Thought Prey was good enough to have on the big screen. It was good.

Day Shift.

Fun movie. I like the take on Vampires and hope there is a sequel.

The Rehearsal on HBO is incredible.

Yeah I have to watch the latest 2 but the first 3 eps were awesome

I'm strangely fascinated by YT Australia Border Security series. Customs & immigration checking people flying in.

The 2 things I've learn (so far) are:

1) Declare any money over $10K Australian or equivalent
2) Declare all food

For (2), all the examples so far (over 5+ episodes) have been Chinese & Vietnamese people with really strange stuff (and not just small amounts).

There's been episodes on folks trying to smuggle in narcotics. I want to watch the Singapore version and see if anyone is stupid enough when facing a death sentence vs fine/toss out of country.

While I am sure that there are a fair number of Asians found by Border Security, I am also sure that there are a disproportionate number of Asians that feature in this show - as well as on the commercials for it.

Yeah, the story recently where they fined someone like $2,000 for bringing a egg mcmuffin in their luggage was... a thing.

https://simpleflying.com/mcdonalds-a...a-border-fine/

Hey, there's a Canadian version! Have to watch that too.

The show starts with people already pulled aside and the investigation then. It mostly doesn't get into why they were pulled aside in the first place, what are the "tells". Would be interesting to know.

I was telling the wife that I've travelled quite a bit overseas, but was never pulled aside for anything except for a couple times when I self declared on that form about bringing in tulip bulbs and bringing in over $10K in cash. They just asked me additional questions and that was it.

You know the question (paraphrased) "did you go to a farm and/or have contact with animals". I answered yes one time and was expecting to be pulled aside. But nada.

I do wonder if the US customs are as diligent as the Aussies.

Just watched the first episode for The Sandman and I'm hooked.

Watched Woodstock 99 (Netflix) just now and can't help but feel this needed more time than the 3 x 45 minutes. Lots of stuff that even i know was left out, not enough different viewpoints from the crowd and the acts that were featured as interviews weren't really adding all that much given that most of their statements were pretty much just cliche music doc statements. And then they wasted time with these 2 minute diversions (like that random conspiracy theory of the chaos being orchestrated to sell merchandise afterwards). The attempts to put it into historical context were very shallow as well and felt almost random with how aprupt it was done.
I mean, it's worth watching because the event itself but really didn't feel all that gripped by it.


Yeah, it's pretty well done imo. Helps that i had finished the Audible production (which is very good) only a month earlier, makes it a bit easier not to go down the "what is different from original" rabbit hole.

Halfway through myself. Episode 3 was my favourite, extremely well done change-of-pace episode.

Watched one of these after the wife went to bed. Was entertaining from a “how the fuck can these people be so stupid” sense.

For the food offenders, they continue to say "no more in luggage, that's it" and the agent then finds more, much more.

This particular one the side had seeds. I was waiting for the smack down and they were like, $400 fine. Was hoping he would get sent back at the very least.

(Didn't have a good spot for this so it's going here)

We've been watching G1 Transformers and GI Joe with my kid because, I dunno, reasons - I guess we had it on the shelf and he wanted to watch it. Of course, both are loaded down with 80s cartoon "buy this toy" episodes. You know the ones - the main character is super powered and goes on a mission perfectly suited for him/her only to never really appear again.

But I've been impressed rewatching some of the larger GI Joe story arcs - they mostly hold up (Transformers has a few but not as many). Even my wife has been surprised as she thought the show would be more jingoistic military man stuff when it's more like sci-fi competence porn than anything, akin to Stargate SG-1 or 90s Star Trek (TNG and DS9, not VOY). Cobra Commander is not (usually) some bumbling idiot like Skeletor - he's more like Megatron where his reach sometime exceeds his grasp. He has some simple tragic flaws (like he shares Megatron's greed) and he likes to put the Joes in arena combat for sport or slow moving torture devices that they /always/ escape from. But, more often than not, he has some pretty good plan that's just undone by GI Joe being a little bit better than Cobra.

Also, as an aside, Cobra is much more of a loose amalgamation of terrorist organizations - there's not a top down structure. Cobra Commander seeming has direct reports like Major Blood and maybe The Baroness. But Destro? Cobra often talks about buying his tech but he's not their Q Branch and has betrayed them a couple of times (Synthoid Conspiracy). Zartan is a wall paid mercenary who likes to hire the Dreadnoks from time to time but none of the are actually Cobra. Extensive Enterprises is a seemingly normal corporation that Cobra uses as a public front and is run by Xamot and Tomax, but they also appear to be more mercenaries hired by Cobra Commander than in the command structure.

