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Watch, Watched, Watching: We Need This!


Ramsay B.

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1 hour ago, SpaceChampion said:

The performances is the highlight of the show.  I've enjoy many scenes.  But they do inexplicable dumb things with the physics of space

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-- having realtime conversations by cell phone when far beyond Moon orbit is the biggest, and then suddenly they cross an imaginary barrier where it doesn't work anymore.  Okay, fine.  I take that as just speeding up the narrative.  In the finale however I don't know how that the whole collecting bags of ice thing was suppose to make sense.   The ice didn't melt or turn into ions, so how was a static charge suppose to affect it?  Solid ice doesn't have a charge.  Also, once your astronaut suit discharges, then what?  And why do they have to turn the stream towards the airlock?  I had thought the idea was to direct the stream into the airlock so anything they didn't catch with the bag would still be "onboard" and could be collected later.  But Ram was outside of the lock.  Or why not put the bag right up against the hole streaming ice from it?

I hope a second season has better physics consultants.  Hire the former astronaut working on for For All Mankind.  Often they'll have better dramatic moments with real physics than the fake physics you come up with.

Yes. that scene stretched belief to breaking point. And the time delay thing was silly, too, but there were some cool things, too

Spoiler

Using Insight's seismograph to listen for the sonic boom of the rocket. 

Though even in that case, why couldn't they use satellites to look for Pegasus? There's mention of satellites that were placed in Mars's orbit, I would think some had cameras, and Mars's atmosphere is thin.

 

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22 hours ago, briantw said:

The third season of AP Bio has been fantastic so far.  The third episode is amazing.

"I didn't wanna kill him because he's a student."
"I wish more of our teachers had your restraint."

Thanks for reminding me to cancel my Peacock trial. 

I liked the third season. It took me forever to realize Devon and Colin left after season one. It felt short at eight episodes, but maybe that's all they had filmed before Covid? 

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7 hours ago, RumHam said:

Thanks for reminding me to cancel my Peacock trial. 

I liked the third season. It took me forever to realize Devon and Colin left after season one. It felt short at eight episodes, but maybe that's all they had filmed before Covid? 

My favorite part of the show is how great all the kids are.  

Heather is the best, 

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29 minutes ago, Triskele said:

This HBO doc The Vow is pretty wild.  Cults are fascinating.

They really are so fascinating. I watched Holy Hell kinda recently and that one was a crazy ride too. 

I totally forgot The Vow started. Just put on the first episode now.

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On 9/14/2020 at 7:22 AM, Triskele said:

This HBO doc The Vow is pretty wild.  Cults are fascinating.

Just binged the first three eps and I'm absolutely hooked. I knew some details about NXIVM, but this doc does a really good job of showing just how fucked up it is. HBO is hitting it out of the park with their docuseries lately, between this one and I'll Be Gone in the Dark. I'm loving it.

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I watched the very early (1980) Robert Zemeckis/Kurt Russell R-rated comedy, Used Cars. Which I'd never even heard of before. It's a Burt Reynolds '70s style comedy; where a lovable dirtbag is trying to beat an over-the-top, loudmouth bad guy in some really low stakes (control over a used car dealership).

Kurt Russell also looks about 10 years younger than he did in Escape from New York, and this was only a year before that. Amazing what shorter hair and being clean shaven can do.

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Just finished Dummy, which was very short for a TV show - closer to a movie in fact.

Took me an episode or two before realising that Dan Harmon was supposed to be the Dan Harmon, and then the meta dimension of Dummy and its comments on feminism made much more sense somehow. There are quite a few references to Rick & Morty in there of course, and the funny thing is that Dummy itself really feels like a Rick & Morty episode at times (an entire episode is in fact quite clearly a R&M parody), almost as if Heller and Darmon had worked on this together... Which they did of course on some level, since this is a show about how the show came to exist, in which one of the meta-est shows out there plays a major role... So it's like a meta show about a meta show, with a bit of extra meta at times.

In fact I nearly posted this in the Rick & Morty thread, but then I would have had to write that this is a show written by Dan Harmon's girlfriend, which would have been both hilarious and sad at the same time. You'll get it if you watch it. Which you should. Really.

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I watched The Umbrella Academy S1 this week. I didn't watch it sooner because I remember hearing some bad reviews plus the commercials had the talking monkey and that put me off for some reason. I am glad I watched it because it's much better than I expected. Plenty of issues with it but I really enjoyed S1.

