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

Casual Shinji

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Watched the first three episodes of Scott Pilgrim on Netflix, and so far it's really darn good. Talking about why it's good, besides the animation, would go into spoilers, suffice to say that I didn't see this coming.
 

Piscian

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Monarch: Legacy of Monsters

...meeeh.

It's a meme that all the parts of Godzilla movies where the scientists and politicians yammer at each other and wring their hands about what to do are the most boring parts of the films. It's only slightly less true here.

This show serves as a prequel to both Godzilla 2014 and Godzilla King Of the Monsters, time jumping between the 1950s and 2014 with a motley crew of scientists trying to find MUTOs (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms) in the 1950s and the Japanese children of a researching who disappeared after the Godzilla attack trying to find out what happened to him. The plot seems to revolve around Monarch being aware of the threat this whole time and hiding it.

Some of the show works and some of it doesn't. Between the first two episodes the vast majority of it is spent with the people and only a few minutes of Monster time. It's kinda awkward because they gotta find reasons to have the monsters, but still drag it out. So a flash back here and there of one of the children surviving the attack on San Francisco, jungle monsters, etc.

Admittedly I'm just not invested at this point. I don't like any of the characters and the monster action is minimal. The end of episode 2 gives us our first look at a full on Kaiju and it's a middling step between film quality and scifi channel. It's pure CGI which is disappointing. Thats kinda the charm of old school Godzilla and with the CGI not quite great it leaves you with a bad taste like those trashy straight to streaming shark vs snake movie. Not that rough but not "awesome".

There's a part where a CGI monster arm 30ft in diameter smashes through a steel wall a ft away from a guy and he does that og star trek "oh no were shaking" shit when in real life the shockwave of something like that hitting right next to you would literally throw you into the air, but they ,...so far, are going cheap on the practical's. I hope it improves.

I'll give it another episode, but immediately I'm disappointed largely in part with it being pre- King Of the Monsters. We already know what happens. Similarly to the Asoka series were left in this weird state of getting an in between story.

I won't say it's "bad", but your mileage may vary on this one 5/10 for me so far.
 
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Old_Hunter_77

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We watched the first two episodes of the recent season 2 of Loki and were utterly bored out of our minds. I was determined to finish the season since it's short and the last one but with the long Thanksgiving weekend away from out living room, I don't see that happening. There was just a lot of explaining of plot stuff that I didn't care about any more because of the long break from the previous season and our general no longer giving of a shit of Marvel. Oh well.

The recent season The Morning Show was quite... something. It's one of those shows that "objectively" is actually rather bad, but I enjoy it. It's pure stupid soap opera at this point and Jon Hamm's "what if Elon Musk but sexy" character was absolutely absurd. I would still strongly recommend the first season of that show to anyone but after that... *blows raspberry*

New season of For All Mankind is getting mixed-to-negative reviews as it fulfill the pattern of a Ronald D. Moore show starting strong than petering out (Battlestar Galactica and Outlander say hello). As with Morning Show, it might have exhausted the larger themes and plot past the point of interest which then pushes the interpersonal drama from something interesting into soap opera cheese. With Mankind, I think now that they're on Mars I dunno how much further they can go to make it interesting in terms of speculative "hard" sci-fi, which made the show so interesting. But I'll still watch the season despite my reservations.

The Curse is the new psycho-mindf*** cringe masterpiece from Nathan Fielder and lemme tell you... if you like his whole schtick, this show is for you and if not, run away. Now me- yeah, I'm a fan. A huge fan. Nathan For You was great and I still think about that insane episode of The Rehearsal where he was like sort of married but not all the time. The Curse is fully fiction and scripted though and he got Emma Stone who, I gotta say, is maybe my favorite actress alive. She also has been doing hilarious stunt promotion with Fielder (i.e., their deliberately uncomfortable Jimmy Kimmel appearance) and call me a sucker but this whole thing is exactly my jam.

The premise is a gentrifying HGTV couple trying to earnestly ingratiate themselves with the economically declining native populations while also glorifying themselves with fame and fortune all through the lens of their f'd up marriage. My favorite details are things like when a John Carpenter like soundtrack swells while they are discussing intimate issues. Truly horrifying. My wife suffered through the first episode and will not watch any more. It gets my very highest recommendation as the best TV show of 2023.
 

