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New episodes finally dropped on Disney Plus here in Finland and I was very excited. I got really worried the writers were going to have Janine mess up the career day over trying to micromanage Jalen Hurts, and I was so happy they actually highlighted her competence.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 3:15 AM on May 10, 2024

I saw that Benjamin Bratt is apparently going to be in season 2 of Andor, seemingly in an arc partly set on Chandrila. Presumably he’s a Chandrilan, then, but one funny little detail that’s stuck in my head since speculation was rife that Luthen Rael was the same character as Rael Aveross, that the original conception of the latter was that he looked and spoke like Benjamin Bratt.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 7:41 AM on March 15, 2024

This is the first whole episode of Last Week Tonight I've watched in a long time, and I'd forgotten how much the first segment resembles an old-school episode of the Daily Show. I'd kinda started to think about John Oliver as a guy who delivers twenty-minute humorous video essays about depressing things, and had forgotten just how delightfully silly the rest of the show is.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 3:19 AM on February 29, 2024

After two very solid episodes, we ended with… a whimpery bang. I still think Thrawn's main skillset is convincing his underlings that every loss after loss after loss he suffers is somehow a win, but at least his plan for escaping was plausible. I will say that the fight between Ahsoka and Elspeth was among the better Star Wars duels, partly because Filoni understands that on some level Star Wars is all about cool swords going whoosh whoosh krrzzzzt krrzzzzt.

I still… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:14 AM on October 4, 2023

Ooh, my son and I are a few episodes out from the Mortis arc in our watch-through of Clone Wars. I'm getting quite excited now, though we only get through about two or three a week, so it'll be a while.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 9:57 AM on October 6, 2023

GhostintheMachine: Still holding out hope for a single Star Wars story to include a character making a decision that makes sense.

Yeah, that's Andor.

To be less clowny, I'll say that Dave Filoni used to be able to write stories which made coherent psychological sense, but that was in a shorter format, and it shows in Ahsoka that he's much better when he's got tight constraints to work with.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:42 PM on January 7, 2024

Oh jebus I hope this is the end of Jonathan Majors’ Kang.

I minded him less in this episode than in the previous ones, possibly because he was so extraneous. Everything that happened was essentially just one character, Loki, figuring shit out, and figuring his shit out. That’s good storytelling and it was easy not to think about other things.

The World Tree reveal was beautiful, and my heart swelled. I also liked how Mobius went back and Don was… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:15 PM on November 10, 2023

The first time I saw the temporal radiation effect in the TVA this episode I was horrified, it looked like a fungus growing on reality, but each time I thought it was more and more beautiful. And then, in the end, I remembered the gag about spaghettification way back in episode one or two and I laughed.

This is one of the best uses of computer effects I’ve seen.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 6:47 AM on November 3, 2023

orrnyereg: Did anyone catch B-15's real name?

Dr. Willis.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 6:49 AM on November 3, 2023

I agree that the show hasn’t had much of an idea what to do with Loki as a character, but I do like that the setting is taken seriously and that the mechanics of it have been worked out and explored this season.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:02 AM on November 5, 2023

That was *much* better than the last week’s. I had nearly made the decision to just stop watching Loki when someone whose opinions I trust posted on social media about liking this episode.

I’m still bothered by watching Majors onscreen, and there were a couple of moments where my mind went straight to the allegations against him. I’m hoping that Timely stays dead and that’s the last we’ll see of Majors, but I suspect that they’ll timey-whimey him back into existence.… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 6:23 AM on October 27, 2023

One of the many things that bugged me about Timely as a character is that he’s anachronistic in a lot of easy to catch ways. To give an example, in the last episode he used the term “science fiction”, decades before it was coined. I thought at first it would turn out he was already time traveling, but no, it’s just sloppy writing.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 10:59 PM on October 27, 2023

He uses it in sense 3, not in the older sense 1. Though I’ll admit that I’m surprised that it was used before 1920 in that sense. 1898 is close enough to 1893 that I retract my objection.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:01 AM on October 28, 2023

Oh, and I forgot to answer the question.

