What TV/Netflix show are you currently watching? (Megathread)

[Cartagia]

The long great trek is over.  All 13 seasons complete.  What a good consistent run.  Even in the last 4-5 episodes there were quotes that have become memes.  That's an enduring legacy.

Also finished Adventures of the Gummi Bears season 2.  It's just a kids cartoon, but my dumb completionist brain won't let it go.

[Cartagia]

Preacher S4 came to Hulu much faster than I was expecting.  It was never a truly great show, but it was always entertaining.  The last couple of episodes are as good as the show ever was, but I do think it was time for it to end.

[Warmsignal]

So I tried out Netflix for the first time ever and was bummed to find out the selection is so mediocre. Most of it just original content, and I was under the impression that "Netflix has everything", when it doesn't. It turns out in the world of streaming content, everyone is clutching to ownership and proprietary platforms. You want to watch this movie? Then you have to get this movie's parent company streaming service, etc.

Here I was thinking you could just watch any movie on Netflix by the time it came out on Blu Ray. Wasn't that basically the deal with Netflix back in the day? Correct me if I'm wrong, but Netflix used to mail DVDs, right? Was the selection always so limited? Do they still do physical rentals in any form?

Netflix isn't going to sell me on a bunch of original content. I want things I've heard of and box office movies. Is Red Box the only option left, now?

[kamikazekeeg]

So I tried out Netflix for the first time ever and was bummed to find out the selection is so mediocre. Most of it just original content, and I was under the impression that "Netflix has everything", when it doesn't. It turns out in the world of streaming content, everyone is clutching to ownership and proprietary platforms. You want to watch this movie? Then you have to get this movie's parent company streaming service, etc.

Here I was thinking you could just watch any movie on Netflix by the time it came out on Blu Ray. Wasn't that basically the deal with Netflix back in the day? Correct me if I'm wrong, but Netflix used to mail DVDs, right? Was the selection always so limited? Do they still do physical rentals in any form?

Netflix isn't going to sell me on a bunch of original content. I want things I've heard of and box office movies. Is Red Box the only option left, now?

Netflix was better, but they've lost a lot of stuff with everyone having their own streaming apps.  They do have non-original stuff, but they are big pushing original content for sure.

[Cartagia]

So I tried out Netflix for the first time ever and was bummed to find out the selection is so mediocre. Most of it just original content, and I was under the impression that "Netflix has everything", when it doesn't. It turns out in the world of streaming content, everyone is clutching to ownership and proprietary platforms. You want to watch this movie? Then you have to get this movie's parent company streaming service, etc.

Here I was thinking you could just watch any movie on Netflix by the time it came out on Blu Ray. Wasn't that basically the deal with Netflix back in the day? Correct me if I'm wrong, but Netflix used to mail DVDs, right? Was the selection always so limited? Do they still do physical rentals in any form?

Netflix isn't going to sell me on a bunch of original content. I want things I've heard of and box office movies. Is Red Box the only option left, now?

Honestly, it sounds like you expectations were misaligned.  Even when Netflix was the only game in town they did not have "everything" on streaming.  They had a lot, but there was always stuff you couldn't find - especially new releases.  Also, a common complaint about the company over the past few years has been how they are filling the streaming options with nothing but their own stuff and filler garbage like the Asylum ScyFy Originals.

And they definitely still do physical rentals, you just need to go into your account settings, find and update that.  Looks like this.

I watched the first season of The Sopranos for the first time in 20 years, and while its a good show, it is merely a shell of how good it would be in later seasons.  I was honestly shocked at just how much it feels like a typical 90s drama, and there are a ton of weird editing and production choices.  You can also tell that HBO wasn't really funneling money into it the way they would eventually.  Certain things feel really cheap.  All that said I can't wait to keep going forward with it.

Speaking of waiting 20 years... the first episode of Star Trek: Picard came out yesterday.  I am so totally in for this.  It was maybe the best pilot episode that a Trek show has had.

[Cartagia]

I watched the first season of The Sopranos for the first time in 20 years, and while its a good show, it is merely a shell of how good it would be in later seasons.  I was honestly shocked at just how much it feels like a typical 90s drama, and there are a ton of weird editing and production choices.  You can also tell that HBO wasn't really funneling money into it the way they would eventually.  Certain things feel really cheap.  All that said I can't wait to keep going forward with it.

S2 and S3 are much more the show I remember.  Much more polished, more confident, fewer weird production issues.  S3 has some all time greatest episodes of television like Employee of the Month and Pine Barrens.

[Cartagia]

The Sopranos still.  S4 is a danged masterpiece.

Also watched the series finale of The Good Place which was one of the most satisfying finales I’ve seen in a while.

[Cartagia]

The Sopranos still.  S4 is a danged masterpiece.

S5 starts good, but it meanders a bit in the middle, but the lat 4-5 episodes are some of the show's best.  Especially 'Long Term Parking'.

