The pandemic IS an episode of Black Mirror 
Television Thread
Roo_Stercogburn
#305
Watched first ep of Solos. Its turd. Will watch other eps since its an anthology and it might be better.
Watched first 2 eps of Intergalactic. Its awful. I found myself wondering why there is swearing on this childrenâs show
psyber
#306
Favourite shows:
- Fringe â such a good sci-fi. I think it is in my all time favourite shows. Mad scientist, drugs, crazy science, deep story; itâs a must watch for any lover of sci-fi
- Battlestar Galactica â again, such a deep story
- Stargate â itâs cheesy but I love it (Atlantis, SG-1, even Universe)
- Altered Carbon â Itâs so well written and well made, that first fight scene in the AI hotel is so cool. Even if some PC points are a little strong for my liking, I like how the show tries to highlight the ultimate meaninglessness of our exterior, despite our subjective impressions
- Black Mirror â absolutely loved how deep and shocking it was
- Star Trek â sometimes cheesier than Stargate, but so too do I still love it (TNG, DS9, Voyager too)
- Travellers â Wish it could have been paced out more in some ways
- Game of Thrones â outside of the usual sort of series I watch, a friend encouraged me, and we watched it together. Loved it. Wish the ending was better but so does everybody else.
Neither Star Trek nor Stargate may have had the best of writing, but despite that fact, those shows will always have a fond and favourable standing in my heart!
nose
#308
update: I finished Breaking Bad a while ago and I have to say that damn, the hype was actually real.
Iâm a pretty big series snob and I consider BB to be by far the best series Iâve ever seen.
Legendary tragedy.
morphic
#309
Finished it. It was such a great idea and execution.
SPOILERS
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I think the pacing was off because they got cancelled after season 2, then picked up by Netflix for season 3 and then cancelled again⊠At least they were able to create a rather satisfying ending.
morphic
#310
Loved it at first but they kind of lost me after season 3 or so - I watched that years ago so I donât really remember it⊠just that it became convoluted and it seemed they had lost the plot a bit. I didnât finish it.
Fantastic show. So say we all!
Watched the original series decades ago, and the movies as well. I loved those when I was a kid. Spockâs death was heartbreaking⊠and the one when they go back in time to earth was just great. Havenât watched any of the follow-up series though.
Pretty uneven. Some great episodes and others⊠meh.
Funny how tastes can be. I thought it was terrible, full of clichés and that the main actor was even worse than Schwarzenegger. Lasted 2 episodes. Wifey hated it too.
If you havenât watched them, do watch all seasons of The Expanse. Itâs the best sci-fi show since Battlestar Galactica.
Just finished Black Summer season 2. Should have re-watched season 1 before that because I didnât really remember the characters⊠Still tons of fun anyway. And quite brutal at times!
Numerical
#312
Weâve started up Dominion. I had no idea they made a sequel series to that Legion movie all this time. Itâs a little cheesy but thatâs just SyFy for you.
Roo_Stercogburn
#313
Legion was very cheesy too. Didnât know it had come to a TV series. Iâll nosey. Cheers for the heads-up 
psyber
#314
Agreed. Such a shame that it got cut short.
Ah, see, I loved how deep the story was. Not sure how far you got, but pretty much all of the loose ends get sewn together in the final season in the most spectacularly unexpected way.
So say we all!
Theyâre not great writing, really â perhaps its the cheap use of drama and âshields down to 80%â to build tension, rather than subverting it and building it up in other ways â and much of the acting is abysmal except some of the main characters.
But, I loved them as a kid, and the atmosphere was always a calming one that helped me in down times â same with Stargate. 'tis why I love them so much despite their shortcomings.
I also just love sci-fi, and pretty much anything with spaceships, alien civilisations and cool technology in.
Perhaps, but then again all of story writing is the recycling of human cliches.
I think at some point we tend to define the objective quality of things based on our personal tastes.
morphic
#315
Re: Altered Carbon - From what I saw, it was nicely made. No doubt about the production values. The problem with clichĂ©s is that more often than not itâs writing laziness more than anything else. When you see something coming from a mile away and yes, it happens, you wonder âReally?â.
That said, people react differently to different things, for sure.
Nobody can define the objective quality of things⊠because everyoneâs opinion is subjective in itself. So the idea is to remove feelings/emotions as much as possible and see the value in the work, even if it doesnât speak to you
psyber
#316
Perhaps it is a good indicator, generally speaking. However, there was nothing in Altered Carbon that seems lazy.