There were just phrases he used which seemed really off, especially compared to the language of the other characters temporally native to 1893, another one I remember is that he says “adjust the settings” at one point. That’s why I thought it would turn out he was a time traveler. Though I suppose that could be explained if that’s a phrase used by OB in the TVA Handbook.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:23 AM on October 28, 2023

It took me a long time to watch this episode, I did not enjoy seeing Majors on screen. I was really hoping Sophie would kill him at the end there. I hope that Renslayer will end up as the real Kang the Conqueror.

Faintdreams: I feel like there must be some nice vexiollogy super nerdery going on there as it was a alternate Branch of Chicago, not the 'sacred Timeline one'..

The two I noticed were the correct Egyptian and… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:39 AM on October 23, 2023

Loki, at its best, is like a good Doctor Who episode (finding joy in the everyday and weird characters being fun) and at its worst it’s like bad Star Wars (plot contrivances explained as supernatural forces and billions dying with little import). This was Loki at its best and worst, in one episode.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 8:49 AM on October 13, 2023

ellieBOA: Did Jonathan Majors’s Arrest Affect the New Season of Loki?

Thanks for the link, ellieBOA. I'll admit that the brief glimpse we got of Majors in the recap made me really uncomfortable. Somehow the statues and the disembodied voice didn't bother me nearly as much, probably because it was more fictional. I was hoping that he wouldn't feature much on screen in this series, but I guess it's unavoidable.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:58 AM on October 6, 2023

As the we got the final twist, my thoughts went from "well, I guess he didn't want to do another season, and that's a good way for his story to end" to "no… oh no! NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!"
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:49 AM on October 3, 2023

How Did ‘Only Murders in the Building’ Become One of the Most Comforting Shows on TV? by Brian Phillips. Excerpt: The more amusing a murder mystery seems, the more disturbing it becomes when you think about it. In that sense, the wallpaper on Only Murders in the Building may qualify as the most morally depraved thing on television. Hulu’s hit whodunit features a frankly staggering amount of exquisite wallpaper—wallpaper that’s elaborate without being tacky, ornate without being busy, bold… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 8:56 AM on October 4, 2023

Ben Trismegistus: That shot straight to the mirror was hard to watch.

I thought so too. In fact, what I thought in the moment was: "That's the first time I've ever seen Paul Rudd look his age."
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 6:02 AM on October 2, 2023

Another notably well-directed episode, this time by Geeta Vasant Patel. This story, with several battle sequences, had many moving parts but I never had any problems following what was happening and what the stakes were. Also, Genevieve O’Reilly got time to act, even if her scene was short.

I’ll say that some aspects of the New Republic are really confusing to me. Does the chancellor chair every court-martial? Or only for high-ranking officers? And is the defense council… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 4:43 AM on September 27, 2023

orrnyereg: They couldn't have known what would happen to Ray Stevenson but he's just so wasted here

The scene where Ahsoka tries to connect with Shin felt like a reshoot to me. I suspect that the original idea was to have Shin die and Baylan Skoll continue as a character into whatever comes next, but Stevenson’s passing meant they had to rejig the ending.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 7:50 AM on September 27, 2023

Yeah, until that scene between Ahsoka and Shin I thought that was the deal too, but something about how it’s shot, with no shot of them together on screen, except for those really strange shots across Ahsoka’s shoulder, which look like she’s being played by a stand-in, makes it feel like a reshoot. I suspect other scenes have been altered to change her and her master’s story.

All that said, it’s just speculation, a feeling based on that one scene.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 10:36 AM on September 27, 2023

My suspicion is that it’s Cliff, but entirely because he’s the most “babyish” character, and would therefore fit thematically, though I don’t know what the motive might be.

