Party of One: Unpopular TV Opinions

[DoctorAtomic]

That's some bull then. 

[Katy M]

3 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

he "One With the Embryos" should obviously be The One With the Quiz Game or something,

Or "the one where nobody knows Chandler's job."  

I would call "the one where Ross got high" "the one with all the crazy confessions."  Although, of course the actual episode title is easily identifiable.

Now, you've made me want to go through and rename all the epis.

 

[Anduin]

I started watching For All Mankind the other day. Ep 1, great. 2, damn good. 3, yeah! 4... I'm sorry. There's too much drama in my proto-space opera, okay? I prefer the grand adventure kind of story. It's a tedious slog.

Yes, I care about people and their problems. Real people and their real problems. But fictional ones? You can give them problems that real people don't need to face.

[DrSpaceman73]

On 5/27/2021 at 3:51 PM, Katy M said:

Or "the one where nobody knows Chandler's job."  

I would call "the one where Ross got high" "the one with all the crazy confessions."  Although, of course the actual episode title is easily identifiable.

Now, you've made me want to go through and rename all the epis.

 

He's a transponder of course!!!

[Quof]

Transponster. 

[Hiyo]

[JimmyJabloon]

I didn’t care for Mike in Friends. I think David and phoebe should have ended up together. Mike was so blah. Poor David.

[ifionlyknew]

6 minutes ago, JimmyJabloon said:

I didn’t care for Mike in Friends. I think David and phoebe should have ended up together. Mike was so blah. Poor David.

I love Paul Rudd and Lisa Kudrow but I thought they had zero chemistry. The character of Mike was just not right for Phoebe. 

[Blergh]

The only Friends ep, I wanna see is 'The One Where They All Went Away, Never To Be Heard From Again' 

This is the UO section! LOL

[Hiyo]

That is an unpopular episode for sure.

[Zella]

I never could get into Friends. I've watched a few episodes, and I would sometimes smile and think "oh that's funny," but I don't think I ever laughed once. 

[Kromm]

12 minutes ago, Zella said:

I never could get into Friends. I've watched a few episodes, and I would sometimes smile and think "oh that's funny," but I don't think I ever laughed once. 

I was more scattered about it. I might regularly laugh watching it, and eventually saw a decent percentage of the episodes, but never sought out the show purposefully. 

[Kromm]

I don't like BTS.  I'm never going to like BTS. 

And I'm not dissing Korean culture as a whole.  Just BTS. 

Edit - I'm counting this as a TV opinion, because they're on American TV constantly now.  Hell, even in McDonald's commercials. 

Edited May 30, 2021 by Kromm

[Danny Franks]

14 hours ago, Kromm said:

I don't like BTS.  I'm never going to like BTS. 

And I'm not dissing Korean culture as a whole.  Just BTS. 

Edit - I'm counting this as a TV opinion, because they're on American TV constantly now.  Hell, even in McDonald's commercials. 

I don't like any of that K-pop stuff. The music just isn't very good, and there's a distinct whiff of forced labour and dictatorial control of stars about the entire industry. And it's causing some performers to resort to the most drastic means of 'escape'.

Edited May 30, 2021 by Danny Franks

[Hiyo]

I know we're all supposed to canonize him as the Patron Saint of Food or whatever...but I never got the Anthony Bourdain hype. More often than now, he came across as a pretentious jerkoff more than anything else.

[DrSpaceman73]

On 5/29/2021 at 11:29 AM, JimmyJabloon said:

I didn’t care for Mike in Friends. I think David and phoebe should have ended up together. Mike was so blah. Poor David.

Yes!!!   David was the one for her.  

[Blergh]

7 hours ago, Hiyo said:

I know we're all supposed to canonize him as the Patron Saint of Food or whatever...but I never got the Anthony Bourdain hype. More often than now, he came across as a pretentious jerkoff more than anything else.

