Be Excellent To Each Other

4 in so far and it’s getting better.

Watched Happy! And thought it was great, the violence was over-the-top graphic novel violence so never had enough realism to be full-on torture porn, which is something I absolutely cannot stand to watch.

Told all my friends to watch it, told them it was violent but funny and surreal so the violence was not such a big deal and realised far too late (when they text me asking why I didn't warn them) that I probably should've given a couple of the mums some notice about a certain scene.

There is a remake of Monkey Magic "The New Legends of Monkey"

30-minute episodes and 10 of them on Netflix.

It had a slightly different take on the story, in this one Monkey is imprisoned in a mountain by Demons which are ruling the land 500 years later. In the original, I remember Budda putting him there for being a general pain in heavens arse

If you liked Monkey before you will like this.

Yeah, I had to tune out and away at that scene (if it’s the one I’m assuming you mean ) but really enjoying it elsewise, in exactly the same way you describe.

That is indeed the scene.

The unicorn wasn't as annoying as I thought it might be, I think I was expecting something along the lines of Ted, so thank God that didn't happen. The whole thing was, in my opinion, very well balanced. I snorted every time I saw Sax run, in his weird wide-gaited way.

Don't watch it if you have an issue with unrealistic portrayals of the physical abilities and resilience of middle-aged men, or a dislike of unreasonably long scarves.

I haven’t seen Ted, but thought the unicorn was a nice balance of witty and cute. My dislike of long scarves was not piqued. I don’t actually have a dislike of them, but nobody wants an Isadora Duncan moment, the thoughtbof which does freak me out occasionally.

We’ve just finished the final episode. One bit made me cry. Bananas out of ten.

Also decided that Nick is a combination of Don Draper, Robert De Niro and a tramp.

That's been my feeling about him since around 1997.

Oh, you don't mean Cras.

Totally meant Cras.

I'll take it.

2%, 5%, 93%.

I'll take it.

Title of your sex tape.

B99 cancelled for some reason. This is why we can't have nice things.

What?! No......

Probably for the best. The quality of episodes has been on a downward slope. It’s telling that no one talks about it anymore.

Maybe Netflix will pick it up...? Or another network? Am I being too optimistic?

Meanwhile Rick and Morty got renewed for seventy fucking episodes.

That's mental.

They have a rabid fanbase who don't understand the premise of the show. Only good and nice people like B99 and there's not enough, it seems.

Also it's on Fox so what do you expect from shysters like them.

It's still funnier than the best episodes of Two Broke Girls, for example.

There's apparently a shitload of interest in it from various source, including Netflix, so I don't think optimism is unwarranted here.



Seventy episodes is an especially weird order given how slowly they churn episodes out. That's like a decade's worth given their output levels.

I read somewhere that there is a magic number for syndication and this might drive that.

It's enough that they can show one every weekday for a whole 'season' without repeating. It's either 88 or 100, depending where you look.

I doubt anyone would disagree with that!

But, come’on, tatties.

You misunderstand - I love Rick and Morty, even if I don't understand it.

But seventy episodes is still mental.

The deal was likely "we want to be guaranteed a big syndication paycheck, so commit to getting us that far"

I can see how that would want a show of faith from Adult Swim, and be able to stop worrying about renegotiating every time the series is up for renewal.

It's a very successful show, and merch rights plus licensing of the ip will be very profitable going forward.

And for Dan, seems like he won't have to go through the stuff he did with Community.

Me too, but surely you understand it. Rick is not meant to be sympathised with, but yet there's a whole swathe of fans who think it's brilliant to act like him, therefore making them geniuses.

He's not utterly irredeemable, but certainly a selfish prick, and that's what makes his character's motives and actions interesting.

The Expanse is back! How did that pass me by?! Still, big yay that I have something to watch other than Penny Dreadful.

Any news on Riverdale?

I haven't killed that many braincells with gin yet.

Less of a yay - The Expanse has been cancelled.

WTAF!?

After they finish season 3, or 5 episodes in?

