I Saw This!! What I Have Been Watching: A Long Long Look Back, Pt. A - OK, Not So Long Back

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our feature wherein Kent(!) or Toasty attempt to write about a bunch of stuff they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. But we can't not write cuz that would be bad, very bad.  Ottawa Freedom Convoy bad.

What I Have Been (or Am) Watching is the admitted state of me spending too much time in front of the TV. But what else was the last few years about? Sure, we got a few breaks from being confined at home, and might have actually gone outside (gasp!) and socialized with (double-gasp!) human beings (faint-dead-away) but we always ended up back on the sofa, flicker in hand, trying to find something to watch amidst the 35 shows we downloaded, and the 5 or so streaming services we are subscribed to.

Ahem. I exclaimed to Kent the other day that I had abandoned writing about TV, in order to actually have some handle on writing about movies. With a simple, "Aww I like your What I Am Watching parts A through X posts," I suddenly felt validated (yes, it doesn't take much) and here we are.

On that note, I will be doing my best to go backwards, back to the date of the last time I wrote something with the watching tag. I will miss some, but I will get to most. And considering the volume, I will likely try to write very little about each, just to give a sense of how much I actually waste in front of the TV.

Peacemaker, 2022, HBO Max -- download

Of course, we start with Peacemaker. I did threaten to basically say, "Just go read Kent's post," as we pretty much agree on every single thing he said.

For those not in the know, or didn't already read the aforementioned post, Peacemaker is a spin-off series from James Gunn's Suicide Squad movie. He takes one of the characters, an ultra-violent, sociopathic "hero" who believes in peace at any cost. He will kill any man, woman or child who gets in his way. The series picks up after he has killed a Good Man and suffered a near fatal wound. After months in a coma, he is once again recruited by Amanda Waller, to do what he does best.

I too was hesitant in my expectations -- the character was a walking, talking asshole without a redeeming quality to his name, and the funny-asshole idea would get tired pretty quickly. I was wrong. This was Gunn, and he far, FAR exceeded my expectations, not only with what he could do with this character, but what he could do with another ensemble cast and full eight episodes. This is likely going to be my favourite thing of the year.

But about the music. It sucked. No, I don't mean that the music wasn't precisely used, didn't fit the tone of the show perfectly and was (on occasion) catchy AF. But ohmigawd, I hated it. From the European hair metal bands that my coworker was crazy excited to hear, as he knew every single band mentioned, to the retro shit from my high school days that I am rather embarrassed to say I listened to back then, having been the D&D nerd who hung with the metal-heads. But they were like Xmas carols at Xmas time, when you are walking through the mall or baking gingerbread cookies -- totally appropriate for the moment.

And, of course, I did exactly what Gunn wanted, and watched each and every opening with a sense of glee, finding every growing amusement when I caught that every main character had a bit in that dance number, even before they appeared in the show.

Again, go read Kent's post.

Reacher, 2022, Amazon Prime Video

Speaking of violent assholes with their own warped sense of justice, we pretty much binge watched Reacher. I was actually a fan of the first Tom Cruise movie, but for the rather cliché ending, right down to a fight in a construction site. The second movie was a toss-away enough that I don't recall much of it. The series adopts the first Lee Child novel The Killing Floor. Child wrote the series in conflict with your standard noir/crime/detective style in that he is not an alcoholic, not a broken man, down on his luck, just barely scraping by. Reacher is a clear headed, confident, brick-shithouse of a man, a massive ex-military type who chooses to be a drifter, chooses to step aside from modern life. The series sets him up as he was in the books, not the lithe, compact Tom Cruise depiction, and Alan Ritchson (Titans) is a perfect choice.

IRL, I would hate the kind of man Jack Reacher is. In our polarized world, we can easily see him having strong opinions on gun advocacy and government oversight, opinions I would probably dislike. Then again, in the topsy turvy way of looking at things right now, real life is more polarized, allowing for fictional characters to be more... grey. Anywayz, Reacher is the kind of guy who likes big guns, and has no qualms against killing as many of the Bad Guys as he can, before they cause more harm, even going so far as to shoot them in the back. He's less the LG Paladin hero, and more the Chaotic Good Ronin ready to do what needs to be done.

