What are you watching?

[Frag Maniac]

And yes, Die Hard is a Christmas movie, I don't care what anybody says.

Of course it is, I thought that was obvious since it's always about that time of the year both in the movies and the theatre release dates. BTW, Alan Rickman who played Hans Gruber in the first film was always my favorite Die Hard villain. God I miss that guy, he was a great actor. I also miss the days when people in general rallied around a good cop movie. Now you have haters that call them all bad and want to defund them, until something happens to THEM, damn hypocrites!

 

[Frag Maniac]

Just want to say I've been checking out The Last of Us TV series on HBO, and the first two episodes were pretty good. Was wondering if anyone else is watching it?

 

[Rain611]

I LOVE The Last of Us TV show.

 

[bSTAR_182]

I have mixed feelings about The Last of Us series. Generally speaking, it is the best video adaptation around and stays the most faithful to its source material, though that's not saying too much seeing as the bar is set low for video game adaptations. And as hyped as I was after episode 5, I feel like the remaining 4 episodes lacked a lot of good tense story buildup.... and concepts.
Had I known they were limiting the first game's story to one season and only 9 episodes, I would have preferred them to put more focus on Joel and Ellie's journey together and who they met along the way, rather than having episodes centered around their past.


Recently rewatched Evil Dead 2013 in preparation for Evil Dead Rise. I absolutely love this movie. Jane Levy does a great job as Mia and the practical effects are much appreciated.

 

[Frag Maniac]

More of a documentary really, but I've been checking out Down to Earth lately, hosted by Zac Efron. He's got a vegan friend along that sort of co hosts, so it got a bit interesting in season 2 when they visited the Jonai farm in Australia. Some really good sustainable farming practices are shown with both agriculture and livestock, and the gal that runs Jonai intends to keep it small and teach other farmers how to farm sustainably rather than expanding like the corporate farms do.

The main focus of this episode was to find a way to keep Australia's soil organic, because it keeps drying out due to big farms putting too many chemicals into it. Coincidentally, one of the best things to keep the soil moist and organic is to grow mushrooms. It also makes the soil actually absorb carbon in the air, vs leeching carbon into the air, plus it increases and keeps healthy the water table, making it good overall for soil, air, and water.

BTW, they also showed Cordyceps, the so called "zombie" fungi talked about in The Last of Us (the coincidental part), which is known to attack primarily insects. Most fungi are not parasitic like Cordyceps though, instead they pop up near trees and such and when their fibers join with the tree roots, they actually help provide them nutrients and make the trees and the soil healthier.

The show also highlights some products like Fable meatless protein dishes made with mushrooms, which taste like chicken, beef, etc. Fable is owned and operated by a former meat eater from Texas whom loves BBQ btw. The guy is considered a mushroom scientist and has made his own equipment where he grows shrooms in a sterile environment to develop highly specified extracts to make the taste just right. They say his meatless products even have realistic fibers like meat does that can get stuck in your teeth like meat. When you get my age and the doc keeps telling you your creatinine levels are slowly rising, mostly caused by eating beef, these kind of products start looking pretty interesting.

 

[bSTAR_182]

Moon Knight
Finished this series recently and I enjoyed it way more than I had anticipated. Really wasn't expecting a psychologically fueled Marvel superhero story and I love it for that. He's one of my favorites now.

Servant
Finished off this series recently as well. It's a bit of a rollercoaster and was dragged out between seasons 3 and 4 but I do like the ending that they ultimately went with.

Spoiler

Dorothy coming to terms with everything and forgiving but also thanking Leanne was an ending I didn't know I wanted or needed to appreciate the series more.

A "good" ending was a bit unexpected and it all happens so quickly that I half expected Leanne to be imagining it all before being blindsided by Dorothy.
I'm glad that was not the case though, but I do think the events of the final 2 episodes are what needed to be expanded on more seeing as the cult stuff and "hook man" went nowhere. Yet we were led to believe Leanne's followers would do more.

