I was a big fan of The Good Wife and I loved the first two seasons of The Good Fight, but holy hell did it go to shit in the third season.
Let me preface by saying I'm a progressive and a staunch feminist. That being said, I still found season 3 unbearable. It's pandering, plain and simple: while The Good Wife regularly plundered the headlines and wore its politics on its sleeve, it still tried to tell a compelling story and presented its ideas in a nuanced manner. The character of Kurt, for instance, was created specifically to represent a more conservative point of view and present a foil for Diane's progressive views. In so doing, it gave us fantastic character drama.
Well, all that is gone in season 3. Now we get flashes of Eric and Don Junior as Diane throws axes to relieve her utter hatred of the Trump Administration. We get Diane arguing with a Trump-shaped bruise on her husband's shoulder, lamenting "Where did the men go wrong." We get Schoolhouse Rock-like interjections featuring shitty music that wink so hard at the audience that the writers must have sprained their eyelids writing them.
Again, my problem isn't with the show's political views. It's with the inane manner in which they've abandoned all objectivity and nuance to give us a bizarre, one-sided revenge fantasy where Diane rages on and on about Trump's existence. It's entertainment for the liberal echo chamber, not a clever discourse on modern politics.
And meanwhile, the characters have devolved into caricatures. If you liked how The Good Wife featured quasi-realistic courtroom drama, tough luck, the courtroom action no longer makes any damn sense.
And so I'm out. Although the first two seasons made it feel like The Good Wife could go on forever, I guess this is the moment I have to say goodbye. You folks had a good run, but somewhere along the way you bought your own cleverness and forgot to tell a gripping drama.
I don't know what it is exactly about this show, but it's just not compelling TV. I loved the comics (it's one of the best comic series ever), but whatever magic was there didn't translate to the screen despite the series sticking pretty close to the tone of the original material.
I watched 4 episodes and I'm just... bored. Agent 355 is interesting, but only marginally so. Yorick, while charming in the comics, is like a Shia Labeouf imitator who goes "No no no no no!" every three sentences. And so far, it's mostly just people walking from point A to point B through the woman-only post-apocalyptic landscape.
I'm chalking this one up to another proof that creating a faithful adaptation doesn't always mean you capture the magic of the source material. Read the comics instead!
It's definitely a batshit-crazy story for our times, and I enjoyed the mad ride. However, the producers really had an agenda going into this, and I find myself resentful of their overall editorial approach. A few points:
Joe Exotic is a bad guy. He's charismatic and fascinating to watch, but the show does a lot to gloss over his actions. The series does its best to gloss over what he did and let him express his own side of the story, but come on. The guy was being harassed by Carole Baskin for legitimate reasons (exploiting and breeding exotic animals) and reacted in the most insane way. This is a guy who manipulated straight guys into marrying him in exchange for a steady supply of drugs.
The series does a huge disservice to Carole Baskin. Is she insane? Hell yeah she is. But crazy isn't a reason to send someone to prison. Yeah, she's as obsessed with big cats as the rest of the cast of crazies, but the huge difference is that she RESCUES exploited animals. She doesn't breed them. She doesn't sell them for profit. That the big takeaway of the series is "Well, she is as insane as the rest of them" really does a huge disservice to a significant difference between Baskin and the exotic pet breeders.
The series really overplays the "Baskin killed her husband" angle to prop up Joe Exotic and for the shock of it. It presents a lot of "facts" as-is to support this without exploring the arguments against them. For instance, Don's Power of Attorney included the activation clause for disappearance because Don Baskin was legitimately concerned he might disappear without a trace in Costa Rica.
So. A cool story, overall, and a crazy cast of characters, but it's unfortunate that people are taking this series as definitive documentary truth when it's a well-spun fiction with amplified craziness for the sake of shock value.
As a big fan of both the games and the novels, I was quite disappointed in this attempt at adapting the world of the Witcher.
This is a world that is vast and filled with ancient history, which makes it a huge endeavor to make people care for it on a TV show. In that specific regard, I regard the show as a huge failure. We're thrown into the world knowing very little, which leaves us with characters emoting about places and events we have no emotional connection to.
It doesn't help that the chronology is a total bloody mess. Why the creators decided it was a good idea to tell three different stories stretched across 50+ years without clearly informing the viewer, I'll never know. I could follow because I read the novels, but as an introduction for someone unfamiliar with the world, it's an awful decision.
Compare this to two massive fantasy adaptations that succeeded at making us care:
Game of Thrones started small, showing us the people of Winterfell, then introducing the visiting Baratheons and Lannisters. It made us care about the world of Westeros by first showing us compelling characters, then slowly expanding the stakes to encompass the entire world.
Lord of the Rings had the most epic world-building in arguably the whole genre's history, but again it started small. It made us care about a quaint Hobbit village long before it was time to venture into the greater world.
The Witcher does nothing of this. As a result, when we're shown the massive battle for Cithra in the first episode, it's hard to care even if you're familiar with the setting. It's all just noise and pointless gore.
