What TV series are you currently watching?

Started by Wakefield, April 26, 2015, 06:16:35 PM

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Daverz

Quote from: DavidW on June 23, 2022, 06:44:28 AM
Season 7 of Death in Paradise.  See I really liked the first detective, and I never really warmed to the second and I had drifted off the show somewhere around season 4.  But this third guy, I actually like him best!  He really reminds me of Columbo.



I lost interest after both original leads left the show.  Otherwise, it was very enjoyable light entertainment.

Recent watching:

The Boyz.  Still a fun show, though not for the squeamish about over-the-top gore.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.  Good enough to keep me watching so far, but not a patch on the best Trek show, DS9.

Endeavor.  I like the characters and the actors on Endeavor, but the mystery plots tend to be absurd.  Good comfort TV.


DavidW

Quote from: Brian on June 23, 2022, 11:55:57 AM
Longtime Death in Paradise fan here. Detective #3 is the best I think. Partly because Ardal O'Hanlon was trained as a comedian and comic actor, so he can play the light touch really well. He also seems to be having loads of fun, especially in his first season.

Unfortunately, the most recent/current detective is pretty much joyless, definitely the worst. I think Ardal had the most success creating a distinctive (and entertaining) character out of the generic main role on the show.

I've really gotten into English detective shows during the pandemic and a LOT of them are strongly influenced by Columbo. In the first episode of "Cracker" (starring Robbie Coltrane, a.k.a. Hagrid), the main character even does a deliberate Columbo impression.

If you know of any other light, cozy mysteries like this please share.

Brian

Quote from: DavidW on June 24, 2022, 08:02:05 AM
If you know of any other light, cozy mysteries like this please share.
None have the Death in Paradise format quite right - most are a little bit cheesier, or a little bit more self-serious, etc. But:

- The Mallorca Files - a clear DIP copycat set on Mallorca with an odd couple dynamic
- Shakespeare & Hathaway - private investigators in Stratford-upon-Avon - this is on the cheesier side but good background noise
- Midsomer Murders - the OG in the light mystery genre, a show on its 23rd season that is a usually impressive combo of gloomy people behaving badly and knowingly campy ridiculous murder methods
- Father Brown - personally I don't enjoy this one; it gets the campiness right but the solution of the mystery is always jarringly heavy and serious compared to the rest of the show's tone

Of course, the all-time champion of the Light Mystery genre isn't even English - it's Psych.

DavidW

Oh yeah I love Psych!  You know it has been long enough that every episode would be like new to me.  Hmm...

George

"I can't live without music, because music is life." - Yvonne Lefébure

JBS

Quote from: DavidW on June 24, 2022, 08:02:05 AM
If you know of any other light, cozy mysteries like this please share.

What about a combination of a Bucket and a Brandybuck?

Dominic Monaghan in his pre-Hobbit days is her teenage assistant/partner.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

relm1


DavidW

Quote from: JBS on June 24, 2022, 06:07:35 PM
What about a combination of a Bucket and a Brandybuck?

Dominic Monaghan in his pre-Hobbit days is her teenage assistant/partner.

Oh yes I have seen Hetty!  But along time ago.

Iota

Quote from: Irons on June 16, 2022, 07:58:13 AM
After a slow start BBC's Sherwood has promise. A murder committed in the present day with strong links to the 1984 miners strike. A bit "Summer Murders" with balls. Not often embarrassed watching TV but a scene in episode two had me squirming, watching you will have no doubt which. Excellent cast headed by David Morrissey.

I'm finding this very compelling indeed. The cast excellent, as you say. And the scene in question .. agonising!  :o

Irons

Quote from: Iota on June 26, 2022, 10:57:25 AM
I'm finding this very compelling indeed. The cast excellent, as you say. And the scene in question .. agonising!  :o

Ideally view alone. If not choose with care who you watch with......."more tea vicar?" :-[
You must have a very good opinion of yourself to write a symphony - John Ireland.

I opened the door people rushed through and I was left holding the knob - Bo Diddley.

Brian

Quote from: DavidW on June 24, 2022, 08:02:05 AM
If you know of any other light, cozy mysteries like this please share.
Just remembered a few more!

- Jonathan Creek - this is really unique and like a British Psych. Alan Davies plays a magician's assistant who designs magic tricks. It's not a whodunnit, it's a HOWdunnit, as he uses his magic design skills to figure out how seemingly impossible murders could be pulled off. Lots of comic subplots. However, after Caroline Quentin left midway through (they forced her out due to a pregnancy), it tended more toward melodrama rather than pure comedy so I'd say the first three seasons are the clear best.
- New Tricks - this is one of the very top recommendations. It's about a gang of grouchy old retired detectives with mismatched personalities asked to come back part-time to solve unsolved old cases from their glory days.
- The Last Detective - so called because the title hero is "the last detective" that anybody would ever want to assign to a case. I liked it but my girlfriend found it dull so haven't gotten to see too many.

SimonNZ

Working through, currently season three:


Iota

Quote from: Irons on June 16, 2022, 07:58:13 AM
After a slow start BBC's Sherwood has promise. A murder committed in the present day with strong links to the 1984 miners strike. A bit "Summer Murders" with balls. Not often embarrassed watching TV but a scene in episode two had me squirming, watching you will have no doubt which. Excellent cast headed by David Morrissey.

