#shinylitwick watches tv shows

[shinylitwick94]

Frankly surprised the fandom is being so positive about Ahsoka

To me personally it's the most 'meh' show since BoBF.

I'm not really sold on Rosario as Ahsoka now that she has extended screentime rather than just a cameo - just feels very flat. And the dialogue is not really doing it for me either for the most part.

And on a more nitpicky fan level, I find the whole 'let's train a non-force sensitive' thing dumb. Yes, yes the Force is in everything blablabla, but if you're literally just teaching her how to swordfight better I fail to see how that relates to jedi anything. (Yes I know Chirrut Imwe but he also literally belongs to a different Force religion)

[shinylitwick94]

Eh, kind of underwhelmed by Ahsoka so far, but we'll see

It's not necessarily bad, just kind of indifferent. And personally I rather dislike the curveball with Sabine. The actress is doing great though.

[shinylitwick94]

Kenobi Ep.6 thoughts before the internet gets to me

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Honestly? Almost absolutely perfect. Loved it to pieces.

I’ll need a couple of rewatches for it all to sink in, but a few thoughts:

- I did not expect them to actually let Obi-Wan get a clear win in the fight. Given the circumstances, I love it, it allows him to hit Vader enough that he ceases to be the monster for the audience and becomes Anakin again; Vader with the cracked mask and OW apologising had me in tears and Anakin somewhow simultaneously absolving him and making it worse; ‘Goodbye, Darth’  is a bigger burn than Mustafar

- Th fun action bits of the fight were also fun, great to see OW back in shape and kicking ass, in love with that stupid pose, you all know the one

-They’re doubling down HARD on the ‘Anakin made his own fucked up choices’ and I’m here for it - the entire purpose of Reva here is this basically, and like in the previous episode the parallels, while heavy handed, were well done;

- Reva was very good in this one and I loved the choice to have her face Luke alone, and choose to back down alone - there’s no one there to pressure her, no Vader, no OW, no Inquisitors - just her and this child and her choices. Predictable? Sure, but this entire show was predictable to anyone with half a brain but that doesn’t make it bad. It just means it’s delivering on beats it has clearly set up.

- Leia in what is basically a cross between her ANH outfit and a jedi outfit was wonderful; love the holster and what it symbolises in terms of her choices moving forward; seeing Bail and Breha was a delight; loved that we got to have some closure on Ben and Leia, even if it is all a little tinged with the tragedy of what will happen later (and of the past of course with OW’s words about Padme and Anakin)

-Owen and Beru defending the homestead! Loved it! Unfailingly brave those two, and good to hear Owen expressly claim Luke as his own

- Vader getting chewed out by Sheev for obsessing about Kenobi had me in stitches

- Owen and Ben somewhat reconciling was also good, and Obi-Wan in pristine jedi white robes was lovely to see;

- ‘Hello there’ was done in such a way that I can’t even complain about that bit of fanservice

- Qui-Gon was another bit of expected fanservice, which was ok, though I do wish we’d had a little more time here, but I understand why they chose to place it at the end of OW’s journey, it makes more sense that way

- I know there are rumours going around about a second season, but to me this is great as it is and tells a nice, complete, cohesive story. I would prefer if it is left alone, but I understand in the current media climate that won’t necessarily be possible.

Nitpicks that don’t matter but angry youtubers who make money from rageclicks will care a lot about I’m sure:

- floating rocks attack looked a little silly, i wished Obi-Wan and Vader had talked a little more, OW gets to Tattooine a liiittle too quickly, Luke sees Reva’s lightsaber, but then he hits his head 5 minutes later and will forget about it obviously,

[shinylitwick94]

Ok, so Wheel of Time initial thoughts before I get too influenced by the wider internet

I liked these first few episodes!

I’m not a huge WoT fan, but I know enough about the characters and setting to care about adaptation issues here and there, but for the most part I was fine with the changes or actively in favour of them.

It’s not groundbreaking amazing tv, but it is a pretty solid show.

It’s not Shannara, it’s not Eragon. It’s not GoT or LOTR either (please stop comparing everything to those two). It does manage, at least so far, to hold its ground and do its own thing. I would at this stage put it alongside the Witcher in my own personal ranking of fantasy shows. Good, but not extraordinary, and with some issues that will hopefully be polished in later seasons.

