TV - What's your passion (NON-sports)?
- Thread starter VF21
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Keep pushing a bit, if you can. I don't know if you've read the three books, but the story gets better. Episode 5 (I think?) is really good, for example. It definitely isn't an action series, though.
When I read the books, book 1 was the weakest storyline by far. There's a lot of setup and world-building, but I agree that they could have cut out some of the early stuff and not really lost anything.
coolhandluke
Starter
Thanks for the review. Just a few episodes in and I already like the Tencent adaptation better than the Netflix adaptation. It captures the dread well and allows time for the story to breathe. I liked that they didn't brush over concepts like the shooter and farmer hypotheses. The pool table analogy was bloody brilliant. I think Wang Miao's deduction of what the string of numbers mean was also done well. The experiments may look trivial and repetitive for the viewers but that's how you eliminate false explanatory variables and narrow down the scope of research. The whole thing can be avoided as we get a live countdown later but still I liked that little indulgence. The sense of discovery, awe and intrigue are lacking in the Netflix adaptation.
While I think that the Netflix adaptation can be more "accessible" to the masses (especially American/western viewers, I would think - given the subtitles, dialogue structure, and overall "feel"), you have some good points I can/do agree with. But holy cow, I'm starting episode 6 (I think) and there are 30 episodes in Season 1. Just Season 1. That's more episodes than the Netflix adaptation might have in totality. Let's get a move on, folks, and trim out some of the fat!
I’m about 20 episodes deep into this and while it is well done, my goodness it is a heck of a lot longer than necessary. I mean, 20 episodes and they’ve mentioned Judgement Day once. We’ve seen one scene on the ship. That arc was “over” in episode 5 of the Netflix version!!!
So, done with the 30 episode season 1 of Three Body on Prime. (If anyone is interested, they don't get to Judgement Day until episode 29 - just skip ahead if you want
. That episode is pretty well done and rivals the Netflix version for that event.) The last two episodes were the best of the series overall. They should have trimmed out over half (and likely more) to make this more watchable. It follows the book a lot closer, but isn't nearly as watchable/user friendly overall as the Netflix version.
Just finished up watching Fallout on Prime, and while I've never played the game and had no idea what it was about going in, I enjoyed it and am interested in where the series goes next. Not "great", but good. It seemed to take a while to get going and not everything is explained, but I assume more will become clear in Season 2.
My wife and I are still cruising through Suits (Netflix) - the seasons are long (like 15 shows?) and we are somewhere past halfway through, I think. The show has a good mix of characters and some great personalities; Donna is a favorite in our house.
Looks like they have the green light from Netflix to finish off the other two books:
‘3 Body Problem' Creators Clarify Netflix's Mysterious Season 2 Renewal Plan (msn.com)
Seems like an obvious green light. I don't know the viewership numbers but between the IRL buzz and the quality of season 1, any other option would seem insane.
Dad and I watched Shogun (Hulu) and it is a high-quality show. Well-acted, excellent costume design and dialogue, good character development, etc. We both enjoyed it overall.
Again, though, please:
Again, though, please:
- quit filming so much in the dark
- cut about 2 episodes to get this from 10 to 8 or so
Just wrapped up watching Bodies on Netflix, an 8 episode series.
Interesting setup where the same body shows up at the same location in 4 different time periods and detectives have to try to solve the mystery. I still have a few questions, but overall I thought it was well done.
Interesting setup where the same body shows up at the same location in 4 different time periods and detectives have to try to solve the mystery. I still have a few questions, but overall I thought it was well done.
LoungeLizard
Starter
Feel like Apple has been killing it with their content. Masters of the Air was fantastic, just finished Dark Matter and thought that was pretty well done. I’m now into Presumed Innocent and am interested too see how this all turns out.
I watched much of The Signal (Netflix) this morning while donating blood and finished it up tonight. It is a German 4 episode (about 4 hours) series about a wife/mom who is an astronaut and encounters a signal from something heading to intercept Earth. There is some conflict aboard the ISS (between her and a co-worker) that makes her question who she can trust and causes difficulty with how to communicate with her family about what is going on. While originally in German, the voices are dubbed in English.
The weakest part of the show is probably the dialogue, and in general it isn't bad at all, but at times it seems a touch melodramatic but that's probably due to the dubbed translation. There are a couple of minor plot holes, or at least there seem to be, but I think some of that is patched up at the end. It came out earlier this year so you will notice some references to things like COVID, world politics, etc., sprinkled in here and there from a European point of view.
There's not a lot of action, mostly drama and tension, but the show is interesting in some of the twists and turns it takes getting to the end. Give it a watch if you want something a little more Arrival than Independence Day for a few hours.
The weakest part of the show is probably the dialogue, and in general it isn't bad at all, but at times it seems a touch melodramatic but that's probably due to the dubbed translation. There are a couple of minor plot holes, or at least there seem to be, but I think some of that is patched up at the end. It came out earlier this year so you will notice some references to things like COVID, world politics, etc., sprinkled in here and there from a European point of view.
