PurpleTentacle

I'm also not quite sure what to make of this. But at least by the end I could see how she ever made it to Chancelor. She gave a very good speech. Hit quite a few populist talking points, but let's be honest, told no lie about the USA. Everything she said on that topic was true. Of course her solutions were simplistic, vague and likely impossible. So par for the course for authoritarian populists. So I'm in for now. Interested to see where this goes.

I was very sceptical after the first episode, that was veeeeery exposition heavy and employed a lot of "tell, don't show". But this show found its groove pretty quickly and is a damn good adaptation. I still prefer the original, for multiple reasons, but this is not bad. In a few places they even made changes for the better. The changes I liked this episode were that the ocean and moon spirit only become physical beings for one night a year. Them swimming around each other in that pond 24/7/365 seems weird. What I didn't like was the Kaijū at the end being Aang fusing with the ocean spirit in a sort of revenge quest. I think it's more interesting if it's just him in the avatar state. I don't know, the show seems a bit confused here. They seem to want to tell us that Aang can't go into the avatar state at all, till he has mastered all the elements, unless controlled by a previous avatar, but then they had him go into the avatar state in episode two, at the southern air temple. Do I smell rewrites? Also overall I think it was more interesting keeping Ozai and Azula mysterious for the first season. I guess the makers of this show thought most people would have seen the original show anyway and so it wouldn't work quite as well to keep them in the shadows for so long, but it is a bit sad for newcomers. Still, looking foreward to season two.

Does the northern water tribe really only have a shrine to the last avatar from there? Seems a bit disrespectfull to the avatars that came before. Sure the one before would have been a while ago, since the northern and southern tribe switch off in the avatar cycle, but still. I'm also wondering how long Aang will be dependant on the shrines. All the avatars are connected to him afterall. Sokka and Yue really had great chemistry. No notes.

I think even in the cartoon the soldiers appreciated that Zuko would stand up for lowly soldiers just like them, after Iroh told them the entire story. But I agree, this was even better.

Actually good changes again. Zuko holding back during the Agni Kai instead of refusing to fight at all feels more real to the character and I do believe that it would enrage Ozai even more that his son could have beaten him but refused to. Also tying Zuko's men more directly to him, by him being the men he saved was a nice touch. It informs his character that he never told them. Never guilted them for it and only ever expected standard military loyalty, no extra treatment.

I liked that Bumi wasn't your typical person who would give into dispair. That he'd always keep his optimism. Mostly I don't like it, because it also informs his character and actions going foreward. Not sure how that is supposed to fit with how they changed the character.

The first thing I really liked is Iroh being confronted about what costs his siege Ba Sing Se had. (though I'm a bit sceptical that Ba Sing Se would have had to ration) What I really didn't like is Bumi being so bitter. I guess I get why he could be, but I liked his optimistic version better. Also this version of the secret tunnels, kinda meh. They were so dismissive of the crystals but are you telling me nobody ever clutched a loved one in the face of the badger moles before?

This was a lot better than the first episode. But I'm still missing the playfull nature of Aang and the other kids. Also I guess that means all the Roku stuff is getting cut out? Not quite sure how to feel about that yet. Hate that we see Ozai this early and that he was on the posters.

I'm only getting to this now because at the time of release I got to "an earth bender!" and was like "nope!". If you think you need clunky exposition in the first 30 seconds of your episode that's not a good sign. Same thing again with Aang talking to Appa later. "Let me tell you all of my emotions so I don't have to act them!" and then Grangran even later (in a vacuum that would have been cool, but not with all the exposition dumps in the episode). Also if Aang isn't running away in this version, why is he flying into a storm, on his leisurely clear your head evening flight? He should have seen it from miles away. And how far did he fly anyway? There was no storm at the temple. I'm not a big fan of the genocide of the air nomads being frontloaded anyway. If you have to show it, it should be in a flashback later. Also Monk Gyatso not taking out a whole room full of fire nation soldiers before going out was a big disappointment, I have to say. Why is every second actor in this mumbeling? Ever heard of ADR?