If you’re not allergic to fantasy tropes (I understand, personally, I’m allergic to superheros), I would recommend you check it out.

Proper thoughts under the cut because spoilers (books and show)

I think cutting the prologue was a bad idea. I get that for some reason people in the anglosphere seem to hate prologues, but this one specifically was what kept me reading through an otherwise very bland and generic Eye of the World.

Knowing upfront why the dragon is so dangerous raises the stakes a lot right from the get-go, and seeing the madness up close also makes us understand why they go after male channelers so hard. It also ties the ‘chosen one’ to something tangible and not just to the chosen one concept. But ok, whatever, they chose not to do it.

Still on the topic of the Dragon, I personally love the gender-neutral dragon. Few things irritated me more in-story than the girls not being ta’veren. I get that that was partially to keep the ‘surprise’ in the books about which of the boys was the dragon, but frankly there was never any surprise in the books, since it was blatantly obvious from the fact that the book is from Rand’s POV, that the dragon is Rand. Like, there’s no reason why Nyneave with all that she accomplishes later should not be ta’veren when Perrin is. So I’m glad they’re put on the same footing here.

I liked hte changes with Perrin. I’m sure this will be very controversial in some circles, but I’ll take anything that actually gives him a reason for his broodiness.

I still have trouble with the LOTR references, even though I know why they’re there, and I understand that it was just the way things were at the time. Every time the Third Age and Mountains of the Mist get mentioned I am paralyzed by second hand embarrassment.

I liked ep 2 and 3 more than ep 1, I feel like 1 was a bit clunkier in some ways.

There’s an irritating amount of stilted dialogue, especially in Ep 1 village scenes, and the direction feels a bit basic, but it’s not annoying enough to make me not watch.

I kind of expected the show would move extremely fast, but I didn’t think it would be as far as it is by episode 3. It makes sense from a perspective of this show surviving at all (it needs to go through the EotW stuff fast, and get into the things that actually make WoT interesting), but it does leave you with relatively little time to breathe.

Rosamund Pike as Moiraine is absolutely perfect, and the rest of the main cast is amazing too. Lan and Nyneave have a great on-screen dynamic, Egwene and Rand feel just the right kind of awkward and annoying, and Mat and Perrin are both more likeable than their book versions at this stage.

Not very cohertent thoughts, but I’ve enjoyed it so far, and I’m definitely going to follow this one all the way through.

EDIT: On the fridging. I agree, it is undeniably fridging, no question about it, and that’s not good. But it’s worked ok in this story, and the story has plenty of other female characters who do have their own stories and agencies and are very definitely non-fridgeable. Also its implications for Perrin’s developement are significant and not just there to make us feel bad. So, i can live with it.

[shinylitwick94]

Final thoughts on The Rings of Power season 1 while still fresh

Spoilers for the whole season and book stuff

It was worse than I hoped but better than I feared, and overall a solid 6/10 for me. Maybe it will even be a 7/10 if in the morning I’m feeling nicer.

There were things I absolutely loved but also things I hated so so much.

There’s definite potential for future seasons if they clean up some of their mistakes, but also some things that will be hard to fix overall.

The bad

The elves will fade in 3 months story. Like, I get the elves fading, being afraid and wanting to stop it. I can work with that. The mithril myth is still ridiculous but I could work with that. The only way I could justify the 3 months was if it was Sauron’s idea. Which apparently it clearly wasn’t. So, I kind of hate that part.

How long they dragged out the Sauron thing. I’m actually surprisingly fine with Halbrand being Sauron. It’s the amount of time we spent dealing with this and the fact that it sidetracked the whole season that really bothers me. I’d rather have known from the start and watched him play everyone around him. Likewise, I’d rather they got the Stranger’s storyline moving faster instead of making it drag so we could have Sauron reveal drama on the final episode.

Pacing issues. The series is all over the place in terms of pacing and rhythm. Sometimes it’s fine, but other times it’s also just plain weird and distracting.

