shrewd.buddha

All the conversations with Naomi/Marco/Filip/OlderGuy were basically the same things they have said previously. I suppose they were trying to build up to Naomi's 'air-lock moment', but it was boring. Filip is so wishy-washy that it is annoying. Stone-cold: the most apt adjective. If any realism is applied to this maneuver, Naomi should be blind and have severe long-term physical repercussions. How would this stunt realistically work? She was seen going to the ship .. the ship is being remotely piloted .. the ship is only a few hundred feet away .. they can dock with it again and get Naomi back (who should be too incapacitated to resist). The Rocinante rail-gun space fight was impressive. But lately it feels as if the episodes are 85% talking and 15% action (if that). I would rather watch characters I don't know exploring the new Ring worlds than most of this boring exposition stuff.

Basically, the moral of the movie: Cheetahs Never Win (slight variation of a comment I read )

Wonder Woman 1984 Pitch Meeting

If nothing else, the show finally made some reference to 'raised by wolves' by mentioning Romulus and Remus - when someone found the tooth. There could be a link to Rome and the religion of Mithraism. But it is all very muddled and nothing seems to follow any known legend. It always seems to snow at night. It was even snowing inside the cave when Mother was about to give birth. Everyone seems to prefer to sleep out in the open even tho there are caves and a lander vehicle available. Mother is standing on the edge of one of the bottomless holes when she is attacked by a humanoid. Then Mother and Father decide to dispose of the body by burying it in a shallow grave. Too bad there is a not a bottomless hole they could use.. The show went completely off the rails for the last two episodes. Paul is getting info from Sol (or is good at eavesdropping). Marcus has gone full nutso. Mother and Father abandon the children to fly through the core of the planet (which is not a long journey, apparently). And that thing that Mother gave birth to was not a snake - - but whatever. Unfortunately, there was nothing about the show that would make me want to see more.

This show is so random - but not in a good way.. It appears that the bucket-head rapist (doing the Lord's work) and his android keeper have disappeared for the moment. There is not a single voice of reason among any of the crazy religious folk. They stop everything to build a church because Paul stacked up some stones. It is interesting (not) that it is only a short walk from a desert, to a forest and to the little barren farmstead that Mother murder-bot established. Where are they getting water? Apparently it never rains, only snows. Karl, the medic bot, is how I would prefer the androids to look. It is so lazy to have androids portrayed by humans with a few facial tics and robotic dialogue delivery. The don't even bother to deal with peach fuzz hair, pores, moles, etc. Only two more episodes to get through.. Praise Sol.

Campion should not be too surprised that Paul figured out the puzzle faster than he did. Campion was raised by two androids - basically two super computers .. yet he has probably spent half of his life collecting firewood, fetching water and growing potato-things. None of them managed to figure out more efficient ways to do any of those things. And none of them considered moving to a better location. They even know that the giant holes put out heat .. but they don't bother to take advantage of that. None of the characters are what one might consider sympathetic protagonists. Mother is a murder-bot who kidnaps children and has killed dozens of adults (maybe hundreds by crashing the ship). Mother lies to Father. Father and Campion keep secrets from Mother. Campion lies to Father. The kidnapped children somehow manage to be more petulant than traumatized. And the primary human characters murdered the people whose identities they stole .. and somehow managed to be to fake, wing-nut religious parents for thirteen years in a simulated environment.

This show is pretty to look at .. but seriously .. whoever is writing this must be doing so between bong hits. This particular set of humans should not be permitted to repopulate a new world. The androids are no better. None of them seem to have the ability to think logically: the androids don't settle near a water source, they don't retrieve available technology, the religious idiots leave behind all the resources from their wrecked ship ... the list is endless. I am beginning to think Ridley Scott projects should be watched with the audio turned off. Whatever you imagine is happening will probably make much more sense than what is actually happening.

Like most others, I was mostly disappointed. The only reason that the run time didn't bother me was because I streamed it in my living room, no bathroom break worries - - and mostly: there haven't been a lot of movie options this year. At one point, I wondered if the producers were intentionally going for cheesy. Some of the special effects were poor: especially some of Diana's running during the caravan action scene. This is one of those movies that make you wonder how it got made by a team of so-called professionals writers. Wonder Woman has a vast catalogue of stories to explore .. and they decided on this? It was way too magical/silly: massive stone walls and nuclear warheads appearing out of thin air and then disintegrating.

It is a bit of a stretch to believe that a ship could attack Tycho Station and manage to escape without being destroyed. Fred Johnson would have had several contingency plans for that - and being a space station there should be several types of ships that could track and catch up to the attacking ship. If the ship were destroyed at a safe distance, there shouldn't be any danger of the proto-molecule causing problems. ... but I suppose there would not be as much excitement if the problem were handled efficiently ..

