The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???

[Hildegard]

13 hours ago, bugarup said:

Oh, it will suck.  And I bet my hat it'll gloss over how all Silmarillion's elves were arrogant, insufferable, condescending supremacists.  

I hope they will focus the show on a gay elf and a vegan dwarf, to show their struggles in every day middle-earth so we as viewers learn more about diversity and tolerance in real life.

[HoonDing]

[InsaneCommander]

I was thinking about The Expanse season 6 and unless I didn't pay enough attention,

(big spoilers)
 

Spoiler

they didn't explain why the Belters ended up so well. In the books it's openly stated that most people on Earth were going to die and that only changed with Prax's magic bacteria (or whatever it was) that would thrive near to nuclear reactors, feeding off the radiation and then be used as food. Still, 15 billion people died and Earth was in no condition to remain as a superpower. Mars faced a massive exodus and lost a lot of power too.

Was any of that clear to non book readers?

 

[Zoraptor]

Kind of?

S6 spoilers for anyone lagging, no book spoilers though as I haven't read them
 

Spoiler

If you have meta knowledge of 'nuclear' winter type scenarios, supply chains and global warming etc you'd get the idea that Earth is pretty borked even though it wasn't really shown*. If you lacked that knowledge/ didn't think about it and only went with what was actually seen and said you'd likely think it was relatively minor.

I guess due to the short season they barely mentioned effects on Mars at all. You can infer a lot- the ring gates largely remove Mars' raison d'être as a terraforming site, they lost a big chunk of their elites and navy to defection and fighting, etc- but again if you went by what was shown you would think they weren't too badly effected even though most of those effects were at least mentioned in passing.

The issue of the Belters doing well is also a bit unclear. The distinct impression is that there was a decent amount of internecine fighting and direct losses- eg Dawes vs Inaros, the station that defected from Inaros late in the piece, the station destroyed by Earth, all the shipping losses from battles and raiding- which would not have left them in a particularly good situation either, especially since there are still Inaros loyalists specifically mentioned as active combatants at the end. Logically, they should be least effected psychologically and practically- but again that wasn't really shown either.

I'd say that the impression of Drummer getting the Transport Union job was that Holden did it to make sure that there would be no return to status quo ante and to right a historic wrong rather than because the Belters were in an inherently strong position. If anything, the conversations around that implied that the Belters were still in a weak position and felt that they could/ would be strongarmed by Mars andor Earth. The solution was kind of unnecessarily convoluted though, I would have thought that simply abolishing majority decisions for consensus ones (ie institute a veto) would have worked fine as well. There wasn't really anything stopping Mars and Earth from tearing up the agreement anyway, if they wanted to, after Holden's shenanigans

*One of the problems is that the areas we actually saw weren't obviously effected, for what is now normal. The northern US where Amos/ Clarissa were in S5 regularly gets snow, and for being fairly close- well, ~600km, but still- to a direct impact site Baltimore seemed to be in decent shape. And the Med farm shown in Ep1(?) of S6 could easily have snow on it as it as the climate is now depending on where it was. Of course, you'd expect The Expanse's Earth to be warmer and if observant noticed the tidal barriers around New York showing that it is, but if you didn't...

 

[InsaneCommander]

36 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

Kind of?

S6 spoilers for anyone lagging, no book spoilers though as I haven't read them
 

  Hide contents

If you have meta knowledge of 'nuclear' winter type scenarios, supply chains and global warming etc you'd get the idea that Earth is pretty borked even though it wasn't really shown*. If you lacked that knowledge/ didn't think about it and only went with what was actually seen and said you'd likely think it was relatively minor.

I guess due to the short season they barely mentioned effects on Mars at all. You can infer a lot- the ring gates largely remove Mars' raison d'être as a terraforming site, they lost a big chunk of their elites and navy to defection and fighting, etc- but again if you went by what was shown you would think they weren't too badly effected even though most of those effects were at least mentioned in passing.

The issue of the Belters doing well is also a bit unclear. The distinct impression is that there was a decent amount of internecine fighting and direct losses- eg Dawes vs Inaros, the station that defected from Inaros late in the piece, the station destroyed by Earth, all the shipping losses from battles and raiding- which would not have left them in a particularly good situation either, especially since there are still Inaros loyalists specifically mentioned as active combatants at the end. Logically, they should be least effected psychologically and practically- but again that wasn't really shown either.

