shrewd.buddha

We are here for the scenery porn. Emily's lifestyle among the rich and famous gets a tad offensive at times. Did she really think a goat farmer would be playing polo and skiing at an expensive resort location? Emily and Mindy only stumble upon princes, no scrubs. Speaking of Mindy, she managed to *poof* away her bandmates, boyfriend, Eurovision and Paris with just a couple of lines of dialogue. It's hilarious how the acoustics of the setting completely changes whenever Mindy has her inevitable musical moments. It's obvious that Gabriel is the endgame - unless the actor bails out - so there's no use caring about anyone that comes along in the meantime. It would be nice if Emily had an older sister or mother who could remind her that in French and Italian cultures mistresses and affairs are not exceptions but almost a rule.

It was a very good season - the show deserves all its Emmy awards. Ava can be annoyingly preachy but she does get checked for some of that - in amusing ways. It is hard to imagine a 70-year-old wanting to endure the stress and strain of a nightly talk show - but that is probably a dilemma for another season. The scene on the plane with Kayla was funny. But I'm not sure it justified all the incompetence of Kayla that preceded it. I appreciate the show acknowledged the phenomena of comedians getting cancelled. There are arguments for both sides and the show sort of managed to walk the fine line.

Yes. The Greek myths were hard luck stories - a lot like Grimm's Fairy Tales. Hopefully, given the current times, they will steer clear of all the raping that happens in the Myths. People who are well versed in the Myths may be enjoying this more because of the all the name dropping of characters. I sort of remembered "Theseus", but had to go to Wikipedia to re-learn his connection to Ariadne and the Minotaur. It is not so easy to get excited for more when you know everything ends with a tragedy..

That might be an interesting way to end things when the series concludes. But it also makes one wonder why there never seems to be a group of supes who are actually good and want to help society. I suppose that wouldn't be as exciting -- but it seems as if it would annoy Homelander and Vought Inc. to have some super-powered people who are selfless and working to help people during natural disasters, etc. Or someone like Sage who could help to find cures for diseases, resolve middle east conflicts or find economic solutions. (If they are, indeed, the smartest of all.) The most humane supe on the show seems to be Starlight - and even she seems to to be more interested in being a celebrity than contributing to society.

Maybe that's it: all of Jeff Goldblum's roles seem like cameos. To me, his character in this is basically the same as in Thor: Ragnarok. It is as if with each role he decides how high to dial up the Jeff Goldblum factor.

It's interesting. But I am not sure I would be that interested if not for all the Greek Myth trivia it is based on. We recall most of the names and the associated myths and wait for their fates to be played out in a modern setting. Jeff Goldblum is always playing Jeff Goldblum: amusing, but it makes everything seem like a farce. We will probably end up watching the rest, just because of the Greek Myth hook. But it all feels like a highlight reel of the myths. For example, Orpheus is somehow a regular guy but also a popstar, spends the day not doing much of anything, is transported to an arena and with no prep walks out on stage and performs a concert already in progress. Then he is told about Eurydice's death - in the middle of the concert. All the stories feel like that: a clever modern interpretation, but if you don't know the myth trivia, things seem bizarre and ungrounded.

We also streamed it on Peacock. It was fast moving and fun - but also forgettable. It was great for home viewing but I can see why it did not do well at the theaters - it was borderline silly. It started out like a light action comedy rom-com, so it was sort of jarring when murders started happening. It would have been nice if Ryan Gosling's character had more dialogue or scenes showing his expertise in stunt work coordination. He basically just shows up and does stunts. I was surprised to find out that the directory also filmed Bullet Train, John Wick and Atomic Blonde. Those movies had more impressive stunts. Also the ending stunt was odd: "The impossible jump"? The most impressive stunts usually involve crashes, not successful jumps.

