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On telly this week

Started by Emperor, 24 December, 2011, 04:01:53 PM

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IAMTHESYSTEM

DREDD starring Karl Urban and Olivia Thirlby: 10:15 pm, Channel 4, Sunday the 17th of July.
"You may live to see man-made horrors beyond your comprehension."

http://artriad.deviantart.com/
― Nikola Tesla

Keef Monkey

I see Mr Robot has started on UK telly now (Universal I think?), have been watching it on Amazon Prime (they're up to season 2 now) and loving it, it's really very good, recommend it!

Link Prime

Quote from: Keef Monkey on 22 July, 2016, 11:00:27 AM
I see Mr Robot has started on UK telly now (Universal I think?), have been watching it on Amazon Prime (they're up to season 2 now) and loving it, it's really very good, recommend it!

Yeah, it started on both Universal and SyFy UK last night.
Heard very good things about it, so have started recording it.

By-Jove

Along with Stranger Things on Netflix, I was able to sample other stuff like Shameless, Daredevil, some series about a woman with superpowers who runs a detective agency. The same girl who got killed in Breaking Bad & Shadow-Hunters. Which is not as dull as the City of Bones film, but could have used the movie same cast and less of the fantastical weirdness that might have been drip fed to the viewer instead flung into my face or their face right from the beginning. Still a improvement over other stuff of similar ilk that I've been watching to fill that supernatural horror niche I've been craving.

Goaty

If anyone not see it yet, worth it to watch Mad Max 2 on ITV1 in 20 mins!

Dandontdare

well not telly but radio .... that episode of Chain Reaction where Frankie Boyle interviews Grant Morrison is on R4Extra at 10:30 tonight. (Which means Grant Morrison interviewing Neil Innes next week)

CrazyFoxMachine

#576
To distract from the sorrow I thought I'd do a summary on here of what LG and I are watching at the moment - we watch quite a heft of TV and have opinions on all of it so WHY NOT.

Agents of S.H.I.E.LD - Season 4
Seems to have been floating over the "shall we stop watching it" bin since the start of season 2 - something (the occasional nods to the cinematic universe & the charming FitzSimmons) keeps it just about watchable. It suffers from what most big-network syndicated US dramas do which is endless time-wasting melodrama and metre-thick idiocy. Some neat twists keep it bearable but DC's colourful TV output puts this to shame.

Ash vs. Evil Dead - Season 2
Fully taken with the slapstick mixed with gore and general excellence of season 1. Just silly enough to take the edge of the scares, just scary enough to take the stupidity out of the silliness. A good balance and doesn't fuck about also Lee Majors was in episode one.

Blunt Talk - Season 2
Underrated. This dirty-minded comedy about an opinion-piece anchor with a heart (played by the evergreen Patrick Stewart) took me by surprise at how open-minded it actually is. In contrast to Family Guy's one-sided cruelty this greasy world is populated by kind and broken perverts. Every interaction is a therapy session - every grubby incident is compassionately dealt with. It is, at times, quite revelatory. Stewart has claimed he had more fun making this than anything he's ever done and it does show. It may not be for everyone but it kind of works for me.

Damned
Jo Brand's sharp-but-bleak recent BBC sitcoms about nursing having flown a bit under people's radars I think but here on C4 she's bringing her absorbingly naturalistic tone into a busy comedy about social care. Frantic, heartbreaking, maddening and spellbinding with an incredibly strong cast I hope this gets the attention it deserves.

Divorce
Sharon Horgan's recent 'pilot' with Linehan for BBC's sitcom season is a hint of what you get here - razor sharp bleak life meets cutting comedy stuff. In Divorce we have the unlikely tormented love triangle of Thomas Haden Church, Sarah Jessica Parker and Jemaine Conchords Clement and it's interesting. Like Veep you get an odd kick of hearing Americans recite acidic British scripts - only seen the first one but it seems worth a gamble.

Impastor - Season 2
Michael Rosenbaum (young Lex from Smallville) plays an utter cad and compulsive liar masquerading as a pastor in a small town and basically spends the episodes desperately-trying-to-keep-a-lid-on-everything in grand sitcom tradition. Another one that took us by surprise, featuring a likeable cast and some genuinely cringeworthy situations. Often charming, sometimes quite tense - always a lark.

The Last Man on Earth - Season 3
I watched the first two because of my love of Lord & Miller (Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Lego Movie etc) and the goodwill they fostered is yet to wear off. It's a post-apocalyptic character piece of sorts - quite off kilter and never consistent enough to generate hatred nor complete adoration but nonetheless quite transfixing. The bizarre setting, the odd character dynamics and the curiously gripping plot twists keep us coming back for more.

