The Official, Long Awaited, TV Shows Thread

NatGeo's the long road home looks pretty decent. Only watches the first screening (which I think was two episodes) so far. At this stage it looks like black-hawk-down, done over 8-9 hrs. it does have very production values.
 
The Punisher is much better / I like it much better than I thought I would.
 
Just watched eps3.4_runtime-err0r.r00 of Mr Robot. What an amazing ride in not only one of the best episodes ever of Mr Robot but one of the best episodes of any TV show, the kind that really stand out in a series and leave you with a "holy shit" when it's over. It's an intense ride in a 46-minute single long-shot format, with well hidden cuts obviously, but there are so many wow moments during it not only from the events that occur in the episode, but the acting, sound, creative offshots and tracking all bring it together really well.

Think I'm going to watch it again tonight.
 
Still watching the Punisher, but I have to look away occasionally because there is just too much gore. It is offset by some great drama so I have kept watching but this is not the first time I have thought that I would have liked a gore filter, but it is certainly the one that has made me want one the most, to the point where I will be searching and or requesting one or support a petition.
 
No, was only comparing to my own expectations. Just finished it and it was pretty amazing. I hate some parts of it for sure, there’s some real ugly in there and some acceptance of the ugly too that makes me want to never show this to my son. But the acting, pacing, everything else was like a good thriller you want to keep reading.
 
Finished Stranger Things 2 the other day, and...epic mullet! lol

Also, this season was perhaps a bit weaker overall, didn't feel as focused as the first. A dash of inappropriate situational comedy, often involving a certain tadpole thing making inappropriately cute noises and which likes nougat (and friggin BASIC, ugh), also, rather a lot of time spent on conflicts between characters instead of advancing the plot, which did not really interest me much. Was promised more horror beforehand, but ended up being less, due to all the inter-personal conflicts and the bizarre misplaced comedy I feel like. Or in short, not much really HAPPENED. One entire episode in particular was essentially just a big ole sidetrack which didn't lead anywhere at all.

It was good television, sure, and the kids were great, and Sam Gamgee was oh so fucking boring but you know, poor Sam Gamgee getting eaten alive by demodogs (SPOILER ALERT lol), that was a bit sad. He was a good guy after all, poor ole dead Sam Gamgee, very heroic, but...stupid. DON'T STOP if you're getting chased by monsters. Keep on running, man! Getting eaten, that'll teach you not to be an idiot for next time. Only there won't be a next time, but that's your fault man. Keep on running! Jesus. :p

So I get it, it's hard to follow up a smash hit and hit that same spot twice in a row without repeating yourself and do the same thing all over again, and that having a second great idea is much harder than just having that one first great idea, but I hope they can steer the show back towards the tone and pace of the first season or the third season is just going to kill this whole thing, and that would be a shame.

If season 1 was like, 9/10, this one's a 7 I feel.

Oh, and if you haven't finished watching the whole series yet maybe you shouldn't be reading this post, because like, I spoiled something. The mullet, you know. That was pretty epic! Except, you don't know about that yet, so disregard. Disregard! Clear it from your mind, because you haven't seen the mullet yet and you don't wanna be spoiled for when it comes.
 
Imho Stranger Things was pretty much 10/10 and Stranger Things 2 was 8,5/10
 
Really enjoying Dark, a German Netflix series. Since the damn synopsis doesn't expose the main theme, I can't either even though it shows its hand early and continuously throughout and somehow manages to fuck with my mind trying to keep track of it all.
 
Stranger Things transformed into 80s appreciation show on its second season. In the first series, the authentic depiction of that time served to increase immersiveness of the story; I got similar nostalgic vibes as from E.T. but second season felt closer to That 80's Show (which I've never watched but must be pretty close).

But my kids started watching ST:TNG, and as we just finished season 3, I must say it's still as awesome as ever. Pure gold.
 
Finished The Punisher. Was alright. The Walking Dead actor was fantastic as Frank Castle, but all in all this was just a really ponderous and slow show (even by Netlix standards) with awfully little punishing in it. Would've made for a really cool 2-hour-film.
 
Finished The Punisher. Was alright. The Walking Dead actor was fantastic as Frank Castle, but all in all this was just a really ponderous and slow show (even by Netlix standards) with awfully little punishing in it. Would've made for a really cool 2-hour-film.
And I really hope they keep making shows like that. I prefer ponderous and slow if it's telling a good story and they keep it interesting (which they really did imo). I doubt I'd enjoy it much if every episode was John Wick slaughter.
 
I simply value at least a modicum of efficiency. I don't need to see 60+ minutes of Frank dreaming about his dead family. Or of him being a jerk to Lieberman. Or an hours worth of what the show runners think about gun control (in the most ham fisted way possible) I also thought the whole Lewis story was a complete waste of time. Quite frankly, The Punisher is probably the schlockiest and most simplistic "hero" in the entire Marvel roster, so 13 hours worth of high drama struck me as an odd way of dealing with the character.
 
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But my kids started watching ST:TNG, and as we just finished season 3, I must say it's still as awesome as ever. Pure gold.
"The Measure of a Man"... It's 2nd season IIRC (while Riker was still all baby-faced), and still one of the highpoints of the entire series, IMO.
 
I simply value at least a modicum of efficiency. I don't need to see 60+ minutes of Frank dreaming about his dead family. Or of him being a jerk to Lieberman. Or an hours worth of what the show runners think about gun control (in the most ham fisted way possible) I also thought the whole Lewis story was a complete waste of time. Quite frankly, The Punisher is probably the schlockiest and most simplistic "hero" in the entire Marvel roster, so 13 hours worth of high drama struck me as an odd way of dealing with the character.

Well if they had done it any other way, I’d have stopped watching after a few episodes or not even started at all. Despite being about the Pumisher, I thought it was one of the best in the series. Just didn’t need *all* that gore ... about 10% of that would have sufficed for me.
 
If anything, the sporadic excesses of gory, cathartic violence made the whole thing seem rather hypocritical. The show is wagging its finger about how violence begets more violence, about the difficulty in resocializing veterans, the gun control debate, the surveillance state and what have you. In the end it still wants you to root for a raging, trained killing machine. This is what the Punisher is all about, though. So if you decided to loose these parts, you might as well not do The Punisher at all. It's a bad case of having your cake and eating it too as far as I'm concerned.
 
"The Measure of a Man"... It's 2nd season IIRC (while Riker was still all baby-faced), and still one of the highpoints of the entire series, IMO.
It's definitely a gem in the rather fluctuating (sic) first two seasons. After that the consistency improved markedly; The documentary "Chaos on the Bridge" gives clear explanation.
"The Offspring" and, in a lighter tone, "Data's Day" continue the topic nicely.
I feel many of the episodes' scripts could have sustained much longer running time than 43mins, ends of episodes seem often rushed. So much potential in the stories; in that light it is such a shame how the movies couldn't improve on the show.
 
shame how the movies couldn't improve on the show.
Sometimes self-imposed limitations like runtime length improve the quality in non-obvious ways. IE, more often isn't better, and frequently just makes things worse.

This is often the case with episodic television I feel. It often happens in games as well, where if you don't have much in the way of hardware resources, or these days - as modern computers can do almost anything in realtime - whittle things away until only a core framework remains you can end up with a timeless classic.

Babylon 5 was a show where many episodes were so packed with story that they felt like a feature movie, and yet they were only about 42mins long.
 
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