What are you watching?

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I started watching a show on Netflix called Archive 81. It's horror (sci-fi?) about a guy who restores old video tapes and who gets sucked into all manner of creepy and cult-y weirdness when he takes on a restoration job for a mysterious corporation. I'm halfway through the 8 episodes and it's been excellent so far. Lots of good fodder for a CoC or other horror/dark urban fantasy game.
 
I just watched the 2009 reboot of Land of the Lost. I was disappointed to see awesome subject material, $100 million budget, and two comedy heavyweights dragged down by a mediocre script and dated cultural references. What a goddamn shame. Despite all that I still managed to like the film because I love the subject matter (lost worlds, dinosaurs, etc)
 
I gambled that "I find Elizabeth Gillies pretty" was a good enough reason to watch the horror flick Animal. Lost that bet!

If you have seen any other "group of attractive young people gets lost in the woods and stalked by a monster" movie, you have already seen Animal.

Followed it up with Bus Party to Hell, which I found entertaining it its over-the-top-ness.
 
I started watching a show on Netflix called Archive 81. It's horror (sci-fi?) about a guy who restores old video tapes and who gets sucked into all manner of creepy and cult-y weirdness when he takes on a restoration job for a mysterious corporation. I'm halfway through the 8 episodes and it's been excellent so far. Lots of good fodder for a CoC or other horror/dark urban fantasy game.

Really liked Archive 81. I felt the same way… like it was a great concept for Call of Cthulhu or Delta Green or similar game.
 
I watched the Russo brothers new action film for Netflix, The Gray Man. I gotta say, after playing Captain America for so long, Chris Evans makes for a really effective, I can't wait to see you get fucked up by the good guy, villain. Plus he's got a great "Trash Stache".

Seriously, he was the best part of the whole movie. It's got a pretty good cast too, with Billy Bob Thorton, Alfre Woodard, Jessica Henwick and Ana de Armas (who gets to kick some ass too). Oh and Tamil actor Dhanoush, who is also pretty damn good during his fight scenes.

Is it a great film? No, because it doesn't stray too far from what you expect from most action films of it's type. But it does it well, and I think this was one of the better action films Netflix has done (and probably my favorite since Extraction with Chris Hemsworth)
 
My wife and I just finished the second series of Broadchurch on DVD. It wasn't as good as the first, in part because it was (for me, anyway) hard to get emotionally involved in the Sandbrook investigation. It was interesting to see another Dr. Who alumnus in the mix, Eve Myles.
 
I watched EEA@O yesterday. Though I like a complex, well written, well acted movie as much as the next guy, I must admit that this one lost me in the last 30 minutes or so. Fun but long.

But there was a trailer for what looks like someone's attempt at a John Wick spinoff :wink:


Edit: it IS by the director of John Wick & Deadpool! :shade:
 
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TIL: Samuel L. Jackson being Nick Fury was part of a legal settlement.

What's amusing is at the time, there was likely little chance of anything happening when the deal was made. I think Jackson was pretty gracious here, and when things turned around, he scored gold. He's part of one of hottest cinematic franchises going, and making money the whole time.
 
What's amusing is at the time, there was likely little chance of anything happening when the deal was made. I think Jackson was pretty gracious here, and when things turned around, he scored gold. He's part of one of hottest cinematic franchises going, and making money the whole time.
He's always been shown as being Genre friendly. See Mace Windu for another example.
 
I just watched Bad Vegan on Netflix. It's a crazy story, check it out. This article is a fascinating post script to the whole thing.
 
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I've been on a quest to watch 36 Westerns this year.

Why 36, you ask? Because on Ben Nichols's Western-themed album The Last Pale Light in the West, there's the line "We set out as men of reason, armed with Navy Colts," and Navy Colts were .36 caliber.

Tonight's Western was Bad Girls, from 1994. It was ... definitely not good, but not entertainingly bad either. It was just sort of there, ya know?

The action did kick in right away, as opposed to the long, slow build of a lot of Westerns, so that was an interesting contrast, at least.
 
I've been on a quest to watch 36 Westerns this year.

Why 36, you ask? Because on Ben Nichols's Western-themed album The Last Pale Light in the West, there's the line "We set out as men of reason, armed with Navy Colts," and Navy Colts were .36 caliber.

Tonight's Western was Bad Girls, from 1994. It was ... definitely not good, but not entertainingly bad either. It was just sort of there, ya know?