I mean first of all, you could make it an option. Second of all, fuck these people. While death threats are never okay, it's pretty cringe to compare creators putting a few lgbt characters into their game to a billionair who spends most of her free time fighting against actual living trans people and their rights. Agreed. It seems to presuppose and hinge on "the fact" that TLOU1 ending was actually good, which it most certainly was not. Very telling that you specifically called it "a gay love story". Let's see what Nick Offerman has to say about that. Aka the doctor who had a snowball's chance in hell of finding an actual cure, which is why Joel's actions were the only correct ones to take, both for saving his surrogate daughter and for keeping humanity's hope for a cure alive. Well maybe they shouldn't have tried to murder somebody who also happens to be the only hope for a cure, for no good reason. There are always people who deluded themselves into thinking that other people are the monsters, while in fact they themselves are the monsters. That's certainly real. But it doesn't mean that I'm going to sympathise with them. But he wasn't going to save humanity. That's (part of) the point. Also it's not murder if you are defending somebody's life and the killing of agressors is the only way to do so. Pretty much every country has exceptions for this case in their criminal statutes. From what we know about Joel he is a murderer and maybe he deserved death. But he didn't deserve death for his actions in the hospital. He did the right thing. What is uncomfortable for me is that so many people just accept this shitty writing. The writers even had a chance to fix it with the show and keep the overall story the same, even make it true to their original attempt, where Joel's actions are either morally ambiguous or even completely in the wrong. But they didn't. Instead they doubled down on their crappy writing. That's one problem, sure. At least in the game you have spores as big threat, which a cure would solve. You don't have those in the show, so a cure seems mostly superfluous. The other problem is that this "doctor" was going to kill his only test subject the day they met. Any real scientist, even one without morals or concience would see that as an absolute last resort and would only even consider it after years of testing. He really was like Dr. Mengele, doing "science" on helpless people, without any actual science being done (everything Mengele did was famously useless, which is good for ethical questions now, since we don't have to consider if we should use his data or not, but in some ways makes it even more horrific). My theory is that the dude was a janitor before the world ended and then conned himself into a cushy position with the fireflies, pretending to be a doctor.

Saw Wish a few days ago. It's pretty damn bad. The villain is annoying. That's the one thing you don't want your villain to be. He can by sympathetically evil, lawfull evil, dispicably evil or just evil evil, but you never want them to be annoyingly evil. Also if you have to have his motivation be a tragic backstory, you can't really just gloss over it and make him just a massive jerk. That might be a thing in real life but it doesn't work in a fictional story. You at least have to explore why trauma doesn't automatically make you right. You know, pick up on the things you established and build upon them. I haven't read anything of the behind the scenes, but this feels like extensive rewrites. The songs were pretty bad except one and even that one wasn't great. Kinda sad, since I like a lot of the ingredients. The luma was cute and Alan Tudyk as a talking goat is just amazing. Also as an aside: Did big guy get his Wish at the end? Everybody else did, but his wasn't shown. I doubt his real wish was to be a knight for the king.

I think she got started by blackmailing the Colliers and expanded from there. But the timeline doesn't make much sense. As I said above. That was like 18 years ago and she only bought a stake in the ship 5 or 6 years ago. They do have the servers though (although that they carted all of them out of there, considering how many racks we saw is ridiculous). Sunil is on the hook for aiding and abetting Kira's crimes. That's for sure. Yeah I assume so. Or maybe even less murdering and only the bomb blackmail thing. Wouldn't have made for a good TV show, but as a simple plan to get one over on the rich and corrupt it would have worked.

