TV recommendation thread

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The pinnacle of 90s comic artists
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I didn't come across DBZ until my late 20s. I'd heard other gamers talking about it, so I turned it on one day. After about a minute, I figured that the window in which I could acquire a taste for it was long past.
 
As much as I love anime, I never got into DBZ.

I don't hate it, but I don't really follow it either. It's just "meh" to me, even though it did start airing when I was a kid.
 
I'm not familiar with Gurenn Lagann,

Holy crap, you should seek this out ASAP! This is up there as one of the greatest series (not just anime) ever made. Its also a story so EPIC it will blow your mind. Like, other stories may call themselves Epic, but GL makes Greek myths look like episodes of David the Gnome in comparison. I dont want to give anything away, suffice to say you start the series at one level, basically the equivalent to worms in the dirt, and by the end, shit is going down that would make Galactus crap his pants!

The closest comparison I can think of is Evangelion, but if you replaced the angst and despair with hardcore optimism and fun. It has just as many mindfuck revelations, but instead of making you go "oh, thats F----ed up," these make you go

"My mind is exploding like a million stars as I am drowning in Awesome!"
 
A friend of mine, and I used to watch DBZ everyday. Its ok. Nothing to write home about. We also used to smoke a lot of weed, a lot of weed.
 
I tried to watch DMZ once. It was like this:

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Holy crap, you should seek this out ASAP! This is up there as one of the greatest series (not just anime) ever made. Its also a story so EPIC it will blow your mind. Like, other stories may call themselves Epic, but GL makes Greek myths look like episodes of David the Gnome in comparison. I dont want to give anything away, suffice to say you start the series at one level, basically the equivalent to worms in the dirt, and by the end, shit is going down that would make Galactus crap his pants!

The closest comparison I can think of is Evangelion, but if you replaced the angst and despair with hardcore optimism and fun. It has just as many mindfuck revelations, but instead of making you go "oh, thats F----ed up," these make you go

"My mind is exploding like a million stars as I am drowning in Awesome!"

I will definitely take you up on your reccomendation. i need a good anime to wash the taste of Devilman Crybaby out of mind.

A friend of mine, and I used to watch DBZ everyday. Its ok. Nothing to write home about. We also used to smoke a lot of weed, a lot of weed.

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I don't watch much television but currently I am enjoying The Mick. Black comedy is my favorite kind.

In reruns I have been watching The High Chaparral. I had never even heard of it until a few weeks ago and started taping it on whatever channel. Pretty good stuff, I was lucky because they had just started over with the first episode the second week or so that I started watching it so now I get to see it from the beginning. It also has the advantage of having cast actual Latinos as Latinos so the Mexican characters all speak fluent Spanish and it sounds like they are using real Apache language as well. As a real-life Latino, I found it novel to come across a Western where the Mexican characters are treated as individual characters with their own personalities. Very good show so far. My favorite main characters are Buck and Manolito. Blue is growing on me as the show progresses.

This is a great Western! One of the best! I saw it all when it first aired, but I occasionally trip across it again, and it is as good as I remember. which most series are very much NOT! HC has excellent writing, great casting, and interesting characters.
 
This is a great Western! One of the best! I saw it all when it first aired, but I occasionally trip across it again, and it is as good as I remember. which most series are very much NOT! HC has excellent writing, great casting, and interesting characters.

The more I see of it, the more I like it, and it gets better as the series progresses. It has rapidly overtaken all other Western TV series to become my favorite. Enough that I actually preordered the complete series that is coming out soon.
 
A friend of mine, and I used to watch DBZ everyday. Its ok. Nothing to write home about. We also used to smoke a lot of weed, a lot of weed.
That was actually the approach I took. It did not help.
 
That was actually the approach I took. It did not help.
Get better weed.:wink:

Seriously though, just skip it (DBZ and weed) and just watch Black Lagoon. You and everyone else is better for it.:smile:
 
So I've got one more good post in me before I go off to do Mysterious Noman Things this weekend. I wanted to write something nice and positive about Amber in the new Amber thread, or make a gag post or two in the hobbies thread. But no. I'm gonna rant. :sad:

It's been a long, difficult, and very derpy week for me. I need to back off, chill out, cool down, and zone out for a while. Shake off the derpity-derp and get back into the flow, into the grove. :shade:

Before I do that, however, I'm going to rant a little. :angry:

Oh, don't worry, I'm not going to go off on STD or anything like that. No, this is about anime.

