TV 2023 TV DISCUSSION THREAD

[Cobra Commander]

the story about what Paramount+ is doing with the shows they cancel:

Quote

“The Game,” “Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies,” “Star Trek: Prodigy,” and “Queen of the Universe” have all been canceled at Paramount+. In addition, all four shows are set to be removed from the streaming service in the coming days.

https://variety.com/2023/tv/news/the-game-grease-rise-of-the-pink-ladies-star-trek-prodigy-queen-of-the-universe-canceled-paramount-removed-1235653191/

[Contentious C]

I was gonna say something, given the premise, about wondering how Mikey really was in The Bear and then I finally got up to "Fishes".

I wonder if that's not immediately in the running for best hour of TV that'll get made. 

There's a lot of stuff that bleeds through on it where you can begin to see influences and whatnot: the graininess and extreme close-ups are right out of Cassavetes and cinema verite kind of stuff, but what it *really* reminded me of was Yorgos Lanthimos.  This whole thing felt like a shorter version of one of his films, maybe a more American, more traditionally dysfunctional Dogtooth.  You could have never had the rest of the TV show ever happen at all, drop this episode as its own standalone thing - no idea who these people are, no background, no understanding of what their future holds or their relationship dynamics, no anything - and it would still hold up.  It doesn't need to be "complete" to understand and appreciate (if 'appreciate' is the right word, even, because there's a lot to not appreciate: maybe grok is better, I dunno) what these people are experiencing and how the trauma never really seems to relent.   And yet we do know.  And it makes it that much sadder to see it still happening, still traumatizing others.  It reflects back on "Review" and makes that dynamic somehow - somehow! - worse than it already was.  It spins it from "Gordon Ramsay performative whiny shit-fit" to "how long before he says something to someone that he can't unsay?" territory.  It takes a heck of a story and set of performances to take your previous 'best' episode and retroactively make it better.

I think you could maybe criticize this for being over-the-top with the ending, but that probably speaks more to the average person's unfamiliarity with severe untreated mental illness.  Watch a person or three stop taking their lithium and you'll change your mind about that.

Now I still have 4 more episodes to watch.  Jesus tapdancing Christ.

Edited July 1, 2023 by Contentious C

[odessasteps]

Happy Canada Day 

 

[J.H.]

So what ever happened SCTV streaming on Netflix?

I know Scorsese dropped the documentary but part of the deal was supposed to be SCTV finally on a streamer

James

[peterien]

Just finished Justified for the first time and what an experience. There’s shows that are probably held in higher regard but it’s definitely my favourite show and the show I’ve enjoyed watching the most. Every character was just so well written and by the end of it you don’t want to leave Harlan. 

Season 5 was a bit of a blip and I guess a pinch of salt is needed for the amount of stuff Boyd (and even Raylan) gets away with near the end but these are my only minor complaints. The finale and in particular the final scene will live long in the memory. 

We dug coal together.

Thats right. 

Edited July 3, 2023 by peterien

[EVA]

Hell yes.

[John from Cincinnati]

Just in time to take a trip to the Motor City. 

[driver]

Starting "Hijack" with Idris Elba as not Jack Bauer. Two episodes in and really liking it. On Apple+.

Been watching the latest season of It's Always Sunny. Based on the "Frank Vs. Russia" episode I think

Spoiler

Charlie's uncle is The Night Man.

 

[Zimbra]

We finally finished Ted Lasso.  I thought the finale was alright and addressed one of my big concerns with the season: that Ted was more or less tangential to the plot for most of it.  Which was the whole point: that he set up all these people to succeed and he was no longer integral to their success.  So good job there.  There were still too many sideplots that never really went anywhere (there really was no point to the whole Zava stuff, huh?) and they did Keeley incredibly dirty the whole season, but other than that it was a fitting send-off.

[Craig H]

I don't think they did Keeley dirty. It seems like for the first time in a long time Keeley has a greater sense of confidence for herself. She was with Jamie and he habitually cheated on her, then she was with Roy and Roy broke up with her because he's a fucking idiot, then she was with what's her face from For All Mankind and that's when Keeley started standing up for herself. She wasn't going to read bullshit talking points that made it sound like she was at fault for the sex tape, she straight up hung up on her ex when she tried calling Keeley back, she turned down both Jamie and Roy, and she seems perfectly confident to go out on her own and not get fucked over by anyone else.

[J.H.]

Caught up The Righteous Gemstones  and... is it wrong for a good New York boychik like me to love Walton Goggins version of "There'll Be A Payday" this much?

James

[driver]

20 hours ago, J.H. said:

Caught up The Righteous Gemstones  and... is it wrong for a good New York boychik like me to love Walton Goggins version of "There'll Be A Payday" this much?

James

Hell no, not at all. Embrace it for all it's worth.

[Coletti]

There's no way Carmy was actually stuck in that walk-in. That was stupid as fuck. 

[Contentious C]

Dumber or better than

Spoiler

"all that money is in these cans we just never bothered to open and somehow he recanned and relabeled them and we never noticed the canner in the basement"

?

I'd go with "better gaping plot hole to finish the season than Season 1" but maybe that's just me.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Contentious C

[Coletti]

It's MADDENING! Like this show is so well written on so many levels but the laziness when it comes to actual practical shit is offensive. 

Plus I kinda hate that Jeremy Allen White is just doing more "Shameless season ends with the Gallaghers constantly reverting to their inevitable fucking up" shit. 

[Contentious C]

Makes me glad I never watched Shameless.  Wasn't till I saw his IMDb page that I realized he had more of a pedigree to him than just this show (though they've done a generally amazing job of casting fucking awesome actors who have maybe one other 'big' credit).

