Underestimating Middle-America Since 1950: Television Test Thread

[Reply #480 on:]

Them's sons a bitches... I was just starting to watch that too!

[Reply #481 on:]

Why would anyone watch Revolution?

Also cancelled this week: Community, Suburgatory and Enlisted.

[Reply #482 on:]

Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. was renewed though, and I'm happy. It started off pretty shaky, but I think it's really come into its own, especially with the way the events of The Winter Soldier have completely changed the landscape of the show. By no means brilliant television, but very entertaining and good world-building for the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Also, I just watched the first episode of Fargo, and I'm intrigued. Very good cast.

[Reply #483 on:]

I love Fargo! Everyone should watch it!

I had mild investment in Suburgatory and the very little I saw of Enlisted was pretty funny, so I'm bummed those didn't get to continue.

[Reply #484 on:]

Enlisted was doomed right off the bat. It was sentenced to the Friday night death slot AND Fox aired the episodes completely out of order, ruining one of the major story arcs. It certainly wasn't in the same league as, say, Brooklyn Nine Nine, but it was consistently funny, and at least deserved a chance.

Suburgatory has never been completely consistent, but when it does work, it's fantastic. Though this most recent season definitely suffered from budget cuts (which also resulted in losing 3 main cast members), so I'm not surprised in the slightest to see it go.

I haven't watched Fargo yet, purely because I'm dubious as hell about it being adapted into a tv series (even if, as I understand, they're doing the True Detective/American Horror Story thing of completely changing the cast/concept/story/setting each season). Though Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is terrible.

[Reply #485 on:]

I love the hell out of the movie Fargo. The show is a fun companion.

[Reply #486 on:]

Though Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is terrible.

Terrible is a little harsh. Like I said, it started off pretty bad but has gotten a lot better, especially near the end of the season now. It's benefited from picking up a boatload of story urgency from major events that tie into what happened in the Captain America movie. The characters have grown on me a lot too. While at first they seemed to be cliche stereotype cutouts for this kind of genre-writing, most of them have been fleshed out with interesting details that completely change your perception of who they are. The female characters in particular, in keeping with what Marvel's been doing right, are all very smart, strong individuals who aren't the slightest bit useless. And what's very nice of the show is that instead of dangling mysteries over your head for way, way too long, most of the questions that were raised in the first season have already been fully answered, with interesting results.

It definitely has its flaws though. Some of the dialogue can still be a bit precious (but again, it's worse at the beginning of the season), and they could stand to get a bigger budget. They're clearly ambitious with what they want to do with special effects, but they're not quite there yet in terms of their green screen capabilities. But I think the biggest thing needed to get into the show is an investment in and enjoyment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole. If you don't have that, you're likely to simply not care.

[Reply #487 on:]

I love Fargo! Everyone should watch it!

When I heard that his was now a series I was a little concerned that it would be poor compared to the film... thankfully it isn't and I'm really enjoying it.

[Reply #488 on:]

I like how it's a new and interesting story that still has a connection to the film

[Reply #489 on:]

But I think the biggest thing needed to get into the show is an investment in and enjoyment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole. If you don't have that, you're likely to simply not care.

That might be it, then. I'm really fucking over the dominance of superhero movies in cinema at the moment. I don't think I've seen a single superhero film since The Dark Knight (I know it's not Marvel, but still, that's how long it's been) because I'm just fucking sick of it all now.

Having said that, I did check out a little bit of the show, and I found it far too cliched/derivative/uninspired to bother investing any more of my time into. Not that I was expecting groundbreaking television or anything, but I didn't even think it was good for what it was.

[Reply #490 on:]

I thought the first few episodes of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D were pretty bad, so I never really bothered watching beyond that. However, I'm actually kind of interested in knowing how the events of Captain America: The Winter Soldier affect it. Anyone want to give me a quick TL;DR of what happens?

[Reply #491 on:]

One of the agents ended up working for Hydra. Cobie Smulders comes back for an episode. And Patton Oswalt gets shot. That's about all I know.

[Reply #492 on:]

The words "Patton Oswalt" are currently the only remotely compelling reason I've heard to keep going with the show.

But he's in everything these days, so I can get my fix by other means.

[Reply #493 on:]

Beamer: Haven't seen Iron Man or The Avengers at least?

Oswalt was fun, but the guest star I've really been enjoying is Bill Paxton, oddly enough. They haven't made it any mystery that Sam Jackson's coming back for the finale as well.

