This is a bumper post.
Jul. 22nd, 2018 08:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessBefore anything else, I found out yesterday that THERE IS A THE BLETCHLEY CIRCLE SPIN-OFF, featuring Millie and Jean, and they are in San Fransisco. And it is on ITV this Wednesday at nine, so that is currently my favourite TV channel. I am thrilled because I thought the show (about former lady cryptographers coming together to solve crimes) was dead and buried!
I've been catching up with some B99 episodes.
5.17 DFW
This had a funny opening, but I watched it a while ago, when I was feeling wrung out, so the first half didn’t get laughs so much as smiles: Terry and Charles’s competitiveness and Gina’s recordings of Holt made me smile the most, as Jake’s new half-sister turned out to be awful.
And then we got into the advert that won’t load scenario. Urgh. So it took several days for me to get around to watching the second half of the episodes, and, again, the resolution to the scenarios made me smile but no more. Though Holt’s lesson to Boyle about the dangers of wordplay was good. I’m willing to put that down to me, not the episode.
5.18 Grey Star Mutual
I smiled throughout, chuckled at Holt’s sass about Twitter (while rightly expecting him to have to give in on photogenic Cheddar) and Rosa enabling Amy wanting a pretty bridal dress.
Pimento as an insurance agent is scary, and him being Boyle’s agent and unreasonably miffed he wasn’t kept up to date on precinct happenings is about right. It was totally reasonable to try the conflict of interest complaint and to fire him for…everything. I loved the suddenly lit match (How?)
Amy chasing the perp in the wedding dress was a thing of beauty, especially the flips showing off the skirts.
I’m obviously still behind with this show, but also a couple of others.
Gotham 4.15 The Sinking Ship, The Grand Applause
I felt there were so many chickens coming home to roost in this ep, and when some of it was pay-off for what happened last season, at least, it feels picky to quibble that it’s only now Babs is (unsubtly) feeling the effects of Ra’s Al Ghul’s soul transfer or whatever it was.
We had Wee Battle Couple! I loved all the Bruce/Selina interaction from her knowing he was in the kitchen, to the way she took his apology (gloved hand on his cheek), the way they took on the pawn shop thugs together and, more seriously, that she turned to him for help this episode, he put what he’d recently learned in practice and the slow reveal of her motivations. I adore them.
Also LEE! I mean, I (stupidly) thought she’d done for Sofia and was all ‘THAT’S HOW YOU DO A HIT.’ And then thought ‘Oops, I shouldn’t be so glad she’d crossed the killing line’, no matter how cross she was. But don’t underestimate Lee, Lee gets things done etc.
The Den of Geek review did point that even in Gotham it’s absurd that the shots fired didn’t kill Jim and Lee.
I found the torture of Ed by the dentist a bit much because that’s one of my squicks (but it was interesting that he ended up looking a bit Jokeresque).
Penguin’s conniption at hearing Pen had betrayed him was a thing of beauty. Robin Lord Taylor goes big so well.
Sadly, the annoying Headhunter did not get killed. But Victor (Zzazz not Fries) was fun, and Pen’s resort was a whole new level of WHY NOT? (the last two words may be the show’s motto by this point.) I did like that the meek apparatchik was a triple agent. I’d been suspicious of him until I’d forgotten to be.
Babs and Tabby still wear terrible eighties inspired outfits. See also WHAT Ra’s al Ghul was wearing. (I learned from the DoG review that Tabby is also called the Tigress.)
Oh, Martin, it would have been better for you if you’d escaped Gotham’s grips.
So, I thought it was a good (entertaining, gripping) episode if sick and bonkers.
Movie news: Initial thoughts on the announced Joker movie (a decade after The Dark Knight came out) are yes, I am interested in seeing Joaquin Phoenix’s take on the character, I’m less excited about the director (I just looked up Todd Phillips’s directing credits and…meh.) More broadly, I am not sure that having several different versions of characters or universes in the same medium out there are the same time is a great idea, Hollywood.