I'd say that the impression of Drummer getting the Transport Union job was that Holden did it to make sure that there would be no return to status quo ante and to right a historic wrong rather than because the Belters were in an inherently strong position. If anything, the conversations around that implied that the Belters were still in a weak position and felt that they could/ would be strongarmed by Mars andor Earth. The solution was kind of unnecessarily convoluted though, I would have thought that simply abolishing majority decisions for consensus ones (ie institute a veto) would have worked fine as well. There wasn't really anything stopping Mars and Earth from tearing up the agreement anyway, if they wanted to, after Holden's shenanigans

*One of the problems is that the areas we actually saw weren't obviously effected, for what is now normal. The northern US where Amos/ Clarissa were in S5 regularly gets snow, and for being fairly close- well, ~600km, but still- to a direct impact site Baltimore seemed to be in decent shape. And the Med farm shown in Ep1(?) of S6 could easily have snow on it as it as the climate is now depending on where it was. Of course, you'd expect The Expanse's Earth to be warmer and if observant noticed the tidal barriers around New York showing that it is, but if you didn't...

 

Exactly. They really should have shown those things. I understand they didn't have much time and greatly reduced things like Prax's appearance but the situation we are talking about is too important to leave it so vague.

Just to clarify, I didn't say
 

Spoiler

the Belters were in a strong position, but that they ended up in such place.

Minor spoilers for the beginning of book 7 (just clarifying what it meant for them to control the Trade Union):

Spoiler

They have the monopoly of all intersystem trade. After a time jump, they have constructed/are constructing stations on each system and get paid really well for it. They also decide which ships can move through the gates and are responsible for avoiding any events with the ring entities. Whatever trouble Earth and Mars caused to them, it didn't stop their becoming the main power.

Notice that in the books they didn't fool Avasarala. She accepted Michio after Holden suggested she had all the qualities Avasarala mentioned (having worked for all factions, being kind of neutral... not that she really was all of that, since she was much more of an accomplice of Marco than Drummer was in the show).

 

[Lexx]

I mean, they did show mars' effects in season 5 more extensively. There was Bobby's arc, and Alex seeing it as well. I don't think it was necessary to go over it again in season 6. We got earth in the beginning of s6 now, which was lacking a lot in s5 (Amos' arc was supposed to show that, but imo it didn't really work well).

My problem with the "tricking" at the end of s6 is that this was a *huge* gamble... just to even get into that position. It made for a better show, but the "realism" went a bit stray there, I'd say. However, I still think it's good the way it is.

Probably going to binge-watch s6 again this weekend, now that it is completed.

Edited January 21, 2022 by Lexx

[BruceVC]

I started watching the latest season of Ozark on Netflix, its really good like previous seasons 

[Malcador]

Found Space Above and Beyond on Youtube, still a watchable show, even if the references to the Pacific theater in WW2 are not subtle, heh.  And the protagonist squadron being the only competent people (at least until the ending..).  Forgot how literally dark the show is, too.

[Amentep]

 

 

[LadyCrimson]

Over the weekend I tried watching some cheap straight-to-Netflix romantic movie called The Royal Treatment. I suppose it had some moments (very brief ones) but yeah that was even more insipid then typical low-rent US romance. Zzzz.

Last night I noticed the fantasy/horror k-drama Bulgasal: Immortal Souls only had two episodes left "to air" so I thought I'd start on that. Halfway through the first episode I was liking it a fair bit (tons of background set up, this will be modern-day but with ancient-times flashbacks). Fairly violent. Past lives. Cursed ppl. Blah blah. Anyway, seems like something I'd like but then ... I fell asleep before the end of the 1st episode. It's just something that happens to me more often now. Will watch more later this week. I liked the attention to detail and setup, at least.

