![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatBeen vegging and watching television today, or rather catching up.
1. Doctor Who: The Ghost Monument -- a solid secondary episode that propels the story forward, clarifies who the villain of the arc will be, and shows that each stand-a-lone is part of a broader arc. Also a secret, mystery, is hinted out that may be the central focal point of the arc.
I think I know what it is -- because if Stephen Moffat's obsession was marriage and being out of sync with time, Chinball's is lost and abandoned children and banding together to solve a problem. Of the Doctor Who writers* (that I've seen to date, keep in mind I've only watched the rebooted Who and haven't really seen any of the series prior to RT Davies Reboot), Chinball seems to be the most interested in team work or community inter-relations. It's not surprising to me at all that he has three companions, and the principal relationship between them is familial. And estranged familial at that. Father/son (Graham/Ryan), the cop (community) (Yaz) and the Doctor who feels her family is gone or lost. It's striking that Grace is dead, and now we have her husband, Graham and his step-son, Ryan, who had a distant and somewhat estranged relationship to begin with as a focal point. I think that's why he killed off Grace -- because each character feels estranged in some manner or has experienced loss of a family member. The first episode -- the victim is a man who is desperately hunting his sister who was taken by the Stenze.
Now, we have the acetone threads telling the Doctor in this episode that her deepest fear and secret is about an abandoned child or person who she has even hidden from herself.
Some nifty monsters in this episode, the sheet or thread like acetones who suffocate you with your fears, hunt at night and smell of garlic -- was inspired.
And a nice anti-gun message at the core of the episode -- where the Doctor informs Ryan that guns never help -- yet off he goes to learn it the hard way. There's always someone in a Who series who tries this. The Doctor prefers to use his/her brain and sonic screwdriver to solve these thinks.
"WE outthink them, not shoot them."
I rather like the team, who are intelligent in their own ways, and not dumbed down -- which was my problem with RT Davies companions. Graham seems to have some concept of what to do, as do Ryan and Yaz. They also aren't all wide-eyed and adoring of The Doctor, which was a problem I had with Moffat's companions.
The series is less plot-oriented or more character focused than Moffat, less twists and turns and plot hijinks. I think the metaphors are still there, just more focused on family and relationships between characters. There were lots of discussions about family and working as a team.
I did like the episode, it held my attention for the most part. But as is true with most Doctor Who episodes, I find it difficult to understand what the characters are saying a lot of the time. They talk fast and mumble, so as a result a lot of the sounds are lost. I had to put on closed captioning finally. It's not just one of them -- it's all of them. So this may be a British accent problem?
Although I haven't done it with other Brit imports. So ...maybe a Doctor Who thing? (shrugs).
2. The Connors as previously predicted and stated, the series is actually better without Roseanne. But I'm not sure her fans will stick with it. It no longer has the insult heavy Roseanne humor that existed previously. What made me cringe is gone now. So I was right, I definitely could and have watched the Connors, and found that group funny without Roseanne in the midst of it.
Also this episode depicted a major problem in the US, and did it with compassion and humor. One a lot of people don't want to look at. Which is the amount of pain a lot of the lower middle class and working class are in. Hence the ophoid crisis. Roseanne dies from an ophoid overdoes -- due to increasing pain in her knees and legs. She'd had knee surgery, but never really recovered from it and became addicted to ophoids, finding ways to get a supply outside of doctors and insurance. The Connors aren't wealthy. They have full time jobs, all reside for the most part in the same multi-family home, and struggle to keep a float. They aren't racist or homophobic either. DJ is married to an African-American Female Army Officer who served in Afghanistan, with a daughter. Darlene's son is gay and possibly transgender. And they don't really care. They are politically incorrect and irreverent, but honest and caring.
Also the cast looks like most Americans. Gray haired. Wrinkles. Not beautiful or air-brushed. The house is scruffy looking, with an aging couch and a small kitchen. It's Middle America. And a sitcom that veers more towards realism than romanticism.
I enjoyed the reboot. It was funny in places and touching in others. I knew these people, worked with them over the years, and have met them. Sat in their kitchens. Listened to their jokes. This, I want to tell people is America, not How I Met Your Mother or Friends or The Big Bang Theory, which don't feel real at all.
3. The Good Place - Episode 4 - Jeremy Berimy -- I think it is episode 4. Better than the last two. They've moved rather quickly out of one paradigm into another.
Surprisingly enough, Michael and Janet were forced to tell the doomed foursome the truth. And even more surprisingly, they believed them. I'm still not quite sure how that happened. I don't know, if I saw a magic door and some guy told me that story -- I wouldn't necessarily believe it. At least not that quickly.
