TV shows

[Fido_le_muet 5,198]

6 hours ago, djw180 said:

Not posted here for a while...

 

I'm currently watch Dark on Netflix. If you like Sci-Fi that stays on Earth, in and around our own time, and that at least tries to base itself on actual science (albeit with very large doses of 'if this hypotheses were true .... ' and 'if this were technologically possible ...') then I think you'd like this. It's a German production. Set in a town deep in the forest, close to nuclear power plant, with some mysterious caves in the woods. It's a little-bit Twin-Peaks like in that regard. The theme is time-travel and ultimately the story is told at three different points in time with the same characters, mostly as their younger / older selves, but with some of them traveling back and forth and even interacting with their younger / older selves. It can get a little confusing trying to remember who is who at different points in their life, but in this respect I think the subtitles help because you are forced to read someone's name rather than just hear it.

Dark is a fantastic TV show. Probably the most clever show about time travel. It's a bit complicated and you can't be doing something else in the meantime otherwise you're immediately lost. You need to be focused.

Currently watching Moon Knight, the latest Marvel show. It's pretty good, looking forward to see where it's gonna bring us and the whole of the MCU. 

I'm slacking a bit on The Walking Dead and the Flash, the only long-running tv shows I'm still following.

Can't wait for Oni-Wan Kenobi in a month. HUGE expectations on this one. You should check it out @LimeGreenLegend if you want real space opera 😁

[LimeGreenLegend 4,275]

@Fido_le_muet this is the only space opera I need 😉 

 

[djw180 6,976]

I've just finished watching Chernobyl

 

It is without doubt one the best TV dramas I have ever seen. You have to keep reminding your self you are not watching a sci-fi horror show; it all actually happened. It is very harrowing, very gory and scary at times. 

For those too young to remember; in 1986 a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union) exploded. This released lethal doses of radiation onto some of those nearby, including firefighters who came to try and put out the initial fire, and showered the surrounding area with radioactive fall out, some of which was spread on the wind a lot, lot further away. It's about the aftermath, the people who risked and lost their lives to clean up and stop the disaster turning into something far, far worse and ultimately to tell the truth about why it happened.  

[pete_95973 4,383]

22 hours ago, djw180 said:

I've just finished watching Chernobyl

 

It is without doubt one the best TV dramas I have ever seen. You have to keep reminding your self you are not watching a sci-fi horror show; it all actually happened. It is very harrowing, very gory and scary at times. 

For those too young to remember; in 1986 a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union) exploded. This released lethal doses of radiation onto some of those nearby, including firefighters who came to try and put out the initial fire, and showered the surrounding area with radioactive fall out, some of which was spread on the wind a lot, lot further away. It's about the aftermath, the people who risked and lost their lives to clean up and stop the disaster turning into something far, far worse and ultimately to tell the truth about why it happened.  

Agreed. Fantastic show. 

[Con 5,719]

On 7/31/2022 at 3:43 AM, pete_95973 said:

Agreed. Fantastic show. 

Absolutely!
I watched it twice. Everything was just amazing about it. 
Why can’t we have a viewing party? Can’t we all get on Zoom or something? 

[Con 5,719]

The Mandalorian (2019)

Season 1 ….5/5…

Season 2 ….4/5…

I have spoken.  

Edited March 3, 2023 by Con

[Fido_le_muet 5,198]

2 hours ago, Con said:

The Mandalorian (2019)

Season 1 ….5/5…

Season 2 ….4/5…

I have spoken.  

This is the way. 

 

Also... THE LAST OF US !

Glorious show. So faithful to the game and it also adds some depth to the characters. 

The game is on my top 3 of all times and the TV show is just as good. I never imagined they could pull it off. 

[Con 5,719]

7 hours ago, Fido_le_muet said:

This is the way. 

 

Also... THE LAST OF US !

Glorious show. So faithful to the game and it also adds some depth to the characters. 

The game is on my top 3 of all times and the TV show is just as good. I never imagined they could pull it off. 

