[S01.E01: The Beast Forever / S01.E02 Prison Of The Abject]

1 hour ago, aradia22 said:

I can tell you one location was Park Guell in Barcelona. The place with all the mosaics? I thought I was imagining it but then they pulled back. They certainly spent money on this show. After the beginning when everything was just scary smoke/weather, the money really started to appear on screen.

End credits say Spain and Hungary. Amazing production values on this show. Just wish it had been released on Amazon or Netflix where it would not just be bingeable all at once (which it really needs, I think), but also would allow it to be released in 4k and HDR, which would make the cinematography pop like crazy.

[S04.E01: Columbia]

Maybe I'm a heretic, but Abbie just wasn't All That to me. Yes she was important as a Witness and as the fish-out-of-water's anchor to modern reality and foil, but she was replaceable. Crane was, and is, the focus of the show and so long as he and his modern day female co-star have chemistry together (romantic or platonic, doesn't matter) I'm good.

In fact, the more I think about it, I'd be happy if Crane and Thomas would stay colleagues and friends, but bring Betsy Ross into the 21st century as an ongoing romantic interest. I'd watch the hell out of that.

[S04.E01: Columbia]

I mostly enjoyed the reboot. They Dreyfuss nonsense was just too over the top but the rest worked for me and I got a bit of the S1 feel to it. The problem is, they've got a huge ratings mountain to overcome in order to get a renewal, and they can't take their time to leisurely rebuild the world with all the new characters, which I think is unfortunate. If they'd had a full 22 episode run starting last October I'd be a little more optimistic.

What works best for me in any supernatural or SF/fantasy plot in modern-day is when the mundanes get let in on the Big Secret and how they react to the new reality. Then the inevitable building of the Scooby Team and cases of the week. That's why S1 here was so enjoyable (and, well, Orlando Jones!), why I loved Chuck, Once Upon a Time and others. When they get into a Big Dramatic Arc, layers upon layers of BigBads, that's when I start yawning. SH was still enjoyable in S2 but the further it went the less fun it became. S3 really lacked any forward movement in the characters and the showrunners were focusing everything they had on a plot nobody gave a crap about. Abbie's death was a serious Screw You to everybody and I didn't think it was recoverable. Well, after this, I think it is, but the question will be, can they either win back the audience they lost the last 1.5 seasons, keep the lighthearted fun, and bring back the sense of otherworldly wonder?

I like Trixie on Lucifer but wouldn't want to see her role expanded. It's perfect as it is. Molly being the new vessel for Abbie's soul/Witness-force/katra/whatever might not be quite a good thing. I like the premise, but having a precocious 10 YO in a lead role, and participating in all the new capers might collapse the house of cards. If they can strike the right balance, then maybe, but it could be a big problem.

The one thing they must do correctly is breaking Ichibod's true history to the new agent. I hope they can write this well, believably, and that the actress has the chops to pull it off convincingly. That's news you just can't absorb and process in 10 minutes of screen time, and it seems with the whole demon plot this week, she got on board far too fast for that. She should have been having the inevitable divide-by-zero moments far longer and only come around at the very end, after Abbie saved the day.

One idle thought, since Abbie and Ichy were both Witnesses, they could never be romantically involved, and that was probably a Good Thing. Depending on how the Molly thing plays out, having Ichy and Thomas in a Cranian Courtship might actually be fun. Heaven knows, Mission could so pull this off if the chemistry is right.

[The First 48 - General Discussion]

Just heard that after losing New Orleans as a filming city, both First 48 and Nightwatch will be heading to Tampa, FL.  I'm really going to miss the detectives and Nightwatch EMS folks in Nawlins. I think NOLA, Dallas and Cleveland are my three favourite cities from this series. And I still say if someone ever puts me 10-7 permanently I want Tom Armelli to come out of retirement and work my case.

[S05.E04: Nobody Else Is Dying Today]

More common than you'd want to believe. Think of it this way, every single newsworthy fire, accident or chemical spill is the result of someone either doing something illegal, cutting a corner that should never have been cut and/or not having proper knowledge of handling volatile materials. In this case, it also appears as if they were stealing electricity, bypassing the meter bank. Frightening for a company that was trying to get certified for hazmat response. Where were the eye-wash stations? Where were the first aid and respirator kits that would be mandatory in any environment handling that kind of stuff?

