The TV and Streaming Thread: Summer Reruns

[Lexx]

Quotes got so bad they had to bring back the best Doc? The problem is just that the issue wasn't really the actors, but the dogpoop writing.

[majestic]

^ Ratings or shares, people are going to wonder what 'quotes' is supposed to mean in context (Quote = German word for rating, share, proportion, quota).

Not very fond of retroactively ruining the finale with David Tennant's Doctor, but I'll tune in regardless.

9 minutes ago, Lexx said:

The problem is just that the issue wasn't really the actors, but the dogpoop writing.

Yeah, still not really over Clara.

[InsaneCommander]

House of the Dragon 10

Not a bad episode, but I wanted more.

They finally talked about the number of dragons:
 

Spoiler

Rhaenyra's side has 7 with riders (including one for the young Joffrey), 3 that have not been claimed and 3 wild dragons in their territory. Aegon's side has 3 adults and one more. But Aemond has the biggest one. So 21 in total, plus any that are too young and who knows how many eggs.

Considering what happened in the end, Aemond's dragon will have to bite several more to even the odds.

 

[Lexx]

Tested this new amazon freevee thingy because there was a show I wanted to see and was like, meh, whatever. First things first: Having 3 blocks of adverts in a 20 minute episode is an absolute pain in the butt, even if those blocks are only 1 1/2 minute. After a while those feel like 5 minutes and I just wanted to die. Especially since I always saw the exact same ads.

However, seems there is some sort of timeout or limit for how often a spot plays, because after like 3 or 4 hours I stopped getting adverts. So I swapped over to Bosch: Legacy and in 3 50 minute episodes I had 1 advert break of 30 seconds. Yay, I guess.

[Hurlshort]

I've noticed a number of the streaming services are glitchy when it comes to commercials. 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

I frequently get commercials in Spanish on Hulu and YouTube. One of the weirdest was double ads for the same thing with the first being in English and the second being in Spanish. I'm not sure who the algorithms think I am.

[majestic]

2 minutes ago, KP From Another World said:

I frequently get commercials in Spanish on Hulu and YouTube. One of the weirdest was double ads for the same thing with the first being in English and the second being in Spanish. I'm not sure who the algorithms think I am.

Dirty Mexican posing as true, blue Texan.

[ShadySands]

I hate how many commercials I get with my ad free Hulu

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

51 minutes ago, majestic said:

Dirty Mexican posing as true, blue Texan.

You caught me.

10 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I hate how many commercials I get with my ad free Hulu

It seems to be mostly live TV for me. Maybe there is something else as well, but truth be told I only seem to watch Hulu for a handful of things.

[ShadySands]

I think it's their partner networks/shows that puts up ads everywhere. I can't really blame live TV for having ads.

[Lexx]

Haven't watched live tv in probably 10 years now. Usually I'm trying to prevent everything with ads as much as possible. But it's getting really annoying lately that Amazon Prime is showing stuff in front of every movie now. And worst is that it's always the same trailers. Saw the LotR tv show trailer probably 50 times and I got so fed up with it, it made me not want to ever check it out.

Edited October 24, 2022 by Lexx

[majestic]

Why do you not want to check out the bestest show ever made? Am genuinely baffled here. Baffled, I tells ya.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

15 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I think it's their partner networks/shows that puts up ads everywhere. I can't really blame live TV for having ads.

I think the Hulu shows I watch are FX(X) stuff and I haven't seen ads on those for a while. Now that I think about it, I don't really watch too much on Hulu.

4 minutes ago, majestic said:

Why do you not want to check out the bestest show ever made? Am genuinely baffled here. Baffled, I tells ya.

[InsaneCommander]

4 hours ago, majestic said:

Why do you not want to check out the bestest show ever made? Am genuinely baffled here. Baffled, I tells ya.

Somebody doesn't want to watch RoP?!

[majestic]

17 hours ago, InsaneCommander said:

House of the Dragon 10

Not a bad episode, but I wanted more.

They finally talked about the number of dragons:
 

  Reveal hidden contents

Rhaenyra's side has 7 with riders (including one for the young Joffrey), 3 that have not been claimed and 3 wild dragons in their territory. Aegon's side has 3 adults and one more. But Aemond has the biggest one. So 21 in total, plus any that are too young and who knows how many eggs.

Considering what happened in the end, Aemond's dragon will have to bite several more to even the odds.

 

6:41 in and I already want to turn it off after hearing the explanation for last week's super dumb episode end.

Spoiler

"This war was not mine to start."

Seriously? What is it with writeres these days lampshading their terrible writing as if that makes it all right? Oh we know it was bad, look! Look!

With each passing day my disposition creeps ever closer to Will Ferrell's interpretation of Alex Trebek.

[Bartimaeus]

Primal, last 4 episodes of season 1. They went full horror for the three before the finale for some reason: plagues, the undead, witches, an unseen one-punch monster... Well, the witch one was kind of averted because one of the witches wondered why Primal Jack and his dinosaur were so loyal to each other, so she looked into their memories to see that they had lost their families together just like she had and decided to free them from the coven's clutches, but still. Anyways, we got a third character that actually knows how to talk (though not in English)...aaand she's gone (note: no, this is not the aforementioned witch). Man, they got me with that season cliffhanger, and it worked too, because now I want to watch season 2.

Edited October 24, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Hurlshort]

I've been working my way through Stranger Things with my wife. I tried to watch it when it first came out, but it was too scary. I'm putting on a brave face for my wife though. We just started season 3. 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

2 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

I tried to watch it when it first came out, but it was too scary.

 

I don't think Stranger Things is supposed to be horror.

