Re: What Did You Watch? 2024-11-21 (Thursday)

On Fri, 22 Nov 2024 07:36:59 -0800, Arthur Lipscomb
<arthur@alum.calberkeley.org> wrote:

On 11/22/2024 5:07 AM, jojo wrote:

Ubiquitous wrote:

After ana rduous workout, I watched:
>
Nothing.
>
What did you watch?
>
--
Don't jump!
>

 
anime mostly,

>
What anime?
>
There was a time a long, long time ago that if someone said they watched
anime, there was a chance that I watched or at least maybe heard of what
they were talking about.  But anime left me behind a *long* time ago.
And when I think of anime, I'm still thinking of stuff from the 80s and 90s.

I am in the same situation. Every so often one will break through and
I'll see a few episodes, ATTACK ON TITAN and ONE PUNCH MAN come to
mind, but my days of watching most of the popular anime are long gone.

I think Cartoon Network was the main one helping to push anime with
their Saturday night block and the SciFi channel did the same with
their anime block. Both back in the 90s/early 2000s.

my time is divided between anime, work and screwing around

online.
 
 

>
I watched:
>
Cruel Intentions (Amazon Prime) -  "Alpha" - New TV series based on the
movie (yes, I know there was a book).  This new series moves the action
from high school to college.  The episode starts with a brief flashback.
 Caroline Merteuil is the president of a sorority and in a
relationship.  Her sidekick CeCe (Selma Blair's character from the first
movie) tells Caroline her boyfriend is out with another girl at a frat
party.  Caroline grabs her stepbrother Lucien (why did they change the
name?!?) and heads over to confront the boyfriend.  They arrive in time
to see him openly with another girl while everyone watches a frat pledge
getting hazed.  Something goes wrong and the pledge is seriously injured.
>
Fast forward to the present day and the college is investigating because
the injured student is the son of a congressman.  The kid has no memory
of the incident, but the congressman is demanding action which prompted
the college to put all fraternities and sororities on probation.
However, the incoming class of students includes the U.S. Vice
President's daughter.  Caroline gets the idea if the daughter joins her
sorority that will put her back on the top and prevent her sorority from
getting kicked off campus.  So, Caroline sends Lucien out to seduce the
VP's daughter with the promise of if he's successful Caroline will sleep
with him.  John Harlan Kim (The Librarians) also pops up as a way too
old college student.  As best I can tell John Harlan Kim's character is
basically Joshua Jackson's character from the first movie.  He's a loyal
ally who helps them carry out their evil schemes.  Sean Patrick Thomas,
who was in the original movie also has a role in this series as a
college professor, and my guess is that this character is a version of
the same character he played in the original movie.
>
Overall, the show is OK.  It looks like each episode might have one or
both siblings ruining someone's life with the overall story arc of
seducing the VP's daughter into joining the sorority by the end of the
season.  But that's just my guess based on the first episode.
>
"Beta" - Episode 2.  I didn't give this one my full attention and it
seemed like a lot less happened.  I went expecting them to ruin some
random person's life, just because they could, but instead this episode
focused more on Caroline's behind the scenes scheming and an anti
"Greek" movement that the VP's daughter is torn between joining or
following in her mother's footsteps and joining a sorority.
>
>
Silo (AppleTV+) - "Order" - Season 2, episode 2.  In a major step up
from the pilot the focus shifts back to the present day silo with all
the regular cast returning to deal with seeing Juliette walk over the
hill.  This has never happened before and now upper level folk must
prepare for a potential revolution.  Juliette is missing from the
episode so no new information about life outside the silo.

Haven't got to the new season yet.

>
Gladiator II (theatrical) Ridley Scott's sequel to his 2000 historical
epic which picks up 16 years later with a pair of co-emperors (Jospeh
Quinn and Fred Hechinger) now ruling Rome.  It's not at all clear to me
how they came to power, but in their thirst for power they send their
general (Pedro Pascal) out to conquer new territory.  The movie opens
with a pretty good naval battle as Pascal captures the last free city in
Africa and takes prisoner Paul Mescal, who thinks he's going to be the
star of this movie and the next Gladiator.  What Mescal doesn't realize
is Denzel Washington is also in this movie and he intends to be *the*
star of Gladiator II!  Connie Nielsen also returns reprising her role as
Lucilla from the first movie and now wife to Pedro Pascal's character.
Overall, this was a pretty solid sequel.  I'll admit it's about 75%
rehash of the first movie.  The plot similarities are the same old story
of a soldier who becomes a slave, a slave who becomes a gladiator, a
gladiator who defies an empire.  But what makes this movie different
from the first one is Denzel Washington's star power.  He basically
comes on screen and goes, I see what you're doing retelling the story of
the first movie, but this is *my* movie now!  And the movie is all the
more enjoyable for it.  Did they even give him a script or just say show
up on set and say and do whatever you want to say and do?  There are
some really good fight scenes in this movie to rival the first one, but
all the repeat viewers will be going back to watch Denzel do his thing.

What did I watch?

I watched a couple of movies over the last few days. First up was 2012
a bat shit crazy apocalypse movie starring John Cusak as the hero with
an ex-wife of Amanda Peet that needs saving. The idea behind the movie
is that the sun is putting off extra neutrinos which begin to heat up
the earth's core faster and faster. Scientists realize the danger and
eventually convince the world leaders so they embark on a secret
mission to build arks to help part of humanity survive the coming
disaster as the earth's core heats up.

Needless to say things don't go exactly according to plan but Cusak's
character lucks out in meeting up with a crazy conspiracy nut while
camping with his kids (or attempting to) in Yellowstone. The nut
(Woody Harrelson) is convinced the world is ending and that the
government is conducting some sort of research there but he knows
about the arks and gives that over to Cusak's character just in time
as Yellowstone goes boom. Which begins the craziness as Cusak and his
kids are in a race against the end of the Earth as we know it to get
to his wife and get them all to the arks on the other side of the
Earth in China. Why China is the last place to get hit and why the
disaster seems to be following Cusak's character and his family..
Don't ask. Lots of great shots of cities falling into the Earth as
they race to safety.. Will they make it? Watch and see.

My other movie was THE EXPENDABLES. The first of the Stallone buddy
hero movies where there's lots of explosions and apparently an endless
supply of explosives that each of the EXPENDBLES can carry.

The plot is (does anyone really care what the plot is?) that the group
is hired to take out a petty dictator on a remote island but really
the goal is to take out a former CIA guy turned drug dealer who is
using the General and his island to produce massive quantities of
cocaine. Needless to say, things don't go as planned. (Is that a theme
of these movies. lol.) While Jet Li is in the movie they don't really
let him cut loose as while he does get into fights he is always on the
losing end. Meanwhile the other guys like Stallone and Statham are
allowed to prove their ability over and over again. Though I will say
they give Li plenty of time to prove his speed and agility. (See THE
ONE or ROMEO MUST DIE to see him show some of his skills.)

What did you watch?