Speaking for myself, I somewhat agree that he more often than not came across as a self-important, self-justifying, snotty bore which made his shows somewhat tough if not impossible to endure.  I'd like to add that I disliked that he eagerly touted substance indulgences (after three generations and counting getting decimated by that mindset ?! Really? ) as well as needless profanity in the voiceover narrations ( I can accept someone getting caught up in the moment letting stuff spontaneously get spilled but deliberately putting stuff in that one knows WILL inevitably get  bleeped out instead of making the effort to consider nonprofane terms for said narration   is  intentionally rude  and obnoxious IMO). 

However, I will say that I've met more than one person who actually was willing to expand their culinary  outlooks as well as their desires to travel  outside their tiny world corners based on the late Mr. Bourdain's productions so that's something IMO that not even his glaring hashmarks can erase. 

And, all the above said, it's rather heartbreaking that he wasn't able find healthy means to cope with whatever demons he was dealing with and, especially that,  his then-preteen daughter lost her father even with him and her mother having previously separated but  hopefully the positive aspects of his legacy will help her give her strength to cope with what happened.

[Madding crowd]

On 5/29/2021 at 10:38 AM, ifionlyknew said:

I love Paul Rudd and Lisa Kudrow but I thought they had zero chemistry. The character of Mike was just not right for Phoebe. 

I actually liked them together. Phoebe was always looking for some normalcy in her life and Mike was just normal enough while appreciating her quirky side. She mentioned at their wedding she never had a real family and Mike provided that. I liked David too but he was always gone and wouldn’t be able to provide the stability she craved.

[Ambrosefolly]

2 hours ago, Madding crowd said:

I actually liked them together. Phoebe was always looking for some normalcy in her life and Mike was just normal enough while appreciating her quirky side. She mentioned at their wedding she never had a real family and Mike provided that. I liked David too but he was always gone and wouldn’t be able to provide the stability she craved.

I know they had to wrap the triangle up quick, but after the initial episode that Hank Azaria returned where Phoebe was believable torn between Mike and David (one of the few triangles on any show that didn't feel forced), they fell back into the trope of Phoebe pining for Mike while being with David so she isn't alone. 

[Suzn]

I liked the Sopranos ending.  I read so many speculations about what happened next and I'm very comfortable with my interpretation of the ending.  Nothing happened.  It was an acknowledgement of it being fiction.  The characters do not go on to do anything unless or until they are written.

I didn't like Friends.  I watched a few seasons and only occasionally found anything funny and I tired of watching and quit.

Edited June 7, 2021 by Suzn

[hoosier80]

As I still work from home, I have the tv on in the background. I will opt for crime shows, history. or some house hunting shows. Sometimes Ice Road Truckers, if I can catch it. Not sure why I like that show, but I do. 
What I no longer care for at all is Flea Market Flip. It is on various channels all day long. Do they have excess shows and need to still make money off of the series? Lara Spencer is too chirpy, too over the top.
I would rather see Living Alaska, the other various locations for house hunting (big sky, Hawaii, islands, mountains), basically not the same locales we’ve seen done to death. 

Not a fan of My Lottery Dream Home either. I can watch one episode or two, then I will switch the channel to anything else.

[Haleth]

6 hours ago, hoosier80 said:

What I no longer care for at all is Flea Market Flip. It is on various channels all day long. Do they have excess shows and need to still make money off of the series? Lara Spencer is too chirpy, too over the top.

And you know the contestants are not really selling all that ugly stuff they crafted. 

[janie jones]

11 hours ago, hoosier80 said:

Not a fan of My Lottery Dream Home either. I can watch one episode or two, then I will switch the channel to anything else.

I feel the same way. Plus, not only is the host annoying, but he's superfluous. The show is basically House Hunters with him instead of a voiceover narrator. They don't need him for anything, and the show doesn't even try to pretend he does any of the legwork. He goes and gets listings from other people and shows the buyers. The thing he does that I hate the most is when he uses his fingers to trace air circles over the different parts of the printouts the realtor gives him.

[Browncoat]

11 hours ago, hoosier80 said:

Sometimes Ice Road Truckers, if I can catch it. Not sure why I like that show, but I do. 

I liked the first season a lot, but my interest waned rapidly with subsequent ones.  I think I made it through the second season, and maybe part of the third?  I don't even remember.