Fido!! Hope you are doin super, bro. How is that bundle of joy of yours doing? Growing and talking back, I bet!! 

Yes, it also has been a fun ride following Ellie and Joel around in person. I really have enjoyed the small alterations from the video game because they have been cool. Some people didn't like the Left Behind episode, but I thought it was metamorphically powerful when it came to loss of innocence and loss of your first love thematic elements. 

I have to admit to crying during the Sam and Henry episode, funny thing is, I kind of had forgotten most of what happens in the game, so to get ready for the tv show, I actually watched an entire gameplay channel to catch up, and I remember being like, oh dang, I forgot that happens to Henry and Sam, it made me sad, but didn't make me teary eyed.

Sure enough two weeks later, we get the episode and even knowing what was probably to come and then the actors doing such an amazing, amazing job, that when Henry raises his gun to his temple in the show, I felt that. That's when I said to myself, this show is doing something special, but it wasn't over yet, I thought i was composed and back to normal as Joel is putting the finishing touches on the burial sites and then the show lets us see what Ellie had written on Sam's writing pad. That broke my crap. 

Edited March 4, 2023 by Con

[djw180 6,976]

Brief reviews of some  of the better TV shows I have watched in the last year or so. I've put the TV service I saw them on, I don't know what they are on outside the UK.

 

Fortitude - Sky

Supernatural / sci-fi-ish drama set on a fictitious Norwegian arctic island, that is home to a British scientific research base (why did they not set it on the real life Spitsbergen which is all those things?). Mostly in English, even conversations between the Norwegian characters. The cast features some reasonably big UK & US names; Christopher Eccleston, Michael Gambon. Stanley Tucci, Denis Quaid – not all in all 3 series. For the most part it feels like a crime drama in an unusual setting. The main Norwegian characters are the islands small police force. The supernatural and sci-fi elements only come in from time to time. The science aspect is very flawed. One of the things they “discover” at the end of series 1 is something any real-life glaciologist at the research base could have told them from day one. It also features a murder that happens the day after a Christmas party, in broad daylight!; since it's supposed to be the Arctic it would be dark 24 hours a day in mid-winter. Series one is good and I can forgive the science flaws. Series 2 not quite so good and a bit silly at times. Series 3 is pointless and seems like they thought “people will watch any crap, so what the hell”.

 

Babylon Berlin - Sky

Set in late 1920s / early 1930s Berlin; the same sort of time and place as the film Cabaret was set in and it features similar music. Of course, in the background is the rise to power of n*zis. But at this time Germany was still, just, a democracy and quite an open and progressive one. It's in German. The main characters are inspector Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch) and criminal assistant Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries) who is set on becoming the first female murder squad detective. It's had 4 series so far, which I binge watched. Each series has a main case Rath and Ritter are trying to solve, but there are themes running through all of them. Rath was shell shocked in WW1 and is undergoing unorthodox treatment from a mysterious psychologist who has links to the criminal underworld. There's plots, within plots, within plots, from Soviet-backed communists, German Nationalists and organised crime syndicates. Although it's basically a crime drama, it does portray how German Nationalists, wanting to undo the restrictions put on Germany after the WW1, used the fledgling-n*zi party & it's paramilitary wings to do their dirty work, without realising they could not control what they had unleashed. This is very, very good. I would highly recommend it.

 

Heksejakt Channel 4

Norwegian drama. The title translates as Witch Hunt. It's about a woman working in the finance department of a law firm who discovers some irregularities in the accounts and will not overlook it, despite what her bosses tell her to do. She becomes the victim of a Witch Hunt set to discredit her and make sure the evidence she found gets dismissed. It's linked to a crooked millionaire who is the firms biggest client and there's a detective and journalist after him as well.

