TV Shows

Discussion in 'Entertainment' started by Kratos, Aug 12, 2008.

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  1. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    In general, I liked it, but I'm not without a few quibbles. I was pretty disappointed by how they changed the Viking vignette at the start. I'm sure Mr. Wednesday will grow on me, but ever since I first read it, I had him mentally cast as Stacy Keach, roughly from Titus. Mad Sweeney was incredibly spot-on though.

    Still, overall happy, and I'll definitely keep watching, just need to get my Prime subscription set up.
     
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  2. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

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    I actually imagined Mad Sweeney as older and more growly voice and tones. But he's good. Wednesday I really like. I imagined him slightly more Morgan Freeman-y but Ian McShane perfectly captured the mischievous grifter with a bit of grumpy old know-it-all thing so he's very entertaining and there's a nuance to his performance of each line. All of the actors do that. I find that is increasingly something I look for as the hallmark of great acting. Capturing every little moment.
    I love the modernized Technical Boy concept. And wow that scene. I was like "fuck, there goes their CGI budget". Beautifully designed and animated.
     
    Last edited: May 9, 2017
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  3. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

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    (I may have watched it on less than legitimate means):whistle::whistle:
     
  4. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    Me too.
     
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  5. Gold Bearer

    Gold Bearer Member

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    Sense8
    Sex, drugs and telepathy, what's not to like.
    I watched the first episode of the second series yesterday, the ending is really awesome. :)
     
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  6. Spencer1990

    Spencer1990 Contributor Contributor

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    Love that show. It's fantastic.
     
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  7. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

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    Anyone else SUPER excited for the Dark Crystal prequel on Netflix? After the sequel series plan went down in 2014 0r 13(?) whenever it was, I thought they would never do anything with it! But now they're doing a prequel series. And given how the main weakness of the movie was a number of weakly explained world concepts, a prequel series would do a lot of good for the original and with the larger time constraints probably function better in it's own.
    :cheerleader::cheerleader:
     
  8. Iain Aschendale

    Iain Aschendale Lying, dog-faced pony Marine Supporter Contributor

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    The Last Ship. I don't know which part I liked best: The "Naval Mountain Warfare Unit", the use of the 5 inch gun for AA at 50 yards, the suggestion that they use Tomahawks as anti-ballistic missile missiles, or the fact that radio silence keeps you from turning on your receivers.

    Anyway, that's 45 minutes of my life I'll never get back.
     
  9. Historical Science

    Historical Science Contributor Contributor

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    Started watching Fargo. I enjoyed the movie, not sure what to expect from the show. Pretty interesting so far.
     
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  10. Mr_Frugal

    Mr_Frugal New Member

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    I enjoyed season 1 more than season 2 but liked both. Except for something weird near the end of season 2. No spoilers, you'll know the weird thing when you see it.
     
  11. Pinkymcfiddle

    Pinkymcfiddle Banned

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    I watched Lewis on Netflix. I normally avoid ITV (commercial channel) because I despise adverts (I mean they make my blood boil) and ITV tends to be aimed towards fucking morons. Literally, if you are watching ITV on a Saturday evening, please never procreate because you are making the world a more unpleasant place.

    Anyway, I enjoyed Morse back in the day. Morse was a pseudo-intellectual crime drama. It reminds me of Frasier, in that it was not half as clever as it likes to think it was, but rather than saying "I'm going to the pub", they'd say "I'm going to the opera", and rather than saying "I'm going to the opera", they'd name the opera. No that is not clever in and of itself, you still rely on the same tired humour of all three-camera-sitcoms.

    Lewis was the put-upon and slightly dumb but work-hard side-kick of the intellectual Morse. John Thaw who played Morse died some time ago. So in the mid-noughties they made Lewis the main man and bought in Hathaway who was a post-Cambridge intellectual who was both arrogant and personable, as Lewis' side-kick. I have to say, this reminds me why I love British drama. In one exchange there was more characterisation than in entire series of American written-by-committee dramas. It really was a joy to watch.

