shadokitty

Started today by watching Planet Earth. Then I decided, why not more, so I ended up finishing the entire disc 2 of the set this morning.

davidh777

Why not indeed?

Though I hate to admit I've only seen the first episode.

shadokitty

It's really a good series. You should watch the entire series some time, or some of David Attenborough's other series'.

ntnon

Have you seen Mr Lyndhurst in Goodnight, Sweetheart or The Piglet Files...?

...and have you seen The Comic Strip Presents or Murder Most Horrid?

ntnon

Voyager's final couple of seasons are certainly shaping up to be good ones. Season 7, Episode 5 has a very interesting stab at discussing medical ethics and the dangers of statistical and logical allocation of resources. Parallel stories on and off Voyager saw two separate crewmen poison a member of a newly-met alien species... and for reasonable reasons, too!

A couple of days ago I saw Season 6, Episode 22 "Muse" which at first I thought was going to be set entirely on another planet and feature a culture adapting Voyager's visit into their mythology and therefore spin off of ideas touched on in TNG's Picard-as-'god' episode and Voyager's recent episode in which the ship is moving in a different timeframe and therefore affects the culture by being always present in the sky for millennia. However, instead of being set purely in the aftermath of a visit, B'Elanna (and Harry) are still on the planet and continue to interact with the species of playwrights. Which, while not as novel, does therefore see the episode drift into meta-textuality when the in-episode play begins to incorporate into itself commentary on the actions of the actors, whereupon one of the actors becomes the character she is playing.. levels within levels!

BobO'Link

That would be "no" on all of those. Amazon *did* start recommending The Comic Strip Presents as soon as I ordered Bottom but I've not yet taken the time to look up any reviews.

pacaway

A very productive couple of days.

My wife and I managed to finish our Veronica Mars Season 1 marathon. You can see that in several spots in the picture of the drawer.

Finally finished watching Life of Brian with my son, which we started about a month ago and was also visible in the drawer. I also watched a 50 minute special that was on the disc about the history of the Pythons filmed during the making of the film.

This led me to watch my new Blu-ray of The Meaning of Life, which was on the floor, because it had been purchased a few months ago, I think for about $5. I'm now watching a 60 minute discussion of the film by the Pythons made on its 30th anniversary.

davidh777

Since I was debating whether Captain America 2 was better than The Avengers, I rewatched the latter (fourth or fifth time overall). It's not as consistent as Cap, but it's just a lot of fun with great dialogue. So I'm not going to pick a winner since they're good in different ways.

I actually own a lot of them, though the most recent one was Life. I liked Nature's Most Amazing Events and The Blue Planet.

Mondo Kane

Decided that I'm taking a break on certain shows:
Avengers Assemble-Seen only 1 decent episode so far (Doomstroyer) Been let down with everything else. I might start EMH soon (Always heard that show was better anyway)

Ultimate Spider-Man-If you're unfamiliar with this show, the writers, animators and voice-actors are high on coke (That Deadpool episode drove me out of my frickin' mind)

On the plus side, I've been doing an X-men movie marathon on mondays & thursdays (In prep for Days-Future/Past) I went in chornological order with First Class and just wrapped up the 2000 movie earlier (It's quite a trip to watch those movies back to back----Especially if you haven't seen them in a while) Origins won't be watched since I don't own that one (I know, no big loss)

LJG765

Finished Little House the other night and took a small break. Had a bunch of stuff to do so just didn't have the time/energy, anyway. Started tonight and watched Series V of "Red Dwarf." Just 3 more series to go and I'll be finished with the box set. I wanted to finish it in January, but wasn't in the mood so only watched a couple of them. Maybe I'll finish this month! If not, sci-fi challenge for sure. I'm surprised I forgot about it when I was planning for this challenge, but at least I remembered in time to watch it!

Haven't decided what I'll watch next, though. I may watch another "Red Dwarf" or go on to "Beetlejuice" the cartoon. I have season 4 to watch-watched the first 3 awhile ago. I really enjoyed it, but I think since it's the longest season, I didn't want to OD on it at the time.

shadokitty

Was in the mood for some golf today, and since Youtube has replays of some of the PGA Tour matches, I watched one of them. Golf and Tennis are something that you should only watch if you have plenty of time I've noticed. It took all morning, as I started the match just after 8, and it just finished now.

ntnon

Comic Strip Presents is very interesting and maybe even odd. It's a grouping of the TV episodes/specials created and acted by 'The Comic Strip', a loose group of comedians and actors. It functions broadly as a series of one-off spoofs - often of peculiarly English subject matter - but the recurring cast include Edmondson, Mayall, Dawn French, Jennifer Saunders and Nigel Planer (et al.)

Murder Most Horrid is an anthology of single episodes featuring Dawn French parodying thrillers and murder mysteries, and usually featuring French as the murderer/accused.

Goodnight, Sweetheart is one of my favourite shows. It's a time travel sitcom starring Nicholas Lyndhurst as a man who finds a portal back to the 1940s and ultimately winds up leading a double life across two time periods. He uses his modern knowledge to cast himself as an insider/spy during the war years, able to avert or predict crises as they occur.

The Piglet Files is a spy sitcom also starring Lyndhurst. I've never seen it, but I've heard a great deal of good things about it...

ntnon

It's not that bad at all... some great character moments between Logan and Creed. The war years scenes are particularly excellent.

ntnon

Snooker can go on a bit, too, but the "worst" of them all is cricket..!

shadokitty

After finishing Planet Earth, I decided to open North America. I never saw it when it was on Discovery, but saw the commercials. It seems like a good show so far, and while he's not up to the par of David Attenborough, Tom Selleck does make a decent narrator.

ororama

Lizzie Borden Took an Ax, a Lifetime movie, was unsatisfying. I knew only the basic outline of the case, and after reading the Wikipedia article on Lizzie Borden, was surprised that all the major facts presented were in accord with that account. The problem for me was that the presentation of the incidents leading up to the murder seemed to suggest at times that Lizzie Borden was mentally ill and hallucinating, while the presentation of the aftermath of the murder was too unambiguous for an unsolved murder case. I thought it would have worked better if the movie had begun with the murders and worked backward and forward from there, with any direct assertion of her guilt restricted to her morphine influenced dreams.

Re-watching Cadfael is fun, my kids are enjoying it and I am observing details that I don't recall noticing while watching the original broadcasts, like Cadfael's limp and just how clever and ambitious Hugh Beringar is. I saw him as Cadfael's student when I first watched the series, but now see that he learns techniques from Cadfael, but has his own skills and code of honor.

Murdoch Mysteries has been the other popular series in our family this month, and my admiration for it is increasing.

Epitafios was very enjoyable, with an incredibly smart and ruthless killer, but the police work seemed disappointingly sloppy. I'm guessing that the writers were primarily interested in crafting a gripping story with a serial killer who might do anything next, but I was expecting more routine work by the police, digging rather than waiting for the killer to do something and then reacting. I still would highly recommend it.

I decided that my next primary focus will be The Wire, another series that, based on the first two episodes, seems to deserve its high reputation. I won't finish it this month, but hopefully will watch the first 2 or 3 seasons.

shadokitty

While browsing the Dish guide to see what was on TV this morning, I found an interesting show to start off the day with, The Aztec episode of Engineering an Empire. It is amazing how widespread their empire was before the Spanish came, yet, how easily they were laid low in such a short time, when the Spanish decided to raze their Capital to the ground.

BobO'Link

I finished Bottom yesterday. Very fun little program. While the episode on the ferris wheel, "Hole," was fun I enjoyed "Terror" more. That's the Halloween one where Richie and Eddie decide to put on their own Halloween party. Being financially challenged, i.e. broke, they go off trick or treating to get some money for beer. Eddie is dressed up as a banana and Richie is dressed up as a devil armed with a electric cattle prod which zaps him every time he tries to use it! Of course they fail so make some home brew for the party. Meantime, Richie has made some "sprouts of evil" which he forces everyone to eat causing them all to have flaming farts! Not to mention the explosive carrots... Whew! This is one I'll be rewatching on occasion.

From there I moved on to a more traditional comedy, One Foot in the Grave. I'd seen the occasional episode on public TV a number of years back and recalled it being fairly good. Being the typical, slightly overpriced BBC release, I'd been purchasing individual series when on sale when it came up on a Lightning Deal a couple of years back at a very low price so I jumped on it. It's finally opened and I started with S2, where I'd left off with the individual series releases.

Series 2 opens with Victor and Margaret coming home from Holiday with their luggage lost and Victor undergoing a cavity search because he told Customs the only thing he brought home was the crack in his bottom, only to find their house has burned, been hit by a hurricane, and demolished as a public hazard. Not a good one for me to start with as I don't find much humor in such happenings but keep focusing on the tragedy. They lost *everything*! Of course Victor finds the current papers have been put through the non-existent door. Funny, yes, but still... Fortunately this sequence is over fairly quickly and we flash forward 6 months to a new "house" (they'd been in a detached house and are now in a condo type thing) with new neighbors. Yes, it gets funny but they still almost lost me with the opening.

shadokitty

After finishing the episode of Engineering an Empire, I decided to watch another episode of North America. It is shaping up to be a good series, and even the music does not seem to be obtrusive. I was surprised to find an actual soundtrack to one of the BBC/Discovery nature documentaries, and don't know if the BBC version has the music in it or not.

pacaway

I'm laid up with a sore neck at the moment so I was able to sneak a couple of features in before the Veronica Mars marathon continued.

