Blue Eye Samurai (2023)

2024.01.29

Saw a recommendation on a Youtube; there exists one season on Netflix.

First episode good; continuing.

2024.02.08

Watched through 6/8 last night.

The show started out with gritty realism, but now it is becoming more and more anime cliches.

It's still fun and interesting to watch, and there are still moments of beauty. I really liked the previous episode where you're watching a play intertwined with a flashback.

2024.02.11

Had to take a break for a while. As the show veers further into fantasy, I am less interested in wherever its going.

I avoided spoilers, so I had no idea if this was a 8 episode one shot, or a the beginning of a series.

* spoilers *

* spoilers *

Not a happy ending for anyone but the bad guys.

Season 2 has been approved.

I think I would have preferred a mini series, but its still worth watching and I look forward to the next one.

1899 season 1 (2022)

2023.09.04

Been putting this off knowing it has been cancelled, but I really liked Dark and curiosity wins.

...done.

About that ending... some light spoilage:

The ending has finality. I was expecting some kind of cliff hanger, like they did halfway through Dark, but this feels OK as a stopping point. You have plenty of hooks you could expand on, but there's really no need. And now that the surprise is unveiled, it kind of takes away the premise.

I give the Dark writers credit, they could probably keep building on this, but there's no need to.

See season 3 ()

{note from a year later: I've never seen so many typos, but I was in a hospital bed, so I'm not embarrassed, and I'm not fixing it}

Ep1 blind prople scaling a sheer cliff face. I just don't know.. trapping big game, smoking herbs.

Letting the old queen just sit there with their baby.

Explosives, makes sense, its about time. But how did we go so quickly  from primitively timed fused bombs to pressure sensitive land mines?

Ep2

The enemy comes deep into enemy territory to take out baba. They put 1 landmine outside his house, blow up a minor character, and leave seemingly satisfied? All that way and no body verification. Or maybe they ate supposed to come off as overconfident, but thats s lot.

Is anybody even in character anymore? I feel like i dont knoe any of these people. Only evil queen is consistent in her ability to stay alive and keep doing evil.

,Ep3

Cmon whos storu is this anyway? Evil queen story is long since played out.

Ep4

This really is the Queen Sibeth show. Looks like this is the last season, snd i am happy about that.

Ep5 always sad to see a library burn but it made sense to destroy Merlin's castle. And, of course, there are others.

Ep6 cannibal episode

Ep7 so.... Trebuchets now .

Ep8 done.

Babas heroic ending is good.

Kofuns ending makes story sensr, but its still tediculous. Self mutilation is never the answer.

Haniwa ending is ok, but its hard to imagine Manhattan being empty.

The two queens story is completely forgettable, and just served as a whip to move some kind of story along.

I enjoyed the premise of the show in beginning. It seemed reasonably well founded, where everything was based on deeper uses of the other senses. But as the story scaled up it strayed from that. More and more shortcuts removed me ftom the story. If i could do it iver i wokld probably just watch seasone one and be done 

See season 2 ()

202211

Ep1

Spoilers****”***"

Nice, were finally addressing the father teaching t he the kids issue, past and present.

The violence seems to be inly increasing; impressed they are going that way 

Ep2

An apartment of the ancients, well preserved... For 5 centuries? You see this in a lot of post apocalyptic stories, its just too tempting to revisit the ancients, no matter how natural decay works.

I like how just whfn you think youve figured out how crazy the queen is, they can go a litte further.

.

Season 2 is complicated. Its different, but still interesting. More anf more though i wonder how complicated a society can the blind really build. 

If the horses are any indication, theres a lot of glossing ovet going on. In this show horses are basically cars with infinite energy snd no maintenance that anyone can operate. 

Also, there is little thought given to supplies. Troops and mounts seem to carry no food butcsn operate far from home with no ill effect 

Ep5 reunited. 

Himans are vey good at facial recognition, and reading each other's expressions. It was probably the basis of communication long before language. What does the loss of that do, even if we still have language?

