The Glass Teat, or 'Television'

Miscellaneous Blather
#661

Queen’s Gambit. It’s good, but there’s not enough chess. In fact, there’s hardly any chess. Given the format, it struck me as the perfect time to teach the viewer about chess so they could actually follow some of the game, but they eschew the actual game almost completely, neatly solving that issue.

Doom Patrol S2. Back at it, and the team and their awkwardness are intact. While it appears Tudyk’s wonderful turn is finished, we’ve still got the Daltonator hamming it up, Brendan Fraser cursing a blue streak, and the prim brilliance of April Bowlby. Very few TV shows are genuinely weird, and I love the absurd turns the story takes even if the budget is nowhere near sufficient.

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#662

I completely agree with you. I kept hoping they were going to start actually explaining some of the strategic intricacies, and that never happens. I mean, the rest is fine, the lead is certainly great in her role, they do a remarkable job with the period sets and clothes, and the dialogue is believable and good. But this could have been about Bingo.

I need to try Doom Patrol. The Daltonator owned Penny Dreadful.

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#663

Yeah, it’s like a Rocky film that just skips the bouts whenever the fighters get in the ring. In the first episode, where she learns to play chess, why not show her learning to play chess in such a way that the viewer can follow it too? In a subsequent episode, they talk about forking. How does the viewer know what forking is? Castling? En passant? In effect it turns chess into a game composed of pure handwavium.

It appears they put an awful lot of work into the actual games, yet almost none of it is featured in the series.


I find that to be absolutely bizarre. There’s a more interesting story in the real segregation in chess, but never mind.
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#664

It felt as though the language/jargon related to chess was just there as demarcation, in the same way the engineering techno-babble is always present in the various Star Treks, but there’s really no effort to explain how warp engines work. In Trek, that makes sense, because warp engines are rarely a key part of the actual plot of an episode. In QG, it makes no sense unless the producers/writers decided from the outset that chess wasn’t the plot.

But then, what is it about? Triumph of a woman in a man’s field? Coming of age via drugs, chess, and hallucinations? Is it a “genius” study, like A Beautiful Mind? And why go to the trouble of so accurately portraying actual chess games if you aren’t going to illuminate them at all? I wonder if all the actual chess stuff was sidelined by Netflix.

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#665

Timothy Dalton is the Jimmy Carter of the Bond world. His time in the limelight was far less impressive than what he did after it. Toy Story, Chuck, wherever he pops up he is just highly entertaining.

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#666

Iconic silver fox in Hot Fuzz.

“Hur hur Sissy Skinner wot a gaylord.”

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#667

That movie is so good. It might even be better than Shaun, but the zombie flick is probably the more “classic” of the two.

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#668

This is wisdom. His Bond movies are unwatchable at this point.

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#669

Truth Seekers. I was worried this was going to be rubbish but Nick Frost does an amiable job of providing plenty of chuckles. Excellent work by Malcolm Macdowell too.

Ted Lasso. Not sure what the rave reviews are about. It’s okay. A few gentle laughs.

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#670

I didn’t make it past the first episode of Truth Seekers, but mainly because my wife wasn’t all that into it. I’ll have to keep going at some point. The show definitely felt more like Dr. Who than the Cornetto trilogy movies.

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#671

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/netflix-streaming-record-broken-by-the-queens-gambit/1100-6484772/

Queens Gambit set a new record for an original Netflix show. And there is a significant spike in interest in chess since it was released.

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#672

I can’t wait to see an analysis of Why. I mean, I enjoyed it, but I don’t get the overwhelming enthusiasm. There are many better shows.

#673

My wife and I are working our way through season 2 of The Crown in the evenings, and even though this is not normally my type of show, I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying it as I know nothing of the Royal family. Seriously the other night my wife asked me half-jokingly when Elizabeth said she wanted more children if I knew if she had any, and I said that I had no idea and then had to demand my wife not tell me and respect our “no-spoiler” house policy. Because I really had no idea even that Charles had a sister, let alone more siblings. I do enjoy the historical setting though, even though I know that most of it is fiction.

Meanwhile, at lunch every day (my daughter is fully remote for 3rd grade right now) I make lunch for my daughter and we watch an episode of Star Wars Rebels…and oh my this show gets better and better as it goes along. Just about done with Season 3 right now, the story is so damn good. And because my daughter is enjoying it so much over the past month, I have started watching the movies with her on the weekends. We have now watched 4,5,6, 1 and 2 (and before you question 2, she loved JarJar, and I figured that would be the case…she is 8. She also thought the Ewoks were “the cutest things ever”)

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#674

Speaking of kids’ programmes, Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts is amazing. I love it and watched it absolutely unironically, dope soundtrack, great story.

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#675

Yeah, we have only watched the first 2 seasons so far, but Kipo is great.

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#676

Netflix counts anything over two minutes as a view. That’s why.

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#677

Just finished Queen’s Gambit with the wife and we both really enjoyed it. I agree with the wanting to see a bit more of the chess, but I think that might have soured the wife on the whole thing. All in all, I think Netflix did a good job of balancing the show, and it’s definitely on my list of one of the better things I’ve seen this year.

Just started Yellowstone on Amazon Prime, starring Kevin Costner. Great modern take on a Western story so far; characters are interesting, it’s well done, and there are multiple angles to the story so far. Recommended.

Next on the list to watch with the wife is The Undoing, on HBO, about which we’ve heard good things.

#678

The Undoing is super, if I’m remembering the right one.

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#679

I just checked back into this thread to catch up on series recommendations, and was surprised to see so little mention of Ted Lasso. I found this show to be completely brilliant and uplifting. (Our family has watched it twice already, and I’m ready for a third viewing.) As 2020 draws to an uncertain close, I daresay that we need more shows like Ted Lasso.

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#680

Dammit, that’s it, I’m watching Ted Lasso.

I don’t even know what it is, but I keep hearing way too much good stuff about it.

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