One of the episodes that's a bit infamous is called "There's No Place Like Springfield" and we were watching it last night to see if it would be kid appropriate for our son. I still remember some of the traumatizing bits to this day and, ultimately, we landed on not showing it to him. I'm old enough now that I've seen a ton of science fiction so it's a bit old hat, but for a kid's show this is pretty wild.

Spoilers ahead, but if you want to watch before - Hasbro dumped all the GI Joe episodes onto YouTube - you just have to sit through a couple of commercials per episode:

• (backstory episode) Memories of Mara
• (not really necessary but has some backstory)The Synthoid Conspiracy (Part 1) (Part 2)
• There's No Place like Springfield, Part 1
• There's No Place like Springfield, Part 2

SPOILERS BELOW (for a nearly 40 year old cartoon...)


Let's just count up all the crazy that happens in this episode and, again, reminder: this is a show targeted at like 5-8 year olds to get mom and dad to "buy my toy".

• The setup is pretty standard fare for GI Joe - Shipwreck and Lady Jaye are doing a recon mission on an island to rescue a scientist from Cobra. When they run across him, he's disheveled and crazy-eyed, and talks about how he created a formula that destabilizes water and makes it explosive. Unexpectedly, he pulls out this device and sticks it to Shipwreck's head, "imprinting" the formula in his subconscious and tells Lady Jaye the code word that she would have to say for him to go into a hypnotic trance and recite the formula. Cobra attacks, they escape by plane, but get shot down and Shipwreck goes down in the water. Again, so far, so good
• Apparently, a bunch of the setup borrows from The Prisoner, the 1960s psychological thriller. Shipwreck wakes up in a hospital and 6 years have passed since the day on the island. He has everything he ever wanted (Cobra defeated and he's the hero). He also has things he didn't know he wanted: a cozy house and family - married to Mara, a character introduced a few episodes ago in a "star-crossed lovers" episode as he fell for her but she was a Cobra mermaid experiment that escaped but couldn't live out of water so they parted ways in a "better to have loved and lost" sort of thing. His daughter, in particular, takes it hard that he can't remember her.
• However, whenever he tries to sleep, he has disturbing dreams where he's being interrogated by Cobra. But each time he wakes up, it's all just in his head. There are parts where this the foreshadowing is laid on thick and, as an adult, it's obvious where this is going - like Shipwreck probably isn't the hero if you're trying to make it subtle. Or there's too much obvious wonky stuff going on with the dreams for it to be real, but, again, 6yo kids.
• One of these recurring dreams happens in a car wash near the hospital so he goes there and sees an old Joe, Roadblock go in. When he comes out the other side he says something about how hot it is and starts melting right before Shipwreck's eyes. He tries to rescue his friend but is attacked by the car wash workers and knocked out. Yes, I remember this scene vividly from my childhood, along with the next one.
• He wakes up in jail and exchanges some pleasantries with the local cop, who brings him a snack. When he eats the sandwich, he doubles over and passes out, falling through a trap door into another room. There he's confronted by four Joes who attack him (Flint: "And you don't even know why") and, as he subdues each, they melt. The final one is Scarlett, who he has a thing for, and he tries everything to not hurt her but, still, she melts, too. As he's anguishing over killing his former friends, the blobs form one big blob and carry him through a trap door in the walls as he screams. To be continued in Part 2. Good luck sleeping tonight, kids.
• Part 2 starts with Shipwreck in the blob carrying an unconscious Shipwreck through a tube in the sewers and then dumping him out in his own backyard. When he wakes, he freaks out Mara and his daughter. Mara calls his doctor, Doc (former Joe), and tells him that he thinks Shipwreck needs help. Shipwreck basically agrees to go to the "funny farm" - his quote as, of course, we're only 10 years removed from Jack Nicholson and the movie version of One Flew Over the Cukoo's Nest.
• A lot of the curtain gets pulled back in the next scene as we confirm a lot of what has been foreshadowed or hallucinated. We see that Doc is talking to Cobra and Polly, Shipwreck's parrot, is a synthoid working for Cobra. Springfield is in Temple Alpha, one of Cobra's main bases. And, of course, they captured Shipwreck to get the explosive water formula but don't know the keyword.
• There's one last real trippy scene. A Cobra interrogator, Cadet Deming, uses a mind probe machine to try and get the information out of him but can't since it's locked in his mind. At first, it looks like 70s animation with weird flashing lights. The scene is loud and bombards your senses a little. The interrogation is also used as a plot device and we get Shipwreck's background, as it hasn't been revealed in the cartoon until now, the last episode of season 1. But when Cobra turns the machine up to full power to try and get the information, the lights turn into weird little ghosts with faces of Cobra and Joe characters flying around the room. Again, none of this works because he doesn't have the code word and both Shipwreck and the interrogator pass out after being subjected to the machine at full power. Some commenters have also noted that the interrogation also has some sexual overtones to it as Cadet Deming is straddling Shipwreck and trying to get the information out of him, but I saw it more as her losing control of the interrogation and it not working than anything like that. YMMV.
• The rest of the episode turns back into a regular Joe episode. There's some weird little scenes like Tomax and Xamot playing a systematic recording of all words in the Oxford dictionary to a sedated Shipwreck, that are lightly disturbing but nothing compared to what we've already seen. He escapes the hospital with the help of real Polly, who finds him and melts the fake Polly. They infiltrate the "car wash", which is really a science base, and stumble across the "hot water" lab room where he finds the crazy mad scientist's formula. Polly, who was with them during the rescue repeats the code word and Shipwreck completes the formula. The baddies find him and he dumps the formula down the drain, turning the entire city into a bomb, which they ignite by shooting at him.
• In one last twist of the knife, with the entire city going up around him in flames, Shipwreck runs back to try and find his family. By this time, the audience is certain they're both synthoids. But you're also sympathetic to Shipwreck that he has to make sure, no matter how small the chance is, because this idyllic life is worth trying to save. He calls to Mara inside his burning house and goes to her and his daughter, only to find them them both pointing guns at him. At this point, it's confirmed that it's all a lie and Polly saves him by melting the two synthoids and his perfect life. After he escapes, Lady Jaye arrives and sees him visibly shaken and asks if there was something important in there. He ruefully responds "Nah, just a dream or two" and then the end credits roll.