Ep6 betrayal. A little boring.

Ep7 

Whete does baba find vaguely asian style weapon and armor? No one else seems to be wearing it.

Ep 8 nice battle. The narrator is back to old tricks to surprise the viewer, even if there's no time for the setup or training required to make it work.

Theres over a dozen endings as every cast member wraps up a bit of their story. the ex queen is just being herself - i can't even get mad at her anymore. Everyone knows whst she is now, but they stilll allow her freedom of motion, no weappn checks, and her tongue. At some point, if you keep letting her get away with it, its kind of your fault.

Ive had enough of this show but there's stilll another season. I have see where this goes.

See season 1 ()

See, Season one (Apple TV)

2022.10

Starts off strong with an interesting world, characters and action, but turns into a whirlwind of non stop new plot points that barely have time to breathe. The promise of learning about how humans function in a world where an ability we take for granted, sight, is now a superpower is quickly forgotten. Time skips and pacing issues can make it difficult to stay immersed. Even worse are episodes that are mostly exposition dumps. Sometimes this feels like a movie or book that got chopped and stetchrd.

Worth watching first season, dont know if ill continue.

Ep1 Going in cold with a good recommendation.

feels lije a book adaptation. There are so many questions to ask but it feels likr the lore is there; just not overexplained. First episode feels a little too fast like they are in a hurry to get somewhere, but it builds enough trust to continue.

Ep2 keeps up the crazy speed, ending with some new characters as if here is the real story now. I would have liked to see a little more world building by now; maybe let the story breathe a bit. Whats the rush, its such an interesting premise, but hard to justify. I would have liked to see them do more

Ep3 the constant time skipping is slowing down; feels likr we've finally gotten to the story tte story wanted to tell.

Im trying to hold the nitpicking til at least end pf season one, but thrse kids seem like they were copy pasted into this world from a much gentler version. Wouldn't you think the kids of the chief would receive some more training than this? Especially in a situation where they have to e even more extra careful?

One thing ive liked from the beginning is this sort of reconsyructed primitive culture (like you see in Heilung).

Ep4 time is linear, exciting things start happening right away. A nice chase, but the nitpicks are accumulating. Trying to just enjoy the stroy as is, for now.

Ep5 still not talkking sppoilers yet, but this really makes you wonder why htbings unfolded this way.

Ep6 suddenly went from action chase show to every 2 chatacters eill pair off and have 5 min. Exposition. This show seems to like big reveals and big drops for the shock vslue, but i guess the cost of that is we have to stop and info dump,?

Ep7 things start happening agsin,.

I notice the props are getting cheaprt. In ep1 the furs and hides lookef hdbc made. Now are hero is wearing a raincoat with grommets, looks off the rack..

How do these people tame hirses, let alone guide them, ley alohe fees them? 

Ep8 done season one. Its ok but... Maybe It could have been edited down to one good longish movie.

For all the time it had, the ending felt a bit rushed.

Severance season 1 (2022)

2022.06.11 Finished watching last night, looking forward to the next.

Alternate title could easily be: "Liminal Space - the tv show".

I like how the show is familiar and strange at the same time. It adds something that exterior shots are filmed at Bell Works, which I've seen the periphery of many times.

Free Guy (2021)

2022.05.23

Watched Free Guy on Disney+.

It's basically The Lego Movie, but instead of legos the background is Grand Theft Auto Online.

If you like that, you'll almost certainly like this.

* spoilers for both of the above... as if you could spoil a Disney movie *

The most memorable thing about the Lego movie is how it interacted with the real world. In Free Guy, the hook is that the real world doesn't matter - the protagonist is an AI emerging from the system itself. Kind of boring and overly done, it makes for a lesser experience than Lego - watch that instead.

Having said that, if you like GTA, its interesting to see it represented on screen. Like everything else in this movie, there's not much depth to it, but it's nice to see one of the best selling games ever get some representation.