Whatcha Bleedin' Watchin'?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

The premiere for His Dark Materials was actually pretty great. I've actually been re-reading the trilogy in preparation for the show and they are even better books than I remember when I was a kid. Easily way more interesting and well thought-out than you'd expect from a series of  children/young adult novels. Glad to see it getting a genuinely good adaptation, at least so far.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Just watched the first episode of HDM. Fun to see Clarke Peters here.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

The casting is pretty great all around, especially Daphne Keen as Lyra, who's proven to be a genuinely good child actor in Logan and is doing a good job here as well. I will admit that James McAvoy as Lord Asriel always struck me as an odd choice since he doesn't really have the kind of demeanor that I associated with the character. That said, he does a decent job so long as I think of him as an alternative interpretation of the character for the show.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Yeah, McAvoy seemed like he wasn't doing his own interpretation of Asriel, but instead trying to emulate Daniel Craig's version from the shitty 2007 movie.

Speaking of which, it's insane looking at the credits of that film and seeing all these stars like Nicole Kidman, Sam Elliot, Christopher Lee, Eva Green, Ian McShane, Ian McKellen, and Derek Jacobi. I know that since this film was New Line's attempt to ride Harry Potter's coattails, they followed that franchise's habit of shoving every famous classically-trained actor they could find into the cast, but it's weird and a little bit sad to see all that money and starpower wasted on that adaptation. Still interesting to compare the film and the show.

[Avaitor]

I have no experience with HSM, but I enjoyed the first episode alright. Not sure if this will be the new Game of Thrones, but I'm interested in sticking around for now.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

It's based on a series of children's novels that's known for having a lot of adult themes and interesting and challenging themes for it's age demographic. It's not quite ASOIAF in that regard, but it holds up really well for any age just for how dedicated the story-telling is to portraying both it's characters and moral dilemmas in complex and nuanced ways that make them far less like ordinary Fantasy or Sci-Fi characters (this series also blurs the lines between those two genres, which is great). And while not having a Game of Thrones level body count, this series doesn't shy away from darker elements and multiple established characters do die, including children.

I'd recommend checking out the books if you ever get a chance. They are very eloquently written despite their intended age demographic since Phillip Pullman is an author who has a deeply passionate respect for classic literature and understands how to tell a story to young audiences without ever talking down to them. Such is the case that even James McAvoy said in an interview that he read these books back in his early 20's and was blown away by how advanced the concepts it was presenting were, which is what attracted him to play Lord Asriel in the first place. Pullman also has a rather outspoken disdain for religion and has some other controversial views, some of which is inserted into his work, but for the most part manages to keep his stories from becoming too encumbered by his personal beliefs.

That said, the premiere was excellent, so if the rest of the show can maintain this level of quality, then it definitely makes for a faithful and excellent adaptation of the source material.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Kind of surprised the show is already tipping it's hat by foreshadowing material from the sequel books, as well as straight up showing the existence of what is essentially our world which was a big reveal in the beginning of book two. Still, the writing, directing, and acting are so on point that it manages to make it all work, IMO.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, I signed up for a free trial of Disney + and the service has constantly kept crashing on me. I looked online and I seem to be far from the only one with this issue. While I'm sure these are things that will get worked out, one wonders why a major corporation like Disney couldn't make sure their product actually works before releasing it. I'll probably cancel before my trial week ends and wait until they have more content and announce that they have fixed their servers.

And if you're curious on my thoughts, I liked the premiere of The Mandalorian. It's nothing all that impressive outside of its production value (for a mini-series), but it was fairly entertaining with some good world building.

[Dr. Insomniac]

The first episode of Mandalorian felt more Star Trek than Star Wars. Maybe it was the blue alien in the first act, or the Mandalorian armor process scene felt very familiar to some Klingon rituals (that's not specifically this show's fault, Star Wars has been trying for a long time to make Mandalorians their franchise's Klingons), but I thought it was okay. I perked up when the IG droid showed up and kept attempting to commit suicide, but then he died. Wish he stayed around for at least one more episode.

Furthermore, this is adorable.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Really glad that they got Iorek's character right this time around. I love Ian Mckellen, but I remember him playing the character a bit too majestically and typical of a fantasy character. The new show portrays him as a gruff, ill-tempered killing machine which is part of who he is, though he has a clever side as well that we have yet to see.

My one criticism is that the show has been paced a tad too slow for my liking. Not sure if they are dragging things out to meet a specific episode count, but there are easily a number of filler scenes that could be cut out completely and not effect the story in any significant way.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Filler or padding was inevitable, since these are 400-page books adapted into 8-hour seasons. Maybe they could have taken ideas from the HDM prequel if they were starved for ways to stretch the story out.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

They have inserted in material from other books and short stories set in the Universe, but obviously they can't cut away to any of those  things outside of Easter Eggs here and there as it would disrupt the narrative flow of the story. That said, if they expand on other characters like Scoresby among others, that would be a good use of their time. They've already been doing that for Mrs. Coulter which has lead to the best of the show's original scenes thus far, IMO.

At any rate, this is one of those slow burn series, even in the books (the last third of the first book is where it really grabbed me to begin with), so I feel like the show may end up playing out very similarly.

[Dr. Insomniac]

FX and the BBC collaborated on another adaptation of A Christmas Carol. and it's so edgy. Scrooge becomes a victim of child molestation who gets people killed, and almost rapes Mrs. Cratchit. I watched half of it, the second half specifically, and while I can appreciate expanding Mary Cratchit's character and the grim atmosphere the creator borrows from his previous work in Peaky Blinders and Taboo, it felt exactly like something Bill Murray's character from Scrooged would have produced.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Watched the first episode of The Witcher. I know jackshit about the franchise beyond they're based off of a series of Polish books that continued into video games, and the only thing I know about the games is Charles Dance plays a character heavily similar to Tywin Lannister. Speaking of, the comparisons to that other fantasy show that ended last year were lurking in my head, but they were superficial at best. But for the show itself, I thought the swordfight was pretty cool, though the plot hasn't hooked me yet.

[Avaitor]

I finally caught up on Succession. It was nice to have Holly Hunter here for a bit to be a part of the show's Fox merger parallels, It would've been nice to keep her on for more, but it felt like that material was running its course anyway. It's funny that I liked that arc as much as I did, because I tend to agree that the show works better as a Shakespearan tragedy than a satire.

On a sidenote, Christ, is Ronan fucked up.