Cheetodust

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Watched the first three episodes of Scott Pilgrim on Netflix, and so far it's really darn good. Talking about why it's good, besides the animation, would go into spoilers, suffice to say that I didn't see this coming.
I'm on the 3rd episode now. Enjoying it so far. Honestly I loved the book, the movie is one of my favourites and honestly (without spoilers) I don't mind that they have changed things. The books and movie still exist. This version is great in it's own way. Honestly better in a lot of ways.
 
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Casual Shinji

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I'm on the 3rd episode now. Enjoying it so far. Honestly I loved the book, the movie is one of my favourites and honestly (without spoilers) I don't mind that they have changed things. The books and movie still exist. This version is great in it's own way. Honestly better in a lot of ways.
I was never a big fan of the movie. I love it for its style and blend of geek indy realism with over-the-top cartooniness, but god did I dislike nearly all of these characters. And it's funny how simply making these characters literal cartoons makes them so much more likeable right off the bat. I felt so much more invested in these cartoons struggling with realistic issues of love than I did for the realistic characters in the movie trying to be cartoony.

I will say I think Episode 3 is probably the peak of the show. It's kinda the most touching one overall. And even as a cartoon Aubrey Plaza's character is still the hottest, because ofcourse she is.
 

Cheetodust

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I was never a big fan of the movie. I love it for its style and blend of geek indy realism with over-the-top cartooniness, but god did I dislike nearly all of these characters. And it's funny how simply making these characters literal cartoons makes them so much more likeable right off the bat. I felt so much more invested in these cartoons struggling with realistic issues of love than I did for the realistic characters in the movie trying to be cartoony.

I will say I think Episode 3 is probably the peak of the show. It's kinda the most touching one overall. And even as a cartoon Aubrey Plaza's character is still the hottest, because ofcourse she is.
After finishing it I can honestly say I prefer this one in a lot of ways. It's a much more grown up look at relationships than the manic pixie dream girl stuff of the original. I enjoyed the books and movie but they're definitely a product of the time.
 

Casual Shinji

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After finishing it I can honestly say I prefer this one in a lot of ways. It's a much more grown up look at relationships than the manic pixie dream girl stuff of the original. I enjoyed the books and movie but they're definitely a product of the time.
There's a lot more character interaction in this show, as opposed to the movie where the interactions were relegated to snark or fights. Can't speak for the comic book. But just that one flashback where you see Roxie sitting there defeated and trying to meet Ramona's eye as she's leaving was so much more genuine than anything in the movie.

Though I do feel the show kinda peters out a bit near the end.
 

Phoenixmgs

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Blue Eye Samaria - 7/10

Pretty solid overall samurai animated adult show. Some really great episodes in the season like the onryo episode for example. The animation is just great looking for the most part, especially stuff like the rain. I feel like some of the rather subtle animations just seem off and in the uncanny valley area. I do like how the show demonstrates the sexism and racism in history as a lot of fiction nowadays like to act like medieval times were similar to today's acceptance. I did not really care for how the main character, Mizu, is a chick and is playing off like a guy the whole time. That is fine for a more comic-y/wacky tone but in such a serious show, she is not going to be able to easily pass as a dude because it's obvious that she's not a dude. At best, people that spend any amount of time with her would be asking themselves "is that a chick?" I'm also not the biggest fan of how Mizu's ark progressed through season as they do a really great job of showing her progressively become evil and it comes to a head in the onryo episode but then she keeps sorta redeeming herself just so the show can get all the characters together again. It would have been really great for her to come to the relevation in the last episode when she sees the city on fire.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Blue Eye Samaria - 7/10

