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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2019 14:20:18 GMT -5
For lots of reasons (due to my hearing) I have a hard time enjoying the Sopranos ... please understand that. I just don't hate it nor like it ... it's just not my show to watch. Do closed captions help? I use them all the time when watching British series. I do have captioning, but the problem lies js the content of the text and half of the time its doesn't make any sense to me. |
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Post by Prince Hal on Sept 26, 2019 14:29:07 GMT -5
Do closed captions help? I use them all the time when watching British series. I do have captioning, but the problem lies js the content of the text and half of the time its doesn't make any sense to me. Gotcha. |
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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2019 17:45:54 GMT -5
I do have captioning, but the problem lies js the content of the text and half of the time its doesn't make any sense to me. Gotcha. Thanks. |
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Post by wildfire2099 on Sept 27, 2019 7:09:12 GMT -5
I just finished a re-watch of the entire run of The Sopranos. I loved it the first time around, but I got so much more out of it this time around. Before I watched with my wife and my middle son and it was a fairly surface viewing. This time around I spent a fair amount of time thinking about and analyzing the episodes and also looking at the historical significance of the show itself. The success of The Sopranos, both commercially and critically lead to a major change in the way television was viewed and produced. Without the show and Tony Soprano we likely never get Breaking Bad, The Wire and Mad Men, to name just a few shows. So, historically, I think it's fair to say it's arguably the most important show of the last 25 years. Beyond that it is just a brilliantly conceived show that uses the episodic nature of television to its best effect while giving us the kind of extended narrative and the technical qualities that had been reserved for film. Having time to rewind and watch certain scenes and to contemplate the show it's a revelation how incredible most of the cast was, in particular James Gandolfini and Eddie Falco. Gandolfini could act circles around most people with his back to the camera just with the way he held himself and used his voice. I think it's a testament to the acting of Falco, and the quality of the writing and directing on the show that Carmela never fell into the trap that made Skyler White and Betty Draper such generally unlikable characters. Just a fabulous show. I really need to watch that at some point, but I find my taste in TV often runs contrary to most... I recently tried to watch Breaking Bad, for instance, and it did nothing for me.. the premise is fun, but the execution and the actual plot just plan ridiculous... I got through the first season (maybe not quite all of it, not sure), but I haven't roused myself to watch more. The Wire I really wanted to get into (as I love Luther and wanted to see Idris Alba as an American)... I think I've watched the first episode 3 times and lost interest before it was over. |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Sept 28, 2019 17:56:15 GMT -5
The German language series Dark, on Netflix, is an excellent time travel yarn!
It manages to bring in genuine emotion, which in addition to a tightly-plotted story makes it one of my favourite shows of the past few years.
Und ich sollte sowieso mein Deutsch üben!
Recommended for all fans of serious SF.
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
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Post by Confessor on Sept 28, 2019 22:25:49 GMT -5
For lots of reasons (due to my hearing) I have a hard time enjoying the Sopranos ... please understand that. I just don't hate it nor like it ... it's just not my show to watch. Do closed captions help? I use them all the time when watching British series. Lol...divided by a common language. |
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,202
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Post by Confessor on Nov 17, 2019 22:00:30 GMT -5
 I just watched episode 1 of the BBC's new version of H.G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds". I only read the book a few months ago, so I definitely wanted to check out this BBC adaptation. Overall, I thought the first episode was pretty reasonable sci-fi entertainment. I liked the fact that, for once, the story was set in the correct geographical location and almost the right era (Edwardian, rather than Victorian). Visually it mostly looked great, although some of the CGI special effects looked a little cheap to me (like you'd see in a modern episode of Doctor Who). Perhaps inevitably there was a lot of new, romantic drama and fleshing out of characters inserted into the story. For example, the book's unnamed narrator now has a name (George), only it's his wife, Amy, who is now the story's narrator -- except that she's not his wife in this version, but a lover with whom he is living in sin, being as he's still married to his cousin. They've also massively expanded Amy's roll in things, which is understandable, given that the book is entirely dominated by male characters. The BBC clearly wanted this to be part Edwardian sci-fi apocalypse, part Sunday night romantic period drama. Unfortunately, there were a few annoying instances of anachronistic 21st Century-style dialogue and modern-day "woke" subtext creeping in, which I found a little jarring for a drama set in this era. Nevertheless, I thought it was pretty enjoyable overall, without it ever being quite as good as I'd hoped it would be. This adaptation certainly "feels" respectful to the source material, even though it plays fairly fast and loose with the events of the book on occasion. Still, that's no different to any number of other adaptations of WOTW over the years, I guess. I'll definitely watch episode 2, but it's unlikely to replace the old 1950's movie version or Jeff Wayne's Musical Version Of War Of The Worlds as my go-to adaptations. |
