Me and Mrs jeffl watched the first three episodes of Rivals last night. Quite good mindless fun and interesting seeing actors you've grown up with being all middle aged.
We're definitely getting old though, as we said the sex scenes got a bit boring and we're too frequent and distracted from the story a bit ?
Posted : 02/02/2025 9:45 am
The Wire is one of my all time favorite series but the last sesson is truly awful
Yes, it's really obvious that David Simon had some axes to grind about the Baltimore Sun, where he used to work. If all that nonsense was edited out, it would be a huge improvement. Still a great show though.
Southland and We Own This City are both excellent too, if you're into shows that aren't copaganda.
Posted : 02/02/2025 10:50 am
Might take a look on ebay myself!
Check out World of Books too. They often have great prices on 2nd hand box sets. It's where I got The Wire from, and when they arrived the set looked brand new (minus the cellophane wrapper).
Posted : 02/02/2025 12:08 pm
fasthaggis and fasthaggis reacted
Probably been mentioned before, but we've marched through Diplomat on Netflix, entertaining political drama that full of politicians who aren't all strictly egomaniacs (so quite unbelievable really).
Posted : 03/02/2025 11:41 am
Might take a look on ebay myself!
Check out World of Books too. They often have great prices on 2nd hand box sets.
And your local charity shops, I've picked up a load of DVD's recently for no more than a quid each.
Posted : 03/02/2025 12:17 pm
I rewatched S1 of Star Trek Strange New Worlds. The best Trek show since DS9. And it doesn't take itself too seriously.
I finished Arcane S1 over the weekend. I have no suitable words to describe just how good this show is. Highly recommended. For me the best animated tv show/movie ever.
Posted : 03/02/2025 12:44 pm
A new treat for Scandi-lovers - Fatal Crossing on Walter Presents. Apparently a Norwegian production, but actually takes place in Denmark. TV adaptation of a popular book and so far very good in the usual Scandi way.
Posted : 03/02/2025 3:46 pm
I've got a mate who lives largely offline; I give him suggestions on series to watch out for and he just swings by the local Oxfam shop and picks up the box sets as they become available. I guess there's a lifespan on that model of consumption but it's working for him.
Posted : 03/02/2025 9:31 pm
The Wire is the most epic, Shakespearean tv tragedy I've ever seen. Although the last season at the newspaper wasn't as great as the others, the final moments of some of the characters - the kid going off with the heroin horse men, Marlow not being able to let his violence go, amazing.
Also, I'd never have guessed some of those actors were English at the time. They've become considerably more famous now of course.
Think I’ve got the wire box set on dvd but no way of playing it - never saw/watched the series either so might stick it on the classifieds rather than dumping it in charity shop
Posted : 03/02/2025 11:46 pm
Think I’ve got the wire box set on dvd but no way of playing it
Assuming you have a Mac or PC, you could buy a cheap USB DVD drive and watch them on your computer/cast them to your TV. You could also rip them as video files to make it easier. However, if you're going to rip them, you might as well just download them from a torrent site - you've already paid for them, you're just letting someone else do the work of ripping them.
Posted : 04/02/2025 3:42 am
fasthaggis and fasthaggis reacted
re The Wire, i'd love for them to retro remove the clunky mini flashback in the first episode (i think) that shows the audience that the dead body is a guy from earlier in the episode.
Im enjoying American Primeavel but same with any netflix series will it get its Alan Partridge second series?
EDIT - was watching a Youtube clip most upsetting deaths on the Wire and Chris killing that delivery woman . In fact, there's loads of them isn't there 🙁
Posted : 04/02/2025 3:13 pm
Assuming you have a Mac or PC, you could buy a cheap USB DVD drive and watch them on your computer/cast them to your TV. You could also rip them as video files to make it easier. However, if you’re going to rip them, you might as well just download them from a torrent site – you’ve already paid for them, you’re just letting someone else do the work of ripping them.
Nah, more hassle than it’s worth to watch a few hours of the series and I’d never use the dvd drive again - would a drive even work with my old iMac, don’t think it’s got software to play dvds so that’s another thing. A mate gave me the box set for a present years ago so it’s not as if I bought it.