Watched the final episode of this the other night. It's so good to see high quality drama like this back on the Beeb, from a fine start it just got better and better. I'm quite tempted to get the book. Happy to see a second series has been commissioned.

Irons

Quote from: Iota on July 02, 2022, 06:08:25 AM
Watched the final episode of this the other night. It's so good to see high quality drama like this back on the Beeb, from a fine start it just got better and better. I'm quite tempted to get the book. Happy to see a second series has been commissioned.

The miner's strike from 1984 and the present day cleverly intertwined. I didn't feel at any time that a political point was being made one way or other. 
You must have a very good opinion of yourself to write a symphony - John Ireland.

I opened the door people rushed through and I was left holding the knob - Bo Diddley.

Todd




The success of GoT predictably spawned imitators on film and on TV, and even the History Channel (?), partnered with MGM, got in on the game with Vikings.  I initially tried watching an episode or two a few years ago, but stopped, but then Netflix's Vikings: Valhalla encouraged me to revisit the show.  So, belatedly, I decided to retry the series from the start.  I'm mostly glad I did.  The first few seasons are lower budget, and they rely more on physical sets than GoT did, which is all to the good.  But things start to turn when the show depicts the sacking of Paris late in the third season, and the reliance on CGI only grows from that point.  Still, the look of the show is often more satisfying than GoT and other, similar entertainments.  I am not a Dark Ages historian, but some quick review of online sources (mostly Wikipedia since I don't really care about the Dark Ages much) and some memories of some of the histories I have read indicate that the show plays fast and loose with real history, jumbling events and timelines, and so on, but it makes for a more cohesive and dramatic storyline, so that's fine.  It's not a documentary. 

The entire series hinges on the success of Travis Fimmel as Ragnar Lothbrok.  I don't recall seeing him in anything else, and at first one doesn't really notice much about his portrayal of the possible Viking, but much like Wagner Moura in Narcos, when he exits the show, one notices.  The actors who play his sons all display certain of his affectations less successfully, and they all lack the same degree of charisma.  So successful is Fimmel in creating his character, that one doesn't mind wasting time to see how the show's producers and directors direct the action that occurs without him.  And what they do is crib from GoT more than a little.  For instance, there's some mysticism; a sadistic and twisted young ruler equivalent of King Joffrey; a dwarf; a Night King equivalent (a Russian as it turns out!); hot lesbians; and violence aplenty, including the especially gruesome execution method known as the "blood eagle".  The use of graphic violence increases as the seasons go on and the budgets increased.  The show's budget for prosthetic limbs and fake heads must have been very large.  Also, the show injects modern politics as women regularly became leaders of Viking earldoms and kingdoms (who knows, maybe they did) and also fought effectively alongside menfolk (who knows, maybe that happened), but one just goes along with it.  And when it comes to women, this show bests GoT.  The women are more beautiful on average, and they are portrayed in a more complex manner, which, the supreme and not entirely believable fighting prowess aside, is a good thing. 

As to non-Lothbrok related acting, it's a mixed bag.  Gabriel Byrne was the big name at the outset of the show, and he does good work, but he quickly exits, and one is left with a parade of lesser-known actors.  The best known to me is Linus Roache, who is excellent as King Ecbert of Wessex.  Lothaire Bluteau does good work as Emperor Charles II of Francia, much better than Morgane Polanski (yes, of those Polanskis) as his daughter.  Showrunner Michael Hirst also produced the OTT The Tudors, and he brings in Jonathan Rhys Meyers to chew the scenery as the sword-wielding priest Heahmund later in this series.  He does not disappoint.  Most of the female leads are good enough, with Katheryn Winnick and Alyssa Sutherland, playing two of Lothbrok's very different wives, the best of the group.  And for fun, there's the gorgeous Karima Adebibe playing Byzantine abbess/composer Kassia rather against type.  And what Nordic themed entertainment would be complete without a Skarsgård, here Gustaf Skarsgård, who plays shipbuilder and populator of Iceland Floki in a memorable way.

The show offers ample hours of entertainment and is worth watching overall. 


The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Daverz

Quote from: Brian on June 27, 2022, 04:50:57 PM

- The Last Detective - so called because the title hero is "the last detective" that anybody would ever want to assign to a case. I liked it but my girlfriend found it dull so haven't gotten to see too many.

Starring Peter Davison, who may be Dr. Who to some, but will always be Tristan Farnon to me.

drogulus

Quote from: Daverz on July 03, 2022, 10:39:31 AM
Starring Peter Davison, who may be Dr. Who to some, but will always be Tristan Farnon to me.

     Yesyesyes....check out Love For Lydia as well, which also features a young Jeremy Irons. It's on Prime (from Acorn).
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George

"I can't live without music, because music is life." - Yvonne Lefébure

Karl Henning

Well, it's like taking the WABAC machine to mine own childhood: Dark Shadows.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Florestan

On Epic Drama



A brilliant but underrated and unassuming police detective (left on the picture) and a brilliant Jewish medical doctor with a penchant for Freudian psychiatry and psychology team up in turn-of-the-century Vienna for solving various mysterious cases. Sort of an Austrian-set "Murdoch Mysteries" --- and just as enjoyable.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini