davidh777

It looks like I joined the conversation too late, but I would’ve been ok with joint discussion of a featured series, and of Travis’s examples, I’ve long intended to finish Band of Brothers and the Sopranos, and am always up for talking Firefly. I would’ve been interested in Brit series but not so much in classic animation.

Last year I embarked on a complete Star Trek franchise (re)watch (I’ve watched most but not all), but my attention wavered and I didn’t come close to finishing. I did get through TOS (so I wouldn’t have watched that again), TAS, and all but a few episodes of TNG so I’ll likely be spinning DS9 in January. There are also a lot of old and new series on my list, including Hawkeye and Boba Fett.

Travis McClain

Two of my all-time favorite series are DS9 and The Sopranos, so even without watching along I'll be able to hang in there with you in discussing either. My friends and I will be syncing up for Boba Fett, so I'll be able to talk about that, too. I've seen all of Firefly but it didn't do anything for me so I'll likely have little to contribute to any conversation about it. Still haven't seen Band of Brothers, either, but I think I'll defer that to the June Historical Appreciation Challenge.

shadokitty

Now that Christmas is over, I've gone back to my regular watching. I'm working on clearing out my DVR, watching DVDs and my normal rotation of shows.

mrcellophane

I've been rewatching Diagnosis Murder and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so I'll continue watching those two series in January. I'm also planning to spend some time finishing some newer series I've started such as Marvel's What If... and Wheel of Time. I'm also planning to watch Downton Abbey in the coming year so I may start next month.

Qrusher14242

Does the challenge begin on the 1st like last year? I've been rewatching Everwood, One Tree Hill and Nowhere Man, among others.. Also started Lost in Space (new one). I have a bunch of goals for this challenge, hopefully i will finish some lol.

Trevor

This is for Paramount Plus.

Guess I’ll focus on new Star Trek in our TV Challenge next month.

Travis McClain

The list thread is now active for those who wish to begin formatting, etc.

shadokitty

I'm looking forward to starting tonight after dinner. Not sure exactly what it will be, but I think I will start off by watching an episode or two to help clear off my DVR. I had a bit of a scare a few days ago, because for days out of the blue my receiver kept overheating, even after I cleaned the vents. I eventually tried moving the tv back from the receiver and I haven't had any problems since.

coyoteblue

I'm starting off with Hilda: The Mountain King (2021) (Netflix). Think I'll probably squeeze in an episode of Drunk History, too. Got my eyes on a couple of Doraemon movies for down the line also. Will also continue my One Piece watch (only 800 or so episodes before I catch up to the present), which I've come to realize, moves at soap opera pace, but then, most long running shonnen titles do...

shadokitty

I might have to add Golden Girls to next month's lineup. Betty White is dead at 99.

BobO'Link

Just because it came in a week or so ago and I started watching it some yesterday I've started with S4 of Deadliest Catch. Later tonight I'll return to The Andy Griffith Show BR I started watching when it came in a couple of weeks ago. Right now I'm in the middle of S5 of that one.

coyoteblue

I was wrong, I've only got about 500 episodes of One Piece before I catch up to the present

lisadoris

Up is airing a marathon of The Librarians this weekend so I'm adding that to the Challenge list.

Trevor

I’ll be watching a lot of Betty White episodes this month.

Jen and I started Hot in Cleveland the other night, and now I see that Bettyis in the old Match Game episodes that I’m recording.

BobO'Link

Ms. White is a hoot in Hot in Cleveland - almost like she's still playing Sue Ann Nivens (and I still have the last season of TMTMS to watch). I watched Hot in Cleveland a couple of months ago in a mostly first time viewing. I'd sampled it when it first aired and liked it but had issues keeping up with its air date/time so gave up and started purchasing it on disc. I'd only seen S1 in its entirety when I finally watched the entire run. I really enjoyed that viewing and especially liked the episode in which the 5 ladies from TMTMS guested.

Mr Awesome

Started with some pilot episodes that aired on Antenna TV. Starting with OG Jetsons then who knows.

