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Post by Fenril on May 13, 2014 9:23:09 GMT -5
- Grimm. As we move close to the season ending (well, here we are about four episodes behind) we get one of those weird episodes where the script is pretty good, if only because it's aware how hilarious some of the situations are; the acting is a bit strange, however, in that nobody can seem to make up their minds if they should be playing everything straight or with tongue in cheek.
- Hannibal. So this episode manages to do something that a lot of procedural shows (like Criminal Minds or any CSI show) have been trying to do for years: take what is basically a B-movie concept and play it as a straight police drama. So we have a killer obsessed with Sabertooth tigers, who fashions a mask out of the skull of an actual sabertooth tiger so he can "eat" his victims. And while it's (intentionally) bizarre, it somehow works.
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Post by slayrrr666 on May 13, 2014 10:31:13 GMT -5
2 Broke Girls
Friends with Better Lives
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Post by slayrrr666 on May 20, 2014 10:40:27 GMT -5
2 Broke Girls
Friends with Better Lives
Mom
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Post by Fenril on May 20, 2014 16:06:43 GMT -5
- Grimm. The last episodes before the ending are certainly picking up steam. Remains to be seen what they'll amount to, however.
- Hannibal. So... did this show actually go so far as to make the lead (not the title character) a murderer AND a cannibal? Normally one would expect this to be a fake-out, but with this particular show it's become difficult to tell. Genuinely dark, basically...
- Supernatural. (Not much to say, really...)
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Post by Fenril on May 21, 2014 0:25:16 GMT -5
- Resurrection. The first two episodes just premiered here, to LOTS of publicity. Since this miniseries (or first season) already ran in the US, I figure I can use SPOILERS here:
So the premise is that dead people are coming back to life in Arcadia, Missouri*. Not as zombies, but as revenants: they are simply alive again, and this creates all sort of questions for the closely-knit town community. For example, would so-called devout people really accept a miracle in their lives? And do we really want to continue with our dearly departed, even if it means unearthing all sort of uncomfortable questions about their lives? And what about those who were dangerous?
*Well, if God appeared to Joan right there... I wonder if anybody else remembers that surprisingly good Fantasy series.
The bad:
- The opening scene seems set up to allude to "Lost". Not a good idea at all.
- Immediately tied to that, this tendency of setting up suspense or mystery by keeping crucial things out of the screen...
The good:
- ...but in these first episodes, they actually do answer a few lingering questions almost immediately.
- The cast is actually pretty good, and they do have very interesting dynamics set up, both concerning the returned and the still-living.
Veredict: I guess I'm intrigued enough to keep on watching. Really hope they do avoid the potential downfalls, however.
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Post by Fenril on May 28, 2014 0:01:29 GMT -5
- Grimm.
- Hannibal.
- Resurrection.
Not much to say, all are in good shape so far.
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Post by slayrrr666 on May 30, 2014 10:34:13 GMT -5
The Big Bang Theory
Mom
Undateable-A smooth-talking ladies man moves a tongue-tied co-worker and his friends into his apartment in order to help them meet women. Well, two episodes in and there's not a lot of hope for this one. As is usual with these types of shows, the least attractive one is supposed to be a real ladies man and is only thought of in that manner because we're told he is through some of the lamest, most assuredly failure-inducing come-ons that are not in the slightest bit funny or impressive to watch and the ever-irritating bit of him always being proved right with everything he says will come back to haunt this show when it gets to be incredibly annoying two episodes in, which we already are. Not to mention the fact that this one really fails the three-season rule, as there's not a lot of ways for this one to really work if it does go three seasons in the first place but we're not given a lot of room to go with should this continue on. The one thing I do like about this are the group of friends the guy has which seem like the true type of friends one would have in his life and they seem like truly good friends. Hopefully they have the chance to shine as it goes on since this doesn't look promising.
The Millers
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Post by Fenril on Jun 3, 2014 11:41:02 GMT -5
- Grimm.
- Hannibal.
- Supernatural.
About to finish the current season (well, it's about to air here, all three already ran in the US); not that much to say, except that of the three Hannibal seems to be the only one with a well-plotted plan for the season arc, managing to be consistently surprising yet making sure that each surprise makes sense in retrospective.
