Re: What Did You Watch? 2024-03-23 (Saturday)

On 3/23/2024 9:03 AM, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
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X-MEN '97 (FIRST 3 EPISODES) | Film Threat Reviews:
Chris Gore and Alan Ng review episodes 1-3 of “X-Men '97,” now playing
on Disney+.
https://youtu.be/xqsPKwRAl5o?si=jI7qaEDVyJe_fQH7

 I was the right age for the original series and I was a total Marvel Zombie
(What can I say? the people who introduced me to comics were Marvel zombies,
they steered me away from everything else for a while). Back t
 

I still haven't finished watching the first episode.

THE UNEXPLAINED:
Several eps.
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QUIET ON SET: THE DARK SIDE OF KIDS TV:
"The Darkest Secret". A former child-star reveals how he survived abuse
at the hands of his acting coach. The harrowing account traces how he
met his abuser on set, the ways this coach upended the child's family
and the challenges faced when the actor sought out police.
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"Rising Stars, Rising Questions".In the 1990s, a new creator emerges at
Nickelodeon: showrunner Dan Schneider, who adds fun and mentorship to
children's television. He promotes emerging talent like Amanda Bynes,
but other female writers work in a toxic and sexist environment.
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Holy crap! That was saddening and angrifiying!

 As a 90s kid who grew up with The Amanda Show, All That, and Drake and Josh,
this was hard to watch. I certainly never connected any of the goofy things
happening to anything sexual or inappropriate as a kid, but eve
 I read Jennette McCurdy's book and while most of it is about her horrible
abusive stage mom, she also talked a lot about Dan Schneider, who she always
called "The Creator" and it lines up with what we heard here. He
 The fact that they had two sexual predators on a set

Possibly three...  They didn't talk much about him, but there was a third guy.
filled with children is

just insane, while I don't know if Dan hired those guys specifically because
he knew what they were, I feel like shitty people tend to find
 Knowing what happened to Drake Bell explains so much, that was brutal to
hear. Its so sad that he went through so many terrible things and it seems
like he never got help, and then the cycle of abuse just continued.
 Uggg shut up internet people. How can you watch a whole documentary series
about how hard child stars had it and then proceed to bully them online for
not responding to this clearly awful situation in a way that you
 