[proserpina65]

On 6/5/2021 at 4:11 AM, Hiyo said:

I know we're all supposed to canonize him as the Patron Saint of Food or whatever...but I never got the Anthony Bourdain hype. More often than now, he came across as a pretentious jerkoff more than anything else.

I hated Anthony Bourdain.

[annzeepark914]

8 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

I hated Anthony Bourdain.

The only episode I loved was when he went to southern California, rented a huge 1970's era Chevy sedan, and had a Mariachi band in the back seat playing music. Otherwise, I found him condescending to his viewers.

[KittyMom4]

On 6/8/2021 at 1:01 AM, hoosier80 said:

What I no longer care for at all is Flea Market Flip. It is on various channels all day long. Do they have excess shows and need to still make money off of the series? Lara Spencer is too chirpy, too over the top.

I used to enjoy that show in the early days, but then it got so ridiculous. every episode you got 1. Bar cart or 2. an ugly "conversation piece", usually a coffee table with "wacky" paint job or a chair with some "fun" fabric. 

I wish they would revamp it to a how-to of repurposing or just restoring flea market items and having judges decide the winner.

On 6/8/2021 at 7:14 AM, Haleth said:

And you know the contestants are not really selling all that ugly stuff they crafted

Exactly.  

 

[Dancingjaneway]

While Ryan Murphy does make SOME good t.v. I am NOT looking forward to his project with Monica Lewinsky. I don't think the story is interesting & I don't see Monica as a victim. I also think it's disrespectful to Chelsea Clinton & her family. There are plenty of other stories(esp. Black stories) that deserve to be told & would probably do some good to tell. 

[Shannon L.]

Like most people, I can't stand product placement--it's usually really awkward, but I absolutely love the way writers of Chuck wove it into their shows.  Nine times out of 10, it's flows naturally and is even amusing at times.  I'm putting this here because I'm not sure if I'm only one of a handful of people who feel that way.

[Bastet]

What's frustrating is product placement doesn't have to be blatant and awkward.  Major Crimes and Rizzoli & Isles were on TNT at the same time, and handled it very differently, so obviously there was no network mandate on how it had to be done.  On MC, characters just sometimes ate/drank/used something that was clearly a real brand.  Rusty was munching on Cheez-Its while watching TV, Sharon grabbed a can of Maxwell House to make coffee, etc.  That was it - no mention of these things (not the brand, but not even drawing attention to the food/drink by one character saying to the other, "Have some, it's delicious"), no weird close-up to make sure we saw the logo, etc.  It was just natural, and I find real brands used that way far less distracting than faux brands or "greeked" packaging.

On R&I, though, the characters literally talked like they were in a commercial.  Jane said her feet were killing her, so Maura whipped out a package of Dr. Scholl's shoe inserts and spent 30 seconds extolling its virtues.  They wound up driving a Toyota SUV for some reason, and when they unloaded stuff from the back, they marveled at the space and features it provides (name-checking Toyota and listing said features).  It was ridiculous, because people don't actually talk like that.

So product placement like the MC scenario, I don't mind at all - except when the character is using a product that character would never actually use.  (Like Sharon Raydor drinking Maxwell House - as if.)  But in-show commercials like the R&I examples, those are the ones that drive me batty.  If you're going to be blatant, you have to do it in a clever way that pokes fun at the very concept without pissing off the sponsor (and maybe that's what you're talking about with Chuck; I'm not familiar with that show). 

[kiddo82]

Yeah.  I don't care if they are eating Lay's potato chips or Let's potato chips as long as it doesn't become some in show commercial for the product.  On the Office Ladies Podcast, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey often talk about the products that were used on the show The Office.  They mentioned that their props guys would try to use companies that might be local to the Scranton area, hence, the episode where Jim and Karen go on a quest to find a specific type of Herr's potato chips.  

[Bort]

Sometimes product placement dialogue is just awkward. I remember Alias with Ford F-150 being the sponsor and do they have Sydney Bristow say, “Quick, let’s take the truck”? No, it’s, “Quick, the F-150!” Which I remember laughing and laughing at how dumb it sounded. Nobody would ever say that.