Plot-wise, Reach arrives in the small town of Margrave, Georgia and is about to eat a lovely piece of peach pie, when he is promptly arrested by a flurry of sheriffs and deputies. There has been a murder in this quiet town and who else could it be, but the hulking, intimidating stranger. Of course, it wasn't him, and despite the evidence to the contrary (footage of him getting on a bus at the time of the murder), he is still sent to the holding prison, wherein he is misplaced into general population and almost immediately tagged to be murdered. This kicks off a LOT of violence and death and corruption and a deep conspiracy that involves pretty much every official in town. It only ends after Reacher and friends essentially kill everyone involved.

The plot is pretty typical crime TV, but the way the three main characters are handled is what kept our attention. Oscar Finlay (Malcom Goodwin, iZombie) is the Boston detective, a fuddy duddy in tweed who came to Margrave to disappear, but nobody likes him. His deputy is Roscoe Conklin (Willa Fitzgerald, Scream), a stalwart, upstanding citizen who never needs Reacher to save her, despite his numerous attempts. Together, the three batter away at a conspiracy that most of the town would rather ignore, as it has funded their dying little community for years. But bad guys need killing, so they get to it.

So, yeah much of the show is about the violence required to move the plot forward, but the interaction between the characters, the banter and the straight forward, admirable if oft an asshole way, Ritchson plays Reacher is the charm of the show. He is not a big dumb brute, but he can be brutal, and brilliant, when required.

The Watch, 2021, Amazon Prime Video

The trouble with having chosen to go down this "write about TV" path is that I have to actually remind myself what shows I have started (and abandoned), are currently watching, and which series I recently completed. Yes, we watch enough for me to forget how much. We recently binged through the final third of this series, even after being rather "meh" about the first few episodes. Admittedly, I am rather "meh" about Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. I have tried to like it a few times, but it never clicked. I also admit, the D&D snob in me generally doesn't like mixed genre fantasy or fantasy/comedy. The greatest thing that stops me from watching D&D livestreams, or listening to all the D&D live-play podcasts is that they are all dominated by comedy. Sure, my own games always had a dose of funny in them, but it annoys me to no end when everything has to be funny. Pratchett was, at least, doing straight parody, so I forgive him.

Anywayz, Discworld was a genre mashup of modern tropes, fantasy world tropes and social commentary. In the large fantasy city of Ankh-Morpork there exists the City Watch, or The Watch. Hinging on the D&D trope of the city watch doing the policing, The Watch is the defacto police force (badges, station house, etc.), but unfortunately, also in a city where most crimes are legally allowed to happen. The Thieves Guild is allowed to steal, as long as they leave a receipt, and the Assassins Guild can kill who they are  contracted to kill. That, along with all the political machinations leaves the Watch pretty much in a farcical existence. Leading them is chief farce, Sam Vines (Richard Dormer, Fortitude) a drunken weirdo, who is obsessed with arresting a cute puppy who constantly pisses on him. He has a partner who is a troll (think Korg from Thor:Ragnarok), and a werewolf, a human raised by dwarves and transgender forensics officer. The latter was originally written as a dwarf dealing with challenging gender identity issues, but they have dispensed with the species for a character with more familiar identity challenges.

There is a LOT to unpack for the plot of this show, as it is convoluted and filled with tons of Discworld background material, but suffice it to say Vines and crew are investigating someone from his past, and his connection to a large, shadowy dragon that keeps on attacking the city. Along the way we explore the city's use of magic, punk music, nobility, the social progression of goblins, Death's obsession with being appreciated, and much much more. Its wacky and weird in a Who-vian style but once I got over myself, I enjoyed it more. And Dormer's over the top portrayal of Vines is just begging for him to appear in another Pirates of the Carribean flick.