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

[Eacaraxe]

This series feels like a subversion of the original Game of Thrones, the sex and violence are still there but one of the big running themes and bits in the original show was it being a deconstruction of the fantasy genre with the grand noble characters often meeting grisly demises best exemplified by the death of Ned Stark in Season 1 because he refused to be underhanded and tried to be honourable and do everything the right way.

What House of the Dragon presents us with are two slightly flawed but mostly honourable sides whose conflict comes about as a result of unfortunate circumstances and possibly less than honourable people on each side influencing things. At present by the end of the series there is no clear villain and it's more going to be waiting for future series to see the paths characters take and if either will truly become villainous through their choices and actions or if the conflict will really be one where both sides have nuance and complexity to them such that it feels far for a better way to put it deeper than the somewhat cartoonishly villainous days of Joffery or Ramsey vs House Stark.

Having read the relevant excerpts from Fire & Blood, you're in for a very rude awakening on this one lemme tell you. This is about like saying "oh boy, I sure do like Catelyn Stark and I'm glad she's getting more screen time!" right before the season 3 finale, then having read the books between seasons 3 and 4 and saying "oh boy, I sure do like Lady Stoneheart in the books and I can't wait to see her in the show!".

Saying the Greens and Blacks are slightly flawed, is kinda like saying the Pope is kinda Catholic. Nobody's honorable, the "unfortunate" circumstances are (or, will be) entirely of their own making, and everyone involved becomes outright villainous by the end.

Even when MGR actually was announced and revamped into a stylish action game, I still remember some fans bitching over like they lost something.

Never quite got that, myself. The point you get the high-frequency blade is the "fuck it, kill 'em all" point in MGS2 where Raiden overcomes his VR indoctrination and finds his own identity, and Raiden is the cyborg ninja in MGS4.

Making a Raiden-focused sequel based on stealth would have been a thematic step backwards, for the character and for the series. MGR being a stylish character action game was the natural progression, and drawing parallels between Raiden and Big Boss to set up Raiden as the "next" BB was just perfect, especially in the wake of MGSV which was as close to third-person shooter analog to stylish character action as you can get.

Now, for me...

I'm rewatching The Sopranos, because fuck it why not. On rewatch, I've rethought Ralph and his character arc, and came to a completely different conclusion than I had before about it. I don't think he actually did kill Pie-Oh-My, I think he exploited Pie-Oh-My's death to commit suicide-by-Tony as Gloria attempted at the end of season 3.

 

[BrawlMan]

Never quite got that, myself. The point you get the high-frequency blade is the "fuck it, kill 'em all" point in MGS2 where Raiden overcomes his VR indoctrination and finds his own identity, and Raiden is the cyborg ninja in MGS4.

Not every single fan was complaining, but there were a loud vocal few, and a local GameStop employee I knew who hated Raiden with a passion, that would not shut up. Like said before, when said game came out, most whiners shut their mouths and enjoyed what they got. Every fan definitely appreciated Rising more, after they found out they weren't getting any more Kojima Metal Gear games MGSV.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I'm rewatching The Sopranos, because fuck it why not. On rewatch, I've rethought Ralph and his character arc, and came to a completely different conclusion than I had before about it. I don't think he actually did kill Pie-Oh-My, I think he exploited Pie-Oh-My's death to commit suicide-by-Tony as Gloria attempted at the end of season 3.

I don't think he killed the horse either. Watching him lie about *everything* else, he seems way too earnest in his confrontation with Tony. At least I don't think the actor was playing him like he was lying. The anger is less about the accusation, more about Tony caring so much about an animal (while Ralph's son is inches away from death).

Some theories actually point to Paulie, since he had a legitimate beef with Ralph which was stoked the hell up in that very same episode. And Paulie gets away with everything in the show. Not to mention the connection with the painting.

Suicide by Tony is a stretch though. That dude's absolutely fighting for his life in that kitchen.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The Shrink Next Door

Apple TV limited series, based on a podcast, based on a true crime, based on a NY shrink who would scam and exploit his "patients" by insinuating himself into their personal lives (abusive relationship red flag number one) and alienating them from friends and family (abusive relationship red flag number two), feeding their dependence with bullshit therapy while slowly taking over control of their finances.

Isaac Herschkopf. Apparently he had a bunch of famous patients, like O.J. and Gwyneth. This guy was like the Bernie Madoff of shrinks.