 

[Springhosen]

I'm not watching it yet, but I'm really excited to binge The Glory next weekend. (Waiting because both my husband and I will be off so we can binge together.)

The wait is excruciating; the things we do for love.

We are currently watching Dear Liar though and that's a crazy ride. I hate that we caught it and it wasn't finished yet because waiting for new episodes to drop, especially since they're only 10 minutes each, is rough. They sure do pack a lot into 10 minutes though.

 

[KManX89]

I just watched the Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey movie out of morbid curiosity (online, you didn't think I'd pay to watch that sh!t, did you?) and let me just say: for everyone hoping it'd be one of those "so bad it's good" movies, I'm here to tell you... it's not, it's just bad, really, really, reeeeeeeeeally bad (to the shock of nobody). It's awful across the board. Everything about it is bad, and not in a "good" way. The characters are all flat, useless and stupid with no depth whatsoever (except for one via a stalker subplot that goes nowhere and that’s literally it for character development) with horrendous shaky cam and lighting that makes it impossible to see WTF is happening (it was so dark, I couldn’t see sh!t and the few kills that were visible had really bad CGI blood) and really bad editing that splices shots from other sets together at certain points (I wish I was making this up). And to top it all off, scenes dragged on longer than needed to get it to the required minimum runtime.

Way to go, you make an exploitation horror flick out of a beloved childhood character purely for shock value and you can't even get that right. Or maybe it was to hide the skin underneath those cheap Dollar Store Pooh and Piglet masks, unclear. And BTW: it's so clearly guys in masks who just happen to be plastic-faced anthropomorphic animals per the movie's story.

But then again, the director flat out admitted he was never interested in making a good or even entertaining-bad/so-bad-it's-good movie out of this in his Reddit AMA that they're strangely censoring hateful comments on, so there you go.

Otherwise, I've been rewatching the John Wick series the past couple of days and will be watching John Wick 3 tonight before seeing John Wick: Chapter Four tomorrow. Seriously, go watch Keanu's meltdown scene from Knock Knock if you want something that's legitimately "so bad it's good". "IT WAS FREE PIZZA!" gets me every time.

I also saw Scream VI, which was a marked improvement on V. Loved the characters and horror trope humor a lot more in this and the kills were brutal, though it was borderline ridiculous how much some of the cast were able to take being gutted I must admit.

 

[Frag Maniac]

Otherwise, I've been rewatching the John Wick series the past couple of days and will be watching John Wick 3 tonight before seeing John Wick: Chapter Four tomorrow. Seriously, go watch Keanu's meltdown scene from Knock Knock if you want something that's legitimately "so bad it's good". "IT WAS FREE PIZZA!" gets me every time.

Unlike many whom hated the sequels, I liked ALL 3 of the original Matrix movies, and the first 3 John Wick movies were exceptional, but I'm not sure anything in Knock Knock qualifies as "so bad it's good".

I just started watching season 4 of The Mandalorian last night. Pretty good so far.

 

[Turo602]

The Mario movie was awesome. I don't really get what critics are up in arms about. A simple plot for a Mario movie? No way! This was everything that it needed to be and It had me smiling from beginning to end. I was constantly pointing at the screen like that Leonardo Dicaprio meme because it's such a visual and musical treat for Mario fans. I'm not typically a fan of Illumination's movies, but with Nintendo and Shigeru Miyamoto's involvement, they really got this one right.

Even Chris Pratt as Mario isn't really all that distracting because these characters are immediately more humanized than what we see in the games and to Chris Pratt's credit, he does a great job transitioning Mario's regular voice into his more classic let's-a-gos and yahoos. I think the most distracting performance was Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong as he just kinda comes off as himself, right down to the laugh.

I actually really enjoyed seeing Mario and Luigi's life in Brooklyn a lot more than I thought I would and would totally love to see more of this side of them, either in video games or in sequels. There's definitely sequel and spin-off potential here and I would gladly watch more of these. It was just such a joy to watch. I guess my only gripe would be the way the movie kinda glosses through various kingdoms. Though I guess they'd also make great settings in future films.