Like between the crazy psychological thriller aspects and the emotional torture of giving the crusty old character everything he wants, only to rip it all away - that's a lot to pack in a kids cartoon. Then again, these episodes were written by Steve Gerber, creator of Howard the Duck, so maybe that shouldn't be much of a surprise.


SI

Thanks for the trip down memory lane, SI. I remember those episodes vividly and always loved Shipwreck as a character, mainly because of these episodes. Crazy, great stuff.

I was more a G1 Transformers kid than a GI Joe kid, but on rewatch, GI Joe was the superior show, once you sift out the "buy my toy" eps of both. Transformers has some ok continuity in the first season (20ish episodes) but then it falls apart. It has some great moments. For instance, the Key to Vector Sigma was good stuff, with the Omega Supreme B plot, and culminating in the Menasor vs Superion's battle raging to the awesome battle music that was used both by Transformers and GI Joe. And Five Faces of Darkness is criminally underrated for its plot and its importance in establishing a bunch of Transformer lore that lives on to this day. And that's even with awful animation including the awful Metroplex transforming matrix "football" scene where the background goes day-night-day-night depending on which character has the matrix - it's lolbad, c'mon, AKOM.

GI Joe does a great job establishing the show with 3 five-parters. All are pretty similar in design - Cobra has some grand plan. GI Joe has to find a way to stop them in globetrotting battles with major characters on each side fighting to a draw. In the end, Cobra's plot is just a little too elaborate and GI Joe is just a bit more competent and the day is saved. But they're well designed and feel grand with each of the 3 movies introducing more characters. Then the show falls into their "buy this toy" episodes. But, GI Joe throws us a bone with some more meat like their "It's a Wonderful Life" crossed with "Mirror, Mirror" 2-parter (Worlds Without End), a quality misdirection Traitor plot where the main character looks like he defected to Cobra to pay off his mom's medical bills and it's mostly believable, and the whole synthoid subplot. Second season's Arise Serpentor basically follows the same globetrotting scavenger plot of the first three movies but is still entertaining.

