Discuss and Rate the Last Thing You Watched (non-movies)

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Severance, s1 plus opener of s2

A bluntly oblique neuro-drama with the pacing of a slug, it kinda gives me a headache but dammit if I’m not hooked enough to see how it all shakes out for the MDR team.

 

[thebobmaster]

Severance, s1 plus opener of s2

A bluntly oblique neuro-drama with the pacing of a slug, it kinda gives me a headache but dammit if I’m not hooked enough to see how it all shakes out for the MDR team.

Who knew that Ben Stiller was so capable of making such a fascinatingly dark sci-fi drama and knock it out of the park?

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Who knew that Ben Stiller was so capable of making such a fascinatingly dark sci-fi drama and knock it out of the park?

The first season meanders so much and while deliberate it got kinda frustrating. So it was nice to see season 2 kick off with the team getting back together and retaining some outie awareness, setting a more hopeful tone for uncovering some more secrets. That said, the show excels most the darker it gets, so ideally there will be a nice balance to these contrasts.

Spoiler: imdb trivia

Christopher Walken admitted that he isn't subscribed to Apple TV+, and can only watch the series on DVDs sent to him.

FFS Apple, get this man a sub!

 

[Xprimentyl]

Watched the Gina Carano vs Ronda Rousey "fight" and it lasted exactly 17 seconds. Whole thing could've been a gif. What a rip-off.

I could probably post this in the "Hot Takes" thread to the same effect, but... I'm that guy who doesn't mind heavily touted combat events that end quickly and suddenly. I grew up in the era of Mike Tyson, the guy who built his reputation on ending the lives of his opponents very quickly, and for me, it is still a spectacle I appreciate. There's something about the hype: two fighters spend weeks mean mugging each other across the no man's land that is the neutral ground of press conference stages leading up to the fight, and then *WHAM!!!*, nine seconds and one punch/kick later, we bear witness as the skies open up, the light shines down, and a human soul is reunited with the lord. Maybe it's the '90s kid in me, the kid who still loves when the disrespect does as much damage as the physical contact. I watched both of Tyson's last couple of stunts with bated breath, hoping to see that one punch that would call back to my childhood when the thought of being punched once by Tyson was a million dollar gamble.

That said, quick MMA submission wins are far from that exciting. You might as well have one fighter pull out a gun, right? I don't really mind them if the fight has gone some distance and one fighter's will has just been worn down to the point they can be grappled into a hold they can no longer fight their way out of, but a fight that has just started and ends like that basically indicates a mistake has occurred, and the talent hasn't been tested.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I could probably post this in the "Hot Takes" thread to the same effect, but... I'm that guy who doesn't mind heavily touted combat events that end quickly and suddenly. I grew up in the era of Mike Tyson, the guy who built his reputation on ending the lives of his opponents very quickly, and for me, it is still a spectacle I appreciate. There's something about the hype: two fighters spend weeks mean mugging each other across the no man's land that is the neutral ground of press conference stages leading up to the fight, and then *WHAM!!!*, nine seconds and one punch/kick later, we bear witness as the skies open up, the light shines down, and a human soul is reunited with the lord. Maybe it's the '90s kid in me, the kid who still loves when the disrespect does as much damage as the physical contact. I watched both of Tyson's last couple of stunts with bated breath, hoping to see that one punch that would call back to my childhood when the thought of being punched once by Tyson was a million dollar gamble.

That said, quick MMA submission wins are far from that exciting. You might as well have one fighter pull out a gun, right? I don't really mind them if the fight has gone some distance and one fighter's will has just been worn down to the point they can be grappled into a hold they can no longer fight their way out of, but a fight that has just started and ends like that basically indicates a mistake has occurred, and the talent hasn't been tested.

Oh sure, apparently Ronda ends or used to end all her fights within seconds. And Gina is older and hasn't really had a fight in 20 years. So it tracks. I'm just disappointed cause I feel like I didn't really watch them fight. At least Tyson went the distance.

 

[gorfias]

Series Final of The Boys (Amazon Prime)

Pretty satisfying.

Spoiler

Homelander dies in a manner similar to the way clone Homelander dies in the comics. Butcher the same. Both reasonably satisfying. I did skip around some. 2 funeral services in a 1 hour show!?!?! Some time killer dialog with the clock running!??! And the dialog? Lot of gross stuff, as if the show creators knew they had a captive audience to spew garbage on for one last hour. But biggest issue is that there was so much time killing in the last 2 seasons it harmed the over-all feelings about the show.

