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Reviews
The Pacific: Melbourne (2010)
The series is legitimately better if you just skip this episode
Rewatching the pacific after masters of the air came out, I got to episode three and was like 'Urgh the pointless one' so rather than scroll on my phone through it again, I skipped it and you know what? The series seemed better for it. So I went back and watched it and boy I was not wrong.
Melbourne should have been 10-15 minutes of another episode really. It's just shore leave... nothing else really happens, they just do marine on leave things... there's a reason that every other war m'avoir doesn't devote an age to it. But yeah 10 mins or so would have been fine... just don't take up a whole episode when they were struggling to fit so much in. It's pretty irrelevant and slows the pace of everything down which adversely affects part four imho. Just skip it. I honestly don't know what they were thinking with this one.
Leave the World Behind (2023)
It's not good
New angle on a B movie trope, but nothing really of interest here.
The whole movie is just a big bunch of nothing you sit through to find out the answer and then just get annoyed at it.
It clearly thinks it's very clever, but it isn't.
It has good actors in it, but I think they must have used up all the budget because the rest of it feels very low budget. The actors do a good job but the characters aren't exactly likeable.
Best avoided tbh. There's films you watch once and don't watch again, and then there's films you wish you hadn't bothered watching to the point you go through the hassle of resetting your IMDB password to warn others.
The ABC Murders (2018)
When you want to write a different crime show but need to ride on coat tails
The bits of the story Agatha wrote still hole up today.
The bits added for this adaptation are just utter tripe.
Made up back story, changed the story of several main characters including poirot from the cannon... and it added nothing. The murder mystery is the same.
They just messed with one of the most beloved characters to be different because they didn't have the wit to write their own murder mystery of the same standard, so essentially ripped off one of the greats and tweaked bits to call it their own.
The whole crew should be proud of what they did with the script. The writer should be ashamed.
Mammals: Episode 6 (2022)
Really naff ending
I didn't get the James Cordon hate and gave the season a go. It was pretty good, but I did have a mounting trepidation about how they'd end it.
In the end that was completely the right stance to take as it was all a bit of a farce really. The shock twist was easily predictable, kind of to the point it didn't actually feel anything was resolved. I was actually a bit surprised when Amazon said that's it no more episodes.
Will there be a season 2? No doubt.. but they probably shouldn't bother. They've burnt all their fireworks with this one and it was just a bit underwhelming.
It's a real problem with modern shows in general - they've mastered how to hook people and get you to binge watch, but when the ending comes they either leave you hanging or have some totally by the numbers explanation like this one. What happens to the characters from here? I don't think anyone cares after this episode tbh.
The Devil's Hour (2022)
Good story let down by having the main characters be such a chore to watch
You know all those shows with likeable characters and enjoyable plot lines? Those fools!
Here we take a different approach. What if the characters were all miserable and insufferable to watch? Wouldn't that be better?!
If you can struggle through the chore that is the main family's life there's an interesting story under there, but believe me, it is a fair old slog to keep motivated. It's not one you'll binge, it's one you'll grind through in several sittings because you want to know what the underlying story is, interspersed with something a bit more cheery.
Worth a watch, would have been better half the length, needlessly hard going.
Us (2019)
Unique idea, possibly good lore, ruined by lack of effort
The lore of this movie is interesting and fairly unique. There's a lot of potential here.
The execution though is lazy and ruins what could have been great. Nearly every action that every character takes is done for no other reason than to get them to their next set piece. No logic, no explaination, just 'character A do X now'.
Then you have the bigger problem of the lore just not being thought through. It really would have taken a simple dialogue rewrite to elevate if from a C movie to a B on that front.
Supposedly there's a twist in it, but it's so obvious I don't think you can call it that.
So yeah, average slasher movie, had a lot of potential but ruined by lazy, lazy writing.
Bel-Air (2022)
Totally Unrelated Show
Completely different show to the original. They only bought the rights because it was cheaper than advertising to get an instant audience.
Actual show is fine, not great, just fine, but it's probably better if you never saw the title or had seen fresh prince. If you come in with the preconceptions they want you to have you'll struggle not to turn it off.
The Long Call (2021)
I think they forgot they were making a detective show along the way
This show is slow and dull, really slow and dull.
It takes the format of a broad church type show where there's one main crime and through the investigation we uncover the dark secrets of a local community.
