Current Watching

[Hot Pepsi]

Manhunt is better than expected.

It’s about the effort to find John Wilkes Booth.
What a shithead.

[ad hoc]

I think Guy Ritchie is more suited to episodic TV than theatrical movies. Shorter episodes, characters that are tiresome over two hours are less so over an hour. Plots short on depth but long on action and repartee likewise. I think the man's found his medium.

Yes I think this is true. I haven't seen the film of The Gentlemen that he made (to be honest I didn't even know it existed until I started watching this TV series), but I really have no great interest in doing so. But I'm enjoying the series very much. Especially surprised at how well Vinnie Jones has grown into acting. He was still a bag of shit on the football pitch*, but he's found a post career niche

(*though he was no Dennis Wise in the competition for most repulsive individual ever to don** a Wimbledon shirt)

(** yes, intended)

[Amor de Cosmos]

Another thumbs-up here for The Gentlemen. What a ton of fun.

I think Guy Ritchie is more suited to episodic TV than theatrical movies. Shorter episodes, characters that are tiresome over two hours are less so over an hour. Plots short on depth but long on action and repartee likewise. I think the man's found his medium.

[Hot Pepsi]

Oh, I see. I’m not sure why I inferred that.

I’m not really sure why they wouldn’t trade him. Perhaps they just thought he was paranoid and couldn’t find a deal.

These are perpetually adolescent people who do not care about anything that will not help them win a Super Bowl. Something like “I fear for my life because of Connecticut gangsters” is not something that would make sense to them.

He was offered security, apparently but he didn’t take it.

It’s not a stretch to believe he was not of sound mind.

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/...-trade-request

[Uncle Ethan]

No, I think its pretty clear that's not what I am suggesting. The doco makes it clear Hernandez requested he be traded and the organisation (coach) refused. Hernandez later murdered someone else. Kraft is openly apologetic about that in the documentary. I have no axe to grind either way on the Patriots.

[Hot Pepsi]

The spygate thing was real, but I don’t know if it really helped them much. I don’t think the deflategate thing created any advantage at all.

I don’t think the Patriots had Aaron Hernandez murdered, if that’s what you’re suggesting.

https://sports.yahoo.com/aaron-herna...191453838.html

[Uncle Ethan]

I don't think their chicanery really added up to much.

But it shows the kind of people they are. Same with the Michigan sign-stealing thing.

I have no idea if it really gave them a competitive advantage, but it shows that these are people who think winning at sportsball is what makes people valuable in the eyes of God (and a lot of them would think of it that in exactly those terms) and therefore the rules should not apply to them.

In a sane world, we'd see these people as terrible role models. But we don't live in that world. We live in a world where "winning" is what matters even though anyone remotely acquainted with reality understands that we are all losers in the end.

Well, they admitted that filming opposition coaches was forbidden and did it anyway. They knew the air pressure in the balls was a rules requirement but deflated them anyway* and when the bloke who eventually murdered someone asked to be released to a west coast club to get away from his old gang, the request was rejected.

*I have no idea how this would have helped one quarter back and not the other btw.

It does remind me of the Sampdoria kitman who, when the referee was testing the pressure in footballs for friendly v Glory many years ago with a gauge, picked each ball up, pressed it and gave the exact result for every ball that the gauge did seconds later.

[hobbes]

Another Halo episode where F all happens.
I want my ultraviolence!

[Hot Pepsi]

The Dynasty, copyrighted as it is to the Kraft foundation, could easily be named "Blame Bill for Everything" as they sometimes subtly and often not so subtly blame Bill Belichick for every negative at the club. The theme appears to be that Belichick let people he managed get away with stuff as long as the team was winning, which is lacking in self-awareness, as if that was the case then the Kraft organisation was giving exactly the same latitude to the coach.

Interesting time to be watching how a club that dominated a sport for so long got away with so much chicanery, though that is of course in no way replicated in the premiership.

I don't think their chicanery really added up to much.

But it shows the kind of people they are. Same with the Michigan sign-stealing thing.

I have no idea if it really gave them a competitive advantage, but it shows that these are people who think winning at sportsball is what makes people valuable in the eyes of God (and a lot of them would think of it that in exactly those terms) and therefore the rules should not apply to them.

In a sane world, we'd see these people as terrible role models. But we don't live in that world. We live in a world where "winning" is what matters even though anyone remotely acquainted with reality understands that we are all losers in the end.

[WOM]

Another thumbs-up here for The Gentlemen. What a ton of fun.

[Nocturnal Submission]

On Tuesday I watched one of the worst things I think I've ever seen. The first episode of the 1988 Andy Capp TV series. Wow it was dreadful.