Pretty solid overall samurai animated adult show. Some really great episodes in the season like the onryo episode for example. The animation is just great looking for the most part, especially stuff like the rain. I feel like some of the rather subtle animations just seem off and in the uncanny valley area. I do like how the show demonstrates the sexism and racism in history as a lot of fiction nowadays like to act like medieval times were similar to today's acceptance. I did not really care for how the main character, Mizu, is a chick and is playing off like a guy the whole time. That is fine for a more comic-y/wacky tone but in such a serious show, she is not going to be able to easily pass as a dude because it's obvious that she's a dude. At best, people that spend any amount of time with her would be asking themselves "is that a chick?" I'm also not the biggest fan of how Mizu's ark progressed through season as they do a really great job of showing her progressively become evil and it comes to a head in the onryo episode but then she keeps sorta redeeming herself just so the show can get all the characters together again. It would have been really great for her to come to the relevation in the last episode when she sees the city on fire.
I started watching this, too; mentioned it in the anime/cartoon thread. I'm almost done, but so far, I'd say your 7/10 is about right. Insofar as Mizu playing it as a male the whole time, I thought it was strange at the end of episode one, when Ringo sees her bathing (and we get the full-frontal, bush and all) that it was played as a reveal to the audience. Like, were we NOT supposed to have known already? I get that we're supposed to believe the people in that world have been fooled and might be shocked to learn she's female, but pretty much from the jump, I (we, the audience) had no reason to believe otherwise. She has a woman voice actor who doesn't ever try to put on a masculine voice, never mind the art style typically has men with square jaw lines and women with pointed ones, and Mizu's has got to be the pointiest of them all!
 

gorfias

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For All Mankind Apple TV S1 E1 and 2

B+

I'm liking an alt reality in which the USSR gets to the moon before the US. Mixes some real world concerns with the socio political environment of the times. Daughter asked me to watch with her and did not realize: we got 4 seasons to catch up upon!

Very different experience as they recreate images, audio and video of the time to make it all the more realistic. Listening to "tapes" of Nixon worrying about his legacy. Hearing them speak of how the F4 Phantom was the ultimate fighter (I worked on the E-s a dozen years later and we thought of them as proving with enough thrust, you can make a brick fly.)

So far? Really worth watching.

 
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Xprimentyl

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Interview With The Vampire: S1:Ep1-2 Curious / Great

A vampire who confessed his tale to a human journalist in the 1970s reconnects several decades later for effectively a do-over. Ostensibly, there was a lot he didn't say then he needs to say now.

This is a re-imagining of the classic book Interview With The Vampire by Anne Rice that was itself faithful adapted for the big screen in 1994. I'm a massive Anne Rice fan, and am actually surprised I'm more intrigued than disappointed. Despite hitting enough of the notes to be instantly familiar, it deviates from the source material substantially making it it's own thing. Examples, the interview takes place in modern days, and the interviewer, Daniel, has [obviously] aged since his first meeting with Louis, and is now an ill and jaded older man as opposed to the original focusing strictly on their initial meeting in the 1970s. The titular vampire, Louis de Pointe du Lac, is not an 18th century white plantation owner, but a early 20th century black owner of a successful cat house who's standings as one of few somewhat respected negroes is precarious as he balances self-respect and his position in white society. It's weird; it's kept me watching because while I've an preference for the original, I want to see what else they do differently, i.e.: I'm not looking to pick it apart and criticize, rather curious where their liberties allowed them to go.
 
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Old_Hunter_77

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Geddy Lee Asks: Are Bass Players Human Too?
Paramount +

Geddy Lee was the singer and bass player of nerd-god prog rock band Rush. He has been out there promoting his memoir and basking in his lifelong accomplishments and given his reputation as a super nice guy it's all quite charming.

Each episode of this show is just 20 minutes of him hanging out with another bass player. The four episodes so far are:
- Les Claypool (Primus and various solo and collaboration stuff. By the way I saw him with Juilan Lennon this summer and he still got it)
- Robert Trujillo (Suicidal Tendencies, Ozzy Osbourne, Metallica)
- Meliss Auf der Maur (Hole, toured with Smashing Pumkins)
- Krist Novosilec (Nirvana)

The latter two were an especially pleasant surprise as when I was growing up, fans of Rush were usually not appreciative of Nirvana or Hole, and vice versa. As a 90s teen who was enamored with the Seattle cross-over scene then fell hard into jazz and prog, it was just cool to watch these legends hang out.
Mostly it's a catch-up on their lives and if you don't care about these people then this show is stupid but 20 minutes of Rush and Claypool drinking wind and fishing is a fine time for me.
 
