TV Tuesdays Free Talk

I finished watching The Witcher. I didn't get it. This review pretty much sums up how I feel ("...and I’m not saying this world that you love is terrible, it could be amazing, I’m saying this adaptation of it isn’t great, but you can ask for better, you can expect better, you don’t have to accept this TV show just because it's tied into this world you love.", "it's like they forgot how to make a TV show"): https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/5live/entries/1365c100-4a9b-4c4c-91df-38628e386f3e

I rewatched all of Lost In Space and it's still a bit frustrating. They set up some amazing characters but whomp they're gone.

I'm going to cheat a bit here. I'm eagerly looking forward to Armando Iannucci's new show Avenue 5. Part of my anticipation is caused by learning that John Finnemore is on the writing team. I am spending some time listening to the radio comedy he's done. In his name he wrote Cabin Pressure - a very funny sitcom, John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme - a long running sketch show. He's also done a lot of writing for David Mitchell, including bits for That Mitchell and Web Sound and That Mitchell and Web Look, and some introductions for Mitchell as chair of The Unbelievable Truth., as well as being a contestant on *The Unbelievable Truth. (All of these are available as torrents). So, while I'm waiting for Avenue 5 I have been re-listening to these radio programmes.

Finally, my child wanted to watch Top Gear or The Grand Tour. The co-parents have said the Grand Tour is not suitable, so I've been watching old (Clarkson, May, Hammond CMH) Top Gear and New (Flintoff, Harris, McGuiness FHM) Top Gear episodes to find out if they're suitable or to at least be prepared if they're not. Top Gear is a weird show because it could be suitable for 8 year olds without any trouble but they feel the need to throw in tired jokes about murdering prostitutes or searching for old escorts and I have better things to do with my time than explain this stuff away. CMH have got undeniable chemistry, but a lot of the blokey jokes are just awful, and most of the humour feels forced and laboured. The setups feel less and less real as the show gets older -- this kind of thing appeals to some nine year olds, but then you have to filter out all the stuff about viagra. Frustratingly I don't care about swear words, but tv ratings do. So an episode might get a 15 because they swear in it, but the episode that includes searching for old escorts gets a PG. This is a long and complicated way of saying CMH's Top Gear needed to die, and I'm glad it did, and that FHM's Top Gear will be good if they manage to tweak it a little bit -- either make it family friendly, or be clearer that it isn't, and cut down the toxicity a bit.

The Good Place is back tommorow for the back half of it's final season.

And also Infinity Train is back for Book 2 this week. It's pretty fantastic, and continues on as something of an anthology series with new characters, some familiar faces, and exploring what can be done with an Infinity of Train to play around with.

We just started watching "Great News" on Netflix. It's produced by Tina Fey and is similar to 30 Rock in that it's about people working at a media company. This time, however, it's a low-end cable news network in New Jersey. It's a silly sitcom where the main character is a producer at the 4:00 news, and her mother takes an internship working on the same show.

I just started season three of The Handmaid’s Tale. Really dark show but it’s really good if you’re into that kind of thing.

So, Disney put another pilot on their YouTube page.

https://youtu.be/DViUDJuFPhQ

I can see how a lot of kids would like this, but it seems like it was accidentally set on Double Speed and literally 5 minutes in our MC, Luz was already in the new world, met the Owl Witch and was on the run from the cops. Where something like Gravity Falls has Dipper finding the Journal and Mabel getting a new boyfriend that turns out to be more than he seems and the two stories play with each other, this show has an "But then" problem where...

• Luz goes to summer camp for normal people,
• but then gets pulled into a demon world,
• but then finds a witch and her demon dog, who ask her to go on a heist to get the demon dog's crown before the witch sends her home,
• but then she finds and frees the people who were captured by the crown's warden, because they were being weird and she is weird,
• but then the warden reveals he's in love with the Owl Witch for being the one weirdo he couldn't catch,
• but then they escape from him with the crown,
• but then after that she decides to stay in the magic world because summer camp is lame.

Outside of pacing there's also the issue that our lead is "not like the other girls" because she likes anime and writes fanfic and is too creative for their own good, when a lot of the in vogue girl stuff seems to be anime, fanfic, and creative endeavors, and I don't know if it's kinda cynical to be "your weirdness is valuable... to our demographic," or just basic in that the "weird" girl appears to be a relatively normal twelve year old who's flaw of weirdness is a strength in a weird world, where "it's okay to be weird" and "weirdos got to stick together." Maybe I'm putting in too much time and thought into children's television.

And also she can text her Mom while in magic world, so she better explain why the Summer Camp said she never showed up, or make it a point why she doesn't.