Current Watching

[Tony C]

Completed ‘Il Cacciatore’ (The Hunter) on C4 catch-up last night and really enjoyed it. We’ve watched several of the ‘Walter Presents’ series on C4 and they’ve all been pretty decent. Mainly Scandinavian, although the last two have been Italian, with the ‘Rocco Sciavone’ series being as good in its own way as this last one.

[Nocturnal Submission]

Just watched Fury, which had been recommended to me a few years ago by my aunt and now late uncle as an extremely realistic portrayal of the life and conditions of a WWII tank crew.

My uncle was a tank commander and had been critically injured on D-Day or shortly thereafter, when his vehicle took a direct hit. Watching the film and getting some sort of idea of what he went through was something I kind of felt I should do as a tribute.

Cheers, Uncle Dave.

[Sits]

We finished Temple last night which was enjoyable in a ridiculous way. Mark Strong and Daniel Mays both, er, strong.

Have also reached the final episode of Devils which has maintained its standards of being both mind numbingly crap and hilariously self satisfied. I’m not really watching; I’m OTFing/watching bike racing on the iPad while listening out for dialogue cliches. Edit: and dozing. I do a fair bit of this during evening viewing.

Edit: I called Daniel Mays Mark Addy.

[Tony C]

We were so charmed by the first episode of ‘The Chair’ that we sat through and enjoyed the whole series last night. Not quite the feat it might sound - only 6 x 30 minute episodes. It’s initially a very easy watch campus comedy - drama which introduces more important issues (ethnic representation in education being the key one) as it develops. Sandra Oh is a wonderful actress who carries the central role as easily and engagingly as you might expect.

[San Bernardhinault]

I had no idea how short it was when we watched it and were very disappointed at it ending so fast.

[DCI Harry Batt]

We finished the final ever season of Lucifer this week. And also watched all of Biohackers. Both on the Netflix.

[WOM]

Any good?

[DCI Harry Batt]

Lucifer is a very silly series, so if you don't like very silly things, you wouldn't like it. But it's fun. And an interesting take on the whole god devil angel thing. And the ending of the whole thing is a proper ending.

Biohackers was a bit intense and you had to concentrate. And as you only notice when you know a bit of the language, the subtitles are a bit poor in places. But still, yeah, pretty strong performances. And hot boys, so what's not to love?

[Sam]

Not sure why I've not frequented this thread before now, but have picked up a few recommendations from the last handful of pages so it seems only fair to leave one of my own.

This evening we watched Diana: The Musical on Netflix. It is every bit as bad as you've heard it is, and every bit as funny for it. Shockingly shit lyrics that might have been written by a bot rather than a human being in some parts, totally unmemorable tunes, clunky dialogue delivered in often pretty ropey accents. The one thing it's missing is a proper chewing-the-scenery character. Halfway through James Hewitt gets an astonishing first scene and I thought he was going to be that character, but his subsequent scenes were more muted.

If you're in the mood to laugh your head off at how bad something is and you've got a couple of hours to spare, go for it. It's been compared with Springtime for Hitler, and I really wonder whether Netflix were aiming for it to be so bad everyone would want to watch it.

[ad hoc]

We've been watching The Fall on Netflix. I presume UK based otfers who like this sort of thing have already seen it as it was obviously a UK TV thing originally. Gillian Anderson leads police team on the trail of a serial killer in Belfast (all UK cop shows are now set in Belfast for whatever reason)

Series 1 was really good. We're half way into series 2 and it's not quite as good, and is getting a bit silly. I'm concerned that the third series will be ridiculous.

[Sean of the Shed]

You are wise to brace yourself for the impending disappointment.

[tee rex]

I haven't seen it yet but, according to Alex Horne's Twitter, the airing of the bleeped version of Taskmaster on network C4 last week was a mistake. That version is only meant for the catch up service.

Apparently it received the most complaints ever for lack of swearing in a show.

The New Zealand version of Taskmaster is worth checking out, two series so far. Usually a NZ version of a UK/USA format is embarrassingly awful, but this is a rare exception. Series 2 especially has been the escape and antidote that I've needed in these dystopian times. And it's very sweary.

[WOM]

Series 1 was really good. We're half way into series 2 and it's not quite as good, and is getting a bit silly. I'm concerned that the third series will be ridiculous.

Yup

[DPDPDPDP]

We've been watching The Fall on Netflix. I presume UK based otfers who like this sort of thing have already seen it as it was obviously a UK TV thing originally. Gillian Anderson leads police team on the trail of a serial killer in Belfast (all UK cop shows are now set in Belfast for whatever reason)

Series 1 was really good. We're half way into series 2 and it's not quite as good, and is getting a bit silly. I'm concerned that the third series will be ridiculous.

