressive job as a young Brit despite being from Florida.

1 Good. Its a serviceable example of the genre, one I more enjoyed in retrospect than in actual viewing. We in fact, almost gave up on it, as we were a bit bored. While being British, I think they structured it more for the Netflix generation, as the usual 3 or 4 long episodes were formatted to six "one hour" episodes. I think it could have been tightened up.

1 Bad. The dark turn the series takes in the last few episodes turns out to have less of an impact than it should have. Maybe I am more used to these series have dark sides, but one dark thing leads to another and its just not as shocking as I felt it should be? The show, probably from its YA source, was walking a fine line between light high-school drama to the Evils That Men Do, and I am not sure if it balanced it well.

Man, this format really lends itself to "meh, it was alright."

Watching: The Acolyte S1

2024, Disney

I really should have more thoughts about this series, but... I don't. I even ended up delaying the watch-through for a few weeks. I guess I am just not as Star War-sian as Kent is, these days. Or maybe its just that I continue to really not give a flying fuck about Jedi. That said, my delay in watching was reflective of the general audience, so even if you ignore the toxic fanboy outcry, the show still didn't draw in a lot.

What 100.  In a galaxy long long ago, approximately 100 years before the start of the prequels, a young woman is killing Jedi. After a brief investigation they arrest ... her twin sister. But wasn't her sister dead, killed as a child when a small group of Jedi came to their planet to save them from Witches? Also, who is the mysterious darthy guy in the helmet with a red light sabre? What really happened on the witch planet? What exactly did the Jedi do that makes her want them all dead?

1 Great. Not Dark, not Light but gray, so very very gray. Even if you didn't enjoy the characters, the actors, the setting or ... anything (?) you can at least appreciate that the entire season (now entire series) was about things not being cut & dry, not being just Light and Dark. Osha begins as our heroine, our nice twin, our good twin but as truths are revealed, as options and choices are offered, she ... changes. 

1 Good. Its Star Wars, so any bit of world building on the screen is fine by me. I love the idea that despite there being fewer visible droids in the series, they state loudly that jobs such as Osha's are generally not done by living beings but legally relegated to droids. Also, her name is Osha, a long running joke about how "their" presence is lacking in the Star Wars universe, and considering she's doing a job considered unsafe for the living... snicker. Also, chair droid pilots ! 

1 Bad. You know, there wasn't anything in particular I didn't enjoy about it. I found everything to be just serviceable. It was fine. The performances were fine. The story was fine. But nothing grabbed me, nothing wow-ed me, nothing made me go "ooooo".

Watching: The Umbrella Academy S4

2024, Netflix

We find this show charming enough that we continue to watch even though it usually ends up disappointing us entirely. I stated it in the Season 3 post, and I will state it now -- they always end up losing steam, fucking their own continuity and appearing to get bored with writing their own show. 

Never wrote about season 1 or 2.... wonder why.

What 100. They've returned from another apocalypse to another, different, timeline, but without powers. Dad (Colm Feore, Face/Off) runs a megacorp, but no matter, they all go their own, usual, dysfunctional directions. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman, The Beekeeper) is (barely) an actor, sober Klaus (Robert Sheehan, Mortal Engines) lives in her basement, Five (Aidan Gallagher, Nicky, Ricky, Dick & Dawn) is in the CIA, Diego (David Castañeda, The Tax Collector) delivers packages, Lila (Ritu Arya, Barbie) is a housewife, Viktor (Elliot Page, Close to You) runs a bar in Nova Scotia and Luther (Tom Hopper, Black Sails) is a stripper. But then, five years later, another Impending Doom draws them together for more weirdo hijinx, more and more dysfunctional sibling disputes, the deaths of countless henchfolk and eventually the end of the world... again. But for good this time?

1 Great. For me, the best things about the show have always been the whackadoodle characters and situations. This season we get Jean and Gene Thibodeau, played by IRL couple Nick Offerman and Megan Mullaly. I am not entirely convinced they are a couple but maybe the same person from alternate timelines. All the hijinx of the previous seasons is jamming in alternate timelines into this one. In fact, they run an organization/conspiracy/cult that researches and finds examples of it, such as books, movies and music that are two entirely different copies of the same thing. Think of finding a copy of Bladerunner where William Hurt played Deckard instead of Harrison Ford. These two characters are out there, a little extreme, but ... onto something.