[kamikazekeeg]

Got through all that is available for Vikings other than Season 6, which I'm not paying for, so that'll be it for now till I can watch that easily.  Overall I enjoy Vikings, it only dragged at times when the multiple stories going on at once started to be too many, like when they were dealing with stuff in France, I though most of that outside of what involved Rollo was kinda unnecessary, and there were stuff with English that didn't work, or in this last season, Floki's tale was kind of a mixed bag (Though the wrestler Edge being a character was cool as he did well lol).  It's a consistent show, though I think I've lost count of how many times Kattegat, the main viking town in the show is stormed and captured, just to be re-captured by someone else lol  Action is good too, so basically anytime there's a battle going on, it's usually a good watch and there are multiple battles per season and they usually do well to try and make sure that they don't feel stagnant or repetitive.

Not sure what to watch next at the moment.  I thought about redoing my Disney Plus sub to finish the Star Wars cartoons and Simpsons, but I might just end up waiting on The Hunters, some 70's based Nazi hunting show that is new for Amazon as I thought that could be interesting.  Also I was watching Blacklist on Netflix, starting back over from the beginning since I stopped at like Season 2 forever ago and figured I'd rather just rewatch it to catch back up.  It's worth it for James Spader lol

[kamikazekeeg]

A few episodes into this new show, Hunters.  I'm mostly liking it, but I feel like it struggles abit with its tone.  The first episode is played pretty straight, it's dark with a slight exaggerated feel to it, but by the 2nd episode they are playing up the 70's exploitation style way more and comes across kinda out of place when its also dealing with holocaust related stuff, and the third episode kinda cuts back on the cheesy exploitation feel for what it was like before.  It's overall well done, I like the characters, so I'm hoping the show kinda picks a path and sticks with it.

[Cartagia]

The Sopranos still.  S4 is a danged masterpiece.

S5 starts good, but it meanders a bit in the middle, but the lat 4-5 episodes are some of the show's best.  Especially 'Long Term Parking'.

Season 6 has the same meandering problem that 5 does.  The first half of the season spends too much time on a character and storyline, that while important, probably should not have been so much of a focus in the final stretch of the show.  The second half of the season jumps from plot point to plot point with not a lot of connective tissue.  Overall, it is still a brilliant, if flawed show (notably the first and last seasons) that walked so that modern television (your Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, etc) could run.

[kamikazekeeg]

Finished Hunters and I'm kinda torn about it.  Generally I was fine with the show, there's stuff that absolutely works, but if I had to make a comparison, it's like Inglorious Basterds, which isn't a positive.  It's two tonally different ideas that don't create a very cohesive experience.  They try to come across as this very real, dramatic, serious story with lots of talk of the holocaust, peoples stories from that time, and it can be very heart wrenching...and then out comes the 70's exploitation with weird, out of place, satirical cutaways that don't need to be there and over the top violence and action, and like a pot fueled dance sequence that lasts all of a 20 seconds...

They touted it as "inspired by true events", but it's really not, it just generally uses the real story of "Operation Paperclip", bringing Nazi's over to America to use their skills, and turning it into an alt-history thing of these Nazi's now trying to start a Fourth Reich and try to take the USA down from the inside.  It's about as "inspired" as Pirates of the Caribbean was "inspired" by real world pirates lol

Had it just been a crazy, over-the-top, fictional story that didn't try to hinge so much on real world drama, basically "The Boys", but with Nazi Hunters, that would've been fine, or if it had been a serious drama that tried to tell a realistic story without all the bloodshed and violence, that would've been fine, but because it kinda zigs and zags through both ideas, it struggles to stand on its own.  They do set up a second season and I think it could embrace its more crazy side, which would be best for it, but there's no telling if it'll get that second season or not.  I can't super recommend it right now...

[Cartagia]

I should be finishing Season 2 of The Legend of Korra tonight or tomorrow.  It’s a good show, but nothing about it is holding a candle to the original series yet, but I have heard that 3-4 are very strong.

[Cartagia]

I should be finishing Season 2 of The Legend of Korra tonight or tomorrow.  It’s a good show, but nothing about it is holding a candle to the original series yet, but I have heard that 3-4 are very strong.

Ok, Season 3 was much better.  Still not as good as the original, but this was a very strong bounce back after the so-so Season 2.

[Cartagia]

I should be finishing Season 2 of The Legend of Korra tonight or tomorrow.  It’s a good show, but nothing about it is holding a candle to the original series yet, but I have heard that 3-4 are very strong.

Ok, Season 3 was much better.  Still not as good as the original, but this was a very strong bounce back after the so-so Season 2.

Season 4 was a little bit of a step back.  I’d rank them 3, 1, 4, 2 - with a pretty big gap before S2.

I started a series called Stan Against Evil.  It’s a super low budget, low stakes version of Ash vs. Evil Dead.  It’s fun and short and John C. McGinley is good.  The sheriff is played by Janet Varney, who voiced Korra.  It’s disposable, but entertaining.