I tried to look at the markings on the ruptured tank but they were just too fuzzy to make out, except where the forklift pierced it. The breach was near about the '650' graduated mark, which I'm guessing is litres. And from the establishing shot the tank was about 80% full of liquid. I'm estimating that was about a 1000 or 1200 litre tank judging by the location of the 650 mark. Therefore, the spill would have been roughly 200 to 400 litres, or about 100 gallons. Bad, but not catastrophic. And from the Life Imitates Art department, from Toronto earlier today: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/west-end-toronto-residents-asked-to-stay-indoors-due-to-acid-cloud/article32657553/

"Toronto Fire Capt. Michael Westwood says a combination of hydrochloric and sulphuric acid was mixed and released into the air, creating a fog that can be irritating if inhaled.

No serious injuries were reported, but the fire service said eight people were being treated for minor throat and eye irritations as a result of the incident."

I get that it's TV drama and that they have budgets to work within, but it's also lazy writing in a lot of cases. There are enough high-risk rescue situations from real life FD logbooks that they could easily use without having to embellish beyond recognition.

[S05.E04: Nobody Else Is Dying Today]

I can actually buy most of the warehouse stuff.  Seems like the operators didn't give a rat's ass about safety and I was expecting the story to be about them bribing Casey to sign off (maybe as a sting operation set up by DouchyAlderman™ from last week). When the fecal matter struck the rotary oscillator I was pleasantly surprised. My biggest eye-roll was that cellphones didn't work anywhere in the building. In 2016 that's rarely a problem, and an old single-story building with basically a brick exterior and no rebar frame would let cell signals pass fairly easily. I think a panic-stricken 15 YO middle-class girl in a life-or-death emergency and no training would react exactly as she did.

But this plot had a huge hole in it. Sulfuric acid, while easily capable of causing severe skin burns on contact, isn't particularly toxic in short term exposure to fumes. While not exactly a pleasant experience it wouldn't be life threatening to have gone back in (with as much physical protection against touching the acid itself) and gotten the phone from the guy who'd tried to use it but collapsed -- which again, wouldn't have really happened. This is what the CDC has to say about exposure to H2SO4: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/81-123/pdfs/0577.pdf

The next eyeroll was about cutting the power. The girl ran right past the main power cutoff to the facility. Yank the lever and bingo, no electricity. Also, the outlets wouldn't have been sparking either.

Not sure, but I'd think a heavy rescue by its very nature would have exposure suits for chemical exposure. I doubt theyd be going in there with regular bunker gear since after exposure it would probably be trashed--as would everybody's clothes who'd been inside. Where were the decon showers?

[S02.E06: Monster]

I think Luci expected what the doc's reaction would be but out of exasperation he let go and maybe broke her brain in the process. Show Canon is that mortals seeing divinity is a Very Bad Thing, thus my feeling that they might push the big red reset button. Like I said, I sure hope they don't. To me this show is all about the human/divine dynamics, screw the Case Of The Week. I'd be good if they handed out a few jay walking and speeding tickets until the Christmas break but get Chloe and the doc fully in on things and up to speed in the battle of Upstairs/Downstairs.

Also, what happened to Lucifer's actually punishing the evildoers as he did early on in the series? Now he's just there to reveal the murderers and Chloe gets the collar. It's far more interesting when the bad guys get to pay a truly deserved penalty for murder or whatnot.

[S02.E06: Monster]

I'm glad someone has finally been let in on the Big Secret, but knowing typical network TV, I'm afraid there's going to be a mind wipe or some other Omega-13 reset-to-baseline gimmick employed so the Big Secret can remain hidden. I hope they don't wimp out and go that way but I've just got a feeling they will.

[S02.E04: Demons and Angels]

12 hours ago, bounnatalie said:

It was amazing that the child was able to find a pen, find a cord, and with significant bleeding, he was able to intricately tie off his leg.

