The TV and Streaming Thread: Series 5

[Keyrock]

4 minutes ago, KP the meanie zucchini said:

But then I'd have to watch 1 and 2.

I don't hate season 1 as much as most people. There are some epidodes that feel quite a bit like TOS epidodes. If you could erase Wesley, S1 would be decently watchable, but man, Wesley was INSUFFERABLE.

Season 2 has some legitimately good episodes, but there's some garbage to wade through to get to them.

 

[majestic]

9 minutes ago, KP the meanie zucchini said:

A weird thing about Star Trek is how people generally experience classical entertainment (Shakespeare plays, classical music) while modern(ish) and futuristic stuff (from our perspective) doesn't really happen. Off the top of my head, there's Riker's jazz, Tom Paris' 50's fixation, and O'Brian singing Louie Louie. I guess people won't remember the 20th and 21st centuries very well.

Irenicus, his celibacy involuntary. 

Bashir plays a 60ies Bond-style secret agent on DS9, and re-enacts the Battle of Britain with Miles. Other than that, drawing up a bit of a blank. Right, Enterprise has movie nights, but that would require me to acknowledge Enterprise. Which I kind of don't want to.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

9 minutes ago, Keyrock said:

I don't hate season 1 as much as most people. There are some epidodes that feel quite a bit like TOS epidodes. If you could erase Wesley, S1 would be decently watchable, but man, Wesley was INSUFFERABLE.

Season 2 has some legitimately good episodes, but there's some garbage to wade through to get to them.

 

Then you do it for me and I'll watch Neil Breen's 50 hour doc for you.

6 minutes ago, majestic said:

Bashir plays a 60ies Bond-style secret agent on DS9, and re-enacts the Battle of Britain with Miles. Other than that, drawing up a bit of a blank. Right, Enterprise has movie nights, but that would require me to acknowledge Enterprise. Which I kind of don't want to.

Oh yeah, that 50's Vegas guy they have on the holosuite too.

What's Enterprise?

[ShadySands]

19 minutes ago, Keyrock said:

I don't hate season 1 as much as most people. There are some epidodes that feel quite a bit like TOS epidodes. If you could erase Wesley, S1 would be decently watchable, but man, Wesley was INSUFFERABLE.

Season 2 has some legitimately good episodes, but there's some garbage to wade through to get to them.

 

I'm in the same boat as I really don't mind the "bad" seasons of Star Trek shows. Part of why it bugs me so much that I can't get into nuTrek, I'm really not that picky.

[Keyrock]

35 minutes ago, KP the meanie zucchini said:

Then you do it for me and I'll watch Neil Breen's 50 hour doc for you.

I'd take you up on that offer.

 

[Amentep]

2 hours ago, Keyrock said:

I don't hate season 1 as much as most people. There are some epidodes that feel quite a bit like TOS epidodes. If you could erase Wesley, S1 would be decently watchable, but man, Wesley was INSUFFERABLE.

Season 2 has some legitimately good episodes, but there's some garbage to wade through to get to them.

 

It's funny, I was prepared for him (from memory) to be awful and he was more just there than anything else.

In a too large cast that left many with nothing to do, Wesley had the least to do. And when he did have something to do, it was often him being the stupidest smart person, but it was more dumb than annoying this time around for me.

But seriously, why did the show think they needed 9 series regulars on TNG? Sure TOS had a lot of named reoccuring characters, but they often had little more to do than fiddle with their dials and buttons in the background until the series rotated them into a major role in an episode with the main 3.

[Gromnir]

19 minutes ago, Amentep said:

It's funny, I was prepared for him (from memory) to be awful and he was more just there than anything else.

In a too large cast that left many with nothing to do, Wesley had the least to do. And when he did have something to do, it was often him being the stupidest smart person, but it was more dumb than annoying this time around for me.

But seriously, why did the show think they needed 9 series regulars on TNG? Sure TOS had a lot of named reoccuring characters, but they often had little more to do than fiddle with their dials and buttons in the background until the series rotated them into a major role in an episode with the main 3.

lieutenant barclay grew more as a person than any cast regular. took how many seasons and the finale for picard to join the card game? required a locutus plot to force stoic picard to face personal conflict. once roddenberry were gone a few o' the female characters got better writing. even so, data, who appeared to be designed specific for growth, changed little. have a non fan watch a rando season two episode then a season seven episode and then tell you which were the matured data. 

nine regulars were needed so they could rotate character focus to keep the show from seeming staleness.

