Pop Culture is Dead to Me: Part 237

It's been a while. Eight months since I last did a proper TV thing.

I did a final (unrelated to this) blog on the old PC. It's still in draft stage. I procrastinate a lot. I wish I could get over it, but I procrastinate about getting over it as well.

We've been watching a lot of TV, but not a lot in the grand scheme of things. A lot, for us. We have a lot to catch up on. We gave up on some things and were pleasantly (or unpleasantly) surprised by some other things. This is life.

Let's get started; we have a lot to get through and it will be in no specific order...

The Witcher - what a load of shite. Sorry, but it is. We gave it two episodes and frankly neither of us wanted to go any further. I know that Henry Cavill wanted this part, but you'd have thought he would have done more than phone in a disinterested looking scowl. It might have got better, but frankly I don't care. I'm sure there will be more and people will be happy. Good for you.

Servant - Apparently all but a few outside scenes were shot in London. 90% of the cast are British. Rupert Grint was brilliantly horrendous as a vile wine drinking, pot smoking twat and it was the weirdest and probably creepiest thing I've seen on TV in years. I really hope they don't make a second series because while there are so many holes in it, it still worked for me. In a nutshell: a family of utter shits, a dead baby and all held together by the 'nanny'. Really tough watching but worth it in a nasty skin crawling way...

Lost in Space 2 - we said we wouldn't bother with season two and so far we haven't. we have it waiting for us, but it's about convincing the wife that it's worth giving it another go.

Shameless US - in the last proper one of these I did, I said it was time to call it a day. No more Fiona means no more glue. We've watched the opening episode of Season 10 and I don't know if I have the will to persevere with it. It should have stopped with season 9 because that was an excellent jumping off point.

Doctor Who - Now... where to start. If you look back to the last time I talked about DW you won't find anything remotely positive and that's almost how I feel about this series. It is pretty much a load of old wank and Chibnall did nothing at all to make me think he was anything other than a fraud with a pseudo-educational brief. The current series has been preachy, whiny (even with the return of the Master) and I don't really like any of the cast; not even Jodie Whittaker any more. It's just shit. However, just as I was about to actually call it a day and stop subjecting myself to an hour of grief and anger up popped 'Fugitive of the Judoon' and arguably the most excellent episode for a decade. It was one of those episodes where absolutely nothing happened, but everything happened. On the surface it just seemed as one-dimensional as every other Chibnall episode and then BAM and BAM and oh yeah BAM BAM BAM. Jack Harkness, an unknown black lady Doctor, lone Cyberman teasers, Galifreyans and the actual feeling you'd stumbled into an episode of Doctor Who. It was quite brilliant. And then we returned to shit the following week...

The Outsider - I've not read the book. After Dr Sleep I've struggled to be tempted by any Stephen King book, especially ones that are crime novels with a supernatural twist. I struggled with Mr Mercedes and didn't get past the opening chapter; never even bothered buying the sequels and was really tempted to read The Outsider until I discovered it had more links to the crime books than it does to any of King's 'proper' books. We're halfway through the HBO adaptation. Ben Mendelsohn is superb. Jason Bateman blew my mind. It is playing on a theme that Joe Hill's NOS4A2 touched on - what happens when weird meets the real world and specifically law enforcement and there's a sense of bewilderment running through it that reflects what the world would actually do if the bogeyman existed. I might read the book now.

Picard - two episodes in and it is how you would want to see the real Star Fleet; how it really is and how the earth isn't really a Utopia, it just pretends to be. It is glorious to look at; moves at a snail's pace and can carry on until Patrick Stewart is 200 for all I care.

The Expanse - I haven't watched Season 4 yet. It's on the 'to do' list.

Preacher - horrid. Just awful. After such an auspicious start it just descended into utter shite. I was glad when it was all over and you got the impression the cast felt the same way.

Nos4R2 - I touched on this when I last did one of these on TV. We'd just started to watch it and I said it felt abridged. It's been fucked about to the extent that I don't know if I'll watch the second (and hopefully concluding) season. Has as much menace as the One Show. I also don't think Zachary Quinto can act. Went on far too long and could have done the entire book in 13 episodes. Hopefully Joe Hill's Locke & Key will be much better, but after reading his book The Fireman, I think he's a one trick pony and hasn't got a tenth of his father's ability. If you get the chance to read The Fireman don't. Killing yourself would be more preferable - dreadful rubbish.

The Boys - is nothing like the comic (apparently). It was extremely enjoyable and in the worst possible taste. One of the few things I watched last year that I'm genuinely looking forward to a second series. Karl Urban didn't need to be English (is he English or an Aussie, it's hard to tell?) and his accent is the worst since Dick Van Dyke. Other than that foible, it made some other superhero series look very poor indeed.

Watchmen - Almost the best superhero series. Utterly compelling; hated the ending, felt that Damon Lindelof simply didn't understand Doc Manhattan. He almost got him, but failed. Other than that it twisted and turned all over the place; felt weird and otherworldly and I hope there's a second series, if only to piss off comic fans.

Undone - watch it. It's a strange mix of animation and Bob Odenkirk. It's a time travel story but it might be about madness. It was strangely fulfilling and there's likely to be a second series.