It's a format growing in popularity because it seems a relatively easy way to fill content and keep viewers hooked for a miniseries. Problem is it requires a good storyline and good writing. This show doesn't really have those. I didn't find the setup nor storyline very convincing, and I don't think there were more than a handful of realistic interactions between characters in it.
Where they seem to have gone wrong is writing a crime drama when what they really wanted was to make a reddit post putting the world to rights.
In reality everything from the setup to plot lines and dialog exist just to move the show from one preachy monologue to another.
It's not that there's anything wrong with what they want to say. Equality issues are important, it's just that... okay rather than show a gay couple as a gay couple, they have a gay couple and their entire purpose in the show is to be 'the gay couple'. They have disabled people, which again is great... but they're only there to be 'the disabled people'. It touches on different types of abuse... but again only so it can shout 'pause!' And then go off on a rant about it like it's was a high school project on types of abuse.
There's nothing wrong with the points it's trying to make, what wrong with it is that in doing it they ruined their show. It isn't a fluid detective show, it's just a recital of social issues someone had to get off their chest fitted into a tv show framework.
Good writing is when you can make a crime drama that hooks you in, keeps you hooked, makes you care about the characters and what's happened to them and is able to use that platform to deliver powerful scenes that hit on the things the writers here wanted to say, but alas that's not what this is. This is more 'character A's entire motivation for this scene is to get me to a point where character B can drop my truth bombs'
Meh.
Fear Street: 1666 (2021)
Really not very good
Keep in mind the ratings for this film are scoped to people who already liked the first two instalments, so it's current 60-70% score is probably more like a 40-50% if you include people who didn't make it this far, of which I'm sure there's a lot.
Welcome to 1666... with the characters from 2021 dropped into a 90's ish world and now presumably cosplaying the 17th century. The storyline that continues to go nowhere from the first film adds nothing really here of any interest. Tbh you could have started at 2, finished at 2 and got the best this trilogy had to offer.
Lots more boring talking and walking, teen relationship dramas that seem to just drag on and on despite supposedly being side plots? Not a lot actually happens here. You set everything up already, part 2 was an okay slasher movie, but no we're back to the really mundane and ridiculous first movie 'period style'. It doesn't even stay in it's suppose time zone.
The promise was we'd go to 1666, meet 'the witch' and learn the truth. Why would you set that up and then not make it? It's baffling to me.
As I say Could have been good, could actually have been the best with all the lore and such established, but went down hill as soon as you find they're just reusing characters from the first two films playing literally themselves with different names and costumes. So ridiculous.
So what did we learn at the end of this? This trilogy should have just been a single 2 hour film... or given to a different director/writing team. Re-cut the first movie down as much as possible to explain the witch, keep the second movie, and ... I dunno.... Reshoot some of the scenes from the third movie with different actors and insert as flashbacks and you'd have a good slasher movie with an interesting lore.
You'd end up with about the same amount of action they managed to eek out across three whole movies that were really just hours of characters talking about anything but the main storyline for the most part.
I saw it, I don't recommend you watch it really - it's not offensive, just a waste of time - and I hope they stop here before they end up with same characters in caveman times talking for 2 hours about cave furnishings.
Fear Street: 1994 (2021)
Eh
This was pretty lazy. Very generic 90's, didn't feel like '94 at all, all of the kids relationships were pretty stupid even for teenagers and took up way, way too much time. I guess +1 point for having an LGTBQ relationship, but that couldn't save the movie from its writing and character problems.
It's basically a 90's slasher movie where the slasher is a curse . Not awful but not very good either.
As far as I can tell R. L Stein's name is on this purely just to have his name on it.
Line of Duty (2012)
It's pretty good.
First off the bat, it does have some problems, most of which are that it's just 'sexed up' a bit too much. The general scenarios are completely over the top and character motivations and actions often not that believable. They overcome this by relying overly heavily on police procedure to ground it in fact. Result is you get something more like a police soap opera meets fly on the wall documentary of really, really boring forms. It probably should have been set in the 70's or America to make the scenarios a bit more believable, and really needed to tone down the knowledge dump of police procedures the researchers had to read.
That aside it is an engaging new take on an old format. The series endings aren't often satisfying, but that's more a common problem of modern police shows than it is specific to this show. They try to avoid the cliche big reveal and keep the user guessing... then run out of time and rush it. As I say it's pretty common.
Great acting and a mostly likeable cast, it'll definitely keep you watching all the way through, though a few moments (like the worst undercover officer there has ever been being used again and again) will break the spell for short periods.
