Finished/caught-up:
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Fallout - As a fan of the games, excellent. I wonder if someone not invested in the lovingly re-created universe and the lore would have found it as engaging.
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Rebel Moon - It took me literally 5 sessions, but I did it. I watched the whole thing. I am a sci-fi space opera loving nerd, so I needed to finish it, but good lord what a beatdown. I have no current intention to start part two. Somebody needs to do the math and tell me what the run time would be with no slow-mo.
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Star Trek Discovery - It is finally hitting its stride now that it’s winding down. Has any ST show ever had to reinvent itself so thoroughly and more than once?
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Bad Batch - It is what it is, a decent continuation of certain plot threads in The Clone Wars, and Filoni has clearly been tasked with rehabilitating the sequel trilogy as he was with the prequels. I fear this generation is lost for the ST, and I say that as someone who liked TFA, loved TLJ, and kinda sorta eye-rollingly tolerated TROS. Time will tell if there is a cohort of Gen-Z and Alpha kids who want to love them and will latch onto the Filoniverse to help justify that.
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X-Men 97 - Good, but a bit overrated from what I’ve seen. Not my particular set of Nostalgia goggles to put on, though I remembered the original fondly enough.
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Ghosts (US) - A guilty pleasure. It’s nowhere near good enough to recommend generally, but I love the concept and find it charming in spite of myself.
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Delicious in Dungeon - Not normally an anime guy; something about the conventions of the form and the way they reflect Japanese sensibilities sort of keeps me at arm’s length, but putting fantasy and D&D tropes through a bonkers funhouse mirror like that really works with that sense of being on the outside looking in. Good dub work, too.
Re-watch/catching up:
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Call the Midwife: Somewhere in S4 now. I am invested, but sometimes in spite of myself, you old bean, you old chum, you cheeky monkey. I do want to punch Vanessa Redgrave every time she reads off middlebrow half-poetic nonsense while the rest of the crew writes, directs, and acts out a vignette that portrays that exact sentiment with (slightly) more eloquence and (just barely) more subtlety. You can also tell that about halfway through S2, they were just about over it with spending time with the births themselves: I SEE THE HEAD! ONE MORE PUSH! MEET YOUR BABY!
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Star Trek Enterprise: 3/4 through S1. I only watched the first half of S1 in the original run. It has a real problem with Archer being an ass, with Rick Berman being a sexist creepo, and with mad-libs script edits to replace 23rd century technobabble with 22nd century technobabble, but that goes hand in hand with it also clearly being a bunch of Star Trek people doing a Star Trek, so it’s… fine? I skip the song most episodes, but every once in a while I let fake Rod Stewart serenade me with the bizarrely inscrutable notions of “faith of the heart.”
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The Good Place - re-watch. Slowly introducing my 10yo to this one, strategically skipping a scene here or there (looking at YOU, Mindy St. Clair!), and not worrying about when her attention drifts, but generally I’m really pleased at how invested she’s getting in Eleanor and the gang trying to sort out how to do the right thing. Also, it really holds up, and the big reveal really was thoughtfully set up to the point of being a bit telegraphed.
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Derry Girls - re-watch, for about the third time. Pop it on whenever I want a chuckle and a time filler that never insults its audience. It never disappoints upon re-watch, and the third season is slightly weaker but not weak, and also has Liam Neeson.