[Hurlshort]

2 hours ago, KP From Another World said:

 

I don't think Stranger Things is supposed to be horror.

A boy my son's age disappears in the first episode and then a girl my daughter's age gets killed in the second episode. What genre do you think that is?

edit: There are a lot of different types of horror movies. I can watch the slapsticky ones like Evil Dead all day long, but when it involves kids, I get more uncomfortable. 

Edited October 25, 2022 by Hurlshort

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

45 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

A boy my son's age disappears in the first episode and then a girl my daughter's age gets killed in the second episode. What genre do you think that is?

edit: There are a lot of different types of horror movies. I can watch the slapsticky ones like Evil Dead all day long, but when it involves kids, I get more uncomfortable. 

Frankly I don't want to dig up examples of children being victimized in fiction, but I think it's not too hard to remember kids getting hurt in genre's outside of horror. So I'll just say that kids being the victims doesn't make something horror so much as horrible.

Just to be upfront, the rona years have destroyed my sense of time and I have not watched the older seasons in a while. Anyways when I think of Stranger Things, including the older seasons, I think far more of 80's action cheese and Sci-Fi shows than of horror. The tone just isn't right to hit horror, for me at least, it feels much more like it's going for wonder that you see in a lot of adventure stuff. Compared to something like Halloween or Alien.... ST just doesn't create an atmosphere of terror and dread that really drives horror. Maybe they try(/tried?) to make the show horror, but I don't really think it accomplishes that.

Now if you want something absolutely terrifying, then It Comes At Night is a sleeper on that front. Especially after the last few years.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Hurlshort said:

A boy my son's age disappears in the first episode and then a girl my daughter's age gets killed in the second episode. What genre do you think that is?

edit: There are a lot of different types of horror movies. I can watch the slapsticky ones like Evil Dead all day long, but when it involves kids, I get more uncomfortable. 

given just how much stranger things is influenced by and indulging overt homage o' 80s horror films, we would suspect we were stuck in the upside down if the duffer brother's tv show didn't qualify as horror.  is one o' those consciously multi-genre shows which arguably is trying to do too much with too many characters; perhaps would have been less messy in subsequent seasons if it had benefited from more focus as 'posed to chasing elusive gestalt. regardless, horror is clear and unambiguous an intentional element.

spoiler from season ... three? wait, no. is now four, yes? the seasons is all kinda merging together for us post season one.

Spoiler

not trying to be horror? serious? 

edgelords gonna edgelord.

HA! Good Fun!

ps am gonna admit there is ambiguous multi-genre media which has us equivocating in regards to horror label. super 8 is an example... and is another messy jj abrams nonsensical ride which we nevertheless didn't hate complete. (kinda makes us feel unclean to need admit we enjoy anything jj abrams, but is actual a couple jj vehicles we found entertaining in spite o' brain freeze levels o' stoopid.) super 8 is another 80s love letter (yes, technical is set 1979) which is embracing horror elements. even the movie the kids is making when the train wreck occurs is a zombie flick, but does it have enough horror to validate a horror label? maybe not for Gromnir, but why should our threshold be the measure?

am not thinking the label matters much in the long run as we have pointed out numerous times how such labels in literature, movies and tv is artificial and kinda pointless save as an advertising tool, but if you wanna argue super 8 is enough horror to be horror, am thinking you got more room for debate than stranger things.

Edited October 25, 2022 by Gromnir

[Lexx]

I'm pretty sure Stranger Things is considered horror. Especially s1, which is still the best one.

The thing with horror is, though, that you usually get desensitized fast, which makes it feel less like horror in later seasons. However, I do think the last season made me feel a bit more again in that direction, so...

Edited October 25, 2022 by Lexx

[bugarup]

First season is horror, what with its Stephen King coating and all, even if it's more horrifying for people with kids than people sans them. The season of kids vs evil Russians is methinks more a homage to "kids vs evil Russians" fad of 80's and the last one with its overdose of hormones and rivers of tears, I don't even know. Some sort of high school rom-com melodrama? 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Barbarians Season 2.

Whatever the shortcomings of the show, I do like seeing colonial powers getting slaughtered so it gets points for that. But it does feel like a backslide in some ways with a massive sequel bait finale. I'll probably watch another season of Romans getting killed if they do another.

9 hours ago, Lexx said:

I'm pretty sure Stranger Things is considered horror. Especially s1, which is still the best one.

The thing with horror is, though, that you usually get desensitized fast, which makes it feel less like horror in later seasons. However, I do think the last season made me feel a bit more again in that direction, so...

I think the problem with ST specifically is the lack of real stakes for the main cast rather than desensitization. Our main group of loveable outcasts don't die, most on screen deaths have been single season (or single episode) characters while the main crew mostly comes out unharmed in their scrapes with the gubbermint, monsters, commies, and proto-fascist lynch mobs. It's just hard to feel scared when you know Hopper is not going to die or that the kids are going to beat the monster with 80's cheese.

Maybe I'm just too far removed from season 1 to remember the horror there, and it works as horror for Hurlshot because it's fresh (and about kids the same age as his), but in retrospect and currently I don't think it works as horror for me because the stakes just aren't there.

[Hurlshort]

I get that a bit. I told my wife from the beginning that there was no way they could afford Samwise Gamgee/Rudy for more than a season. Although I was a bit surprised Paul Reiser avoided a similar fate. But the first season was a lot less clear about the stakes and who was considered a main character.

It has settled into a more comfortable show for me. I just remember turning it off years ago after the 2nd episode because it was upsetting me. I also struggled with The Black Phone recently, but watched it because my wife and daughter wanted to, and I enjoyed it at the end.