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    That’s pretty much the reason for success I’d say. It felt like It, in a way I doubt the movie gets close to.

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      The OA also from Netflix, (ie: data driven and heavily budgeted) and working similar turf was dramatically much stronger.
      I really tried with that, but it seemed to move in geological time and be self-consciously and needlessly portentous. After 3 episodes I really just didn't care at all any more.
      That and Britt Marling's acting style seems to be wafting around like a concussed Kate Bush. (Likewise in Another Earth.)

      Stranger Things was great, but I can absolutely see that it would be hollow calories if you weren't 35-50 or 15-25 and in the midst of 80s revival. It's pure nostalgia porn.
      Last edited by hobbes; 02-10-2017, 07:58.

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        The OA was pretty glacial at times, and the repetitiveness of the story didn't help much. It picked up about about half way through when it became clearer who was who, and what was going on. I really liked some of the performances — especially Marling's parents — and the conclusion was genuinely unexpected, but made absolute sense. It validated much that seemed overly drawn out in the rest of the series.

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          Originally posted by hobbes View Post

          In episode 10 there is the best joke I've heard all year. It's about a BBC comedy and it rendered me insensible for a good 5 minutes.
          Haha yes, that was very funny.

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            A seriously heavy weekend saw the demise of major characters on two favourite cable shows: Ray Donovan and Halt and Catch Fire. It was a double Kleenex box night in the de Cosmos household for sure. Both were dramatically excellent — in quite different ways — and underlined how superior HBO, Showtime, and AMC are in comparison to Netflix.

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              I'd like to catch up with Halt and Catch Fire. Not sure if it's on Netflix or Amazon prime. Perhaps I could pay for it via iTunes. Not sure I care that much.

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                A new season of Lucifer starts tonight. I'm watching it right now instead of the coverage of Las Vegas.

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                  Originally posted by Hot Pepsi View Post
                  I'd like to catch up with Halt and Catch Fire. Not sure if it's on Netflix or Amazon prime. Perhaps I could pay for it via iTunes. Not sure I care that much.
                  It's one of those series that gets better with each season. Season one was sorta meh, but now — as it draws to a close — its excellent.

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                    So we've got to the end of season 1 of The Good Place. I enjoyed the season finale episode. Probably one of the best season finale episodes I've seen.

                    Having done some ethics in my studies earlier in life I think this is one show that actually addresses some deep questions quite cleverly. The whole question of motivation making an action morally good or bad is a fascinating one.

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                      OK. We are now caught up on The Good Place. (New episode released today!) I wasn't sure how they were going to continue the story in season 2 but it seems to be working OK.

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                        Originally posted by Amor de Cosmos View Post
                        A seriously heavy weekend saw the demise of major characters on two favourite cable shows: Ray Donovan and Halt and Catch Fire. It was a double Kleenex box night in the de Cosmos household for sure. Both were dramatically excellent — in quite different ways — and underlined how superior HBO, Showtime, and AMC are in comparison to Netflix.
                        SPOILER: Ray Donovan requires us to believe that Ray's love for Mrs. D was deeper than it appeared in his past behaviour. There can be marriages that fluctuate that way, and after years of neglect, the male spouse realizes how much he loves the female, but I dunno if Ray was one of those. Only the awesome acting of the male lead makes it possible to pull off.

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                          America's Game, the documentary series about the Superbowl. Great stuff, especially the early years.

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                            Spiral/Engrenages is back, in France (series 6 being broadcast on Canal Plus, started last month, 2 episodes a week). Can't be long now before it hits the UK. There'll be a season 7 (~2020/21) and then basta.

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                              Woo hoo! I'll have to start stealing again. No distributor in this neck of the woods, I've no idea why Netflix haven't picked it up.

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                                Modern Family is back for Series 9. Seen the first 2 episodes. The first episode didn't really work. But the second one had a very clever sight gag and then 2 gags about accidentally setting off a decontamination process that really made me laugh.

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                                  So firstly yes! to more Spiral. But secondly I've just remembered what happened in series 5 and now I'm sad.

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                                    Went to see the Lego Ninjago Movie today. Not as good as the first two Lego movies imo, but still enjoyable. Dragged a bit in the middle and Garmadon was a bit too Batmanish really. Mrs Thistle thought it was better than the Lego Batman Movie but not as good as The Lego Movie.

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                                      Originally posted by hobbes View Post
                                      I really tried with that, but it seemed to move in geological time and be self-consciously and needlessly portentous. After 3 episodes I really just didn't care at all any more.
                                      That and Britt Marling's acting style seems to be wafting around like a concussed Kate Bush. (Likewise in Another Earth.)