I gave up halfway through season 2. Glad to hear from others that I made the right choice not to persist with it.

[Sam]

The New Zealand version of Taskmaster is worth checking out, two series so far. Usually a NZ version of a UK/USA format is embarrassingly awful, but this is a rare exception. Series 2 especially has been the escape and antidote that I've needed in these dystopian times. And it's very sweary.

Yes we've given some of the foreign versions a go as many are available on YouTube (through less official channels than the official one the UK series goes up on, but clearly tolerated). We gave up on the Finnish one, which has some rather odd departures from the format during the studio sections, after one episode and aren't sure about the Norwegian version. Only clips of the Spanish one are up, but based on those we're not crying about what we're missing, and the US version we haven't seen but have seen some reviews and short clips of. It looks like it was an absolute dumpster fire (they made one series before it was cancelled), in part due to one contestant who seemed to misunderstand the tone and, rather than going in for friendly piss-taking with Alex (who played himself in it) would just scream about how much she hated him the whole time. But the New Zealand version is really excellent. Thought the first couple of episodes of series 1 took a bit of settling into, because the main host has such a different dynamic (he just plays it as quite a nice man who wants to see everyone do well), but it grew on us and series 2 is absolutely superb.

[DCI Harry Batt]

This "The Fall" thing sounds right up my alley.

[Ray de Galles]

I thought they were playing the latter bits very much for laughs, I'm absolutely sure that parts of this series will have me in tears because elements of all the previous ones have but episode one was a very jolly easing-in for me.

With regard to the landscape shots though, the programme yet again showcases the best drone camerawork I have ever seen.

So it took watching episode five (of 'Mortimer & Whitehouse : Gone Fishing') last night to set me off this series.

It was a combination of lots of Ted, an area of Wales & landmarks I know well from visiting with friends' families every year when all of our children were little but mostly the section with the chap with cancer about his therapeutic fishing and charity to promote it.

I lost one of my business partners to cancer a week ago and a friend shared his diagnosis of it with me a few days later so it all came pouring out. It took me well over an hour to get through the thirty minute show. What a programme though that it can do that to a viewer but still be such a life-affirming watch.

[Hot Pepsi]

I’m watching Big Sky, an ABC show set in Helena, MT, but shot in BC.

It’s about two beautiful women who, due to circumstances, work together to solve a murder and track down kidnappers/sex traffickers.

[San Bernardhinault]

I watched the first season of that. The first half of it was absolutely fine landfill TV that was very pretty to look at. The second half was risible. I was amazed to see that it returned for a season two - it definitely had the air of something everyone had given up on and had been turned over to the most junior writers.

[Femme Folle]

Squid Game. Intense. Not bingeable because I need time to recover after each episode.

[Sheep]

They really put the cliff in cliffhanger in that one episode.

[Incandenza]

Watched the first episode of Squid Game last night. Really liked everything up until when the game part began. Not sure if I need to hide the rest behind spoilers since it was pretty much all what the trailer what I saw was, but I will anyway...

spoiler: Show

the green light/red light game part, especially when "Fly Me to the Moon" was playing, seemed to be so ham-handed in making what was happening dissonant from the surroundings and the bright visuals that it annoyed me. It just seemed like it was saying "this happy music is playing, but these people are being killed for a game. Isn't that TWISTED and FUCKED UP?" I'll give it a few more episodes because people seem to love it so much but the episode went downhill for me. Also, after the first 10 people being shot through the head, I got what was going on. Didn't need to see every possible way someone would be shot and killed.

[Sheep]

The first episode makes the series seem like an inferior edition of Battle Royale but with capitalism instead of intergenerational conflict. However, the second episode raises the level in a remarkable manner. This ties in with Inca's surroundings and bright visuals observation:

it would be a bit spoilerific for me to explain that, but click here if you want to read more: Show

it seems better to get a 'fair' shot at winning a metric boatload of cash in a murderous schoolyard game in brightly-colored surroundings, than having basically no shot at keeping your head above the water in the drab outside world which is stacked against the common man.

[Ginger Yellow]

If you don't like the first episode, you'll hate it by the end of the run. It goes downhill from about episode four (and then becomes actively bad in episode 7)

[Femme Folle]

I liked the first two episodes and was looking forward to the next ones, but GY has me wondering if I will be disappointed. My tolerance for bad might be higher than the average viewer, however.