Luke Cage
We tend to watch Netflix stuff on a week-by-week basis which makes it more manageable but leaves us fragile to spoilers. Only seen the first of this and it's a hell of an opener. Colter's Cage is excellently downplayed and the classy pulpy tone is perfectly set by a brilliantly chunky retro score by Black Dynamite's Adrian Younge who I've been a fan of for ages. In fact the whole thing seems to be dipped in Daptone records which is... well it's just perfect. It sets a really unique tone next to Daredevil's gritty realism and Jessica Jones's angsty nineties thing.

Morgana Robinson's The Agency
I've been entranced with Robinson ever since seeing her in a series of comedy shorts done for iPlayer by Vic and Bob's production company and of course her demented turn in the pleasingly weird House of Fools. She's an uncanny impressionist and hilarious with it. Like most impressions shows this is held together by a flimsy pretext and is fairly hit-and-miss - also the odd heavy focus on the overlong and fairly cruel Natalie Cassidy skits feels a bit unnecessary.

Red Dwarf XII
As I've said on the dedicated thread - for this former Red Dwarf obsessive it's not offensive in the least and I get like a massive nostalgic childhood wave of joy everytime I watch it but the pacing is off this series - the endings seem too brusque and the daring tone compared to the funny-but-safe X is being marred by that a little frankly.

The Simpsons - Season 28
Yeah still watch this week by week. Never stooping to the cynical hatefulness of Family Guy (never mention the crossover that was as wrong as Tellytubby porn) but frequently as awkwardly out of touch as a bored granddad firing off lame topical Tweets. The Simpsons is now more tired habit than intelligently-crafted endeavour and the feather light touch of showrunner Al Jean (a permanent fixture since season 13 hmmm) means that each season is scattershot at best. Some episodes are surprisingly touching and funny, some are actively abysmal and some are divertingly bizarre (in Season 27 there was a non-Halloween episode where the family just randomly go to Kang and Kodos' planet).

Star Wars Rebels - Season 3
I hated Clone Wars simply out of reverence to the excellent Genndy Tartakovsky series - I thought it was flabby, I thought it was pointless. Rebels however charts unknown ground and is thrilling for it - often visually quite stunning (although their Plasticine hair is distracting) and after Season 2's unexpectedly jarring finalé [spoiler]where Darth Maul shows up and Ahsoka Tano is finally sadly felled by her former master[/spoiler] it has gained an unlikely edge of genuine drama to it. Occasionally oversimplified for the intended audience but quite engaging. Really didn't expect to grow to like this quite as much as I have. ALSO TOM BAKER.

The Strain - Season 3
Guillermo del Toro's body-horror vamp-pocalypse series had me at episode 1 with its odd balance of grimdark and pulpy silliness - and the unexpectedly involving characters. The pace is rarely sluggish and the deaths are Thronesian in their impact thanks to a nicely focused cast of charismatic actors (the great Dave Bradley in their number). Rarely goes for the cheap shot, is sometimes deeply brutal.


The Enigmatic Dr X

WHere can I see the Evil Dead season 2, Foxy?
Lock up your spoons!

CrazyFoxMachine

Quote from: The Enigmatic Dr X on 14 October, 2016, 06:08:43 PM
WHere can I see the Evil Dead season 2, Foxy?

This was what I was affeard of with my mega TV post. The answer is not legally. Such is the nature of international television consumption unfortunately. IF ONLY NETFLIX PROVIDED EVERYTHING.

COMMANDO FORCES

Ash vs The Evil Dead season 2 is exclusively on Virgin.

moly

Really enjoyed the strain and hope season 3 comes back to nowtv soon

The Enigmatic Dr X

Quote from: CrazyFoxMachine on 15 October, 2016, 01:02:36 AM
Quote from: The Enigmatic Dr X on 14 October, 2016, 06:08:43 PM
WHere can I see the Evil Dead season 2, Foxy?

This was what I was affeard of with my mega TV post. The answer is not legally. Such is the nature of international television consumption unfortunately. IF ONLY NETFLIX PROVIDED EVERYTHING.

Ach, not to worry. I just bought the first season from Tesco for a tenner, and watched the first one last night. Well, most of it. Mrs X gave up after 10 minutes and so we put on a BBC 4 documentary.

Friday nights - rock and roll in our house.
Lock up your spoons!

Spikes


Geoff

If past form is anything to go by, this will likely be the most insightful, thought-provoking and disturbing film you've seen for some time.

The extraordinary soundtrack, comes as a bonus...   

Goaty

Crystal Maze was let down! But lovely to see Richard O'Brien again