I had the interpol agent as Viktor Sams from about episode 4 or 5. Maybe it was easier to see if you binged this, but she was really the only possible choice left. That she was Kira I didn't see coming. Is it the same actress? I'm bad with faces. But I also think it doesn't make much sense. Imogene found Cotesworth 6 months after Kira supposedly blew up and not long after he found Viktor Sams was blackmailing the family. But in her long spiel to Imogene, Kira said that it took her a long time to put herself back together and start her blackmail business. What is it, a long time or less than 6 months? Also how did Cotesworth not figure out that the blackmail started after Kira was dead? What was Kira even whistleblowing about? They said the blue stuff was banned in 1989. I assume it was banned in the US then and not even in China? Even if it was also banned in China, what was Alexandra supposed to do about it? She didn't have jurisdiction. And even if we put that aside, did they even use it past 89? A good part of that was set 50 years ago. Even if the show is set in current year, that would make it 1974. Or did they use it past that time? If so why? Did they use it till Anna cleaned up? And how does not using a pigment almost bankrupt the entire company? How can that possibly be cheaper than just use another blue pigment and not pay massive amounts of hush money over decades? It's freaking blue, not platinum. While we are at it, how can they be broke? They still have 49% stock in the company that got just bought by a massive conglomorate. Even if that conglomorate disolved the company, they would have needed to be payed market value for the stock. Not to mention the 3 billion they still had in their account. That would have been never transfared out with a paper check. Also how did Celia get so rich? Are we really to believe that she just got there on her own with that little startup cash in her lifetime? Well maybe she built good connections to the CCP somehow. I guess I can fanwank that... That and a bunch of coincidences that are supposedly clues. But how is it a clue that Anna and Eleanor knew each other from way back and were ex-lovers? Are we to believe Celia arranged that? If so we should have seen something to that effect. It didn't seem like it in any way, shape or form. Unrelated nitpicks: - It was sure very convenient for Kira that Llewellyn Mathers told nobody who she was and just did some incoherent rambling on the ships railing, before jumping to his death. This was completely out of character for Kira, to not tie up that loose end, as she tied up one earlier in the season, that set all this off, and for Mathers to not at least tell Imogene. - Are Vitamin B12 drips really a thing? As somebody who has to supplement it because of a genetic mutations, that means I don't absorb B-Vitamins well, that seems super unnecessary. First most people don't have a deficiency in the first place and if you do, there is no need to drip it in slowly. You can inject it into your veins, into your muscles, or just under your skin. It does not matter. Your body will absorb it. It's not like hormones where you have to be a bit carefull where and how you inject them. Anywhere will do. - Why are there ukrainian refugess on the ship? The writers do know Ukranians can just walk over the border to Poland, right? I guess the dad might not be allowed through from the ukranian side, since he is in fighting age, but why didn't the daughter and wife do that? He could have been on the ship alone. Also why would it have been so important to hide them from Interpol? They didn't do anything illegal and the owner of the ship said it was okay for them to be there. What did they think Interpol would do? There was nothing for them to do. - Why did anybody think interpol had jurisdiction in the first place? If you are in international waters, the police of the country, the ship is registered in, has jurisdiction. Interpol only investigates crimes that span multiple countries and works together with local authorities. And finally, not a plot-problem or nitpick, but a general question: Am I supposed to see this as a good ending? It sure seems like the writers want me to, but I don't see how. Yes, Kira did kill one innocent person. That was bad. She should have chosen a different path (and considering her general MO I'd say it was out of character that she didn't, but I guess the plot needed to happen). But, she is saving countless people from the rich and the corrupt. Not just in an abstract sense, she is saving their lives. Is the world really a better place with her in prison and most of her organisation destroyed? I doubt it.

So if Flower is in a well, who got sucked off?

I'm a very big fan of Helluva Boss but wasn't quite sold on the pilot episode of Hazbin Hotel that has existed on Youtube for years. Imagine my suprise when this was even better than anything I've seen in Helluva Boss. Vivziepop really took everything he learned over the years and applied it here. Of course the Prime-money doesn't hurt. It actually did feel like a Disney musical, just with a bit more mature themes and as good as Disney hasn't been since the 90s. Btw. the pilot episode I linked above does take place before this episode. It's not necessary, which is probably why they didn't rehash it, but maybe once you are through with the season go back and watch it. It's quite interesting and just because it wasn't quite on par with this show or Helluva Boss, doesn't mean that it's bad by any means.

I have to say, this show was surprisingly a lot of fun. A lot of good jokes. Haven't laughed out loud so much in a long time. But I think the biggest improvement from the movie, that made this a lot better, is that the kid they got actually has some comedic chops, while Mark Wahlberg has exactly 0.