It's so weird that the show frames this as a comedy. There's nothing funny about the real life story, which focuses on a dude that was exploited like this for 30 years. And there's nothing particularly funny about the series per se, other than having Will Ferrell and Paul Rudd in the roles. Pause the movie anywhere and it looks like a comedy. Maybe the disarming effect is by design.

I feel sorry for the dude. But the thing about these incredibly obvious, bizarre scams that some people fall for (ie. the Tinder Swindler) is that as much as I feel sorry for the victims... they're usually kind of idiotic, too. At least here Rudd has the veneer of being a respectable shrink, and has the tools to suggest and manipulate people to his will. Who the hell sees or listens to the Tinder Swindler and buys the globetrotting playboy millionaire act for even a second, except the gullible-bordering-on-stupid ones?

 

[Casual Shinji]

I'm rewatching The Sopranos, because fuck it why not. On rewatch, I've rethought Ralph and his character arc, and came to a completely different conclusion than I had before about it. I don't think he actually did kill Pie-Oh-My, I think he exploited Pie-Oh-My's death to commit suicide-by-Tony as Gloria attempted at the end of season 3.

I don't think it matters really. That scene is much less about Ralph and more about Tony. The fact that he's willing to kill a grieving father on the inkling he might've killed an animal. You see the same with Christopher's intervention, where Tony is generally calm till he finds out Chris accidentally killed Adrianna's dog. With Ralph they even spent most of Season 4, not exactly redeeming him, but making him much less of a piece of shit than he was in Season 3, so that when Tony kills him it's not even for reasons of hatred he might feel toward him for shit he pulled in the past. It's just the horse, with Ralph at his most vulnerable and human.

Though you could also argue Tony was just looking to vent his anger on anybody, and Ralph was the person who'd be missed the least.

 

[Gordon_4]

I don't think it matters really. That scene is much less about Ralph and more about Tony. The fact that he's willing to kill a grieving father on the inkling he might've killed an animal. You see the same with Christopher's intervention, where Tony is generally calm till he finds out Chris accidentally killed Adrianna's dog. With Ralph they even spent most of Season 4, not exactly redeeming him, but making him much less of a piece of shit than he was in Season 3, so that when Tony kills him it's not even for reasons of hatred he might feel toward him for shit he pulled in the past. It's just the horse, with Ralph at his most vulnerable and human.

Though you could also argue Tony was just looking to vent his anger on anybody, and Ralph was the person who'd be missed the least.

Doesn’t the show make some kind of small but important point that Tony has a weird soft spot for animals with both the ducks and the horse and Adrianna’s dog as a way of showing his ability to empathise is totally skewered because he reacts with more piss and vinegar about them than he does most people he knows and should in theory love?

 

[Casual Shinji]

Doesn’t the show make some kind of small but important point that Tony has a weird soft spot for animals with both the ducks and the horse and Adrianna’s dog as a way of showing his ability to empathise is totally skewered because he reacts with more piss and vinegar about them than he does most people he knows and should in theory love?

I wouldn't call it small, it's probably one of the character's most prominent personality traits. It also tricks the audience into thinking Tony can't be too bad of a guy, because look, he's an animal lover.

 

[Eacaraxe]

Suicide by Tony is a stretch though. That dude's absolutely fighting for his life in that kitchen.

The point with suicide-by-X is to deliberately escalate until you've forced the other person to use lethal force in the moment. Not to mention, the complications of fight-or-flight kicking in, deciding you want to live after you've crossed the point of no return, or just simply trying to back down -- we see all three happen in the show.

What changed my mind about it, is the fight played out disturbingly similarly to Gloria's suicide-by-Tony attempt: similar set layout, visual language, choreography. Given Chase's fastidious focus on detail, blocking, framing, editing, and fondness for recalling past events and expressing characters' mental states through visual language, the parallels are pretty clear. It's a subtle, but deliberate, callback to Tony's fight with Gloria.



The biggest differences are the fight with Gloria is shot predominantly in wide angle with pans, and the half-wall separating kitchen and dining area in the foreground; the fight with Ralph is shot exclusively in hand-held close-up. That fits with Chase's visual language and his use of framing and editing to reflect mental state: in the former, Tony just wanted Gloria out of his life, had just realized she was borderline and manipulative, and kept his rage in check to subvert her attempt to control him; in the latter, Tony was out for blood, it was intensely personal, and that fight was only ending with one or both parties dead.

I don't think it matters really. That scene is much less about Ralph and more about Tony. The fact that he's willing to kill a grieving father on the inkling he might've killed an animal...

