What TV Shows Are You Watching?

OK I just watched the tail-end of a Q&A they did with the cast after showing the first episodes at the Alamo Drafthouse(s) and for those watching the stream they put on something like 10-15 minutes of content.

That 15 minutes was better than any 15 minute segment from season 1 by a long shot. SO HYPE.

The only reason I watch GoT now is just to get an ending to the series. I read the books years ago, as they came out, and only started to watch the show last season (6) when it outpaced the books. I honestly have no hope in Mr. Martin ending the series in any satisfying way on his own, so I hope HBO does a decent job of it.

I kind of liked that. Sure the solar system is huge, but at the end of the day, if youā€™re a human, youā€™re in an air bubble somewhere. I thought the focus on small spaces dovetailed nicely with how strongly Belter culture is tied to the collective maintenance of their precarious, cramped living environments.

In the book, the spaces didnā€™t feel small. The stations seemed quite large. My point was more about the same-ness of the locations, not about their sizes.

Hey, Brooklyn99 is really good fun.

Thatā€™s one of those shows that I never expected to like as much as I do.

I watched the first five minutes of the pilot roughly a year ago, and it didnā€™t grab me. But I downloaded the first three episodes onto my phone before this trip, to see if it just needed more time. And it did! Once it got to near the end of the first episode, and I realised what the show was really about, it really clicked for me.

Now I wish Iā€™d downloaded more than three episodes.

I watched at least the first season, itā€™s alright but I never really found it to be that funny. Itā€™s more of that amusing humor thatā€™s comfortable to watch. But I didnā€™t stick with it more than a season.

Brooklyn 99 one of the few comedies Iā€™ve watched from start to present. Itā€™s on the same tier as Black-ish for me (however Black-ish cares more for social commentary than comedy).

I canā€™t believe Iā€™m typing this, but Iā€™m actually enjoying the new Riverdale TV series based on the Archie comics. Itā€™s like Archie meets Twin Peaks plus Veronica Mars with some CW teen melodrama thrown into the mix for good measure. Itā€™s not a great show by any means, but I find myself enjoying itā€™s noir David Lynchian Blue Velvet-like deconstruction of the small town Archie universe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XmFTADupMc

So, who watched the first two episodes from the new season of The Expanse? I feel really sorry for those of you in the markets where itā€™s not showing the next season yet, cuz itā€™s really kicking everything up a notch. Iā€™m definitely in fanboy territory but I canā€™t help but be excited the entire episode. Front the back of the first two were as edge of my seat as any episode of GoT or Vikings has been. We get to see long anticipated book scenes and characters from the books are just my favorites now. Diogo and Sam especially, I need more of them in the episodes to come. They changed Sam to a real self-sure hardass, but sheā€™s even more awesome now as a result.

In unrelated news I am feeling The Americans senses tingling. Itā€™s coming soon. Itā€™s gonna be here. So many things hanging over everyoneā€™s head. Gonna be some big shoes to drop. Gonna be great disguises. So many wigs. All the wigs.

No need to feel sorry for us we have a technology called file sharing. I will post you a detailed manual on how to make it run from a 3.5" floppy disk.

I wasnā€™t on the edge of my seat because there are parts of how this show are produced which are detrimental to the enjoyment of the story or understanding whatā€™s going on. Iā€™m speaking of HELMET TALK. Yeah great we know youā€™re wearing helmets and the sound is different but do you have to make it so that I have to fucking put on subtitles for me to understand what youā€™re saying?

There was only a small bit of this last season.

Anyhow, the military might of the Mars troops was interesting.
I havenā€™t read the books but predicted many of the events in the show minutes in advance. Iā€™m sure Iā€™m missing large plot based ones but the supposed shockers were easy to spot.

Iā€™m only really interested in whatā€™s going on at the UN / Earth at the moment because the space stuff didnā€™t seem as interesting as last season or maybe I will grow to like them if I can understand them and continue to talk about cheese.

[quote=ā€œKate_Monster, post:58, topic:277ā€]
From the age of 5 to 9, I had a huge collection of vintage Archie and Josie and the Pussycats comics. My mother was on a garage sales, estate sales, and antique store kick/ While she perused, I would find a book or a comic, buy it with my pocket money, and read. When I saw the adverts for this show and Jughead was described as ā€œbrooding,ā€ ā€œattractive,ā€ and read that he was no longer asexual, I was out.
[/quote]Oh, it gets worse. Archieā€™s in an illicit relationship with Ms Grundy.

I read Archie comics as a kid as well, and as a kid, I never considered Jughead to be ā€œasexual,ā€ I just thought he was just more interested in food.

At least through two episodes of the show, Jughead is pretty close to his comic character. Heā€™s shown no interest in romantic relationships at all, and mainly just wants to eat food. Heā€™s not even a main character, heā€™s more of the narrator or Greek Chorus, providing exposition.

Iā€™ll admit, the whole Archie and Ms. Grundy thing is a bit odd and creepy, but the show is definitely straying from the source material. Reggie is Asian, Moose is secretly gay or at least bisexual, and Betty and Veronica are friends.

The show isnā€™t going to set the world on fire, but Iā€™m digging the Twin Peaks-esque vibe Iā€™m getting from it.

I tried it out last night.
I have a low tolerance for shitty TV and while I could guess what was happening for most of the events this show successfully places the viewer in Archieā€™s conundrum which always seemed so difficult to relate to in the old comics and is slightly better handled in the more recent iteration.

Archie is all about that teen coming of age in suburban America. I thought I was going to switch off after the first 10 minutes or so but ended up watching both episodes.

I can definitely see itā€™s flaws but it seems fine compared to other trash. Jughead to me was never an asexual character in the comics but maybe I was too young to pick up on this. However he hasnā€™t been shown off as attractive, as jabrams007 has said, he takes more of the Greek chorus role and is Archieā€™s conscience.

That wasnā€™t even a disappointing thing, it at least made some of his decisions harder to make or ambiguous in that no matter what action he took it would have a negative impact on someone.

I think the show Riverdale is a great benefit for the Ginger community.

I will likely drop it as soon as work starts up again lol.

1 Like

[quote=ā€œsK0pe, post:62, topic:277ā€]
I think the show Riverdale is a great benefit for the Ginger community.
[/quote]It has to be CGI. Nobody can be that ginger and survive.

1 Like

https://youtu.be/5r-R070qHYw?t=1m53s

Iā€™m obviously not ginger, but I never even heard that word until South Park.

On that front: Jughead being asexual is a development from more recent comics. The Jughead series by Chip Zdarsky and Erica Henderson revealed him to be asexual in an issue, which made a lot of ace people really happy to be getting some very rare representation in media. So having that rare representation not only ignored but actively reversed in other Archie media would be kind of like a slap in the face to that.

That said: apparently there could still be room for Jughead to develop more and come out as ace later in the series. One of the showrunners has said that Riverdale is an origin story, and that, starting from that origin point, canon things like Archieā€™s band or Jugheadā€™s asexuality would be waypoints on the road to the more standard Archie canon. So fingers crossed that it eventually develops in that direction at least? But Iā€™m also still wary. Will be waiting for more of the show to be out before I decide if Iā€™m going to watch it or not.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVN_0qvuhhw

Itā€™s not for polite company.

3 Likes