Whatcha Bleedin' Watchin'?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I know that comedy is a subjective thing and all, but beyond not making me laugh (admittedly, I did chuckle at Brad Pitt getting shot in the face and that bit with J. K. Simmons at the end, out of the entire movie), I found the movie to be surprisingly slow to get through.

I also nearly fell asleep watching True Grit. To be fair, I never cared all that much for the original, either, but as someone who loves Westerns, it's pretty odd for a modern, gritty one, to not at least entertain me a little bit.

And while we're at it, I don't really "get" The Big Lebowski  (call me stupid all you want), and I believe that aside from the admittedly great performances and a well-directed shoot-out scene, No Country For Old Men is pretty dull to sit through.

I get that most people love the Coen Brothers, and I'm perfectly fine with that. But if ever there were popular directors whos' work I just couldn't begin to appreciate no matter how much I tried, they'd rank near the top for me.

[Foggle]

Nathan For You is a godsend.

[Avaitor]

I'm at the same point of Fargo's second season when I dropped the first, and I'm liking it a little better so far. I still don't really care about the plot, but the pacing and character building has improved, enough to where I can at least see myself finish the season.

But really, Ted Danson and Cristin Milioti have solid chemistry together.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I finished watching the first season of Master of None. I'm not a fan of Aziz Ansari's stand-up, but this show itself is pretty decent, IMO. Doesn't hold a candle to Louie, though.

I also finally started watching Sons of Anarchy. I didn't realize that Charlie Hunnam and Ron Perlman were in this show!

[Avaitor]

Oh yeah, I watched the first episode of Sons of Anarchy a while ago. I liked it, but never got around to watching more.

I should try to fix that soon.

[Avaitor]

I'm finishing up season 2 of Fargo now. Unless the finale really messes up everything, I do think that this was an improvement from the first. It's not a retread of the film, like the first attempted to be, and its experimentation with its form helped to make an iffy plot work otherwise.

This isn't one of my favorite series from last year, but I'll probably at least give the third season a shot. And I do think that it's a good call that they're taking the year off to make the next season even fresher. Maybe this will turn into something I can really get behind.

[Dr. Insomniac]

At the penultimate episode of War & Peace, it's weird how quickly I got used to Paul Dano as Pierre. At the beginning, I thought he was a very inspired choice. Although, it's a shame the miniseries doesn't have as much Denisov as the book did.

[Pharass]

I haven't got around to watch War and Peace yet, I should check it out in due time.
I've started watching the BBC series The Musketeers, I'm about half-way through the first season and I have to say that I'm impressed with how good this show is. Its up there with Fargo and the horse-show, in terms of shows that have exceeded my expectations. I should point out that The Musketeers is not a straight-up adaptation of the novel (hence why it says "based on characters created by Alexandre Dumas", rather than "based on the novel..." in the opening credits), but it does capture the spirit of Dumas' novel very well and all the characters are recognizable.

[Dr. Insomniac]

After a few self-imposed hiatuses, I'm steamrolling through the rest of the Sopranos. I've gotten to the point where I can't forgive the main cast anymore.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Welp, I watched the finale. Subscribing to the "Member's Only" theory. Silvio was the best character, and happy that Norway gave him a spin-off.

I was intrigued by one of the underlying themes in the last season, about how gentrification and modern culture shifts were killing the mafia more than any law enforcement could do. One of my favorite scenes is when two of Tony's crew try to rough up a Starbucks wannabe for protection money, but fail thanks to how multinational business practices already treat its employees.

[Avaitor]

I'm liking this series so far.

And it makes me want to look for the laugh-track removed tracks, since I couldn't get into the series otherwise. Maybe it's because I've seen Chris Elliot in HIMYM and Raymond beforehand, and his shtick already feels old to me. But the talent behind the camera is what interested me.

[Avaitor]

http://www.eonline.com/news/680827/it-s-official-married-with-children-reunion-is-in-the-works

Well, then.

[Dr. Insomniac]

The Night Manager was an interesting watch. Le Carre's particular brand of espionage fiction works well in the modern era, though I admit I haven't read the source material to get a good idea of how the two compare in terms of time. But even then, the series really played with your head in the middle episodes as to who was the good guy and who was bad. Like you know where they stood, but the roles were portrayed in a way that arms dealing almost came off as a more noble cause than government surveillance operations. It was almost fun up until the shock at seeing how firm Roper and Burr's stances are.

Also, I kept staring at Hugh Laurie's bald spot. I know that's rude, but it was just there in so many shots.

[Avaitor]

The Good Wife finale spent so much effort trying to make its final scene call back to its first, that it fell pretty flat on the whole. And there just wasn't enough emotional weight to make it work as well as it wanted to.

If the show ended last season, it might have had a tighter ending, but it was never especially consistent. Besides the lameness of the first half of season 4, the show hasn't been the same since the half-point or so of the previous season. But man, when it was good, it really was one of the last great cable shows.

[Avaitor]

A few notes-

-Caught the Preacher premiere last night, and dug it. The GN is another series where I picked up the first volume, dug it, and never continued, but this captures the tone down pretty well, and does a good job with Tulip and Cassidy, moreso than Jesse so far, and even then, Dominic Cooper is showing plenty of promise. I'm hoping that this doesn't leave me as flat as AMC's last comic adaptation did.

-We're getting 2 more seasons of The Americans. This order feels like a compromise, with AMC acknowledging and embracing how critically successful the series is, but also accepting that it's not that popular. I sadly don't know anyone else who watches it, even though I swear that it's everything yon can look for in this age of TV. I want more for the show, but I'm willing to accept the short order.

-And now that I've finally discovered Rachel Bloom, I feel compelled to try out Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.