I’m really glad the show is retaining its high quality throughout. I’m really excited now for the last couple of episodes.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:35 PM on September 21, 2023

My poisoning theory is that Dickie put some foul-tasting substance on the cookies, so that Ben wouldn’t eat them, but he did anyway.

Though I will say that the “snake brother” thing (CoBro) is some real effing foreshadowing if Dickie turns out to be the murderer.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 12:17 AM on September 26, 2023

This is my favorite episode so far, just notably better directed than any of the previous. It was really easy to understand who everyone was and what their relationships were, just by how they were portrayed on screen. Also, Peridea felt a lot more real than the previous planets we'd visited. I have no idea who Jennifer Getzinger is, but she clearly knows her way around a camera.

All that said, I cursed out loud, involuntarily, when Huyang said "a long time ago, in… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 3:55 AM on September 22, 2023

Atreides: I think Marrock the inquisitor was a big clue dropped in the front half to tell us that most of Thrawn's men are animated by Dathomiri magic.

The English language captions referred to Thrawn’s troops as “Night Troopers”, so my assumption was also that they were animated by Nightsister magic.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 9:41 AM on September 25, 2023

I will say, that was Hayden Christensen’s best ever version of Anakin Skywalker.

Which admittedly isn’t saying much, but still…
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:17 AM on September 13, 2023

Okay, I will say another thing… whoever thought it would be a good visual to have the squidwhales travel between galaxies by farting into hyperspace needs an editor.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:20 AM on September 13, 2023

I’d had this show recommended to me a bunch of times. I thought it was fine. Ironically, it’s not really good with cause and effect when it comes to human beings, most obviously in that it’s never actually explained why Sergei is murdered. He just is.

It’s well acted, expertly shot, and the music is brilliant, but the script has gaping holes in it, and for a show obsessing over cause and effect, it seems really vague about characters’ motivations. In the end, the story… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 3:17 PM on September 8, 2023

like_neon: Forest said something about “I need him back”.

In case anyone’s still wondering, he says “I need them back”, as in his wife and daughter.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 3:19 PM on September 8, 2023

octothorpe: then they immediately killed off Glusman's character without much apparent motivation

I've just started watching this, and finished two episodes already, and it's really bugging me that there seems to be no reason why Forest had Kenton kill Sergei, and didn't simply confiscate his watch and have him arrested. The murder seems like such a weird escalation, and no one in the show so far seems to treat it that way. Is the motivation for the murder ever explained in the show?
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 12:14 PM on September 2, 2023

To come back from the future to answer my own question…

No, they don’t ever present a good motivation for the murder. For a show that’s so obsessed with cause and effect, it’s a fairly big flaw that they never settled on the primary cause that set all the other effects in motion. Anyway, if this bugs you as much as it bugged me, I’ll say that the show, flawed though it might be, is worth sticking with.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:46 PM on September 8, 2023

I barely got through the first episode of Ahsoka, but decided to give the second a chance, which I liked a lot more, and by this one I feel invested. I really liked how much time characters had to just interact. It felt like a throwback to the original Star Wars movie that Ahsoka, Sabine and Huyang spent enough time in hyperspace to be able to have that training session and drink caf. I liked that it echoed the scenes onboard the Millennium Falcon after they leave for Alderaan, not only because… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 12:46 PM on August 31, 2023

My wife and I have caught up with the show. We’re absolutely loving this series of OMITB. I thought that the second series lacked the lightning-in-a-bottle quality of the first, but I’ll be damned if they haven’t managed to figure out how to recapture that spark. How the show manages to switch between high farce and emotional depths at the flip of a switch is remarkable.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:12 AM on August 23, 2023

Superilla: has any team made the finals of a major tournament by knocking out as many exciting, good-vibes underdogs consecutively as England has this year?

Traditionally that has been the role of Germany in the men’s game (and West-Germany before that), exemplified by keeping Poland from reaching the final in 1974, France in 1982 and 1986, and the US and South Korea in 2002.

