TV You Have Watched

[fallenangle]

Saw that ^ as well and accidentally in much the same way.

Agree about the presenter: Ali Plumb. He's the BBC's resident 'hip' film critic/interviewer and often I find him annoying too.

[Neon Ignition]

Poltergeist: The Legacy Season 01
I remember loving this back in the day and being crushed that Channel 5 opted not to continue airing it after the second season meaning I never got to see the latter two runs. Finally revisiting it and... it's aged... oh man, it's aged.

[fallenangle]

Rewatching Alphas on Pick TV Freeview has been viewing time spent well, some really good characters created by the writers and actors lead by the reliably good David Strathairn.

He's also to be seen in 5USA's Freeview showing the older The Blacklist series they're currently running on Mondays.

The episode of Alphas on Friday (08.09.23) was one I remembered well: When Push Comes To Shove. Showcases what was great about the series with the cherry on the cake being the fairly new character Kat seen listening to a track from a record which then played over the poignant end of the episode.

The track: I've Seen All Good People from The Yes Album. Prepare your ears for some gentle Prog Rock/Pop at it best with the voice of Yes front man Jon Anderson working its magic.

[prinnysquad]

I like that album. Wurm is one of my favourite instrumentals.

I’ve been loving these TPTV efforts recently:

The Four Just Men - stars Jack Hawkins, amongst others. Each episode is self contained, and features one of the Four Just Men trying to resolve a situation.

Dial 999 - Robert Beatty is a Canadian Mountie seconded to Scotland Yard, solving a different crime a week. Excellent TV. I haven’t seen a bad one yet. Innocent, likeable, absorbing 50s tv from a simpler time.

The Adventures of Robin Hood - the 50s one, with Richard Greene. A treasury box of great old actors. In fact, all three series I’ve mentioned so far are.

The Outer Limits - the old series. Great stories mean that any dodgy effects really don’t matter.

[fallenangle]

The Richard Greene Robin Hood series was a week day afternoon and then later a perennial school holiday TV staple from the '60s onwards. I must have seen most of the episodes a dozen times.

But it has been decades since I last watched it although Richard Greene did make a big screen version: Sword Of Sherwood Forest (Hammer films) which I have seen a few times over the years and fairly recently. I always thought it was little more than an extended episode of the TV series but with different actors doing the other parts. If that was what you were use to it felt a bit odd.

It is certainly not a great film.

[Neon Ignition]

Star Trek: Picard Season 02
There are elements of this that I don't mind including the ending with Q but definitely the execution of the plot is what's the issue with this one. So many better ways of handling the same storyline and considering this was Q's last story he was criminally underused.

[Neon Ignition]

Red Dwarf VIII
We're taking a breather before continuing now but finished up the Beeb's era. As always, this run has its ups and downs but still likeable.

Doctor Who: Series 5
The kids have now made their way through Smiths first run and are noe used to having a new Doctor. Every time I watch these my appreciation of Smith grows and with the kids it's nice because they have zero idea of the twists and developments that are coming.

Lost: Season 06
It's taken an epically long time but we got to the end. The last season lost (ha!) my missus, the flash sidewards did nothing for her and she much preferred the flashbacks of old. She fell into the camp of wanting some epic twist reveal at the end too. Having seen it years ago I focused more on the bits I'd forgotten and was always more focused on the character journeys than the MysteryTM of the island. It all made infinitely more sense this time out and for me the issue with the final season is the level of time and focus placed on the brothers of the island which is just far too much for two who aren't that interesting to warrant it. But on the character front the season can land hard and the final still carries a massive emotional punch. Despite the lows I would still enjoy a revival event series.

[fuse]

Netflix thing: Who is Erin Carter? Story begins with mother and daughter hurrying to flee the UK, clearly panicked but minus explanation, and then picks up years later with them in Barcelona living a normal, happy, quiet life. Would you believe it, this is not where the story ends! It's cheesy and contrived and you've absolutely seen it done better before, but it's light enough that we watched it all over a few nights and had enough fun with the action and chuckling at the other bits that didn't quite work.

[Lebowski]

Finished off season 3 of The Great over the space of a week, (7 day free trial of Lionsgate via amazon) I'd heard this was the last and despite it being a critical success and have a great cast it feels like this show never really found its audience. Not sure if two seasons was enough for me too as after really enjoying season 1-2 i struggled a bit here. It has some great episodes but it struggles a bit with pace at times, its still funny but it kind of feels like their retreading old ground. A Nice end to the series but it was running out of steam i felt in places.

It's one of them shows that feels like it should of done better but was hard to access in the UK as its only available via weird subscriptions on streaming or for a very limited time via 40D.

[fallenangle]

RIP David McCallum.

Really sad news to read of his death at the age of 90. For I'd guess four generations of school age kids he was Illya Kuryakin in mid-1960s The Man From U.N.C.L.E TV series which was repeated during the school holidays for at least 25 years along with the spin off 'big' screen films.

He was Steel from the almost impenetrably weird Sapphire and Steel playing alongside Joanna Lumley in the late 1970s/ early 1980s. Later on, and the role which the current generation will know him best for, he played Ducky, the forensic pathologist in NCIS for almost 20 years.

Inbetween his TV work he appeared as one of those ever dependable supporting actors in films like The Great Escape, A Night To Remember (about the Titantic sinking), Mosquito Squadron and more recently in various Batman films.

A screen career and particularly TV one that started in the late 1950s and never really ended, he was still being credited and appearing, occasionally in the most recent season of NCIS.

A true TV great who was known to and will be missed by many generations of viewers.

[Neon Ignition]

Superman & Lois: Season 02
A very uneven second run which has decent moments but some real weak points too. I wondered how it would cope when I read they were sidelining a lot of secondary characters moving forward due to budget cuts but on reflection it's probably for the best based on this as most reek of writers simply not knowing what to do with them.

[Neon Ignition]

Red Dwarf IX
Still the weakest link in the chain just about but has its moments

[Neon Ignition]

Doctor Who: Series 06
Other than perhaps the issue that Smith's era dealt with avoiding a threat to Earth by making every series a universe & Doctors death threat instead, this series plays really well on rewatch with only the finale itself proving to not quite stick the landing.

Red Dwarf X
It's nice to hit the newer series as I've seen them so much less than the older ones. This has its ups and downs but it really is noticeably on the up quality wise from the prior few runs.

[fuse]

Other half had watched some of it before whereas I’d seen none and been reluctant, but together we’ve sped through all four seasons of Sex Education in a few weeks. It’s focused on the sexual activity of teenagers as portrayed by 20-somethings, but framed around sex positivity, progressive attitudes, and seeking help with your issues rather than wallowing in messy hedonism. The two run parallel in a lot of ways but I almost feel like from what I remember of it, it’s jostling to be positioned as the anti-Skins?

In broad terms there are some good characters, storylines and messages in there, but the way the on/off, up/down nature of the two main characters is strung out in piecemeal fashion and is a bit too contrived to remain compelling for the whole run. Generally speaking I feel the show is on a steady downward trajectory, but this newest final season is particularly weak as it unceremoniously shuffles out a lot of recurring cast and pushes in a lot of new, struggling to carve them out meaningful roles while pushing a lot of others to the back.

[Neon Ignition]

We've watched two seasons so far of it and enjoyed both but noticed a noticeable shift in the second season toward the more dramatic end and new characters proving to be highly annoying. We've held off to spread it out (and horror month) so the third run will be next but definitely the Ross/Racheling of the two leads already feels like the wrong choice.