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Piscian

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Im an episode into Scott Pilgrim and idk if its just mean, but the sound is...off. Like Its very stilted between scenes with and without music or effects so it lacks the same frenetic energy as the movie.


More problematically the voice acting also lacks energy. It kinda reeks of one of those animated films where they got a bunch Hollywood actors to do voices vs experienced voice actors so the dialogue just lacks the right emotion for the scene.


Its always a mixed bag some Hollywood actors just fall right into voice acting and some struggle to hit those notes. Scott himself just idk sounds super phoned in.

Im still more or less enjoying it, but it won't leave the back of my mind the whole time that I didn't need the cast doing the dialogue. I would have preferred qualified voice actors who could really bring the heat.
 

Bob_McMillan

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Im an episode into Scott Pilgrim and idk if its just mean, but the sound is...off. Like Its very stilted between scenes with and without music or effects so it lacks the same frenetic energy as the movie.


More problematically the voice acting also lacks energy. It kinda reeks of one of those animated films where they got a bunch Hollywood actors to do voices vs experienced voice actors so the dialogue just lacks the right emotion for the scene.


Its always a mixed bag some Hollywood actors just fall right into voice acting and some struggle to hit those notes. Scott himself just idk sounds super phoned in.

Im still more or less enjoying it, but it won't leave the back of my mind the whole time that I didn't need the cast doing the dialogue. I would have preferred qualified voice actors who could really bring the heat.
This is mean but... I think Michael Cera doesn't fit animated Scott because animated Scott doesn't look enough like a loser to sound right with Michael Cera's voice.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Ramona. Well, she sounds bored. But I guess that's kind of just her character.

Everyone else though, I think they were pretty solid. Especially the guy who plays Wallace. Chris Evans and the vegan one were also solid IMO.
 

Piscian

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Ok Im all done with Scott Pilgrim takes off

If anyones still on the fence I don't think Im gonna be able to change your mind. The Netflix anime is a direct sequel to the books, also written by the original author. So if you don't like the books or movie, still probably a pass.

I mostly enjoyed it, but it didn't quite have the charm of the books or energy of the movie.

Think those are too very different things. The books are more of a slice of life indie graphic novel for nerdy genxer/xenniels spiced up with manga and scifi wackiness.

The movie, while keeping the same plot beats is more of an Adderall fueled CGI action fest.

The Netflix anime is both a sequel and a retread. Same characters, and some of the same beats but closer to a multiverse/sequel.

At times I was really enjoying it and others I was honestly playing on my phone because I was bored.

I really really did not like the voice casting. Cera is just awful and Ramona is completely phoned in. Shes largely a monotone character, but there was literally scenes where her on screen character is supposed to be screaming and she still delivering the same disinterested tone.

Her voice acting felt particularly problematic because this "version" of her is pretty emotionally invested this, this time around.

I also noticed lipsync issues typical with bad anime dubbing.

It got to me so much that I looked around online, and I noticed something interesting. This has a full professional Japanese cast and was simulcast in japan.

Looking at the time lines I have a sneaking suspicion the anime was done with the Japanese cast first then dubbed over in English. I know that sounds crazy, a Canadian show, but it seems strange to me that they went to such lengths for japanese dubbing.

Id need to reread the books, but man I don't recall all the characters like young neil and Wallace being so unlikeable. I only really recall Scott being human garbage that the rest of the group puts up with.

idk 7/10 for me. It just didn't quite get there.
 
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Phoenixmgs

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Im an episode into Scott Pilgrim and idk if its just mean, but the sound is...off. Like Its very stilted between scenes with and without music or effects so it lacks the same frenetic energy as the movie.


More problematically the voice acting also lacks energy. It kinda reeks of one of those animated films where they got a bunch Hollywood actors to do voices vs experienced voice actors so the dialogue just lacks the right emotion for the scene.


Its always a mixed bag some Hollywood actors just fall right into voice acting and some struggle to hit those notes. Scott himself just idk sounds super phoned in.