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Post by Fenril on Jun 10, 2014 12:13:05 GMT -5
So, after seeing the season endings (again, they just aired here):
- Grimm. Yeah, cheesy and entertaining, occasionally thrilling, continue to be the keywords here. I'll probably stick around for the fourth season, but at this point I've given up on the plot arcs ever amounting to much. Case in point, after a magnificent buildup, this season's arc comes down to a wedding, complete with sitcommy shenanigans ["Oh, no, the bride's sister got drunk and ran away in the bridal costume! And now all the guests turned into werewolves! And the maid-of-honor is actually a witch in disguise! And..."]. Still...
- Once upon a time. So between the overly-cute use of licensed Disney properties ["Gee, the mysterious new character is a blonde woman in a blue dress with freezing powers, I wonder what that's alluding to"] and the tortured use of the writer's old tricks from Lost ["Oops, we closed the season's arc and there's still three episodes to go! Er... Time travel! Asinine resurrections! Fabricated relationship drama! Anything!], this show's become equal parts entertaining and irritating. Don't think I'll watch the next season regularly, but it does seem worth taking a peek now and then. I still love the title cards, at least.
- Hannibal. Hard to say this without sounding superlative, but WOW. Not only did they manage to work in visual nods to pretty much every previous iteration of Hannibal Lecter ("Silence of the lambs", "Manhunter", the latter sequels...), but they actually managed to make the ending shocking and filled with surprises that (mostly) make sense in retrospective. Definitely sticking around for the next season.
- Supernatural. And... I'm dropping out; this finally managed to go from "so bad it's good" to just plain awful, and it's starting to look like everybody involved -the cast, the directors, the writers-- just don't want to do this anymore. Yeah, shoulda gone with the original plan and end in the Fifth season, so it would have been fondly remembered as a genuinely good monster-of-the-week show. Oh, well...
Tonight's the season ending of "Resurrection" and next week they start airing the second season of "Bates Motel", so that's something.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Aug 11, 2014 11:19:29 GMT -5
Saw stuff on Discovery Channel and Animal Planet to denote the start of Shark Week. Can't recall the show names, though.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Aug 12, 2014 11:17:36 GMT -5
Caught more Shark Week shows on Discovery Channel and Animal Planet.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Aug 13, 2014 10:46:44 GMT -5
Caught some more Shark Week shows on Discovery Channel and Animal Planet.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Aug 15, 2014 10:48:14 GMT -5
Caught even more Shark Week shows on Discovery Channel and Animal Planet.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Sept 25, 2014 10:26:50 GMT -5
Finally, summer's almost over and the new seasons/series premiere.
The Middle
The Goldbergs
Modern Family
Black-ish-Upset over the growing gap between his own upbringing and his children's lifestyle, a black advertising executive and his wife try to force more of their own culture upon the family. I'm not entirely sure where they're going with this since this again follows the seemingly newfound stance of using a feature-length movie plot as a sitcom story that has no real bearing on lasting for several seasons. As it stands, though, that makes a pretty funny movie with this potentially generating some laughs with the difference between what it means to be a Black person in a middle-class neighborhood yet there's still a long, long ways to go here with this as a sitcom. There's so much thinly-veiled racism here about skin-color and behavioral norms that it doesn't feel like the clean-cut show it's being propped up to be and really has a guilty air about because of that. Coupled with a rather displeasing pace which isn't that funny, this won't last too long.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Oct 1, 2014 11:29:39 GMT -5
Selfie-After an accident forces her to realize the error of her ways, a self-absorbed woman asks a co-worker to remake her image in order to succeed in life. Certainly not as all-together terrible as I thought it would be, instead this turns out to be rather enjoyable. The central premise is actually one that can hold itself up for a while because she's such a train-wreck of a person that needs a lot changed about her which can be whittled away slowly and surely which you can't do in a feature-length effort so this is something than can work. The undercurrent story of her helping him does have the potential for some gold-mines in terms of the both of them needing to be fixed at the same time so there's a lot to work with there, hopefully the working group around them can get fleshed out so there's more than can be done with them and with a pretty decent supporting cast around them, this might be promising.
Manhattan Love Story-After moving to New York, a shy woman and a playboy decide to give their unconventional romance a chance. I'm not entirely sure where this one's going to go that will allow this one to go for a while, it's a typical rom-com played out as a sitcom which doesn't make for very promising material to come with this being way too cliched to work as both a sitcom or a feature-length rom-com. The leads aren't good enough to hold my interest, it's their mutual friends that set them up which is more fun to watch and I'll do that until something else comes on that's more entertaining. That's all this one will be for.
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