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Cornhusker12

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Everything posted by Cornhusker12

  1. Siiiigh I think Clay seems like a smart and earnest guy and a good person, but there are a lot of times when he has a very childlike naivete. I think he genuinely thought the day would go well, and his reasoning would make sense, and they would just happily move on to the post-show world together as a smiling success story couple. The scenes with his dad were really illuminating. Clay has talked about how he thinks his dad's past has affected his own ability to be in a relationship, but seeing him light up and go into a little bit of awe around his dad made a lot of things click. Again, he was a little bit like a kid, he hasn't quite come to grips with how much his dad/idol really did him and his family wrong. And you could see why! His dad really was "smooth" as Clay always said, but man, the way he was just speaking in platitudes and rattling off his own track accomplishments, it just bummed me out to see Clay lapping it all up. Anyway, people usually say this in a condescending way but I mean it sincerely - I hope Clay really does go to therapy! Haha I think his heart is in the right place, and there are some "issues" that stick out like a sore thumb that could probably change his life quite a bit. Maybe even go with his dad! I think there is a lot of love there, but also a lot of weirdness and past situations that need to be revisited and ironed out for both of them. ...Wait what show is this again?
  2. This is exactly how I read it too. To me, it was extremely clear that she was the one trying very hard to connect with him, whether through physical touch or conversation or even unpacking/setting up their apartment together, and he was unfortunately checked out. Waking up your fiance at 1:30 am when she didn't know where you were and she had to wake up at 5, and expecting some cuddling or intimate time, doesn't count... haha. Unfortunately from what we saw on the show it does seem like he kinda got spooked on his relationship after spending time with Clay and AD and realizing the real-life implications of being in a mixed-race couple. The strange breakup made it look like he was looking for a quick and easy reason to break it off. I admired the way they both talked about race in the brief times we saw them discuss it, but apparently it would have taken quite a bit more to make it work as a couple. As someone else said, if being with a Black woman was extremely important to him that's his prerogative and I wouldn't begrudge him for that, but if that was the case he shouldn't have gone on this particular show.
  3. I read it a little differently... there's no doubt Chelsea is insecure and that is making her and Jimmy a very bad match, but I think most of the blame falls on Jimmy being SO weird and now having any idea how to talk to fellow humans haha. He keeps saying the words "we have the best connection, I am so happy, I'm the happiest out of anybody" but zero of his actions are matching those words. We've seen him mention looks multiple times already, he turned into a cartoon wolf around AD, which clearly made Chelsea insecure, so she kinda played into it to NOT seem insecure, which backfired... but it was Jimmy who decided to go stammer at AD for who knows how long, with a drunken aloof grin on his face, while Chelsea just waited and waited. I feel like after Chelsea piggybacked off his comment and did her own catcall, Jimmy could've just been like "we're all so lucky, everybody here is smokin hot!" or something and totally diffused the situation. Instead he went and draped himself over AD like a lovesick (horny) puppy under the guise of apologizing. On the topic of objectifying AD, I was really turned off by Laura's "bean dip" thing... If I remember right, her fiance (Jeremy?) was like "so Laura told me to go bean dip you, I don't even know what it means, she said you would know what it meant...?" which very understandably made AD and Clay weirded out, and then Laura tried to blame the entire thing on Jeremy, as if he made an inappropriate joke...? Even though she was the one who told him to bring it up? I thought I was gonna like Laura, I figured she might be light and funny in the group settings, but that was messed up and weird. I don't like the vibe between her and Jeremy.
  4. Absolutely true, however I just think the show itself would be more effective to show that in its storytelling rather than expect the audience to fill in the blanks with their own historical knowledge. BoB obviously did this incredibly well throughout the entire series, and even The Pacific did it pretty well, with Sledge in particular.
  5. Yeah that's a great point, it's almost as if there is no context outside of what we're seeing on our screens at that very moment. These guys are heroic pilots because... they're heroic pilots! They're friends because... they're friends! The missions are happening because... they are the missions! It's all important because... it's important! One thing I find really interesting and kinda harrowing is that this show seems to have made a point to cast some actors who are the actual age of a lot of the soldiers in WW2, AKA late teens and early 20s. The character who is now going to try to escape from Belgium + his buddies looked like children. Most war depictions make the choice to cast guys who all look like full grown men for obvious reasons, but I appreciate that this show is changing that a bit. Just unbelievable how young so many of those guys were in real life. EDIT: Ironically that actor who plays Quinn is actually 26 haha but man, he looks much younger in the show.
