What was the last TV show you watched?

[Benzadmiral]

A Season Three episode of The Fugitive, with Arthur O'Connell, Sheree North (later Cosmo Kramer's mom), and Kim Darby, still 3 years away from playing Mattie Ross in True Grit. Dr. Kimble is injured slightly while running from a posse, and winds up being treated by O'Connell's "Dr." Adams, a naturopath who has loads of enthusiastic patients . . . some of whom are dying prematurely because, at his instructions, they scorn traditional medicine. At the climax, Kim, as Adams's niece, falls and is stung by the bees Adams keeps for the honey with which he treats his patients. She doesn't just go into anaphylactic shock, which would have been plenty. Kimble diagnoses her as being in a diabetic coma! The question is, can Kimble talk the "doctor" into letting him take the girl to a hospital?

The technical problem with this one, I thought, was that I'd never heard of anaphylactic shock from bee stings bringing on a diabetic coma. Internet research, however, says that it can. But Kim's character is not presented as diabetic; there's no mention of any symptoms that "Dr." Adams is ignoring, etc. And besides, she has been helping harvest the honey for some time. Wouldn't she have been stung (even wearing beekeeper's gear) more than once, and evidenced this medical crisis before?

Aside from that, good drama.

 

[Worf]

"The Orville" - Arrgh what a terribly disappointing season premiere. It was slow, stupid and ridiculous. No one needs to see an hour devoted to he/she drama and shipboard hookups. What a waste! If this is what I waited a year to see... damn was I fooled!

Worf

 

[Doctor Strange]

I watched it too. More precisely, I hate-watched it.

The show is such an embarrassment on every level, and especially MacFarlane himself, who can neither write a decent hourlong dramedy script, nor play the captain as an interesting character. The obviously big budget thrown at this show, its extensive visual effects and costumes/sets, and the better actors stranded in it, only serve to point up that he's got no ideas other than ripping off the Trek series and adding dick jokes. I mean, a total steal of the plot of "Amok Time", but about urination rather than reproduction: that's a GENIUS idea, right?!?

Ugh. As I keep saying: it's Trek dumbed down for an audience that actually found the Trek shows "too cerebral" and never watched them... so they don't realize that every even vaguely good idea on the show is "borrowed"! A total vanity project for MacFarlane, Fox's way to reward him for making 17(!) profitable seasons of Family Guy.

But I'm a lifelong Trekker - since the very first broadcast in 1966 - and I can't stop watching. Yeah, it's a disasater, but I remain curious and can't look away!

 

[LizzieMaine]

Seth MacFarlane has always struck me as someone who looks and acts like he has an immense amount of real talent -- but somehow he actually doesn't. But everyone else buys his act, so he gets away with it. If you talk loud enough and long enough, nobody will notice that you aren't really saying anything.

 

[Formeruser012523]

^^^ This is so true because the other night my brother in law was telling me how talented MacFarlane was. Ugh! I've yet to sit down and force myself to watch a single episode of this farce. Or any of his "work" for that matter. Don't think I could stomach it. And I feel too sorry for the other actors.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The one thing MacFarlane did that genuinely made me laugh was the Captain Kirk bit from when he hosted the Oscars -- but that was due to William Shatner's talent, not his. The Shat, even drunk out of his skull, completely owned that stage, which is something that MacFarlane for all his preening will never be able to do.

 

[Touchofevil]

Finally finished our journey the other night of once again watching each episode of Game of Thrones. Last night, under the influence of GoT withdrawals, we watched Bodyguard on Netflix. It was okay, but we will give it another shot. We watched an episode of Call the Midwife, but that didn’t really do it either. I guess we will just have to accept that it will be a while before we can truly enjoy anything else that isn’t GoT.

A few episodes of The Andy Griffith Show this rainy and windy morning.

 

[LizzieMaine]

^^^ This is so true because the other night my brother in law was telling me how talented MacFarlane was. Ugh! I've yet to sit down and force myself to watch a single episode of this farce. Or any of his "work" for that matter. Don't think I could stomach it. And I feel too sorry for the other actors.