Anime that I hate.

Important noman note: This is semi-angry and NSFW.

Queen's Blade



Okay, look. I'm a simple creature. I have no problem with bewbs in anime, ridiculous, oversized, physics-defying bewbs. I make no apologies for that. :shade:

Likewise, I have no objections to female characters stomping about the countryside with absurdly revealing outfits that are as impracticable as they are wonderful. And no, I'm not leering at the screen as one might think. I'm more concerned, really. I want to offer the anime lady my coat, in case she's cold. Yet I still recognize her choices as a strong independent woman, to wear whatever the hell she feels like. I have to assume her outfit, however revealing, empowers her as a woman, and I respect her choices. :thumbsup:

I got five episodes in before I had to stop. It's that bad.

Plot? There's a plot? Okay, something about a fight to become queen or something. I wasn't really sure.

Characters? Um...bewbs? Because as far as I could tell, the characters had no real purpose other than bewbs. And sometimes combat, with weaponized bewbs (not a joke).

One of the worst anime I've ever seen. I hate it because it's everything anime-haters accuse anime of being.

Not recommended.

Rosario + Vampire

The manga was surprisingly good, for a harem manga. Solid characters. Interesting story. Sweet yet sorrowful romance. It was good.

The anime was :crap:

Two seasons of pure fanservice that served very little purpose other than to disgrace the source material. It was painful to watch. I'm not even going to link to the opening, I hate it so much.

The anime ends with some horribly bad final conflict where the main protagonist (MP) has to deal with his crush's dad. It was awful. I mean, get mad and put your head through the screen kind of awful. :angry:

In the manga, Daddy doesn't show up until the crises is past. He and the MP bond. It goes something like this:

Dad: "Hi, I'm your crush's dad."
MP: "I'm totally in love with your wife who was in fact dead except for her soul which was trapped inside your daughter and with whom I've been crushing on for two seasons and was totally into me until she died saving us all leaving me to continue my romance with your actual daughter."
Dad: "It sounds awkward when you put it like that."
MP: "Not as awkward as the fact that all of this suffering and death could have been prevented if you had kept your wives from going insane, murdering one another, and trying to destroy the world."
Dad: "Meh. Hey, you want me to teach you how to be a bigger badass than you are now?"
MP: "Would I!"
Dad: "I'll also teach you how to properly keep a harem of bitches so you don't make the mistakes I did and nearly destroy all of humanity."
MP: "Sweet!"

I hate it because if the writers had actually followed the source material, this would have been a potentially good anime.

Not recommended.

As a bonus, here's 2GS Bootlegged's abridged version. Better, funnier, and will spare you hours of derp.

Warning: Possibly offensive content: viewer discretion is advised.


Gantz



Not necessarily as objectively bad as the previous two selections. It's still pretty bad, IMO.

The premise here is actually pretty promising. MP is teleported, just prior to death, into an apartment with a giant black sphere. The sphere is a bio-mechanical construct that (a) controls the hunt, (b) provides the weapons, and (c) grades everyone on their performance during said hunt. The hunt in question is a hunt for alien life forms hidden in the local city. Groups of people are teleported into the apartment, armed and equipped with advanced armor and weapons, and sent out to hunt the aliens.

Sounds fun, right?

It starts out with a lot of potential, then just degenerates into the same, bleak and ugly routine, episode after episode, until everyone dies. It had the potential of being an amazing mystery / sci-fi show, but they dropped all of tha potential in order to focus on the MP's quest to get laid. It tries to be a deep message about the darker sides of human nature and the ugliness therein, spiced up with anal sex. :fu:

"Why does everything have to be about my dick!" Actual quote from the English dub. :fu:

I hate it because wasted potential and hours of my life I can't get back. :fu:

Not recommended.

Yuri on Ice



Let me get this out of the way now.

Yuri is excellent. It's a solid romance anime, and the fact that it's about a homosexual relationship doesn't bother me at all. There's nothing really wrong with the anime. :thumbsup:

I hate it for one, and only one, reason:

It stole all the hype for the season away from Drifters, which is the greatest anime ever conceived. :angry:

Recommended.

Not listed

Every anime that is based on sister issues or pushes the sexualization of some random loli. Screw you, Japan, screw you in your dolphin-murdering face. :fu:

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is my anime hate rant. I'm done now. Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend.