Overall a recommended, but not must watch
Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel (2021)
Irresponsible, dishonest as callous
Just don't watch this.
It takes the death of a young woman and tries to return it into entertainment, dragging her death back up for loved ones more than 7 years after it was resolved for nothing but entertainment. In so doing it will inevitably re-awaken the internet garbage mills that caused her family so much hurt the first time.
Just know there is no mystery here. The answer was known years ago, but they deliberately misdirect the viewer into thinking of all kinds of conspiracy theories against innocent people were possible by giving you false information and then turn around at the end and 'reveal' they were misdirecting you the whole time.
Entertainment from death, nothing more and they didn't care about the consequences for those involved. The case had been closed for 7 years and it should have stayed that way. All involved in its production should be ashamed
Hinterland (2013)
A bit too slow and gloomy, with a few flaws but overall good
In all honesty this is a 7/10, but I think a lot of people give it a boost for being both a great welsh language show and one of the first dual language dramas. It's significance there is noteworthy.
As for the show, great acting, great views of Wales, but it's not amazing. The pace is incredibly slow, the character development is severely lacking and I don't feel like any of the officers actually like being cops; they took the gritty hardened detective trope just a bit too far on this one.
The crimes themselves are nothing special - not boring not too fanciful but are let down a little by the pace. It's not a whodunit that's for sure.
Overall though it's a very solid offering that's a significant milestone and worth watching, but you won't miss it when it's over.
Deadwater Fell (2020)
Just... meh
The cast are good and the performances strong... but as others have said, it's ultimately just a bit of a waste of time.
It feels long and drawn out at 4 episodes, but I suspect if they sped it up any the problems would have been too evident.
I wish I'd checked the reviews sooner TBH, but I just thought I could trust a David Tennent drama.
It's hard to put my finger on exactly what the problem is. On the one hand, it feels like the problem was there from the concept, but on the other there are definitely ways this story could have been engaging and powerful.
Ultimately I think it tries too hard in some areas whilst not trying hard enough in others, and I've tried to work out why that is. I suspect maybe they thought they were breaking ground in some area and could lean on the shock or newness of it? Unfortunately the reality is it's treading a very worn path in British drama, and whilst in itself that isn't anything bad, here it just fails to engage. The baddy is bad, the characters have depth and secrets.. it's just I don't care about any of them. It kind of feels like real people following a fake script, making decisions for no other reason than to move the plot along.
It's not bad per se, not a 'don't watch this at all costs' it's just... a meh. At the end of the day there's so much great TV these days it seems a waste of time to watch this.
The Great Escapists (2021)
Swing and a miss
The premise could have worked, Cory and Richard are pretty good, but the format/writing is horrible. What's worse is it's not only incredibly irritating, but because of the shows both presenters are famous for, you know how easily it could have been good.
Top Gear/Grand Tour were very good at the extreme adventures with fake situations made plausible thing and Mythbusters were really good at explaining things in relatable ways, so when you see they're essentially combining the two you can immediately see how that could work together right?
Unfortunately whoever was producing/paying for this decided that the target demographic would most likely be people with severe head injuries.
It's almost a kids TV show, but it fails to properly target that demographic, so it's an infotainment show that treats its audience like morons.
The show could be easily elevated to a 7/10 just by changing the writing to be a lot less patronising, and the format to massively tone down the pantomime of the situation.
Keep the cast and presumably very extensive crew, make some heavy changes to the production team for season 2. Steer into what you're actually making and you could have something fun. As Richard said in the first episode I think 'we've had our fun which is a waste of time and childish and immature, but okay... now let's get on with it.
Oh and completely remove that interview to camera nonsense - this is so incredibly on the nose it doesn't need further explaining.
Midway (2019)
It's a bit better than Perl Harbor (2001).
The cast look great, the costumes look great and it's a true story that just lends itself to film - the surprise attack on Pearl through to the epic battle of midway, and everyone knows it, freeing the writers of having to explain every little thing.
But something's off. Whilst it doesn't go off on a weird 3 way relationship arc that absolutely nobody wanted, the special effects and amount of over the top action scenes are actually even more Michael Bay than the 2001 movie by him. It's an aerial/naval combat movie - you don't need to play up the amount of explosions!