Forget the cord, even. There was a ton of 35mm film. Wrap that around. You wouldn't believe how much tensile strength that stuff has. I'm a former professional projectionist and I've seen polyester film strip gears after a jam. And speaking of such things, the projection room is probably the safest place in the entire theater, especially if it's an old one. Back in the days of nitrate film there had to be a separate exit to outdoors that the operators could escape through in case of fire. FD operatives have such info in their CIDS systems. And I agree, leave them for a minute before it all went to hell and find firefighters to execute a safe rescue.

On 10/28/2016 at 9:22 PM, juliet73 said:

The ER/OR director needs to check his ego at the door.  He's so busy showing everyone who's boss that it's affecting patients and their care.  I hope in the near future,  something tragic happens because of his poor decisions and he's terminated.

I say we drop a helicopter on him. Seems to be SOP for hospital villains, no?

On 10/27/2016 at 10:01 AM, Xantar said:

Why am I watching this show?

I'm starting to wonder the same things. Ugh. Carole "Jessamine" was the only newcomer I was even remotely invested in as a viewer, and the dynamic with Mama and Papa was the best part of S1. I don't give a fig about the rest of the rest; they're interchangeable and meh at best.

But I guess the fact it was almost cancelled and they forced so many focus-grouped-to-death changes this is about all we could expect.

My biggest complaint in emergency-service shows is they have to throw common sense out the door in the name of budget constraints. A building collapse of that nature would have at least a 4th or 5th alarm response, meaning about 30 FD vehicles, 200-250 FFs, probably a similar number of cops and a full incident command structure set up. Good luck getting that kind of budget to play with in a low-rated network show.

[Show Spoilers and Book Talk]

In a fluff piece I read this morning apparently Sam indicated that we'd see not just Jamaica in S3 but also

Spoiler

North Carolina.

 Gotta wonder just how far they're going to move things forward if this is correct.

http://bit.ly/2dtgKO5

[Frequency - General Discussion]

The 7000 is handy. That's my backup, and I used it from the Bahamas 10 years ago. That was also the radio of choice for BS7H on Scarborough Reef in 2007. I tend to run out of things to say after a two minute ragchew contact. I'm happy with 59-73. Or preferably 5NN TU :)

Elecraft makes some great equipment and I love my K3S, but it's not a cheap radio by any stretch. Friends with the Flex 6700 love them, too. SDR can be pretty nice. Again, very, very expensive. My old radio was a fully-loaded Yaesu FT-1000 MP Mark V, which last I heard is on its way down to an 8P contest station. That beauty got me on the DXCC Honor Roll.

[Frequency - General Discussion]

Greetings all, from (de) W2IRT.
I definitely got the homebrew feeling from that setup and didn't mind it in the slightest. A closeup of his "license" showed he's a Technician Class operator so UHF/VHF antennas (and what could pass for either a small 2m or 6m Yagi) would be expected.

@Netfoot, congrats on those two amazing contacts. I'm more a hardcore HF DXer/contester (I get nosebleeds above 30 MHz :)) but I've always wanted to work the Shuttle. Mir would have been one of the greatest catches of all time.

I really wish the production team has just changed a couple of things: No hetrodyne whistle on transmit, no full-duplex transmissions and using the lock-to-talk feature on the mics when making a long hands-free transmission. Half the time they weren't using the PTTs, and I somehow doubt a little homebrew rig like that had a perfect VOX circuit in it (nor would Raimi know how to use such a thing even if it were present).

For the non-hams persistent enough to read this far down the thread, ham radio is still very much alive and is experiencing a renaissance in the US/Canada and especially in Europe. There are more licensees now than ever before in history and on any given weekend the HF ("shortwave") bands are chock-a-block full of folks chatting, contesting (friendly competition to contact as many people as possible within specified places or globally), DXing (talking long distances and to rare countries), nice friendly round-table style discussions ("nets"), using Morse, voice and digital keyboard modes. It's not really about the content of the messages or the ease of sending them--cellphones work well for that--but rather about having fun experimenting with the technology, making new friends around the globe or around the corner and the fun of saying you've talked to every country on earth.