Even so, there was enough here to have felt the experience a good one, worth watching and a better, more satisfying conclusion than, say LOST or Game of Thrones. Series: B. Series Finale D for the bad parts, A for the good stuff.

 

[Xprimentyl]

The Boys: S5:Ep8: FINALLY / Great

No spoilers, but it was good. As @gorfias mentions above, a great way to end the series given what it became. On the whole, the series was something I greatly enjoyed (despite all of the anus-puckering moments that spiked my blood pressure,) but you can obviously zoom in at any moment of its 5 seasons and see flaws. I guess season 5 catches the most flak because it ostensibly holds a decent chunk of the low points, but it goes out with a decent bang, and reflecting on the journey, I'm satisfied. Solid A for the entire series if only because Antony Starr's performance as Homelander is now cemented in my brain as one of the greatest, most terrifying villains in cinema.

 

[Bartholen]

The Boys finale, 5/10

A sucky-ass, drag-ass season ends with a mediocre finale. Not nearly as terrible as I'd expected, and about as good as I'd hoped. And so it ends, not with a bang, not with a whimper, more of a tacit "Well, that's a wrap. Everyone go home".

• The series ended up being two great seasons, 1 mediocre one and two bad ones with an okay at best finale. I guess that makes the series overall just barely above mediocre. I would probably complain about all the characters they just fridged with no real conclusion like Ashley, Soldier Boy and Stan Edgar but here's the thing: I just. did. not. care anymore. The finale felt like the bare minimum, just going through the motions. I guess Sameer just made it out okay, no acknowledgement of him. Same goes for Maeve, who was such an integral part of the show for so long but now doesn't even warrant a mention or a cameo.
• Honestly, what did Homelander getting the V1 achieve in the end? It just dragged the season out. They already had a kill button with the virus, and they could have done so many interesting things with it. How to get the virus to Homelander? What vector to use? Do they try to draw him out, infiltration, subterfuge, all out assault? You could have had the finale be a whole heist. You could have had a moment where one of the Boys sacrifices themself to get the virus into Homelander or something. And you wouldn't have needed this stupid-ass ass-pull of replicating Soldier Boy's null-blast.
• The clear lack of budget this season really hurt the show. What should have been an explosive final season instead feels like it's shot on 5 different soundstages and the most boring everyday locations you could imagine. There's very few crowd scenes, very little action, and most of even the finale is just spent with characters talking in rooms. No place seems to have any surveillance, guards or security measures of any kind to prevent The Boys from just waltzing in, not even Seven Tower or the fucking White House. The least they could have done is a scene where Homelander disbands the WH security detail, explaining that a God doesn't need protection. Would have been perfectly in character, and explained this annoying little tidbit. God knows they had the time, but they apparently deemed that butt-sniffing scene more important
• The dialogue this season really broke the camel's back for me. It's like an obnoxious mix of Marvel quippage, Borderlands lolrandom and a 12-year old trying to sound edgy. The funeral scene at the start of the finale was probably the worst offender. It really got to a point where every time there was a dialogue exchange longer than 5 sentences, I started dreading when someone would tell someone to eat a shitty dick, or how the room smells like the farts of a dog with colon cancer, or GOD SHUT UP!!!
• Anthony Starr is and remains the GOAT until the very end. No marks for him, stellar performance from beginning to end.

What perhaps ended up annoying me the most was how they used the ending from the comics, ie. Butcher aiming to unleash the virus globally. Here's where we come to crucial differences between the comic and the show, so the rest is spoilers.

Spoiler: Here we go

IMO a huge and crucial difference between the ending of the show vs. the comic is that in the comic Butcher is revealed to have been working on unleashing the virus for months on end, secretly sending it all across the globe to wait to be triggered. And it's not just supes it's going to target, but every single human on the planet with even trace amounts of Compound V in them. In the comic Compound V is ubiquitous in the populace akin to common chemicals, which means that hundreds of millions of normal people have some amount of it in their system. Meaning that in order to be rid of supes Butcher is willing to commit a global genocide on a scale that would make Stalin go white with horror. And Butcher has known this all along and is still willing to go through with it. He even kills MM, Frenchie and Kimiko in the comic himself to spare them having to experience his genocide. His hatred of not just supes, but the very idea of their existence, runs that deep. Like in the series, his downfall is due to one last moment of empathy towards Hughie, but there's also another difference: Hughie kills him not out of some noble, empathetic intent, but because Butcher is lying to him that he's killed Starlight. By the time Butcher dies, he's already been stopped: his neck's snapped, and he's been paralyzed from the neck down. Meaning that Hughie effectively kills a defenseless man in a fit of rage.