But, There's No Place like Springfield is both a crown jewel and really crazy. I'd say they never could get away with stuff like that today, but I think that's probably not true and borders on "old man yells at cloud" territory. Warner Brothers animation got away with a ton of stuff in their DC properties - Batman: the Animated Series treated its viewers like adults a lot and, while Superman, had lighter stories - the Darkseid episodes were definitely grown up with everything from nuclear meltdown to Jack Kirby-tribute Dan Turpin being killed in cold blood. It can even show up in unexpected places like when the Powerpuff Girls had a really dark alternate dystopian future episode with Him (Speed Demon). Avatar had a ton of really dark moments and characters if you stopped for a few minutes to think about it - but it just a great, rich show. And this doesn't go anywhere near the anime that was imported - sure, there was stuff that could only be shown after hours (Evangelion, Bebop, Trigun, etc) but even "kid friendly" stuff like Yu-Gi-Oh had characters battling actual demons and gods and stakes where main characters died. I guess I've just covered examples across multiple networks in the 80s, 90s, and 00s so I guess to say it couldn't be done today would be wrong. But it's not something you really expected in the "carefree" 80s.

SI

Judging from my newsfeeds Amazon has begun it's media blitz for The Rings of Power.

I think the first episode comes out September 1st?

If you don't know the premiere date, Amazon may need to re-think the efficacy of it's media blitz.

But, yeah, the next few weeks will be all about Dragons (HBO) and Rings (Amazon)!

LOTR prequel series vs. GOT prequel series. A lot's at stake for both companies.

Finished The Sandman. Great first season. Episode 5 is one of the greatest single episodes of all time.

Rewatching Schitts Creek with our 12 year old. Man this show is so good and I am picking up on a ton of things I didn't the first time.

Russian Doll season 2 is soooooooooooo good

I've been enjoying the heck out of A League of their own. Got through Episode 4 last night, and wanted to stay up to watch more...Stupid work keeping me from binging!

Wow I didnt know there was a second season? loved the first season a lot!

They just dropped an additional 11th episode of you haven’t caught it! I’ve watched 7 episodes so far and love it.

The Netflix doc on Manti Te'o is great. It really gave me a different picture of the whole catfishing scandal.

I need to watch it, but I remember reading an article a couple of years ago that went into some of the details and how it happened made a lot more sense and it changed my perspective on it. I remember the general consensus at the time was either this guy is a fucking idiot or he's lying. There's definitely a lot more to the story and I really felt bad for the guy after reading more info.

Big thumbs up on this and props to Manti for the way he has handled this as time has passed. Dude is straight class!

Woodstock 99 documentary was good. Honestly, I guess I completely blocked it out of my memory. When I saw this was airing, I just assumed it was going to be a behind-the-scenes expose about Woodstock 94, which is the only one I remember. But then I saw the acts from 99, with Korn, Limp Bizkit and Kid Rock being amongst the biggest draws, and it makes sense why I didn't remember it.

Once I got into it, some of the general memories came back to me of the fires, sexual assaults, and what-not. But I went into it thinking it was the Woodstock I cared about, not the nu metal rave. I mean, when Gavin Rossdale is the only reason why the entire thing didn't explode the first night...

The people who put it on came off looking terrible, of course. Reminded me of the Great White fire stuff, although unbelievably, I don't think anyone died.

about halfway through Dopesick, man, brutal.

What a depressing watch.

If you're looking to remain depressed, Dark Waters is a good movie and the documentary The Devil We Know is great as well. They're both about the Teflon chemical dumping crime.

At the time we all knew it was nothing but a total cash grab. We didn't give 2 fucks about it, and we were happy when it ended up a total and complete clusterfuck. It was a literal shitshow from start to finish and the people who put it on got the show and result they deserved.

Watched the end of The Rehearsal and the whole thing was just absurd and funny but also kind of fucked up in the last couple episodes. Hopefully it was kinda staged and Remy will be ok.

I think that it's going off Prime soon (like in a week or so), but there's a 4-episode documentary called We Need to Talk about Cosby that Mrs. A and I really liked.

It is very much an African American production, so it was interesting for me to get the AA perspective on Cosby. And, as a child of the 80s, it was really interesting for me to see what a big deal he was in the 60s and 70s.

The guy really was larger than life and fundamentally changed American culture and entertainment. And he was a serial rapist. Great documentary fodder.

Remy broke my heart.

Sent from my SM-G996U using Tapatalk

This was really good and I had forgotten just how big he was at one time. Like maybe the biggest comedian in the world at one time. Tens of millions of people watched that show every week.