Chidi's response by far was the most interesting and humorous. He's rapidly becoming my favorite character. Plus, nice abs.
The best scene in the whole episode is Chidi's rundown of various ethical morality philosophies from Nieztche to Kant...ending with a nihilistic rant about how we're doomed, God's dead, and we might as well do whatever we feel like it -- since it doesn't really matter anyhow.
It's oddly Tahani and Eleanor who figure out that they should help others and do good mainly because it gives them pleasure. It feels good to try and help. To see someone else happy in response to their actions -- is more rewarding than expected.
Eleanor decides to find the owner of a wallet she discovers in a bar. And it's not an easy quest.
She goes to the address and ends up having to cart his mail and other left over belongings from his old house to his new one via cab. Once she arrives, it turns out that he could care less about the money or the tree or anything else she brought, what makes his day is the drawing his daughter had given him -- which he'd thought was lost forever. And he considered a good luck charm. The fact she went out of her way to return this -- was amazing he thought. (It was, Eleanor realizes, a simple act of kindness, which she did because she felt bad taking the money and throwing out the wallet. While giving the wallet back to the man made her feel good. It's not a rule she's following per say, but the voice in her head, her gut...and it moves her. For the first time in months, possibly years, Eleanor feels good about herself.)
Tahani has a similar epithany -- maybe instead of doing things for attention or recognition, she should just do them. Jason takes it step further, and suggests she just give money to people randomly. Jason's still behind the game. And marrying Jason just so she can split her money and therefore the responsibility with him seems a little dumb. I agreed with the Banker, who supplies two rather good, albeit presumptive jokes...that do explain why no one should give him money, and also underlines my issues with the character. He's so stupid that he doesn't understand the difference between right and wrong. In other words, he appears to be amoral by default, and incapable of ever moving past that default setting or realizing beyond a Pavlovian perspective, the difference. But he does work well as comic relief, I'll give him that. The lollipop joke was funny.
And as an aside is there anything grosser than chilli and peeps together? What horrible writer came up with this?? Ew.
4. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is beginning to bore me. I kept wandering off during the episode. The best bit, and the only reason to bother with it is Patton Oswalt's musical number in the cemetary entitled "The Cringe", best musical number this season.
5. The Kids Are Alright is a rather charming retro-seventies family sitcom starring Mary McCormick -- about an Irish Catholic family in the 1970s. I wish they'd stop doing the stereotype. Not all Irish Catholic or Catholic families have that many kids. Mine didn't. And most of the people I knew back then didn't. My father's family did -- but they were 1930s-1950s, and it made sense back then. Catholic family, poor working class, with eight kids is a bit cliche and stereotypical. That said, McCormick and the guy who plays her husband are rather good in it and save it. Also the narrative voice reminds me a bit of The Wonder Years. So it's a satisfyingly warm family situation comedy with some good retro commentary. Sonny & Cher (which I watched as kid), the Aerospace Program (practically everyone who lived on my block growing up worked for the Aerospace program as either engineers or machinists), and the references to how Nixon wasn't to blame and Watergate was fake news (the Republicans actually said that and wanted Ford to pardon him) -- all are nice touches. But it's not quite to the same level as The Connors.
6. I've given up on The Neighborhood-- which has become more about father's and loser sons, and less about racial conflicts or community. It's sort of redundant and cliche in the jokes. I really loved the first episode, but the last two I've found unwatchable.
Ditto for Big Bang Theory.
7. In tooling about the net, and listening to recent pop songs -- several Taylor Swift, I've decided there's a lot of pain and rage and dissatisfaction out there. Taylor Swift is truly miserable and filled with rage. Her songs aren't what I'd call uplifting. Neither are Lady Gaga's for that matter.
I'm hunting happy music. Maybe Bobbie McFerrin?
1. Doctor Who: The Ghost Monument -- a solid secondary episode that propels the story forward, clarifies who the villain of the arc will be, and shows that each stand-a-lone is part of a broader arc. Also a secret, mystery, is hinted out that may be the central focal point of the arc.