    Imagine seeing an exchange like this in CSI: Wherever: -

     
    Last edited: Jun 3, 2017
  12. Mouthwash

    Mouthwash Senior Member

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    Anyone else hate Game of Thrones for ruining the books?
     
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  13. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

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    Define and explain "ruining"?
     
  14. Mouthwash

    Mouthwash Senior Member

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    Having bad writing (mainly in seasons five and six), removing the detailed worldbuilding of the novels, ruining the themes and point of the novels, ruining the character arcs of the novels, ruining the characters in the novels... explaining all of it would take quite some time, but this and this are a good places to start. You can also click on my signature if you want an idea of what Martin was really going for in the books.
     
    Last edited: Jul 12, 2017
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  15. obsidian_cicatrix

    obsidian_cicatrix I ink, therefore I am. Contributor

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    Nope.

    I did at first but not anymore. I've come to see them as two different entities. To put it in musical terms, I see GOT as a variation on a theme, a work of fan-fiction of sorts. Do I prefer the books...yes, I do, but that doesn't blind me to the fact that Martin made a few wrong turns himself in writing ASOIAF. (For example, realising he was going to have to split arcs between FFCs and DWDs. He'd self admittedly overwritten and needed outside help to rein in his monster.) I can cut him some slack for that, he has so manying plates spinning on thin, bendy poles above his head. Likewise Benioff and Weiss were under immense (not to mention fiscal) pressure to deliver a season per year. Working at that rate, something had to give.

    I was upset at the treatment of the aftermath of Blackwater in GOT, where the show repurposed the 'Mother's Song' and had Sansa sing it to the Ladies when in the book, it came by way of a more potent rendition, sung at the behest of Sandor Clegane, a pretty song from a pretty bird. I too was dismayed by the loss of the Kindly Man, in favour of a show fan favourite. And as for Arya's badly written episodes last season...yeah, they sucked. The treatment of the Dorne plotlines...well, Bronn and Jaime were like some oddball, comedy duo replete with silly garb. The Sand Snakes were....ugh. And Doran?

    Even the main characters lack depth and suffer from whitewashing. Tyrion is a great example of that but, still, the show holds together remarkably well at times. It's just not the books and never could have been.

    But... no matter what I see on screen, nothing can take away the impact of Martin's work. I dreaded the thought of the show catching up to the books, and if I have been spoilered, (Shireen and Stannis's death, or the nature of Jon's resurrection) as a book reader I'm just gonna have to take it on the chin. It isn't clear whether these events will come to pass as portrayed. All I know is that the themes will be served up in far greater detail... I can live with that. Thought I couldn't but it turns out I can.

    Comparing one to the other is like comparing apples and oranges. TV is a mixed medium. The writing isn't always good but there are many consolations, Ramin Djawadi's soundtrack being one of them. Not once did Martin ever inspire me to pick up my guitar. ;)
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2017
  16. Mouthwash

    Mouthwash Senior Member

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    The original Star Trek did 80 episodes in three years. If you want a more recent example, Breaking Bad had 13 and is a much better show than GoT. And that still doesn't excuse the bad writing these past two seasons.

    How could anyone accept Jon Snow's arc? Having him get stabbed like that is just a way of squeezing 'shock value' out of the audience, and it's the opposite point that the books were making... Jon is supposed to get stabbed because of his own questionable actions, not because of random bigotry.
     
  17. obsidian_cicatrix

    obsidian_cicatrix I ink, therefore I am. Contributor

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    I accept it in the show because I've learned to compartmentalise, and it helps that show Jon Snow is a mere shadow of the book equivalent. He's not the character I came to know. Same goes for all the main characters. I wouldn't expect that the themes would be richly explored in a less than hour long, serialised show. There are too many characters, too many plotlines many of which have had to be sheared away for sake of time considerations. Altering anything will have a knock-on effect on the whole.