I think what makes England’s progress to the final… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 12:20 AM on August 20, 2023

Due to an absolutely catastrophic scheduling mix-up I had to rush out of the house with my daughter minutes before the match started and take her to meet people in a park with very poor reception, so I missed the final and was updated with the occasional text message from my wife. Having watched nearly every game of the tournament, except for the ones in the middle of my night, this was a huge anticlimax.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 6:49 AM on August 20, 2023

Jeezy Chreezy, the end of Spain-Sweden was as much fun as the preceding match had been dull. I’m bouncing from the excitement.

biffa: where I believe you can also find one of MeFi's own on a regular basis.

Saying things like ‘the problem with Sweden is that they can’t score’ a minute before they score 🤪
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:59 AM on August 15, 2023

These quarterfinals are turning out to be a real bummer for me, personally. I was essentially a neutral when Japan-Sweden started, but by the end I was really hoping Nadeshiko would come back. France are always my team if Iceland aren’t playing (I lived in France as a kid) and I thought they were much the better team against the Matildas (though that may be my supporter’s eye view of the game) and now Colombia, who’ve been the most joyful story of this World Cup, are losing to a grimly efficient… [more]
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:05 AM on August 12, 2023

So far Japan-Norway is a great match. Japan have been utterly dominant, but Norway got one chance and took it, so one-one it is, with a bit more than half an hour gone.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 1:35 AM on August 5, 2023

Oh wow, what a comprehensive performance by Japan. Whichever of Sweden or the US will not like facing them.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:56 AM on August 5, 2023

It’s strange, as a neutral, to feel sad for a team as richly garlanded with prizes as the US, but I really felt for them at the end. Seeing Rapinoe crying felt somehow wrong, after a decade plus of watching her tear apart opposing teams. But the image which will stay with me is Naeher’s stunned reaction after it’s been confirmed that Hurtig’s penalty crossed the line. Such shocked disbelief.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:51 AM on August 6, 2023

But yay Sweden! They’ll give Japan a hell of a game, that’s for sure.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:51 AM on August 6, 2023

Sports journalist Charles Boehm once described the Swedish men’s team thusly:

Sweden are organized and smart and rugged and just cynical enough to really have a shot at going all the way. The walking manifestation of that sinking feeling that it's not going to be your day.

This applies probably doubly for the women’s team.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 8:55 AM on August 6, 2023

Not for the first time I’ve messed up the schedule of an international tournament, so I turned on the television thinking I’d be seeing the kickoff of Japan-Spain and was very confused to see the score Japan 4-0 Spain. At first I thought it was a clip from a previous match they were showing for context, but then… wow!

Nadeshiko Japan have really showed themselves as contenders for the title, and La Roja will need to go back to the drawing board before their next match.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:05 AM on July 31, 2023

That was a weird performance from Canada. Even after the four changes at half time, they seemed subdued.

But congratulations to Australia and Nigeria! Both teams could go deep into the tournament.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 5:13 AM on July 31, 2023

I think it’s been my favorite match so far. Open without being out of control. There were few mistakes, and they were punished.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 12:47 PM on July 29, 2023

Oh geez, that was heartbreaking for New Zealand. The Swiss played like a team who knew that a draw would see them through to the 2nd round, and the Football Ferns didn’t find a breakthrough.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 2:24 AM on July 30, 2023

Speaking of heartbreak, I can’t be the only neutral who had become a wholly committed supporter of Colombia. What a performance by the Cafeteras, and what amazing skill by Linda Caicedo. It’ll take some strike to dislodge that from being the goal of the tournament.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 4:24 AM on July 30, 2023

Waaaaaaaah! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

I hereby apologize to the entirety of the Colombian nation for having doubted their team.
posted to FanFare by Kattullus at 4:31 AM on July 30, 2023