MacFarlane doesn't have in his whole body the talent Mike Judge has in his fingernail clippings. It annoys me to no end that Hollywood throws buckets of cash at MacFarlane for any half-baked idea he has, and Judge has to go around with his hat in his hands trying to scratch up financing for projects that would, if they were ever made, actually be something worth your time. If the only thing Judge ever did was "Beavis and Butt-Head," he'd still be miles ahead of MacFarlane's entire body of work.

 

[Zombie_61]

"The Orville" - Arrgh what a terribly disappointing season premiere...

I watched it too. More precisely, I hate-watched it...

I just finished watching the first two episodes of season two. The second episode was marginally more entertaining than the first, but if this is the best they can do they should just call it quits now. Good special effects (including the "alien" makeups and costumes) and the performances are as good as they need to be for a show like this, but the scripts are very hit-and-miss and for a show labeled as a "comedy drama" I find it to be rather lacking in humor. I was "on the fence" about this show throughout most of it's first season but ultimately liked more than I disliked about it, so I kept watching; now I'm back on the fence.

 

[Ernest P Shackleton]

Finally finished our journey the other night of once again watching each episode of Game of Thrones. Last night, under the influence of GoT withdrawals, we watched Bodyguard on Netflix. It was okay, but we will give it another shot. We watched an episode of Call the Midwife, but that didn’t really do it either. I guess we will just have to accept that it will be a while before we can truly enjoy anything else that isn’t GoT.

There's always the behind the scenes clips and bonus material. Some of it is worth watching. For instance:

 

[Doctor Strange]

Yeah, The Orville continues to be a real downer.

And I'm done with Gotham. Folks here may recall that I've gone back and forth on hating and liking it, but 20 minutes into this week's (final) season premiere I just realized I don't care and turned it off.

Even after finally having given in to the show's own gonzo take on a Batman backstory that could never possibly lead to any classic interpretation of Batman, and having eventually enjoyed it for its crazy excess (and splendid production values and excellent cast)… this interpretation of the No Man's Land plotline is just too wrong, in just too many ways, for me to handle. I won't be watching the final season.

And Lizzie, I totally agree about Mike Judge, and let's be thrilled that he's also managed to do Office Space, King of the Hill, Idiocracy, and Silicon Valley!

 

[Formeruser012523]

MacFarlane doesn't have in his whole body the talent Mike Judge has in his fingernail clippings. It annoys me to no end that Hollywood throws buckets of cash at MacFarlane for any half-baked idea he has, and Judge has to go around with his hat in his hands trying to scratch up financing for projects that would, if they were ever made, actually be something worth your time. If the only thing Judge ever did was "Beavis and Butt-Head," he'd still be miles ahead of MacFarlane's entire body of work.

Remember watching Beavis and Butt-Head back in the day and my sister quotes it from time to time to this day. What happened to Mike Judge? Was he just drummed out of Hollywood for not kissing up to the right people? Never really saw any of King of the Hill probably because it would be too close to some of my actual family. LOL

 

[LizzieMaine]

"King of the Hill" was the best pure character comedy ever written for American television -- I can't remember a single "joke" the show ever did, but I feel like I know the characters as well as I know any real person. I think it's the closest a television show has ever come to capturing the character-based absurdity of "Vic and Sade" on radio, and that's extremely high praise. Judge is the only American TV comedy writer of the last forty years whose work could stand as real literature.

Judge got on the bad side of Hollywood with "Idiocracy" -- when Fox realized what it was, they tried to worm out of their release contract, and when they couldn't, they went to every possible effort to deliberately bury it. He's basically been persona non grata ever since. I'm amazed he was able to get a show on HBO, especially since he doesn't seem to have agreed to pull any punches. Aside from admiring his skill as a humorist, I really admire his artistic integrity -- a commodity that's as rare in Hollywood as an honest accountant.