  6. Hmmm I'm going to watch it all, but I'm still not sure how much I like it after two episodes. I think it's already a little repetitive, which makes sense considering the subject matter, but I'm curious how that will play over 9 episodes. I think a big component that is missing is the historical context that BoB and The Pacific both had at the beginning of each episode. I'm a fairly decent amateur WW2 buff (for my generation anyway - I'm 34), so I knew the gist going in, but my wife kept being curious where/when things were happening, and what the stakes were at that time of the war, things like that. I think that perspective would've helped some of the issues, such as some bland characterizations. I was nervous about Austin Butler, luckily he hasn't bugged me but he also just doesn't really bring anything to the table in the role of Buck. Callum Turner on the other hand (Bucky), is much better in my opinion, but I still don't really get a sense of why Buck and Bucky share a bond. To compare it to BoB, it seems like their relationship should be somewhat similar to Winters/Nixon (the responsible boy scout and the cynical drunk with a heart of gold) but we haven't quite gotten that dynamic. One of the things that kept The Pacific from hitting as hard as BoB was the dialogue and characterizations that seemed very romanticized and almost soapy. So far I think MotA is working better because we're focusing on one group of guys, but I still feel a little bit of that soapiness too much. Many of the characters in The Pacific (and possibly MotA as well) seemed like modern actors reciting borderline-corny lines on a movie set. The characters in Band of Brothers seemed like they were channeling the real people they were portraying. Now for the good - The flying sequences are incredible. I'm usually drawn more toward ground war stories because it's just easier to put myself in their shoes and follow the action, but this show is doing an amazing job at recreating the feeling of being in these planes. I can't claim to know the ins and outs like a historian, but the attention to detail the show seems to have is definitely pulling me into those scenes. I feel the cramped space, I feel the freezing cold, I feel the rickety plane shaking, and it helps the show create that camaraderie for the characters too. When it goes from a mission to an interrogation to blowing off steam at the bar while they wait to do it all over again, you feel how those guys are experiencing something totally life-altering together as a group. Anyway, I'm excited to see where it goes! I am under no illusion that it'll be as good as Band Of Brothers, but it's definitely worth a watch for me and it will be a good thing for TV in general for a show like this to be good and succeed, so I'm definitely rooting for it to keep building into something special.
  7. Haha I think they mentioned something about "Josh will handle the evening news" a couple times when Bradley has been absent for whatever reason, but I have no idea who Josh is... Have we met him or is he an offscreen character like Norm's wife on Cheers?
  8. This season is an absolute rollercoaster haha. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to be rooting for Milton and Lydia the most...
  9. Agree! I want a Milton + Josh spin off. They were cracking me up for some reason haha.
  10. Aaliyah is a saint, I'm still shook by that absolute bomb drop haha :( Her and Lydia's friendship seemed so incredible, my wife even said "THEY'RE THE REAL LOVE STORY" but then... damn. Very hard to see any other angle other than she cozied up to Aaliyah as a way to live vicariously through her with Uche, or something weird like that. The way she rattled off all of those little facts about him, sheeeesh. Poor Aaliyah. Uche is extremely awkward, I still can't really put my finger on him. There are times when he seems like a total dick, and then other times when he seems like he legitimately can't read people/situations correctly and knows that he needs to back off and apologize after the fact. I dunno, I'm interested to see what the hell happens with these three. One thing I feel pretty certain about is that Lydia and Milton have zero future together haha. Poor guy got swept into her whirlwind I think.
  11. Agree. Sally was always SO insecure and self-absorbed, and in previous seasons we saw how much she wanted others to view her as someone who (literally) stood up for herself, left the violent man in her life behind, and in her tv show retelling, saved her child from the violent man in her life too. In that moment, she finally lived up to the person she always wanted (and pretended) to be. Obviously that doesn't miraculously make her a great person, or a great mom, ESPECIALLY when you factor in the incredible trauma and terror she had gone through in the past 8 years since learning about Barry, killing someone, and then living a bizarre awful fake existence on the run. But it was a moment of clarity! I'd like to think she AT LEAST was able to build a relatively normal, if not perfect or even happy, life from that point with John.