HA! Good Fun! 

ps sounds like am slamming tng. ain't true. as we noted, some o' our all-time favorite tv were tng, but the writers o' tng faced serious self-imposed obstacles. they nevertheless managed to somehow come up with new material for years, squeezing everything possible outta an episodic format w/o the possibility o' real character growth from the main cast. we can't imagine trying such today. 

Edited July 27, 2021 by Gromnir

[Amentep]

10 hours ago, Gromnir said:

nine regulars were needed so they could rotate character focus to keep the show from seeming staleness.

I guess what I'm pondering is this:

TOS had three main regulars (Kirk, McCoy, Spock), 2 frequent reoccurring (Uhura, Scotty) and the rest used as needed (Sulu, Chekov, Chapel, Yeoman Rand, Riley, Harrison).  Plans had been made to expand Sulu so he'd probably have been the 3rd frequent reoccurring, but it got scuttled by Takei's role in GREEN BERETS and the studio wanting to add a youth character that became Chekov.

There's not much to go on, but The Cage seems to set up three main regulars (Pike, Number 1, Spock), and at least 1 frequent reoccurring (Dr. Boyce).

Phase II would have had three main regulars (Deckard, Ilia, Xon), 3 frequent reoccurring (Uhura, Scotty, Bones) and the rest used as needed (Sulu, Chekov, and Chapel(?)) plus a big unknown in Kirk (who could have been a series main regular or a guest star admiral a couple of times a season).

When we get to TNG, you'd think based on the way they're set up, they'd have 3 regulars (Picard, Riker, Troi), 3 frequent reoccurring (Data, Yar, Crusher) and the rest (Wesley, Worf, Geordi, the Engineering guy who appeared in a few episodes of the first season, the secondary doctor).  What they do though is set up a large ensemble show cast (like, say L.A. Law that started the year before TNG) but don't change the structure of the stories to match the idea of an ensemble cast, instead sticking with TOS style one or two episode stories that are self-contained.

This gets you things like Yar and Worf having the same role in stories, Wesley and Data competing for some stories, Geordi having little to do, and early on what seems to be an indecision as to who was Picard's confidant (Crusher or Troi).   When re-watching the show, it struck me that it felt like there were too many characters fighting for screentime.

From a production standpoint, we know Picard-Riker-Troi is modeled after the idea they had for Kirk-Deckard-Ilia, but Troi gets marginalized a lot throughout the series (partially due to her role on the ship being ill-defined, I think).  Denise Crosby leaving allowed them to restructure the cast so that everyone had a better role (Geordi goes to Engineering, Worf no longer competes for stories, Wesley gets the former Geordi role, some of the minor reoccurring characters get jetisoned).  It just makes me wonder why they went with the large regular cast and then so poorly use them in the first season.  And why did they not have a regular in Engineering? You'd think the utilitarian role Scotty had played for TOS would have made them realize they needed a regular character there.

[Keyrock]

I wonder why they never followed through with the Picard and Dr. Crusher romance angle? They were clearly shipping them early on, then it was completely forgotten for 4 or 5 seasons, then near the end somebody seemed to remember that they were supposed to have feelings for each other and they paid lip service to it in an episode or two in season 6 or 7 and that's pretty much all we got.

[Amentep]

Well they also couldn't decide if Riker and Troi were:

1. Rekindling their romance
2. not rekindling their romance and okay with them finding happiness with someone else
3. not rekindling their romance but interfering in each other's new relationships for various reasons

 

[Keyrock]

I think both Riker and Troi are interesting cases.

Riker was clearly a back up plan in case audiences rejected Picard and wanted someone more like Kirk as the lead. Once it was obvious Picard was a success, Riker got sort of shuffled back into more of a background character.

Troi was a character the show had to, somewhat regularly, make disappear because otherwise she would instantly resolve the situation given her empath abilities. So writers had to come up with reasons she couldn't be around to deal with the A story by putting her in a B story or just ignoring her.

[Amentep]

Yeah, they didn't have a clear role for Riker I think once Picard could be diplomat and man of action.

And yeah, its obvious several times that Troi is absent because her abilities would render the conflict moot (or, something had to cause her powers not to work if she was there).

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Amentep said:

I guess what I'm pondering is this:

 

When we get to TNG, you'd think based on the way they're set up, they'd have 3 regulars (Picard, Riker, Troi), 3 frequent reoccurring (Data, Yar, Crusher) and the rest (Wesley, Worf, Geordi, the Engineering guy who appeared in a few episodes of the first season, the secondary doctor).  What they do though is set up a large ensemble show cast (like, say L.A. Law that started the year before TNG) but don't change the structure of the stories to match the idea of an ensemble cast, instead sticking with TOS style one or two episode stories that are self-contained.

