The TV Series discussion thread

Nightflyers? Episode? Wasn't that a (pretty crappy) movie?
Radiohead… No, sorry, never heard.

Yeah I'm not thrilled with the show, the novel was much superior, but I'll tolerate a lot for musical genius. I plan to have my kindle in hand for the extra boring parts, that much is certain.

Right, I had a postponed "project" so instead of finally playing something I thought let's see that new show mentioned here by several people.
Binged it whole. It was a horrible mistake.

Nightflyers is yet another SyFy's timewaster dud, only this time the audience won't ditch it after the first episode because it doesn't look too cheap unlike usual SyFy's production.

What's it about really? A homicidal ghost that haunts not a house this time but a spaceship. Haunting is not metaphysical now as it's sci fi, so a ghost possession is of course described as technological breakthrough.
As that isn't interesting enough, the spaceship crew is full of different characters, um, sorry, actually they're not different at all as all of them basically escaped a nuthouse.

It is one of worst TV series I've seen in 2018 and whoever is reading this, please, avoid it like a plague. Even grinding in FO76 is better than this unbelievable idiocy.

Yeah I've got two episodes left and I'm not in a hurry to finish the show off. The book was sooooo much better, but then again, they always are, at least for me. What I find truly laughable is, at the end of each episode they take four or five minutes to talk about what happened on the show, do you not realize I just watched the bloody thing?

I remember seeing the movie Nightflyers in theaters the week it came out because I was a big George R.R. Martin fan (though I never read the novella it was based on) and thought it was one of the worst SF-horror films I had ever seen perhaps only rivaled by Larry Buchanan's It's Alive. The idea of a television series based on it produced by the SyFy channel makes me want to ram a dirty magazine down my throat and asphyxiate myself.

Sometimes the movie IS better than the book though. The Warriors (1979) is clearly superior to the novel it's based on for example.

Originally Posted by JackOfOwls
makes me want to ram a dirty magazine down my throat

Stop! Gimme that magazine!

Originally Posted by joxer
Stop! Gimme that magazine!

That was my little homage to a certain scene in a classic SF film. I'm sure most of you got it.

Speaking of dirty magazines, when I was in junior high school finding an issue of Playboy or one of the harder girlie magazines in the woods or on the street was considered a huge stroke of luck. Once, my best friend and I were walking home from school and there on the sidewalk in front of us was a magazine with its pages spread open, and containing nothing but naked bodies in salacious poses. As our eyes popped and we marveled at our good fortune, we reached down to pluck up the precious artifact when we suddenly realized it was all pictures of nude men stroking their huge erections. My friend and I both cried, "Ewww!" in unison as we dropped the filthy thing onto the sidewalk as if it were a big bag of dog stools. We laughed heartily as the small group of fellow male classmates also walking home about 100 yards behind us repeated the exact same action: a cheer of celebration followed by a groan of disgust as they too flung the offending article to the ground.

Anyway, that's my little dirty magazine story. I hope you liked it

I guess that's what they mean when saying one man's trash is another man's treasure.

After years I couldn't believe noone tried it, it finally happened:
https://www.comingsoon.net/tv/news/1…on-of-rashomon

Amblin TV has announced they’re developing a small-screen adaptation of the 1950 classic from legendary Japanese film writer/director Akira Kurosawa, Rashomon.

The original film, co-written by Kurosawa and Shinobu Hasimoto and directed by the former, revolves around the rape of a bride and the murder of her samurai husband and sees the story told from four different perspectives, that of a bandit, the bride, a woodcutter and the ghost of the samurai.

The series, … , will adapt the story into a 10-part mystery drama surrounding a single event, which has yet to be announced, and will tell the story from each of the different characters’ perspectives.

It's not a remake obviously, just a storytelling style about human nature.
Note that the closest thing to Kurosawa's masterpiece was basically HBO's Wire and Channel 4's Red Riding. Noone else was brave enough to get even closer till now. Even if Amblin yells "caution", I'm happy.

EDIT:
Just to add. Rashomon is one of those movies you need to watch before you die. Okay? If you didn't already, stop whatever you're doing and go for it!

EDIT2:
Pardon my ignorance, seems someone already tried it, but I've never heard about these two before (thanks google!):

Vantage Point

The attempted assassination of the American President is told and re-told from several different perspectives.

And of course I'll remain an ignorant fool - I don't care about american presidents.
But you… Well, maybe it's worth checking.

Virumandi

The take on death penalty told through the story of a temperamental villager caught in between two village clans. Told through an offbeat screenplay inspired by Korosawa's Rashomon, the film narrates two versions of the same incidents.

I'd go for this immediately, but where to find it damnit.

Australia. Two decent crime movies got the third sequel. Two movies are:
Mystery Road (2013)
Goldstone (2016)
Basically, these two are a kind of australian westerns, a detective comes to solve a crime and it ends in gunsblazing where weapons solve more things they were supposed to. The work of camera is perfect, characters aren't bad at all, stories are a bit bland, but if you have time, watch 'em, they're good.

I said they got a third sequel and it's miniseries of 6 episodes, that's why it's in this thread. Miniseries kept the name of the first movie, I'm not quite sure why but that doesn't matter:
Mystery Road (2018)

Just as the movies, the story happens in australian bush. Ask Corwin for more details what's that "bush" about. But my, visuals are absolutely amazing. Mesmerizing. Even if there was no story, miniseries would be worth looking at just for shots of nature. Sure, there were stuff like that in movies already, but not as spectacular as here.