Here's a pretty big recap of what's up so far, Unreal (stole this from a weekly article I sometimes check out):

Show spoiler

S.H.I.E.L.D. has been dismantled, following the revelation that HYDRA had been thriving as a secret society using The Agency's infrastructure as cover.
The team of Agents serving under Phil Coulson are the sole S.H.I.E.L.D. unit still active, chasing down HYDRA side-faction CENTIPEDE; a mercenary outfit scavenging illegal technologies to build super-soldiers. One such super-soldier, Mike Peterson, has been upgraded against his will into the cyborg Deathlok by CENTIPEDE-affiliate corporation Cybertek.
CENTIPEDE's leader is turncoat S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent John Garrett, who was secretly using Agent Grant Ward as a sleeper within Coulson's unit in order to locate and steal whatever Agency technology was used to bring Coulson back from the dead.
Said technology turns out to be a mysterious serum, GH-325, which was subsequently discovered to have been derived from the unidentified corpse of a large blue-skinned humanoid creature (possibly an alien) on ice at a top-secret facility.
Apparently, GH-325 can regenerate dead tissue, but at the expense of driving the subject to madness, which in Coulson's case was averted only by wiping out a substantial part of his memory. However, GH-325 was also used to heal Agent Skye of mortal wounds to no apparent ill-effect.
Skye's ability to better process the serum may be related to her still-unclear origins: She was discovered as a baby in a small Chinese village, and at the time S.H.I.E.L.D. believed her to be a superhuman being of unknown origin.
Garrett, Ward, Deathlok and Raina have stolen a boatload of alien weaponry and S.H.I.E.L.D. secrets (including GH-325) and are planning to integrate them into CENTIPEDE/Cybertek's next line of Deathlok soldiers.

tl;dr: One of the main characters from the beginning turned out to be Hydra and evil all along (looks like he just killed two other major characters, but I doubt they'll die). The good Agents have essentially gone rogue and are being hunted down by the U.S. government who think all SHIELD is bad now. The main bad guy just injected himself with the same stuff that brought Coulson back to life, which ain't good. And our main female character is some kind of alien or superhuman, I assume we'll get more info on that in the finale.

[Reply #494 on:]

One of the reasons I didn't keep up with Agents of SHIELD is because the core cast kinda sucked. Especially Skye.

[Reply #495 on:]

Beamer: Haven't seen Iron Man or The Avengers at least?

Nope. I've heard good things about both (especially The Avengers), and I'm sure I'll get around to them sometime, but probably after we stop being so oversaturated with superhero movies.

[Reply #496 on:]

One of the reasons I didn't keep up with Agents of SHIELD is because the core cast kinda sucked. Especially Skye.

I feel you. The actress who plays Skye can be grating, although she's at least become somewhat less so since the series began. Same with the guy who plays Ward, he has been extremely bland since the start, although the recent revelation regarding his character almost makes up for it. So hopefully the superhuman/alien stuff they're hinting at with Skye will lead somewhere interesting enough to justify her character. I genuinely enjoy the rest of the cast though, especially Clark Gregg who is consistently fun.

I'm sure I'll get around to them sometime, but probably after we stop being so oversaturated with superhero movies.

I wouldn't hold your breath. While some franchises may be crashing and burning (*cough*Amazing Spider-Man*cough*attempts to build a DC Cinematic Universe*cough*), Marvel Studios has been delivering both critically and commercially with its films with such success that I don't see them slowing down their release rate for at least the next several years. And as long as they're making ends meet, other studios are going to keep trying to bank on that trend. I do think eventually they'll hit enough diminishing returns to create a lull in the market, but if they keep building the MCU competently enough to keep people invested (and so far they've been doing a better-than-good job of it), I would say not to expect the current level of saturation to die out for quite a while.

[Reply #497 on:]

Yeah, I kinda figured that when I read this article on The A.V. Club last month.

Though, I guess what I should've said was, I'll get around to seeing them when I stop being sick of superhero movies.

[Reply #498 on:]

Lots of movie watching in the afterlife then? Sounds like a good plan.

[Reply #499 on:]

I read somewhere that Marvel has movies planned for the next fourteen years... so I definitely don't think they'll be dying down soon unless they somehow run into financial problems.

But yes, I'd definitely recommend seeing Iron Man, The Avengers and Captain America: The Winter Soldier at the very least. They're the best ones (the others range from barely passable (Iron Man 2) to pretty good (Thor)).

Show spoiler

I also have no idea if my double-bracket maneuver at the end of my post is grammatically correct. It looks pretty stupid either way.

[Reply #500 on:]

Yeah, I kinda figured that when I read this article on The A.V. Club last month.

I read somewhere that Marvel has movies planned for the next fourteen years...

[Reply #501 on:]

...And there's proof that I should bother clicking links. 

[Reply #502 on:]

Speaking of - Fox and NBC have announced their fall schedules. Quite a few surprises - namely Animation Domination being disbanded, with Brooklyn Nine-Nine moving into a slot between The Simpsons and Family Guy.