2 Good. The characters. The mains are what always have me forget how dissatisfied I was with each season and still come back for more. They are so utterly broken and dysfunctional, you would think the cringe factor would turn me off, but there is a caring between them even when they hate each other. And all the actors pull it off so very very well. My fav is still Five, the non-named perpetual youth. Actor Aidan Gallagher is 21 and probably, finally, playing something akin to Five's body age. In actual lived aged, the character is in his... 70s? And the acceptance of Elliot Page as Elliot Page, and therefore Victor, is wonderful -- they had their chats about it last season, and have moved on, while not discounting that Victor was Vanya in season one. Probably a rare example of tight continuity in this showed being acknowledged.

3 Bad. Said general lack of continuity. This show has me constantly yelling at the screen, as each season (except the first; I remember that being tighter) just loses steam before they reach the final few episodes, losing focus, cutting plot elements to the wind and generally just being bad writing. Now that Kent has revealed, to me, how much of a shitshow the writing room was on this show, and how it basically torpedoed the season cutting it down to almost nothing, it explains things but doesn't get my forgiveness. No more than in any other season does this one's last few episodes shit the bed, story telling wise. Five and Lilah go on a time journey through the multiverse TTC with intent to find their original timeline where their Ben was killed. After one upset that thread is ignored entirely and while its a beautiful standalone plotline, where the two spend years and years together lost on the TTC (note, that is actually a recurring thread in my own dreams; maybe I will bump into them someday), its forgetting the point of it being introduced in the first place. And Daddy Hargreaves. He did not create an Umbrella Academy in this timeline, there not even seemingly any example of these kids here at all, and yet he interacts with them as if he is aware of it all. And BTW isn't he supposed to be an alien or something? I could go on and on about my frustration but I will just some it up with a loud, "aaaaaargh !!"

Ken't spake. 

Watching: Will Trent S2

2024, Disney

Wrote about Season 1 in the old TV format. I cannot recall if we didn't bother watching this week-to-week for a reason or just forgot about it until it appeared, in full, on Disney. Most of the shows we write about here have a seasonal continuity, but in procedural police shows, everything after season one, and the background being set, the season often ends being mostly a "and this happened" and "that happened" tied together by some tenuous threads or theme.

What 100. Will researches his mother's family, while also dealing with the vision of his younger self and the guilt of not being able to save one of his foster moms. Ormewood deals with the consequences of being an asshole to his entire family. Angie deals with the consequences of getting too involved with a victim. Amanda's past comes back to haunt, shaking Faith's ... faith in her. Its a mixed bag season focused on family and not an easy thing to summarize, as character based procedurals tend to be.

1 Great. Honestly, its the theme of the season -- making family from the people you love. Will Trent (Ramón Rodríguez, Battle Los Angeles) was the product of a serial rapist/killer, rescued by a cop but lost to the state foster system. In there, as a child, he connected with Angie (Erika Christensen, Parenthood), and they dealt with life's worst. She's a recovering addict, in an on and off again relationship with Will. They are both each other's greatest strengths and weaknesses. Ormewood (Jake McLaughlin, Quantico) is a classic overt-machismo cop who cheats on his wife and is distant from his kids, until his wife has a breakdown and leaves him. Faith (Iantha Richardson, This Is Us) is Will's single mom partner raising an adult son she had as a teen. Her surrogate mother is also her boss Amanda (Sonja Sohn, The Wire), a harsh but loyal woman. They are all damaged goods to one degree or another, but make a tight knit family, also adding in Nico (Cora Lu Tran, Paradise), once a crime suspect, but now mainly house & dog sits for Will. Said dog Betty is also a stray from a crime scene that Will adopted. 

2 Good. The episode to episode procedural crime investigations are usually solid independent stories, always leaving enough breathing room to allow for full season threads to run between them. As Will investigates his past he finds an uncle from Puerto Rico, and begins to learn Spanish -- must be fun for an actual Puerto Rican actor to pretend he's terrible at Spanish. Angie deals with the fallout for claiming to have killed an abusive father, letting the daughter go free, and it could unravel her entire life. 

3 Bad. The shows desire to tie up loose ends from Season 1 leads to some... well, filler episodes so we can dispense with a few side characters. Also, the season opener is supposed to be a heart-wrenching episode, but ended up leaving me asking, "Why the fuck did you fridge what could have been a cool add-on character?"