The Downton Abbey movie has been confirmed. I thought it was inevitable if they could get the stars to align. It’ll be interesting to see what they do with Lady Violet, who comes back and how it stands up when there's a more direct comparison to Gosford Park, even though the show has such a body of episodes behind it.
This week I went to see The Incredibles 2. Now, the first movie, which I rewatched has a ’15 Years Later’ title, and it is very nearly fifteen years since the last movie. So, a little voice in me did ask ‘why now?’ It was a very entertaining movie, though, and was much better on the women front. Although the film had Stuff to Say about modern technology and Bird’s theses about exceptionalism continued, as soon as I suspected who the big bad was, and this was early on, I was disappointed, because it was a retread. However, the scene between Jack-Jack and the raccoon was a classic.
I also watched Mark Kermode’s Secrets of Cinema (it’s on the iPlayer) where he takes a genre an episode and casts a critical eye over it in the considering, non-judgmental sense, rather than with negativity, using a lot of clips to back up its suppositions. It was co-written with Kim Newman. The genre in question was the rom-com. I will definitely watch the episode on science fiction, but probably not the others. It’s fairly comprehensive. I liked the way that it looked at how the romcom overlaps with fairy tales, musicals and superhero movies, as I like all those genres.
My criticisms? It needed even more of a female perspective. It tried to be even-handed and awake to gender, but I think it could have dug deeper there and might have if more women had been involved in the making of the show. There were no clips from the late 40s through to the 60s as far as I recall, and it’s not as if there were no romcoms then. It might have been a better idea to have something explaining how we got from The Philadelphia Story to Annie Hall than going on about how The Shape of Water isn’t a rom com, but borrows from rom coms to merge with other genres and become a fable. I also have to point out that Four Weddings came out when I was at school and Bridget Jones’s Diary when I was at uni, so calling them ‘modern’ is a stretch.
Sorry, picky. I did clap my hands in delight when they did a side by side of The Shape of Water and The Gay Divorcee (or is it Follow the Fleet), shouted out ‘Manic Pixie Dream Girl’ as the phrase was uttered and decided I must see The Lady Eve because PRATFALLS. It is the type of show that should make you want to look up or revisit films.
That's it for now. Phew.
I've been catching up with some B99 episodes.
5.17 DFW
This had a funny opening, but I watched it a while ago, when I was feeling wrung out, so the first half didn’t get laughs so much as smiles: Terry and Charles’s competitiveness and Gina’s recordings of Holt made me smile the most, as Jake’s new half-sister turned out to be awful.
And then we got into the advert that won’t load scenario. Urgh. So it took several days for me to get around to watching the second half of the episodes, and, again, the resolution to the scenarios made me smile but no more. Though Holt’s lesson to Boyle about the dangers of wordplay was good. I’m willing to put that down to me, not the episode.
5.18 Grey Star Mutual
I smiled throughout, chuckled at Holt’s sass about Twitter (while rightly expecting him to have to give in on photogenic Cheddar) and Rosa enabling Amy wanting a pretty bridal dress.
Pimento as an insurance agent is scary, and him being Boyle’s agent and unreasonably miffed he wasn’t kept up to date on precinct happenings is about right. It was totally reasonable to try the conflict of interest complaint and to fire him for…everything. I loved the suddenly lit match (How?)
Amy chasing the perp in the wedding dress was a thing of beauty, especially the flips showing off the skirts.
I’m obviously still behind with this show, but also a couple of others.
Gotham 4.15 The Sinking Ship, The Grand Applause
I felt there were so many chickens coming home to roost in this ep, and when some of it was pay-off for what happened last season, at least, it feels picky to quibble that it’s only now Babs is (unsubtly) feeling the effects of Ra’s Al Ghul’s soul transfer or whatever it was.
We had Wee Battle Couple! I loved all the Bruce/Selina interaction from her knowing he was in the kitchen, to the way she took his apology (gloved hand on his cheek), the way they took on the pawn shop thugs together and, more seriously, that she turned to him for help this episode, he put what he’d recently learned in practice and the slow reveal of her motivations. I adore them.
