(no subject)

1. Finally found a book to get engrossed in, The Twisted Ones. And up until a certain point it was decidedly creepy and engrossing - and while I still am engrossed, to the point in which I can't quite put it down, there is one small problem. It's providing too much information on the well, the "problem" or "monsters in the woods". Kudos that it's not aliens. (I'd have give up if it was aliens. Evil alien stories don't work for me at all.) But, I feel as if the writer has borrowed heavily from TS Eliot's Fairy Stories, Mabinogi, Perilious Guard, and Harvest Home. Harvest Home by the way is among the creepiest books that I've read.
( Read more... )

2. Finished Picard S2 - Season 1 was decidedly better. But I did like S2 - it's a good character study of Picard, and I liked the thematic structure. It drug in the middle, and the time travel bit doesn't work for me at all. Apparently Wesley Crusher is now a Time Traveler or Watcher?
The actress they found to play a young Guinan was excellent. I liked her better than Whoopie Goldberg. Also, they did a decent job with Seven of Nine's arc, and Doctor Jurati's. Chris, Raffi and Elinor didn't get much of an arc or screen time.

I do recommend the series - it is in my opinion among the better Trek's. Helped greatly by the fact that each season is pretty much stand-alone. You don't have to watch all of them. They are self-contained.

Each one appears to have Brent Spiner guest-starring but not as Data, but as Data's creator or brother Lore. Mainly an antagonist to Picard. Seven of Nine also recurs as does Raffi and Laris.

Working on watching S3 now, but decided to watch at night - since it's filmed way too dark to watch in daylight. I can't see what's going on.

3. In other television news? I tried Last of Us episode 1, then immediately jumped away from it. I can't. It'll give me nightmares or make it hard to sleep. The set-up is kind of terrifying. It's about how most of the population is wiped out by a fungi pandemic, and the fungi is a parasite that takes over the human brain, changes the body, keeps it moving forward, and sole purpose is to spread the infection. (Similar to fungus that attacks insects, or say the gut - and usually it can't really attack humans - since it can't survive in a temperature above 94 degrees. But with global warming - it's rapidly adapting.

I can't do pandemic zombie movies with a body horror fungi component. This thing scared the writer, Ellen Kushner (per Twitter). Hard pass.

I've noticed my co-workers who were watching House of Dragon, have passed on it too. They aren't into video games, and don't like zombie horror series either. As have most of my correspondence list apparently - or so I presume since only one or two people have commented on it.

Also watched the Cillian Murphy film Red Lights - it's okay. Saw it on FreeVee. So had to deal with commercials. It drug a bit. Also not sure the plot worked, nor did the reveal. But Murphy is rather good - his eyes are mesmerizing. I'm slowly making my way through his films.

4. I keep drifting off to sleep today. I didn't sleep well last night - brain kept ranting about work. Refused to turn off. Either that - or it would plague me about what I was reading. Ended up having odd dreams as a result.

Today? Felt sluggish. Not helped by the fact that I chose to get up at 5:45AM to do laundry. Got the laundry done, but not a lot else. In fact, I almost fell asleep when the laundry was in the dryer.

Doctor's appointment tomorrow - so taking the day off - since I have to fast, and its easier. Good news? I can sleep in at least.

Maybe get a little work done on the novel I'm revising?

I had something else to say...oh right, I was talking about my Dad to my mother over the phone. Talking about how we had sensitivity issues in common, etc. And my mother interrupted me suddenly to state, "Are you aware that you are speaking of your father in the present tense?"
( Read more... )

(no subject)

1. Watched the first episode of Picard S3 on Paramount Plus tonight (only one has dropped so far) and it's excellent. Better than the first episodes of the last two seasons (which were good as well, but not excellent). This one delivered. You do however have to watch it movie style - with the lights turned off, on a big screen television set.

They've wisely only brought back Orla Brady (Laris), Michelle Hurd (Raffi) and Jeri Ryan (Seven) of the first two season's cast. The others were kind of weak. Also Brent Spiner's Lore appears to be in there somewhere, although not featured in this episode.

Beverly Crusher, Will Ryker, Picard are all in the first episode. And the episode is gripping, with a nice mystery component.

Here the Trailer.

This episode also mentions that it is for "Annie" at the end - "Annie" refers to the actress who played the "Borg Queen" and recently died of cancer this year.

2. Recently a few authors on Twitter commented on how matching a writing style to a reader is hard. Not all books (or television) shows work for all people. Humor in particular is in the eye of the beholder.

I have a very dry and offbeat sense of humor, as you've no doubt figured out by now. My sense of humor is all over my journal entries. I inherited it from my Dad who has a very dry biting wit. One online friend, Andrew Jorgensen aka D'Herblay once informed me that I had the funniest dry wit he'd encountered. It doesn't work for everyone. My father once said - "it can often turn off your fellow humans..." more or less as a warning.

My father and I also share(d) the same sense of humor. We like subtle wit.
Parody and satire rarely works for us - since it's often done too broadly or as my father would state, it needs a light touch. Movies like Austin Powers tended to annoy me, or make me cringe. But I did like Stephen Colbert. And found Trevor Noah hilarious.
( Read more... )

3. Watched The Company You Keep - I think that's the name of it? Is on ABC on Sunday night, or was this past Sunday night. Also streams on Hulu. It stars Milo V (from This is Us and Gilmore Girls), William Richter (a talented character actor), Polly Draper, and a few others. Milo plays Charlie, who is a con man in a criminal family - they run cons. During his last con - his fiancee rips him off - stealing their take and disappearing.
Depressed he hooks up with a beautiful woman at a hotel. The woman at the hotel is a CIA agent, who had just discovered her boyfriend, fiancee cheating on her in a hotel room - which he'd been doing for a while now.
Neither knows what the other one does for a living. And we go from there.

It has potential, even if the pilot is a bit on the clunky side or clunkier than I'd like. I feel like it's a bit rough around the edges, and needed a bit more editing and fine tuning before airing. (But I've also been watching a lot of high quality stuff on PBS, NETFLIX and PARAMOUNT PLUS...so there's that.)