                                      Stranger Things was great, but I can absolutely see that it would be hollow calories if you weren't 35-50 or 15-25 and in the midst of 80s revival. It's pure nostalgia porn.
                                      I'm all for 80's Nostalgia, but I've never read anything by Stephen King - perhaps the only 44-year-old American white man who hasn't. I've never been into horror - sci-fi, fantasy, etc, but not horror, for some reason.

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                                        I'm getting way into Mindhunter.

                                        It's about the guys in the FBI who first started interviewing serial killers in the 70s to learn insights that would help stop future serial killers - the origin of what is now called profiling (though, counter to a lot of TV shows, there's no such job title as "profiler.")
                                        The two main guys are loosely based on real people, but they changed the names so they could do more with the characters.
                                        Anna Torv - from Fringe - plays a Harvard professor who is very interested in their work, but she hasn't been in the show much so far, so we'll see. I'm only on episode 3.

                                        I'm not so fascinated by serial killers, but it's fascinating to see these guys figure out stuff that we now would just take for granted - that there's a lot more complexity to these killers' motivations and methods than simply "they're crazy" - and how hard it was for them to convince their superiors and other cops that it's worthwhile.

                                        There's also the main guy's girlfriend, who so far seems to be there for the guy to have somebody to talk to about his ideas - she's a psychology grad student - and for there to be sex scenes. I'm not really sure what the point of those are other than gratuitous, but maybe it will matter in the development of the characters.

                                        There's also a lot of 70's nostalgia to be had in the sets, etc. I don't really remember the 70s, but I remember the early 80s and recognize stuff. Like the guy drives a Chevy Nova. The grandma-hand-me-down I drove in high school was a Dodge Aspen - same car, same color, but I think maybe a year or two later - and whenever I see the scenes of him giving a slide show to cops, I can remember what a working slide projector smelled like. Same with offices - all those mimeograph machines, and shitty coffee, and cigarettes, of course. There's one shot where we see one of those stainless steel ash-tray things that were shaped like half an egg and bolted to the wall. You might recall. I hadn't seen or thought of those in 30 years and yet I recognized it immediately.

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                                          Very much enjoying Star Trek Disco (they were even jogging around the ship with Disco on their sweat shirts .
                                          Also The Orville ; but keep getting the Orville's Krill mixed up in my mind with Disco's new Orc Klingons - so mixing up the story lines, makes for same interesting internal discussions.

                                          Saw some love on here for The Good Place - couldn't get past two episodes myself.
                                          Stranger Things 2 starts Friday, so will be watching that.

                                          Missus has given up watching Our Girl on the Beeb, thank god. Oh and Bake Off version C4 was poor last night - although I learnt there is something called Swiss Meringue - I knew already about French and Italian so will now go off and find out about Swiss - I guess something around secret accounts, expensive coffee but efficient cablecars.

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                                            Originally posted by VTTBoscombe View Post
                                            Very much enjoying Star Trek Disco (they were even jogging around the ship with Disco on their sweat shirts.
                                            As can you.

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                                              Originally posted by Hot Pepsi View Post
                                              I'm getting way into Mindhunter.

                                              It's about the guys in the FBI who first started interviewing serial killers in the 70s to learn insights that would help stop future serial killers - the origin of what is now called profiling (though, counter to a lot of TV shows, there's no such job title as "profiler.")
                                              The two main guys are loosely based on real people, but they changed the names so they could do more with the characters.
                                              Anna Torv - from Fringe - plays a Harvard professor who is very interested in their work, but she hasn't been in the show much so far, so we'll see. I'm only on episode 3.

                                              I'm not so fascinated by serial killers, but it's fascinating to see these guys figure out stuff that we now would just take for granted - that there's a lot more complexity to these killers' motivations and methods than simply "they're crazy" - and how hard it was for them to convince their superiors and other cops that it's worthwhile.

                                              There's also the main guy's girlfriend, who so far seems to be there for the guy to have somebody to talk to about his ideas - she's a psychology grad student - and for there to be sex scenes. I'm not really sure what the point of those are other than gratuitous, but maybe it will matter in the development of the characters.

                                              There's also a lot of 70's nostalgia to be had in the sets, etc. I don't really remember the 70s, but I remember the early 80s and recognize stuff. Like the guy drives a Chevy Nova. The grandma-hand-me-down I drove in high school was a Dodge Aspen - same car, same color, but I think maybe a year or two later - and whenever I see the scenes of him giving a slide show to cops, I can remember what a working slide projector smelled like. Same with offices - all those mimeograph machines, and shitty coffee, and cigarettes, of course. There's one shot where we see one of those stainless steel ash-tray things that were shaped like half an egg and bolted to the wall. You might recall. I hadn't seen or thought of those in 30 years and yet I recognized it immediately.
                                              Yes. I'm liking this too, though fundamentally it's yet another cop/buddy show.