I'm gonna go do some yoga or eat a pizza or something. :blah:
 
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Me and my bro (literally my brother) liked to get drunk and watch Hello Kitty on late night TV. That was some trippy shit.

 
I'm watching Electric Dreams on Amazon Prime. Ten standalone episodes based on stores by Philip K Dick. There will be inevitable comparisons to Black Mirror, but only because Dick was decades ahead of his time. Also stories nothing like Black Mirror, lots of different kinds of scifi. One episode is basically Body Snatchers + Stranger Things. :smile: Another one, that I thought would make a cool RPG setting, was based on the idea that some people (mutants) develop telepathy, maybe in the 40s or so, which seems to make information technology stagnant, since the telepaths take over that role. It also slows down the aesthetics - the setting seems to be 50s mixed with 80s, classic noir plus Miami Vice or something. :smile: Then trouble starts a'brewin' between the "normals" and the "teeps" ...
 
Do we have a walking dead thread I just can't find?
 
I'm watching Electric Dreams on Amazon Prime. Ten standalone episodes based on stores by Philip K Dick. There will be inevitable comparisons to Black Mirror, but only because Dick was decades ahead of his time. Also stories nothing like Black Mirror, lots of different kinds of scifi. One episode is basically Body Snatchers + Stranger Things. :smile: Another one, that I thought would make a cool RPG setting, was based on the idea that some people (mutants) develop telepathy, maybe in the 40s or so, which seems to make information technology stagnant, since the telepaths take over that role. It also slows down the aesthetics - the setting seems to be 50s mixed with 80s, classic noir plus Miami Vice or something. :smile: Then trouble starts a'brewin' between the "normals" and the "teeps" ...

For a moment I thought you were saying Dick wrote this classic from 1984...
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I'm watching Electric Dreams on Amazon Prime. Ten standalone episodes based on stores by Philip K Dick. There will be inevitable comparisons to Black Mirror, but only because Dick was decades ahead of his time. Also stories nothing like Black Mirror, lots of different kinds of scifi. One episode is basically Body Snatchers + Stranger Things. :smile: Another one, that I thought would make a cool RPG setting, was based on the idea that some people (mutants) develop telepathy, maybe in the 40s or so, which seems to make information technology stagnant, since the telepaths take over that role. It also slows down the aesthetics - the setting seems to be 50s mixed with 80s, classic noir plus Miami Vice or something. :smile: Then trouble starts a'brewin' between the "normals" and the "teeps" ...
I've watched a couple of episodes, and I'm not all that happy with it. I was concerned when I heard Ronald Moore was doing it, as his work tends to be largely devoid of humor, and humor is an essential part of Dick's work. And both the episodes I watched were dour, serious business.

I'll be vague here to avoid spoilers, but one of the episodes was based on a story where the ending is ambiguous as to what was real and what wasn't. In the episode, they tack on a final scene with a doctor explaining exactly what was real and what wasn't, and it goes with the darkest, most dour interpretation possible so we know the show is serious drama business. It's like if Total Recall had an additional final scene where a doctor superfluously explained that all the stuff on Mars wasn't real while standing over a comatose Arnie, and his wife stood by weeping.

It even adds a dead wife subplot so the main character can spend a lot of time being sad and serious through the whole episode, and not just at the tacked on ending. Now, Dick's work could be dark, but there was an absurdist humor running through it, and that is just lost here.

I also feel it was a mistake to make the show an hour long. We've had a number of movie adaptations of Dick's short stories, and they have mostly labored to take quick and breezy stories and bloat them out to a couple of hours. A TV show gave them to chance to adapt the stories at the same pace at which they read, but they went with an hour format, so they still all feel pretty slow. The second episode, "Autotofac", was better than the first, but still felt like molasses compared to the manic pace of the short story.

I'll probably get around to more episodes, and I hope there are some gems in there. It sounds like the episode Theo is describing is based on The Father Thing, so maybe I will give that one a shot. It is an anthology show, and they always have some clunkers.
 
I've watched a couple of episodes, and I'm not all that happy with it. I was concerned when I heard Ronald Moore was doing it, as his work tends to be largely devoid of humor, and humor is an essential part of Dick's work. And both the episodes I watched were dour, serious business.

I'll probably get around to more episodes, and I hope there are some gems in there. It sounds like the episode Theo is describing is based on The Father Thing, so maybe I will give that one a shot. It is an anthology show, and they always have some clunkers.

