Cheap cop out way of writing an ending. The intended effect Safdie was going for was everyone will wonder, “why all the gentrification themed - non-magical realism 9 previous episodes?” They’ll think he’s a genius but realize theres little rewatch value. For this ending? Nah. Safdies character was cringe, the episodes were cringe. Stone and Fielder made the experiment slightly watchable but I see this series as sealing Safdie for me as having gone beyond his expertise. It seems he was given an opportunity by the studio with the seed of an idea that never really grows up - rather it just evaporates.
The actor from the 1992 NZ Maori hit "Once were Warriors", who played a wife beating rage-a-holic now approaching his 80s, plays the role of a bounty hunter in his late 20's. Okie Dokie. Out of 8 Billion people on Earth that was the directors choice. Fine, I'll suspend by disbelief. At least, he's ethnic and not Johnny Chad Brad, right? Next -- it picks up where the famous Empire scene with him dying in the sandpit left off. Good idea. That's one way of rebooting a tertiary character that people care about because of one scene from a movie in 1982. Easy peezy Disney! Then it spirals into some BULLLLLLSH:T !
I watched the whole episode half awake since its almost entirely CGI of an 80 year old fighting dragons. That in itself makes it half interesting. 3 bags of popcorn.
I’m at a point with these shows where I feel the writers, director and perhaps the sound man need to be brought to an international court for crimes against our attention span with a high crime of wasting everyone time.
It seemed like a demo tape for a new camera with long droning cello’s — all enclosed locations, terrible dialogue, a character not established enough for the audience to commit any empathy towards (nor any other character.) Really melodramatic for no reason. Like the shot is a girl putting that thing on and you think its going to cut to the alternative world, but the tension continues instead to a lab guy pulling a smoky probe out a hole. The music continues to build obnoxiously, like a Key & Peele level absurdity -until two characters ( I’ve clocked 6 hours watching but still unsure of who they are and why I should care) step out and watch a rocket launch. Long music cue, shots of close-ups of people i dont care about, music is blaring 15 minutes later - nothing burger.
The episode has four of these moments of blue balls inducing suspense. The first is at the UN, long monologue extremely poor writing, tension building, shmuck refuses to stand - tension drops to full orchestra. Nothing burger- literally what is the point of this shows score? To fill the void of how poorly written it is? Perhaps :thinking: or maybe its an illusion of a show; a corporate sprint that attempts to dot the tee’s and cross the eyes to just suck the soul out of your already jilted soul.
Drolling. Enclosed. Drawn out. Unintelligible. Purposeless. Crisis of complexity amidst simple room locations, a hospital bed, a series of hallways and a graveyard. The filmmakers intentions about “deep” characters don’t translate when they don’t do the things a show needs to do for such emotional connections to be made. So in a sense, presumptive -as if the voices in the writing room are demanding you get it. Unfortunately, I get it - extending episodes and boring characters beyond what is earned means miserable writers got paid and you got robbed of time. Had to watch in 3 separate viewings over 15-20 minute intervals to finish. By 30 mins in I felt like the episode was 700 hours long. Something about how incredibly boring, slow and bad it is that gamifies getting through each nano-minute. Can’t wait for the next gripping long shot of a monkey vomiting, a grave stone or stone faced character looking into the distance.
30 minutes in, wish i was 30 minutes into reruns of anything else. Whats the value of these garbage shows that hook you at first but spiral into nothing burgers. I hear my screenwriter professor screaming “Why do I care about any of these characters ?!” Yet this show returns silence, a meaningless droll down talkie talk talk long tension no relief street. finished watching this episode and im totally wondering why do i give a shit about this rando dude buying a star to lana del ray? It seems like Mark Zuckerberg has the hots for the other rando scientist who is really dramatic about her dumb nuclear idea. Like, why should i care about these characters!
Safdie cant carry a scene let alone the show and he’s in 95% of this episode just being the worst.
Safdies and Fielder - not exactly an incredible combo. He should of done another season of The Rehearsal or his og show. The “Nathan” we know and love isn’t plugging and playing quite the way we wanted here. Emma stone gives tho.
puff piece for ek, no story or character building, pure propaganda for a streaming service, remarkably awful sequences on par with a B movie.
I have no idea what’s going on, the show is moving at warp speed. Everything is on the line. Everyone is in crisis mode. The empire characters are up against a wall. This ragtag team with Andor are totes in survival mode. Talk about stacking stakes. Honestly its dope though — feels like Star Wars should be.
I relate with wanting to play out a timeline where I have a son — for a few hours. I can also see how Nathan fans who have kids and are living their best lives in Oregon with family (or in a 2br rental with a kid) won’t relate. Quite possibly some single moms will get bent on Nathans apparent inability to have foreseen the kid getting attached. It happened to me as a kid. A natural consequence of sh:tty fathers. That's what I saw as Nathan tackled with what he had done. I saw all my mother's boyfriends realizing how immoral it was to fake dad me. If it gives you single moms any recompense this will likely be a lifelong issue for your boy to not have a good dad. Chances are the kid in the show continues to look for a dad until he is one, or at least until some politician becomes his daddy.
Those contradistinctions is what makes Nathan Felder a growing meta-cognitive comedian who hits us all in differing ways. His trying to figure out peoples dreams until he is left alone to figure out his own. That is what makes The Rehearsal’s final moral message so poignant to our times; the grass of our lives may not necessarily be greener after our futile manifestations arrive even with infinite rehearsals but "monkeys paw" and all -- the show must go on. Or better said by the late Buddhist monk Thicht Nhat Hanh, when asked by a disciple, "Master what is the best path in life?" He replied simply, "Decency is the absence of strategy." And it seems that is what Nathan has learned here at least until his next wild concept meta-comedy show. You may have gotten something else or maybe nothing. Just a stare into the screen wishing for another "Nathan for you" to soothe whatever rehearsal you're in the middle of.
Entirely watchable! Carrie fischer did a splendid job as mocap tiny version of Leia! Incredible work by H.Allen Smith as Vader, how he went from writing “Life in a Putty Knife Factory”, to Josh Starsons stand-in was a •Skywalkerian” summer (if ya know what I mean!). Speaking of which, great job on lighting - we never once saw the boom mic from stage top. Imma exit stage left now but ya’ll to on with your clone wars! Have a gluten free yom kippur!
The Osho doc on NetFlix was much more interesting. The XViM cult documentary on Showtime was also a bit more interesting as far as religious cult documentaries go. This one is dry and the “cult leader” is a privileged bro. I guess its Discovery+ channels approach. I found it like the Fire fest doc and the “cult leader” profiled not that interesting.
I tolerated the first episode, but honestly this second episoder is pure cringe. Elizabeth Holmes is portrayed not as a grifter POS but a hip-hop loving nymphomaniac who breaks out in dance every five minutes. And the rest of the cast has suddenly become terrible versions of a Judd Apatow movie.
Buddhist, Nudists and Zootists : My codewords for this episode. :)
High noon meets Dune. Probably the best episode of the series so far. 4 bags of popcorn.
This is the episode where you realize this whole Boba Fett thing is going to be embarrassing -- for everyone involved.
I can’t really follow up this final episode of cobra Kai with anything else. It was so intense, and I mean like in every way, that I might need to binge view the office now because nothing can follow up how good this was. I almost feel like this final episode will be remembered like the original karate kid
