I take it you didn’t watch 24.
I’m reading Tim Matheson’s autobiography “Damn Glad To Meet You”, currently up to him recalling working with Kurt Russell in the series The Quest. I found the pilot and episodes on youtube and decided to check it out. It’s nothing special–standard 70s TV western fare–but it’s neat to see the two sharing the screen as brothers searching for their lost sister.
I saw Bad Monkey and it was fun.
My wife and I just finished Running Point on Netflix and it was pretty decent. The show stars Kate Hudson and it’s modeled after Jeanie Buss. I am not really into basketball or the Lakers and I am not familiar with Buss but it was a fun show.
Hudson’s character takes over as CEO of her families LA basketball team after her father dies and one of her brothers has to go into rehab. Hijinks ensue. I liked the storyline, I liked the interactions with the basketball players, and I liked some of the family stuff. A lot was a little too goofy and some of it was predictable but there was a surprise or two at the end.
I re-subs to Acorn and am binging the Brokenwood Mysteries. Even tho i already saw the first 4-5 seasons (very short brit-style seasons), i am still enjoying it.
Just watched the new version of Bergerac to see if they could ruin my childhood memories of the original. It wasn’t too bad, mainly due to a strong cast and pretty scenery. But it contained pretty much every police procedure cliche going. Dead wife, alcoholism, troubled relationships with colleagues and family. When ‘A Touch of Cloth’ did that it was satirical. But this was supposed to be serious. And of course they changed the gender of Charlie Hungerford just to stir up some controversial headlines.
The original Triumph Roadster turned up a couple of times, but never moving or even with the engine running. Maybe the owner wouldn’t allow it for insurance purposes?
I guessed who the killer was in the first episode as it was obvious the writers were trying too hard to be clever.
Finished Black Doves last night. It’s worth watching, especially if you like comedic violence. A typically densely plotted British series, with an extended wrap-up of all the intertwined stories in the last ep. There is a bit of explicit gay sex.
We watched the first two episodes of the BBC series Ellis last night, (on Amazon Prime). There are only 3 episodes in this season, although I think a new season has been ordered for later this year.
DCI Ellis is a brash, rude, hard driven investigator who solves difficult cases. Reminds me some of the series Vera. She has some personal baggage that’s hinted at but not gone into, at least in the first 2 episodes, which is fine with me. I like police procedurals. I don’t like personal drama. YMMV.
I did enjoy Running Point quite a lot. I also enjoyed The Legend of Korra (anime spinoff of Avatar: The Last Airbender). After Season Two, I’m taking a bit of a break as a palate cleanser.
Right now, I’m about 66% through Season One of Nobody Wants This. I’m happy to have read on Wikipedia that it’s been picked up for a second season.
(Somewhat off topic: I once read that the Disney people would tend to cancel a show after a certain number of seasons, so they would not have to negotiate residuals benefits with the actors if the show got syndicated. Is this a real strategy, and if so, is Netflix mirroring it?)
I’ve been interested in watching a mini-series from 2020 Flesh and Blood mainly because it stars Stephen Rea. Finally got around to watching it.
A woman with 3 grown (and really messed up) kids starts the ball rolling by introducing her new paramour (Rea). There’s also a neighbor lady that is heavily involved in their lives. She and the kids are not happy, drama ensues.
There is an attempt to be clever with showing things at different times. It starts off with the woman’s 70th birthday celebration when a Bad Thing happens. Almost all the story takes place in the weeks before the Bad Thing. The “present day” storyline only consists of people being interviewed by the police. 1 person for each of the 4 episodes. (So you can rule out who the Bad Thing was done to as it goes along.)
The Bad Thing is referred by the police in quite different terms, confusing things (and plot summaries online). They also say things like “the victim” rather than saying a name because that would give things away.
Forget that. It is so contrived it’s idiotic. This could have more or less been a single time line.
Well acted by the usual selection of British actors (plus Rea). E.g., I had just seen one of the secondary characters in Shetland. Sharon Small stands out in another secondary role.
Anyway, fairly good if you basically ignore the “flash forward” interrogation bits (they really don’t matter). They even set things up for a 2nd season but that’s unlikely to happen at this point.
I might agree with some of your criticisms if they were solely about Season 4. I think S4 is the weakest of the four seasons (S1 and S3 are the best, in my view). In S4 they seem to be running out of ideas. TBH I took a break about halfway through, but will go back and finish it. If they had quit at S3 they would have gone out on a high note and left fans clamoring for more. With S4, I found myself thinking “I see why they stopped”.
Tried watching Jack Taylor on Acorn and couldn’t even get through the first episode. While I liked Iain Glen in GOT, everyone in this thing seemed to be ACTING! LOOK! I’M ACTING! Now we’re giving Prime Target a shot on Apple.
“House of David” is a wanna-be biblical epic streaming on Amazon+. I’m not especially religious but having sat through “The Ten Commandments” and “Ben Hur” as a youngster, I can get some entertainment out of a well-told biblical saga. And my wife is Jewish, so I thought she might enjoy it.
She doesn’t. Even with all the battle scenes, it’s awfully dull, and David is such a schlemiel, it’s hard to muster-up any sympathy or interest in him. One of the first things he does is disobey his mother, which results in her being attacked by a lion and her ultimate death. Oy!
We’ve watched three episodes and are probably going to stop there. We know how it ends, anyway.
Major alert! Dark Winds Season 3 premiers tonight on AMC.
I woke up from a nap a bit ago and decided to put Netflix on, but couldn’t figure out which of the shows I’m bingeing I wanted to watch. Until I saw a preview for an anime that mentioned a dungeon. The name was intriguing, too.
So now I’m four episodes into Delicious in Dungeon, and it is hilarious. Kinda like The Order of the Stick mashed up with The Galloping Gourmet.
What can I say, Hulu crushed it last night.
Say Nothing (Hulu, Limited Series, 2024) a semi historical period piece covering two young ladies caught up in The Troubles in the early 70’s in Londonderry. We are two episodes into this thriller with wry wit and are enjoying it. It’s dark, but not depressingly so.
Deli Boys (Hulu, 1 se so far, 2024) 10% Fargo, 70% Shits Creek and 20% Kim’s Convenience are the ingredients to this delightful pallet cleanser. We have only seen one episode so far and are here for it.
Curse the ever-increasing balkanization of streaming services. We watched seasons 1 and 2 on Netflix, but they take about a year to get the latest seasons of a show. So I went to see where on streaming channels it appears, and apparently now there’s an AMC+ service for $6.99/mo. No thanks. Looks like I have to wait until 2026 to watch it.
Just to warn you that it’s a lot of fun at first, but it does get increasingly dark as it goes on. Not that that’s a bad thing, but if you’re hoping for lighthearted culinary comedy all the way through you will be disappointed.
Apparently what was run on AMC on March 5 was a brief preview of the upcoming season. The first full episode will be aired on March 12.