Also LEE! I mean, I (stupidly) thought she’d done for Sofia and was all ‘THAT’S HOW YOU DO A HIT.’ And then thought ‘Oops, I shouldn’t be so glad she’d crossed the killing line’, no matter how cross she was. But don’t underestimate Lee, Lee gets things done etc.
The Den of Geek review did point that even in Gotham it’s absurd that the shots fired didn’t kill Jim and Lee.
I found the torture of Ed by the dentist a bit much because that’s one of my squicks (but it was interesting that he ended up looking a bit Jokeresque).
Penguin’s conniption at hearing Pen had betrayed him was a thing of beauty. Robin Lord Taylor goes big so well.
Sadly, the annoying Headhunter did not get killed. But Victor (Zzazz not Fries) was fun, and Pen’s resort was a whole new level of WHY NOT? (the last two words may be the show’s motto by this point.) I did like that the meek apparatchik was a triple agent. I’d been suspicious of him until I’d forgotten to be.
Babs and Tabby still wear terrible eighties inspired outfits. See also WHAT Ra’s al Ghul was wearing. (I learned from the DoG review that Tabby is also called the Tigress.)
Oh, Martin, it would have been better for you if you’d escaped Gotham’s grips.
So, I thought it was a good (entertaining, gripping) episode if sick and bonkers.
Movie news: Initial thoughts on the announced Joker movie (a decade after The Dark Knight came out) are yes, I am interested in seeing Joaquin Phoenix’s take on the character, I’m less excited about the director (I just looked up Todd Phillips’s directing credits and…meh.) More broadly, I am not sure that having several different versions of characters or universes in the same medium out there are the same time is a great idea, Hollywood.
The Downton Abbey movie has been confirmed. I thought it was inevitable if they could get the stars to align. It’ll be interesting to see what they do with Lady Violet, who comes back and how it stands up when there's a more direct comparison to Gosford Park, even though the show has such a body of episodes behind it.
This week I went to see The Incredibles 2. Now, the first movie, which I rewatched has a ’15 Years Later’ title, and it is very nearly fifteen years since the last movie. So, a little voice in me did ask ‘why now?’ It was a very entertaining movie, though, and was much better on the women front. Although the film had Stuff to Say about modern technology and Bird’s theses about exceptionalism continued, as soon as I suspected who the big bad was, and this was early on, I was disappointed, because it was a retread. However, the scene between Jack-Jack and the raccoon was a classic.
I also watched Mark Kermode’s Secrets of Cinema (it’s on the iPlayer) where he takes a genre an episode and casts a critical eye over it in the considering, non-judgmental sense, rather than with negativity, using a lot of clips to back up its suppositions. It was co-written with Kim Newman. The genre in question was the rom-com. I will definitely watch the episode on science fiction, but probably not the others. It’s fairly comprehensive. I liked the way that it looked at how the romcom overlaps with fairy tales, musicals and superhero movies, as I like all those genres.
My criticisms? It needed even more of a female perspective. It tried to be even-handed and awake to gender, but I think it could have dug deeper there and might have if more women had been involved in the making of the show. There were no clips from the late 40s through to the 60s as far as I recall, and it’s not as if there were no romcoms then. It might have been a better idea to have something explaining how we got from The Philadelphia Story to Annie Hall than going on about how The Shape of Water isn’t a rom com, but borrows from rom coms to merge with other genres and become a fable. I also have to point out that Four Weddings came out when I was at school and Bridget Jones’s Diary when I was at uni, so calling them ‘modern’ is a stretch.
Sorry, picky. I did clap my hands in delight when they did a side by side of The Shape of Water and The Gay Divorcee (or is it Follow the Fleet), shouted out ‘Manic Pixie Dream Girl’ as the phrase was uttered and decided I must see The Lady Eve because PRATFALLS. It is the type of show that should make you want to look up or revisit films.
That's it for now. Phew.
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Date: 2018-07-23 08:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-07-24 07:05 am (UTC)