I agree it's about Tony and his mental state, not Ralph -- Chase (and his writers) always prefer ambiguity when it comes to key details not directly relevant to the story, themes at hand, or the statement being made at the time. The ambiguity itself is what directs us to contemplate Tony's psychology in those moments and plot developments. Regardless how or why, Tony still snapped and killed Ralph.

That's the immediate take on the issue, at least; with what I'm most interested, is what was the source of Tony's misplaced rage. Most people argue it's not about the horse at all, but rather Tracee; I disagree, as I think the source is actually Gloria, Tony's guilt and sense of lost control over her fate, and his struggle to suppress the realization he's a piece of shit.

You see the same with Christopher's intervention, where Tony is generally calm till he finds out Chris accidentally killed Adrianna's dog...

She just crawled under there for warmth.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

The Witcher, season 3 part 2

The end of the Cavill era sees him go out at what basically- IIRC- is like the middle of the book saga, the break point where the early mysteries are revealed that plot turns. This means he gets to go out with some big fights and some crazy stuff happening to everybody. Therefore it had to stick most closely to the books than previous episodes because it really had to move the plot forward. Stuff like Ciri handing out with a unicorn is one of those things I expected would not translate well to the screen, and I was right about that, but the infighting and betrayals and battles were done well.

I honestly will be surprised if this show comes back. Not just from the change of actor, but now the writers and actors striking? That's a lot to come back from. I also wouldn't be surprised if show runner Lauren Hissrich moves on to something else, if she finds the criticisms (justified AND unjustified) to be not worth it.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I don't think it matters really. That scene is much less about Ralph and more about Tony. The fact that he's willing to kill a grieving father on the inkling he might've killed an animal. You see the same with Christopher's intervention, where Tony is generally calm till he finds out Chris accidentally killed Adrianna's dog. With Ralph they even spent most of Season 4, not exactly redeeming him, but making him much less of a piece of shit than he was in Season 3, so that when Tony kills him it's not even for reasons of hatred he might feel toward him for shit he pulled in the past. It's just the horse, with Ralph at his most vulnerable and human.

Though you could also argue Tony was just looking to vent his anger on anybody, and Ralph was the person who'd be missed the least.

Tony wanted Ralph dead since he beat Tracy to death. The line "She was a beautiful, innocent creature - what did she ever do to you?" as he's killing him, might as well refer to Tracy. When Tony wakes up at the Bing at the end of the episode he sees her picture backstage so the episode wants you to make that connection (or see the irony in Tony killing him over an animal instead).

I'm not saying he was deliberately avenging her by killing Ralph but subconsciously he's wanted to kill him since her murder. After the whole debacle with the weight joke, maybe the death of the horse just so happens to be what gets him over the edge.

The point with suicide-by-X is to deliberately escalate until you've forced the other person to use lethal force in the moment. Not to mention, the complications of fight-or-flight kicking in, deciding you want to live after you've crossed the point of no return, or just simply trying to back down -- we see all three happen in the show.

What changed my mind about it, is the fight played out disturbingly similarly to Gloria's suicide-by-Tony attempt: similar set layout, visual language, choreography. Given Chase's fastidious focus on detail, blocking, framing, editing, and fondness for recalling past events and expressing characters' mental states through visual language, the parallels are pretty clear. It's a subtle, but deliberate, callback to Tony's fight with Gloria.

I agree they look similar - both fights end with Tony on top on the kitchen floor. But you have Gloria there literally telling Tony to kill her. Nothing about the acting or Ralph's demeanor suggests he's suicidal. In Ralph's case it's Tony who wants to escalate the situation and refuses to change the subject (which Ralph keeps trying). Ralph also happens to be sharing good news about the whole situation for the first time, since his kid seems to be improving. He's angry at Tony for not giving two fucks about his own tragedy and focusing on the death of the horse, and Ralph's outrage also comes from having been exploited over that horse without ever protesting about it.

 

[09philj]

Rev. (Series 1)
This is a BBC comedy series from 2010, starring Tom Hollander as an Anglican vicar. The Church of England was and is in a general state of decline, and the series is prominently about the main character dealing with the effects of that - preaching to a small congregation of very strange people, being caught between the material and spiritual needs of the church, and feeling inadequate as a result of his low status. It's simple, gentle comedy that works because it's sympathetic to the struggle of trying to have faith in difficult circumstances, while being realistic about what the Church of England in the 21st century looks like.