This tragic misfire carries on throughout the rest of the show. Before we get to experience how awesome Yennefer is, we get to experience her as a misfit whose only apparent redeeming quality is her hunger for power. Geralt himself is interesting from the get-go, but he's all too serious to be sympathetic, at least until Jaskier shows up.
And so, we're left with characters emoting and chewing scenery. It's pretty scenery, sure: the VFX is nice, and the fight scenes are pretty great. But none of this feels lived-in and compelling the way Lord of the Rings was from its very first minutes. The dialogues tend to be arch and clichéd, and the whole affair lacks the subtle realism of Game of Thrones.
And so, as much as I love the characters of the Witcher, I'll continue to look to the novels and the games as the more definitive versions. This is a brave attempt, but as much as it aspires to be top-shelf fantasy TV, it's second-rate at best.
There's one moment where the TV series shone bright: the striga fight. This had all the markings of what made the Witcher stories great, and it was genuinely terrifying and exhilarating. This makes me think that the first season would have been much, much better if it didn't try to build the entire world across a century of conflict, and instead focused on the adventures of Geralt of Rivia as he hunts monsters. Ciri and Yennefer could have been introduced a bit later, and their backgrounds explored in season 2, when we would all be on board for the ride.
As much as it deviates from the novels, I'd recommend The Witcher 3 as the ultimate interpretation of that world. surpsassing even the novels.
Julia is a comfy show, albeit not one with as much substance as it would like to claim. The portrayal of Julia feels a little hollow, as she's perpetually disarmingly charming and almost naïve in her pursuits. We never really get to know what makes her tick or what about her drove her to become a TV pioneer. There's also a tendency to put roadblocks in her way that are caricatural at best, and rely a lot on white men being assholes to women. They even did poor Paul dirty for a while, which is really sad considering how supportive and adoring the real-life Paul Child was of his wife.
Ah, but it kind of comes together in the end. And there are plenty of genuine, heartfelt moments that feel earned to make it a pleasant watch. The show kind of wore its welcome in the end, but it was short enough that I didn't mind too much.
Yeah... This is working for me.
It's got this cool focus on the food that the original Japanese show had, and it wastes no time with BS rivalries the way American reality TV shows usually does. It's fun, the chefs are respectful and crazy inventive, and the food is really out of this world in inventiveness and creativity. Some of the personalities (like Dominique Cress, my favorite) are big and boisterous in the most fun way possible.
My only complain, and it's a small one, is that I would have preferred to be a clearer underdog dynamic with the challengers and the Iron Chefs. Sometimes the contest just feels like two chefs going at it, instead of this basic idea of a contestant facing an impossible legend. This was most apparent with Samuelsson, who looks to be an amazing chef, but who played the underdog card by invoking how he came from humble beginnings. I know everyone in there is happy to be on the show, but I prefer the near-mythical contest of underdog versus legend that the original Iron Chef went for.
But that's a small quibble. The show is entertaining, Alton Brown and Kristen Kish are on point, the food looks amazing, and the rivalries are light-hearted and food-centric. This feels like a legitimate Iron Chef show.
(Plus, bonus, no Bobby Flay in sight...)
The main actress and the actor playing the crime boss are really phenomenal and carry this show. That being said, this series' quality just went down and down from the very high point of the first episode. It went from a hard-hitting exploration of a grief-stricken woman on a path of vengeance, to a middling cop show, to bloody but very melodramatic soap opera with emotions turned to 11 and flashbacks every five minutes.
Also, while the music was fantastic in the first episode, by the time I had heard it 50 times I was very much done with it.
Okay, I'm out. The idea of showing us an alien invasion through multiple POVs around the world is fantastic, but they clearly didn't have enough material to fill a season, because all we get are tired character moments with little tidbits of alien action. To call it a "slow burn" is to overlook just how wet and slow things are. You'll find yourself wishing the aliens would kill the main cast already because there's no reason to watch otherwise.
It's too bad, because performances and cinematography are pretty good. But this show is an expensive nothingburger.
Fun little show that doesn't overstay its welcome. It started REALLY strong, but it meandered more as the seasons went on.
My major negative comment on this show is how Sharon and Rob experience conflict... I didn't expect the show to be all love and butterflies, but Sharon and Rob have a way to fight that's just mean and cringe-inducing. I think it's because, often, the conflict stems from them getting irrationally angry at each other and saying overly mean things. The result is that the two mean characters act shitty to each other for a while, severely diminishing the fun of the series. Also, as the show progresses, Sharon gets more and more self-centered and cringey, which I did not enjoy.
Other than that, though, it's a hilarious good time. Carrie Fisher in particular is just great whenever she's on screen.
I rewatched this in 2020 as I gear up for a BSG rewatch, and I gotta say, it held up nicely. It's not groundbreaking in any sense, and I wouldn't call it essential viewing for BSG fans... But it's a nice SF action adventure with some cool moments. Not as good as BSG itself, but it doesn't diminish anything about BSG, contrary to Caprica...
