Consider this my presidential state of the union address.
The state of television right now is …
Shit.
But that’s all about to change.
It’s been a long winter.
A LONGwinter.
Better Call Saul, and the premiere of Jordan Peele’s new communist show Hunters premieres in the coming days. … And so does the catastrophic train wreck that has come to be known as The Walking Dead.
Also, Kidding is currently airing it’s second season and I didn’t even realize!
Hopefully things will be looking up.
I need to start making more of these posts. SO consider this the first, of many updates to come.
What have we been watching during this shit winter?
Watchmen: Phenomenal
Star Trek – Picard: Love it. Love it. Love it.
Curb Your Enthusiasm (season 10): Great. Just great. As usual.
Homeland (season 8): Off to a great start to it’s last season
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (season 3): Good. Not as powerful as the first two seasons but still compelling.
The Witcher: Good
BoJack Horseman (season 5): The final season was just okay. The series finale was a bit of a letdown.
The Good Place (season 4): Again, just okay, and the finale felt anticlimatic.
Servant: M. Night Shymalan’s show. Mostly garbage. Some interesting characters and scenes save it from being utter trash.
Sanditon: A lackluster Downton Abbey knockoff, that’s passable.
Shrill (season 2): Okay
You (season 2): It’s. Addictive. Terrible. But, addictive and entertaining.
For All Mankind: .. Why do I keep torturing myself with anything to do with Ronald Moore?
McMillions: I’m bored, but it’s watchable
Avenue 5: Why was this show even made?
High Fidelity: Barely tolerable
The Outsider: Nauseatingly terrible
Dracula: The absolute god damn worst abomination of a show
And there you have it.
The state of TV right now is shit. But getting better.
Hopefully this lull in quality television will end soon.
As it is, I am living week to week to watch Star Trek – Picard.
I’m way behind on my space dramas. With NPR’s never-ending coverage of the Apollo 11 anniversary today, I feel obligated to try to catch up on some of the things gathering dust on my hard drive.
Before that, I heard something strange today. Did you know that the space race came down to the wire? Fun fact, I heard on NPR: Russia nearly almost beat us. They had a rocket launch less than a month before Apollo 11 that blew up on their launch platform. It is not known to this day whether it was their planned mission to the moon. Screw Chernobyl. Show me THATmovie.
No, I have not watched ‘The Expanse’
Yes, I know that I need to.
This will be a short list of other things.
A very short list. Don’t get your hopes up for anything great.
Without further ado, behold my Apollo 11 related watch list!
I’m about 3 episodes in. Started it months ago. I wasn’t wowed by it, and wasn’t thrilled with the occult turn it took. But it’s not terrible by any means, and as the completionist that I am, I need to revisit it.
Okay, that list was too short. How about another?
The 3 Most Underrated Space Dramas You’ve Never Watched
Originally airing on ‘Yahoo!’, it felt like I was the only one that watched this at the time. And some episodes had me dying of laughter. Give it a chance to build.
I don’t have anything against the original. Okay. Maybe I do. It was before my time, but I’ve seen enough to know that it was cheesy. I also saw the movie remake starring Matt LeBlanc. I’d watch the movie any day over this long, pointless remake.
Oh boy. I could only make it through one episode. The cringe-levels were too high, even for me. Maybe it gets better, but I doubt it. The premise seemed interesting: Earth is nearing extinction, rocket scientists gather to discuss the feasibility of building something to save humanity. Yet, it had no sense of humor, and an added level of neutered dread.
You have to really love George R. Martin to slog your way through this one. I made it to the end, and it was okay. But, there were some god awful episodes, like the one-off meeting of the cannibal ship. Horror / Space Sci-Fi is a very niche field that I’ve very rarely seen ever done right. No, Event Horizon (1997) is not a good movie. Sunshine (2007) is okay, up to the point it becomes a horror film. Pandorum (2009),yes… I don’t care what anyone says, that movie is brilliant.
You know what?