Every time I see Clarissa (Peaches) Mao, I am reminded of the time she killed the old guy who was trying to help her work on the space station .. then used her enhancements to twist his body into a shape that could be stuffed into the machinery. .. I wonder if she thinks about those times.. I wonder if Amos would be as sympathetic if that old guy had been a friend of his. Same thing with Marco and Filip Inaros .. there are things that are just irredeemable. Marco is just another Bin Laden: what support would he have? He will go into hiding and be hunted for the rest of his short life.

The Pirate Life may have worked in the 1700's - - but at that time there was no digital recording, facial recognition, interplanetary communication systems and the world powers were usually at war with one another. Drummer should become a well known interplanetary criminal very quickly. But, okay .. Space Pirates .. sure.. Trapped-in-a-shipping-container thing: Hate to say it, but NCIS:LA did it better. Why leave a recording device? Where was the light coming from that allowed her to see things? Besides the oxygen issue, how cold would it have been in there? It is hard to believe that security tech is not going to get any more advanced than what we have today. Even in Star Trek times, someone is always able to disable security cameras and erase security footage.

The CGI space landscape visuals were nice. ..But perhaps I am not enough of a superfan to be giddy just to see the main characters again and have them exposition their way into separate stories. I am hoping that the crew is not kept separate for the majority of this season. Some of the stories already seem a bit blah ... not looking forward to Holden running around Tycho station having conversations with various people.

I was satisfied with the "and she lived happily ever after" ending. I was not in the mood for a gritty, more-like-real-life conclusion. I was a bit sad for this to be ending - but this isn't the kind of story that needs a sequel. (So please don't attempt one, Netflix.) Beth had two adjournments near the end of a major tournament. Would that really happen? Consulting with the best players during the overnight adjournment seemed highly unethical on the part of the Russians. But was all that just a setup for Beth's endgame rally moment when she realizes she has 'family' of friends ready to help? ..It was a nice moment, though. The Jolene character felt like such a lazy stereotype when she magically appeared at the end to put Beth back on track. And why did Jolene, of all the characters, have the sassy, ghetto diction? Marvel Studios has helped make the "best friend who is a minority" such a cliché that it is almost offensive. These characters are always super chill, worldly and are always ready with some wry observation about 'crazy white folk'. I believe writers can do better than that. I did like that Beth rejected the church money on principal, despite how easy it would have been to take it.

Of all the times and all the places, Cleo just happens to show up in Paris, on the night before Beth's final match, finds Beth's hotel, finds Beth's room and phone number, and proceeds to passively bully her into drinking. It was odd. And Cleo was giving Beth all those compliments, like a friend, but never seemed to care about her well-being or being rested for the big match. Cleo could have waited - just one night - and they could have partied with abandon. The show takes some odd turns. It was interesting that Benny wasn't living such a grand life in NY. It looked sort of sad. I suppose it is not that different from today's video game 'superstars' who are living in their parents' basement. In many ways, Beth is like a celebrity to all the chess nerds in the US. And people want to help her, personally and professionally. Sometimes I cannot tell how time passes on the show, but it felt like Beth was sober and industrious for two weeks - then she was a fall down drunk for two weeks. I was guessing that from the time she was supposed to go to Paris and the time thereafter. It was amusing that Beth suddenly took an interest in taking care of the yard and planting things ... five or so years after she and the chronically incapacitated Mrs. Wheatley were left on their own.

The match with the Russian prodigy was odd: surely at that point every match would have some onlookers. And Beth should not have been able to get away with such behavior - though I thought it was her intentional attempt at psychological intimidation. Maybe the book addresses that aspect of the game more. Some of Beth's previous matches involved people trying to psych her out - like the yawning guy or the guy who purposely arrived late. I wondered if Beth felt guilty for intimidating a kid. Beth's Mom's death was inevitable ever since her consumption-cough made its appearance a while back. But she got a very nice final weekend of drinking, romance, performing, being motherly .. and more drinking. I had expected a diagnosis of lung cancer and hospitalization - but we got a very tidy and peaceful death. There was also the impression that Mom may have been a bit much to deal with when her pen-pal Mexican lover also disappeared to a distant city. I suppose I shouldn't give any more consideration than the show does to how a non-working, abandoned, not-very-active woman financially and physically manages a house and yard. Was Mr. Wheatley sending money? Was everything being paid for with Beth's prize money?