 

[KManX89]

The Mario movie was awesome. I don't really get what critics are up in arms about. A simple plot for a Mario movie? No way! This was everything that it needed to be and It had me smiling from beginning to end. I was constantly pointing at the screen like that Leonardo Dicaprio meme because it's such a visual and musical treat for Mario fans. I'm not typically a fan of Illumination's movies, but with Nintendo and Shigeru Miyamoto's involvement, they really got this one right.

Even Chris Pratt as Mario isn't really all that distracting because these characters are immediately more humanized than what we see in the games and to Chris Pratt's credit, he does a great job transitioning Mario's regular voice into his more classic let's-a-gos and yahoos. I think the most distracting performance was Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong as he just kinda comes off as himself, right down to the laugh.

I actually really enjoyed seeing Mario and Luigi's life in Brooklyn a lot more than I thought I would and would totally love to see more of this side of them, either in video games or in sequels. There's definitely sequel and spin-off potential here and I would gladly watch more of these. It was just such a joy to watch. I guess my only gripe would be the way the movie kinda glosses through various kingdoms. Though I guess they'd also make great settings in future films.

I'm seeing this tonight on my night off from work.

Glad you enjoyed it.

 

[bSTAR_182]

I'm hoping to catch the new Mario movie sometime this week, it looks really cute and well done. Glad to see others are finding it to be just that as well.


Caught up on Ted Lasso and The Mandalorian this weekend. Both shows are still going on strong.

 

[bSTAR_182]

Watched the Netflix mini-series Unbelievable. Really great show with strong actresses/actors all around to help deliver a powerful message. Kaitlyn Dever, you would have made an amazing Ellie in TLOU.

 

[KManX89]

Can confirm the Mario movie was a good, fun time. Loved the fan service. I, too, found myself pointing at the screen and going like "yeah, I remember that from (insert Mario game here)" all throughout the movie and it was chalk full of fan service. I absolutely loved the Mario Kart bits and the platforming parts added nice bits of nostalgia as well.

I agree critics are being anal. No, it doesn't have deep character development and it's not gonna make you think, but would you really expect that from a Mario movie? The movie succeeded at what it set out to do and be and I still felt there was some feel good moments between Mario and Peach and Jack Black absolutely killed it as Bowser (he easily gave the best voice acting of anyone in this movie), though I did think Mario and Donkey Kong could've used more polish. They were definitely building towards a potential friendship much like Knuckles in Sonic 2, but it doesn't really go anywhere. Mario and friends also get miraculously saved a few too many times for convenience, which took me out of it a little bit, but it didn't quite reach ridiculous levels.

Speaking of which, I also liked the contrast from the live-action Sonic movies. Whereas Sonic and Co. transitioned from their fictional world to the real world, in this, Mario and Luigi went from the real world to their own fictional world, which looks great along with the rest of the kingdoms in this movie BTW.

But yeah, it's way better than the '93 John Leguizamo movie and his boycotting comments just reek of sour grapes (BTW, it made in one day what that movie did in its entire run, how 'bout them apples?). In fact, I remember saying after the movie that Mario can only really work in animation, much of the action and world set pieces (in particular the platforming), not to mention the creature designs wouldn't even be possible in live-action (oh great, now I've got those weird-looking lizard people as goombas and Dennis Hopper's terrible Bowser makeup ringing through my head), and it showed in that movie. His full potential is on full display in this movie and it deserves all the dough it's raking in.

 

[Frag Maniac]

Just watched the movie Pearl. Mia Goth literally lights it up in this one, and she does this weird super creepy smile that gets more horrific as they show it. I am now certain I will never mess with a chick that has abandonment issues.

 

[Frag Maniac]

I have mixed feelings about The Last of Us series. Generally speaking, it is the best video adaptation around and stays the most faithful to its source material, though that's not saying too much seeing as the bar is set low for video game adaptations. And as hyped as I was after episode 5, I feel like the remaining 4 episodes lacked a lot of good tense story buildup.... and concepts.
Had I known they were limiting the first game's story to one season and only 9 episodes, I would have preferred them to put more focus on Joel and Ellie's journey together and who they met along the way, rather than having episodes centered around their past.