Further to what I started saying above... its hard to write about a show like this, beyond "I liked it as I was watching it, but it does not leave anything impactful beyond that I like the characters."

Watching: House of the Dragon S1

2022, download

If I recall correctly, the original pitch for a "Game of Thrones" prequel was supposed to be set some thousand years before the first series. That was probably considered too much of a rift between what people already know & like and something new. Instead, this series is about two hundred years prior, while the Targaryens, a family line descended from magic-using & dragon-rearing Valyrians,  still reigned. 

That said, there are like 900 other spin-offs also "in production".

What 100. House Targaryen rules the land under Viserys. He has only a teenage daughter and needs an heir. His latest attempts kills his wife and newborn son. His dick brother Daemon thinks he should rule. His daughter Rhaenyra just wants a chance to prove herself. After her mother's death, her dad shacks up with her (also teenager) best friend. After much consternation, Rhaenyra agrees to marry a cousin, but is named heir (gasp!). Some time jumps later, her dad dies and his wife usurps the throne for her son, while Rhaenyra has married her uncle and plans a war to reclaim her crown.

1 Great. I struggle to find the great in this series, that I delayed in watching properly because I was so "meh" about the last few seasons of its origin show. So, I guess I will just have to make the easy choice, and say, "the dragons." This show takes place before the dragons became legends of the distant past, so House Targaryen, and cousins House Velaryon, are still known for raising and riding dragons. We get to see a lot of them in flight, and in fight mode. In a show that is mostly British-period-style political machinations, its nice to be reminded it is a fantasy show with the mighty terror of the dragons.

1 Good. Most of the show is not bad, and not scream-at-the-TV annoying like the last few seasons of Game of Thrones (this blog started when that show started; how the fuck did we never write about it?!?). So, I guess that covers the good? It is decent in pandering to what made the original series popular with the broader audience -- lots of politic-ing both in the throne room and in the bedrooms. The characters are all challenging and strongly built, with few weighing on the perfectly good or perfectly bad sides. If I was to say I had a favourite character, it would have to be Daemon, because he was always such a scene-chewing bastard even when he was doing things I hated. Matt Smith embraced the debauchery of his Targaryen character's family line, and he just did as he saw fit, even after numerous times having it just not work out.

1 Bad. The first series got lots of ick-vs-titillation (?!?!? seriously?) via the incestuous brother & sister coupling from the Lanyards... cough... excuse me, the Lannisters. And it is said quite clearly in the predecessor series that the Targaryens practiced incestual breeding in order to keep Valyrian blood in the family, and strong. So, despite being content accurate, I did not need to see the weird attraction between teen Rhaenyra and her 30ish uncle Daemon. It all just seems to be played up to cause an uncomfortable thrill in the audience, which is a weird & odd choice, given the show dials back majorly on the tits & full frontal, like every second scene, from the origin show.

Further meta, though I usually do what Kent does in his "Meta" section at the beginning, but I had one further thing to mention. Opening Credits. We all remember the theme score and the wonderful animated toy-machine-map for the original series. They majorly cheaped out in this show by re-using the music, not even a different mix, and building an entirely boring opening sequence. Meh's continue.

Watching: The Boys S4

2024, Amazon

When I watched Season 3; I was already over the show. My watch of "Gen V" was eaten by my TV-writing hiatus from the end of last year (I have filled in some blanks, but skipped this one) actually spurred some more interest in the world. And while this sounds really really strange, I really was craving the over-the-top antics of this show as escapism from the even more depressing IRL. The world of The Boys is at the extreme end of Right Wing fantasies (to be clear, it descries them, despite a lot of r-wing-nuts not getting that) and this season went even further, to parallel the current IRL divide but amp it up, as they always do. At least in a show we see people fighting back, while all I see IRL are more and more losses and nothing being done about it.

What 100. Butcher (Kar Urban, Riddick) is dying -- cancer caused by the superpowers-supplying drug V. Before he dies he wants to reconcile with his step-son Ryan, and get him away from his real father (by rape) Homelander. His Hail Mary is a supe killing virus created in Gen V. Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit, Timeless), herself secretly a murderous supe is VP to POTUS (Jim Beaver, Supernatural; love that he is called Robert Singer in this show as well), while conspiring to assassinate him, and aligned with Homelander (Antony Starr, Banshee) behind the scenes. Homelander continues to go batshit and brings in "the smartest woman in the world" -- Sister Sage (Susan Heyward, Powers) -- on to plan his coup. Everyone else is dealing with their own shit and whatever happens episode to episode.