The biggest crime is frankly bad, out of date CGI that ruins it, often looking more like a WW2 video game than a movie. Thr dialect and writing isn't bad, but it's not great and something is just really lacking so what are likely well delivered lines on set fall flat or seem out of place in the final edit.
Dunkirk is a great example of what they could have done with the story, cast, crew and modern effects, but this movie comes in a lot closer to the afore mentioned afleck from 20 years earlier.
On the plus side if you like explosions there's a lot, and if you love swaggering 40's GI stereotypes it's got a lot of those too.
Not awful, just sad when you know how easily it could have been so much better!
Greyhound (2020)
Good peak into the battle of the Atlantic, but a bit short, Hollywood and not edited well for TV
Whilst it can't escape the trappings of US WW2 movies completely - the Germans are crazy evil, the Brit are incompetent but die with a resolute stiff upper lip, and the American captain can save the day with his one-of-a-kind instincts even on his first time out - it is way toned down compared to what we came to expect from Hollywood 20 years ago. Of course, it's still Hollywood so the timing and some of the set pieces of the battles will still have you saying 'oh come on!' But I'm not convinced that's entirely a negative.
That aside it does a great job portraying the horrors of the battle of the Atlantic to a newer audience than are likely to be aware of it. Tom Hanks does a great job yet again as captain of a vehicle in distress (what an oddly specific type casting), and overall I really liked it. As others have said... it wasn't a kids movie nor made for the VHS era so why is it 90 mins? I get the impression something may have been lost on the cutting room floor that could have made it a 9/10.
Only other slight quibble is that it was clearly shot and edited with the big screen in mind & would have benefited from having been shot from the beginning with a home TV audience in mind, but it's a small knit pick
The Handmaid's Tale (2017)
Would have been a fantastic mini series or similar
Great idea, world and characters, but I think a lot of the ratings here are praising the importance of telling a story such as this over the actual content of the show. It's pretty forced, dialogue is frequently atrocious and loves to drop a 'deep if you're 14' line in and stand back whilst everyone says how amazing it is. It isn't.
It's not bad, but the story could have and should have been done so much better - it's not as amazing as it thinks it is.
It Comes at Night (2017)
Boring, uneventful... just a dull episode of walking dead basically.
This isn't one of those films you either do or don't 'get', it's one of those films that tries too hard to be deep and forgets that it's core story is almost totally uneventful. Worse, its been done so many times it is a total cliche to the point there are several almost totally identical films. I believe the phrase is deep if you're 14, but I think that's a bit unfair to 14 year olds really.
Disenchantment (2018)
Eh.
It doesn't suck, but it's also not great. All in all it's just a bit underwhelming given what you know the creators to be capable of.
The major downsides are that it's laiden with gags that are forced, cringey or generally not funny, the character art is very lazy, with most characters appearing like they were put together from a bucket of bits from previous Simpson's and Futurama characters; Similarities are fine, expected even, but unoriginality is just lazy. It does the creator's usual social commentary, but in an very superficial way. Finally the core problem - the writing. The whole season feels like a single episode of Futurama where they went to a medieval planet, except dragged out over hours and hours.
It sounds like a lot of whining, but really it's just disappointment in what could have been. It might have a different setting to Futurama, but at its core it offers almost nothing different to Futurama, and doesn't seem to do it as well, and it certainly lacks the writing the Simpsons has seen.
Honestly, It's worth watching at least one episode to see if it's your kind of thing, but don't get your hopes up. To really sum it up in one word, it would be "Lazy".
The War (2007)
well researched, lots of great personal stories, just... not that great to watch
I don't want to write too long a review for this, because I know a lot of people loved it, and maybe I'm just not the target audience for this, but I really found getting through this to be a chore.
Where it shines is the personal history. Yes, it tells the war from a distinctly american perspective, and washes over a lot of quite important stuff quite superficially, but that's not actually so bad. We don't need 500 WW2 doco's saying the exact same thing over and over, and it was made for the American domestic market, so what do you expect? But if you accept that going in then what it really offers that other ww2 films don't is the huge array of personal stories. Of course many other documentaries interview veterans and civilians, but the story telling style of Burns does bring those stories to life, if in a more dramatised interpretation than reality.
For me, the problem here however is basically that it's just too rambling.I'm interested in this history, I've watched a lot of WW2 documentaries and wanted to hear everything this wanted to say, and engage with it, but it just kept throwing me back out. I finished it, and I learnt quite a lot of details about the human experience, but it was a real chore by the midpoint