If it helps, there are definitely some episodes with happy endings. :smile: I can PM you some episode titles, if you like (and to avoid spoiling anything for anyone else).

I see it more as loosely based on PDK rather than straight adaptations, which is the intent, I think. They clearly seem to be making something that will compete with Black Mirror and Westworld (including having some of the same actors), and that's definitely going to be a bug or a feature, depending on your preferences and expectations.
 
If it helps, there are definitely some episodes with happy endings. :smile: I can PM you some episode titles, if you like (and to avoid spoiling anything for anyone else).

I see it more as loosely based on PDK rather than straight adaptations, which is the intent, I think. They clearly seem to be making something that will compete with Black Mirror and Westworld (including having some of the same actors), and that's definitely going to be a bug or a feature, depending on your preferences and expectations.
I will definitely own up to approaching the show with a load of preconceptions. Discovering my mother's PKD books on the shelf was one of my first steps into reading science-fiction classics, so I am going to be picky in a way that someone watching the show cold wouldn't be.

It's not really happy endings I am looking for. Not all PKD stories have happy endings, and I love Black Mirror. There is just a certain tone to PKD's work, and I was hoping it would make it into the show.
 
13 Reasons Why
Alias Grace
American Horror Story
Arrow - grown tired of this, stopped watching season 6
Bates Motel
Berserk (anime)
Better Call Saul
Black Lagoon / Burakku Ragūn (anime)
Breaking Bad
Castlevania
Daredevil
Defenders
The Devil is a Part-timer! / Hataraku Maō-sama! (anime)
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
Doctor Who
Erased
The Fall
Fargo
The Frankenstein Chronicles
Frontier - somewhat silly at times but amusing
Godless
Hannibal
Japanese Style Originator
Jessica Jones
Karin Chibi Vampire (anime)
The Killing
Luke Cage
The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya / Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuūtsu (anime)
Midnight Diner: Tokyo Stories
Mindhunter
The Missing
Monster (anime)
One Punch Man / Wanpanman (anime)
Penny Dreadful
Planetes (anime)
The Returned
Shiki (anime)
Spice and Wolf / Ōkami to Kōshinryō (anime)
Steins; Gate (anime)
Stranger Things - second season somewhat disappointing
The Toys that Made Us
Wallander
Wolf's Rain / Urufuzu Rein (anime)
 
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Wallander
Is there one you prefer? By that I mean the UK series, the swedish series, or the film series? I honestly like them all. I would have to rewatch a couple of each if asked to pick a favorite. Right now my answer would be all.:smile:
 
I will definitely own up to approaching the show with a load of preconceptions. Discovering my mother's PKD books on the shelf was one of my first steps into reading science-fiction classics, so I am going to be picky in a way that someone watching the show cold wouldn't be.

It's not really happy endings I am looking for. Not all PKD stories have happy endings, and I love Black Mirror. There is just a certain tone to PKD's work, and I was hoping it would make it into the show.

I didn't have a lot of interest in Electric Dreams because to me Dick didn't really do his best work in short stories.

I love select PKD novels and his short stories are enjoyable but I never found they had as much meat as his novels. If he had been strictly a short story writer I don't think he'd be much remembered today.

I feel a bit split on the Dick cult these days, he use to be massively underrated sf master, but with the levels of academic overkill, uncritical druggy hipster fandom, etc he is starting to feel overrated. I think that Vintage's decision to publish every book he ever wrote, including unpublished emphera is a money-making move that only obscures his half a dozen best novels in a tidal wave of okay to mediocre work.

I know a few people who faced with a bookshelf of Dick have picked one at random (or picked up Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?) and been underwhelmed because they didn't start with, say, Man in High Castle or Three Stigmata Palmer Eldritch et al.
 
Is there one you prefer? By that I mean the UK series, the swedish series, or the film series? I honestly like them all. I would have to rewatch a couple of each if asked to pick a favorite. Right now my answer would be all.:smile:
The one that's currently (?) on Netflix, starring Kenneth Branagh. We haven't watched any other ones.
 
I didn't have a lot of interest in Electric Dreams because to me Dick didn't really do his best work in short stories.

I love select PKD novels and his short stories are enjoyable but I never found they had as much meat as his novels. If he had been strictly a short story writer I don't think he'd be much remembered today.

I feel a bit split on the Dick cult these days, he use to be massively underrated sf master, but with the levels of academic overkill, uncritical druggy hipster fandom, etc he is starting to feel overrated. I think that Vintage's decision to publish every book he ever wrote, including unpublished emphera is a money-making move that only obscures his half a dozen best novels in a tidal wave of okay to mediocre work.