[Amentep]

TNG: Inheritence

Data meets Juliana Tainer, former wife of Dr. Soong

Spoiler

• If Tainer felt guilty because she convinced Soong to leave Data, why didn't she show it until it was time in the script for her to express guilt?  Up until that point she'd shown no mixed emotions at meeting with Data again.
• Since Data makes the jump effortlessly, why does he force Tainer to jump with him (which injures her settling the 'is she a robot debate), rather than pick her up and jump with her to protect her?  Is it solely to force a solution to whether she's a robot that he only suspects?  What if she'd been human and he'd been wrong?  It doesn't seem a very Data thing to do to risk that since he didn't have conclusive proof and being wrong meant death.
• Why was Tainer's husband dropping all the side-eye on Data?  Had he watched a lot of Terminator re-runs over the years?
• Why did Tainer expect Data to have more emotional knowledge when she talked with him?  If its because she expects him to have the emotion chip, why didn't Data tell her that he didn't have it?  Since she helped Soong, could she have recreated it?
• For that matter, why don't they discuss at all the return and death of Lore?
• If Tainer is programed to shut down if the fact that she is a robot is revealed to her, then why does VR Soong believe that Data COULD tell her that she's a robot and not have the program kick in to protect her?  The dilemma of the choice seems false as it was set up.
• The writers want us to believe the point of the episode is Data's choice at the end, but the real point seems to be about whether a mother could love an artificial son which seems to be a more universal concept, but one that is never settled by the episode in lieu of a false dramatic choice.
• Another dramatic episode of TNG where the drama only works because the cast is good, not because the drama is.

 

[majestic]

How's Discovery going for you?

[ShadySands]

Keep all these Data episodes in mind if you ever decide to watch Picard

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

16 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

Keep all these Data episodes in mind if you ever decide to watch Picard

Do they explain the reapers that appear?

[majestic]

16 minutes ago, KP on top of ZA WARUDO said:

Do they explain the reapers that appear?

Organics made them to stop organics from making more synthetics that would inevitably wipe out all organics.

No, wait, wrong franchise. Sorry.

No, there is no explanation. Mecha-Cthulhu and its tentacles just hover somewhere in space, waiting for synthetics to make the call to come and free them from organic oppression.

Edited January 25, 2022 by majestic

[Amentep]

2 hours ago, majestic said:

How's Discovery going for you?

I haven't been able to watch as many episodes (too many other time commitments).  I got to watch "Into the Forest I Go" two weeks ago.  Overall, there's a lot of pointless changes the show has made to the ST universe, but accepting DISC for what it is rather than what it is not, I thought this was a fairly fun episode.

That said, I can't help but feel its kind of like a game of telephone with this series, if TNG is an echo of TOS, then DISC is an echo of TNG.  I do think it suffers from (a) too much Star Wars influence because the writers really, really, really hate the structure of Starfleet and want someone to jump onto the Millennium Falcon or Slave 1 and go do badass things without regard to command or structure and (b) not really being sure whether the series is about Burnham (so it should focus on her as a solo character) or if its like the other shows and focused on the crew of the Discovery in general (of which Burnham is one).  This has made it so that she is weirdly involved in a lot of things (because the story is about her) without those things seeming to have real meaning (because the story is about the whole crew, and they need to do important stuff too).  

2 hours ago, ShadySands said:

Keep all these Data episodes in mind if you ever decide to watch Picard

Do I have to?  I'm pretty sure the writers of TNG didn't always remember the previous Data episodes...

[ShadySands]

1 minute ago, Amentep said:

Do I have to?  I'm pretty sure the writers of TNG didn't always remember the previous Data episodes...

They didn't but it gets so so much worse

[majestic]

5 minutes ago, Amentep said:

or if its like the other shows and focused on the crew of the Discovery in general (of which Burnham is one).

Name the bridge crew, please.

Spoiler

This is a trick question. They don't have names yet. Spoiler: That's the sort of character development you'll get in season 2, assuming you stick with it!

 

9 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

They didn't but it gets so so much worse

Fun discussion topic time. Order nuTrek by level of terribadness.

Picard >> Discovery S4 > Discovery S2 > Discovery S3 > Into Derpness = Star Trek: Beyond Bad = Discovery S1 > Star Trek 2009 > being waterboarded.

First place is pretty cemented, regardless of how bad Discovery season four is going to get. That can't be beaten. Nope.

 

[Amentep]

19 minutes ago, majestic said:

Name the bridge crew, please.

  Hide contents

This is a trick question. They don't have names yet. Spoiler: That's the sort of character development you'll get in season 2, assuming you stick with it!

 

Spoiler

Captain Lorca, First Officer Saru, Lt. Tyler (he takes the Chief of Security position according to Lorca's dialogue when he recruits him to replace Commander Landry, which seems to have a spot on the bridge) and Lt. Detmer at helm.  Saru gets named in the first episode, Burnham says Detmer's name when she recognizes she's there when she first goes on the bridge and Tyler introduces himself in prison to Lorca, who introduced himself to Burnham.    