I watched Odd Thomas, a movie from last year that is based on a teen novel, I believe. It's along the "I see dead people" theme. It was quite good despite the fact that I don't think it ever got a wide theatrical release. Picked it up last month on its home video release and it was still sitting on the floor. I actually had a ticket to see this at a special theatrical screening in January but I forgot to go! Pretty bad, eh?

I also watched, for the first time, A Clockwork Orange. I bought a three-pack blu ray a few months ago with that title along with 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Shining. I think it was $15. It was the only title of the three I hadn't seen. It was still on the floor as well.

After my wife got home, it was six more episodes of VM. Man! It's easy to binge on that show! When one ends you HAVE to watch the next!

shadokitty

Dean Koontz book I believe. A friend of mine once read the Odd Thomas books.

ntnon

Ugh.

Man of Steel is awful. Awful, awful, awful. It's not just a really, really terrible version of "Superman," it's long, tedious and confusing. It's shakey and really poorly put-together. It's not a very good film, but it's a terrible adaptation. Watching it so soon after Captain America - and remembering the fisherboat teaser/trailer to cross-compare with the Cap trailers - it's even worse.

It's so bad it makes me keen to re-watch Superman Returns for the first time. So, that's a small point in its favour - it's making me less scathing about Returns (at least until I see it. Although I suspect it will now be boosted to 'second-worst Superman film').

How is it that the Superman films have been progressively worse? Steel is ghastly, Returns was appallingly misjudged and stupid, IV was merely embarrassing, III was good but odd, II very good but flawed, and The Movie superb. Crazy..! Hearing Kevin Smith recount what could have been had Joel Silver stuck in mechanical spiders, and breathing a sigh of relief, how did we wind up with sub-War of the Worlds robots?

Even the special effects in MoS were nothing to write home about. Zod was ridiculous (perhaps I'm harsher because Stamp WAS Zod.. but I don't think that's the only thing). The plot was nonsensical. As daft and weird it was that Jor El hung about as living hologram and Deus Ex Machina, Russell Crowe was the best thing in the film. Which is in itself distinctly strange.

Kel Ex was in it! Hooray! Lois' (final) line - "Welcome to 'The Planet'." was witty. And pretty-much everything else hopped from a mistake to a fundamental misunderstanding of the character to a strange plot 'twist' to a plot hole to an embarrassment. And people are worried about Ben Affleck.......

Click through to IMDb, and the on-page start of its plot summary reads:
Can't source the quote, but beginning a SUPERMAN summary "A young itinerant worker.."..?! Having Lois uncover his identity in about twenty minutes flat? Not having him join the newspaper until the very end of the film (and after he's debuted, costumed, saved the planet, annoyed the army)? Having his Dad tell him to let people die..?!

Who thought this was a step up from having him leave the planet to visit empty space, abandoning his shouldn't-exist son and then returning to spy on his ex-girlfriend and try and split up her happy family while rehashing the stupid plot of the film it semi-sequelised in an even MORE stupid way?



Poor Superman. Poor Superman fans.

ntnon

AND...!? Appalled, amused, impressed, staggered by its brilliance, worried by its plausibility...?

ntnon

OFiTG is one of the best. It's not just frequently one of the funniest shows ever, but it's a masterclass in plotting and tying everything together. And you could easily imagine (most things in) it really happening..!

There are several parts - and a couple of whole episodes - that really need to be followed immediately by another episode, because they are VERY bleak. There's one about troubling happenings at an old people's home which is actually fairly disturbing...

I can only presume that David Renwick occasionally found something he was so angry about that he couldn't quite bring himself to ignore it or to 'trivialise' it with an abundance of humour. So you wind up with the occasional episodes/moments of an hysterically funny sitcom being hard-hitting and grim. Which is very jarring... but that juxtaposition undercuts the issue, and makes you think. Which, on balance, is a good and important thing. Exposing people to issues and thoughts they might like to ignore and shouldn't.

But... first and foremost it's a sitcom. And a really, really great one. Enjoy!

ntnon

Yep. Fascinating and troubling at the same time...

Oh, have you seen/heard of Stephen Fry in America...? Seems like it might possibly appeal. (I've read most of the companion book, never seen the series but do think Mr Fry is a brilliant - and very witty - man.)