How about some more obviousmovies that you NEED TO SEE.
TLDR: Netflix has gone back and removed roughly 3 minutes of their show depicting a suicide in the finale of season 1’s 13 Reasons Why. Spoiler: Hannah kills herself. This isn’t a spoiler, by the way, if you’ve watched more than the first five minutes of the show.
My First Reaction:
What the actual fucking fuck?
First, let’s be very clear up front right now:
I am not a fan of 13 Reasons Why.
I am not a Trumpist, alt-right, GAB troll, that believes the United States is becoming too ‘politically correct’.
Nor am I a fan of George Lucas adding all his fancy special effects to the original Star Wars movies.
That all said, something about this makes my blood boil, for reasons not pertaining to the list above. Let’s be even more clear: ’13 Reasons Why’ is an absolute shit-show.
Season 1 consists of nearly every episode focusing around a ‘tape’ Hannah made before her death, that inevitably exposes one (or more) character’s contribution to her decision to kill herself.
13 Reasons Why was literally one of the worst shows I’ve ever watched in my life for a plethora of reasons. Yet, I felt it was mandatory watching for anyone that cares about television, because it set the standard for TERRIBLE television that takes itself too seriously and sends a horribly wrong message to its viewers.
It is an abomination on many levels. For a time, I thought nothing could be worse than 13 Reasons Why, and I would casually judge people’s taste in television simply by asking if they liked the show.
…. Oh, and it turns out I was wrong. Season 2 managed to be worse than season 1, by continuing to ratchet up the dial on high-school drama shock value, to eventually include my least favorite subject for movies and television: school shootings.
Okay, end mini-rant. Let’s continue:
But that doesn’t mean Netflix should go back and make it more palatable to audiences by removing key scenes.
The scene in question here is, awful. Hannah is a bit of a pretentious brat, and season 1 was roundly critiqued for glorifying her decision to kill herself. The scene at least showed the reality that killing herself was painful, and wasn’t easy to do. Stripping it out, makes it seem even more like the show is trying to tell kids that suicide is okay, in certain circumstances. That message is absolutely wrong.
In my mind, I contrast this scene, with the scene in Sharp Objects:
Where, in a flashback, Camille is shown to be in a mental institution for treatment of her cutting habit. She returns to her room, to find her roommate having attempted suicide and bleeding on the floor.
The direction in this scene is nothing short of brilliant, as it seems to put you in her shoes with her warped thought process. It’s one of the most jarring few minutes of television I’ve watched in recent memory. And, most importantly, in no-way-shape-or-form, is glorifying suicide. It, instead, shows how the mind can immediately and irrationally jump to that decision, and leaves you feeling emotionally drained and thankful that you’re not (hopefully) suffering from that same mental affliction.
They managed to make the show worse
By putting up a middle finger to any critics saying the show glorifies suicide, by removing the last bastion of their defense: The gory scene depicting the awfulness of suicide. And they’ve done this in favor of making the show more ‘politically correct’, and ‘less graphic’.
Where does this editing practice stop?
I already can’t watch movies on TV anymore because of the time-crunching editing they do to cram in any many commercials as possible, as well as the product-placement campaigns.
This is the first instance that I know of, of a streaming-service engaging in the practice to, appease some unknown god of public opinion without fully understanding the consequences.
Let’s make my stance on editing clear here: Release a show. Don’t edit it under any circumstance. If it’s terrible, it’s terrible, let it be.
The only form of post-release editing that is acceptable is in the form of ‘Director’s Cut’ reworkings of the source material. Blade Runner remains the shining example of this, with the Director’s Cut stripping out all the unnecessary narration.
…
Additionally, it should make everyone that watches Netflix and other streaming services incredibly nervous. Nervous that they’re not ever watching the original release the way it was originally received and reviewed.
I still advocate for downloading and possessing access to copies of every movie/tv show. This is just one more prime example of why that is a good idea.
I need to write a rant on the other reasons, as well as how to get into that for anyone that is interested.