End of the season

B99 has apparently been picked up by NBC

I'm a wee bit disappointed at Lucifer being cancelled. Only watched the first two series on Prime Video, but I really enjoyed them.

From what I've read online they left it on a cliffhanger at the end of S3 too, in an attempt to prevent Fox cancelling it. That worked well for them....

Killing Eve is beyond excellent.

Riverdale:


Which is the least of the issues with it but the most noteworthy

Haven't even started it, but very excited about shottgunning it. Not least because I'm utterly in love with Phoebe Waller-Bridge.

You know she’s not in it, right? She’s a showrunner and writer and her fingerprints are all over it but she’s not on screen.

Yeah, I know that, but I love her stuff so much that her being the writer is enough to make it something I'm very interested in.

That's totally valid. It has a (very successful) way of shifting tone from funny to extremely dark that is strongly reminiscent of Fleabag.

Just finished black sails. I think Markg said up thread that it starts well and ends brilliantly, and I'd broadly agree with that trajectory.

I thought it took a little while to find its feet, with one-dimensional characters behaving in largely appalling ways, surrounded by a trembling coterie of knockers. However as time went on the characters became far more human and much more compelling.

I did think it suffered from some Deus ex machina plotting at times, with us being asked to believe in some fairly out of character actions just because the story demands it.

Regarding Teech,

Regarding Silver,

But overall Nassau was a wonderful place to spend 30 or so hours. Will miss the Wrackhams and impossibly treacly voiced Vanes. it was a show I'd initially written off as a thinly plotted action tit fest. Instead it's a very well written, intelligent, action tit fest, with extremely high production values. Would highly recommend.

Almost finished Lost in Space, just one episode to go. It's rather good, I think. Also bonus points for having child actors who aren't teeth-grindingly annoying.

I am rewatching Smallville, which I caught quite a bit of back when it originally aired, but never watched the whole run. I'm up to season 5 now, and I think I only ever saw the first three seasons.

It holds up really well, especially when compared to the awful movie version of Superman we've got now.

It's a little bit soap opera in parts, and they drag some of the "people nearly working out Clark Kent's secret identity" thing way beyond believablity, but it's a lot of fun.

Luthor senior and jr are both fantastic in the roles, and the cast in general has some great chemistry.

Clark gradually developing his abilities, and how to use them responsibly is really well done. The cosmic themes and his connection with Krypton are slowly brought in, and there's some fantastic special guest stars (Micheal Ironside as General Lane, Michael McKean as Perry White, and obviously the likes of Christopher Reeve, Terri Hatcher, and Annette O'Toole).

Special effects were good for TV at the time, but are obviously a little dated now, and I imagine if they hadn't done 20 episode seasons the writing could have been a bit more consistent, but overall I think it is worth revisiting if you never watched it back in the day.

If you do decide to watch it, be warned that season 1 is a lot of "huh some kid was exposed to Kryptonite and now have some kind of powers and have started being a villain of the week". That's basically every episode, whereas they start dropping in more varied formats in subsequent seasons, and bring in more extended story arcs that carry across multiple episodes.

Although I was pretty taken aback when they had a plotline about Lana getting mysteriously branded with a Kryptonian symbol, given the NXIVM stuff. Very strange coincidence.

Edit: Oh the inspiration for revisiting it was that some of the cast are pushing for bringing it back as an animated series. I gather the final episode refers to the year 2018 (not sure how having not seen the end yet) but I think it would be a good time to bring it back.

One of the cast could definitely use the money right now for lawyer bills

I think it got mentioned before, but Cobra Kai is outstanding.
It does every bit as good a job as Stranger Things in perfectly capturing the feel of the 80s and updating it perfectly.

Just watched an episode of Smallville that featured Dave Bautista's acting debut (excluding wrestling).

I watched all 10 series of Smallville commuting to and from London from Newcastle every week for a bit, back in the day. I enjoyed it at the time, but not sure I could go back to it now, I think superhero shows have moved on.
Lana Lang is ridiculously pretty though...

It is definitely dated in some regards, but it was also ahead of it's time in others, and holds up in some interesting ways.