[Raja]

The infamous Hawaii 5-0 scene where Chin Ho told someone "to Bing it" to find information. On the  other hand good guys always drove GM vehicles and bad guys drove Fords 

[andromeda331]

I still remember on White Collar Neal and Diana talking about her environmental friendly car while they were on their way to rescue Peter. 

[Danny Franks]

16 hours ago, Shannon L. said:

Like most people, I can't stand product placement--it's usually really awkward, but I absolutely love the way writers of Chuck wove it into their shows.  Nine times out of 10, it's flows naturally and is even amusing at times.  I'm putting this here because I'm not sure if I'm only one of a handful of people who feel that way.

There are two ways to do it that I think can work well.

One is the way Chuck did it - be obnoxiously obvious and tweak it on the nose the entire time, knowing that your audience will get the joke and most won't mind.

The other is the way Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles did it - They had a deal with Dodge (I think) so the characters drove a Dodge truck and there were a few sexy shots of it each episode, but only within the context of the scene - they're driving somewhere, they're talking next to the truck, they're loading up the truck with all their gear and look at all these amazing storage compartments! But I don't recall them ever mentioning the make or model, or talking about the truck at all.

[Zella]

I just started watching Justified for the first time, and I had been thinking Ford was a sponsor and the show was tweaking it but that was really confirmed for me last night. 

Before, people just teased Raylan about him driving a town car and there was a throwaway sarcastic reference to an F-150. But last night, Boyd used his beatup old pickup truck to help him assault someone. After he drove around with the guy in a headlock in the truck window, the show lets you see very clearly Ford on the back. That Boyd's a real multitasker. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Edited June 20, 2021 by Zella

[Wiendish Fitch]

6 minutes ago, icemiser69 said:

Lost in Space (the original series), my favorite episode is "The Great Vegetable Rebellion".

For whatever reason, it is considered one of the worst, but I think it is the best episode by far.  So, there is a talking carrot in the episode.🥕  Big deal, I have seen weirder shit in other episodes in that series.

The original Lost in Space was good, goofy fun, and I hate it whenever it's rebooted to be "edgier". You can't take this shit seriously, so why bother?! 

[Nicmar]

On 6/21/2020 at 5:17 PM, meep.meep said:

But mostly it was the stupid robot dog.  And the adorable moppet.

Although it was progressive - they had two black guys!  Tighe and Boomer.

When I was kid I would only BSG just for the dog lol

[magicdog]

On 6/22/2021 at 12:31 PM, Wiendish Fitch said:

The original Lost in Space was good, goofy fun, and I hate it whenever it's rebooted to be "edgier".

FWIW, LIS was originally meant to be more serious and the first season (shot in B&W) is demonstrative of this.  Irwin Allen had big dreams for it, but when Star Trek came on and had brightly colored aliens, someone at the network insisted LIS go color (which would have happened to any primetime show after 1966) and to feature as many campy aliens and scenarios as possible. 

[DoctorAtomic]

I actually liked the movie in the 90s. 

[EtheltoTillie]

On 6/19/2021 at 4:49 PM, kiddo82 said:

Yeah.  I don't care if they are eating Lay's potato chips or Let's potato chips as long as it doesn't become some in show commercial for the product.  On the Office Ladies Podcast, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey often talk about the products that were used on the show The Office.  They mentioned that their props guys would try to use companies that might be local to the Scranton area, hence, the episode where Jim and Karen go on a quest to find a specific type of Herr's potato chips.  

Is there really something called The Office Ladies Podcast?  Here's an UO, perhaps.  I don't think the world needs that podcast--and I liked The Office.  There are too many podcasts now. 

[kiddo82]

42 minutes ago, GussieK said:

Is there really something called The Office Ladies Podcast?  Here's an UO, perhaps.  I don't think the world needs that podcast--and I liked The Office.  There are too many podcasts now. 