Posted : 04/02/2025 5:48 pm
Well if you're not keen to keep the set, let us know - I reckon you'd find a buyer!
Posted : 04/02/2025 6:26 pm
Under the Banner of Heaven.
I highly recommend this.
Started it last night.
Not bad,but with all The Wire chat, it now makes me want to re-watch 'The True Detectives' (first series)
Posted : 04/02/2025 6:42 pm
Well if you’re not keen to keep the set, let us know – I reckon you’d find a buyer!
When the new forum/classifieds are working I’ll list it
Posted : 04/02/2025 6:54 pm
This thread came good with Mr Inbetween which i'd never heard of and is my current best thing on telly. We're not yet through S3 and I'm missing it already.
(Though the song will stay with me. Which I thought was obvious but hadn't occurred to my wife "you've got to, accentuate the positive; eliminate the negative; hang on, to the affirmative; and don't mess with... )
Posted : 04/02/2025 10:58 pm
would a drive even work with my old iMac, don’t think it’s got software to play dvds so that’s another thing
Posted : 05/02/2025 4:21 am
^ yes it does “just work” thank you very much , bought it in 2019, never done anything to it, never had an issue with anything, think I’ve only actually switched it off 3 or 4 times when I was moving my desk.
No backups in 1500+ days of use, try that with a pc
Bring it on all you pc fan boys ;o)
Posted : 05/02/2025 5:05 am
But it can't play a DVD. Really?
Posted : 05/02/2025 7:27 am
'On Call' is an easy to watch street cops in Long Beach, Cal. Got an End of Watch vibe to it.
Posted : 05/02/2025 7:41 am
But it can’t play a DVD. Really?
Just type 'DVD player' into spotlight and voila. Its not a very prominent app on the system because Macs haven't had internal drives for over a decade but plug in any external devise and it'll play fine
Posted : 05/02/2025 8:26 am
Enjoying Tokyo Swindler. Probably one for the Japanophiles.
Posted : 05/02/2025 8:30 am
Just type ‘DVD player’ into spotlight and voila. Its not a very prominent app on the system because Macs haven’t had internal drives for over a decade but plug in any external devise and it’ll play fine
There you go, problem solved.
Posted : 05/02/2025 10:13 am
There you go, problem solved.
Never owned a standalone dvd player, but I guess there was a dvd player in my 2008 MacBook……dunno?…only ever ripped cds with it
Posted : 05/02/2025 5:18 pm
Gave 'The Gorge' a try on Apple+ . A lot better than I expected, a bit Lovecraftian in places, plus a shot of High Force at the end.
Posted : 16/02/2025 9:33 pm
I saw Elevation on Amazon. Yes it's another brain-out action film with enough plot holes to make Swiss cheese look like a Raptor scale, and so riddled with tropes & clichés it's amazing how they fitted anything else in.
Oh, Chekhov's gun looks a bit ratty, does it? - 10 minutes later - Yep! There we go.
If nothing else, it should get an Oscar for Best Display Of Nostrils for that one scene. I was expecting her to sneeze at any moment, quite impressive.
There's a 10-second mid-credits scene and they even manage to fit a plot hole into that.
Anyway, that said, it's actually quite good. The acting is good and that definitely helps as well. Enjoyed it and looking forward to the sequel.
Hollywood! This is how to do a brainless action film. See also: Back in Action for how not to do it.
Posted : 16/02/2025 11:05 pm
just finished mr inbetween. best series we've seen for a long time, thoroughly enjoyed it. if i could trust the forums spoiler tags id ask for interpretations of the ending, although i think we'd all see it the same way.
Posted : 17/02/2025 7:54 am
House sitting just now,so binged the second season of 'The Recruit' an easy enough watch,it rolls along .
Posted : 17/02/2025 9:01 am
The Curse (Paramount+) - not a recommendation, I watched the first episode, it was awful, am I missing something leaving it at this point? Note: watched purely because Emma(Emily) Stone.