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Post by beccabear67 on Nov 17, 2019 23:43:52 GMT -5
This reminds me... did anyone see the fake documentary that had War Of The Worlds Martians invading and being fought with WWI soldiers and tech? That was on a history specialty channel here two or maybe three years ago? I watched it all so it wasn't bad at all, not sure I'd watch it over again anytime soon and yet they did a good job on it I thought. Guys really into the WWI armaments and stuff would have a steampunk style field day perhaps. I'm not sure how ready for another WOTW adaptation I am having just read all the '70s Killraven comics. The last one I saw had Tom Cruise I suppose... but the George Pal one and the Mercury Theater radio play are monumental in stature... it's kind of like the remakes of King Kong... why? And then there was the WOTW LP, a classic to me!  If I get the chance I'll check out this new BBC version... I still am a bit bitter towards them for not finishing the Tripods trilogy way back however.  |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Nov 19, 2019 16:28:48 GMT -5
This reminds me... did anyone see the fake documentary that had War Of The Worlds Martians invading and being fought with WWI soldiers and tech? Is that where this was taken from? Brilliant stuff! |
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Post by beccabear67 on Nov 19, 2019 17:42:14 GMT -5
^ Yes, I think that's some of it minus the narration. It's listed on imdb: www.imdb.com/title/tt3199240/I could swear it was broken into two parts in the version I saw on a specialty channel, I suppose with the adverts/commercial time that would make for a couple single hour slots. The day I typed about the BBC WotW I found it listed on a channel we get, I saw a part of some episode among a marathon approach of the show, but didn't have time to hang about to see the first episode that was listed right after it, so hoping I can find it on 'demand'. It did look like it would be decent. |
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Post by The Captain on Nov 27, 2019 9:57:02 GMT -5
I guess this fits into the "What's NOT on TV" category, but Netflix has canceled its Mystery Science Theater 3000 revival.
I can't say this is terribly upsetting, as I tried to watch a couple of the episodes and found them lacking. The new host is a pale shadow of Joel and Mike, and while I love both Felicia Day and Patton Oswalt in other media, I just couldn't get into their characters here.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 12, 2019 1:26:10 GMT -5
Ok, so this is one I thought would never see the day as a movie or tv series, but it looks like Brian Taylor (of Crank and Happy) is set to adapt Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea's Illuminatus! trilogy as a TV series. Personally I think the announcement is just part of OMF... -M |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Dec 19, 2019 14:04:21 GMT -5
Spoilers ahead for the BBC's War of the World series ahead!!!!!! I just watched episode 1 of the BBC's new version of H.G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds". I only read the book a few months ago, so I definitely wanted to check out this BBC adaptation. Overall, I thought the first episode was pretty reasonable sci-fi entertainment. I liked the fact that, for once, the story was set in the correct geographical location and almost the right era (Edwardian, rather than Victorian). Visually it mostly looked great, although some of the CGI special effects looked a little cheap to me (like you'd see in a modern episode of Doctor Who). Perhaps inevitably there was a lot of new, romantic drama and fleshing out of characters inserted into the story. For example, the book's unnamed narrator now has a name (George), only it's his wife, Amy, who is now the story's narrator -- except that she's not his wife in this version, but a lover with whom he is living in sin, being as he's still married to his cousin. They've also massively expanded Amy's roll in things, which is understandable, given that the book is entirely dominated by male characters. The BBC clearly wanted this to be part Edwardian sci-fi apocalypse, part Sunday night romantic period drama. Unfortunately, there were a few annoying instances of anachronistic 21st Century-style dialogue and modern-day "woke" subtext creeping in, which I found a little jarring for a drama set in this era. Nevertheless, I thought it was pretty enjoyable overall, without it ever being quite as good as I'd hoped it would be. This adaptation certainly "feels" respectful to the source material, even though it plays fairly fast and loose with the events of the book on occasion. Still, that's no different to any number of other adaptations of WOTW over the years, I guess. I'll definitely watch episode 2, but it's unlikely to replace the old 1950's movie version or Jeff Wayne's Musical Version Of War Of The Worlds as my go-to adaptations. My wife and I watched the final episode yesterday and I felt it was a little lacking. It was more focused on the handful of main characters than on the large scale events surrounding the martian invasion, and alas the main characters proved not to be that interesting (apart from the stiff-collared brother who turned out to be quite a decent chap). The ending had me puzzled, too. While it was a nice twist to show that the invasion was actually just the first step in the Marsification of Earth's environment, it's not quite clear what the conclusion of the tale