Weird logistic choices in key action moments. Sadoc in this episode is a great example - he’s dead, but then he isn’t, but then he is again? What? Just confusing and unnecessary, and there were moments like that in other episodes too.

The uncalled for and bizarre lore-breaking. In particular the weird mithril thing, but also more importantly for this episode, the contraction with what is said in canon about Galadriel and Gil-Galad mistrusting Annatar. Also Annatar as a whole because I’m assuming he can’t be involved in the forging of the other rings as per canon like this? The Celeborn thing as a whole... Very strange and unconvincing choices. Also some good ones, mind you, but the bad ones naturally stick out more.

And the number one offender: the sheer insufferable amount of PJ movie references. The first few episodes were fine, but these last ones? They just would not stop quoting, either visually or in the script. And a reference here and there is fine but like this it’s just painful and cringey and the main thing putting me off this show.

The good

The acting is wonderful throughout, and the dwarves in particular are complete scene stealers. Wonderful job by all the actors, especially with a script that sometimes really was not helping them (Galadriel and Elrond in particular).

The worldbuilding and the visuals are amazing, colorful(!!!everyone is not wearing black and brown and the screen is not blue/grey all the time, take note other fantasy shows!!!), textured, and it just looks spectacular overall. The costumes are also out of this world and sometimes even quite clever in how they relate to the characters and their backgrounds. I think people make some very fair criticisms of this show, but ‘it doesn’t look/feel like ME’ is one I 100% disagree with. 

The soundtrack is also spectacular. Not as iconic as the PJ movies, perhaps, but that’s an impossibly high bar to clear. The Valinor theme, the one that plays in the Adar chase, the numenor theme, all of the dwarven themes, nampat, the wandering days song, so so many wonderful tracks.

For all that they make some weird lore choices, they also have some nice and clever moments of using it well, in particular in Elrond and Durin’s interactions (so much about Earendil...), and in that amazing conversation between Galadriel and Adar. The whole character of Adar, really.

Speaking of which, it turns out I actually love most of the new characters. Adar is very obviously the best of them, but I also really enjoyed the Harfoots which I expected to hate, and Arondir and Theo. Even Mr Totally-not-Sauron, who makes me want to do a rewatch with that in mind. (Seriously, once we do find out Halbrand is Sauron? He’s doing some A+ Sauron mindfuckery).

There are also specific scenes and moments which are just wonderful, and I don’t just mean the admittedly cool Mt Doom fireworks, but some of the scenes in Numenor, the dwarves overall, Galadriel and Theo, many of Arondir’s scenes even if I wasn’t too sold on the romance, the Harfoots especially early on.

There’s a lot to like here, but also a lot of work to be done.

They NEED to stop doing shout-outs to the PJ movies. I was watching with a mixed audience and the normal people didn’t get the references, and the people who did get the references were all getting extremely annoyed by them. Just STOP.

They also need to tighten up the pacing and the writing quite a bit. There’s some storylines and choices that don’t make sense, and far too much was sacrificed this season to keep us guessing about Sauron (Harfoots especially).

I have no idea where they’re going next season, and they have a lot of time to work on it, but I do hope that it improves on some of the stuff that has been iffy.

I also sincerely hope the fandom calms down a bit by the time the next season comes out, because this has been a grueling month and a half so far.

And if it doesn’t, at least we got some gorgeous visuals and the most adorable take on Elrond ever, so that’s a win for me.

[shinylitwick94]

RoP ep. 7 thoughts beneath the cut

This is probably my least favorite episode after episode 5, and that one set a high bar for WTF are they doing

The bad

-I have been VERY generous so far, but throwing my man Teleporno under the bus like that might actually be the thing that makes me walk away from this show. There’s a good chance he’s Hollywood dead and he’ll show up in later seasons but whyyy it’s so unnecessary

- And speaking of unnecessary and the likely reason why Teleporno got thrown under the bus: the heavily hinted GaladrielxHalbrand thing. UGH, UGH. WHY. We don’t need this, the story doesn’t need this. It pisses me off to no end

- Radioactive mithril and the elf solarium thing. While easily the best scenes in this episode and some of the best scenes in the show come from the elf-dwarf thing, the plot basis for this continues to be utterly insane

- That house burning scene felt super contrived. It would have been better to just have the same consequences come directly from the blast. But whatever, this one is a small nitpick

- Durin’s Bane. Uncalled for.