Season one (the heist in the Spanish Royal Mint) is superb television. Tense, full of action and character drama, and exciting plot twists at every turn. Sure, it's sometimes over the top or unbelievable, but it never stops being fun, and all the characters are fantastic and flawed and crazy.
Season two is utter crap and shouldn't have been made.
Note on episodes: the episodes listed here on Trakt.tv are for the original play order from Spanish TV. Netflix recut the episodes from season one and broke them down into two seasons or parts. The 15 episodes listed on Trakt.tv constitute the first two parts available on Netflix, made up of 13+9 episodes. These two parts are sometimes called "seasons," too, just to add to the confusion.
In other words:
Season 1 (15 episodes) on Trakt.tv = Seasons 1 (13 episodes) + 2 (9 episodes) on Netflix (aka parts 1+2)
Season 2 (16 episodes) on Trakt.tv = Seasons 3 (8 episodes) + 4 (8 episodes) on Netflix (aka parts 3+4)
I've rewatched this series 10 years after it aired, and boy did it not age well.
It's just a bunch of nothing happening to uninteresting characters and it goes on and on and on... Nothing happens for entire episodes, only for movement to take place in the last 10 seconds to set up the next episode. There's also a LOT of plot happening with religious factions fighting each other and I... don't... care...
I like some of the characters: Zoe is great, and I like Joseph Adama and Daniel Gladstone. The rest of the characters tend to be mired by boring plots that really don't move the story towards any kind of satisfying resolution.
Someone should re-edit the whole thing into a 2-hour movie and it would probably be fine. As it is, it's 100% skippable even if you're invested in the BSG universe.
Started with good momentum right out of the station, but by episode 4 it just started to go off the rails. The initial episodes were okay, with some intriguing potential, but flat, predictable writing means that promise was never realized.
If you've seen the movie, there's really no reason to watch this show.
Amazing show. I'm not a fan of rotoscope animation, but the writing and an amazing main character more than make up for it. Smart, meaningful, funny, poignant... A fantastical portrait of a mind unraveling. Highly recommended.
Not great, not terrible.
The premise isn't bad, but comparisons to The Good Place are hard to avoid and not to the advantage of this show. The technology often makes no sense, which detracts from the drama, and the story gets bogged down by a pointless murder mystery. That being said, Andy Allo in the role of Nora oozes charm; she definitely carries the show on her shoulders, because her co-star is pretty forgettable.
Worth a quick binge, but I'm not sure I'm gonna stick around for a second season.
If you've ever wondered what part of Rick and Morty is Roiland's and which is Harmond's, just watch this show. While it showcases Roiland's manic improv, it lacks the character introspection and pathos that made Rick and Morty a success.
Without Harmond's guidance, there's just not much to root for about the alien family. Typically some random shit happens, then things go from bad to worse because aliens. None of them are particularly likable. Some gags are fine but on the whole it all feels pretty skippable.
I really tried to like this show because I like the idea behind it, but David Chang is absolutely insufferable. I gave up on the show at episode 3, where he kept bringing up old stories of his mom embarrassing him with her home cooking, then said, to the face of someone cooking a home dinner for him, "Doesn't matter if it doesn't taste good, it's the intent that's great."
Chang also has a weird superiority complex about Asian food, which is weird considering that, according to the way he talks about his mom's cooking, he evidently didn't like it growing up and considered it a source of embarrassment. This is such a pitiful contrast to someone like Roy Choi (from "The Chef Show") who embraces both his roots and his upbringing in LA in a way that is inclusive of all the cultures he meets.
What an ass. He clearly thinks highly of himself and thinks that the only real value of food is as seen through the prism of a Michelin-starred chef. You could see it in the Tacos episode, where, as always, Mexicans are folklorized as poor but honest cooks, while only American-trained chefs can truly coax the maximum out of their ingredients or comment on the greatness of Mexican cuisine.
This is also the guy who, while sitting with a famous NYC pizza chef in a historical Brooklyn institution, orders Domino's to prove some kind of bizarre point. It's all so weird and awkward because you can tell people want to stay polite for the camera.
It's all so sad and infuriating. I can't.
Rarely have I ever watched a show that has provoked such a lack of reaction on my part. It's the fat-free vanilla yogurt of SF TV. It's not poorly done, and the acting is okay, but there's nothing interesting to connect with.
Plus, the VFX is too clean, so it lacks the kind of pastoral, grounded yet whimsical quality that Stålenhag's amazing art evokes.
After watching season one, I can say this show is pretty great. I wish the show was more believable, but watching Eve at work, especially when she interacts with the bad guy, is really irresistible. Bit on the light side, but really fun, for sure.
I'm probably in the minority on this, but I enjoy the Villanelle scenes a lot less than I do Eve. She's just over-the-top psycho, and she's not even a decent assassin at that. If this were the real world, she'd get caught after one hit and no one at MI6 would break a sweat catching her. Although I admit, she's great to watch when she gets close to Eve.
I love this show! High production values, great acting, and the characters are really compelling and well developed. The show is very Spanish in that it references a lot of Spanish culture and history, so a lot of it went over my head, but the show was still super-enjoyable. Highly recommended.