Among my consideration..
Bionic Woman
Get Smart

Travis McClain

I signed up for some 99¢ month trials through Roku, including Epix. Binged the first two seasons of Pennyworth. It features young Alfred Pennyworth out of the SAS as a mercenary for hire who gets mixed in the series' primary plot, which is a coup and civil war in 1960's Britain. He/we also meet young-ish Thomas Wayne, Martha Kane, and in the second season, Lucius Fox. It's only vaguely recognizable to me as a longtime Batman fan, and I would have serious reservations recommending it to someone solely because of its ostensible Batman connections, but it plays well enough I suppose as a gritty alternate reality thing where the U.K. was overrun by fascists. There were times when I dug it and times when it felt boringly recycled. Moral compasses don't work in this show and it's considerably easier to dislike than to like pretty much anyone.

The cast is solid, though, and I especially got a kick out of Paloma Faith as Bet Sykes. Bet is a mercurial, volatile, and wickedly fun villain/antihero not as wacky as, say, Harley Quinn, but injects a somewhat similar spontaneous energy whenever she's onscreen. I gather the third season will be on HBO Max when it premieres. I won't go out of my way to sign up for it, but I suppose I liked enough of the first two seasons that if I signed up for some other reason, I'd make a point to check it out.

BobO'Link

I've been watching S1 of Grimm - a first time viewing - the past several days. It's interesting and sometimes fun to see a face morph into something you know from one of the Grimm's Fairy Tales. I don't know that it'll be able to keep up the interest over 6 seasons though. It's interesting for the most part but is already starting to feel just a bit rote and generic with its overall story arch.

lisadoris

Now that I'm near the end of Babylon 5 S2, my plan to only watch 1 disc per day might have to be revised. When this show gets going it's hard to stop watching.

Trevor

Similar thoughts here from the few episodes I watched a couple years ago. Decent, but not sure how it could hold up for 6 seasons. Think I own the first two seasons, imagine they’ll end up in the sell pile after I watch them.

BobO'Link

Schools' out - "snow day" - which means I can work from home if I wish so it's a day of remote updating servers while watching TV shows.

I've just about finished S7 of The Andy Griffith Show, watching my new BR edition. Watching the series in full proves to me what I've felt all along - S1-S5 are absolutely the best while S6-S8 are good but just not the same, somewhat lacking, often having an intrusive laugh track, and plots that are "just OK" in the effort to deliver a show. Basically fewer stand-out episodes and laughs. The few episodes with Don Knotts as a guest star often make Barney feel rather pathetic (not that he *wasn't* somewhat pathetic in the early episodes but these make it even more sad - almost like he regrets leaving Mayberry but is too proud to ask to come back).

Still not feeling the love for Grimm. It's OK but nothing all that special as it tries to create a new mythology.

shadokitty

I was tempted to record this season of The Amazing Race, because there was a big story on my local news yesterday. A local team was taking part in it this season. I didn't record it last night though, and I found out this morning from the same news that they were the very first team eliminated.

BobO'Link

I finally finished Season 4 of The Man in the High Castle. Boy... what a let down and absolutely unsatisfying conclusion! For a series that started off soooo well and maintained that quality for 2 seasons it started to kind of go off the rails in S3 and completed the process in S4. It's another of those where the writers/creators went completely "off book" for the final seasons to make it a completely different story than its original form. I'd read Blish's novella in HS and reread it when I started watching this series. When season 2 ended and had pretty much reached the book's conclusion I was curious as to where they'd go next. Sigh... a completely predictable and cliche' direction was the path they followed.

I've been a bit curious about Amazon's adaptation of Robert Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series. After watching that ending I'm not sure I want to invest in yet another adaptation that could easily deviate from its source material in unsatisfactory directions. At least if I *do* watch that one I don't have knowledge of the books to know if there are changes. Maybe that's truly the best way to watch some of these adaptations. BUT - it didn't work for Game of Thrones. I'd not read a word of that one and absolutely knew when the writers ran out of books from which to get dialog/plotting.