Agree on the quantity of podcasts but The Office Ladies is really good.  When a friend of mine told me about it I initially balked.  I'm not an Office super fan and the idea of a rewatch podcast seemed like an undertaking I wasn't up for.  Fast forward a year or so later and I was bored so I gave it try.  It's very insightful, in regards to both the show and the business in general, and Jenna and Angela are terrific hosts.  They also get soundbites from cast members or guest stars for specific episodes.  Or they just go off on tangents about random stuff that popped up in the epsidoe like Carvel Cakes and Fudgie the Whale.  Now, do we need a The Office Ladies podcast?  Certainly not.  But am I happy it exists?  Yes I am.

[Spartan Girl]

I don’t get why everyone was so obsessed with  Baron Zemo and his stupid dancing on Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Aww, he did a dorky dance—I DON’T CARE! He’s a terrorist who murdered a bunch of people just to break up the Avengers!

If they weren’t going to use him as a Big Bad, he didn’t even need to be on the show at all.

[peachmangosteen]

My fave parts of FATWS were probably Zemo, Sharon, and John Walker. Now there's an UO lol!

[Bort]

Yeah, I loved that Sharon was the power broker. I mean, come on, if ever there was a role that Emily Van Camp is good at playing, it’s the morally ambiguous anti-hero. Hello… Emily Thorne… Revenge…?

[Danny Franks]

7 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

I don’t get why everyone was so obsessed with  Baron Zemo and his stupid dancing on Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Aww, he did a dorky dance—I DON’T CARE! He’s a terrorist who murdered a bunch of people just to break up the Avengers!

If they weren’t going to use him as a Big Bad, he didn’t even need to be on the show at all.

That's how I feel about Loki, most of the time.

Aw, he gets all sad-faced because he thinks daddy didn't love him. I don't care, he still opened a portal for an alien army to attack New York, killing what must have been an absurd number of people.

[peachmangosteen]

14 hours ago, kariyaki said:

Yeah, I loved that Sharon was the power broker. I mean, come on, if ever there was a role that Emily Van Camp is good at playing, it’s the morally ambiguous anti-hero. Hello… Emily Thorne… Revenge…?

Thank you! I wanna see more of Sharon as the power broker because I think EVC is great at playing that type of character.

[festivus]

She'll finally be interesting, hopefully.

[Spartan Girl]

19 hours ago, kariyaki said:

Yeah, I loved that Sharon was the power broker. I mean, come on, if ever there was a role that Emily Van Camp is good at playing, it’s the morally ambiguous anti-hero. Hello… Emily Thorne… Revenge…?

Emily Thorne at least had a justified reason for doing what she did: to get back at the people that framed her father. And there were some levels she couldn’t bring herself to stoop to, in order to keep her character remotely sympathetic. 

With Sharon, the MCU isn’t even trying to do that. I feel like the writers only decided to turn her full-blown evil because they ran out of ideas for the character (like the MCU even tried that hard to begin with, since they pretty much gave her role to Natasha/ScarJo because she was the bigger name🙄) and to justify the controversial Endgame finale of Steve fucking off to the past to snag Peggy (Sharon’s great aunt) for himself. And it’s a disservice to her character, just to turn her into a woman scorned when they didn’t develop her character as much as they should have. I HATE that character trope. I’d be fine with her being bitter and jaded at Steve, but to turn her into a crime lord? Thanks, I hate it.

54 minutes ago, festivus said:

She'll finally be interesting, hopefully.

They could have done that without making her the Power Broker, but maybe that’s another UO around here.

[GHScorpiosRule]

1 hour ago, Spartan Girl said:

I’d be fine with her being bitter and jaded at Steve, 

And here’s my unpopular opinion about that-she has no reason to be bitter or jaded when it comes to Steve because she helped him of her own free will and choice, fully aware of the consequences. And I refuse to believe he didn’t go looking for her. The asshole writers just didn’t feel it was important to provide that because her character in the movies, was basically an extra. It was a disservice to the character.  But I’m also not a fan of the actress-don’t think she can act. So I really don’t care how she feels. And think she’s a traitorous asshole.