The action did kick in right away, as opposed to the long, slow build of a lot of Westerns, so that was an interesting contrast, at least.
Interesting choice, I think I have it on VHS but don’t think I’ve ever watched it. What are the others you have seen or plan to see? I think the most recent I have watched was the Sabata trilogy and have started on the Santara movies which have some of the best titles ever put to celluloid :If You Meet Sartana Pray for Your Death (1968), I am Sartana, Your Angel of Death (1969), Sartana's Here… Trade Your Pistol for a Coffin, Have a Good Funeral, My Friend... Sartana Will Pay and Light the Fuse... Sartana Is Coming (all 1970)
 
Tonight's Western was Bad Girls, from 1994. It was ... definitely not good, but not entertainingly bad either. It was just sort of there, ya know?
I actually didn't mind it.

... and now you have me wanting to watch westerns. I might join you on your journey. First up- 3:10 to Yuma.
 
Tonight's Western was Bad Girls, from 1994. It was ... definitely not good, but not entertainingly bad either. It was just sort of there, ya know?

The action did kick in right away, as opposed to the long, slow build of a lot of Westerns, so that was an interesting contrast, at least.
Can't say I've ever seen that one.
The new one. And I'll follow that with the new True Grit.
I enjoyed that movie; I thought Bridges made an interesting Rooster Cogburn. It's something of a departure for the Coen brothers.

Last night I caught a little bit of The Ballad of Cable Hogue on broadcast and now I want to see the whole thing.
 
Interesting choice, I think I have it on VHS but don’t think I’ve ever watched it. What are the others you have seen or plan to see? I think the most recent I have watched was the Sabata trilogy and have started on the Santara movies which have some of the best titles ever put to celluloid :If You Meet Sartana Pray for Your Death (1968), I am Sartana, Your Angel of Death (1969), Sartana's Here… Trade Your Pistol for a Coffin, Have a Good Funeral, My Friend... Sartana Will Pay and Light the Fuse... Sartana Is Coming (all 1970)

The Westerns I've watched this year, listed in the order I watched them:

  1. The Harder They Fall
  2. Gone Are The Days
  3. True History of the Kelly Gang (Australian Western)
  4. Slow West
  5. Old Henry
  6. Gunfight at Dry River
  7. Cat Ballou
  8. The Last Outlaw (The 1993 movie starring Mickey Rourke, not any of the other Westerns called The Last Outlaw)
  9. News of the World
  10. Wild Bill (The 1995 film with Jeff Bridges)
  11. In a Valley of Violence
  12. Texas Rangers (The 2001 movie, not the 1951 movie or the 1936 movie. It has a bad reputation, but I found it entertaining)
  13. That Dirty Black Bag (series, not movie)
  14. Outer Range (series, not movie. Contemporary Western with a large supernatural element)
  15. Justice (The 2017 movie. Apparently I didn't like it much, because on my list I wrote "bad" in parentheses after the title)
  16. Lady Lawman (kinda bad)
  17. Bad Girls (a bit blah, as posted above.)
  18. The Quick and the Dead

Of these 18, Old Henry was my favorite by far. It's set a bit later than most Westerns, 1906, iirc. There's a good reason why, but I can't say without spoiling. News of the World was also quite good.

I also watched a Horror-Western about a lone lady homesteader that was pretty good, but I can't recall the title. Pretty sure it was made within the last 5 years.

As for what's on the docket, I've never actually seen The Man With No Name trilogy, so I figure I should probably rectify that.

Never heard of the Sartana movies before, but those titles have definitely piqued my interest!
 
As for what's on the docket, I've never actually seen The Man With No Name trilogy, so I figure I should probably rectify that.
GTFO, seriously? All of them are great but The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly is up there with Apocalypse Now, Seven Samurai and Blade Runner in the "films you have to see at least once" club.

The only problem with seeing older masterpiece films for the first time later in life is that they have been copied, memed, and deconstructed so much that you might feel like you have already seen them million times before.
 