 

Mare of Easttown Sky

Kate Winslett stars as detective Mare Sheehan. A girl's body is found in woods near the Pennsylvanian town of Easttown and there is an unsolved case of a young woman gone for missing for some time that the police have given up on. Guy Pearce plays a teacher just moved into town who takes a romantic interest in Mare. Obviously I think this is great because it's got Kate Winslett in it. But it really is very good. It won 4 Emmys and was nominated for many more.

 

Barbaren Netflix

German historical drama set in the 1^st century AD in what was then Roman occupied “Germany” (that name for a country obviously did not exist then). The main characters are “barbarians”, that is anyone the Romans did not consider civilised. They include Arminius, a German raised by Romans who returns to the people of his birth and leads a rebellion culminating in their victory over the Roman legions at the battle of Teutonburg Forest in 9AD. To me this has to be watched in the original language, as the German characters speak German and the Romans speak Latin- you would not get that with a dubbed version. Lots of fighting, a little gory at times, but mostly not. Well worth it if you like this sort of historical, war-themed drama.

 

Der Pass (Pagan Peak) Sky

Another German language police drama, this one a German-Austrian collaboration. Two series so far. I'm not sure why they gave this an English Language name that is not a translation of the original. It's not as if “Der Pass” is particularly difficult to guess the translation of. First series starts with a body found on the German-Austrian border, clearly deliberately placed with head in one country and feet in the other, forcing a collaboration. The two detectives could not be more different. The Austrian Gedeon Winter (Nicholas Ofczark) does not play by the rules, and does not seem particularly interested in his job any-more. The German, Ellie Stocker (Julia Jentsch) has a much more professional, play it by the book sort of attitude. But ultimately they work well together tracking down a serial killer. Second series is a different case, some new cast members, less of a role of Stocker.

 

Lykiland (State of Happiness) BBC

Another Norwegian drama in Norwegian and English. Set in Stavanger in the late 60s / early 70s. It's about how Stavanger went from a small town to become Norway's oil capital following the discovery of vast reserves of crude oil under the North Sea. The characters are local Norwegians and American oil men. At times it's like a family drama, even slightly like a soap opera, as the main Norwegian characters are a young couple, one of whom is the son of the towns pre-oil main employer and his girlfriend works for the local authority as they seek to attract oil companies to the area.

 

Missions BBC

French sci-fi about the first missions to Mars, and the aftermath of events that occur there. Originally there are two competing billionaire funded missions, one US, one European but circumstances force them to cooperate. The central character is a psychiatrist drafted on to the European mission at the last minute. There are 3 series of rather short, ~ 20 min, episodes. The first is the missions to Mars and what they discover. The second and third are hard to describe without major spoilers but lets just say they find something unexpected on Mars and when they return to Earth it seems somehow slightly different.

 

[Sinister 2,583]

The Last of Us was a great show even though they eliminated almost all threat of the infected that caused the end of society in the first place. At one point Joel says "This place is too remote for infected".  Then why the hell aren't you and everyone else living out there? It's working out well for the old couple he encountered before finding Tommy. LOL

Also recently finished watching Black Mirror. What a crazy ride that was. Some episodes are better than others but I enjoyed it.

A netflix show called True Story with Kevin Hart and Wesley Snipes was also pretty good. Different role than what Hart usually plays.

[djw180 6,976]

I have started re-watching The X-Files. I have not seen them since they came out in the early 90s. Some bits are a little dated, most obviously people smoking indoors and the massive mobile phones with extendable aerials. It's still mainly good though. And I totally agree with Frohike's opinion of Scully.

Currently just into series 2.

[LimeGreenLegend 4,275]

@djw180 I used to love The X Files when I was a kid.  Saw it was all on Disney Plus. including the two films, and I've been considering watching them all again too.

[djw180 6,976]

I just finished watching The Fall of the House of Usher on Netflix. Highly recommended!