Travis McClain

I saw Acorn TV has the Reilly--Ace of Spies mini-series so I checked it out over the previous few days. Overall, I dig it. Reilly's shenanigans benefited from the expanded format in a way I don't think a movie, or even a trilogy of movies, could quite cover as well. It would be going too far to call it an indictment of British colonial adventurism, but it certainly doesn't shy away from showing that attitude prevailing among the ruling elites in London and contrasting that with the consequences of their whims manifest in misery for people everywhere else, often in various forms of widespread violence. The ensemble is solid. I saw a ruthlessness in Sam Neill I'm not used to seeing that I found surprisingly engaging.

There were two areas where I felt it fell short. One was the presentation of the various Mrs. Reillys, each getting less screen time than the last, to the point that all we really got were the seduction scenes and sometimes a breakup scene. I'm not even sure I can account for what happened to one of the wives. Not only did it do them a disservice, but it made that entire subplot of the series feel formulaic and rote after awhile. The other area where it fell short was Lenin and Stalin, particularly the latter. This isn't Joseph Stalin the ruthless tyrant; this is Joseph Stalin, the sitcom boss who keeps complaining no one treats him like the boss. I doubt I'll have a strong interest to revisit this series anytime soon, if at all, but I would definitely be intrigued if someone took another whack at a long-form dive into Sidney Reilly's life and exploits, particularly given how differently we understand and perceive some of them now versus when the series was made, or the book from which it was adapted was published.

BobO'Link

I finished Grimm Season 2. I doubt I'll go any further with this one. It's rather disjointed and rather generic for what it is. The first season was decent enough but they are trying *too* hard to create a mythology and serialized story with season 2. As it continues more and more "normal" people are drug into the world of the "monsters" and how they hide in plain sight. And the detective who's *every* case just happens to involve one of the hidden monsters in some fashion is just a bit more unbelievable than I can accept, even for a show that's pretty much unbelievable to start. Going by what the series indicates it appears that fully 50% of Portand's population are fairy tale (aka monster) creatures.

I also finished The Andy Griffith Show on BR. I've only seen seasons 6-8 of this one a handful of times, 2 of those viewings in the past year. First the DVDs I'd finally purchased and got around to watching them last year and then the recent BR release of the series. While there are some decent episodes in season 8 it's absolutely the lesser season of the series and I can see why my sister and I had pretty much stopped watching it by that point. I never cared for Mayberry R.F.D. and the last half dozen or so episodes of TAGS are essentially an extended "backdoor pilot" for that series as those characters are introduced and then given more and more screen time leading up to the finale of TAGS which is nothing but a Mayberry R.F.D. episode that completes the setup for that series. IIRC it'd been green lit at that point so maybe it was more of a way to interest viewers in that series for the next season. My sister and I watched an episode or two and decided it just wasn't anything we cared to keep watching.

Then it was Hercules: The Legendary Journeys season 2. I already own this one but recently took advantage of a GRUV (Universal's online store) sale to purchase S2-6 in more compact cases (my original copy is the Anchor Bay sets in those huge fold out digipak things where a single season takes up as much space as 3 seasons in the new cases). I think the episodes look just a bit better than those on the Anchor Bay sets but would have to get those out to know for sure. The downside to the Universal season 1 set is that it does *not* contain the 5 telefilms which set up and preceded the series - and Universal's not seen fit to re-release those. I'll probably pull those from the AB set and put them in a standard case alongside the Universal sets.

Anyway - this one, along with Xena: Warrior Princess, has been somewhat a guilty pleasure since it first aired in syndication. It's just plain cheesy fun. I watched the first 4 episodes of season 2 last night and enjoyed them just as much as when they first aired. It's been so long since I've seen them, and helps that I've only watched the series completely twice since it left the air, that I'd also forgotten most of what happens in each episode, remembering mainly some of the characters. That, too, is a huge plus and helps make them even more enjoyable.