    No matter what criticisms can be pointed at the show, I'm still glad it exists as it opened the doors to Martin's work and beckoned enter to many who, otherwise, wouldn't have read a series of fantasy books for love nor money. My daughter, who is not a reader ordinarily, read the whole series after seeing just a few episodes, something my harping on for years never managed to achieve. For me, the books will always be the bottom line, the only account that truly matters. GoT is the fluff equivalent.

    All book readers were presented with a choice to watch or not. You made your choice and had the option to quit at any point, and it's not as if you didn't have prior warning before Jon's arc went all FUBAR. I was regretful of my decision to watch at points but I've made my peace and learned to enjoy GOT for what it is: a big budget-no brainer, something to criticise, or poke fun at. There are people dying unnecessarily in our own world. That thought serves to remind me that a bad adaptation is hardly way up there on the list of what I should be complaining about. ;)
     
    Last edited: Jul 16, 2017
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  18. Mouthwash

    Mouthwash Senior Member

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    I was unfortunate enough to watch seasons 1-4 before reading the books. :bigmeh:
     
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  19. obsidian_cicatrix

    obsidian_cicatrix I ink, therefore I am. Contributor

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    Just checked your age on your profile. Your join date gave me the wrong impression; that puts quite the different spin on it. The question now in my mind is: would you have bothered to read the books if it hadn't been for the show?

    I really don't know how I would feel in your shoes. I've read the book series, end to end, more times than I care to count and that familiarity and discrepencies on the part of the show keep driving me back to the original text. I'd like to think, in your situation, I could rise above the hamfistedness of the show and still enjoy the books for what they are but, that's pure conjecture on my part. All I know is that I feel that many of the details the show left out actually made the books.

    You were just unlucky to be born too late. There have been many serialisations and films that I saw prior to reading the source material that took the sheen from them. Happens to every reader, sooner or later, I guess, TBR piles being what they are.
     
    Last edited: Jul 16, 2017
  20. mezzo

    mezzo New Member

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    i am not fan of tv shows
     
  21. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

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    Why u here then? Kind of a waste of time to tell us that.
     
  22. KaTrian

    KaTrian A foolish little beast. Contributor

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    Just binge-watched Norsemen on Netflix. A TV show hasn't made me laugh this hard in ages. It was basically Asterix and Obelix for adults, except instead of Gaul it takes place in Norway, and the Celts are Vikings. :-D I think it's poking fun at the TV show Vikings (which I haven't seen). Norwegian actors actually speak all their lines in English, which is hilarious. Add to that a lot of dead pan gags, absurdist humor, and satirizing Scandinavian people and their customs... Had me in stitches. :rofl:
     
  23. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    Thank you. I'm rather enjoying this so far.
     
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  24. Bill Chester

    Bill Chester Active Member

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    I'm bingeing on Tomorrow's Cantabile. It's a Korean TV show about students and professors in a music school. There's something strangely captivating about it. The characters are caricatures, to me, but I don't know how a Korean would see them. The story world is so strange that it's fantastical, yet it is presented as unremarkable. This is the first Korean TV series I've watched--anyone have other recommendations?

    I love to watch international TV shows and movies. Some favourites were Elle, Rita, and Amelie (but Amelie is not on Netflix anymore).

    The French version (with English subtitles) of 19-2 is way better than the English version, IMO, but I'm from Montreal and I used to watch a lot of French TV (with French subtitles). There's something about Quebec French entertainment, a little je ne sais quoi, that the English never got. Maybe a lack of prudery?

     
  25. Chiv

    Chiv Active Member

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    Throwing my hat into the "Game of Thrones sucks now" ring. Don't know why I still watch it. Guess I enjoy hating it.

    What I hate more is people coming up with excuses for the directors' lazy writing or saying "it's fantasy so logic doesn't matter", which is completely disrespectful for GRRM's world building, character development and the fantasy genre as a whole.
     
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