 

[Eacaraxe]

I agree they look similar - both fights end with Tony on top on the kitchen floor. But you have Gloria there literally telling Tony to kill her. Nothing about the acting or Ralph's demeanor suggests he's suicidal. In Ralph's case it's Tony who wants to escalate the situation and refuses to change the subject (which Ralph keeps trying). Ralph also happens to be sharing good news about the whole situation for the first time, since his kid seems to be improving. He's angry at Tony for not giving two fucks about his own tragedy and focusing on the death of the horse, and Ralph's outrage also comes from having been exploited over that horse without ever protesting about it.

Different circumstances. Like Irina before her, Gloria was using suicide as a cry for help and attempt to keep Tony in her sphere of influence. She didn't want to die in that moment, so long as she was capable of manipulating Tony into staying with her. Ralph, on the other hand, didn't display suicidal behavior in that moment, but did in everything leading up to it: shock, extreme grief and remorse, resignation and attempts at redemption and reconciliation. Practically every scene he was in from the hospital onward highlighted a different, common, warning sign of imminent suicide, but none more than his conversations with Rosalie and Father Intintola.

You gotta remember, suicide is a paradoxical behavior: the more someone talks about or threatens it, the less likely they are to do it -- or at least, make attempts guaranteed to succeed. I mentioned Irina before, but you can add to that Artie's and AJ's attempts; all four, contrasted against Eugene and Makazian, who just up and did it without leaving possibility for failure or rescue. Ralph's pattern of behavior before confronting Tony is far more consistent with the last two, than any of the previously-mentioned four.

 

[bunniesandrainbows]

I just saw the first episode of Spy x Family and it was super cute! I loved Anya. I also liked Loid's super tsundere attitude. We all know he got the fathering bug right away. It was funny but also left me wanting more. Will watch the next episode when I can make myself sit down for 25 minutes, haha!

 

[gorfias]

The Shrink Next Door

Apple TV limited series, based on a podcast, based on a true crime, based on a NY shrink who would scam and exploit his "patients" by insinuating himself into their personal lives (abusive relationship red flag number one) and alienating them from friends and family (abusive relationship red flag number two), feeding their dependence with bullshit therapy while slowly taking over control of their finances.

Isaac Herschkopf. Apparently he had a bunch of famous patients, like O.J. and Gwyneth. This guy was like the Bernie Madoff of shrinks.

It's so weird that the show frames this as a comedy. There's nothing funny about the real life story, which focuses on a dude that was exploited like this for 30 years. And there's nothing particularly funny about the series per se, other than having Will Ferrell and Paul Rudd in the roles. Pause the movie anywhere and it looks like a comedy. Maybe the disarming effect is by design.

I feel sorry for the dude. But the thing about these incredibly obvious, bizarre scams that some people fall for (ie. the Tinder Swindler) is that as much as I feel sorry for the victims... they're usually kind of idiotic, too. At least here Rudd has the veneer of being a respectable shrink, and has the tools to suggest and manipulate people to his will. Who the hell sees or listens to the Tinder Swindler and buys the globetrotting playboy millionaire act for even a second, except the gullible-bordering-on-stupid ones?

The only "funny" part of which I can think is

Spoiler

when they don't properly add fire retardant to those stage curtains and the cast is walking around them with torches. Black comedy.

It was heart breaking, particularly how he alienates his victims from their families.

Shrinking is also on Apple. It is a fun, more amusing story of psychiatry but had me cringing a lot. You want to like the protagonist but from what little I know of the profession, this guy (and anyone supporting his work) seems to be riotously violating his obligations. This is in particular evidence in the last episode which, I have no idea how they will work around that should there be a season 2.

ITMT: Just checked out "Twisted Metal" (S1E1) on Peacock. It is inspired by and includes some characters and situations from the Playstation games of the same name. This show appears to know what it is: put guy in a car in danger with freaks chasing him around while everyone does a sort of demolition derby involving guns and rockets. Pretty 7.5/10 satisfying nonsense. Anthony Mackie as John Doe does a terrific job with what he is given. Can't wait to see more of the clown.

Twisted Metal (TV Series 2023– ) ⭐ 7.3 | Action, Adventure, Comedy

30m | TV-MA

www.imdb.com

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Who remembers this?


Things I never knew (or don't remember knowing) despite frequently watching this as a kid:

1. The theme song is composed by Iggy Fucking Pop.
2. It was a weird French show and not a Cartoon Network original.
3. The original name is Les zinzins de l'espace, aka The Space Homeless, with "zinzins" being apparently horribly offensive by today's standards.
4. The green alien was meant to be male and gay in the French and English dubs. News to me. In the Latin American version, the one I watched, he was dubbed over by a female voice actor to avoid hurting third world sensibilities, effectively giving him a sex change and "freeing" him to perform stereotypically feminine actions (like cooking, cleaning and dressing up).