 

[belfastboy]

Watching a Canadian produced Netflix series..."Users Guide to Cheating Death" An engaging show that takes on the many many fads around diet and lifestyle and debunks the crap out of them. The host has a pointed dislike for Gwyneth Paltrow. He has taken on the fallacy of "Cleanses", "Diets", and with no shortage of subject matter there will be a season 2.

 

[HanauMan]

I taped the new BBC three part mini series The ABC Murders over the Christmas period and was looking forwards to watching this as I am such a big Poirot (David Suchet era only, mind you) fan. The BBC series has little in common with the Suchet Poirot films, though its darker undertones echo the last few episodes that features Suchet as a old and dying man.

I intended to watch the three parts over three days but ended up watching all three hours in one setting. There are some problems with the series, however. The film is basically style over substance, for starters. Set in the (bleak) England of 1933, there are more than a few parallels with modern day England. A big undercurrent is the rise of fascism and the racism against ,and fear of, outsiders (ie Europeans). Poirot, as a Belgian refugee, is a regular target of this English racism.

Ignoring this, the series is good entertainment. The ABC Murders introduces us to a brand new Poirot, played by a favorite actor of mine, John Malkovich. Malkovich has none of the fastidiousness and odd mannerisms of Suchet's Poirot (which are present in the Agatha Christie stories) but instead plays him as an old man past his prime, his fame forgotten and now seen as a joke figure by the new generation of police. His old Scotland Yard sidekick, Japp, has retired from the police and dies within a few minutes of the start of the first part. There are some little touching details; Malkovich dyes his grey goatee beard, he lives alone in a large, but dark and lonely apartment, he prays on his knees, he keeps letters from the past (fan mail) and from the present (abuse and ridicule). If you expect a David Suchet, don't. BUT, I like this Poirot and hope to see more of him.

Japp's place is taken by a new, much younger, policeman, played by Rupert Grint. Another Harry Potter face is Shirley Henderson playing a sleezy landlady who does a by line in selling her daughters' body to the tenants of the boarding house she keeps, a shilling a go . There is no Miss Lemon or Captain Hastings.

The whole series is bleak and has a darker tone than many viewers, who may remember the Suchet series with fondness, may be comfortable with. It is a modern series dealing with modern issues. I like the new Poirot, however, as he seeks personal Redemption in finding the ABC killer. There is a surprise revelation in the end, about Poirot's past, which I won't revel, which explains so much about Poirot's character and the demons he has carried with him since 1914.

Watch it, if you get the chance, and enjoy......

 

[ChiTownScion]

"King of the Hill" was the best pure character comedy ever written for American television -- .

My wife's family is from Texas. I thought that it was a documentary.

 

[Touchofevil]

There's always the behind the scenes clips and bonus material. Some of it is worth watching. For instance:

That is funny, we already resorted to watching bonus material to prolong the viewing of all seven seasons. We also found a number of them to be very interesting/entertaining. Thank you for the suggestion.

We have watched a few episodes of Vikings the past couple of nights, but find it to be just okay at best.

 

[MisterCairo]

More episodes of series two of Outlander. The actor playing Alex Randall, younger brother of Black Jack Randall, has an excellent likeness and matching tone of voice!

 

[belfastboy]

Finally finished our journey the other night of once again watching each episode of Game of Thrones. Last night, under the influence of GoT withdrawals, we watched Bodyguard on Netflix. It was okay, but we will give it another shot. We watched an episode of Call the Midwife, but that didn’t really do it either. I guess we will just have to accept that it will be a while before we can truly enjoy anything else that isn’t GoT.

A few episodes of The Andy Griffith Show this rainy and windy morning.

Have you tried "The Last Kingdom"? On Netflix....kind of GoT like without the dragons!!! We loved it. My wife has a huge crush on the lead character.... Utred

 

[Ernest P Shackleton]

Vikings has been canceled...but they have enough episodes...with their oddball breaks and splitting seasons, to air into 2020. D-U-M-B. Like the show.