Besides, you can't have a redemption arc if you don't break things once in a while.

[J.H.]

I spent 15 years working the line at various restaurants. I've never been in a walk-in fridge where there isn't a failsafe to open the door from inside the fridge. As much as I loved S2 of The Bear, that really made me crazy

James

Edited July 9, 2023 by J.H.

[Craig H]

I worked in frozen foods at a grocery store for 2 years when I turned 16. So the freezer in the back was obviously a walk in. I always closed the door behind me but the door had this round doorknob shaped thing with a stem attached to it. You’d just pull that to open the door.

So yeah, Carm getting stuck in there was annoying, but given how many corners Mike cut on Mr. Beef, it wouldn’t surprise me if that door didn’t have a way out.

[Contentious C]

54 minutes ago, Craig H said:

I worked in frozen foods at a grocery store for 2 years when I turned 16. So the freezer in the back was obviously a walk in. I always closed the door behind me but the door had this round doorknob shaped thing with a stem attached to it. You’d just pull that to open the door.

So yeah, Carm getting stuck in there was annoying, but given how many corners Mike cut on Mr. Beef, it wouldn’t surprise me if that door didn’t have a way out.

6 hours ago, J.H. said:

I spent 15 years working the line at various restaurants. I've never been in a walk-in fridge where there isn't a failsafe to open the door from inside the fridge. As much as I loved S2 of The Bear, that really made me crazy

James

19 hours ago, christopher.annino said:

It's MADDENING! Like this show is so well written on so many levels but the laziness when it comes to actual practical shit is offensive. 

Plus I kinda hate that Jeremy Allen White is just doing more "Shameless season ends with the Gallaghers constantly reverting to their inevitable fucking up" shit. 

The Bear season finale plot holes are the filmic equivalent of Misawa fidgeting with his tights after a head drop.

[J.T.]

19 hours ago, J.H. said:

I've never been in a walk-in fridge where there isn't a failsafe to open the door from inside the fridge.

Even in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining, Wendy uses the security bolt on the pantry door so that Jack Torrence cannot use the interior release handle to escape.   Walk-in pantries and fridges usually have some sort of failsafe to keep you from locking yourself in.

Edited July 10, 2023 by J.T.

[Greggulator]

Man, as a ridiculous comedy enthusiast, I really have to think where the hell Gemstones goes on my all-time list because it is so so so so so good. It has everything a TV show can have: 

1) Some of the best and most unique characters ever. I think Judy is the best of the main characters and the best character on TV and Billy Bob is just the ultimate in scene stealers.

2) It says something about a slice of Americana that probably most people with MAX subscriptions aren’t intimately familiar with but absolutely love to see deservingly mocked with the whole megachurch world.

3) John Goodman is a national treasure.

4) It is somehow also secretly the best action show on television?

5) The amount of laughs per line is at a really high ratio.

[Chaos]

6 minutes ago, Greggulator said:

Man, as a ridiculous comedy enthusiast, I really have to think where the hell Gemstones goes on my all-time list because it is so so so so so good. It has everything a TV show can have: 

1) Some of the best and most unique characters ever. I think Judy is the best of the main characters and the best character on TV and Billy Bob is just the ultimate in scene stealers.

2) It says something about a slice of Americana that probably most people with MAX subscriptions aren’t intimately familiar with but absolutely love to see deservingly mocked with the whole megachurch world.

3) John Goodman is a national treasure.

4) It is somehow also secretly the best action show on television?

5) The amount of laughs per line is at a really high ratio.

We finished the second season yesterday and knocked out the first episode of this one. It's just tremendously hilarious stuff. I also like how a lot of the violence and action is more due to incompetence than intent, which fits these characters perfectly. 

[Curt McGirt]

I worked third-shift frozen once too. So yeah. 

That didn't last long, btw. I flipped out one night, grabbed a High Life, put on Poison Idea's "Just To Get Away" and said fuck it and never answered their phone calls again. 

[Craig H]

When I started working in frozen foods I was told to get ready to be sick a lot. And yeah, my frequency of getting colds seemed to go up in my two years doing that. I suppose it was fine for a first job though. Most annoying part was that the manager for that department was a complete perfectionist for how all of the frozen foods endcaps had to look completely flat with the tv dinners or ice cream or whatever in them, and everything had to be faced or have a completely flat look on the shelves. Ice was a pain in the pass too, especially during graduation season, July 4th, and any time there was a Notre Dame home game and this was the store within walking distance of the campus. Tailgaters would essentially raid us for ice and I'd spend all shift breaking my back restocking the ice chest or making desperate calls for more ice deliveries. Fun stuff for a 16 and 17 year old.

[Craig H]

Oh, I talked to a friend that works at a restaurant about season 2 of the Bear. He loved it, but he too was bugged by the lack of any kind of way to get out of the walk-in. We both thought that, yeah, I suppose Mikey could have cut corners on the door, but he reminded me that in an earlier episode, maybe episode 1 of season 2, they were talking about the prices for a new handle being $2k to $5k and needing to come from Germany. Given the cost, it doesn't sound like something you could cut corners on.

The other thing that bugged him was the convenience of it where Carm is whining about his life with his essentially completely perfect girlfriend that is S-Tier level while she just happened to hear him out.

Although the incident did give Richie another great moment and we had the great line that Carmy was fucked and was frozen in Carbonite from Fak.

Regardless of the walk-in stuff, I still love the shit out of that season and that series. Someone should sit Carmy down and have him watch Garden State to point out that his girlfriend might be even better than Natalie Portman's character.