IMO that's a far more impactful and disturbing end to such a character. Butcher is a monster through and through, and willing to hurt the ones closest to him just to get his way even with his dying breath. The show, by comparison, makes his decision seem more like a spur of the moment thing brought on by abandonment and despair, and not something he'd spent months planning and setting up. Which just smacks of mixed messaging IMO: the show has thoroughly shown Butcher to be irredeemable, so making his final decision seem like a "despair event horizon" makes me think the show wants me to feel bad for him. Whereas in the comic by the time of the final issue you already know he's a monster, but the true depth of his depravity is still to be revealed.

So yeah, not a great finale. The final question in my mind is: is the show better than the comics? Up to season 3 I'd say unquestionably, even including season 2. But holy shit the two last seasons end up dragging that grade down. It's clear that the comic had a better thought out long-term narrative, and even though a lot of it was episodic, those storylines usually either did some character development or further worldbuilding. The show just ends up rotating through the same or similar plot points over and over, and repeating the same beats over and over. What changes in the dynamic it introduces end up being in large part pointless (Black Noir jesus christ). A big and valid criticism of the comic is that a lot of it is needlessly edgy, mean-spirited and graphic for no other reason than shock value. But how is that not true of the later show as well? If anything, the shock value in the show ends up being worse, because in the comic you can at least just skip quicker, and the gratuity actually goes down as the comic goes along. The show by contrast hits the ceiling by season 3, and then just keeps doing the same shtick over and over as if it's still novel, when instead it's grown dull and samey. So to my everlasting shock and surprise, I think the comic ends up coming on top for me. What a world.

 

[Bob_McMillan]

So to my everlasting shock and surprise, I think the comic ends up coming on top for me. What a world.

Damn, that's brutal. I did see clips going around online of Homelander's final confrontation, so I decided to watch the full fight. It looked indistinguishable from the average CW show episode. They really should have ended the show when they could still afford the production quality from the first season.

 

[Bartholen]

Damn, that's brutal. I did see clips going around online of Homelander's final confrontation, so I decided to watch the full fight. It looked indistinguishable from the average CW show episode. They really should have ended the show when they could still afford the production quality from the first season.

If you don't mind being spoiled about the comic, there's a tragic irony to the show now:

Spoiler: Spoilers about the comic's ending

In the comic there is no final confrontation with Homelander and Butcher. It's revealed that Black Noir is actually a clone of Homelander, which drives Homelander into a berserk rage. Butcher escapes the oval office while BN and Homelander go to town on each other - off panel. What we see next is a shredded-apart Black Noir holding what bloody dregs remain of Homelander, and he ends up getting blasted to kingdom come by the military. Butcher then walks up to the basically still-living corpse of Black Noir and pries his skull open much like in the show, completing his revenge.

The tragic irony is that they actually could have had something similar had they not included the V1. You could have had it so that a non-supe releases the virus inside the White House, which causes Homelander to become depowered, and stumble out holding on for dear life. And then Butcher comes out and pries his skull open. They could have had more tension, less budget, less stupidity by not suddenly nerfing Homelander to oblivion, and a more drawn out, more satisfying death for him.

 

[FakeSympathy]

The Boys finale. 7/10

You know, there is a difference between a fun insane villan, and a villain who is insane just for the sake of it. And sadly, I think Homelander falls into the latter categroy. It's a shame, really. He used to be a fun to watch, but now I think he is stupidly insane and vile. On that end, the comic version was so much better, because at least that version was consistent with his character. Also, the comic counter-part didn't grovel and cried like a little b*tch.

Deep dying was probably for the best; I mean what kind of purpose would he have had, if he survived? He's hated by all ocean creatures, every human think's he's a joke, and he will continue to live in misery.