The good

- My god but the acting in the dwarf-elf scenes can make me forget that entire plot is bonkers. They are absolutely killing it and I could watch Elrond and Durin interact all day

- Harfoots were solid, and fun, if a tiny bit cheesy, and I’m sticking by my blue wizard bets

- Galadriel and Theo were a wonderful dynamic that I wish had got more screentime than the weird Halbrand thing

- Elendil continues to be absolutely wonderful, though I wonder what they’re going to do with Isildur stranded in ME since we know he can’t be dead

The huh?

-The Disa thing. Idk if it was intentional or not, but those last scenes just came off as extremely suspicious and Lady Macbethish

- Isildur - we all know he’s not dead, what is this charade about?

- Miriel - I can see what they’re probably going to do with it, and I would have been fine if it had been a direct result of the blast, but like this it was just odd

- Durin has a brother???

Last bets on character identities:

- Halbrand: Sauron or Witchking, leaning heavily towards Sauron

If Sauron is not Halbrand, then we haven’t seen him yet

- The Stranger: Blue wizard

- Shady lady with the staff: The other blue wizard

- Adar: Teleporno

[shinylitwick94]

Obi-Wan Kenobi thoughts before internet influence

- Liked this one a lot, and more than the previous one;

-Really loved how they handled Obi-Wan and his approach to the situation they’re in - contrasting his approach to Anakin’s in both the present and the past

- Also liked Reva, even though it was pretty much what we had expected (at least those of us who understand how storytelling works...)

- Leia was a bit eh this episode, which she’d had something either more substantial or more clearly related to her skills to do,

- Sad to see Tala go, I really liked her!

- The negotiations with OW and Reva were great, as was Obi-Wan getting into combat mode

- Obi-Wan seeing all those lightsabers... :(

- Stupidly OP Vader is always fun and I’m sure that at least will make the internet happy, though I didn’t quite get the switcheroo with the ships

- Wondering now if the Obi-Wan v Vader match will actually take place on Tatooine and whether Bail shows up to pick up Leia at some point

- We heard you all want Clone Wars flashbacks...so here’s some Attack of the Clones flashbacks has to be one of the funniest pettiest moves ever. Disney appreciates the mullet is all I’m saying

- I wonder how well those flashbacks pass to an audience that hasn’t watched the movies a million times; to me it’s pretty obvious that Hayden at least is a lot older, but idk if someone more casual would notice

[shinylitwick94]

Kenobi ep IV thoughts, before internet corruption

I liked it, but less than the previous ones.

Probably because this was more go-go-go action and less introspection. I’m guessing we’ll have our slowdown episode next week.

I did love Obi-Wan slowly getting back into Jedi-ing - actually using the force and his lightsaber.

Also loved the creepy jedi tomb. Seems exactly the sort of petty evil thing our man Palpatine would do. Makes me wish we could see what has become of the jedi temple on Coruscant.

Tala is IMHO a very convincing imperial officer and I liked how her scenes played out.

Leia and Reva had some good moments - I don’t remember the young actress’ name, but she was channeling EP IV Leia so hard for me, she’s wonderful!

There were a few off moments in terms of action again - that scene where he’s telling her to hide but she clearly isn’t and the end bit with Leia hiding under the trenchcoat and the two ships was rather unconvincing. But eh, wonky action is never a hill I want to die on, there are more important things.

And now I’m going to go play Jedi: Fallen Order again.

[shinylitwick94]

Kenobi Ep 3 thoughts before the internet gets to me in full

SPOILER WARNING

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I watched this one on a plane so I had more trouble focusing on it, will have to rewatch later. Still, a few points:

- ANAKIN YOU PETTY SICK FUCK, damn that was hard to watch

- Obi-Wan is back to being the galaxy's punching bag and honestly I'm here for that

- I'm kind of glad that he totally failed at this fight? I assume there'll be another one later in the show, unless they're being VERY brave, but the Obi-Wan we've seen so far should indeed have been trashed by Vader

- 'Are you my real father?' Anakin having a fit somewhere probably

- But that aside I did love those little quiet conversations with him and Leia

- Quinlan lives! I'm sure some segments of the fandom are happy about that. And I did like seeing this sort of jedi underground railway operation. Although the more jedi survive the purge, the more ridiculous Luke and Leia's importance becomes IMHO, but there's no turning back from those decisions now.

