Good TV (aka, the TV series spamthread), the second series

[Alan]

Under The Dome

Yeah so this is utter shite but addictive background shite in its own shitey way. Some good visuals here and there but the writing is utter gash. I will almost say its worth watching for the recap at the start of S3 though which is just fantastic.

Big S2 spoilers: (like you care)

Spoiler

So dome comes down sealing a town off from the outside world and lots of dumb shit happens. At one point they fine a portal to outside the dome but it colapses because dumb shit. At the end of S2 they find another portal out and the season ends just as all the townsfolk are entering said portal. S3 starts with the usual recap and it ends with "Now we have found our way out, we just hope it doesnt take us into an alternate dimention". Bear in mind there has been zero mention of alternate dimentions till now!

BTW it has basically fuck all to do with the book other than theres a dome and a bunch of character names/archetypes.

[Animalmother]

Couldn't be any worse than The Mist series could it?

[Wrathbone]

Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel

A four-part look at the death of Elisa Lam, which made headlines in 2013 after the bizarre last known footage of her was released:



Surprisingly for this sort of documentary, there’s a fairly mundane and reasonable conclusion as to what happened, though it’s nevertheless tragic. Of course that doesn’t stop several hours of wild speculation and conspiracy theories, not to mention a thorough condemnation of the Cecil hotel. Not that I was on the brink of booking a holiday in LA’s Skid Row at a hotel that costs less per night than the bus ticket to get there.

Regardless of what actually happened (and I do think the police’s conclusion is likely), there are some very weird coincidences and anomalies with the case. Worth a watch for that alone.

[Snowy]

Under The Dome

Yeah so this is utter shite but addictive background shite in its own shitey way. Some good visuals here and there but the writing is utter gash. I will almost say its worth watching for the recap at the start of S3 though which is just fantastic.

Oh fuck that shit. I read the book way back and kinda enjoyed it. Saw the TV show and thought it would be worth a watch so gave it a good Yo Ho Ho down the VPN and watched with the wife, who had also read the book. All went well till they decided to turn it into a multi-series nonsense. The original book didn't warrant it and when they slowed the story down to fit a million episode pile of wank, and then ended the 'final' episode with nothing tied up and a big TBC, we cashed out.

[elgaucho]

I finally finished S5 of The Expanse - loved every minute of it!

After seeing a recent article on the BBC about a French show called "Dix Pour Cent", I'm giving that one a go ( https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4277922/ )

It's VERY french, but I'm finding it entertaining!

[Medicine Man]

Call My Agent is great! We just finished it here ourselves, well worth a go.

[Animalmother]

Tribes of Europa

Out on Friday on Netflix. Looks a little bit iffy from that trailer but it's from the people who made Dark, which is one of the greatest things ever, so hopefully this will be good.

[Raid]

The Expanse - Season 5
This is my favourite TV series. Possibly ever. It's got the political machinations of the first few series of Game of Thrones mixed with an incredibly realistic feeling portrayal of interstellar warfare. It's tense, well acted and it looks great. I felt that season 4 was a bit of a letdown (it wasn't bad exactly, it just seemed to use up a lot of its runtime with a plotline that didn't feel hugely important), but this latest was a return to form.

Spoiler

Oh man, that final scene, and the lingering spectre of.. whatever that ominous alien structure is behind the end credits. This is why I love The Expanse; the threat of a civilisation-ending Sword of Damocles constantly hanging over everything, even while the story of the human factions remains so thrilling.

On Alex's death; I was unaware of the furore surrounding Cas Anvar, who had to be written out of the series after shooting had ended on this latest season due to some serious sexual misconduct allegations. Alex was my favourite member of the Roci crew and it's just such a letdown that the actor portraying him turned out to be a creep. I can't say whether I'd prefer a recasting or not; they've already done it once albeit with a more minor character (Arjun Avasarala), and from what I understand the character does not die in the books. Perhaps the producers felt the need to kill the character off so as not to be seen to be in any way supportive of the man who had let them down, but the way it's handled doesn't really work on screen, and it feels like everyone has moved on too quickly to be believable.

[Rossell]

Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel

A four-part look at the death of Elisa Lam, which made headlines in 2013 after the bizarre last known footage of her was released:



Surprisingly for this sort of documentary, there’s a fairly mundane and reasonable conclusion as to what happened, though it’s nevertheless tragic. Of course that doesn’t stop several hours of wild speculation and conspiracy theories, not to mention a thorough condemnation of the Cecil hotel. Not that I was on the brink of booking a holiday in LA’s Skid Row at a hotel that costs less per night than the bus ticket to get there.

Regardless of what actually happened (and I do think the police’s conclusion is likely), there are some very weird coincidences and anomalies with the case. Worth a watch for that alone.

Good shout I've had a look at this and got some observations:

1. That British couple, with respect to them "we didn't know the hotel with the holiday we booked". Golden rule number 1 of travel, always know where you're staying.

2. The Cecil Hotel manager was in way over her head.

3. Some of the Internet sleuths need shoeing in the mouth. That one chap who got the grave filmed needs help.

All I could think of while watching is the meme of Scar going "I'm surrounded by idiots".

