Ava DuVernay has got the delicate touch of an elephant and the level of cheesiness is out of the park. Still, the first two episodes are really, really good, engaging and moving, quite thrilling if you don't already know how it went. Episode three is really the worst one, too much easy melodrama and really schematic in its structure. It gets a bit better in the final episode, thanks to the "prison drama" approach. Overall, it's an interesting and important series for sure but I think I would have preferred a different approach. Maybe it's just that I don't like DuVernay.
They recently added six episodes as a "Season 1 - Part 2" bundle and I gotta say I think they got quite better. The series was already smart and cute but these new episodes are more fun, confident, even moving at times. I love watching it with my daughter.
The writing is a mixed bag. Dialogues are mostly made of dull expository monologues and tragically unfunny humor, while being constantly over the top and coming from really clichéd characters. But the lore is somewhat fascinating, keeping the climax for the penultimate episode is something I always like and I think that the overall structure, with the good guys doing nothing and the bad guys moving the plot, constitutes a nice choice. Plus, I like that it's moody, slow, never in a hurry to please with action. Visually, it's also a mixed bag: backgrounds are often beautiful, while the characters are atrocious and the action, when it kicks in, is quite good. Overall, it's an interesting adaptation and a decent animated show, with a nice crescendo, some very good moments and a good voice cast. It takes a couple of (quite boring) episodes to find its strides but then It's fine.
Visually, the stop motion is really, really cool. Even when the story is frankly a bit boring for me, I’m still amazed by the aesthetics and my daughter has fun anyway. The lessons are always clearly explained by the main character (many different variations of “Oh, I figured it out: I have to do this and that”), so it can be a bit dull for me, but it’s smart, full of interesting things, and it’s about kids playing outside, learning things by experimenting with stuff and getting their hands dirty. Which is a cool thing I hope my daughter will do more and more, even though she hates having her hands dirty.
So, again, it's only for kids, but it’s good. And there's two or three episodes near the end of the season that I really, really loved, not as a father, just as a spectator: Parachute Play is quite moving, I dare say, while Bedtime Story and A Treasure Hunt are visually and structurally really well made.
A nice show, well acted and decently directed, maybe a bit too on the nose in the way it talks about contemporary issues.
It's really cute and visually fascinating, plus the voiceover is quite good. Of course, being clearly targeted to children, it's really on the nose with its "messages", but it's still a nice watch. And my three-year-old daughter loves it.
The first half of the season is really, really good, then it tragically falls back in the usual "not enough stuff to fill 12 episodes" problem. There's still a bunch of good episodes and great moments, though, plus the finale is spot on.
A good and fitting ending, I guess. I though it was a bit funnier than the previous one, but still it's far from the enjoyement of the first couple of series.
Like season one, with the added bonus of continuity.
The whole web of mysteries is quite fun, even though a bit predictable in the actual twists. The whole philosophical part is frankly really basic, but also decently fun. What is missing is the human element, a bit of fun, some deep characters and some really engaging storylines. It's made this way on purpose because of the themes, of course, but still, I feel it's lacking. I mean, "that guy" shooting himself was powerful, but it instantly deflated because it didn't really mean anything. And that's just an example. And - jesus - too much exposition. Info dumps after info dumps with no elegance at all. They know it, they joke on it with the "show, don't tell" line, but that doesn't make it better. That being said, the production is amazing, the cast is great and I think this could be a good prologue to a much better second season.
It's the worst season, lacking the creativity and the crazyness of the previous one and with a cliffhanger that never got resolved, but it's still quite fun and with some occasional stroke of genius.
Maybe it's not as good and crazy as the first two seasons, but there's still a bunch of amazingly creative episodes, plus the whole prison and coma storyline ar quite fun and inventive. Also, there's a good ending, which I guess is not what we had with season 4 and the whole series. :(
The production value is always high and Idris Elba is alwasy Idris Elba, but this honestly felt like an empty filler. Plus, I miss Ruth Wilson.
Well, it's a Joe Swanberg TV Show.
Not as strong as season 2, this is already starting to feel a bit too formulaic, but there's a couple of really nice episodes and the final stretch is quite good.
It feels more confident than season one, with a better rhythm and more consistent overall quality. It's nice that it does not necessarily look for a fairy tale ending, but episode 5 is the only real standout.
Kinda like season two of The Flash, this starts really well, has a great mid season cliffhanger and then loses its momentum in having to fill too many episodes with not enough story. It's still fun, though, more fun than season 3, mainly because of the less crybaby attitude of Oliver Queen and the over the top villain. Actions is always good, the closing stretch of episodes is really engaging and, amazingly, it looks like a couple of deaths will stick. But I have to say the flashbacks are atrocious. It's not a full return to form but it's a fun season.