- Inquisitor dialogue was a bit meh again, but I'm curious now if Reva thinks Leia is actually force sensitive

Anyway more thoughts later maybe

[shinylitwick94]

Late to this party by quite a few hours but I finally managed to watch the two Kenobi episodes

I can't figure out how to do cuts on mobile so here's your

SPOILER WARNING

So here's my thoughts, untainted by the internet as of yet:

- I FUCKING LOVE THIS SO FAR

- It hits all the beats we kind of expected it to hit and it does so WELL

- Opening on Order 66 is ouch - though I think this is more for Reva's character than Obi Wans

- Didn't think we'd get so much Alderaan and I'm here for it - Bail and Breha and Leia and it's all going to end so tragically ugh why am I a sucker for this kind of stuff

- Baby Leia is PERFECT - the actress does a great jkb and the writing for her is brilliant, to say nothing of her dynamic with Obi Wan

- So much sad Obi-Wan, all my dreams are coming true, sobbing and Qui-Gon meditation next please

- Love that he actually did bury the lightsaber in the desert, alongside Anakin's no less, and now that has bonus ST ressonance points too

- I like how clear they're being on the themes and goals of this thing even if it's a little heavy handed sometimes (it's SW so that's to be expected) - much rather have that than the unclear mess we ended up with in BOBF

- I really like Reva so far and I think it's hilarious that Obi-Wan keeps picking up darksiders who are obsessed with him in every single continuity

- Owen bit was also what was expected but good and I liked what followed

- Obi Wan taking quite a few hits in those fights is great as a reminder that he IS seriously out of practice

- Cool that we're out of Tatooine and Daiyu and have passed most trailer material already

- Happy that we're not getting that many cameos for the sake of it so far - all the old characters that are in this make sense for this story

- Two things I didn't like: some of the action in episode 1 was oddly clunky, especially the baddies chasing Leia and in the opening scene; also in ep 1 there was some very awkward dialogue here and there, mostly in the beginning (although let's face it: that, too, is a SW staple)

- Two things that will have the fandom frothing at the mouth and IDGAF about: Grand Inquisitor dying here when he dies in Rebels also. Guys, he somehow returned and that's all we need to know really. And Leia actually knowing Obi-Wan - granted he never introduces himself properly, but several people call him by name within earshot of her. If they can 'write' around the Leia remembering Padmé thing they can write around this - see above on the 'somehow' issue (let go, let go)

[shinylitwick94]

Finally finished “Arcane” and I can honestly say the hype was justified

The art is so gorgeous, and I loved the setting and did manage to connect to some of the characters

Only played LoL once or twice and I have no intention of trying again, but I look forward to a second season of this show for sure

[shinylitwick94]

Guess this really was just mando S3

It was a nice episode, especially the first half, and seeing that spaceship at the end

The infodump on Mandalore after the Republic fell was pretty neat and had some great imagery, the backgrounds on that planet felt much more alive and dynamic than most of what we’ve had in this show so far, and I liked how much love for the Phantom Menace there was in this. The ship, the podrace track, even ‘wizard’! Prequel fans can get their nostalgia fanservice too.

I still felt like there was a lot of padding and some moments don’t feel quite right. Especially the whole building the ship section dragged on for waay too long and had some awkward dialogue/delivery here and there.

There’s something not quite right about BOBF as a whole, and I suspect it’s rushed writing/planning. There have been a lot of unnecessary scenes, a lot of bad dialogue, and just a clumsy and unreal feel. Some directors have managed it better than others, but this smells like a foundations problem.

Honestly I’m not sure how I feel about the amount of crossover in this one. I feel like a person should be able to watch either of these shows without having to watch the other, unless we do consider BoBF to be formally part of Mando. And now someone who goes into S3 of Mando probably has to watch this episode of BOBF and someone who just wanted to watch BOBF now has all this Mando suff dumped on them.

