Do you guys and girls ever get into a mode where you watch a lot of the same kind of thing one right after each other ? For Christmas, I got mainly dvds. So, I've really been into watching the 90s X-Men cartoon....one disc right after the other. Do you guys do that sort of thing, too ? I just got the Brady Bunch complete series and I just know that, when I start it, I'll have to watch through all five seasons before I watch anything else. And every now and then, I go through my collection and watch nothing but 80s movies. Back To The Future, Ferris Bueller, Dragonslayer, Tron, and The Breakfast Club are usually the ones I start with.

i'm that way with bad tv. top chef, jersey shore, stuff like that I can fly through entire seasons in 3 days, whereas good shows like Deep Space 9 and The Wire take me a long time to watch.

with movies I like to spend a week or two just watching movies with a particular actor (Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christina Ricci are recent examples) or by Director (Paul Thomas Anderson, Todd Solondz). this can be fun

This is probably why I enjoy the various challenges so much. I don't have it in me to commit as wholly as others; I'm content if I hit 20 entries per challenge. Still, as someone recently noted in the TV on DVD* Challenge discussion thread, what's really nice about these kinds of marathon viewings is that you can really get into the milieu. After an episode or two of a series, for instance, you're already acclimated to the show's conventions and suspensions of disbelief, making it easier to just go with it.

With movies it's not quite the same (unless they're part of a series), but the effect is still present. After a few "one man alone" action movies, it's easy to forget how unlikely and absurd it is for one guy to take on a criminal empire singlehandedly. I've never really cared for musicals, but I would think it's a lot easier to accept seemingly spontaneous choreography after watching a few of those than it would be to watch one in the middle of a group of non-musicals. So on and so forth.

I like to break it up by watching episodes from a series one night, a movie the next, then back to the series, etc. That way we don't get bored by any one thing, it gives us a chance to watch the various TV series that I have, and yet still watch the movies too. It took us a LONG time to make it through Stargate SG-1/Atlantis (15 seasons/3 movies, currently on Season 5 of SGA) but that's a good thing because we both really enjoy those series' and we'll be sad when it ends. Next up: Season 2 of Fringe, then maybe Season 1 of War Of The Worlds (after we watch the old 1953 movie, since the series is apparently a continuation of that storyline, or somesuch), with movies every other night... -kd5-

I wasn't participating in any challenges in October or November, so I suddenly got caught up in a western kick and watched about 33 westerns from mid-October right up through early December, cutting into my holiday challenge viewing, ranging from early talkie westerns like BILLY THE KID (1930) and CIMARRON (1931) to YOUNG GUNS OF TEXAS (1962), which starred the sons of Robert Mitchum and Joel McCrea and the daughter of Alan Ladd. All culminating, of course, in the late December release of TRUE GRIT, which I saw on Dec. 28 and then a re-watch of the 1969 original and a reading of the book. Great stuff.

I'm now doing the TV on DVD challenge and have so far watched eight episodes of the great western series, "Stories of the Century," in which each episode is devoted to a different western outlaw from the famous (Billy the Kid and Jesse James) to the infamous (Belle Starr, John Wesley Hardin, Sam Bass) to the obscure (L.H. Musgrove, anyone?). I'd like to watch the whole series. I've got more TV westerns to get through, but they're competing with my anime series, as you can see from my view list on the TV on DVD list thread.

Now, if we can only get a western challenge going.

So far my problem participating in the challenges is just that I seem to have a lower threshold for gorging on a theme than I'd realized. I haven't had the problem of competing themes yet; i.e., I haven't found myself wanting to watch Westerns at a time when I could be watching anime. (Actually, that's not true as I've been largely indifferent to the anime I've seen--not to bash the medium/genre--and generally like Westerns, but that's neither here nor there.)

You do bring up a fun aspect of going on a kick like that, and that's when there's something playing on the big screen that fits your mood. I almost always get a hankerin' for some Bond movies in November (thanks to the last six features being released around then, and the regularity of the movies being shown on TV). I'm stoked already about 2012, because I know I'll get my annual itch and there'll be a new movie to go see. The non-release years are always a bit dissatisfying, though that's when I tend to explore the DVD bonus content to compensate.