means. It's been a good five years or more since the invasion, judging from little George's apparent age, and nature is clearly overwhelmed by Martian life forms and odd cystals. Our intrepid heroes discover that Martian life is vulnerable to typhoid fever and necrotizing fasciitis, and that the Martian invaders weren't defeated by the courage of the British army but because they ate the flesh of infected humans. Fine. Then they test the bugs on Martian fungi, which promptly dies. Good. But so what? It's been years and years, and that confounded fungus is growing everywhere except on the contaminated soil of graveyards... How is that discovery supposed to help us? Clearly, Martian life is quite able to outcompete indigenous Terran life forms, unless exposed to bacteria that would also kill us. What are we to do, spread typhoid germs all over? Gargle with flesh-eating bacteria? I'd say that our goose is cooked. If that depressing realization was the take-home message, I wish it had been clearer... Because the final shot of a main character looking at a brand new green sprout and seeing a bit of sunshine above really felt like some sort of optimistic message, which would be totally unwarranted if we consider the facts. |
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,202
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Post by Confessor on Dec 19, 2019 20:50:55 GMT -5
Spoilers ahead for the BBC's War of the World series ahead!!!!!! I just watched episode 1 of the BBC's new version of H.G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds". I only read the book a few months ago, so I definitely wanted to check out this BBC adaptation. Overall, I thought the first episode was pretty reasonable sci-fi entertainment. I liked the fact that, for once, the story was set in the correct geographical location and almost the right era (Edwardian, rather than Victorian). Visually it mostly looked great, although some of the CGI special effects looked a little cheap to me (like you'd see in a modern episode of Doctor Who). Perhaps inevitably there was a lot of new, romantic drama and fleshing out of characters inserted into the story. For example, the book's unnamed narrator now has a name (George), only it's his wife, Amy, who is now the story's narrator -- except that she's not his wife in this version, but a lover with whom he is living in sin, being as he's still married to his cousin. They've also massively expanded Amy's roll in things, which is understandable, given that the book is entirely dominated by male characters. The BBC clearly wanted this to be part Edwardian sci-fi apocalypse, part Sunday night romantic period drama. Unfortunately, there were a few annoying instances of anachronistic 21st Century-style dialogue and modern-day "woke" subtext creeping in, which I found a little jarring for a drama set in this era. Nevertheless, I thought it was pretty enjoyable overall, without it ever being quite as good as I'd hoped it would be. This adaptation certainly "feels" respectful to the source material, even though it plays fairly fast and loose with the events of the book on occasion. Still, that's no different to any number of other adaptations of WOTW over the years, I guess. I'll definitely watch episode 2, but it's unlikely to replace the old 1950's movie version or Jeff Wayne's Musical Version Of War Of The Worlds as my go-to adaptations. My wife and I watched the final episode yesterday and I felt it was a little lacking. It was more focused on the handful of main characters than on the large scale events surrounding the martian invasion, and alas the main characters proved not to be that interesting (apart from the stiff-collared brother who turned out to be quite a decent chap). The ending had me puzzled, too. While it was a nice twist to show that the invasion was actually just the first step in the Marsification of Earth's environment, it's not quite clear what the conclusion of the tale means. It's been a good five years or more since the invasion, judging from little George's apparent age, and nature is clearly overwhelmed by Martian life forms and odd cystals. Our intrepid heroes discover that Martian life is vulnerable to typhoid fever and necrotizing fasciitis, and that the Martian invaders weren't defeated by the courage of the British army but because they ate the flesh of infected humans. Fine. Then they test the bugs on Martian fungi, which promptly dies. Good. But so what? It's been years and years, and that confounded fungus is growing everywhere except on the contaminated soil of graveyards... How is that discovery supposed to help us? Clearly, Martian life is quite able to outcompete indigenous Terran life forms, unless exposed to bacteria that would also kill us. What are we to do, spread typhoid germs all over? Gargle with flesh-eating bacteria? I'd say that our goose is cooked. If that depressing realization was the take-home message, I wish it had been clearer... Because the final shot of a main character looking at a brand new green sprout and seeing a bit of sunshine above really felt like some sort of optimistic message, which would be totally unwarranted if we consider the facts. Following my somewhat upbeat review of episode 1, I felt that this series went further and further downhill throughout episodes 2 and 3. In fact, I have to be honest, I turned it off mid-way through episode 3 in disgust. So, I never actually saw the end. I agree that the idea that the Martian invasion was just step one in the "Mars-ification" of Earth was a neat idea, but that wasn't enough to save the show for me. Despite initially being pleased at the adaptation's somewhat similar setting to the book (Edwardian, rather than Victorian), it deviated too far away from the novel for my tastes -- missing some great moments in the process. It also shoved far too much "woke" 21st century