I watched:
Hollywood Shuffle (blu-ray) 1987 comedy written, produced, directed by, and starring Robert Townsend as a struggling actor trying to get a role that's not a stereotype.  This is my first time watching this since I'm guessing the 80s. The movie holds up great and has an excellent commentary by Townsend who tells lots of great stories about the making of the movie.  He points out a lot of the farfetched things that happen in the movie really happened to him right down to White people teaching him how to be Black for a movie role.  It's no surprise that stuff was really happening, but he details a pretty humiliating experience where afterwards it motivated him and his friend Keenen Ivory Wayans to make this movie.  Keenen Ivory Wayans cowrote and costars in the movie, but Townsends talks about one scene that Keenen was supposed to be in, but Townsend fired him from the sketch because Keenen missed rehearsal.  So many good stories!  He also how they were able to make the movie with no money by renting the camera for one day use on a Friday...They'd pick it up on a Thursday.  Forget to return it on Friday and keep using it over the weekend.  And "One of the first things I learned as an independent filmmaker is to find a location where the police can't see you. If the police can't see you, it's a good location."
The Player (blu-ray) 1992 comedy directed by Robert Altman and starring Tim Robbins as a Hollywood producer who accidentally kills a writer who he thought was sending him threatening notes then gets into a relationship with the man's ex.  Holds up great.
Bowfinger (blu-ray) 1999 comedy directed by Frank Oz and starring Steve Martin (who also wrote the script) as a Hollywood producer schemes to make a movie with Hollywood's biggest star (Eddie Murphy) by secretly filming him and having the rest of the cast run up to him on the street and say their lines.  The movie holds up great.
Entourage (blu-ray) 2015 comedy based on the HBO series of the same name about a Hollywood star as his friends.  "Vince" who was the star of the series has used his fame to bully the studio into letting him direct his next movie but then needs more money to finish the film, but is reluctant to show the rough cut.  I remember liking the series, and I thought I liked the movie when I saw it in 2015.  But I guess too much time has gone by because I really couldn't relate to the characters anymore and pretty much didn't care.
3 Body Problem (Netflix) I binged through the rest of the series about a pending alien invasion of Earth.  SPOILERS!
Spoiler Space
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"Judgment Day"  Episode 5 - In the present day Jonathan Pryce is a billionaire on Earth who has known about the alien invasion since the 70s and has been working to make to make it happen.  He is in direct communication with them and reads them stories and answers their questions.  Then one day during a story he explains to the aliens that the stories are just made up, not real.  The aliens are confused at first because they don't have that concept in their culture.  Once Pryce explains the concept of fiction/deception to the aliens they say, "A liar is someone who cannot be trusted.  We cannot coexist with liars. We are afraid of you." Then they cut off communication. They also stop protecting their human allies.
Meanwhile Benedict Wong and his people are actually really good at what they do, and now aware an alien invasion will arrive at Earth in 400 years, and are making plans to deal with it.  As his boss (Liam Cunningham) says,  "We've got 400 years to come up with a plan." There's a scene where the group trying to stop the alien invasion needs to take out a tanker ship where Pryce and his followers are living. They need to do it in a way that doesn't give them warning or time to destroy any data they might have on board.  And the way they do it is like nothing I've ever seen before.  From my perspective it pretty much destroyed the ship too, so I'm not sure why gas wouldn't have been better.  That being said, it was a sight to witness as everyone on board started to brutally die having no idea why or how.  However, humanity's win is brief.  At the end of the episode, the aliens initiate direct communication with Cunningham's character.  And explain to him that in 400 yeas time humanity will be more advance than the aliens and would easily be able to defeat them.  Therefore, they then inform him they have the ability to monitor everything everywhere and they will kneecap humanity and prevent any future development.  They then proceed to broadcast a world wide message on every screen that humans are "bugs" and appear to engulf the planet in a shield.  Roll credits.
"The Stars Our Destination" Episode 6.  News breaks of an alien invasion fleet coming to conquer Earth and the general populace doesn't take it very well.  Although the aliens had a lot of secret human followers, and now they have humans who are publicly willing to help.  Things weren't *as* bad as they looked at the end of episode 5.  The aliens ability to directly impact Earth (outside of messing with communications or making people see things) is minimal.  Nevertheless, the governments bring together all the best minds to develop a plan to fight back.  They know the aliens have the ability to see and hear everything they do so they'll be no element of surprise.  "Let them listen."  First up how to achieve 1% light speed so they can send a probe to intercept the alien fleet.  And beginning development of a base on the moon as well as a fleet of human ships.  Some of the scientists insist the technologies needed are impossible to and given they have 400 years why not wait a few decades to develop them.  But Liam Cunningham's character has no intention of dying without making a contribution to the now planet wide war effort.
"Only Advance" - Episode 7 and "Wallfacer" Episode 8 (the season finale).  I binged and the final two episodes blurred together. Humanity begins to make preparations for a generational war against the aliens.  There are 3 main plans put into place.  One is construction of the moon base and space fleet.  The second plan is to send a human brain in cryogenic freeze to make personal contact with the aliens.  The hope is the aliens will pick up the ship carrying the brain and reconstruct the body.  And also not torture the person for eternity or worse.  This may not be the best plan, but options are limited.  And the third plan gives three individuals the power to develop any method to fight the aliens they wish but never divulge any details.  These people will be known as "wallfacers."  Since the aliens can monitor anything everywhere on the planet (although there are some practical limitations to this) The wallfacer's plans will be kept strictly in their minds, but their orders to execute their plans must be obeyed.  I *really* liked that concept.  Unfortunately the series ends without a resolution.  It's not a cliffhanger, but the story ends in present day and the aliens are still 400 years away.  I *really* hope for a season 2.