The Westerns I've watched this year, listed in the order I watched them:

  1. The Harder They Fall
  2. Gone Are The Days
  3. True History of the Kelly Gang (Australian Western)
  4. Slow West
  5. Old Henry
  6. Gunfight at Dry River
  7. Cat Ballou
  8. The Last Outlaw (The 1993 movie starring Mickey Rourke, not any of the other Westerns called The Last Outlaw)
  9. News of the World
  10. Wild Bill (The 1995 film with Jeff Bridges)
  11. In a Valley of Violence
  12. Texas Rangers (The 2001 movie, not the 1951 movie or the 1936 movie. It has a bad reputation, but I found it entertaining)
  13. That Dirty Black Bag (series, not movie)
  14. Outer Range (series, not movie. Contemporary Western with a large supernatural element)
  15. Justice (The 2017 movie. Apparently I didn't like it much, because on my list I wrote "bad" in parentheses after the title)
  16. Lady Lawman (kinda bad)
  17. Bad Girls (a bit blah, as posted above.)
  18. The Quick and the Dead

Of these 18, Old Henry was my favorite by far. It's set a bit later than most Westerns, 1906, iirc. There's a good reason why, but I can't say without spoiling. News of the World was also quite good.

I also watched a Horror-Western about a lone lady homesteader that was pretty good, but I can't recall the title. Pretty sure it was made within the last 5 years.

As for what's on the docket, I've never actually seen The Man With No Name trilogy, so I figure I should probably rectify that.

Never heard of the Sartana movies before, but those titles have definitely piqued my interest!
There is a good selection of Italian Westerns on Tubi including the Sabata and Santara films
 
There's one more I've watched that I forgot to write down: The Range Feud, from 1931, starring Buck Jones.

I don't watch movies from the 1930s very often (nothing against them, I'm just more likely to have heard of, and therefore be interested in, something more recent), so some of the stylistic differences between it and more modern films were a bit jarring, but it was fun to watch.
 
I enjoyed that movie; I thought Bridges made an interesting Rooster Cogburn. It's something of a departure for the Coen brothers.

I liked that version. Great performances all around, especially lil Hawkeye. And Bridges is always great.

Speaking of Bridges, last night I watched the first episode of “The Old Man”, an FX show starring him and John Lithgow. Not sure how good the show may turn out to be, but the first episode was really good. I’m looking forward to more.
 
So I got recommended Severance so I decided to watch it through. I mean, actually I was like "I'll watch a couple of episodes before I go to bed" and then proceeded to watch the whole first season in one sitting.

Legitimately super good. I'm still trying to figure out how something directed by Ben fucking Stiller is this good.
 
So I got recommended Severance so I decided to watch it through. I mean, actually I was like "I'll watch a couple of episodes before I go to bed" and then proceeded to watch the whole first season in one sitting.

Legitimately super good. I'm still trying to figure out how something directed by Ben fucking Stiller is this good.

Whoa whoa… have you forgotten Cable Guy?

Severance is very good.
 
So my friend and I went to see Neptune's Frost, billed as an "Afrofuturist, sci-fi musical". I left the theater, and my friend and I were both like "WTF did we just watch?". It's a slow film that starts off kind of boring. When it starts to get into the sci-fi part, the futuristic elements are really, really vague. Everyone has these devices like phones, and there's an internet, but it's not cyberpunk.

The musical numbers were interesting. At first, characters start singing with no music. Later, the songs have music. The music is really good, but the lyrics, not so much.

I don't regret seeing it (as it was different), but yeah, I still have no real clue what the movie was about.
 
I started watching a show on Netflix called Archive 81. It's horror (sci-fi?) about a guy who restores old video tapes and who gets sucked into all manner of creepy and cult-y weirdness when he takes on a restoration job for a mysterious corporation. I'm halfway through the 8 episodes and it's been excellent so far. Lots of good fodder for a CoC or other horror/dark urban fantasy game.

It's pretty good. I enjoyed it and thought "This would make a good Call of Cthulhu scenario".

I finished watching The Boyz, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Currently taking a break from Fantasy and SciFi, so am watching Alba, on Netflix, about the after-effects of a woman attacked by friends of her boyfriend. It is compelling stuff.
 
We started watching Golden Kamuy on Crunchyroll. An anime set after the Russo-Japanese war set in Hokkaido and featuring lots of elements of the indigenous Ainu culture and folklore. So far we really enjoy it. Many people are completely unaware of the existence of the Ainu. It's very cool to see them get some respectful and serious attention in entertainment media.

The Hokkaido Ainu language has only been acknowledged as an indigenous language by Japan as late as 2008!
 
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I watched Jurassic World: Dominion and Moonfall today. I enjoyed both.
 
I started watching the Gray Man last night. Switched it off after about 20 - 30 minutes - just awful.
 
The Orville been on a roll. That and Strange New Worlds, Better Call Saul it been a good summer of tv.
 
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