Elizabeth is simultaneously very smart and very naïve. It feels like a trend for main characters to be borderline autistic these days. While I did enjoy Elizabeth not really caring about fitting in with the snobby popular girl clique, she comes off as an almost feral street urchin willing to do almost anything to get by: lie, shoplift, skim prescription drugs, etc. So far, she seems to have been lucky enough to only have to deal with people who mostly ignore her. Being ignored and isolated can make for an unhappy childhood, but it beats the alternative of being targeted and abused. Nitpicks aside, this is one of the better series available this year.

I am always suspicious of shows that start with a pivotal ending scene and then jump back to the true beginning. Do they not trust their story to be engaging enough? Maybe they wanted their lead actor to have some face time because the first episode only used the younger actress for the character. The character of Jolene, while interesting, feels like bit of a stretch for the time and place. Maybe Kentucky in the late '50's was more progressive than I imagine. I know the show is cutting to the chase, but the orphanage seems so regimented and Elizabeth seems so detached. Elizabeth is so unemotional and so narrowly focused on chess and tranquilizers that it is somewhat difficult to get invested in her as a character.

It's hard to ignore glaring inconsistences like that. Conspiracy theories live and breed online. Our heroes are constantly online. But they never bother to photograph or upload anything. (Seems like Jessica would know about burner phones.) The Utopia comic seemed to be of little use by the end. Maybe the comic 's biggest benefit was that it helped flip RaisinBoy killer's loyalty by reading it. Once RaisinBoy killer delivered Christie to Jessica, he just told them everything - - what was the point of the cryptic comic clues? Dr. Mike Stearns came to the same conclusions as the Nerd Squad without benefit of the comic. Would knowing what the anti-pregnancy virus looks like make any difference? Cool visual, but another puzzle that didn't matter. The worst part was having to endure Christie's endless monologue-ing. Such a trope. All the ruthless killing suddenly stops when it comes to the major characters. So, during 20+ years, Christie never bothered to figure out what the Chinese tattoo on his torso represented? Wilson was a real disappointment - he could not even avenge the murder of his entire family and was easily seduced by Christie. During the season, Wilson would complain about how much waste there was in peoples' houses - but who was he to be outraged? Both Wilson and his father were obsessive hoarders. The ending was sort of a mess. Jessica and RaisinBoy (siblings?) are both emotionally damaged lab rats and indiscriminate murderers. Should I be invested in them as anti-heroes? No thanks. I would be happy for both to end up in jail or dead ( I doubt either option would bother them much). A second season? Not exactly anxiously anticipating more of this. I suppose I am not as obsessed with "What Happens Next" as Christie thinks. also: Justice for Samantha!

I was trying to figure out why this show wasn't very engaging - then skimmed thru some reviews on RottenTomatoes and MetaCritic (not the best reviews) .. and I think I know: it is frustrating to watch people trying to figure out mysteries when you know most of the answers already. The nerd squad doesn't seem so smart when they believe Dr. Mike (Basement Lab Guy) could be Mr. Rabbit. The real action seems to be happening at the evil Christie Corporation. Jessica Hyde and the nerd squad do not seem to be active players - - they are just running for their lives and have only recently gotten all of the pages of Utopia to study. So far, their biggest breakthrough was something from a photograph - not the comic. A big part of the show deals with what is happening with the 'big name' celebrity actors - and not the comicbook nerd characters. If we were learning things from the nerd squad's perspective, the tension could be mounting. Instead, we are just waiting for them to catch up to what seems obvious. Are all of the employees at the Christie Corporation part of their cult of sycophants that were raised from childhood? Everyone in the boardroom and internet influencing team seemed to be 'all in'. With that many people, there should be one of two who aren't so excited to help cover up a national crisis.

So .. one "dying" girl gets "cured" and everyone is declaring that Basement Lab Guy's vaccine-cure is legit? No one is going to question why none of the other sick children are getting better? Are they all already dead? It's frustrating that Basement Lab Guy is so easily duped. And the Christie Corp. guy and his son are a very special type of sick assholes. They have managed to raise their own suicide cult of brainwashed children. I suppose we will never know what exactly is in the Dystopia and Utopia comics (though they appear to just be a collection of art pages). The only glimpses the audience gets is when something in the artwork is determined to be a puzzle that can be figured out at some particular time, for some particular reason. It reminds me of that show, Blindspot, featuring a character covered in tattoos - one tattoo getting deciphered at a time. It seems that someone in the nerd group would have suggested posting all the Utopia pages on the internet. It would make them and their loved ones less of a target. It would also cause the evil Christie Company (Mr. Rabbit ?) a lot of problems: the clues would be available for everyone to figure out, not just five people. I agree with what they nerd team guy said - if Jessica was kidnapped to force her father to create viral bioweapons, her life is not worth more than hundreds of children. Especially not Jessica, who only wants to find her father, doesn't care about anyone else, and shoots innocent people in the head for no reason. Jessica does not seem much different in her own unhinged way than the Raisin Boy killer guy.