Its possible one or more of the other reocurring Bridge crew for ops/conn/comm got a brief name check, but I don't recall them if they did.  Right now the show seems focused on Burnham, Lorca, Saru, Tyler, Stamets, Culber and Tilly, which makes for a large group even if they aren't all bridge crew.

 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

3 hours ago, majestic said:

Organics made them to stop organics from making more synthetics that would inevitably wipe out all organics.

You know what, Mass Effect really blew it. The Reapers would have worked much better as something incomprehensible instead of a Rogue AI or whatever it was. They teased MechaCthullu and delivered mecha middle manager instead.

Anyways, Archive 81. It was ok, it got less scary when the CGI demon took over and the conspiracy/cult stuff got less obvious.

[Amentep]

7 minutes ago, KP on top of ZA WARUDO said:

You know what, Mass Effect really blew it. The Reapers would have worked much better as something incomprehensible instead of a Rogue AI or whatever it was. They teased MechaCthullu and delivered mecha middle manager instead.

I think Mass Effect had bigger problems than the Reaper motivations.  That said back at the end of ME1 I actually thought, when they had them lurking outside the galaxy waiting, that they were going to be still active remnants of a war between two Galaxies.  I thought they were waiting to slap down whatever got up enough to trigger the machines to think their long dead enemy had returned.  That seemed like it fit the original space opera story type with a nice clean story of derring do to stop the menace that didn't realize it was no longer relevant (and I guess in retrospect, since we're talking about Star Trek, a bit like ST:TOS "The Doomsday Machine").  Then we got space conspiracy theory and space war is hell afterwards...

[majestic]

17 minutes ago, KP on top of ZA WARUDO said:

You know what, Mass Effect really blew it. The Reapers would have worked much better as something incomprehensible instead of a Rogue AI or whatever it was. They teased MechaCthullu and delivered mecha middle manager instead.

Anyways, Archive 81. It was ok, it got less scary when the CGI demon took over and the conspiracy/cult stuff got less obvious.

 

In case you're interested enough after all these years.

[LadyCrimson]

After all these years I'm still wondering if Guinan was, evolutionary speaking, a pre-Q. Or a race with some abilities that could cancel out the Q's abilities in some fashion, like negative vs. positive, and that's why Q was so wary of her. Or maybe it was just Guinan alone vs. her entire species.

Apparently I'm not the only one who's wondered about that.

 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

58 minutes ago, Amentep said:

I think Mass Effect had bigger problems than the Reaper motivations.  That said back at the end of ME1 I actually thought, when they had them lurking outside the galaxy waiting, that they were going to be still active remnants of a war between two Galaxies.  I thought they were waiting to slap down whatever got up enough to trigger the machines to think their long dead enemy had returned.  That seemed like it fit the original space opera story type with a nice clean story of derring do to stop the menace that didn't realize it was no longer relevant (and I guess in retrospect, since we're talking about Star Trek, a bit like ST:TOS "The Doomsday Machine").  Then we got space conspiracy theory and space war is hell afterwards...

Oh yeah definitely, in a lot of ways it is like the new SW trilogy in that they probably didn't plan ahead and just winged it as they went along. Still, the Reapers stand out for me more for some reason, I guess because MechaCthullu would be cool.

1 hour ago, majestic said:

 

In case you're interested enough after all these years.

Not enough to watch a 40 minute video.  

Yes that's an orangutan, the emojis around here are weird. At least he isn't smoking or wearing a captain's hat.

 

[Amentep]

1 hour ago, LadyCrimson said:

After all these years I'm still wondering if Guinan was, evolutionary speaking, a pre-Q. Or a race with some abilities that could cancel out the Q's abilities in some fashion, like negative vs. positive, and that's why Q was so wary of her. Or maybe it was just Guinan alone vs. her entire species.

Apparently I'm not the only one who's wondered about that.

After Generations, I always assumed it had to do with the Nexus.  My thinking is the Nexus may be immune to Q's powers*, which makes someone whose partially here and partially in the Nexus a big unknown for the Q.  He recognizes her as being something other than she appears and naturally sees that as a threat.

*I think there's a non-cannon book that has Q claiming he created the Nexus, but I don't really buy that and Q probably claims credit for everything anyhow.