  12. This is actually where my mind went too, but I don't think we'll ever know for sure!
  13. Speaking of what is and isn't shown on camera, am I remembering correctly that there are still post-merge reward challenges happening, but they don't show them in episodes anymore for some reason? I swear I remember hearing that during a previous post-Covid season. Seeing Jamie at tribal council made me think about it again. Her hair looked nicely done and just seemed cleaner than the rest of the tribe haha, and I wondered if she had won some kind of spa reward or something. To me, that would explain things like Jamie's fresh look, apparently some peoples' faces clearing up according to @HappyDancex2, and even some relationships changing on a whim. IF they are still doing those challenges/rewards, we are missing out big time. So much relationship-building happens during that part of the game.
  14. I used to think I wanted MORE of Vanessa and Nick, simply because they are barely in the show at all and I figured they would have something to offer if they were involved more, but nope! Vanessa seemed like a mean girl weirdo, and Nick came across like Brick Tamland.
  15. Yeah I agree. I think Chelsea has this idealized vision of Kwame almost as like, an "accessory"? That's probably too harsh, I think she genuinely loves and respects him, but I think she looks at him as the final missing piece that she can bring along for the ride in the perfect life that SHE has set up. And Kwame, on the other hand, is like, "wait what if I'd rather chill and play soccer with my friends instead of go to your family's Sunday dinner every week for the rest of my life...?" In Chelsea's defense, obviously Kwame can't expect to play soccer 4 nights a week or whatever when he's in a serious relationship haha. But yeah I think they just have too much of a gap between the kind of lives they want, and Kwame isn't so head over heels that he'd want to go be as attached-at-the-hip as Chelsea wants them to be.
  16. Kwame and Chelsea are so hard to figure out... I could imagine them being a good couple, but I don't think they are a very good INSTANT couple. I think they're both sincere, and they like each other, but they both seem to be VERY comfortable in the identities they've carved out for themselves as single people. Chelsea portrays herself as this sexy, grown, competent woman, who is always a little ExTrA!! but it's just because she knows what she wants, and isn't afraid to be herself. She doesn't mind being single because she knows that once she finds her man, LOOK OUT, they're going to run the world together like Beyonce and Jay Z. Come join her in Seattle, because she has got it all figured out already and you just have to jump into her passenger seat. Kwame portrays himself as the ultimate good guy, always disarming any situation with his smile, gets along with everyone no matter what. He just wants to navigate the world at his own pace, making time for his pickup soccer games and simple comforts, and he knows that he can explain any misunderstandings away because he only wants the best for everybody. If you let him speak, you'll see his point of view about staying in Portland is well reasoned, even if you don't realize it yet... I think it seems like they both just assume the other one wants to jump into THEIR worldview that they've cultivated throughout their single lives. Again, I think they're both legit good people, and if this was just a normal new relationship, I could definitely imagine them working out after months/years of compromise and learning about each other. But as an "experiment" where they have to start a full life together immediately, they can't just fold their lives over onto each other as easily as others who have more flexible ideas of a new life with another person.
  17. Alright I'm way late starting this season and maybe my feelings on this will fade after another couple eps, but I still wanted to comment about this because I totally agree! I think somewhere in the middle of the show's run, fans got tired of the "recruited" castmembers who had never seen the show and were only brought in for drama or because they fit an archetype or whatever, and the "superfan" castmembers were seen as more deserving of a chance to play. I think at this point it has swung too far in the opposite direction. There have already been a couple seasons now in this new S40+ era that are overflowing with superfans who are, for lack of a better word, "nerds..." (I'm sorry if that is judgmental, if it helps I would be considered a nerd as well if I was on the show haha, but I think it's true.) SO many superfans who are extremely "online," who study the puzzles and strategies of past seasons as a hobby, and who neurotically obsess over the mental game. I have nothing against players like this at all! I loved Cochran, Christian, Aubrey, Erik, etc. I do have a problem however, with the show casting so many of one type of player. To me, Survivor is about throwing ALL kinds of people together. Nerds, jocks, rich, poor, LGBTQ+, straight, funny, boring, smart, dumb, crazy, reserved, old, young, urban, rural, etc. It seems like by casting so many similar types of "young/nerdy" players recently, the show has veered a little bit too far toward the "OUTWIT" part of the slogan, which has left the "OUTPLAY" and "OUTLAST" parts behind a little bit. I want to see odd couples bond like Stephen and JT, or ultracompetitors slicing and dicing their competition like Kim or Boston Rob, or people earning their stay by providing food and shelter for the tribe, or lowkey social geniuses catching people by surprise like Cirie. I'm growing tired of having THIS many people show up like they won a Survivor Sweepstakes where they get to go on vacation with their demigod hero Jeff Probst and then flail around like kids on a sugar rush all season haha. We need a little more variety!