There are a few things that do not seem to add up. Vought was happy that sales of Compound-V were about to skyrocket. The Boys exposed Stormfront and supposedly stopped the escalation of fear of Supe-Villains. The Boys were also instrumental in exposing the Supes as products of Vought using Compound-V. (Tho I did think someone else was going to be responsible for that press leak - Hughie and Starlight seemed surprised.) The Boys also helped expose Vought+Homelander for creating foreign Supe-Villains with Compound-V to justify The Seven being given military status. After all that, why would Vought suddenly be okay with The Boys still existing? Also, their identities are public knowledge now. Hughie should not be able to return to regular civilian life. Not sure, but I think The Boys remained a clandestine task force in the comics.

The comics - Dystopia and Utopia - do they actually exist? Has either one ever been shown completely? It seems that only bits and pieces of artwork have been displayed as part of bigger conspiracy board. When people are shown flipping through one of the comics, it only looks to be ten or so pages. And there does not appear to be any dialogue or captions that a comic would normally have.

This one seemed random and confusing. Jessica is going to the funeral of the woman who sold the Utopia comic? Didn't that woman die at the convention only a day ago? Or has Sam's body's been lying on the floor for three or more days? The Basement Lab guy and the Evil Corporate guy are at odds. But why, exactly? It's not as if the FDA would allow a vaccine to be produced and distributed without testing. What did Basement Lab guy think he could accomplish at the site of one of the outbreaks? After years(?), Jessica tracks down Artemis, the woman who raised her, hears something she doesn't like, and decides to kill her. Jessica is on quite the killing spree - including killing the assassin twins. The five or so minutes it took for their death battle could have been better used by explaining what is going on. But the writers are probably using the fighting and killing to keep things interesting. The comics - Dystopia and Utopia - do they actually exist? Has either one ever been shown completely? It seems that only bits and pieces of artwork have been displayed as part of bigger conspiracy board. When people are shown flipping through one of the comics, it only looks to be ten or so pages. And there does not appear to be any dialogue or captions that a comic would normally have. ( I will also post this in the media thread )

Maeve cannot fly, yet she magically appeared at two locations in the nick of time. That felt too convenient. And it is becoming a bit unbelievable that Butcher is repeatedly coming face-to-face with Supes that could kill him in a half-second - yet manages to walk away each time. Homelander and Black Noir are shown to slaughter people without hesitation, but they seem to know that main characters require time for smack-talk. At least Stormfront is gone. Maybe. I was tired of her Nazi shtick, and ready for her to go, but her exit was not handled very smoothly. It felt clumsy - - as if the writers wanted every female character to get a piece of her before she died. Becca even got to stab her in the eye (somehow). They had ramped Stormfront up into the nastiest villain possible and then took her out like a piñata. Vought's reasoning for using Stormfront seemed pretty sketchy. And how did a hate-monger like Stormfront suddenly appear on the scene without her reputation being known? The motivations of the head-popping senator woman are even more difficult to understand. Why kill the CIA director lady at the beginning of the season - but none of the Boys team? If she is helping Vought - by killing people willing to testify against them - why is she not stopping The Boys and the retired CIA woman? She knows all the players on the anti-Vought side. It should also be easy for her to find out where they have taken Ryan. I was expecting the head-popping Supe to be the not!Scientology leader - so that was a surprise. The show is really hammering Scientology's crazy tactics and beliefs. That does not seem like something that would have happened years ago.

I will be actively wishing for Jessica to be killed for the rest of the series (if I continue). I will even hold a grudge against the three others if they don't attempt to avenge the murder of their friend - or at least try to escape. Is Jessica supposed to be on the 'good' side? I cannot think of any antihero character who would kill an innocent person just because they cannot be bothered with their leadership being challenged. The torture scene was brutal. And pointless. Are the killers so clueless that they cannot tell if someone doesn't really know the information they want? Of course, the icky-ist of the conspiracy killers is still alive to pursue the main characters for the remainder of the season ... because, typical trope syndrome. The scene of the characters changing into disguises looked as if it was supposed to be humorous - - but after having just seen a family being killed and a guy graphically tortured, it felt weird. The tone feels really off and schizophrenic. Two episodes in and I cannot say that I am enjoying this. It's not really fun, more off-putting than scary, and not super interesting because the comic book connection to whatever conspiracy is happening feels like a gimmick that is being forced to work. If every character turns out to be as repulsive as Jessica Hyde, I doubt I will finish this season.