 

la law? well, tng had drumhead, and even got gene freaking simmons to guest for it.

'course the genuine star o' that show were the vision o' the future. tng (especial initial) were, even more than tos, less 'bout characters and more 'bout imagination stretching stories; outer limits stuff but with a regular cast. data didn't develop as a character were not a problem for roddenberry 'cause his real contribution were bringing assimov's positronic brain material to trek. the idea of data were more important than the character. who were the star o' wet soil if not the crystalline whatsitz? don't even get us started on 11001001. as such is no surprise tng remained dedicated episodic for the first couple seasons while gene's health remained good enough for him to maintain day-to-day control. 

'course the problem is writers and actors and fans no doubt saw different than roddenberry and season 1 helped make obvious a bunch o' ciphers for a cast were not the best approach. 

HA! Good Fun!

[LadyCrimson]

Reading the current posts, I realize I got the title of that Willis movie wrong, earlier.  It's actually Cosmic Sin, not Cosmic String.  Not that it's important or anything.  I just hate it when I type-brain-fart like that. 

TV wise, I've been sifting through some various K-drama's that have been in my list a long time, watching a few episodes to decide if it should remain in my list. And a lot of documentary series/films, mostly environment/food-diet and ... uh ... cat ones. Of course cat ones.

[Guard Dog]

Picard gets 3 more seasons

The mediocrity will continue. Resistance is futile.

[Bartimaeus]

If Mike and Rich were still watching it to torture themselves purely for my entertainment, I'd be celebrating right now, but sadly they gave up and so now I'm mad they'd greenlight such a large amount of flaming crap all at once, .

[Lexx]

Damn, they aren't doing it anymore? This was the only way I could experience the Picard ending and the other seasons of STD.

[majestic]

6 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

If Mike and Rich were still watching it to torture themselves purely for my entertainment, I'd be celebrating right now, but sadly they gave up and so now I'm mad they'd greenlight such a large amount of flaming crap all at once, .

I'm still surprised they followed through with Discovery and did not do anything on season three.

Mostly because its just financially unsound to not do anything on it - or Mandalorian season two -  and as much as we like them, at the end of the day Mike still runs a business. That's like automatic clicks by the alienated Star Trek fanbase.

Guess going on Patreon really paid off for them. 

[Amentep]

TV series sequel to Waterworld being developed.

[Gfted1]

I might be the only one on the planet that didnt hate the movie so Ill give it a looksee.

[Amentep]

I watched it for the first time a couple of months ago and enjoyed it. I think the end was kind of sloppy, but it was a perfectly acceptable action film of its time.

I hear it's amassed a following of fans in the years since it opened. 

[Zoraptor]

I got the impression that the overwhelming reaction to Waterworld at the time was one of indifference rather than hate- a decent amount of schadenfreude from its cost overruns, but even that was mostly passive "they spent that amount of money, on that?" type stuff rather than active dislike.

(Maybe I'm biased since I'm sure I've seen it on TV, but can barely remember a single thing about it including whether I liked it or not. Guess it must have been at least OK if I watched it to the end though)

[Gromnir]

only saw 'bout 20 minutes o' waterworld. seemed like a curious roadwarrior remake, but with the cha-ka kid robbed o' the razor boomerang now playing the role o' the chosen one and instead o' a desert post apoc wasteland, there were jet skis? am typical liking dennis hopper over-the-top performances, but from what little we saw, he were no humungus.  

HA! Good Fun!

[Lexx]

IMO the film came out too late. The time of end time movies was ... ending. Same with Postman, which is actually a pretty good movie (except for the last chapter, which is just terrible american patriotism that makes me want to vomit). Nowadays these movies have gained in popularity again. The old hate seems to be forgotten and now people see them as the movies they are. At least worth a watch.

I'm curious about a waterworld tv show, but I fear they would throw in too much useless drama and half the story will be set on land in a small forest, because everything else would be too expensive.

Edited July 30, 2021 by Lexx

[Gromnir]

47 minutes ago, Lexx said:

IMO the film came out too late. The time of end time movies was ... ending. Same with Postman, which is actually a pretty good movie (except for the last chapter, which is just terrible american patriotism that makes me want to vomit).

best we can say o' postman is it is our favorite tom petty movie.

HA! Good Fun!