  18. Just popping in here to say that all of these posts about how "Marlene had no plan for anything" or "I have no idea what Marlene was thinking" are giving me flashbacks to one of my OG previously.tv forum shows, Pretty Little Liars. Anyone else who read/posted about that wacky show knows what I'm talking about. Haha
  19. Decent start! I'm also disappointed that Tanya is back, when I saw her in a promo photo for season 2 I was hoping she would just be in the background or something as a clever *wink* to connect the two seasons. I'd rather spend all the time with the new characters. In season 1 she was a pathetic lonely figure floating through the resort who you could simultaneously cringe at and sympathize with, but in this episode it's like we're being shown why nobody wants to be around her in the first place. Maybe I've just reached Jennifer Coolidge overload haha.
  20. I can see that people here have WAY more knowledge about these real-life people/events than I do, so I have to ask - is it true that Diana just openly complained about her life and the royal family all the time to anyone who would listen, including total strangers? That is how she's portrayed so far this season, and it's really surprising to me. Also kind of surprising that such a fanboy like Mou-Mou (absolutely loved this actor btw) would be charmed by her sarcastic quips in that situation. I was blown away by the actress playing Diana at first, but I'm worried that her portrayal is starting to seem like a one-note impression.
  21. Tuello goes down as the most boring character in tv history. Utterly useless and SO dull since day 1.
  22. I can't remember the history of Gilead, is there a chance that maybe these higher-ups had their own customs and craziness going on up in the hills somewhere before their revolution started? Like maybe they had been this small cult for a few decades before they actually took control of an entire country?
  23. I appreciate a show that keeps things close to the vest, and keeps certain character motivations vague and ambiguious, but we're now 5 seasons into this show and there are way too many people/situations that make no sense haha. Maybe some of you can help me out here... Tuello - What is his job? Have we ever seen him interact with another member of the US govt? He's some sort of cross between a CIA agent and the Secretary of State or something? Why does he have unlimited decision making power with political prisoners? What does he care about in general? Driver Nick and Bradley Whitford - Are they basically in charge of Gilead now? It seemed like it when they were basically leading the funeral parade. If so, why don't they just shut it all down? Aren't they supposedly against Gilead? They seem to be half-in and half-out to the point of boringness. What do they care about in general? Gilead - Is it on the verge of collapse? Is it rolling along as usual? Are they putting on a front? The peeks we see behind the curtain are obviously not even close to the level of fucked-upness from the early seasons (Janine would've gotten murdered on the spot if she touched her baby, for example) so it seems like the fabric of their society is falling apart, but then Aunt Lydia is just back to training the new crop of handmaids with her usual gross chipperness and the funeral was this ornate display of grandeur that was apparently broadcast live internationally. I would just appreciate more details on what is going on in the world of the show. Each episode could have a good 10+ minutes of world-building and character development if it didn't spend SO much time on slow-mo closeups of June's twitching face. It's truly nuts at this point.
  24. Oh absolutely, I'm just saying he originally went in with the confidence that he could survive the elements and win the game. A lot of modern "superfan" contestants are in awe of the entire situation and just feel lucky to be in Jeff's presence. The whole point of casting people like that is the irony of someone knowing so much Survivor trivia but being totally out of their element once they're actually on the show.
  25. This is spot on! And beyond that, the main type of superfan they bring on nowadays is the "wow I was just on my couch watching my hero Jeff Probst and now I'm in the outdoors for the first time in my life!" type. Don't get me wrong, I loved Cochran, I appreciate the "fish out of water" element with those types of superfans, but we rarely see superfans anymore like Rupert or Malcolm or Kim - people who were not only big fans of the show but actually go in with the belief that they have the skills to win the game. Most people seem pretty likable so far but, I mean this in the most harmless way possible, this is the most awkward/nerdy personalities I've ever seen in one cast haha.
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