I think I know what it is -- because if Stephen Moffat's obsession was marriage and being out of sync with time, Chinball's is lost and abandoned children and banding together to solve a problem. Of the Doctor Who writers* (that I've seen to date, keep in mind I've only watched the rebooted Who and haven't really seen any of the series prior to RT Davies Reboot), Chinball seems to be the most interested in team work or community inter-relations. It's not surprising to me at all that he has three companions, and the principal relationship between them is familial. And estranged familial at that. Father/son (Graham/Ryan), the cop (community) (Yaz) and the Doctor who feels her family is gone or lost. It's striking that Grace is dead, and now we have her husband, Graham and his step-son, Ryan, who had a distant and somewhat estranged relationship to begin with as a focal point. I think that's why he killed off Grace -- because each character feels estranged in some manner or has experienced loss of a family member. The first episode -- the victim is a man who is desperately hunting his sister who was taken by the Stenze.
Now, we have the acetone threads telling the Doctor in this episode that her deepest fear and secret is about an abandoned child or person who she has even hidden from herself.
Some nifty monsters in this episode, the sheet or thread like acetones who suffocate you with your fears, hunt at night and smell of garlic -- was inspired.
And a nice anti-gun message at the core of the episode -- where the Doctor informs Ryan that guns never help -- yet off he goes to learn it the hard way. There's always someone in a Who series who tries this. The Doctor prefers to use his/her brain and sonic screwdriver to solve these thinks.
"WE outthink them, not shoot them."
I rather like the team, who are intelligent in their own ways, and not dumbed down -- which was my problem with RT Davies companions. Graham seems to have some concept of what to do, as do Ryan and Yaz. They also aren't all wide-eyed and adoring of The Doctor, which was a problem I had with Moffat's companions.
The series is less plot-oriented or more character focused than Moffat, less twists and turns and plot hijinks. I think the metaphors are still there, just more focused on family and relationships between characters. There were lots of discussions about family and working as a team.
I did like the episode, it held my attention for the most part. But as is true with most Doctor Who episodes, I find it difficult to understand what the characters are saying a lot of the time. They talk fast and mumble, so as a result a lot of the sounds are lost. I had to put on closed captioning finally. It's not just one of them -- it's all of them. So this may be a British accent problem?
Although I haven't done it with other Brit imports. So ...maybe a Doctor Who thing? (shrugs).
2. The Connors as previously predicted and stated, the series is actually better without Roseanne. But I'm not sure her fans will stick with it. It no longer has the insult heavy Roseanne humor that existed previously. What made me cringe is gone now. So I was right, I definitely could and have watched the Connors, and found that group funny without Roseanne in the midst of it.
Also this episode depicted a major problem in the US, and did it with compassion and humor. One a lot of people don't want to look at. Which is the amount of pain a lot of the lower middle class and working class are in. Hence the ophoid crisis. Roseanne dies from an ophoid overdoes -- due to increasing pain in her knees and legs. She'd had knee surgery, but never really recovered from it and became addicted to ophoids, finding ways to get a supply outside of doctors and insurance. The Connors aren't wealthy. They have full time jobs, all reside for the most part in the same multi-family home, and struggle to keep a float. They aren't racist or homophobic either. DJ is married to an African-American Female Army Officer who served in Afghanistan, with a daughter. Darlene's son is gay and possibly transgender. And they don't really care. They are politically incorrect and irreverent, but honest and caring.
Also the cast looks like most Americans. Gray haired. Wrinkles. Not beautiful or air-brushed. The house is scruffy looking, with an aging couch and a small kitchen. It's Middle America. And a sitcom that veers more towards realism than romanticism.
I enjoyed the reboot. It was funny in places and touching in others. I knew these people, worked with them over the years, and have met them. Sat in their kitchens. Listened to their jokes. This, I want to tell people is America, not How I Met Your Mother or Friends or The Big Bang Theory, which don't feel real at all.
3. The Good Place - Episode 4 - Jeremy Berimy -- I think it is episode 4. Better than the last two. They've moved rather quickly out of one paradigm into another.
Surprisingly enough, Michael and Janet were forced to tell the doomed foursome the truth. And even more surprisingly, they believed them. I'm still not quite sure how that happened. I don't know, if I saw a magic door and some guy told me that story -- I wouldn't necessarily believe it. At least not that quickly.
Chidi's response by far was the most interesting and humorous. He's rapidly becoming my favorite character. Plus, nice abs.
The best scene in the whole episode is Chidi's rundown of various ethical morality philosophies from Nieztche to Kant...ending with a nihilistic rant about how we're doomed, God's dead, and we might as well do whatever we feel like it -- since it doesn't really matter anyhow.
It's oddly Tahani and Eleanor who figure out that they should help others and do good mainly because it gives them pleasure. It feels good to try and help. To see someone else happy in response to their actions -- is more rewarding than expected.
Eleanor decides to find the owner of a wallet she discovers in a bar. And it's not an easy quest.