 

It's a horror-drama in 8 episodes, very loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe short stories or poems with each episode named after a different work of his. I have never read any of them and some had not even heard of, but I now at least know the brief synopsis of them from Wikipedia. What the creators have done is woven together a plot primarily based on the short story "The Fall of the House of Usher" that greatly expands on that. The first episode has the same name as the whole series. Roderick Usher, corrupt billionaire head of a major pharmaceutical company, invites an old adversary, lawyer August Dupin, to his family's derelict house, to confess to a host of crimes. Dupin has been trying to prosecute the Ushers for decades but they always got away with it. Now, following the recent deaths of all six of his children, supposedly in freak, horrific, unrelated accidents, Roderick wants to come clean. Most of the story is now told in flash back, both to the early years of Roderick and his sister Maddie (the brains behind their rise to power) and the children's recent deaths. The next 6 episode each focus on the violent deaths of a different son or daughter, each related in some way to the Edgar Allen Poe story that episode is named after. The final episode, The Raven, then brings everything to it's conclusion, revealing the true cause of all that has happened.

It's very, very good. It is a bit bloody and gory at times, but never over-the-top, always done for a reason and usually to fit in with the story that death is named after. It features Mark Hamil in the most un-Luke-Skywalker-like role you can imagine. I never really rated him as an actor in Star Wars, but here, as the Usher's ruthless lawyer he is excellent.

 

Another Netflix series I think is worth a mention is Kaos

It's a modern day story of Greek Gods and Heroes, in a world where they most definitely exist and are still worshipped by mortals. Jeff Goldblum is Zeus and there's other recognisable faces amongst the rest of the cast, including David Thewlis as one of Zeus' brothers and fellow god Hades and Suzie Izzard as one of the Fates. It loosely follows the story of Orpheus in the Underworld, but this is part of a bigger plot with both gods and mortals having to accept what fate has in store for them, whether they like it or not.

Edited Monday at 02:12 PM by djw180

[omarcomin71 3,892]

3 hours ago, djw180 said:

I just finished watching The Fall of the House of Usher on Netflix. Highly recommended!

 

It's a horror-drama in 8 episodes, very loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe short stories or poems with each episode named after a different work of his. I have never read any of them and some had not even heard of, but I now at least know the brief synopsis of them from Wikipedia. What the creators have done is woven together a plot primarily based on the short story "The Fall of the House of Usher" that greatly expands on that. The first episode has the same name as the whole series. Roderick Usher, corrupt billionaire head of a major pharmaceutical company, invites an old adversary, lawyer August Dupin, to his family's derelict house, to confess to a host of crimes. Dupin has been trying to prosecute the Ushers for decades but they always got away with it. Now, following the recent deaths of all six of his children, supposedly in freak, horrific, unrelated accidents, Roderick wants to come clean. Most of the story is now told in flash back, both to the early years of Roderick and his sister Maddie (the brains behind their rise to power) and the children's recent deaths. The next 6 episode each focus on the violent deaths of a different son or daughter, each related in some way to the Edgar Allen Poe story that episode is named after. The final episode, The Raven, then brings everything to it's conclusion, revealing the true cause of all that has happened.

It's very, very good. It is a bit bloody and gory at times, but never over-the-top, always done for a reason and usually to fit in with the story that death is named after. It features Mark Hamil in the most un-Luke-Skywalker-like role you can imagine. I never really rated him as an actor in Star Wars, but here, as the Usher's ruthless lawyer he is excellent.

 

Another Netflix series I think is worth a mention is Kaos

It's a modern day story of Greek Gods and Heroes, in a world where they most definitely exist and are still worshipped by mortals. Jeff Goldblum is Zeus and there's other recognisable faces amongst the rest of the cast, including David Thewlis as one of Zeus' brothers and fellow god Hades and Suzie Izzard as one of the Fates. It loosely follows the story of Orpheus in the Underworld, but this is part of a bigger plot with both gods and mortals having to accept what fate has in store for them, whether they like it or not.

I agree @djw180 The Fall of the House of Usher is worth a watch for Mark Hamill’s performance alone. 
Plus, I’ve been on the fence about watching Kaos.  I will definitely give it a go now. Thanks!