1 Great. The introduction of Joe Kessler (Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Rampage), Butcher's old CIA wetwork buddy, who shows up to constantly point out that the "old Butcher" would never have pulled so many punches, would never have worried about collateral damage, would not have given a fuck about a step-son. He constantly badgers Billy from the sidelines, while initially providing some sorely needed intel. In fact, he's not real. He's long dead. He's a hallucination caused by Billy's cancer, which is actually taking on a form of life itself, emerging as a tentacle weapon when Butcher is in grave danger. Billy doesn't realize this until very very late in the game. But I just love Jeffrey Dean Morgan, already a Kripke regular, playing his typical three-letter government agency type, in requisite black suit.

1 Good. The constant, non-stop mockery of the Right (Wing Nuts) from the conspiracy theorists, to the anti-woke agendas, to the Fox New style pundit assholes, to the fact they are all fucking each other over as well as their enemies on the Left. There is no doubt these are all bad bad people. The only problem is that the "good" people are generally not very Good either. Its like an entire show of Chaotic Neutral people leaning in one direction or another.

1 Bad. While I know a lot of "fans" just love all the gross-outs, the juvenile locker room humour, the show has long since passed the point of making us numb to these things. So, the human-centipede salad tossing from a supe who duplicates himself is meant to be "OMG Shocking!!" I just sighed and rolled my eyes. Yeah yeah, nice CGI. The violence can still be rather chilling, but the constant sex & kink jokes are tiring.

Watching: The Witcher S3

2023, Netflix

By reasons that can only be lost to the ether, we dropped it three episodes in, when it first came out, and then pretty much binged it this Canada Day Weekend.

What 100. Geralt (Henry Cavill, Enola Holmes), Ciri (Freya Allan, The Third Day) and Yennefer (Anya Chalotra,Wanderlust) are on the run from: bounty hunters seeking Ciri for her dad in Nilfgaard, the Elves who want her Elder Blood, and a mad fire wizard named Rience. Eventually they tire of that and go to Aretuza so Ciri can learn magic from the school, as well as allow Yennefer to repair her relationships there. That doesn't go well. Conspiracies abound. They culminate in an attack on Aretuza, which pretty much destroys the place, and then tosses Ciri into a portal, sending her far far away. Lots of people are betrayed, lots of people are killed.

1 Great. This is a challenge. Based on the bland paragraph above which dismisses about 75% of what's going on in the show, I guess the best thing about the season was the multi-perspective episode 5, "The Art of the Illusion" where Geralt and Yennefer attend a ball. We see the conversations happen, edited for one perspective, and then we see them again, edited for another perspective. And so on, and so on. I guess the show, which made made some creative buzz back in S1 by having two stories told in different timelines, and not informing us until the very end, wanted to at least have one episode where they fuck with our perceptions? Either way, its well done and a lot of fun.

2 Good. At this point in the series, where I am no longer very into it, possibly even not-liking-it, I guess the general aspects of what I did like about the show are still there, on occasion? At its heart The Witcher (book, TV shows, games) is about a D&D-like adventurer for hire who kills monsters with sword and magic. So, whenever we do actually get that in the show, I enjoy myself? And, despite my boredom with the rest of it, Cavill's investment in the character is always apparent, and I do enjoy that immensely.

3 Bad. My boredom with the politics of the show. I get it, a key aspect of the books and the game was the continental politics, reflecting the author Sapkowski's fantasy version of European history with Elves, and Dwarves, and Dragons, but their attempt to match Game of Thrones for all the machinations and complicated plotlines involving many political powers just bored the fuck out of me. It is trying to be epic but in doing so, loses sight of the primary focus of the show -- a man killing monsters. And if the show's goal is to get to a game-changing (pun intended) plotline involving The Wild Hunt, then... fuuuuuuck, just get there already.

Watching: Dark Matter S1

2024, download

The multiverse is in. Not enough movies of TV shows are properly exploiting its potential. What we really need is a Max reboot of "Sliders". But I will be OK with this one, though it suffered much from what I feel a lot of genre TV does -- adding into much dramatic filler, in order to ground it in a world where a wider audience will enjoy.

SPOILER WARNING: In order to actually relate my 1 Great bit, I need to spoil the best part of the entire show.