Also, I liked Giancarlo Esposito as Stan Edgar, but he was nowhere near as diabolical as James Stillwell in the comics; IDK, I feel Stan Edgar was pretty much Gus from Breaking Bad, just in CEO position. James was calm and cold villain throughout, and pretty much gets away with everything by the end.

That being said, I am not gonna say the comic had top-tier writing, and there are things the show is doing better; The main heroes are getting their happy endings (except for Kimiko), Soldier Boy was way better written, each of the Seven was more fleshed out, and I think it's overall a better representation of superhereoes existing in capitalistic world.

OMG, excellent choice of song for the send-off!

 

[Bartholen]

You know, there is a difference between fun insane villan, and villain who is insane just for the sake of it. And sadly, I think Homelander falls into the latter categroy. It's a shame, really. He used to be a fun to watch, but now I think he is stupidly insane and vile. On that end, the comic version was so much better, because at least that version was consistent with his character. Also, the comic counter-part didn't grovel and cried like a little b*tch.

This is yet another area where the clear lack of budget ends up hurting the show. For example, could you imagine a scene where Homelander in a fit of insecure panic sets up an exclusive show for his most diehard fans where he butchers Starlighters to show his powers and stroke his ego? I think that could have been a genuinely disturbing area where the show had not dared yet go. And it's not like it would come out of nowhere: it would have been a logical continuation of the end of season 3 where he lasers a guy dead on the street, and the crowd ends up cheering for him. But no, apparently Jared Padalecki comically turning people into red mist by running into them was sooo much more important for the effects budget.

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

The Boys finale (finally)

Oh boy. So the ultimate confrontation stuff was about as-expected and well done, but then they had to fart around by leaving it open for another bloody spinoff.

Fuck Vought; it should’ve ended definitively like Butcher said, because he was right. Hughie is a fucking twit, and the Gen V tie-in really didn’t amount to shite. Would’ve been disappointed to finish watching that one only to get what we got here. This whole thing should’ve had a fork in it but now we’re apparently getting not only a prequel about Vought but a spinoff/sequel to The Boys.

Ugh…played out…gotta peace out.

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Widow’s Bay, s1 ep5

Bit of a palate cleanser to the above. A tad too cryptic in the end, but pretty funny along the way. The mayor inadvertently trips out on a funky mushroom and the episode kinda flies by, leaving us in the dark as to whatever the hell his cry for help might’ve conjured up.


Severance, s2 ep4&5

That sure was a nice change of pace to the doldrum interior shots, and ironically now I’m totally thrown off to just where the f this show is going in every other respect. Bread crumbs, courtesy of Kier. Milchick is played so well by Tramell Tillman. Mannerisms and speech so exacting, always leaving me guessing where his true allegiance will wind up. It’d be nice to see him make a true play for the team, possibly even escaping Lumon himself, but probably more entertaining going purely villainous. Hoping that won’t be the case with Helly R.

Also, bloody hell Miss Huang is a cold little biatch.

 

[thebobmaster]

Widow’s Bay, s1 ep5

Bit of a palate cleanser to the above. A tad too cryptic in the end, but pretty funny along the way. The mayor inadvertently trips out on a funky mushroom and the episode kinda flies by, leaving us in the dark as to whatever the hell his cry for help might’ve conjured up.


Severance, s2 ep4&5

That sure was a nice change of pace to the doldrum interior shots, and ironically now I’m totally thrown off to just where the f this show is going in every other respect. Bread crumbs, courtesy of Kier. Milchick is played so well by Tramell Tillman. Mannerisms and speech so exacting, always leaving me guessing where his true allegiance will wind up. It’d be nice to see him make a true play for the team, possibly even escaping Lumon himself, but probably more entertaining going purely villainous. Hoping that won’t be the case with Helly R.

Also, bloody hell Miss Huang is a cold little biatch.

Milchick is one of the MVPs of the show, IMO, along with Dylan.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The Boys Finale

Looking back over the years, The Boys has been fundamentally about finding ways to spin its wheels and kill time. I think season 3 is when I gave up on it. It was the fact we spent the whole season on Soldier Boy's revenge path, only for it to peter out and hit reset at the end. Then season 4 was about finding a deadly virus that proved less than deadly where it counted. Now season 5 was about looking for V1, which also ended up not mattering.