A couple questions

Spoiler

 Do they intentionally not tell us what year this is set in(right after posting this I watched S2 Ep 1 and they say the date....lol?  Did anyone else see the twist coming where the "dad" is an alien? That came out of no where for me. I mean 7 having power was obvious, as was the conjurer using the dead to fight but I never saw the space thing coming.

Also love a lot of the music and action sequences.

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On 9/14/2020 at 8:12 PM, Fez said:

I watched the very early (1980) Robert Zemeckis/Kurt Russell R-rated comedy, Used Cars. Which I'd never even heard of before. It's a Burt Reynolds '70s style comedy; where a lovable dirtbag is trying to beat an over-the-top, loudmouth bad guy in some really low stakes (control over a used car dealership).

One of my favorite crass comedies when I was young (too young, really, but those were the 80s for you). Played a lot on early HBO, as I recall.

Still remember the "fishing" scene, and Kurt Russel's Rudy talking a mile a minute hawking his cheap lemons. Good cast, too, with the great Jack Warden, Gerrit Graham, Frank McRae, and Michael McKean (in his second film role, after having a part in Spielberg's 1941 the year before).

As to my own watching:

Watched Black KkKlansman for the first time, and it was entertaining but relatively slight for a Spike Lee joint. Felt the actress playing Patrice, the student union president, was rather poor (particularly in the scene where Stallworth admits he's an undercover detective). Also, did not know Steve Buscemi had a brother who acted (though I see that I've seen Michael Buscemi in a one-off appearance on The Sopranos from twenty years ago).

Caught up on the latest two epsiodes of Lovecraft Country, still enjoying it. Felt like such a dunce for not realizing something at the end of the 5th episode, but they've been very good at throwing around elements to distract. Special effects on TV have gotten to an absurd level of quality.

And just finished Hereditary, Ari Aster's first horror film. Very creepy. Owes not a little to Rosemary's Baby, I think. Toni Collette was the standout performer by far, definitely had the key role to sell the slow unraveling of horror. (Also, being in Sweden, what's with the family owning not one, but two Volvos? Between this and Midsommar, I'm thinking Aster is a Suecophile.)

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54 minutes ago, Ran said:

And just finished Hereditary, Ari Aster's first horror film. Very creepy. Owes not a little to Rosemary's Baby, I think. Toni Collette was the standout performer by far, definitely had the key role to sell the slow unraveling of horror. (Also, being in Sweden, what's with the family owning not one, but two Volvos? Between this and Midsommar, I'm thinking Aster is a Suecophile.)

Horror films always get the shaft at the Oscars, but she really deserved at least a nom for Best Actress. 

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44 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Watched Mulan last night. Everything said about it is true, so not great. I do not recommend.

The first half (before the plot really kicks in) wasn't too bad though. Visually stunning.

Has there been a single live action Disney movie that has been at least as good as it's animated counterpart?

I think we are living through the darkest times of Disney right now.. and there have been some very dark times.

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I haven't been watching much normal cable lately so hadn't noticed the two episodes of S4 sneak onto my DVR.

Nice surprise. 

Enjoyed E1 so much I'm denying myself the pleasure of the next a bit.

 

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1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

Has there been a single live action Disney movie that has been at least as good as it's animated counterpart?

I think we are living through the darkest times of Disney right now.. and there have been some very dark times.

I thought the The Jungle Book was at least as good as the animated version.

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3 hours ago, Ran said:

One of my favorite crass comedies when I was young (too young, really, but those were the 80s for you). Played a lot on early HBO, as I recall.

Still remember the "fishing" scene, and Kurt Russel's Rudy talking a mile a minute hawking his cheap lemons. Good cast, too, with the great Jack Warden, Gerrit Graham, Frank McRae, and Michael McKean (in his second film role, after having a part in Spielberg's 1941 the year before).

Yeah. With this concept it could've been complete trash, but the cast, and to some extent the writing, help elevate to be really fun trash. 

I didn't have HBO until around 2006, and by then I think it had disappeared from the rotation. I've seen plenty of other 70s and 80s R-rated comedies over the years, but Used Cars seems like its just slipped from memory. I only learned about because I listened to a podcast episode that talked about it and decided to see it for myself. 

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The other perennial film from the early 80s of HBO, that I recall, was Super Fuzz:

My recollection is that Used Car is a much better film, though, and it is a little surprising that it doesn't show up on TBS (if they still show 80s films on occasion like they used to) or AMC or some such, especially given Russel.

@Fez

Which podcast was that? I've been listening to the Screen Drafts podcast for awhile, and have been considering getting into some other cinema-centric podcasts. 

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