Sure as a person who tends to watch all the things it’s fun, but I think I really dislike the extent to which Disney pushes this stuff. It gives me terrible Avengers:Infinity War flashbacks of just sitting there thinking ‘I have no clue who half of these people are or why I should give a shit’.

Idk, I suppose that’s just the media world we live in now.

[shinylitwick94]

Wheel of Time S1 episode 8 thoughts

Under the cut for spoilers

Ok that was admittedly weird.

I’ll start this by saying that while I like WoT I’ve never particularly liked EotW, and I disliked its ending in particular for being a giant convoluted mess that had nothing to do with what had come before. I expected it to be changed, for good reason.

But I really don’t think this was the way to do it.

The stakes were both too high and too low, the power levels were all over the place, the writing was suddenly weird and clunky again, and it was just very, very confusing.

I was really hoping they were going to keep the prologue for this episode, and I’m rather disappointed they didn’t. The scene with LTT was fine, but it fails in getting across the enormity of both the DR’s power and what LTT is about to do. I liked it well enough, but it needed way more oomph, IMHO

Not letting Rand fry the trollocs in Tarwin’s Gap was another mistake. We’ve had a whole season of jumping around with every other character, trying to keep the mystery of the DR. We needed this episode to be all about the Dragon, and therefore all about Rand.

The need to give every other character something to do in this episode massively dragged it down. It might have been best to just have them sit in Fal Dara, have them help out a little bit, maybe have them all involved in the Fain subplot or looking for the horn, or darkfriends or sth, build up the approaching trolloc army, and then have Rand blast it.

The bit with the women channelers was clunky and had too much awkward dialogue. Nyneave burning up was unnecessary, and having Egwene heal Nyneave and not the opposite is a sure way to piss off the fandom. Perrin most obviously had nothing to do and that entire exchange with Padan Fain made no sense in where it came in the episode and in terms of what both characters know. Perrin’s choice in particular is weird because there’s been not enough setup of his issues of axe vs hammer, so the whole thing feels like it comes out of nowhere.

Ishy and Rand were ok, but again underwhelming. It honestly makes me feel like maybe a bit more exposition was needed here, but I guess if you want to keep the whole Ishy is not actually the DO you can’t say much? Basically, I think the audience wasn’t given enough to understand why this wasn’t the last battle and that Rand and Moiraine were tricked into coming to the Eye. We’re just...told that, seemingly out of the blue, by Fain and Moiraine. There is no feeling, no impact in OMG we just did all of this and it was for nothing. I think if that had been more clearly set up and explained it would have helped this episode a lot.

And then there’s a few things that are just bizarre...Fain stabbing Loial? Rand just taking off into the Blight? And then the Seanchan were just...there? I mean I like seeing them, but that was just weird and out of nowhere.

So yeah,all in all one of my least favorite episodes this season. Which is a tragedy really, because I felt like we had been getting continuously better since Ep 4.

I’m seeing words like ‘butchered’ and ‘neutered’ being thrown around which I find both excessive and irritating, and in the case of ‘neutered’ indicative of a certain mindset I can’t stand. I’m sick of feeding the rageclickbait industry and I will have no part in it. So none of that from me.

Yes, I didn’t particularly like this episode, I thought it was frustrating and disappointing, and I may vent about it again. But that’s it. I’ve better thing to do in life than be permanently outraged.

Final veredict:

Do I dislike it more than EotW’s ending? Eh, they’re about equal amounts of nonsensical, but this one irked me more.

Do I like the season overall better than EotW? Hell yes, no argument there.

Would I recommend the show? Yes, it’s fun and probably will get better in later seasons.

[shinylitwick94]

Wheel of Time show episode 7 thoughts!

Under the cut because book and show spoilers:

Phew, it’s out there now so book readers can finally relax the spoiler barrier a bit. Well done everyone in working so hard to keep the secret! Hope the non-readers enjoyed the surprise!

I like how they did it. I assumed for the implication is Rand’s known for quite some time now, and that’s been fuelling his tension. If so, it was well handled and Josha proved he could handle it too.

