What Are You Watching (TV Series, etc.)? :facebook:

Wow. Worth the wait. S5 lived up to my initial expectations and more. Powerful. Touch of cheese at the very end, but not complaining.

Think I’ll watch the Deuce next.

Ooh. That’s a good one, I’ve heard.

Altered carbon on Netflix if you like sci-fi

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And in keeping up with the recycling motif:

The original was a staple of my childhood. Thought the movie was simple disgusting carnage. Color me skeptic.

What’s next, Gilligan’s Island? Better not give em ideas…

Queer eye is everything. I want to Jonathan to be my friend. That’s all.

Just finished that last week. Really enjoyed it.

Just started Brooklyn 99. Good for some stupid humor and funny lines.

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I really like Brooklyn 99 (on Netflix Taiwan) - Andy Samberg takes a little getting used to, but his character isn’t quite as obnoxious as he initially seems. Plus I’m a sucker for gentler, rather than cringy, comedy. If you like The Good Place or Parks and Recreation, you’ll probably like Brooklyn 99. (Those three have a lot of overlap in creative staff.)

Sci-fi: I went through Altered Carbon (on Netflix everywhere) in a few days. Very, very (too?) reminiscent in style of Blade Runner - with tons of added breasts, plenty of added butts, and even a few added dicks. Visually very impressive (um, I’m not just talking about the body parts), and exciting in places, but I thought the story fell apart towards the end of the season and, while a few of the supporting characters are good (Poe!), some of the central characters didn’t work well for me. Plus if you care a lot about sci-fi world-building, well, this world doesn’t make much sense.

More sci-fi: I liked Travellers (also Netflix Taiwan) more than Altered Carbon, although it’s got a much lower budget and it shows. The premise is that people from the future travel (get it?) back in time, and take over the bodies of people in our present who were otherwise about to die - and those travellers are doing things to try to push us off the dystopia-bound path we’re on. (That’s all covered in the first twenty minutes or so.) I like the writing and the characters, and I think they do better than most shows at keeping a balance between story-of-the-week and the long-term arc. If you’re from Vancouver, it’s even better/worse at displaying lots of local landmarks than The X-Files used to be. Most meta “Yup, we’re joking about the budget” moment: a key character saying “Why is it always barns?!” late in season 2.

And I have finally, finally, started watching Breaking Bad. Now early in Season 2. Hey, I think this show may have some potential!

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Vanhelsing on Netflix.
Just finished it.
Wow.
Really great show!

Anyone watch the finale for Star Trek Discovery?

What are your thoughts for the final scene? Are we honestly going to see the movie’s Enterprise crew on a network television show? I find it highly unlikely and assume they will have different actor’s portray the iconic roles.

The final scene may have been my least favorite moment of the whole season. The show’s done pretty well at standing on its own, and putting the Enterprise into the mix is too heavy-handed. Part of me hopes next season begins with “Now that we’ve finished our adventures with the Enterprise, we’ve resumed our journey to Vulcan.”

Note that at this point in the timeline the Enterprise is captained by Pike (Bruce Greenwood in the films); Spock is on the ship, but based on the Star Trek pilot, he’s really weird and emotional! The first officer, “Number One”, was played by Majel Barret; so really the only iconic character to worry about is Spock - I doubt most people know who Pike is.

Apparently there are books out there where Georgiou’s ship (Shenzhou?) works with the Enterprise, a few years before Discovery is set, but not even I’m nerdy enough to read those.

On the season as a whole: OK first couple of episodes. Fantastic middle ten or so. Weak final two: I feel like they should have ended the season on their return to the main universe, with the Klingons winning the war, OR developed the end of the war a lot more.

Thanks for clarifying that, don’t know enough about the lore or timeline to even comment too much about it. Discovery is my first Star Trek series I have watched and I think it’s pretty damn great. The twist towards the final 4 episodes totally caught me off guard, despite the hints.

I agree with your hopes for next season. Which I hope doesn’t take too long.

Hell, I’m still waiting for the next season of DareDevil and season 2 (or was it 3?) ended over a year ago.

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Star Trek: I’m not sure how much I’d recommend the older series if you’ve never watched Star Trek … Deep Space Nine is probably the closest to modern TV sensibilities, in that the characters are moderately complex and there’s an extended story arc. But the first two seasons are weak. Later seasons were possibly one of the best pre-Sopranos things on TV.

They’re all on Netflix. If you’re interested in looking back, for Next Generation, “Q Who?” (S02E16) can be a good place to start. “The Inner Light” (S05E25) is probably my favorite episode of all (and I’m being very unoriginal with that sentiment), but I’m not sure it’s a good place to begin - it doesn’t rely on an arc, but it does probably rely on some knowledge of character. “Darmok” (S05E02) is another popular stand-alone episode. If you don’t like those three, don’t bother with the show; if you do like them, try digging a little deeper. (Cool thing about older TV: you often don’t need to worry about spoilers!)

The original series of course is iconic, but it’s fifty years old, and wow does that show. TV was a different beast back then. A much slower, more vividly hued, shorter-skirted and over-acted beast. “The City on the Edge of Forever” (S01E28) is one of the best, and you may as well try it - it’s totally stand-alone - but, well, you know how today if a character enters a building to visit an office? Today, we don’t see them walk through the front door, wait for the elevator, get on the elevator, stand in the elevator, walk down the hall, open the door, and walk in the office. Back in the 60s, that shit was part of the episode.

Jessica Jones Season 2 is coming out in a couple of weeks! I liked Season 1 a lot. Daredevil … enjoyed Season 1, haven’t yet watched Season 2. Haven’t watched Luke Cage or Defenders or Punisher at all. Or Iron Fist, but that probably goes without saying.

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Ehem, and the Star Trek animated series, which is way cooler in book adaptations by Alan Dean Foster.

Right, real good stuff but not sure where they go for Season 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfU0a-b6Iqs

Thanks to whoever mentioned the Unabomber miniseries (Andrew?). An engaging effort with no false notes–other than Sam Worthington’s badly mangled Philly accent.

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ME! Still got to finish that last episode

Muito obrigado. I’m on the last episode too. Then I’ll have to dig up the manifesto and read it.

McMafia can be found on Prime Video if anybody’s interested in watching it.

Unabomber was great. Flew through that one. Watching “Waco” now. My wife was shocked when I told her it’s a true story.