Yellowjackets series 3, the main reason we have Paramount+ at the moment is going well after the first 2 episodes, strongly recommended by my wife who loves it.
Posted : 17/02/2025 10:28 am
Watched “The Gorge” on Apple TV, don’t bother as it’s shite, unless you’re an Anya Taylor-Joy fan which in that case it’s good.
Posted : 17/02/2025 6:22 pm
Watched “The Gorge” on Apple TV, don’t bother as it’s shite, unless you’re an Anya Taylor-Joy fan which in that case it’s good.
I thought it looked shite enough to watch for brainless entertainment that's good for taking the piss out of but doing the washing up by hand is more entertaining.
Posted : 17/02/2025 11:33 pm
Thanks for the Mr Inbetween recommendation - best thing I've seen in ages, it's like Colin From Accounts meets Scarface.
Posted : 18/02/2025 10:47 am
Pauly reacted
Watched “The Gorge” on Apple TV, don’t bother as it’s shite, unless you’re an Anya Taylor-Joy fan which in that case it’s good.
That's disappointing, the reviews and trailers suggest it's OK, I was looking forward to watching it at some point but ideally without buying and then cancelling an Apple TV subscription. I had a free trial of it a while ago and the cancellation process to prevent them automatically billing me was insane, not going through all that again!
Posted : 18/02/2025 11:47 am
Yeah I also didn’t enjoy The Gorge. Acting was poor, I couldn’t care what happened to the main characters. Ridiculous premise. I don’t mind brain out tv, but this was just nonsense.
Posted : 18/02/2025 11:56 am
Yeah, I think my advantage was having very very low expectations of it. 🙂
Posted : 18/02/2025 12:31 pm
New series of the White Lotus: S3E1 looks just as really really good as the previous series. Best thing on telly by a long way (and having finished My Brilliant Friend, which was er brilliant, the only reason of which I'm aware to keep NowTV a bit longer).
Posted : 18/02/2025 12:45 pm
New series of the White Lotus: S3E1 looks just as really really good as the previous series.
I second this. It's the second best show on right now after Severance.
Posted : 18/02/2025 1:47 pm
after Severance
Ah yeah. Forgot about that. V different, v good. And I think that's all we have to watch atm, plus Am I Being Unreasonable which despite Daisy May King is really good.
Posted : 18/02/2025 3:03 pm
i think with squid games, as it's netflix's sacred cow they probably wanted to truncate the final season (as is the convention these days) to milk it and build anticipation etc
the way S2 ends definitely suggests that season '2' and '3' are effectively the same series. I think season 3 is in June 2025?
Just finished it. It is ok. I think 2 and 3 are/were filmed back to back and being released separately because money, probably.
Way too very much is rehashed from the first series. Ya, I know, it is the same thing, but again and different, but you know, it isn't different enough.
The first one or two (I forget now, that's how good they were) episodes are total filler, no contribution to the plot. You could entirely leave them out and start at the start of "the games" and you would not miss anything.
Some of the characters have no reason for being there. The cheesy rapper? Why not, I dunno, keep rapping, instead of committing drug addled suicide? The front man in 001 outfit? yeah, er, why not, I dunno, do the regular front man job instead of risking life in the arena?
The side plots are, er, um, well... The ex police guy on the boat isn't doing squat... The soldier in the organ harvesting thing... nope, nothing really doing there either...
As often with sequels, less would have been more.
Posted : 18/02/2025 6:18 pm
I don't think it's been mentioned yet.. Cassandra (Netflix) is worth a watch if you like Black Mirror type stuff.
Posted : 18/02/2025 10:50 pm
Bit of rewatching but Jack Irish series on Netflix, not as good as the books but pretty good for TV.
Posted : 20/02/2025 6:10 pm
S3 of Reacher (Amazon Prime) is good so far. First 3 episodes are available, after that it's one per week.
Posted : 20/02/2025 6:32 pm
Got Zero Day lined up for the weekend. Good review in the Guardian - which is not always a key indicator.
Posted : 20/02/2025 10:14 pm