She goes to the address and ends up having to cart his mail and other left over belongings from his old house to his new one via cab. Once she arrives, it turns out that he could care less about the money or the tree or anything else she brought, what makes his day is the drawing his daughter had given him -- which he'd thought was lost forever. And he considered a good luck charm. The fact she went out of her way to return this -- was amazing he thought. (It was, Eleanor realizes, a simple act of kindness, which she did because she felt bad taking the money and throwing out the wallet. While giving the wallet back to the man made her feel good. It's not a rule she's following per say, but the voice in her head, her gut...and it moves her. For the first time in months, possibly years, Eleanor feels good about herself.)
Tahani has a similar epithany -- maybe instead of doing things for attention or recognition, she should just do them. Jason takes it step further, and suggests she just give money to people randomly. Jason's still behind the game. And marrying Jason just so she can split her money and therefore the responsibility with him seems a little dumb. I agreed with the Banker, who supplies two rather good, albeit presumptive jokes...that do explain why no one should give him money, and also underlines my issues with the character. He's so stupid that he doesn't understand the difference between right and wrong. In other words, he appears to be amoral by default, and incapable of ever moving past that default setting or realizing beyond a Pavlovian perspective, the difference. But he does work well as comic relief, I'll give him that. The lollipop joke was funny.
And as an aside is there anything grosser than chilli and peeps together? What horrible writer came up with this?? Ew.
4. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is beginning to bore me. I kept wandering off during the episode. The best bit, and the only reason to bother with it is Patton Oswalt's musical number in the cemetary entitled "The Cringe", best musical number this season.
5. The Kids Are Alright is a rather charming retro-seventies family sitcom starring Mary McCormick -- about an Irish Catholic family in the 1970s. I wish they'd stop doing the stereotype. Not all Irish Catholic or Catholic families have that many kids. Mine didn't. And most of the people I knew back then didn't. My father's family did -- but they were 1930s-1950s, and it made sense back then. Catholic family, poor working class, with eight kids is a bit cliche and stereotypical. That said, McCormick and the guy who plays her husband are rather good in it and save it. Also the narrative voice reminds me a bit of The Wonder Years. So it's a satisfyingly warm family situation comedy with some good retro commentary. Sonny & Cher (which I watched as kid), the Aerospace Program (practically everyone who lived on my block growing up worked for the Aerospace program as either engineers or machinists), and the references to how Nixon wasn't to blame and Watergate was fake news (the Republicans actually said that and wanted Ford to pardon him) -- all are nice touches. But it's not quite to the same level as The Connors.
6. I've given up on The Neighborhood-- which has become more about father's and loser sons, and less about racial conflicts or community. It's sort of redundant and cliche in the jokes. I really loved the first episode, but the last two I've found unwatchable.
Ditto for Big Bang Theory.
7. In tooling about the net, and listening to recent pop songs -- several Taylor Swift, I've decided there's a lot of pain and rage and dissatisfaction out there. Taylor Swift is truly miserable and filled with rage. Her songs aren't what I'd call uplifting. Neither are Lady Gaga's for that matter.
I'm hunting happy music. Maybe Bobbie McFerrin?
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 12:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 01:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 12:10 am (UTC)The best scene in the whole episode is Chidi's rundown of various ethical morality philosophies from Nieztche to Kant...ending with a nihilistic rant about how we're doomed, God's dead, and we might as well do whatever we feel like it -- since it doesn't really matter anyhow.
That was my favorite scene, too. Chidi off the rails is a freaking delight to behold.
I feel very conflicted about Jason's character. I get that he's the comic relief, but frankly, the way that he's depicted as having the IQ and maturity of a little kid makes his eternal damnation very icky. The way they've set it up, he'll never 'get it,' so he can't grow the way the other characters can. I don't know, maybe they'll just continue to handwave the whole thing since he's not innately malicious, and when he's surrounded by the gang and Janet, his kinder qualities are brought to the fore.
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 01:29 am (UTC)I feel very conflicted about Jason's character. I get that he's the comic relief, but frankly, the way that he's depicted as having the IQ and maturity of a little kid makes his eternal damnation very icky. The way they've set it up, he'll never 'get it,' so he can't grow the way the other characters can.
This is my problem as well. He's good comic relief, but I'm not sure he works as a character -- he's almost too one note, and there's no chance of evolution here. It's not the same as the Woody or Coach characters in Cheers, the likable dummy. There's an amorality to him, and it seems like the writers are linking that immorality or inability to do the right thing to his low IQ, which is disturbing and somewhat icky.
I think they may have to do some serious work on his character this season...to remedy that problem.