The first half of the season is kind of a mess, maybe too ambitious from a plot standpoint, clearly lacking the rythm and the inventions of the first two years. But then it comes together, the fun comes back and the last few episodes are really great, with an amazing season finale and a great cliffhanger.
A great season opener followed by a disappointing first half of a season. But I did have fun with the second half, with some over the top stuff (the cable between cars, the kinda Mad Max tribe, the flying sword... it felt like they borrowed stuff from Z Nation), a bit more dynamism in going around with the different communities and some nice twists. The final death was very predictable, though the battle was fun, even if not particularly well executed (as always with action in The Walking Dead). Overall a watchable season, with some nice ideas (the Eugene conversion is fun, Daryl and Carol meeting again was cool, Morgan losing it was great, I like the more trashy ideas, Negan is fun but underused), but I hope that next year they really ramp it up with the war. Even though I fear that the "war" will be four episodes of actual fighting and twelve episodes of mediocre actors stumbling on bad dialogues.
The actors and the characters are adorable and certain bits are really funny but it's quite inconsistent. The crescendo through the last four episodes is really good, though.
He's cheesy as hell and the honorable woman is clearly out of his league, but the night manager is a fun chap.
Funny and clever, it's classic Woody and the characters are adorable, but honestly I hoped for something more.
This season is fucked up.
The first episode is not that good but then the season takes off and it's still very entertaining, even though it's much less fun and much more focused on the tragic side of things.
Lots of great moments, both in terms of action and storytelling, a wonderful take on the Punisher (he's got most of the great scenes) and a decent Elektra, but there's not enough stuff to fill 13 long episodes and as a result it feels stretched. And too many fights against anonymous enemies I couldn't possibly care about: they become tiresome and when the action that really matters came up I couldn't bear it anymore. Plus, it lacks focus and a strong antagonist, even though I gotta admit that following up the wonderful Wilson Fisk from season 1 was a tough task.
It's still a good series, really watchable, with strong production values and a couple of really great episodes at the beginning and near the end, but the rest would have been much better if the season was shorter, maybe around 8/9 episodes. And dear God, people, cheer up! Foggy is the only character that feels human, while being surrounded by depressed sociopaths.
My thoughts while watching episode 1:
- this is visually charming;
- how much did they spend for the cast?;
- mh, actually, visually, I like it less than I thought;
- oh, so it's a super super loyal adaptation of the comicbook? No, wait, someone told me there's a twist;
- jeez, keeping the dialogues exactly as they were in the comicbook is not a great idea. They are meant to be read, they feel really stiff in a visual medium;
- this is incredibly boring;
- oh, so that's the twist. I kike it. OK, you have my curiosity.
My thoughts while watching episode 2:
- this is incredibly boring;
- what? We are still at minute 15? Fuck it, I'm giving up, there's no point, I'm literally falling asleep.
Now, this clearly is a superficial judgment and I'm sure that if I insisted and watched the rest of it I wouldn't hate it but I'm at a point in my life where if I'm watching a TV show, I'm incredibly bored and I think the best case scenario is "I didn't hate it", well, I can invest my time in something else.
It's not that atrocious, a couple of actors are well casted and there's some potential for growing up (but I assume we won't see anymore of this, so... ). The problem is that it's so naive... it's written like a show from twenty or more years ago, it really is out of its time. And yeah, of course, even if you look at it that way, it's not particularly good.
Visually it goes from some nice things (mainly in the backgrounds department) to some awful stuff (mainly the characters). The writing is a bit clunky and pretentious, but at the same time the adaptation from the games is well made. It needs a little less silly monologues and a bit more action, possibly with a bigger budget, but the last two episodes show some potential. I kinda think that from season two it could be fun.
They should have squeezed the first three episodes in a bottle episode during The Mandalorian season 2 and then they should have used the storyline of the last three episodes as The Mandalorian Christmas Special. Maybe, that way, it wouldn't be boring as shit. Instead, we got the usual, well produced, moderately fun, moderately boring, kinda wasted opportunity we tend to get from Star Wars/MCU TV shows, just a little more boring than usual.
Do not get me wrong: there's some good stuff and some fun stuff in here and I'm kinda fascinated by the idea they are basically making one big "Tatooine Tales" TV Show with different titles in different seasons, but really, this was tolerable only because I decided to watch it while doing laundry.
This is really cute. Maybe too much.