Russian Doll - there's also going to be a second series of this and that confounds me. If you like Groundhog Day (I did) then you should like this; but unless they use other characters I can't see how this is ever going to work. It was an enjoyable romp but ultimately you didn't really care about the characters you just wanted to find out why everything was rotting away.

Fleabag 2 - We finally watched this, like a film, the other night. Nothing beats the first episode which has more laughs in it than all the following five put together. I liked the juxtaposition where all of Fleabag's awful people just get more awful and she seems to find some kind of redemptive peace (oh and she shags a priest). Olivia Coleman's stepmother has to be the most vile and horrendous human being ever portrayed in a TV series; the weird thing is we know people like her...

Haunting of Hill House - I liked what they did. I didn't think it was scary. It was clever but also stupid. It felt a little like The Umbrella Academy while being nothing like it at all. The problem with ghost stories is that when you boil it down, ghosts are not real, even if they exist. They have no form, they can't hurt you; the entire thing about them is to scare you and if you know its a ghost and it can't really hurt you it stops scaring you. Apparently this is also going to be an American Horror Story anthology series... shame.

Stranger Things 3 - hated and loved it in equal measure. I've never really understood the hype around the series and I discovered 11 is English (and essentially plays herself in most things - such as the woeful Godzilla: King of Monsters). It just feels like it never wants to give you a proper money shot because once it does it won't be able to replicate or beat it. Prick tease television.

Castle Rock 2 - was in many ways a bit of a revelation. The first series was a struggle, while this one was more of a rollicking adventure featuring the 'origin' of Annie Wilkes. I can't say I ever liked the character but tying her in with the Marston House from Salem's Lot and suggesting that the old place had much more history than just a mad bastard and a vampire's residence was a master stroke. Tying it into the first series wasn't such a good idea.

Love, Death & Robots - something of a revelation in that almost every single short SF film was excellent. It was full of sex, robots and death, but also stories that were excellently done in such a short space of time. This was science fiction anthology at its most excellent. I hope season 2 lives up to the first.

Mindhunter - the second series of this semi-fictionalised account of the FBI's psychological profiling department focused on another true crime and managed to wrap a disturbing and alienating story around it. It's superb TV and feels like it should be twice as long. A real pleasure, even if we're dealing with serial killers, horrid deaths and serious mental health issues.

His Dark Materials - frankly, they could have made this with glove puppets and it would have been better than the abomination that was The Golden Compass. It was, however, slightly cold and calculated and doesn't have the soul the books had. It was still quite brilliant in places and the only real heartbreaking thing is The Northern Lights is by far the lightest and shortest of the trilogy, but they're wrapping the entire thing up in a second series. How they will deal with the entire Mulefa storyline, the death of God and the battle between everything and travelling to hell and back, I really don't know?

For All Mankind - let's save the best till last. If I had to stick my neck out and declare something as my favourite TV show of the last 12 months, this would win. This alternative history of the space race is quite superb. It starts with the Soviet Union beating the USA to the moon and then upping the ante by putting a woman on the moon next. Everything the Yanks want to do, the Russkies beat them to it, so as a result the space race never ended. It's essentially a kind of science fiction soap opera focusing on the astronauts (some real, some fictitious) and how the world changed - but didn't too much - as a result of the events in 1969. It was the first big show on Apple's streaming service and was probably worth the entry fee alone. It's full of edge of the seat action, tragedy, love and with a fantastic late 60s/early 70s feel; all done extremely well. If I had to recommend one TV show from this entire list it would be this one.

***

I mentioned Dr Sleep earlier. We watched the film the other night and it was 3 hours long. The first 2½ hours follows the book extremely well, but then becomes a sequel to Kubrick's The Shining, which the book really avoided. The great ending in the book was replaced by a sorry homage to a film I've never liked and ended up being truly disappointing as a result.

We have watched so few films this last 12 months, it's either an indictment to the lack of interesting films or we're just not seeing anything we like. My mate Andy always manages to list 50 films a year - minimum - he's seen; I think I can count on one hand the number of films I've seen that I want to remember. I don't think the medium is dead, but it's very much in a coma for me at the moment and I fail to understand why some films get so hyped up, especially when they leave me disappointed and feeling like I've just wasted valuable life time watching them.

***

Spider-Man: Far From Home... I might be done with Marvel films. Endgame was a really poor film but also a good jumping off point. I can't see what the point of Black Widow is, unless it's a gift to Scarlett Johansson for time served and the Spider-Man film simply left me with far too many questions that I get the feeling are going to be breezed over. Mysterio was a lame villain and I'm fed up to the back teeth with Spider-Man. I feel about as much of an interest in him as I do Batman and anyone who knows me will know I can't stand Batman and haven't really watched any since the first Bale film.

Which brings me nicely to Joker. Joachim was okay; better than the dead Aussie channeling Jeff Goldblum's Seth Brundle or that singist twat in Suicide Squad, but apart from a few oblique references to Batman it was just a film about mental health and right wing America. Not a nice film; maybe a necessary one. I wouldn't have minded not seeing it at all. At least it wasn't a multiplex cinematic blockbuster with more special effects than you can shake a stick at.

That's me done. If I missed anything it couldn't have made much of a mark on me.