It's pretty obscure, you've probably never heard of it. Also it's on Netflix Instant.

[BrotherMan]

[Ensign Steve]

We're watching Wednesday, and I'm not sure about it yet. I don't love the vitriol from Wednesday to her parents. Is it a teenager thing? I don't remember her ever being like that to her parents before. I love the casting of Catherine Zeta and Luis Guzman, but since the show is from Wednesday's POV, they make her parents look kind of like assholes. I don't know, I'm just not getting it so far. Am I too old?

[beyelzu]

I’ve been enjoying Wednesday Drew Outcast School Detective.

The relationship between Wednesday and Morticia is much changed. I’m hoping they chose to do that so Wednesday can grow to understand her parents some and appreciate them.

Perhaps this is just an angsty time in Wednesday’s life.

I like how dark they are making Wednesday and I’m here for wherever it goes.

(The shift in relationship tone is bit jarring, like I first thought they were joking, especially if you are thinking Ricci/Huston, but I head canon that they used to be closer and will be again one day)

[beyelzu]

Also we watched

1899 | Official Trailer | Netflix - YouTube

By the motherfuckers that brought you Dark. It’s fucking good.

Also, watch it English subtitled if you can handle reading subtitles. Many of the characters speak languages that most of the other passengers don’t speak with some characters fluent in multiple languages.

So people talk around and to people who don’t understand them, subtitles help you keep that in mind.

I really, really liked it. I will watch it again. Much like Dark, the show warrants at least a second viewing.

Looking forward to the next season.

[-FX-]

Originally Posted by JoeP

... We should get him onto to "interview" FX

And all this time I thought you were just pretending to be a woke idiot.

You are actually serious about it

[fragment]

So I also watched Wednesday. I enjoyed it well enough, I guess. Jenna Ortega does a great job in the main role, and her goth dance pastiche to The Cramps is fun. But the story has a bunch of things I find fairly unsatisfying, so somewhere mid-tier for me.

[BrotherMan]

I haven't gone all the way through it yet, but that's about right.

Some of the casting/writing/directing isn't where I think it could be. But then, the other characters aren't really why I'm watching the show. Ortega p much solos and is why you're watching.

[ShottleBop]

It's on Amazon Prime, but last night I watched "It's a Wonderful Afterlife." It's an Indian romantic comedy set in England, and it was a lot of fun. (Of course, i'm easily amused.)

[specious_reasons]

Originally Posted by fragment

So I also watched Wednesday. I enjoyed it well enough, I guess. Jenna Ortega does a great job in the main role, and her goth dance pastiche to The Cramps is fun. But the story has a bunch of things I find fairly unsatisfying, so somewhere mid-tier for me.

Just started watching this. I'm still watching this for Jenna Ortega's take on Wednesday. There are moments of pure brilliance - "It's amateurs like you that give kidnapping a bad name." *chef's kiss*

[viscousmemories]

I enjoyed Wednesday more than I thought I would, and I thought it got better as the season went on. I loved some aspects of it, like the set design of her bedroom and the occasional dark quip (ala specious' comment above). I have been describing it as Addams Family meets Harry Potter meets Veronica Mars, though the dialogue in VMars was more consistently clever in my opinion.

[fragment]

To expand on my reservations on Wednesday:

show spoiler

The style of the show and Ortega's performance are so great that it took me a few days to realise that the show promised a clever and independent protagonist but kept delivering one who has convenient plot-furthering visions rather than deducing stuff, and who goes straight to the authorities with the revelations rather than doing something cunning to foil the villains.

The show keeps doing lack-of-payoff stuff like this. Episode 1, you get a cool fencing show-off between protagonist and rival. But protagonist also feels conflicted about fencing because of mother-daughter stuff. We get more backstory fencing in a later episode. So in the big finale we get... well, protagonist and rival do work together with pointy things to defeat the end boss, but in a way that's pretty underwhelming considering we were kinda promised epic swordfighting and related character growth around two key relationships the protagonist has.

Speaking of end boss, why is that what he is? He's built up through the show as a villain, in particular one who works through manipulating the prejudice and violence of mobs. So why does he suddenly have a magical staff and fighting superpowers? He should be trying to whip the normies into a frenzied mob (maybe enhanced by appropriate demonic powers). Instead we get this underwhelming boss fight.

All that said, I did enjoy the show, will watch another season and hope for better story arcs next time.

[specious_reasons]

It might be worth your time — if you have any interest in Murderville — to watch the Murderville holiday special. It's stupid fun.

[beyelzu]

Y’all might remember Squid Game, a show where assholes watch desperate people compete for money.

Well, they decided to make a reality game show of it, and the contestants say it’s unpleasant, what a shocker!

“Imagine you’re playing ‘Red Light Green Light’ for six hours. What game is that? This isn’t a game. The fun is now gone. You can’t tell people they have to stand in below freezing temperatures in just a tracksuit and two pairs of socks. Come on.”

That quote is from a dude who got on the show because he was a huge fan of the series.

But as the game got underway, the atmosphere changed. Coats were taken away; hand and foot warmers were scooped out of pockets and plimsolls; and the players’ jackets had to remain unzipped in order to display their numbers as well as the fake blood that would squirt from devices strapped to their chests if they were eliminated. When the show’s giant killer doll stopped singing, they had to freeze in position — but what began as the promised two-minute wait was quickly bumped up to 10 and then 15 minutes. Marlene says she counted a 26-minute wait during one round. (Sources close to the production say the wait time increased to allow independent adjudicators to assess the gameplay.)

Inside Netflix's 'Squid Game' Reality Show Disaster - Variety

Apparently, the people who make the Circle are one of the two production companies making this.

[viscousmemories]

Originally Posted by lisarea

You young hepcats have probably already seen it, but Bo Burnham's new special is really well done. It starts out a bit disjointed and silly, but it coalesces, or spirals maybe, in the last 2/3 or so.

It's very heavy on depression and suicidal ideation, so it's not for everyone.

I don't remember reading this but I most definitely wasn't seeking out expressions of depression and suicidal ideation in early 2021 so I probably skipped right over it. That said, I will be watching it with some of my sibling's offspring today. We had a karaoke party last night and two zoomers, my non-binary former nephew (we really need a better gender-neutral word than 'nibling' to describe that relationship) and niece, 25 and 26 respectively, both knew "How the World Works" and "Welcome to the Internet" BY HEART, and I was legitimately in awe of the content and profoundly inspired by the idea that young people are confronting these dilemmas head-on. I mean obviously it's a horrible world they've inherited, but there's no way out and up but through it amirite?