 

[Absent]

3. The original name is Les zinzins de l'espace, aka The Space Homeless, with "zinzins" being apparently horribly offensive by today's standards.

What?

I only ever heard zinzin as a cutey childish word to say crazy ("looney" or "nutty"), or sometimes, but rarely, to designate a weird, silly looking object or contraption. Never for homeless people, and even less as an offensive word to anyone.

 

[Hawki]

Peacemaker: Season 1 (3/5)

I really didn't like this series. If not for the last 25% being better than the preceeding 75%, there's a strong chance this would be in "bad" territory. But even if the ending is stronger than the beginning, I really don't have much to say here.

Anyway, yeah. Peacemaker is set in the DCEU (though season 2 will be in the DCU), leading on from The Suicide Squad (not Suicide Squad, because that's how we roll), dealing with the character of Pacemaker (sorry, Peacemaker) being recruited by a bunch of idiots to deal with an alien invasion of butterflies. Yes, that's the premise, and while I could certainly elaborate on more, I don't have much desire to. It's crass characters with crass dialogue, engaging in crass humour, where despite being idiots (sufficie to say, Amanda Waller didn't pick the best and brightest of Task Force X), they still succeed. Some of the insanity works (such as with Vigilante), but much of it just got tiring.

I could say more, for better or worse, but I really can't be bothered. The one thing I'll praise the show for unequivocably is its music - the opening dance number is bonkers (in a good way), but the use of music is well done throughout the series as a whole. This is especially seen with the "Beautiful Monster" sequence, and the ending theme/sequence. But as a whole? Not much to write home about.

 

[BrawlMan]

This is now my favorite episode of CJ Dachamp!

​

 

[BrawlMan]

Watching EVO stream on Twitch.

 

[Bartholen]

I've been reading through the Witcher saga again recently, and as such my curiosity about the Netflix show was somewhat re-piqued. So I watched a lot of this quite hefty, but rather insightful analysis of why the show is a failure. And after that I skimmed through the last 3 episodes of the latest season just to see where we're at, because those same events I read in the books less than 2 weeks ago.

Either my memory's hazy or i had rose tinted glasses on to begin with, but I could swear the show did not look this cheap in the first two seasons. There's a noticeable lack of grit or wear to almost every costume. In the last episode when Dandelion's in Brokilon with Geralt, and has been for weeks if not months, his leather jacket just looks like it's come right off the shelf. Locations, even supposedly grungy taverns, just looks like sets, with immaculate paint and fresh woodwork. Fuck's sake, the moss hanging off the entrance of Geralt's resting place looks like plastic!

My interest in the show had suffered a dramatic decline after the news of Cavill's departure, but after watching those videos I realized the show was botched from the very start. I don't say this lightly, but I do consider the Netflix show a bad case of cultural appropriation: taking something that was distinctly eastern european in its themes, style, dynamics and feel, and just turning it into an americanized "We have Game of Thrones at home" (although Game of Thrones itself became Game of Thrones at home by the end... anyway). I'd heard the usual suspects shitting on the showrunners and just shrugged it off as the usual misogynist malarkey that permeates the internet. But having now heard tons of footage of how the showrunners and writers approached the show has demonstrated to me that they

1. simply did not get the source material
2. do not get the fantasy genre
3. respect neither the fantasy genre nor the source material
4. just used the series as a platform to tell their own story with its own themes and style, filling it with subject matter that was personally relevant to them, but still torturously crowbarring it into the narrative of the books.

The result is a schizophrenic mish-mash of ideas and concepts that merely wears the skin of the Witcher brand. Dark satire and subversion of the fantasy genre replaced with entirely sincere "whoa badass" grandiosity and an overabundance of "omg so kewl" action scenes. Complex explorations of xenophobia and generational cycles of hatred and violence replaced with heavy-handed surface level allegories about racism and colonialism. Complicated, powerful and morally ambiguous female characters flanderized into "yaas slay queen, you go grrlboss" meme fodder. And some really, really nasty undertones regarding morality that may betray more about the writers' personal views on the world than they'd probably like.

I genuinely thought this series could have been a decade-defining phenomenon for the 2020s at first. But man, they just fumbled it soooooo hard.