Another thing upped was the courage. Movies went mildly on reckoning with the past, but this time, there was no "misfire". Before watching this miniseries, the worldwide audience should at least know two things:
https://www.culturalsurvival.org/new…ndigenous-laws

Aboriginals were not considered citizens of Australia until 1967, and some were regulated under Flora and Fauna Law. The federal constitution, written in 1900, explicitly stated that Aboriginals would not be counted in any state or federal census. Queensland was the last state in Australia to grant state voting rights to Aboriginals in 1965; Aboriginals in the Northern Territory were considered “wards of the state” and were not allowed to vote in federal elections unless they were ex-servicemen up until 1962. Voting and citizenship rights for Aboriginals were written into the constitution with a 1967 referendum, which also removed discriminatory references to Aboriginals from the Constitution and gave Parliament the power to make laws pertaining to Indigenous Peoples (previous to that, state governments had total law-making power over Aborigines). The referendum set a voting record, with 90.77 percent of the entire population voting in favor of it. Interestingly, the highest percentage of “no” votes were recorded in territories with the highest Aboriginal populations, suggesting that anti-Indigenous racism was still rampant in many areas of Australia (since the passage of the Race Discrimination Act in 1975, 10,5000 complaints have been filed with the government, with more than 3,500 of those coming from Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders). However, though voting is mandatory for all Australian citizens, voting was not made compulsory for Aborigines until 1983. Queensland has lagged behind in many Indigenous rights laws – Queensland Aborigines could be forced to live on reserves until 1971, and could not own their own property until 1975. In 1959, Aboriginals became eligible to receive pensions and maternity leave, but only if they were not “nomadic or primitive,” and often group payments were made to reserves or missions rather than individuals or communities. Though many of these discriminatory laws were changed in the 1960s and 1970s, others were being created – legislation created in the 1970s requires that the estate of an Aboriginal who dies without leaving a will should be automatically put in the hands of a public trustee, rather than granted to the next of kin as is the case with non-Aboriginals. The Law Reform Committee recommended that this law be changed in 2008, and the Department of Indigenous Affairs confirmed in 2012 that they are “considering it.” Also contentious is New South Wales’ Flora and Fauna Law under the National Parks and Wildlife Act. This law claims that the majority of Aboriginal artifacts are “property of the crown,” and claims jurisdiction over all Aboriginal heritage and culture. Aboriginals, understandably, object to their culture being regulated under an act meant to protect vegetation and wild animals. New South Wales is the only state in Australia not to have a stand-alone Aboriginal Heritage Act, and activists have been lobbying for one for the past thirty years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aborig…ths_in_custody

A 2018 investigation found that over half of the Indigenous people who died in custody since 2008 had not been found guilty

Mystery Road is not world shattering masterpiece, but it does at least try to document some of horrors from the past and some from present day.
It's trying to be, as much as possible, aussies' Longmire. And IMO it succeeded.
You don't have to watch the first two movies, but the miniseries? Watch it before you die. Please, don't let this gem to become Australia's best kept secret.

For australians it's streaming on ABC site, it's also available on Amazon with some odd service, but plenty of worldwide channels are airing it (recently it appeared on BBC4 for example).

Finished Patrick Melrose wirh Benedict Cumberbatch.
A mini-series about a high society addict. Can’t say I enjoyed watching the self destruction, but the desire to learn what had happened to him kept me going.

Greatly enjoyed "Before we die" until the very last episode, where it turned to complete shit.

Oh well…

Orange is the new Black. Not sure I really get it but well it is bizarre.

A miracle happened!

I finally reached a stage of enjoyment with Voyager. What a difference a couple of good episodes make.

I can even watch Neelix on screen without feeling the urge to throw up!

Here's hoping it lasts

Started Star Trek Discovery (on Vudu). Not a bad first episode but I can do without all the political correctness being rammed down my throat. Accusing "Michael" of racism in the first episode. How I miss Kirk.

I had too many issues with Discovery myself, the biggest and most difficult to overcome was that their current technology, while being more than ten years earlier than the old series was, seems to be fifty to a hundred years futuristic by comparison. That was just really tough for me to deal with, and then I found most of the acting, especially the younger folk, was really….just not to my liking. I got to watch the first season for free when I lived in Canada, but I certainly wouldn't pay for the privilege now that I'm back stateside.

And do not even get me started on what the Klingons look like…..I don't even know where to begin with that. I get that they couldn't use certain aspects of ships/uniforms and such because of the current deals in place, but there were other ways to go. Some of it just looked awful.

Started to re-watch Gotham. Just finished season one in two days.

Escape at Dannemora. One of the better series this year, fantastic cast. Wouldn't say it's the most original concept (prison escape) but the actors are so great that you just want to continue watching.

I liked what I saw of Dannemora - but I just can't take yet another prison-oriented drama.

Also, it seemed to be one of those shows that emphasize realism of the mundane over compelling content, which isn't really for me.

I can almost see Ben Stiller behind the camera, going that extra mile too far in an effort to demonstrate how this is serious material and not his usual stuff. Arquette's appearance was a little too on the nose, in this regard - for my tastes.

But I might have been too harsh on it.