It’s cool that the writers felt the need to attack me personally, but aside from that, I’m enjoying Severance, a tale of corporate secrecy and wage slavery gone mad. More mad, I should say. Radically different environments with some great design and lighting, good cast, and black humour.
6 Likes
1883, on Paramount+
Lead in, I loved Yellowstone. I love Westerns.
I loved everything about 1883. Great characters, filmed beautifully, and a great story of moving west on the Oregon Trail. No need to care about or know Yellowstone to enjoy it.
5 Likes
Am editing a whitepaper for one of my clients today, and it will not break any NDAs for me to share this paragraph:
“According to IMDbPro, a total of 34,434 movie feature and short titles and 268,872 TV episodes were released worldwide in the entire decade of the 1980’s. Fast-forward to the 2010’s and those numbers increased by an order of magnitude. In the 10-year period between 2010 and 2020, 483,582 movies and 2.48M TV episodes were released worldwide; a growth rate of 1,304% for film and 822% for TV episodes.”
Eye popping. I mean, I knew it was higher, but that’s crazy. No wonder I can’t track anything.
5 Likes
Anyone can make a “movie” with the phone in their pocket now.
Which means there a few good films that wouldn’t have been made in years past and also a whole lot of footage that is a complete waste of time.
To be fair, I have to ask if that takes into consideration that a list from modern times is probably a lot more complete than one for entertainment created years before IMDb existed.
1 Like
I had assumed it had something to do with the limited amount of airtime available on limited channels, with even less airtime for a very few prime time shows
Nowadays the number of channels and amount of airtime is functionally infinite
1 Like
Big Little Lies. A dissection of the machinations of a group of mothers whose children all attend the same high-quality school in what I assume is a coastal haven for elite metropolitan liberals. It did not surprise me at all to find Jean-Marc Vallee was behind it, as it has the same quality throughout as Sharp Objects, with a cast topped by Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman, and apparently I can’t escape the haunted gaze of Adam Scott these days, because he’s in it too. One of those series that is so well-produced it’s really just like a long, extended film. Surprisingly banging soundtrack too.
2 Likes
Moon Knight. I’ll watch Oscar Isaac in anything, and here he does a nice job of being a harassed, exhausted nobody. I’m hoping against hope this will not be another formulaic run.
3 Likes
Pieces of Her, on Netflix.
Should be called Pieces of Unwatchable Shit. Couldn’t even make it through the first episode. Girl, who’s a 9-1-1 dispatcher and utterly inept, whiny, and not cool under pressure (just what you look for in an emergency dispatcher, amirite?) are out to lunch, mom stops a murderer. Not a spoiler, it’s obv from the get go that the mom is a retired secret agent or some such other trope. Cue stereotypical bad guys from the past who see her on the news blah blah blah.
Can’t get past the daughter’s whining, sniveling, and ineptitude. Not recommended.
4 Likes
Recently rejoined Apple TV+ after watching a few free pilots (a cool thing I only recently noticed they do). So now I’m partway through all of Ted Lasso (my last subscription ran out near the end of season 2), Severance (which, two or three episodes in, is superb, as Ohbollox says, but also probably ideally enjoyed interspersed with something else), Foundation (gorgeous, but hits as out of its time), and Slow Horses (which I read about a year ago on a recommendation I saw here, and seems quite faithful so far, with an excellent cast. It’s weird that I’m enjoying it as much as I am, since I found the first third of the book hard going, but perhaps knowing the characters already makes their introduction as disagreeable losers easier to handle). I feel more excited to watch tv than I have been for months.
2 Likes
Slow Horses. I’ve been putting this off for fear of it being terrible and disappointing me, but it’s a very faithful adaptation, and that is all I wanted. Impressive cast, good dialogue, down-to-earth spy jobs doing the boring and dirty work intentionally shoved on rejects and fuck-ups to discourage them. I’ve read all the books, so while I am never going to be 100% satisfied, I am very happy.
2 Likes
Tokyo Vice, on HBO (HBO Max? Are they different? Who tf knows).
A Michael Mann product. White guy living in Tokyo attempting to become a crime reporter. Cops, Yakuza, reporters, all interplaying.
Fantastically done - great Japanese culture, action as you’d expect from MM, fantastic cinematography. The whole nine yards. Highly recommended; first season, five episodes so far.
3 Likes
Just finished the first season of Severance on Apple+, that was fantastic. Absolutely mortified that there isn’t already a season two to jump straight into.
3 Likes
As soon as I read “Vice” and “Michael Mann”, I am 100% in. Will be trying this tonight.
1 Like
From. Bingeing this immediately, what if a more fucked-up Salem’s Lot. Terrible theme tune aside, there’s a decent cast with a well-fed Harold Perrineau leading it. Uncompromising horror including some excellent practical effects. As long as it doesn’t go off the rails, this should be great.
Edit: Okay, so it went off the rails. It’s not a write-off yet, but season 2 has got a lot of explaining to do.
We Own This City. David Simon’s doing Bawlmer again! A pitch-perfect creation studying brutality and corruption in the Baltimore Police Department. Both Pelecanos and Simon are excellent crime writers, and the cast are superb, including returning Wire alumni, but also the likes of Jon Bernthal and Wunmi Mosaku (try keeping the Brits out of any production, America, you can’t do it). Direction is excellent, quality all-round production.
We Own This City, on HBO. Based on the nonfiction book of the same name - https://www.amazon.com/We-Own-This-City-Corruption/dp/0593133668
True story of a corrupt squad of cops in Baltimore post Freddie Grey. Good so far but jumps around timeline wise without any warning, could be confusing to those who haven’t read the book or are unfamiliar with the background. Only one episode so far, but will watch more.
Outer Range. Josh Brolin in an almost Yellowstone-like situation, running a family ranch, except the series goes deeply weird almost immediately. Well worth a try, and even better for explaining nothing to you.
1 Like
I’m enjoying it as well but I do agree that it fully embraces the weird with zero explanation. I assume one is coming but I do want the season to at least stick some sort of landing and explain something. This is one I’ve hesitated to recommend to friends until I see where it goes.
1 Like