There are several articles that explain the straightforward financial decision to cancel: The Very Obvious Reason Disney Canceled ‘The Acolyte’ — It Wasn’t ‘Toxic Dudebros’ https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2024/08/23/the-very-obvious-reason-disney-canceled-the-acolyte---it-wasnt-toxic-dudebros/#:~:text=The show was far too expensive and did not receive,acclaim and widespread fan support. However, cancelling the show also shut down an entire cottage industry devoted to creating online outrage content. And the disappointing thing about that is almost any legitimate criticisms related to the writing, production or handling of the Star Wars lore gets lumped into "hater" rants. With regards to marketing - I am surprised at this point that Disney has not established some behind-the-scenes guidelines for actors giving interviews. Some seem intent on kicking hornet's nests - and the results have not seemed to benefit their project.

I doubt that anyone is worried about consistency in these movies - and everything can be explained away with some multiverse gobbledygook, but this stuck out to me: Deadpool's timeline appears to be the same one as the Wolverine movie Logan - isn't that why he digs up his bones at the beginning of the movie? But in Deadpool 2, it appeared to be the younger Xavier in the X-mansion - - and yet somehow all the events of Logan have transpired without any of Deadpool cast of characters aging at all - - and some of the X-Men are at Wade's birthday party. If the explanation is that Deadpool used the TVA time-thingy to travel to his timeline's future to dig up Wolverine's bones, then why not use the time-thingy to prevent the events that lead to his death? (Answer: so the movie can happen.)

This show perfectly fits the description of overstuffed and undercooked. So many characters, so many tropes, so many cliches.. Not once did I worry that any of the prominent characters were going to die - until it was glaringly obvious that their time was up. Cala and Kwame's family seemed to have the strongest plot armor. Most of my sympathy went to the poor giant lion, dragged to Rome to be killed for sport - and it wasn't even real.

It seems odd that the showrunners would intentionally undercut their season 2 cliffhanger ending with a comedic season 3 trailer. Guess we don't have to worry about anything bad happening to the main cast. The ST:SNW trailer and the ST:Section 31 trailer appear to indicate that Paramount has decided to go full tilt into making Star Trek into a sitcom. "This injection will also cut and style you hair.."

It was entertaining and managed to avoid overstaying its welcome. Still, like the 2nd Deadpool, it fell far short of the greatness that was the the first movie. The cinematography and story structure did not push any boundaries. Pros: It was a nice tribute to the 20th Century Fox era. They acknowledged the post-credit time-travel shenanigans from Deadpool 2. It seems to the only superhero movie of the summer - and is adult oriented. Cons: It relied heavily on knowledge of comics, older movies and the Disney+ Loki show. If you don't see it within the first few days, you cannot avoid spoilers - almost every entertainment news headline is a spoiler. The entire movie feels like a parade of cameos. None of the sincere emotional moments landed (We never learn any specifics as to what happened to alt-Wolverine; he is just very sad).

There were a lot of unsatisfying developments - and bad writing - for a season ending episode: Sage taking credit for all the coincidences she had no knowledge or control of. The Shapeshifter suddenly having super strength and invulnerability to bullets. Kimiko, a lifelong fighter, suddenly not having additional strength and easily taken out in a hand-to-hand match-up. Butcher going from deathbed weakness to octo-posse savior. Ryan disappearing and showing up wherever the plot needs him to be. (A 12-year-old who can fly but prefers to mope.) Hughie's trauma of enjoyable mistaken sex can take a backseat to Neumann's daughter having her mother literally being ripped apart in front of her. The good guys on this show are not very inspirational. The whole vibe of the show is that all people are broken emotional timebombs easily corrupted by money and power.

I must have glazed over the election night events.

Bingo. The only way the writers know to telegraph smartness is to have Sage surrounded by stacks of books. Also - why does it feel so random that it is suddenly Christmas? The show has not bothered to show any type of progression towards the end of the year. This means the super important election we have been building towards is still almost a year away.