There's not a lot of action, mostly drama and tension, but the show is interesting in some of the twists and turns it takes getting to the end. Give it a watch if you want something a little more Arrival than Independence Day for a few hours.
Just finished up Season 4 of The Boys (Prime), and whoo-boy is the plot spot on for recent events. Unfortunately, this season, moreso than the others, seems to drag in spots and seems to take a while to get where it's going. A few parts seemed a bit sillier than previous seasons as well. Season 5 is slated to be the last one, and 4 sets up quite a conclusion for the final round of episodes.
I watched Under the Bridge on Hulu……as did my wife. Actually we binged it in 2 days. Based on true events with some liberties taken but generally this was a big story when it happened. Lily Gladstone is awesome in it. Riley Keough, of Daisy Jones fame, was also in it but man I wanted to shake some sense into her character.
Good show despite it being a tough subject matter.
Good show despite it being a tough subject matter.
The reviews just roasted this show……but to be fair, it might be my least favorite of all the Disney shows related to the SW Universe. Didn’t really care for the lead actress. And as much as I liked the lead actor who was in Squid Games, just felt like he was trying to do an imitation of Ken Watanabe from The Last Samurai.
I get it. Maybe my expectations were extra low due to the reviews?
I think one thing I liked about it is it seemed to have a story it was following. Some of the other shows seemed to be wallowing around in circles, even if the acting was better. I thought maybe they had started something they could turn into something better in Season 2.
We just finished watching this series, and that was a darn good show. Some minor quibbles here and there, but great characters, character arcs, drama, etc. Highly recommended.
Just wrapped up the most recent season of Upload (Prime) - a quirky show that (other than the occasionally exploding heads, but that would do it) I think my wife would possibly enjoy. In general it is more lighthearted and relationship-based than I would normally dig into on my own, but there is enough of the real world/digital world conflict to keep me interested. The ending of Season 3 definitely turns in the last few minutes of what appears to be a "good" ending firmly into "Oh, crap" territory. Robbie Amell (Code 8, which also starred Stephen Amell, his cousin, from Arrow) is the only face I recognized from outside the show, but it's pretty entertaining without any real big "names" attached.
I've had a lot of idle time lately, spending many of my evenings at the hospital, looking after my father. So, when not watching the WNBA, I've been streaming some TV shows. Most of them have been re-watches, but one that I did enjoy was Reacher. It hits all the right notes for me, in terms of a non-superhero action/drama series. In fact, if it weren't for the casting choices of the female leads, I'd swear that they downloaded this series straight from my brain.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
So, rather shockingly, the Matlock pilot might be the best pilot episode of television I’ve seen since Lost. Absolutely shocked because (a) it’s Matlock and (b) the advertising for this show keeps all the cards it has close to its chest.
An absolute clinic in how to establish a show’s premise, characters, and get the audience to stay tuned for a full season of broadcast television in just an hour. Also Kathy Bates is possibly America’s most under appreciated actress.
An absolute clinic in how to establish a show’s premise, characters, and get the audience to stay tuned for a full season of broadcast television in just an hour. Also Kathy Bates is possibly America’s most under appreciated actress.
Finished with another show while keeping my dad company: Ducktales (2017). I was a little too old for the cartoon block that was "officially" dubbed The Disney Afternoon™, but the original Ducktales debuted right at the tail-end of my pre-adolescence. I loved this reboot that not only paid homage to the original series, but gave shoutouts to the comics from the 50s, and the video game, as well as the other D.A. cartoons. Some of the series, like Rescue Rangers, they weren't allowed to reference directly on the show, but they found clever workarounds. A few of my favorite D.A. references that I wouldn't necessarily consider spoilers:
Also we got introduced to
And learned that
Loved the usage of all the Duck characters; big fan of how they wove Flintheart Glomgold's comic book origin into the show. Overall found it to be highly entertaining.
Dad was released from the hospital today, so I'm hoping to not have time to binge anything else in the immediate future.
- The aforementioned Rescue Rangers workaround.
- The events in Talespin all happened in this series' past. Molly Cunningham and Kit Cloudkicker are both adults.
- Darkwing Duck was a fictional character who became a "real" character when the actor who was cast to play him in the movie was convinced to try being a superhero in real life.
- The plot of one of the episodes revolved around the Gummi Bears having really existed in-universe.
It provided an in-universe explanation for April, May and June from the comics!
the boys' mom! And she's a pilot! And she went to flight school with Molly and Kit! And she hadn't been around for the boys' childhood because
She got stuck on the moon!
Huey, Dewey and Louie weren't supposed to be their names.
"I could have been Turbo?!"
Dad was released from the hospital today, so I'm hoping to not have time to binge anything else in the immediate future.