Re: What Did You Watch? 2024-11-22 (Friday)

On 11/23/2024 8:35 AM, Ian J. Ball wrote:

Yesterday, I shifted gears and watched neither soaps nor a movie. In the evening, I made a "census" of many of the recent streaming TV shows I should add to "my list", and also some movies on the various streamers I may want to watch.
 Basically, that led me to the decision to start watching a streaming TV series now, but one that I could watch "semi-casually" (IOW, not feel the need to necessarily watch it *every* consecutive day until I finished).
 So I settled on:
 Lioness (Pee+) - First two episodes of season #1.
    This series strikes me as being very "Taylor Sheridan" - despite having two female leads, it's a very "macho" show.
    <s>Gamora</s> <s>Eva from "Center Stage"</s> (starring Amanda Schull as a baby! it's on the Tubi right now!!) Zoe Saldana stars as "Joe", a... well, they never really do come out and say what she is! I guess she's CIA. But they never say what her background was - like whether she was ex-military, or what... Anyway, as the series opens Joe's most recent asset gets herself killed by ISIS in Syria because of a hidden tattoo she didn't disclose - Joe calls in the missile strike that kills the asset. Meh.
    Meanwhile, Laysla De Oliveira lives a life of not-so-quiet desperation, and signs up for the Marines. In typical over-the-top Taylor Sheridan fashion, De Oliveira's Cruz (that's her first name?!!) scores in, like, the Top 0.1% of Marine recruits, so the higher ups quickly boot her into special forces stuff.
    Then she crosses Joe's path.
    Joe & co. (which includes a very butch Jill Wagner, as BTR warned - I wondered if she was just season #1, but apparently Wagner is back in season #2, and Wagner is an E.P. on the show, along with Zaldana) set up an operation - to take down a richie rich Arab terrorist financier by planting Cruz (who they claim is half-Arab) with the financier's daughter (Stephanie Nur).
    In subplots, we see Joe's family, a child oncologist doctor husband (Dave Annable) - why go into this line of work?!! - her rebellious teen older daughter (who seems like she needs to given away to human traffickers 'cos she's so awful!!), and her precious younger daughter (who disappears in the second episode, and whom I wondered about being memory-holed, but apparently the younger daughter is just recurring).
    This is decent stuff, certainly watchable. But it looks like I made the correct call with this one, as I can watch it casually, and not be put off with myself if I don't watch it for a day or two...
 

If I jump back into this show I'll probably have to restart at season 1 and rewatch the pilot again.

What did you watch?

I watched:
Star Trek: Lower Decks (Paramount+) "Of Gods and Angles" - The crew help mediate a pieces between a society made up of floating orbs at war with a society made up of floating cubes.  It wasn't as bad as this sounds, but it wasn't that good either.
Cruel Intentions (Amazon Prime) - "Gamma" - Episode 3 is a bit of a step up from episode 2.   There is still the ongoing plot of trying to get the VP's daughter to join Caroline's sorority with her stepbrother Lucien (why did they change the name?!?) helping in the seduction efforts.  But they were back to destroying someone because they could with lots of help from Blaise.
Tommy (TCM) 1975 musical directed by Ken Russell based on The Who's concept album.  I know I saw this movie on TV once before a long time ago, but I'm not sure if I actually watched it all the way through from beginning to end.  I do remember except for "Pinball Wizard," not liking it.  Anyway, I really wanted to give the movie a second chance.  And as it turns out, I actually kind of liked this time.  I think the better presentation helped a lot.  This is not a movie meant to be watched full frame on a tiny TV screen.  But one plot point I was shocked by was the character Tommy, was not actually deaf and blind.  The song "Pinball Wizard" has been lying to me all these years!  I thought the character was born blind or had an accident or something and it turns out he just decided one day he wasn't going to see, hear or talk anymore until another day when he decided he would again.  I kept thinking couldn't any half competent doctor tell he was faking, then Jack Nicholson pops up playing a doctor who says all the tests show he can clearly see and hear.  It took to or more years to figure that out?!?  I'm also not entirely convinced Tina Turner's character was just a drug dealer. Sure, that's what the lyrics claim, but if you watch what's happening on screen, she was selling more than just drugs!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBN7nG8RDlw