What shows are you watching?

[Drenk]

Yes, definitely. I loved/liked The Good Wife, but The Good Fight is way better. It becomes its true self in season 2 but season 1 is very solid.

[WorldForgot]

Seriously. Well earned character moments, parallel political conundrums. So well shot and paced, and you'll get a hearty dose of character actor cameoz. Such a dope show.

[polkablues]

A couple Netflix originals that just came out that are worth everybody's time:

BLACK SUMMER


There are a lot of reasons to be skeptical of this one. It's yet another zombie thing. It's a ostensible prequel to Z Nation, the show that was seemingly based on the pitch, "The Walking Dead, but intentionally bad." It's produced by The Asylum, the company behind such masterpieces as the Sharknado hexalogy and the Pacific Rim ripoff titled... *deep sigh*... "Atlantic Rim." There's no reason to expect this to be good.

EXCEPT IT IS. It eschews the bloat and soap opera melodrama of The Walking Dead in favor of a sparse, starkly minimalist, intensely focused narrative. There's a single story being told here: people are trying to get to a place and there are obstacles making it hard for them to do so. Characters drop in and out of the story organically, characters die abruptly and typically with little fanfare, and notably -- unlike The Walking Dead, where the human characters almost always seem to outmatch the zombies and are only in danger when they really fuck up somehow -- the stakes feel truly life and death at almost any given moment. Dialogue is scarce, and there are long sections where we're just following a character or characters, the tension building the whole time, and when that tension breaks it goes off like a pipe bomb. There are only a few points across eight episodes where it feels like it goes too over the top and you're reminded of the show's provenance, but it does so much right that it was easy for me to forgive those moments.

THE SOCIETY


It suffers from some shaky writing, especially at the beginning, but the ideas it's grappling with, and the weight with which it treats them, is really the selling point. I'm about two-thirds of the way through the season, and while I'm questioning whether it will be able to pull off the more fantastical elements of the premise, the grounded elements are dead on. How is power allocated outside an established order? What's the human cost of exerting that power, and the psychological cost on those who have been thrust into position to make impossible choices for the greater good?

Also, Kathryn Newton, who was so good in the last season of Halt and Catch Fire, so good in the movie Blockers, and so good in Big Little Lies, is SO GOOD in this. When she's winning Oscars in the next few years, know that I called it here first. 

[wilberfan]

On April 26, 1986, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine, Soviet Union suffered a massive explosion that released radioactive material across Belarus, Russia and Ukraine and as far as Scandinavia and western Europe. Chernobyl dramatizes the story of the 1986 accident, one of the worst man-made catastrophes in history, and the sacrifices made to save Europe from the unimaginable disaster.

Really well done, with an excellent cast.  There's a fascinating "official" podcast episode for each episode in which host Peter Sagal talks with the creator/writer.  A disturbingly high percentage of what we see in each episode is historically accurate. 

[Jeremy Blackman]

I also endorse Chernobyl. The storytelling is just really engaging and well-done. Skillfully gives you the right information and the right amount of time for things to sink in. While somehow not being sensationalist at all. Great job, HBO.

[Jeremy Blackman]

Oh my. Episode 3 goes places. This is now a must-watch in my opinion.

[wilberfan]

Are you combining it with the official podcast?  Highly recommended...

[wilberfan]

Based on Joseph Heller's seminal novel of the same name, Catch-22 is the story of the incomparable, artful dodger, Yossarian (Christopher Abbott), a US Air Force bombardier in World War II who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy, but rather his own army which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to avoid his military assignments, he'll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule which specifies that a concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers which are real and immediate is the process of a rational mind; a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but a request to be removed from duty is evidence of sanity and therefore makes him ineligible to be relieved from duty.

Never read the book and thought the Nichols feature film rather bad (back in the day and especially during a recent attempt at a rewatch)--but found this version quite engaging and compelling.  At least a couple of episodes directed by George Clooney (who Exec Produced and has a small role).  Not sure I've seen the lead anywhere before, but really liked his performance.  Didn't expect to like this much, so was very pleasantly surprised.

[polkablues]

As someone who loves the Nichols film with every ounce of his being, I'm skeptical but open to this new version.

[WorldForgot]

It's great. This production gets the novel'z tone perfectly. Also, wilberfan, Christopher Abbott nailz it in (a cult cult film) as well as (he's only in about three seasons), if you're looking to catch more of his naturalist fuego.

Excuse the cat. I just adore this scene/song:

[csage97]

Based on Joseph Heller's seminal novel of the same name, Catch-22 is the story of the incomparable, artful dodger, Yossarian (Christopher Abbott), a US Air Force bombardier in World War II who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy, but rather his own army which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to avoid his military assignments, he'll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule which specifies that a concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers which are real and immediate is the process of a rational mind; a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but a request to be removed from duty is evidence of sanity and therefore makes him ineligible to be relieved from duty.

Never read the book and thought the Nichols feature film rather bad (back in the day and especially during a recent attempt at a rewatch)--but found this version quite engaging and compelling.  At least a couple of episodes directed by George Clooney (who Exec Produced and has a small role).  Not sure I've seen the lead anywhere before, but really liked his performance.  Didn't expect to like this much, so was very pleasantly surprised.

The book is excellent! Really one of my favourites. The humour in the novel is fantastically ridiculous but really indicative of how ridiculous parts of war can be. I'd like to think that Jerry Seinfeld ripped off Catch-22 ....

[wilberfan]

I want to circle back and sing the final praises of Chernobyl.   The final episode is 73 of the finest minutes of filmed drama I've seen in a very long time.  The entire cast is brilliant--but let's give Jared Harris special notice for his work in this.   The epilogue at the end is absolutely devastating.   This is the best thing I've seen since last year's "Escape at Dannemora". 

[jonas]

Yea, the finale of Chernobyl was really great. The show was great at explaining the scientific aspects of the situation with simple clarity, that courtroom explanation of the explosion in ep. 5 is the best example.

The fact that they were able to create so much tension when recreating the explosion (something that we know happens) was fantastic, it made you hope their was some kind of different ending. I never knew about the potential of a large explosion after the initial one, to know eastern Europe was THAT close to disaster is almost unreal. The fact that they don't know how many were truly affected shows the horror of the whole situation.

I thought everything from the acting, cinematography and music were top notch.

[polkablues]

The incredible thing is to look at Craig Mazin's prior filmography, and then see what he accomplished with this series. You never in a million years would have guessed he was capable of this.

[Robyn]

The incredible thing is to look at Craig Mazin's prior filmography, and then see what he accomplished with this series. You never in a million years would have guessed he was capable of this.

Omg, you're not kidding!

It's the fucking creator of Superhero Movie??