[Wrathbone]

What frustrated me was the lack of basic follow-ups to the most obvious bleeding questions (some of which were addressed right at the end). The odd editing and time stamp on the video, for instance - it was released by the police and the original video was fine according to the detectives, so it should have been trivial to ask who edited it and why. The detectives’ response at the end was something like “Dunno, lol, wasn’t our department.”

And the business with the lid to the water tank... As soon as the first internet sleuth latched onto the idea that she couldn’t have closed it from the inside and thus was 100% murdered, my immediate response was that the maintenance guy who found her very clearly said that the lid was open when he found her and he closed it before reporting it. The resulting theories were all clearly bollocks because of that detail, which was ignored right until the end where it’s revealed the police cocked up their statement to the press.

If anything, it’s a lesson in the importance of clear communication in police work, particularly in a bizarre case like this.

[Achtung Englander]

Bridgerton (Netflix)
So I was intrigued to see this to see what the fuss was all about. If Jane Austen is a top class restaurant, this is McDonalds, but sometimes you just want that sugar rush and their apple pie is amazing. So the dialogue is laughable. The acting is OK, a little ropey, but its not bad. You get a feeling everyone who made it knows its bollocks and you kind of join the fun. I have to hand to the script writers they managed to spin 80 hours on a subject of who will marry who. That is a masterclass in bullshit.

I had a ball. It is throwaway TV at its finest.
7/10


Pretend Its A City (Netflix)
Fran Lebowitz is a superb here. Her insights are both profound, funny and completely spot on. If you have 30 min to kill just watch any episode. I would recommend skipping ep1 as I found that one the weakest. The only bug bear is Martin Scorsese's laugh which I found irritating but my partner loved it. One to re-watch.
10/10

[Rossell]

What frustrated me was the lack of basic follow-ups to the most obvious bleeding questions (some of which were addressed right at the end). The odd editing and time stamp on the video, for instance - it was released by the police and the original video was fine according to the detectives, so it should have been trivial to ask who edited it and why. The detectives’ response at the end was something like “Dunno, lol, wasn’t our department.”

And the business with the lid to the water tank... As soon as the first internet sleuth latched onto the idea that she couldn’t have closed it from the inside and thus was 100% murdered, my immediate response was that the maintenance guy who found her very clearly said that the lid was open when he found her and he closed it before reporting it. The resulting theories were all clearly bollocks because of that detail, which was ignored right until the end where it’s revealed the police cocked up their statement to the press.

If anything, it’s a lesson in the importance of clear communication in police work, particularly in a bizarre case like this.

Yeah I did feel like the conversation when starting this documentary went:

Oh wow a girl whose found dead in a water tank with a mysterious elevator video! We can do a four parter off this!

Hours after agreeing to do the show:

Oh fuck, she was off her meds and did it herself, um we need to do some subplots create some mystery and reveal it to be mundane at the end! Brilliant, problem solved, let's do lunch!

Thanks for the shout on Pretend It's A City, Achtung. I liked the first ep so I'll do the rest later.

[Achtung Englander]

whare can I find Vanishing ?

[Sly Boots]

whare can I find Vanishing ?

Netflix.

[elgaucho]

The Expanse - Season 5
This is my favourite TV series. Possibly ever. It's got the political machinations of the first few series of Game of Thrones mixed with an incredibly realistic feeling portrayal of interstellar warfare. It's tense, well acted and it looks great. I felt that season 4 was a bit of a letdown (it wasn't bad exactly, it just seemed to use up a lot of its runtime with a plotline that didn't feel hugely important), but this latest was a return to form.

Spoiler

Oh man, that final scene, and the lingering spectre of.. whatever that ominous alien structure is behind the end credits. This is why I love The Expanse; the threat of a civilisation-ending Sword of Damocles constantly hanging over everything, even while the story of the human factions remains so thrilling.

On Alex's death; I was unaware of the furore surrounding Cas Anvar, who had to be written out of the series after shooting had ended on this latest season due to some serious sexual misconduct allegations. Alex was my favourite member of the Roci crew and it's just such a letdown that the actor portraying him turned out to be a creep. I can't say whether I'd prefer a recasting or not; they've already done it once albeit with a more minor character (Arjun Avasarala), and from what I understand the character does not die in the books. Perhaps the producers felt the need to kill the character off so as not to be seen to be in any way supportive of the man who had let them down, but the way it's handled doesn't really work on screen, and it feels like everyone has moved on too quickly to be believable.

I'm gonna keep saying it until everyone I know has watched, but yes. Absolutely agree that Expanse is one of the very best shows out there! This and Black Sails are both massively underrated shows

Spoiler

I had no idea about the scandal either when I watched the episode, and his death was so... subtle that I didn't even notice it when it happened. As far as I could gather, Covid and Geography, with cast and crew being across the world from each other, meant that what they did was some clever editing rather than writing a scene for it.

I'm pretty pissed off too at how irl events end up spoiling great shows and characters, but I can't fault that what needs to be done, needs to be done.

The other thing that stood out in this season is how little concern anyone had for Amos after the events on eart, even though he was completely incomunicado! I don't think the narrative pace really allowed for much diversion, but it seemed a little too detached, overall