Yesterday I started watching Peep Show for the first time.

Peep Show is brilliant. I was going to say that "It's my favourite British sitcom since..." but I can't really think of one that I like more.

[Benjm]

I remember seeing an episode of that at the time and it being very bad, even in an era of rock bottom expectations for mainstream domestic sitcoms.

We watched a 2021 Paul Schrader film called The Card Counter last night. Oscar Isaac and Tiffany Haddish were engaging in the lead roles. Otherwise it was very Paul Schrader-ish but quite watchable by his variable standards.

[Simon G]

On Tuesday I watched one of the worst things I think I've ever seen. The first episode of the 1988 Andy Capp TV series. Wow it was dreadful.

Yesterday I started watching Peep Show for the first time.

[Uncle Ethan]

The Dynasty, copyrighted as it is to the Kraft foundation, could easily be named "Blame Bill for Everything" as they sometimes subtly and often not so subtly blame Bill Belichick for every negative at the club. The theme appears to be that Belichick let people he managed get away with stuff as long as the team was winning, which is lacking in self-awareness, as if that was the case then the Kraft organisation was giving exactly the same latitude to the coach.

Interesting time to be watching how a club that dominated a sport for so long got away with so much chicanery, though that is of course in no way replicated in the premiership.

[Ray de Galles]

She might be a ghost, according to the internet.

I feel like it all was a waste of time. The first three episodes were great.

You’ve probably already seen this but the creator, writer and showrunner Issa Lopez said this ;

I’m not saying that she’s alive, and I’m certainly not saying that she’s dead. I very carefully crafted this as an ink block test for you to discover yourself as an audience member. I do love that Navarro states very early in the series that she has this impulse to just walk away and leave everything behind. On the other hand, the entire series is an exploration of the fact that she feels a calling to the beyond. In the climax of the finale, and instead of fighting it and going in with pain and fear, she surrenders to it. And in doing it, she receives a piece of herself. So that call that she was afraid of is solved. The Aboriginal people in Australia go and walk about, find themselves and then come back, which is I think is what Kali embraced [for the character]. However, there is a chance that she is also going to be with the women before her to visit them. You can read it both ways and it’s up to you to interpret which one fulfills your heart.

But, you know, ghosts don’t exist so it fulfils my heart to say she’s alive and has faked her death/disappearance - otherwise it’s bollocks.

I don’t think it was “all a waste of time” at all, there was a lot to like throughout the series even if it did peak midway through and have an unsatisfying finale.

[Hot Pepsi]

Tokyo Vice is getting more interesting.

[Uncle Ethan]

On other shows that I have enjoyed/am enjoying:

Shogun, because of my obsession with Japan. See also Tokyo Vice.

Masters of the Air, though predictably it has got stuck in representing the sections of the book around captured airmen, the change of tactics later in the war and shoehorning in the myriad issues raised by the Tuskagee airmen.

Sunderland 'til I die seems a very odd, belated, add on with three episodes arriving in February 2024 that cover the 21/22 season. I still like its emphasis on the fans, emotional as it becomes.

The Dynasty: Interesting look at the Patriots.

[Hot Pepsi]

I think some shows are just made to fuel reddit discussions.

[Uncle Ethan]

Absolutely consistent with the True Detective tradition though - utterly baffling after some gripping moments.

[Hot Pepsi]

It eventually became clear that Navarro had staged her disappearance/suicide, presumably to avoid repercussions from...well, I can't quite recall exactly what as the finale was a bit of a mess.

She might be a ghost, according to the internet.

I feel like it all was a waste of time. The first three episodes were great.

[Ray de Galles]

It eventually became clear that Navarro had staged her disappearance/suicide, presumably to avoid repercussions from...well, I can't quite recall exactly what as the finale was a bit of a mess.

[Hot Pepsi]

Sorry, but it absolutely is. The writer confirms it in an interview with Variety.

Ah yes, I watched it again more carefully.

That makes even less sense than it did before and I hate the whole fucking thing even more.
Is she a ghost? What was the point of showing her walking off onto the ice?
Being "ambiguous" isn't clever. It's just bad storytelling.

[RaggedTrousered]

Finished Black Bird on Apple TV+. The finale lost it for me slightly but I really enjoyed the series overall (not withstanding the subject). I thought Paul Walter Hauser's performance was fantastic.

[Uncle Ethan]

No it isn’t. Navarro walked off into the sunset.

Sorry, but it absolutely is. The writer confirms it in an interview with Variety.

[San Bernardhinault]

Finally watched Marcel The Shell a couple of days ago. What an utterly delightful, charming, whimsical, inventive film. Lovely.