What 100.  Jason Dessen's a physics teacher at a Chicago college, unsuccessfully attempting to convey the idea of Schrödinger's cat to his bored students. He's also rather checked out at home. Then another Jason Dessen shows up and steals his life, shoving Our Jason into his world, where he discovers his alt had invented a method to traverse alternate universes. Our Jason escapes back into the box, along with Other Jason's wife, and spends the rest of the season desperately trying to get back to his own world, his own wife. It takes awhile and the return has some unexpected consequences.

1 Great. The consequences. You would assume that if one Jason Dessen (Joel Edgerton, Zero Dark Thirty) has invented a box that can traverse infinite number of alternate universes, that there is also an infinite number of Jason Dessen's doing the same. But most of these stories consider a one to one linear path for the traversal. Jason 001 goes to Jason 002's universe, and Jason 002 ends up going to the universes of Jason 342, Jason 881, Jason 9999, Jason 41001, etc. And in those universes, if a Jason is using his box to steal another Jason's place in another universe, then they are all similarly displaced from our perspective's early versions. But, since the show postulates, like so many other multiverse shows have, that new universes are born of choices, then there were new choices for Jason 002 each and every time there was one to be made, creating Jason 002.1, Jason 002.2, Jason 002.3, and so on. Guess what happens in the last few episodes? All those Jason's return to what is technically their original universes as well. Suddenly Jason 001 is not only dealing with a very very angry Jason 002 but many many MANY more. But who gets to have this world, this life, this wife (Jennifer Connelly, Dark Water)?

Does your head hurt yet? Its not perfectly thought through, but its sure a novel take on the multiverse traversal idea.

1 Good. Jason 002 gets to visit a BUNCH of worlds before he figures out how to properly control the box. Until the final few episodes, I was convinced they were going to reveal that it was never actual, physical, travel but just perceptual, and Jason 002 was going to wake up in a box eventually, but that theory was too fraught with paradoxes, so the show did do as expected --- have him do the Sliders thing, and go to a bunch of slightly different worlds. Some were good, some were only imperceptibly different, and some were vastly, terrifyingly different. Some were incredible, utopian places, others were just apocalypses. As Jason and Amanda (Jason 001's wife; Alice Braga, Elysium) work to control the boxes, things become less... interesting.

And no, we never get a "everyone is a cartoon" or "everyone's a blob of paint" universe, which just told me that Jason and Amanda are not very imaginative.

1 Bad. The drama. This is an idea that has to be spread out over season for accessible viewers. It knows where it wants to go, but it has to establish the Jason's and their family dynamics and their relationships and their worlds. And all too often, all that filler became boring AF. I just didn't find either Jason's rather compelling.

This is a show that doesn't need a Season 2; its all done and if I was be asked if it was "good" I am not sure what I would answer. I know I like anything multiversal in nature, but until the final few episodes and a handful of segments as they visited other worlds, I wasn't always very engaged.

Watching: Doctor Who S1 (???)

2024, Disney

Season One. What? Not even 2005 Doctor Who has the conceit of rebranding itself as Season One. But Disney bought streaming rights for anything "new" and that has caused all sorts of weird fuckery. 

What 100.  A new Doctor, introduced to us in a weird, David Tenant guest-appearing, Xmas Special, and a brand new companion, Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson, Coronation Street), an adopted orphan with a mysterious past linked directly to The Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa, Masters of the Air). This is a Doctor for our age: much more sexual, black (sad this is groundbreaking), extremely colourful, and oh so emotional. The anti-woke whingers will hate him, but fuck em. Russel T Davies returns to give us back the Willy Wonka, welcome to my factory, wonderment of companion-ing with The Doctor, but also with his requisite, dark, underlying story that ties directly to Ruby.

1 - Great. The dynamic between Ruby and The Doctor. Its a romp across space and time. But not without its dangers. She immediately falls for The Doctor, but not in a romantic way, just in a "we can be best buds forever" kind of way, which is how it should be. 

Also, when The Doctor is talking to the intergalactic bounty hunter Rogue (Jonathan Groff, Mindhunter), "Did you get your name from Dungeons & Dragons?!?!?"

Also, the requisite Davies standalone episode "73 Yards", wherein Ruby crosses over a fairy ring in Wales and ends up losing The Doctor, stalked by an old woman pointing at her, which derails her life almost entirely, and ends up saving the world from "the worst Prime Minister in History" (no not, Boris Johnson). She lives her entire life through to its end, only to return to Wales and cause a paradox so we can have our show. I am sure this will come back to bite her on the bum.