They have FTL travel and communication through the cosmic hexagonal wormhole network that was created with the bangles. It's fine. That is just something we have to give to scifi movies. There are a lot of other problems in this movie. Apparently? That was some horrible uncanny valley. Looked like they didn't get the CG finished in time. I don't even think they bothered with mo-cap. All his movements seemed so unnatural. The budget after reshoots is much higher than officially reported. Then you have advertising, which granted, due to the strike was lacking and then you have the theaters cuts, which are much bigger internationally than in the US, a fact the studios don't like to talk about. All in all, I think the $700 million are actually realistic. On the other hand, there is always home video sales. Something that is also rarely talked about. But I don't think this movie can make its money back, ever. Oscars don't mean that much anymore. Look up who else has an Oscar and what they do now. I mean, before the MCU, all the Marvel characters were pretty unknown. You had Spiderman in the public conciousness, maybe the Hulk and then... nobody. So Marvel could make that happen for anybody, but they seem to play it too safe nowadays and don't let any enthusiastic director do what they do best. Well, it was still called "Captain America: The Winter Soldier", this was not called "Captain Marvel: The Marvels". Did Peggy Carter get younger? I mean you might think so when looking at Hayley Atwell, but I don't think that's canonically the case. Neither did Pepper Pots or Jane Foster for that matter. I think the last Ant-Man movie damaged it far worse. That was a big yikes, while MoM and LaT were just minor yikes. I'd say this was actually better than all three, despite its maaaaaaaaaany problems though. Both directors did very well in their first outings. It's just the second that went off the rails and Love and Thunder wasn't even that bad. Just a little too on the silly side. Also I don't think the director is as much of a problem as the writer (though often they are the same person, nowadays). They do? I thought She-Hulk was screwed over in her own show so hard. She is supposed to be a smart as whip lawyer, funny fourth wall breaker and a kickass action hero and she didn't get to show any of it off, because the writers apparently think "legal comedy" means neither legal nor comedy required.

This movie was a bit of a mess. With all the reshoots not that suprising. First reshoot mess is right at the beginning, they all switch places, across the galaxy, next scene they are all in their original positions again, but not through switching. Somehow they just flew? Especially with Kamala it's really not clear how that happened. So Carol keeps messing up. First she destroyed Hala, then she sabotaged the peace talks. Good going there. Not the best start if they want to make her sympathetic. But speaking of, how does destroying a computer kill a sun and how does that deplete the atmosphere and oceans of a planet? Is the movie ever going to explain that? Guess not. Details the entire plot hinges on are apparently not important. Also what should have actually happened was that the planet and everybody on it should have frozen, but apparently that was not a problem. I guess they needed to nerf Carol's powers somehow, after she just flew through space ships like they were paper in the last movie. They did it in two ways. First having her switch with the others, second having the bangle absorb her powers. You'd think though maybe they would have called in a super hero who didn't have powers the bangle could easily absorb, once the earth was in danger? I guess they are down a few, but what are Dr. Strange, Thor or the Guardians doing right now that is so damn important? Or for that matter Daenerys Targaryen G'iah. Isn't earth her home now and does she not have all the super powers? Anyway, at the end Carol is back to igniting suns. So a third movie is going to be hard pressed to justify why she doesn't just blast the villain to kingdom come. Maybe best to retire the character. Speaking of reigniting a sun, Carol never thought of rectifying her mistake and asking Fury and all the scientist he has at his beck and call how one could do that in all those years? So she let billions of people suffer for decades, for no reason? Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. (/Jake Peralta) Because she would have been told that she can just do it, right? I think out of universe, this was also a reshoot and in the original version she needed a bangle to do it. Because Kamala suddenly and without explaination, comes out of the ship without one of the bangles. That bangle is then worn in the final scenes by Carol. Again, without explaination. But Carol isn't wearing the bangle when she reignites the sun. So the second bangle is just somewhere in limbo during that time. Nobody has it. I guess the CGI was done after the script was changed and the reshoots. But then maybe they should have also changed who wore the bangle in the final scenes. That should be doable without having to reshoot the scenes nowadays... Well maybe not if you overwork your CGI artists regularly and they don't even have time to finish the CGI that is absolutely necessary... Speaking of the ending, that was a mess. So why did the big bad explode? I thought that was only a risk when you used one of the bangles alone and overcharged it? At the end she didn't use her hammer to overcharge them and she had both. That should have just worked, shouldn't it? And why did it suddenly rip a hole into another universe? That was never an established power before. That was nothing the big bad tried to do. There doesn't seem to be any sense in it. Also does that universe now have to deal with the "incursion"-bullshit, that was established in multiverse of madness? Did Monica just kill that universe? Also why did she have to stay on that side in the first place? Seems like you could have stayed on either side while closing the rift. It's not like she's in a space between universes. Then it would somewhat make sense. Also why was that threeway powers combined stuff shoehorned into there in the first place? Before it was established that the two bangles together could basically shape spacetime at will, them having created the wormhole network. Also I was under the impression, that the bangle had more to do with Kamala's Djin ancestry rather than cosmic stuff. A bit of a clunky retcon... All the workers on SABER now need years of therapy after having been eaten by tentacle monsters. But I guess it's better than being dead. Do you not need to breathe in there though? Is it some kind of stasis? I figured out the eggs were Goose's right away, after remembering that Kamala's mother had called her fat. Everybody who is called fat in movies is pregnant. All the tentacle kittens were cute and fun. Anyway, I liked the ideas here. I liked the three main characters, their chemistry and interactions and as always I love Kamala. She is just such a loveable nerd. I also liked the tone it was going for. Not too serious, not too whacky (Thor Love and Thunder went a bit too whacky). But overall this movie is a big mess and I'm glad I didn't schlepp myself to a theater to see it. Weird thing is it didn't have to be. I think most things are fixable, relatively easily. But maybe after all the reshoots nobody had a clear view of the big picture anymore or maybe they didn't want to throw even more good money after bad...

In 2003? Then the FAM-universe is behind ours? Because I had internet in 2003. Pretty sure that was already DSL 1Mbit/s and I lived in a small town. (In some areas of Germany DSL 3Mbit/s was availible in 2003) There wasn't wifi everywhere, but wired internet was quite ubiquitous. Do you have a link to that AMA? I want to see for myself if they really have gotten this out of touch on the world building. I wouldn't be surprised though, considering everything I've seen this and last season. Edit: Found it. Wow... now I'm not surprised about anything on this show anymore. I think it was a "Sergei's last wish" kinda thing. He didn't say it directly, but Margo mentioned this episode how he was saying that if the asteroid came to earth the Mars program would die and that he was right. They were both in a mode of "let's do something for humanity's progress towards the stars and fuck the soviet space agency in particular". Yes, that was also a shower thought of mine. They should have let her go back to russia and stand trial there. That also would have meant they could have saved some face. Because now that she is in the US in court, she doesn't have to keep up the lie, that she defected because the soviet space program is just so much better, but can tell the truth about the KGB choking her friend in front of her and blackmailing her. Of course, she is still a US citizen. So she could have refused to go. So lifting her immunity might have been the only move left. But, considering what increadibly dumb decisions all these characters make, maybe she wouldn't have refused and gone to russia willingly? We should have had at least a scene where she was ordered back to Moscow and refused. Here I agree with the show. We haven't been back to the moon in 50 years. Mars missions are an order of magnitude more expensive and what exactly do you want up there? Iridium isn't exactly unobtainium. Since when has anybody ever let politics or animosities get in the way of money? I don't want to list real world examples, because that might get too political, but there are many.

This was certainly suspensfull throughout. I'm glad that Dani didn't die, even though she got the classic "I'm only 7 days away from retirement!" last episode. Guess that was an intentional misdirect. Ed really should have kicked the bucket in this episode. Oh well. Glad Margo did what she did. After her outburst at Irina that probably was the smartest move for her anyway. Speaking of Irina, she's not the sharpest tool in the shed, is she? She should have known that killing Sergei, while Margo was still on US soil, could very well backfire. Margo was liable to do something crazy. At the very least she could have elected to stay in the US and take a reduced sentence in return for sharing secrets about the russian space program. Then, after she lost an asteroid worth a few trillion, Irina actually went back to the soviet union. If I was her I would have asked for asylum right away. Again, not very smart. Speaking of Sergei, to rule his death a suicide, the police must have been very incompetent. He wouldn't have enough gun powder residue on his hand and sleeve. Though of course the police being very incompetent wouldn't be out of the ordinary. I really don't understand why this show is acting like putting the asteroid into Mars orbit would be permanent. Something you can put into orbit, you can also pull out of orbit. It still has a big ass rocket strapped to it. You could still send it to earth. I feel like we are missing a step here. We should have been told that/why it wasn't politically possible anymore. Another thing was pumping the room full of CO2 to torture Miles. Are you telling me they are circulating CO2 throughout the base? That doesn't make any sense. What they could have done was cut off the air supply, which would have made the air in that room CO2-rich, after a while, probably more than an hour though. But what we were shown was the opposite, of them pumping the CO2 in. Overall I was very, very underwhelmed by this season. If there is another one, let's hope that one is going to be better. Well, at least the final episode was good.

