The TV Thread

CaseOfAce

3 Seasons of Loudermilk just dropped on netflix.

Not bad on the strength of the first 2 eps. We're on familiar ground here - High Fidelity meets Flaked - so the beats are well established. It stars the lead from cult classic Office Space.

If you can get past the hot women falling for grouchy but loveable middle aged males schtick - it's worth a view...

boogieman

rze99 said:

AlbertC said:

Murder Is Easy - BBC

The standard of Agatha Christie adaptations seems to be getting worse and worse in recent years but this really was a new low. 
I really don’t want to sound like a Daily Mail reader but poorly written nonsense like this shows the BBC have lost it. 

I’ve no issue at all with having a diverse cast or bringing in our dubious colonial past into a story but it’s the totally unsubtle, patronising and completely hammy way they’ve done it in this. 

It’s like the BBC are so blinkered in putting across an agenda that they pay little attention to the more important elements of a production, like the script. 

I thought this was a particularly bad production., Watched it with a bunch of different ages. Forget all the right-on casting and poor rewriting for a moment, the dialogue was like some cut up simplistic job and the acting was absolute wooden stagy hammy crap across most of the cast. However, I thought that Penelope Wilton was good and would make an excellent Miss Marple.

There’s a 1980 version of Agatha Christie’s The Mirror Crack’d, with Elizabeth Taylor in one of the main roles, plus numerous other stars: Tony Curtis, Kim Novak, Edward Fox, Rock Hudson, Angela Lansbury. I’ve watched it because parts of it were filmed in the village where we live and several neighbours insisted we had to see it. Despite the all star cast it’s bloody atrocious. 

boogieman

Still wading through the MR James “Ghost Stories at Xmas” I recorded. 

Stalls of Barchester: pretty lame with a rubbish final resolution. 

A View from a Hill : interesting premise with some good tension to it. 

Stigma : meh. Very slow pacing and a paper thin plot. The gratuitous lingering boob shots don’t make up for the rest of it. 

The Treasure of Abbott Thomas : still my favourite of all of the stories. Intriguing plot, code breaking, good build up, great atmosphere. Perfect. 

RocknRollDave

Jools’ Hootenanny. It was OK. Could have been a lot better. 

breakstuff

RocknRollDave said:

Jools’ Hootenanny. It was OK. Could have been a lot better if Jools wasn't in it.

You missed a bit off.

goldtop

Collateral (Netflix/BBC) - complete pants. So much useless social commentary, and all at the expense of decent plot writing. The baddies (an actual gang and the many "Bad Men" dotted through the cast) are all totally unconvincing.

I'd call myself left-of-centre, but this really is an example of preaching to the choir and it's embarrassingly bad. Abdullah was lucky to have to endure only 10 minutes of this sh*t - I had to watch 4 hours.

2/10

Haych

Just started watching Fool Me Once on Netflix.

It's really annoying me because I'm sure I've read the book but apart from the nanny-cam bit and the fact the protagonist's husband isn't actually dead, I can't remember for the life of me what happens and none of the other detail in the story rings any bells.

We've only watched the first two episodes in the series (of eight) so too early to tell whether it's any good, but the story is intriguing enough to keep watching.  

stufisher

Ref Jools Hootenanny this was my highlight of the show:

Philly_Q

RocknRollDave said:

Jools’ Hootenanny. It was OK. Could have been a lot better. 

Should've turned over to BBC1 and watched Rick Astley.

Timcito

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

Timcito said:

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

Are you sure you're not accidentally watching Borgen or something like that, and forgetten the subtitles?! 

Timcito

Dontgiveupyourdayjob said:

Timcito said:

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

Are you sure you're not accidentally watching Borgen or something like that, and forgetten the subtitles?! 

It's all peppered up, too, with f-bombs just to show how 'real' and passionate the key American players are.

RocknRollDave

Philly_Q said:

RocknRollDave said:

Jools’ Hootenanny. It was OK. Could have been a lot better. 

Should've turned over to BBC1 and watched Rick Astley.

Already watched it, and you’re quite right. Excellent stuff.

Offset

Timcito said:

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

We usually have subtitles on for US movies.  We are, after all, two nations separated by a common language :-)

Philly_Q

Offset said:

Timcito said:

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

We usually have subtitles on for US movies.  We are, after all, two nations separated by a common language :-)

I have the subtitles on for pretty much everything, apart from the news and game shows.  Partly because I watch late at night and can't have it too loud, mostly because there's so much mumbling and/or background noise in modern films and TV shows.  I hate missing some bit of possibly-important dialogue and having to rewind.

boogieman

Wis ^. I use subtitles a fair bit too. I’m pretty hard of hearing and struggle to hear tv dialogue sometimes, even with hearing aids, but there’s also the mumble factor that’s crept in more and more. If you turn it up to hear the dialogue then, when the inevitable huge jump in the music track kicks in, it’s deafening. 

Timcito

Offset said:

Timcito said:

Anyone watched The Diplomat on Netflix? Can you work out wtf they're talking about half the time?! Up to episode 3, I can glean that there's been a terrorist attack and a danger that this might be pinned on Iran. But the repartee? Holy moly, most of it's Greek to me. Am I stupid (a distinct possibility!), or is this a production in dire need of a verbiage laxative!

We usually have subtitles on for US movies.  We are, after all, two nations separated by a common language :-)

Very true! However, it's not hearing the words that's causing the issue, but the meaning. There's a kind of 'in-government speak' that they're all using - fast, pithy, wise-ass exchanges seemingly designed to create a mood of professional, 'movers-and-shakers' type elitism. It's a real pain in the broadside; time to find something else, I think.

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

We always have the subtitles on as my partner is French and she sometimes struggles with accents. It's a bit frustrating sometimes when you're watching a crucial, tense scene and the subtitles give away the dramatic plot twist before it's actually come out of the character's mouth! Or a comedy where you read the punchline before it's delivered and you lose all sense of the comic timing! 

DannyP

I hate getting deafened by mega-loud soundtracks after I turn up to hear mega-quiet dialogue!

Maybe I should put the aux out through the Boss CS3 and listen through my amp?!?!?

Is it possible to get some kind of external soundbar gadget with a compressor?

goldtop

DannyP said:

I hate getting deafened by mega-loud soundtracks after I turn up to hear mega-quiet dialogue!

Maybe I should put the aux out through the Boss CS3 and listen through my amp?!?!?

Is it possible to get some kind of external soundbar gadget with a compressor?

Annoyingly, the only 'cleverness' I've seen in soundbars is a noise gate that (unnecessarily) mutes the aux input after a couple of seconds of silence and then takes about 50ms to open up again when there's a signal.

Creative, I'm looking at you...