The only thing I didn't really buy was the parts about him leaving hints over the years in his shows/interviews/etc. Just felt like those were jokes that people told back in the day.

Most of the way through "A League of Their Own". It is enjoyable. I don't know if it as enjoyable as the movie, but good.

Edit: I will say there a couple of plot twist that you can see coming from a mile away.

Started watching 1883.

Pleasantly surprised by Tim McGraw & Faith Hill. Sam Elliott has always looked old (since Roadhouse). Great story line so far.

Kinda slow on action but okay with that.

Watched a couple episodes of Evil.

Like X-Files for evil vs aliens/conspiracy. Not sure it'll hold my interest but entertaining so far.

This reminds me that I'll have to re-watch one of my favorite X-Files episodes ... the inbred family

I had higher hopes for Evil but just couldn't get into it. Same formula for each episode. Something supernatural happens, it's investigated, explained as not supernatural, and then we move on. I heard they flip a bit in future seasons, but it just felt kind of dull outside of the initial charm.

Really need a new Person of Interest type show to get into.

Fantastic show. Not a masterpiece. Just a great watch.

Rewatching old Seinfeld and it's amazing just how much Julia Louis-Dreyfus adds to the show. Her sense of timing and expression just lift the chemistry of the main group. It's also amazing just how many things don't translate to current society. Otherwise known as, holy fuck we're old. Literally every episode has some reference to something obsolete today.

"What's the deal with the telegraph?"

SI

You mean people don't call movie phone anymore?

Finished watching it. Liked the ending, thought it was well done especially the process of "acceptance".

There's a 1923 sequel coming out.

Started Evil s3.

I like how it's got humor interspersed with horror-lite and gross-heavy elements. I also like the Mulder-Scully sexual tension.

The episode are well written. There's the overarching theme of evil using modern technology & social media to corrupt, and there's episodes that touch on great topics - priesthood, sainthood, exorcism, Vatican secret service, struggle against committing sin, murder & guilt, occult practices etc.

I don't like the 4 daughters as much. And I don't like how some episodes are not concluded but left hanging. It seems that other than for the conspiracy, X-Files did a better job of providing closure in each episode.

But overall, a great series.

Just watched the season 3 finale yesterday. This series reminds me of the early seasons of The Walking Dead in the sense that where you just never know who may be getting killed off at any moment.

Glad to hear season 4 has kicked off filming.

Not sure who mentioned it but started watching Sunderland til I die last night. Wife is away and I am always looking for stuff to watch that she may not like. I actually think she would enjoy it but I couldn't stop! Was up until 1 AM watching the first 3 episodes. It is really good. Every time I play FM I can relate to Simon Grayson.

Anyone watch Couples Therapy? I'm talking about the one on Showtime, not the show that apparently ran on VH1 a decade ago. DirecTV gave us Showtime for free, and since I don't watch movies, I didn't really care, but I was searching through their offerings for stuff I might watch and ran across it. I DVR'd all 3 seasons to watch on my own, figuring my wife wouldn't want to watch it. I was interested simply to watch the psychology and analysis in real time, especially since I've never been to a therapy session. It was mostly curiosity.

So, one night after the news (when my wife reads and falls asleep approximately 3 minutes after she starts reading), I put on the first episode. And after about 5 minutes, my wife is not only watching, she put her book away. It's really a great show. We've only got 2 more episodes in season 3, and that's it - I believe a fourth season is coming, but it hasn't been announced yet. She told me that we're paying for Showtime when season 4 airs.

Each season follows 3 or 4 couples being seen by a doctor in what I've read is actually a fully furnished office that is a replica of the doctor's office, within a production warehouse in NY. The couples are, uh, eclectic - all of them have their own baggage, you've got gay couples, trans, orthodox Jew, etc. I find the show fascinating. As TV shows go, of course, they "cast" couples that will be the most interesting, so there are antagonists to react to as if this is a fictional universe - but the participants are real clients of hers, and everything is filmed in a non-obtrusive manner given that the office was constructed solely for the purpose of filming. Even better, Covid interrupted everything, so that's incorporated into the show.

If you haven't watched it, I suggest at least tracking down season 1, episode 1 and experiencing Mau. I almost wish he was a fake person.

Yep, just started season 2, although I watch it sparingly. With a psych background and years and years of therapy for myself and my family, it is really good to read these people and watch their body language and hear the words that they choose. Agree with you on Mau.