If youâve only watched two episodes, as you say, then that in itself is a clichĂ© and a frankly a lazy assessment of the quality.
That I agree with â youâll get no argument from me there.
However, what I mean by my comment is not to question the limits of objective truth, but rather to point out that, even when we think we are being objective, and subtracting emotion from the picture, most of the time we actually arenât doing it as much as we think we are.
That would be because only 0.4% of information that counts into a decision by the brain is actually conscious, hence, we are not aware of 99.6% of the information that forms a particular intuition.
And, generally, given the ratings for the show are actually generally very good, and only about 5% behind the ratings of Battlestar Galactica, Iâd say that would be a good indicator that Altered Carbon is not as full of cliches as perhaps you might think it is, from the first two episodes.
Roo_Stercogburn
#317
I read the Altered Carbon books years ago. Proper pot boilers but here and there some great sci-fi ideas. First book was great then after that a bit so-so. So I wasnât surprised how both seasons of AC went. I was a bit surprised how good Poe was in the first season.
Its fun, well done and definitely better than most offerings even if not quite classic.
morphic
#318
Itâs not laziness - itâs a question of scarce available time & how you spend it. Unfortunately, with the job I have and being married, I donât have that much time for myself that I can and/or want to spend watching TV⊠Thatâs why I wonât spend more than 2-3 episodes on a show and if it doesnât speak to me, I just drop it.
In 2021 we do have a âfirst world problemâ in that a couple subscriptions bring you tons of hours of entertainment. I remember the time long ago before the internet when I would listen to the same album over a hundred times or reading the same book twice, rewatch movies 10+ times on VHS or DVD, play and replay a video game all night even if I didnât think it was all that great but I was broke and paid for it so I had to⊠etc. etc.
Nowadays thereâs just so much content available everywhere vs so little of my time available that Iâm nowhere near as ready or simply capable to give something a chance as I was before.
morphic
#319
Sorry if I did go hard on AC. Mostly, I remember being disappointed that it had evident amazing production values but the writing wasnât all that. Ultimately, Iâm glad you & many people had a good time with it and who knows, maybe one day Iâll give it a second chance then!
psyber
#320
Lazy was a poor choice of word! I was trying to use your own language against you. 
Though, that did come out sounding very rude.
All I mean is that looking at the total ratings, generally people feel AC is a good show that doesnât embody lazy values, and so perhaps not liking it is attributed more to a stylistic preference than an objective quality of it.
The brain point is about how, when we analyse what we really feel through careful reverse engineering of the self, we tend to find logical fallacies deep within, because naturally we donât resolve our views to that high a resolution unless there is a necessity to do so.
Haha, Iâm not that upset about AC, really.
I get funny when I perceive something being unfairly judged.
I think on some level I still get a bit reactive because of my time as a kid being bullied and mischaracterised!
Numerical
#321
I tried watching Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness a few days ago. Terrible. Japanese writers making scripts depicting Americans are usually a bit weird and stilted, and also derivative of cheesier American action movies and this is no different. It has the oddest story beats and some of the plot points make little sense even for a zombie show. The CGI of the world looks great but the characters look odd and are animated very cartoonishly. Itâs only 4 episodes so you wont lose much time watching it but it doesnât expand on or add to the RE story much in any way.
relic
#322
Resident Evil should have been the perfect video game for movies but I wouldnât rate any of the movies as 5 stars even just compared to other zombie movies. I have 100% watched all the live action ones more than once butâŠ
Is that the CGI focused at an airport for the most part? I thought that one was OKish.
Speaking of Zombie shitâŠBlack Summer season 2 is out. I highly recommend Black SummerâŠits very to the point, no character development one story line, one set of characters per season and just like 6-8 eps a season. Made by the people that did Z Nation (which I love for its campy-ness and the way it lampoons specific things from TWD). Black Summer is pretty much dead serious and is a period of time referenced in Z Nation so its kinda cool to see the same world depicted through two very different cinematic lenses.
Army of the Dead on Netflix (starring David Bautista!) is pretty good, new Zombie material (and kinda feels like what a Resident Evil movie should have been).
/soap box
(Also Tomorrow War with Chris Pratt wasnât awful, entertaining)
morphic
#323
To folks about to watch Black Summer season 2: I would recommend you re-watch season 1 first if you initially watched it a long time ago. I couldnât really remember the characters who survived season 1 so I ended up re-watching after season 2. Great stuff.
Z Nation: at times absolute genius and at other times dragging/totally lost the plot. Overall it was tons of fun, yup. Much recommend.
This oneâs on my list