                                              I do think the GF is more than a spurious sexual add on or exposition device. In episode three (which is where I'm at too) for example there's the incident with the nail-file which underlined the acceptance of threat/violence in "healthy" sexual relations. I expect this type of juxtaposition might be explored in later episodes.

                                              One thing that always bugs me slightly in shows that go to great pains with historical veracity is when they get vernacular expression wrong. No one described an attractive person as "hot" in 1971. And nobody said "Can I get an egg salad sandwich?" in a restaurant either. Details perhaps, but they stand out when everything else is so painstaking.

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                                                Have just watched these two superb recently-broadcast programmes on the Beeb iPlayer:

                                                #1 on Milwaukee presented by the excellent Louis Theroux (stayed there very briefly in the early 1990’s at a friend's I was visiting while in Chicago, hadn’t realised how segregated it had become):

                                                https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episod...r-in-milwaukee


                                                Milwaukee is said to be one of the most racially divided and impoverished cities in the US. With spiraling gun crime and homicide rates, this Midwestern city encapsulates America's complex and troubled relationship with guns and the increasing disharmony between African-American communities and the police.
                                                In this episode, Louis spends time with the Milwaukee Police Department as they patrol District 5, home to some of the nation's deadliest streets, with a homicide rate over twelve times the national average, and follows the homicide division as they investigate one of the city's many killings. He also embeds with a family who have recently lost a loved one to gun crime, and he meets a local social activist, once a criminal and gang leader herself, who has turned her life around and is coming up with her own solution to the blight of gun crime. On the streets of Milwaukee, Louis discovers a community who is often misunderstood by, and mistrustful of, the police. Arriving at a time of heightened tension between the police and the African-American community due to a recent police shooting, Louis hears from both sides of the debate and uncovers hope in a desperate city.




                                                #2 on Colombia, by the equally excellent Simon Reeve: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08n5flh

                                                Adventurer and journalist Simon Reeve heads to one of the most spectacular countries in the world - Colombia. For 50 years, Colombia has been in the grip of a brutal civil war that has killed more than 200,000 people and displaced seven million. But in late 2016, a peace deal was signed promising to end the conflict and finally bring peace to the country.
                                                In this hour-long documentary for the award-winning This World strand, Simon explores Colombia at a pivotal point in its history. He travels into the jungle and comes face to face with the guerrilla army FARC, which is now promising to lay down arms. In the Pacific coast city of Buenaventura, Simon finds out more about the fearsome right-wing paramilitary gangs who now dominate the cocaine trade. As the FARC abandon the countryside, there is a fear that these groups will only grow in power. Travelling in the countryside, Simon meets the coca farmers who are demanding government support to stop growing coca and stop the flow of money to criminal gangs. With land ownership, poverty and drugs at the heart of Colombia's problems, it is in the countryside that the country's precarious future will be decided.

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                                                  Plenty of great art programmes on BBC4 these past few months (after a long period – 2 years? – where not much of note arts-wise was shown on BBC4). The pick of the crop being the terrific three-parter "Blood and Gold: The Making of Spain", masterfully presented by Simon Sebag Montefiore (unfortunately no longer on the iPlayer but maybe available on Youtube and DVD soon).

                                                  Also terrific is the 4-part series "The Renaissance unchained" by Waldemar Januszczak on BBC4 (just finished).

                                                  Episodes 1 and 3 ("Gods, Myths and Oil Paints" and "Silk, Sex and Skin") being particularly interesting if you don’t have time for the whole lot:

                                                  #1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b070sq9t

                                                  Waldemar Januszczak challenges the traditional notion of the Renaissance having fixed origins in Italy and showcases the ingenuity in both technique and ideas behind great artists such as Van Eyck, Memling, Van der Weyden, Cranach, Riemenschneider and Durer.

                                                  #3 http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0726fyv

                                                  Waldemar Januszczak focuses on Venice and its extraordinary impact on art history. He celebrates colour, drama and vitality by looking at the delicate colours of Bellini, the mystery of Giorgione, the splendour of Titian, the drama and chaos of Tintoretto and the glorious banquets of Veronese.

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                                                    Myself and Mrs Flibl have been enjoying the Amazon programme Halt and Catch Fire which is about 1980s IT companies. As both of us are from a mainframe IT background (different companies in different towns we both were mainframe ops who switched to programming) there was a load of reminiscing triggered by an early season two episode where Joe arranged to meet someone in the mainframe room ....

                                                    Those Big Blue boxes look familiar. There's an IBM 3090! Gosh look, those are IBM 3480 cartridge tape drives with autoloaders. Oh my, those prehistoric reel to reel tape drives ... can you remember the model number? Nor me, but the addresses of our two were CA0 and CA1 ...

                                                    Part (most?) of this post may be more suitable for the Mundane Thread.

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