I am so disappointed that the sequel just aired in the UK but we don’t get it until March 2024. I’m sure it will be worth the wait though! The books are also excellent, I listened to all three on audio and never a dull moment.
Thanks for the recco. I was considering reading the books.
I started watching The Penguin tonight.
It continues the movie story from The Batman in 2022 . Picking up after the flood and killing of the mob boss kingpin.
The death of the Gotham Kingpin gives Oz an opportunity to go from mid-level gangster to the Top of the crime family in Gotham. He’s called the Penguin behind his back.
HBO produced 8 episodes. The characters are vividly drawn. Sofia is the Psychopath, serial killer that was recently released from a mental institution. She is Oz’s most unbalanced and dangerous adversary.
That’s the background. I won’t go into spoilers.
I’m enjoying the series. Sofia scares the crap out of me. You can tell at some point she’s going to go completely unhinged. Whoever she’s near better run. The actress is doing a great job.
Colin Farrell reprises his Penguin role from the Batman movie.
I’ve seen two episodes of The Penguin. Theres a podcast after each episode with the producers and writer.
It’s on Max.
There is an entire thread about the Penguin here, although you might want to watch for spoilers.
I saw the Thread this morning. I won’t read it until I’ve finished the series.
I still need to watch The Batman from 2022. The Penguin is in a few scenes. He’s not a major character. That should change when the next Bat movie comes out.
I watched the behind the scenes. The writer said she enjoyed being able to tell a more complete story in the HBO series. She finds the PG-13 requirements in the movies very limiting. The violence restrictions are frustrating with complex characters like Oz and Sofia.
I’ve started watching Severance on Apple+. A dystopian future series that is holding my interest so far.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. It’s probably my favorite show of this decade so far. I can’t wait for Season 2.
I can’t wait for season 2.
Agree! Heh, just noticed I repeated your third sentence (only read the first two). I think all the actors are doing great jobs. Adam Scott and Patricia Arquette are standouts.
Looks like Jan 17 for season two.
Yes. Too far away!
Does Shrinking remind anyone else of Cougartown, beyond sharing a star?
We really liked the first season, but it was so long ago we decided to re-watch it before starting S2. Good decision. It would have been hard to remember all the details and complexities before resuming the story following the cliffhanger ending of S1. Also, it’s definitely a good enough show to bear a second watching. I particularly like the chemistry between Russell and Sewell, who really seem to me to be like a real married couple.
I’m guessing that @Elmer_J.Fudd rolled his eyes at the false-flag plot line, and the idea that the PM would be involved or even suspected.
I have to admit that I predicted a plot twist coming down the pike, but was (apparently) wrong. I thought that Dennison would turn out to be behind the bombing to oust Trowbridge. It just seemed like an obvious way to flip expectations, but they flipped in a completely different direction.
I have to say I’m always a little annoyed by Hollywood-style recoveries from major injuries. You’re seriously injured in a bomb blast, you awake ten minutes after surgery and remember all the details of the incident. You are released with a bunch of facial scars and a slight limp, which fade away completely over the course of the next three days, after which you’re right as rain. No permanent disability, months of physical therapy, nothing.
To distract myself, I watched a few more episodes of The Lincoln Lawyer. I don’t know what to think. Season one was about showing us how well he knew the law and could find these loopholes. That was interesting to me. Season two is about him manipulating people and that’s not as interesting to me. It’s drama, which I can get from any show, instead of interesting law cases or him knowing the law.
I look at it as a good detective show. The characters acted on the evidence they had or were led to believe in some cases. When the PM goes into one of their meetings and yells, “Russia! Russia! Russia!” it looks like he’s pushing for that while things are still fresh in the mind of the public and where things point. It makes him look guilty because of how hard he pushed for it and wouldn’t hear any evidence it might not be Russia. What makes it good, to me, is that rewatching it or thinking about it later, we now see he wants something to look strong and knows he can get everyone behind going after Russia.
I didn’t see the twist with the PMs reaction, expected the results to be worse, nor did I see the ending. I was pissed when it ended at episode six instead of having eight!
This gets to me the older I get, when I see people in their 40s or 50s bounce back quickly. Nope. It took me three years after rotator cuff surgery of PT to use it for the reason I had the surgery. I’m also annoyed that someone gets X time to live, gets the fix at the last minute, and two minutes later, perfectly fine. I’m pretty sure organs would be damaged by that point. Even mental stuff from this is ignored.
It’s why I like early MCU better. Sure, they still recover, but I like how Tony has PTSD in IM3.
Thanks for the discussion!
Just hitting Season 8 of Dexter, a show I watched before, and remember having gone bad at the end and had a universally hate ending. With that sort of trepidation, I started rewatching it with the other half.
First four season solid, then I think the showrunner left to do the twilight films.
Then it parallels to Game Of Thrones are very striking. Few plot holes and wrongness at first, accumulating into bad decision on bad decision, clever people suddenly becoming morons and flipping their personalities, fully formed characters just there to stand for heroes to use. Season seven went really stupid, and Season eight will be a hate-watch, which was the same for GOT for me (GOT spoilers follow) all these people offended at the end seem to forget the 1000mph dragons, travelling to beyond the wall for no reason to get a zombie, littlefinger becoming dumb as a rock, Arya’s stabbing marathon run, all before Season 8.
Dexter spoilers following now.
Was that the worst psychiatrist ever, to encourage Debs to run off and declare her undying love to her adopted brother??? Dexter suddenly decided to kill Tom Hank’s son in an actual crime scene? This supposedly clever serial killer not even questioning the sudden release of one of his top marks for killing, just as the captain of police accuses him of being a serial killer??? Suddenly dumb as a box of rocks.
Not just a star (Christa Miller) but also a co-creator and producer (Bill Lawrence). They’re spouses.
Bill Lawrence is becoming the Stan Lee of Apple TV; Shrinking, Bad Monkey, Ted Lasso. I think they all have at least one Scrubs alum in them. It was no surprise seeing Roy Kent from Lasso show up as the drunk driver.
Brett Goldstein is actually a co-creator of Shrinking as well.
We finished “Disclaimer.” For those who plan to watch it or who have not yet seen the final episode, my thoughts are blurred.
Kevin Kline’s “wife” was an obvious unreliable narrator, having concocted the events leading up to their son’s death completely out of thin air. Not only was there no proof that any of the events she wrote about had actually occurred, she was mentally disturbed and anything she said should have been questioned. Yet Kline’s character, an intelligent man, accepted it all at face value. For that reason, we figured out early on how this woeful tale was going to end. And for those of us who watched it to conclusion, it was annoying that Kline’s character suffered no comeuppance for putting Cate Blanchett’s character through the turmoil he did. Saying, essentially, “Oops, my mistake” was a weak and unsatisfying conclusion.
We haven’t seen the final ep. I think it airs tonight, so I’m confused as to how you’ve seen it?
Since we couldn’t watch “Disclaimer”, we started on S2 of “The Diplomat”. It’s been too long since S1 and even with the recap I couldn’t figure out who was who and WTF was going on. I still like it if for nothing else than seeing the TV version of life in the Foreign Service and having a laugh at some of it. Also the glaring (to me) mistakes, like not having the American flag on the vehicle carrying the Ambassador, and the obviously unarmored vehicles she rides in.
Unlike some shows that drop new episodes on Friday, this dropped on Thursday. I’ll be interested in your thoughts when you’ve seen it.