subtext down our throats for the Edwardian setting to be entirely believable. Love wasn't love, and black lives didn't matter in Edwardian England, I'm afraid. I would've very much liked a little more era-appropriate dialogue and authenticity, rather than the thinly-veiled mocking of those silly, prejudiced and unenlightened Edwardians. On a related matter, there was too much ham-fisted criticism of British colonialism too; yes, I know that H.G. Wells' book functions as a warning against the perils of imperialism, but Wells was a much better writer than the hack (or hacks) who scripted this monstrosity and, thus, didn't feel the need to bludgeon the audience over the head with it. Ultimately though, the thing that really broke my will to watch this mini-series until the end was the boring pace of the thing, and the fact that it was populated by such thoroughly unlikable, condescending and/or pathetic human charcacters. Honestly, I was sort of rooting for the Martians! What looked so promising in the trailers just turned into a major let down for me. Everyone I've spoken to over here felt the same way, and I've seen lots of criticism of it on the British TV and classic sci-fi groups I follow on Facebook. It was a real dud, unfortunately. |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Dec 20, 2019 5:57:54 GMT -5
Spoilers ahead for the BBC's War of the World series ahead!!!!!! My wife and I watched the final episode yesterday and I felt it was a little lacking. It was more focused on the handful of main characters than on the large scale events surrounding the martian invasion, and alas the main characters proved not to be that interesting (apart from the stiff-collared brother who turned out to be quite a decent chap). The ending had me puzzled, too. While it was a nice twist to show that the invasion was actually just the first step in the Marsification of Earth's environment, it's not quite clear what the conclusion of the tale means. It's been a good five years or more since the invasion, judging from little George's apparent age, and nature is clearly overwhelmed by Martian life forms and odd cystals. Our intrepid heroes discover that Martian life is vulnerable to typhoid fever and necrotizing fasciitis, and that the Martian invaders weren't defeated by the courage of the British army but because they ate the flesh of infected humans. Fine. Then they test the bugs on Martian fungi, which promptly dies. Good. But so what? It's been years and years, and that confounded fungus is growing everywhere except on the contaminated soil of graveyards... How is that discovery supposed to help us? Clearly, Martian life is quite able to outcompete indigenous Terran life forms, unless exposed to bacteria that would also kill us. What are we to do, spread typhoid germs all over? Gargle with flesh-eating bacteria? I'd say that our goose is cooked. If that depressing realization was the take-home message, I wish it had been clearer... Because the final shot of a main character looking at a brand new green sprout and seeing a bit of sunshine above really felt like some sort of optimistic message, which would be totally unwarranted if we consider the facts. Following my somewhat upbeat review of episode 1, I felt that this series went further and further downhill throughout episodes 2 and 3. In fact, I have to be honest, I turned it off mid-way through episode 3 in disgust. So, I never actually saw the end. I agree that the idea that the Martian invasion was just step one in the "Mars-ification" of Earth was a neat idea, but that wasn't enough to save the show for me. Despite initially being pleased at the adaptation's somewhat similar setting to the book (Edwardian, rather than Victorian), it deviated too far away from the novel for my tastes -- missing some great moments in the process. It also shoved far too much "woke" 21st century subtext down our throats for the Edwardian setting to be entirely believable. Love wasn't love, and black lives didn't matter in Edwardian England, I'm afraid. I would've very much liked a little more era-appropriate dialogue and authenticity, rather than the thinly-veiled mocking of those silly, prejudiced and unenlightened Edwardians. On a related matter, there was too much ham-fisted criticism of British colonialism too; yes, I know that H.G. Wells' book functions as a warning against the perils of imperialism, but Wells was a much better writer than the hack (or hacks) who scripted this monstrosity and, thus, didn't feel the need to bludgeon the audience over the head with it. Ultimately though, the thing that really broke my will to watch this mini-series until the end was the boring pace of the thing, and the fact that it was populated by such thoroughly unlikable, condescending and/or pathetic human charcacters. Honestly, I was sort of rooting for the Martians! What looked so promising in the trailers just turned into a major let down for me. Everyone I've spoken to over here felt the same way, and I've seen lots of criticism of it on the British TV and classic sci-fi groups I follow on Facebook. It was a real dud, unfortunately. Very true. What saved the show in that regard, in my opinion, is that the character meant to be the modern and enlightened one was self-serving, inefficient, and a bit of a coward, while his prudish and stiff brother proved to be brave, energetic and far more sensible... and, in the end, not as intolerant as all that! I doubt that was done on purpose, but we did see that when facing an alien invasion, no amount of culturally sensitive self-molestation is going to be as useful as helping build another petrol bomb. It was like seeing a teenager who’s found a pet social cause blaming his dad for being a bourgeois exploiter of the people, while enjoying the free food and high speed internet. |
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