I’m a bit iffy on the Ways and on the soap opera fight afterwards. The ways I’ve always felt pretty meh about even in the books. The soap opera had a few good moments here and there, but felt a bit forced and the dialogue was weird (kind of reminiscent of episode 1). Buuut, I am not completely against the Perrin-is-into-Egwene thing? OTOH they’re all clearly lashing out as a side-effect of Machin Shin, and OTOH, there are hints of that in the book, so it’s not like it’s out of nowhere. And besides, we know where this is going and it’s not there.

Which does make me wonder how show!Perrin’s romantic experiences will impact the whole Faile thing. Maybe the whole kidnap plot will be more palatable coming from the POV of a Perrin who has already lost his first wife.

Mat’s departure I think was handled about as well as it could have been given the circumstances. Moiraine setting the Reds on him was difficult, but something I could see her doing. One change from the book I wish they hadn’t made would be keeping her actually saying to their face “I will kill you rather than let the Dark One have you”, instead of just saying it to Siuan. But that’s water under the bridge.

I LOVED Nyneave and Lan. Sooo much better and more believable than what we got in the books. Loved her following him and the little interaction with the family. And Daniel Henney was just...wow. The equal oportunity fanservice is strong with this one.

Also liked Egwene and Rand’s insufferable break-up-get-back-together stuff. It’s necessary set-up for what’s coming. Looking forward to their next breakup already.

The one thing I didn’t particularly like (contrary to popular opinion apparently), was the cold open. It felt too over the top and sterile and Marvel-esque at the same time. Loved the actress, but the sequence took me out of it. I liked the second scene with Tam much better, but the environment still felt oddly fake.

Anyway, liked this one, maybe a little less than the previous one, and looking forward to our finale! Can’t believe we’re there already!

[shinylitwick94]

Finished watching “The Man in the High Castle” tv show.

Here’s the thing - I watched seasons 1 and 2 ages ago, but didn’t adore them. But for some reason this show was stuck in my throat so I decided I needed to finish it. In between then and now I’ve also read the book, which made me curious about it again.

I still don’t love it. It has a mountain of issues, not the least of which are the unlikability of a lot of its characters and a peripheral fandom of actual nazis that has never really gone away.

But I did enjoy it. More than that, I was surprised by how well the show managed to pivot on its problems and turn itself around for what turned out to be a pretty solid final season. Which is the main reason I’m even writing this.

To come back to those issues - the main problem with this show has always been that its antagonists were far, far more interesting than its protagonists. The protagonists and the resistance were, as a whole, bland, boring and downright unlikable in the first few seasons. Not exactly the stuff you root for. The only characters most people cared about ended up being the Smiths and one or two of the japanese cast. Add to that the tha plot had basically no direction and you get an average to mediocre show.

Which was why I was (positively) surprised that the show essentially decided to double down and make the Smiths the main characters. I mean Juliana herself is still there (and we get to see her happy once or twice, which helps), but most of the bland cast around her is dropped/killed and the emotional/thematical core of the show shifted decidedly towards the Smiths.

This was helped along, of course, by the best decision this show ever made: killing Thomas.

And actually dealing with the fallout for everyone around him on both a personal and political level. Which meant that at some point the show actually managed to find itself a theme (The Banality of Evil (TM)) and used its setting, including the world-hopping stuff, to its fullest logical and emotional conclusions, instead of just as window dressing for boring action scenes. I.e, the plot was actually clearly going somewhere.

Also helping the show was the introduction of the BCR as a group of resistance characters who were actually likeable so that we, you know, cared about what happened  to them.

Basically what I’m trying to say is that I’m impressed by how this show managed to rescue itself and that it turned out to be pretty good in the end.

It’s not amazing television and it still has many, many problems, but it has some gret moments here and there, it managed to make some smart choices and it ended up pretty decent, and I might even recommend it to some people for reasons other than “Rufus Sewell looks disturbingly attractive in a nazi uniform”, and that’s saying something.

[shinylitwick94]

Of all the weird shows I could latch onto this year it had to be Cobra Kai, of all things.