Anyone watching Dept Q? Netflix Bit of a copy of Slow Horses, set in Edinburgh, but the 2 eps we’ve seen so far suggests continuing with it
Mrs Wim fkg cncrs.
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Just started it, like it so far. Good, dark tone (but not relentlessly depressing), good cast, Edinburgh! Feels like the writers are actually trying.
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Found it insanely tedious, slo motion padding scenes with plastic strings and expository voiceovers. Some bizarre wrap ups and unexplained, extremely unlikely events, and 500 close ups on her face with the rapid blinking thing, jesus. E Moss should not direct. Whole season was pretty shabby I thought. Hard to keep it up over that many seasons but tbh they didn’t really keep it up for much more than 2 or 3. Also, she really rediscovered the old fairy in the sky in a big way.
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Agree with you Lofter, you could always tell which episode Moss directed, it turned into a slow-mo music video with her playlist favourites.
This show was a brilliant piece of television for many years but it clearly went down hill around season 3 and 4. Originally the world of Gilead felt huge and expansive whilst focusing on a small part of the Gilead world. The longer the show went, it felt like Gilead consisted of Boston and 6 commanders…one being a promoted limo driver…it never felt so small. Their military felt like a few guys in a black bronco and a few security guards at a brothel. I think they were the three guys hanging on the wall in the last episode. The world just felt small in the final seasons.
Even the resistance and US army felt limited. Suddenly Moss’s character was some badass indispensable militant and her husband now commanding forces while wearing chinos.
Then you have Sabrina and Aunt Lydia. The former should have been handing on the wall with the three gilead soilders, her child taken off her by child protection. Lydia should never have left the Handmaids barracks alive, those handmaids should have torn her apart with their bare hands. The guard was lucky to escape…though probably one of those three guys on the wall…
Don’t get me started on how stupid and ill-thought out the planned attack was by June and her fellow handmaids. So convoluted. If you gonna drug them to put them to sleep, just to kill them with a knife, how about just drug them to kill them. Cyanid should do it. Simple.
Let’s not forget commander Nick (the limo driver) and commander Joseph, you know, the good Nazis, that the audience was meant to root for. Every episode I was thinking, you’re in love with this Nazi? History shows the liberated french were not kind to the french women that did that during WW2, maybe June should be hanging on the wall alongside Sabrina and the three soldiers.
As for not having a reunion with her daughter after so many seasons with that sole focus, well, I don’t mind it. That sadly is life, not every story ends like a fairytale.
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That’s a fair summation, and a good effort! After the world building and genuine dread of the early seasons, a bit of a messy soap really. You’re spot on about the shrinking sense of things, and I wonder what writing room conversations must have gone on in light of machinations in the real USA all the while? A genuinely good team would’ve taken the opportunity to be subversive and illuminating. They went cack handed and heavy handed by turn instead. I’m very glad to never have to sit through another weepy, interminable conversation between June and cuckold-to-Nazi hubby as the strings build to nowhere. The Aussie actor playing Serena for the best on field, playing with what she was given.
yeah that switch happened real fast I thought.
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we are so back
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You obviously didnt pay too much attention
SERENA was her name not sabrina.
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Why isn’t this in the Non-English Speaking thread?
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Taskmaster is 5 for 5 in episodes so far. All the contestants are great, and the combo of anger, nuttiness, stuff ups, and hating Alex is chef’s kiss.
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Fatiha is 
I am sad that the headphones weren’t actually a way to provide clues to upcoming colours.
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I thought the Mobland series was good, but the final episode was disappointing.
Not up to Ritchie’s usual tying all the threads together standards at all, imo.
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I thought it was good wim.
O’hara trod an impossibly thin line
Not all loose ends were tied up, agree, so felt it left plenty of room for a next season.
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I guess I’ve been spoilt by his movies where the last, I dunno…ten fifteen minutes?..just wrap everything up in a very interesting way.
I didn’t feel like that with Mobland, but perhaps I wasn’t supposed to.
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I agree. Wasn’t a great finale.
In fairness to Ritchie, he’s only an exective producer on this. He directed the first two eps, and you can see the difference in those two eps.
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The more I think about it, the more I really dislike that last episode.
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Or perhaps it’s the preceding episodes that need to be blamed because the character turn just came out of nowhere.
Yes, I understand there was a cathartic moment, but to lay it all on that just doesn’t work for me.
The end of the war was confusing and unclever and…turning on a character I don’t even remember, and unsatisfying.
There so much that looks like it’s setting up for a second season, which makes the accident just look so…ugh.
But I really, really liked the series.
To compare it to The Penguin…
That finale just worked.
You could do a second season if you wanted to (and all reports are that they don’t want to and I agree with that because it’s perfect as it is), but it gave closure for That story.
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Ooh, summary tag. Good call.
Summary
Yeah, the end to the war was pretty lame, considering the build up to it. Richie, who has proven himself to be extremly suspicious, just falls for blatent setup? And Harry just walks into the pub and bang bang, it’s done?
I’m also really confused by Kat. The more they show of her, the less threatening she appears. Obviously she’s being setup to be the big bad in season 2, but Harry just told her to got ■■■■ herself and then casually wandered out of the room.
And the ‘accident’ was about as silly as a cliffhanger can be.
I quite liked the series overall (wouldn’t say I loved it), but I do feel that the ridiculously good cast is carrying it a fair bit since the intial plot setup.
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I couldn’t stand her at first, but I’ve really warmed to her and her humour now
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Finished up a binge of For All Mankind on apple.
I’m still not sure how much I liked it. When it was ‘on’ it was as enthralling as anything I’ve watched. But then there was the ‘soapie’ elements, the boring side-plots and the pretty poor 4th season which probably brought it down a bit in my mind.
Great concept though, and I’ll be tuning in again when season 5 pops up soon, even if it does appear to be heading into ‘poor man’s verson of The Expanse’ territory.
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