Unlike cell phones, you never know who's going to answer you when you call CQ (a general call asking for anybody who hears you to reply), and anybody can listen in and break in if they want. So in the context of this show I have to wonder whether anybody from across time could intercept and break in and what effect that could have! I really wish this had been less about police work (gawd, how many more procedurals do we need!) and more about communicating through time and the effects it could have on the world. Imagine tuning across and picking up a CQ from an operator 75 years in the future, in your town, asking for help because the country has just suffered a nuclear attack and then the quest through time to prevent it. That would be far more interesting than catching Yet Another Serial Killer™.

For anybody who cares, this is my slightly less rustic station, taken as I prepared for a contest last winter. The big silver-colored block at the bottom is a Morse Code key, the radio is a very modern Elecraft K3S with various antenna and station controls on the shelves above. A much nicer station can be seen in Mike Baxter's office in Last Man Standing on ABC, incidentally. Too bad the shows are on different networks. That could be fun if WQ2YM called CQ and KA0XTT answered!

Getting a license is easier than it ever has been in the past and any hams here or elsewhere are always happy to talk to and mentor those wishing to give it a whirl.

[Frequency - General Discussion]

As both a lover of time travel stories and an active amateur radio operator (de W2IRT) I went into this expecting some horrible technical gaffes and operating nightmares, but was willing to let it slide if the acting, story and overall emotional feel was there. It certainly was in the trailer, but I found this to be yet another typical CW Network millennial-aimed procedural. Too many hot 20-somethings and too few serious acting chops and some pretty awful production values. Vancouver is NOT NYC and never will be. That so clearly wasn't the East River they pulled Frank out of. NYC gold shields have a very distinctive shape that any TV viewer should recognize in a heartbeat, and the list goes on. By themselves these are minor nits, but taken as a whole, it just didn't work particularly well for me as a television show.

As for the radio stuff, with one particular exception, if you are using a microphone that has a push-to-talk button, then you need to push it in order to talk! And when you do, you can't be interrupted by the person on the other end, like you can on a telephone. When you're transmitting you won't hear any hetrodyne whistle, and you'd almost never hear it on receive either. One tech detail that I liked was the closeup shot of the license (and fictitious callsign) showed a Technician Class license, and the antennas were UHF, which does fit nicely. And for whoever said earlier that nobody uses radio, my log shows over 8500 contacts last year, so it's still a popular hobby with more participants in the U.S. than at any time in history, including it's so-called golden era of the 50s and 60s.

It's funny, though. The one radio thing that most of my friends were cringing over was the hospital scene at the end, when they bring him his radio and microphone, but no antenna. That didn't actually bother me at all. The radio itself was the magic device. I kinda liked that part, as well as 8YO Raimi talking to 28 YO Raimi. That part really did it for me in a good way.

All in all I gave it a 6/10 and I'll be back for the rest of the first 13. Beyond that let's see if the acting and writing can improve, and a plausible long-term storyline can come out. I can't see the hunt for the Nightingale killer lasting more than a season or even a half-season.

[The First 48 - General Discussion]

On 8/14/2016 at 2:27 PM, Enero said:

True. But there are also a lot of cases that are tied to love triangles, people wanting insurance money or just an argument gone bad. I think The First 48 aims to profile cases that are "easily" and quickly solvable to keep in line with the theme of the show and as a result mostly drug and gangs cases are profiled.

It's honestly much simpler than that. Those are the vast majority of real life murder cases in urban settings. Any detective who's worked major cases/murder police will tell you the same thing. Dope, dope-related robberies, disrespecting the wrong person, fist fights gone bad, domestics, the odd hate crime, that's the main thread through all this. And most are either slam-dunks or grow into cold cases quickly. Upper class attractive female victims dying in mysterious circumstances ain't something you're gonna see more than once a career. This show captures much of the reality of working homicide.

You don't see things like the detectives attending the PM exam at the ME's, which is pretty well universal, and fortunately they sanitize the scenes for TV; I doubt they'd hold a TV audience if they didn't blur the defects and faces.

Sorry to see NOPD go, but much worse (for me) is Nightwatch leaving NOLA as well. I really wish they'd get to work with a departments in the major cities in the northeast; Newark, Boston, Philly, etc. It's a different world up here.