So they didn't bother to peel off the sticker with the serial number from the bug, before they installed it in the north korean part of the base? These people are killing me... How convenient for the plot though... I'm really annoyed how the astronauts keep blaming the people, who striked peacefully for fair wages, for their dumbass friends dumbass decision to bypass safety equipment and blowing themselves up. That might be human nature, but again, I'd expect more from astronauts. But I guess in a world where Ed and Gordo were first class astronauts something like this is to be expected. Shame about Sergei. Guess he was spotted and KGB got him?

The sovjets aren't dumb. If Margo dies it's obvious. Even if she by some weird fluke died in an actual genuine accident, everybody would assume the CIA killed her. There is also no upside for anybody. So the only reason could be wounded pride. But that order would have to come from from the highest place there is and frankly Gore doesn't seem to be the type to reignite the cold war even further and jeopardise the future of humanity over his pride. (also Margo defecting didn't happen under his watch, so he has basically no incentive) So it's in the best interest of everybody to keep her very, very safe while she is on her trip. If anybody really, really wanted to kill her, I'm sure the CIA could get to her in Moscow. It's more difficult, might even burn some assets and/or connections, but it would be a lot less fraught diplomatically.

I could even see it slamming into earth. As they said, this episode, if you change the trajectory a little it will head to earth and enter its orbit, if you change it a lot, it will enter Mars orbit (I still doubt you could slow it down enough for it to not just slingshot around, but we'll go with it). Now, what heppens when you split the difference, because somebody tried to put it into Mars orbit, but got interrupted? Yup, it could totally slam into earth.

Doubt it very much. That would cause a massive political shitstorm, at a time where nobody wants it, because so much money is on the line. Happy Valley is the nickname the astronauts on this show gave the Melas Chasma.

This seems solidly to be for little children and little children only. The story is overly simplistic and the acting from the child actors is horrible. Aryan Simhadri does an okay-ish job, but the other two are just attrocious. Maybe this might be watchable with very thick nostalgia goggles, but sadly I don't have those for this franchise, so I think I'm out. But as long as I'm here: How the hell does Percy not get that the prophecy means that he'll lose his mother and how does Annabeth not get that either? Isn't she supposed to be the smart one? It's really not all that cryptic. Pretty straight foreward as prophecies go. At least for Percy we already knew that he was a complete moron, since he brought his only friend on a quest where the oracle warned him that his friend would betray him. But I thought Annabeth had some brains. Echidna: "Of course they're [the monsters you killed] like me. They were my children." So far the kids faught the Minotaur, the Harpies and Medusa. None of which are Echidna's children. So what the hell is she on about?! Grover: "There is an athenian temple in... somewhere in the middle of downtown St. Louis?" Annabeth: "Yes, except it's not all that hidden." Great job editor, you took the one take where Aryan Simhadri forgot to say "a hidden athenian temple" and now the whole conversation doesn't work. You can really see how much care was taken with this show. How exactly did sending Medusa's head to Olympus embarrass Athena? They never made any of that clear. I thought Percy's argument last episode that it was an offering was a solid one. Also her willingness to let her daughter and other kids die over emberessment doesn't exactly make me want to root for any of this. It's probably in character for her, but man it makes it hard to root for the stupid quest these stupid kids of asshole gods are on. What do these kids care? They should just run and hide, let the asshole gods fight it out and rescue Percy's mom in the fog of war. I mean yes. But preventing Dionysos from drinking, that's a new low. Even for Zeus, who has always been the biggest asshole of them all. Can't argue with that. Kids will laugh at the stupidest shit.