Yeah but they also showed stuff like Marlene's relationship with Ellie's mother, whom was played quite well by Ashley Johnson. Not as much to my liking, but they also showed Bill's relationship with Frank, and I'm sure some appreciated that.

So overall I think they've thought about not just the game fans, but TV fans in general. I think their goal was similar to that of the Halo TV series, to not just bring the game to TV format, but adapt it to that format, and I think they've done well at that.

I find as far as appeasing game fans goes though, they have pretty much included all the emotionally driven scenes, especially with Joel and Ellie. In a few cases they don't do it verbatim and make minor changes, but the end result is very similar and good viewing IMO.

 

[leon_hellppp]

Watched The Super Mario Bros. Movie. I thought it was overall pretty good. I wouldn't consider it a great movie but it's not a bad one, either. I would nitpick about some of the casting and characterization, but frankly the movie is exactly what it should be for its target audience (kids). Sitting there in the cinema, I felt a bit sentimental seeing kids still getting excited for Mario. I played my first Mario game when I was around three or four years old. It's nice to see today's younger generation still enjoying Mario, and I'm happy that the red plumber is still going strong.

Recently re-watched Alien: Covenant. I'm a real sucker for the Alien movies and I can't help but like them all. Still, Covenant is the one I like least. I think it suffers too much from identity crisis and wasted potential. An Engineer city could have been something really special, but there's little "biomechanical" visual spectacle on offer. The Neomorph could have been so much creepier. It baffles me that they cut those shots of it stalking Rosenthal with its uncanny human-like walk. I also hate what they did with Shaw and feel that it undermines the ending of Prometheus. Still, Michael Fassbender was really great as David (and Walter) once again. That guy can really act!

 

[SpaceOwlHoot]

I watched Willy's Wonderland a few days ago...not a Nic Cage fan, movie wasn't great, it has low scores but it was still entertaining to watch...

Spoiler

Nicolas Cage has ZERO dialogue in the whole movie

 

[Frag Maniac]

I watched Willy's Wonderland a few days ago...not a Nic Cage fan, movie wasn't great, it has low scores but it was still entertaining to watch...

Spoiler

Nicolas Cage has ZERO dialogue in the whole movie

The last Nic Cage movie I watched was Color Out of Space. I wasn't expecting to like it, but it was fairly good, in a dark comedy kind of way. Nic almost played the reverse of himself in Kickass, which was a brilliant film where he did a vague Will Sh@tner Captain Kirk version of a Batman-like character. In this one instead of being super sweet to his kid like in Kickass, he was very sarcastically annoyed by them.

 

[KManX89]

I watched Power Rangers: Once & Always on Netflix purely out of childhood nostalgia (as somebody who hasn’t cared to watch anything past season 3 back in the day when they went Zeo, Alien, Turbo, etc.), it was a nice piece of nostalgia, but also a bit of a letdown. Not (fully) having the big 3 really stung, though

Spoiler

technically all the original Rangers WERE there. I thought for sure Adam would be the new Green Ranger, but they just dance around Tommy not showing up out-of-gear and JYB is just reduced to a glorified cameo.

There were some glaring plot holes, too.

Spoiler

At one point, Rita conveniently and abruptly stops attacking the Command Center, allowing the Rangers to escape in one piece. I was like “WTF?”

Loved seeing the original Megazord again and Billy really kept everything together narratively, though the Megazord battle was kinda underwhelming with not-so-great CGI to boot. Apparently they’ve learned nothing from the first movie going with CGI over toy robot model zords. Seriously.

It was a solid one-time nostalgic watch, but nothing I’d want to revisit. I teared up for the Trini and Tommy tribute at the end, though, R.I.P. Jason David Frank. Once a Ranger, always a Ranger.