This Old Neon Forum

I started watching Westworld season 2 and I've watched the first four episodes. So far, there are some interesting developments. I know a few of you weren't too impressed with the season overall. I'm liking it, but I suppose I'm not hooked to it like I was season 1.

The Shoemaker wrote: ↑06 Aug 2018 16:06 I started watching Westworld season 2 and I've watched the first four episodes. So far, there are some interesting developments. I know a few of you weren't too impressed with the season overall. I'm liking it, but I suppose I'm not hooked to it like I was season 1.

There were some interesting developments and some very good individual episodes. We can chat about it more when you get to the end. Without spoiling anything, I kind of feel like things went off the rails a little bit.

My brother-in-law and I have started watching HBO's Rome to fill in the time between now and Game of Thrones, since it was HBO's big-budget genre show before the fantasy juggernaut came around. Rome is such a good show. Every single character is excellent.

Anyone watching Barry? I'm currently binging season 2 and it's fantastic. The show is kinda being overshadowed by the Game of Thrones finale hype, but it's really great and leagues better than the past couple GoT seasons.

Haven't really chatted since finishing Rome and discussing Game of Thrones in the dedicated thread, so here's the other shit I watched this year:

The Umbrella Academy (S1, Netflix) - Just OK. I thought the show was slowly working up to them all finally coming together to work as a team, but it didn't really work out that way. Ellen Page's character was very unconvincing. The best episode was probably the one that didn't happen. Shame.

Cavendish (S1, CBC) - Hilarious. Short absurd comedy/horror series. This is my kind of show. Pity it wasn't renewed for another season. Canadians can probably still check it out on CBC's site. Definitely recommended.

Chernobyl (S1, HBO/Sky) - Amazing show. Won 3 Emmy Awards.

Cowboy Bebop (S1, Bandai Namco) - It had its ups and downs. The worst episodes were the ones that were relevant to the overall story, sadly. Good music, animation, and overall stylistic coherence, though.

The Boys (S1, Prime) - Not great. Too much relentless shitheaddery and not enough comeuppance.

Good Omens (S1, Prime) - OK. Pratchettian stylized comedy. It's a nice love story between the two main characters but the rest all felt oddly peripheral, and there was some time-wasting garbage in here too.

American Gods (S1-2, Prime) - OK so far. There's some overwrought filler. Maybe the recurring problem I'm having is that they're adapting all these stories from books, and overstylizing them as a way of trying to approach literary narrative. Ian McShane is good in this. It's relatively low on actual conflict, though.

I'm on the last episode of The Man in the High Castle (Prime).
And I also watched the first episode of Watchmen (HBO) last night.

The former is surprisingly good. They're going in multiple different directions from the source text right out of the gate, but it all works together for what the show is trying to do. Lots of good characters, which is a nice change from the other Prime offerings I've checked out.

The latter is off to a good start. It'll be interesting to see how it connects to the Watchmen comic book(s), because so far the first episode already has a lot of direct continuations.

Kong Wen wrote: ↑22 Oct 2019 15:15 I'm on the last episode of The Man in the High Castle (Prime).
And I also watched the first episode of Watchmen (HBO) last night.

The former is surprisingly good. They're going in multiple different directions from the source text right out of the gate, but it all works together for what the show is trying to do. Lots of good characters, which is a nice change from the other Prime offerings I've checked out.

The latter is off to a good start. It'll be interesting to see how it connects to the Watchmen comic book(s), because so far the first episode already has a lot of direct continuations.

I'm now part-way into the third season of The Man in the High Castle and still enjoying it. The finale of the second season was very satisfying—so much so that I'm not sure how they'll be able to continue the series and maintain that level of quality.

The third episode of Watchmen was excellent.

The first episode of His Dark Materials (BBC/HBO) also came out this past weekend, and it's off to a promising start. This series deserves a good adaptation. The debut felt slightly fast-paced, especially the introduction of daemons and Professor X's lecture, but I suppose they have to hit all the right beats in a mere 8 episodes.

These shows will doubtless carry me through until The Witcher comes to Netflix in December.

Kong Wen wrote: ↑08 Nov 2019 15:21 These shows will doubtless carry me through until The Witcher comes to Netflix in December.

Kicking off 2020 on the right foot by cracking through the "dad" shows.

Finished off The Mandalorian on 2 January and really enjoyed it. I liked the small-scale "sidequest" episodes, Baby Yoda, Baby Herzog, and how they tied the series back off at the end.

Finished off The Witcher on 12 January and really enjoyed it. I liked the larger-scale "sidequest" episodes, something structural and spoilery, and really enjoyed Cavill as Geralt. I think he did a great job!

I watched The Haunting of Bly Manor as it's spooky season, and I really enjoyed it. Took some good classic horror tropes and pulled them off excellently. Ultimately it's the characters that shine the most, wrapped nicely in a well set up horror environment.

I've started watching The Haunting of Hill House now, which I had never seen before. Very cool to see that the majority of the actors in Bly came from Hill, just playing different characters. Really shows the range of many of the actors.

Just started a free year of Apple TV+ last week. There wasn't much on it for free that I would like to watch, but I found See and just started S1E2. Looks promising.

Finished See season 1 (8 episodes) and now started watching Mythic Quest.
Wanted to watch Foundation, but it's scheduled for a 2021 release (hope it's still in my free year of Apple TV+).
Going to watch For All Mankind after Mythic Quest.