Im still more or less enjoying it, but it won't leave the back of my mind the whole time that I didn't need the cast doing the dialogue. I would have preferred qualified voice actors who could really bring the heat.
I'm only like 3 or 4 episodes in and I recall the 1st episode being a poor redo of the movie for the most part. The dialogue just didn't flow at all and felt really generic. But the other 2 episodes I really didn't find that issue. One thing I do hate about the show is how the music is mixed (and that's been every episode). In the movie when there's a song, the sound really bursts into the soundscape and takes it over whereas in this show, the music feels like it's so in the background even when it's the only thing you can hear.
 

Old_Hunter_77

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Alias

All done! I started watching it because I felt like it was a sort of important but forgotten piece of TV that bridged the gap between the X-Files and Lost in terms of semi-serious but bonkers genre TV. My wife had watched it, ore most of it, but she was down for a rewatch with me so it became our main viewing thing for the past few months. And I'm so glad she joined me because this is absolutely a show that benefits from group viewing- it has everything good and bad a TV show can, from fun characters and good acting to absolutely f'n batshit stupid plot twists and premises. Including one of my favorite pet peeves- introducing magic and an otherwise realistic setting without definitively explaining if it's really real or how any of it works.

The shorted season 5 kind of flies completely off the rails as they try to wrap everything up and star Jennifer Garner was both IRL and in-show pregnant. I will give them credit for actually showing a pregnant woman, like, do actual stuff not just be pregnant or, what usually happen, but written off the show or hide it.

The appeal of the show was watching attractive people go undercover and do heists and spy stuff because I had been watching the Mission Impossible movies (in fact, apparently Tom Cruise got JJ Abrams to direct the 3rd movie because he was a fan of Alias) and it certainly does that. Much of the show was me identifying what felt old-timey and what looked towards the future. The fight scenes, for example, were generally like something about Hercules/Xena bad and fake looking like from the 90s, the technobabble was Star Trek TNG levels of "wtf are you talking about but that sounds cool sure let's go" and it's-not-TV-it's-HBO levels of stakes and twists and suffering, often followed by CW-in-its-prime levels of immediately forgetting about what just happened.

Alias is a trip and I loved it despite/because of its many many many flaws.
 

gorfias

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The Fall Of The House Of Usher (Netflix)

Netflix, at its best, has backed some great shows. Horror maestro Mike Flanagan was paid to produce a number of series, and to my deep and enduring sadness, this is apparently the last on his contract. It's fair to say that The Midnight Club was a little bit meh, and I appreciate that Midnight Mass was in ways very un-TVish (despite being my favourite), but even despite that these have been some premium TV experiences.

It is of course loosely based on the Edgar Allen Poe novel of the same name. The Ushers here are owners of a large pharmaceutical firm that has been peddling opioids called Perdue Fortunato, run by brother and sister Roderick and Madeleine. Inside the rotten edifice of their family are a bunch of grotesques who - and I can give this away because you're told almost immediately upon watching - are all doomed to die. If you're familiar with Poe's work, it's a constant series of references and influences from across Poe's works running throughout, plus some pretty scathing commentary on the rich and business elites. Some parts of it are just superb. I think maybe my favourite (so far, I haven't finished) is where the patriarch and CEO Roderick muses "If life gives you lemons" ... and explains what he would do would if he got lemons, in a viciously satirical monologue: see below. Flanagan reaches for a lot familiar faces from his other works, who put in sterling performances - plus, oh look, isn't that Mark Hamill as the gravelly-voiced corporate lawyer/fixer?

You got me interested and then the Critical Drinker committed me to checking this out. I'm on episode 5/8 and have to write, this is freaking fantastic.

I will write I stopped his video once I was hooked to avoid any possible spoilers but for those that want to see his review,

 
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You got me interested and then the Critical Drinker committed me to checking this out. I'm on episode 5/8 and have to write, this is freaking fantastic.

I will write I stopped his video once I was hooked to avoid any possible spoilers but for those that want to see his review,


Have you seen any of Flanagan’s prior shows? In some ways I think the intended impact of Usher hits best, but overall I’d probably put it somewhere between A Haunting of Hill House being a high point in terms of consistency and Midnight Mass which, had its issues but also built a sense of dread that culminated in a suitable finale.
 
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