And a cute bum it... Shaddup you.

Also, Goblins on a flying boat and a song & dance number -- sadly, the only one for the season.

Ummm, I just noticed you are are not actually using Kent's format for this 100-1-1-1. So, I guess this is a Or Not scenario applied here as well?

1 - Good. The season long arc, which combines The Mystery Behind Ruby Sunday and a legacy Big Bad from Old Doctor Who -- Sutekh, the Egyptian God of the Dead. As is the tradition, it causes The End of the World, but only temporarily as a pissed off Doctor can undo just about anything. I am generally not jazzed for how Davies ends up his long running story arcs, as he is almost always anti-climactic, I did like the chicken & egg aspect of why Ruby was so important, so important that any time she came close to finding out who she actually was, it caused snow out of time to fall. And only because a Dumb Death God thought it was important. Turns out Ruby was just a normal girl with a normal mom, and a normal dad, who just happens to get mixed up with The Doctor, which makes her important from almost the first day of her life.

1 - Bad. Despite the fans lauding a drag queen playing Big Bad Maestro (Jinkx Monsoon), I just found the whole episode tiresome. Maestro is connected to the other (legacy) Big Bad from the Xmas Special, The ToyMaker (Neil Patrick Harris, Doogie Hauser MD), and both are supposed to be all powerful godlike beings with specific agendas. Sure sure, The Beatles show up. Sure sure, its all over the top melodrama -- classic Doctor Who. Yawn.

Also, its Ruby's only season. Booooooo.

Boooooo !!!

Watching: Star Trek: Discovery S5

2024, download

OMG Kent, remember when you said, "I freaking love Star Trek Discovery. Unabashedly."

What 100. Season 5, the final season of Discovery. Book (David Ajala, Jupiter Ascending) and Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green. The Walking Dead) are still butthurt over Book's betrayal in season four. But they have to work together because a pair of couriers, which Book used to be, stole something that David Cronenburg wants. Turns out its something that leads to the Progenitor's technology, those godlike aliens from ST:tNG who created all humanoid life in the universe. The Discovery is sent on a multi-part McGuffin hunt to get the tech before the Breen do. The Breen are the ultra-scary, mysterious Bad Guys of the 32nd century's Star Trek. I was very bored.

1 - Great. This one is tough. I cannot answer "nothing" so I will have to say I loved Rayner (Calum Keith Rennie, Longmire) -- a cantankerous, crabby but dedicated Number One to Captain Burnham. He is assigned this duty cuz he's an arrogant fuckup in the first episode, and because Saru (Doug Jones, The Strain) is now a fulltime ambassador. This is punishment to Rayner, which it most definitely is, so he has to learn from Burnham and crew, how to be a good team player.

1 - Good. That the show is ending? Its about time. I am not sure how or why, but it seemed to run out of emotional energy somewhere around the end of season three leading into four. I had hoped the retrofit of the Roddenberry plotline used for Andromeda would inspire a whole new world of story telling, but ... yawn. I did thoroughly enjoy the playful nature of Mol (Eve Harlow, The Night Agent) and L'ak (Elias Toufexis, The Expanse), the couriers they are chasing all over the place but the season barely kept my attention.

1 - Bad.  This totally checked out season confirmed my opinions of previous seasons. It just felt entirely disinterested in the show. It could have gone out with a huge bang, toss caution to the warp stream but it played safe & boring & distracted. I mean, a major plotline was Saru planning his nuptials. I mean, two of my favourite characters, Detmer (Emily Coutts, Crimson Peak) and Owosekun (Oyin Oladejo, Endlings) were absent most of the season. Tilly (Mary Wiseman, Longmire) was still around but I found her much diminished from who I enjoyed so much in the earlier seasons. It was supposed to be a love note to all these characters we came to enjoy, but it all felt like a grand disservice to everyone involved. And reading/watching any of the promotional material around the season just makes me furious.

Yeah ! YEAH ! Its like they did even watch the show!

I almost included the retcon of "Calypso", which was tagged onto the end of the final episode, in the Good but then I realized they literally just tweaked a few things but didn't explain a fucking thing, gave no reason but for time-fuckery. Sure, pandering nods are fun but...

Anywayz, up next will be whatever bastardization they do with Star Trek: Section 31 which is already switched from a series to a TV movie.