As for the upcoming shows announced in those links that UrL won't read, I'm looking forward to The Last Man on Earth and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. The rest, I'm not so sure about. With Community cancelled and Parks & Recreation set to end soon, I'ma need some new live action comedies (HBO seem to be killing it on this front right now, what with the excellent Silicon Valley and the even more excellent Veep).

[Reply #503 on:]

[...] *cough*attempts to build a DC Cinematic Universe*cough* [...]

Hopefully there will be no such thing as a DC Cinematic Universe. I do, however, have high hopes for a DC Television Universe, as they had great success with the DCAU, and the world put together in Smallville was also rather enjoyable. Unfortunately, I dislike Arrow, and as of yet have no opinion of Gotham, so who knows how well that will go.

But The Flash looks awesome. I can't wait for that.

[Reply #504 on:]

[...] *cough*attempts to build a DC Cinematic Universe*cough* [...]

Hopefully there will be no such thing as a DC Cinematic Universe.

Too late. The still working-titled "Batman vs. Superman" movie is essentially acting as a setup for the Justice League movie that has already been announced, with Wonder Woman making an appearance (and I'd be surprised not to see some form of Robin as well). And if Flash is at least as modestly successful as Arrow has been (though I haven't seen Arrow so I can't comment on its actual quality...I hear bad things), I imagine that those actors will be carried over onto the big screen for the team-up.

No idea what they're planning to do with Green Lantern though. That film was such an immense turd of a failure that their best bet may be to ignore the character's existence altogether, as much of a shame to DC fans as that would be. As for Aquaman and Martian Manhunter, I bet we won't see them because DC isn't Marvel and the people in charge of its movies are probably terrified of trying to bring those characters to life in a way that isn't amazingly silly.

[Reply #505 on:]

Too late.

Yeah, by several decades.

[Reply #506 on:]

Woah Fargo, woah. You don't have to go all Game Of Thrones on my ass. I mean, I know it's based on true events so I probably can't complain about who dies. But jesus...

[Reply #507 on:]

They killed off the dragon on Fargo? Oh no!

[Reply #508 on:]

Woah Fargo, woah. You don't have to go all Game Of Thrones on my ass. I mean, I know it's based on true events so I probably can't complain about who dies. But jesus...

I can complain.

Show spoiler

Adam Goldberg NOOOOOOOO! Who will have witty non-verbal conversations with the deaf guy now? REVENGE! I WANT REVENGE!

[Reply #509 on:]

Too late.

Yeah, by several decades.

I'm quite sure I don't know what you mean.

[Reply #510 on:]

Anybody watch Utopia? That was bleak and pretty and I can't wait for the second season.

[Reply #511 on:]

Can't say I have.

Anyone watch Silicon Valley, though? It just finished up its first season and it's become one of my favourite shows currently on the air. It also makes a great companion show to Veep, which continues to be excellent and hilarious in its third season.

[Reply #512 on:]

Seems like all these shows I'd be interested in are on HBO which I do not have.

[Reply #513 on:]

I don't have it either...

[Reply #514 on:]

Anyone watch Silicon Valley, though? It just finished up its first season and it's become one of my favourite shows currently on the air.

I just binge-watched the season in one very unproductive day. Great stuff.

[Reply #515 on:]

Such a shame about Christopher Evan Welch. Peter Gregory was a fucking brilliant character.

[Reply #516 on:]

I...I hadn't even heard about that until just now. That's awful! His deadpan was a staple. And he was great in other stuff I've seen him in, including his small roles in The Master and Lincoln.

[Reply #517 on:]

I finished season 2 of Orange is the New Black. Overall I liked it a lot. Not looking forward to the return of Alex next season because fuck her, she sucks the life out of everything that makes Piper interesting and likeable.

[Reply #518 on:]

But... But she's hot.

(I'm still only a few episodes in, but season 2 is amazing so far)

I...I hadn't even heard about that until just now. That's awful! His deadpan was a staple. And he was great in other stuff I've seen him in, including his small roles in The Master and Lincoln.

That's why he was conspicuously not present during the last 3 episodes. From what I hear, they pretty much had to write him out last-minute and still don't have a plan on how to handle his character from here (though they've absolutely ruled out having him played by someone else, which would be an atrocity).

[Reply #519 on:]

And now my beloved Fargo has come to an end in its first season. It was satisfying in that the finale played out very similar to the movie and that both worked for it and against it. If it's picked up for another season, as I am led to believe it will be, I'm curious as to what's gonna happen next. I know they want to take an American Horror Story approach and have it be kind of an anthology so I'm really curious as to how that will play out because I would love to see another season of Molly. She's wonderful.