The world's "smartest person"? Has she done anything demonstrably smart ? There was some lame media manipulation.. Was it smart to let the wrong guy be killed for being a mole? Even if Sage has been working a long con against Vought/Homelander, I can't recall any actual moments of genius. ^.. The actual source of the problems.. The show is stuck with these characters, stuck in one area of the US, existing in a world where apparently there are no natural disasters or actual criminal activities that the Vought super-people can provide help with. The Deep doesn't even live near water. And apparently it's too much trouble to have Homelander and Ryan fly around anymore.

It feels a bit lazy at this point. Apparently season four is the season of butt stuff.. Butcher has been "dying" for six episodes - yet we know he isn't going anywhere. Once the show reached the point where Homelander and the Vought know exactly who and where The Boys are and could remove them any time they wish - but never will - you just have to decide to sit back and watch things go 'round and 'round.

Recently saw Giancarlo Esposito in The Gentlemen on Netflix - - exactly the same character. Maybe the theme of the season is repetition: the Vought convention hit the same socially offensive notes as before. The farm adventure seemed to be staged a little awkwardly, trying to give everyone something to do and say .. but at least they had the forethought to bring extra no-name characters to be cannon fodder for the killer sheep.

Things did get a bit sloppy towards the end. But, it was an easy watch. What stuck with me the most was how the movie, using the college lecture scenes, slow-walked the audience into becoming comfortable with the idea that it is okay for a "good person" to commit murder to remove obstacles in order to become "their best self".

"Smartest person on Earth" is an easy tagline - but to actually demonstrate that type of ability requires smart writers. There is a possibility a person could be very smart but have no ambition to gain wealth or pursue scientific research - - but it is very doubtful. Hughie and Starlight, Frenchie and Kimiko, Butcher and M.Milk: they are all going through rinse-and-repeat story beats. After you have braced yourself for gross-out death and sex scenes, there's not a lot left for the show to offer.

I almost respected that misdirection. But with today's technology how did they not have a photograph of a most wanted FBI rogue agent? The new team leader (Brian Lange) was okay - but he looks like a cloned version of the team leader on FBI Most Wanted. Not his fault, but still ...

We sampled it, mostly because it was new, and we were drawn in because it seemed like a quirky cozy murder mystery. Taking jabs at the current podcast craze was enjoyable - because you can't go five minutes without hearing about someone's podcast these days. In the end, it felt as if the show didn't know what it wanted to be: a comedy, a murder mystery or a quaint Irish dramedy. There was a feeling of unfinished business at the end -a lot like Dove and Emmy's hook-ups in the village: messy, undefined and unresolved. But we did stick with it until the end, which is what seems to matter these days.

My exact feelings regarding the show. It took a while to get through it all - the pacing and drawn out conversations made each episode feel like a two hour movie. I wondered if I had become an old softie who felt more sympathy for the victims instead of the charismatic criminal - but this Ripley was not charismatic. At the end, I was still sad for Dickie, who no one cared enough about to fight for more answers about his alleged death. The cinematography and camera angles were impressive. But Italy looked like a ghost town (probably due to costs of trying to recreate a time period?). While I appreciate the showrunner's choice to be true to the locale, the requirement of reading English subtitles did start to wear on us as the series went on.

Overall it was light and breezy - an easy watch without a lot of expectations. I think it could have been better if the 'Dead Boys' had actually been cast as boys (remember how well that worked for the first season of Stranger Things?). Netflix seems to always go for the older teen sexy times vibe, with middling results. It was difficult not see the leads as early 20-somethings. And the actors playing Edwin and Charles could have swapped roles: I think the Edwin-actor could have pulled off the 'muscle' half better since he looked physically larger. Most of the episodes were pretty good - as long as they were dealing with the case-of-the-week. Too many side-plots per episode really slowed down the momentum. The cartoon animation parts did help with avoiding extended exposition dumps. With this type of show, it would be difficult to avoid a lot of explanation of concepts, creatures and the setup of the cases to be solved. The nitpicks are better left alone, such as: how could Crystal not know her full name yet manage to take a flight from Europe to the US? Can the Dead Boys conjure up fake passports? Also, all teens these days seem to have their entire lives documented on social media.