I know a few people who faced with a bookshelf of Dick have picked one at random (or picked up Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?) and been underwhelmed because they didn't start with, say, Man in High Castle or Three Stigmata Palmer Eldritch et al.
My opinion is that he wrote a lot of filler both in short stories and in novels, but there are definitely enough good stories to fill a season of an anthology show. The guy was banging stuff out on speed to pay the bills.

I guess part of the reason I wish this show got his voice right is that Dick's ideas are so mainstream now. If you lose the tone and humor of his writing, you can end up with something that feels like yet another holodeck episode of TNG.
 
For sure, there is definitely enough quality in the short stories for a good anthology series.
 
Me and my bro (literally my brother) liked to get drunk and watch Hello Kitty on late night TV. That was some trippy shit.


My daughter would likely love that.
 
I mentioned upthread that I was watching The Vampire Diaries in an effort to better flesh out my high-school themed Part-Time Gods campaign. So far, this experiment has been a failure in that regard, as there's little content of the sort I'm looking for.

However, I've discovered an array of new tropes I'm now going to inject in every urban fantasy game I run from this point forward. They include, but are not limited to:

  • All characters will have amazing hair, no matter the circumstance: fighting, just got out of bed, just came out of the shower, just ripped somebody's head off and is covered with gore, just nearly died a violent, horrible death? Perfect. Hair.
  • All strategic decisions made by the NPCs will be based on the power of Boner.
  • Whenever a plan goes wrong, all NPCs will overreact in the worst possible way. Usually with a needless killing spree.
  • All NPCs will only have two personalty settings: generally okay to hang out with and psycho serial killer asshole.
  • Only the blondes will make any sense or make good decisions.
  • All conversations of a sensitive nature must be conducted in a crowded public place: a bar, a restaurant, a school dance, or a formal social function. No one will be able to hear or notice anything, no matter how outrageous or how close they may be.
  • All law enforcement will be the absolute worst.
  • Alcoholism solves most problems, also bondage and torture (shout out to Supernatural).
  • Vampires will be...well, they're pretty badass, actually.
  • Werewolves will have the ability to one-shot all other supernatural beings, have a fearsome reputation, and be constantly disorganized and inept.
  • All magic users (witches) will be super OP and simultaneously useless.
  • All major conflicts will take place at some kind of dance, party, or other social function.
  • All mortal characters are completely irrelevant to the story and affect nothing of any significance whatsoever, except to die tragically so that the PCs can bond over their loss.
  • Local government will know about the existence of supernatural beings, but the Federal Government, with all of its resources, will apparently not have a clue or give a fuck.
  • All brothers will hate each other, no matter what.
  • Bromances.
  • Women bonding over their crushes crushing on other crushes. Also death.
  • I will have one incredibly capable and clever female antagonist who somehow insists on staying in a city populated with supernatural beings who really want her dead.
  • I will have one incredibly capable male antagonist that's OP, a total dick, but who's actions actually make sense when you stop to think about it.
  • I will have one OP antagonist who's classy, capable, and interesting, only to turn him into a terrible disappointment.
  • All romances will be forced into a musical chairs style merry-go round of cheating and betrayal, for no reason whatsoever.
  • Guns fire wooden bullets. That will be a thing.
  • Hunters will make clever use of explosives, but only in areas with a lot of human traffic, where there will be a lot of collateral damage.
  • Mortal humans will routinely take severe injures to the neck, in the area of the jugular vein, only to walk it off.
  • Mind control will be so overused it'll become annoying.
  • Blood banks can be easily robbed, with no repercussion whatsoever.
  • No mortal human will be seen eating anything.
 
Crap, I did it again. Sorry.

OP = Overpowered, usually in the context of anime, manga, and some fantasy-oriented TV shows.
Comes up in the context of RPGs where "builds" are a big thing too.
 
Excited for the 2nd season of Legion. Noah Hawley's psychedelic superhero show is one of the strangest things made for mainstream TV.



 
Here's a show you might not expect: CW's The 100.
It's a CW show, so there are some CW-like elements, but it hasn't detracted from what has been a fun ride so far. I just watched the third season, which was the most D&D like season of a TV show I've seen in a long time, I think. There are characters on the show who I'm constantly thinking "that's a PC" and matching them up with their class.
 
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