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 01:59 am (UTC)Ella Fitzgerald does pretty upbeat renditions of jazz standards.
Mozart wrote mostly happy music as long as you avoid his Requiem. We attended a performance yesterday. It's damned scary. My husband said it makes you think it's past time to get right with someone, somewhere.
I figured the discussion about the afterlife and how they'd died must have mostly taken place off camera. We don't know exactly what was said or how long it took to convince them. The transition did seem abrupt to me.
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 04:41 am (UTC)The gut punch in the first episode was Dan's confrontation with Marcy Bellinger. In two minutes, Goodman and Mary Steenburgen gave you a picture of middle class life in this country so desperate, so hanging-by-a-thread that it gave you chills. More, please.
"Jeremy Bearimy" was easily the best episode of The Good Place Season 3, and as you said, William Jackson Harper dominated. But I found the platonic tag team of Tahani and Jason an unexpected pleasure. For once, the writers didn't load down Tahani with endless names to drop and there was only one "Florida" joke--and it was actually funny! Jason came off as sweet, not scuzzy (for a change), and you're right--his essential dimness just emphasizes how the afterlife's point system doesn't work. I expect Michael and Janet's manifesto to come up again, and the cyclical nature of time in the afterlife will almost definitely come into play by the end of the season.
Maybe Team Cockroach/Brainy Bunch/Soul Squad accepted the explanation because on a deep, unconscious level they knew what Michael said really happened?
(My favorite line was Janet pointing to a spot on the Jeremy Bearimy and proudly announcing "That's my birthday!")
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 02:57 pm (UTC)Agreed on The Connors. The humor was more subtle, along with the pathos. One of the other best scenes was the last one... Dan trying to figure out how to sleep in his bed without his wife. (A very nice reversal of the first episode of the reboot, where Roseanne check's to see if he's still breathing.) And all the jokes landed. Along with the timing, which had been off previously.
It's an accurate depiction of lower middle class America, and why it's very hard for most working class and lower middle class Americans to care about elections or politics.
Agree for the most part on The Good Place, although the moment that really stuck out for me in the Jeremy Berimy sequence was Chidi asking what the dot was for or meant. And Michael says it's nothing, absence, and everything -- which pretty much undoes it for Chidi. It's when he loses it. The universe, all of it, makes no sense. There's no logic to it. And he falls into Neiztian nihilism. It's hilarious.
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 03:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 08:00 am (UTC)And yet, River Song always seemed to get away with it ...
Also, Graham was married to Ryan's grandmother, not his mother. And it really annoys me that he expects to be called "Grandad" when he isn't. I would never have called someone who married my mother or my grandmother "Dad" or "Grandad".
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 12:56 pm (UTC)Grandmother? She seemed too young to be his grandmother. Also, what happened to his parents? I totally missed that. When I sate that I can't make out what these actors are saying, I was not kidding. When Graham said Grand-dad, all I heard was "Dad". Also why would anyone ask someone to call them "Granddad"? Dad, I get. Closer relationship. Granddad is a step removed.
Doctor River Song was represented as a bit of rogue, and using a gun didn't work real well for her either -- also that was several years back before the media began to realize wait -- we need to be anti-gun. Because look at all the kids into guns! ACK!
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 04:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 04:14 pm (UTC)See? I'm 50, so the idea of being a grandparent at 55 is hard for me to wrap my head around. My brother who is just three years younger has a kid who is turning 15 next year, and I've two friends who are five - six years older than me with ten - fourteen year olds. So from my perspective? Grandparents are in their 70s. ;-)
I know a lot of people with step-parents, and none of them call their step parents Mom, they call them by their names -- so agree, it was a bit off.
But I think the writers just found it convenient if SOMEONE shot the Doctor's enemies, so long as it wasn't the Doctor. It's pretty difficult to find ways out of the situations they get themselves into without violence.
And yet, here they managed to prove you wrong. No good comes from a gun. ;-)
no subject
Date: 2018-10-22 04:18 pm (UTC)Eh, I should clarify on the gun bit?
In the episode she warns Ryan not to shoot at the sniper robots, it's better to out-think them. He ignores here and fires, it appears to work, except they are robots and reboot, all it does is knock them out for a matter of seconds. What does however work is an EMP charge which disrupts their electrical wiring for far longer. The shooting just makes it worse. Also in the episode, it's made clear that what triggered the robots was being fired at initially by the other contestant, who got injured for it. He'd have been better off if he'd never reached for the gun. And the whole episode has a big message about violence and weaponery -- and is anti-violence.