Ultimately Homelander's downfall boils down to a season 5, episode 7 (out of 8) ass-pull: cook Kimiko in a radiation chamber for a few minutes so she gains Soldier Boy's depowering blast, walk into the White House past security (the security: there's one dude with a gun, repeatedly shooting at 3 of the 5 intruders who happen to be immune to bullets) and then just blast Homelander. A plan so simple that you'd think - why, yes, they already tried that two seasons ago. Second time's the charm!

Sage gets off for no clear reason. She orchestrated the murder of a bunch of people and helped a genocidal maniac to power. Why does she get off? Sure, she's stupid now, or stupider anyway, but she wanted that. It barely qualifies as punishment.

Deep and Oh Father get cool deaths, though the emotional whateverness of seeing Annie and Deep duke it out one last time just wasn't there for me.

I call bullshit on Vought remaining unchecked while we're still pretending this is a happy ending. How? The system that created Homelander remains intact, still being run by the same person. How do the Boys all just walk away from that?

So to summarize, the glut of the show was a bunch of circular macguffin quests and eleventh hour ass-pulls, and it never quite lived up to its full potential - no matter how long and hard it baited people with the promise of Homelander "finally snapping" or Butcher going scorched earth. Oh, or that Gen V spin-off show factoring at all. Those teens got focus grouped harder than Rose Tico in Star Wars 9.

 

[Gordon_4]

I call bullshit on Vought remaining unchecked while we're still pretending this is a happy ending. How? The system that created Homelander remains intact, still being run by the same person. How do the Boys all just walk away from that?

Because The Boys were a bunch of barely functional fuck-ups who only seem to succeed because their opponents are too busy being angry, degenerate losers to take stock of them. And because the Boys have - by this point I assume - no official backing or even popular support and if I read all these spoilers correctly, like

Spoiler

only Hughie and Starlight are left at the end and neither of them seem come across as having either the rock star charisma for a popular revolution OR the cold blooded underhanded ruthlessness to apply Butcher's lessons but not be an over-emotional shithead about it.

. One or both of which is generally required to bring down something the length and breadth of Vought American. At least one of them should have tried to pull a Johnny Silverhand on the corporate HQ but that never comes up.

 

[Bartholen]

The Boys Finale

Sage gets off for no clear reason. She orchestrated the murder of a bunch of people and helped a genocidal maniac to power. Why does she get off? Sure, she's stupid now, or stupider anyway, but she wanted that. It barely qualifies as punishment.

I was so checked out during the finale that I didn't even stop to think of this. Why would The Boys suddenly be okay with her, but especially why Butcher? If anything, she should have gotten the cruelest kill in the series, seeing as she's no longer superpowered and is effectively just another normie. I think Butcher would have relished the chance to go medieval on her.

 

[Bob_McMillan]

If you don't mind being spoiled about the comic, there's a tragic irony to the show now:

Spoiler: Spoilers about the comic's ending

In the comic there is no final confrontation with Homelander and Butcher. It's revealed that Black Noir is actually a clone of Homelander, which drives Homelander into a berserk rage. Butcher escapes the oval office while BN and Homelander go to town on each other - off panel. What we see next is a shredded-apart Black Noir holding what bloody dregs remain of Homelander, and he ends up getting blasted to kingdom come by the military. Butcher then walks up to the basically still-living corpse of Black Noir and pries his skull open much like in the show, completing his revenge.

The tragic irony is that they actually could have had something similar had they not included the V1. You could have had it so that a non-supe releases the virus inside the White House, which causes Homelander to become depowered, and stumble out holding on for dear life. And then Butcher comes out and pries his skull open. They could have had more tension, less budget, less stupidity by not suddenly nerfing Homelander to oblivion, and a more drawn out, more satisfying death for him.

Oh I finished the comics, and hated them, hence why I thought you saying the comics were better than the show was brutal. But yeah considering the finale in the comics, the show's finale seems distinctly low budget. I've been seeing a lot of people pissed about how misleading all the marketing was, given the level of destruction they were teasing.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

A couple of series finales last night:

The Boys
Kinda bored caring about the criticism and DISCOURSE and all the internet noise about it. We get it, it's not as good as it was, but it was a solid last episode that gave pretty much every character the send-off they deserved.

The Comeback
Also a nice ending, giving Valerie a believable but rewarding ending bit of character growth and dignity.