{"id":2971,"date":"2017-05-31T02:51:07","date_gmt":"2017-05-31T02:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/?p=2971"},"modified":"2020-08-22T10:54:03","modified_gmt":"2020-08-22T10:54:03","slug":"random-movies-tv-shows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/random-movies-tv-shows\/","title":{"rendered":"Random Movies &#038; TV Shows"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On a whim I decided to check out some of the many, many non-Anime TV shows I&#8217;ve been ignoring for the past 12 years or so (along with a few movies as well):<\/p>\n<p>TV Shows<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Agents_of_S.H.I.E.L.D.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.<\/a> &#8211; Everyone&#8217;s far too smug.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Almost_Human_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Almost Human<\/a> &#8211; A very good buddy-cop action series. It&#8217;s practically criminal it only got one season.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Alphas\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Alphas<\/a> &#8211; Not bad; the pieces are all there&#8230; they just don&#8217;t cohere into something greater. It&#8217;s serviceable and no more.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Andromeda_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andromeda<\/a> &#8211; Eh. Everything about it screams low-budget.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Caprica\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Caprica<\/a> &#8211; I don&#8217;t know what I was expecting really, but it wasn&#8217;t this. It&#8217;s an odd collection of disparate elements that don&#8217;t really work on any level.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dark_Angel_(American_TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dark Angel<\/a> &#8211; Deliberately avoided watching this in the past for no particular reason. Checked it out now and something about the atmosphere\/tone\/look doesn&#8217;t quite work for me.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Defiance_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Defiance<\/a> &#8211; Reminiscent of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Farscape\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Farscape<\/a> and surprisingly good. Both expansive and structurally coherent with an engaging cast of characters. The third season however goes too far off the rails.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Falling_Skies\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Falling Skies<\/a> &#8211; Could do with less children and the protagonist&#8217;s constantly bemused expression is annoying. Those issues aside it doesn&#8217;t seem to know whether it wants to be post-apocalyptic survival or hi-tech sci-fi.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nikita_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nikita<\/a> &#8211; Huh. I wasn&#8217;t really expecting anything from this reboot, but it seems to capture the mood and tone of the 1997 version rather well (based on my hazy recollections from that time).<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sanctuary_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sanctuary<\/a> &#8211; Okayish. Kind of rough around the edges though and the episodic stories are all over the place&#8230; deliberately it seems.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sherlock_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sherlock<\/a> &#8211; More like a collection of movies than a TV series\/mini-series. While they&#8217;re a bit ambling and the lectures are kind of dry (and it becomes more and more unhinged as the seasons progress), there&#8217;s some good banter scattered about.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Space:_Above_and_Beyond\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Space: Above and Beyond<\/a> &#8211; The sci-fi aspects here are almost incidental; a few visual tweaks and this would easily pass for a conventional war drama.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Stargate_Atlantis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Stargate Atlantis<\/a> &#8211; I don&#8217;t like how a random pilot suddenly becomes the hotshot ranking officer protagonist with zero transition time. Other than that it&#8217;s perfectly watchable, if formulaic and overly episodic.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Stitchers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Stitchers<\/a> &#8211; Only took a look at this because I wanted to see what else the actress who played Claudia in <em>Warehouse 13<\/em> was in. Curiously, it reminds me of a peppy <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/La_Femme_Nikita\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Le Femme Nikita<\/a>&#8230; which is surprisingly engaging.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_100_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The 100<\/a> &#8211; Remarkably well made post-apocalyptic survival&#8230; assuming you don&#8217;t mind young protagonists.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Expanse_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Expanse<\/a> &#8211; Pretty good. Reminiscent of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Battlestar_Galactica_(2004_TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Battlestar Galactica<\/a> if that show happened to have police procedural elements.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Last_Ship_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Last Ship<\/a> &#8211; Starts out surprisingly similar to <em>Stargate Atlantis<\/em>, just with stiffer character interactions and far more engaging storytelling. Unfortunately it deteriorates once the focus moves to the government, with events seeming to occur for the sole purpose of artificially dragging things out.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Magicians_(U.S._TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Magicians<\/a> &#8211; Something&#8217;s off here. There&#8217;s a distinct air of contrivance, with events coming across as especially forced.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Threshold_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Threshold<\/a> &#8211; Feels staged; looks awful.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Torchwood\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Torchword<\/a> &#8211; Doesn&#8217;t look professional in the slightest. It&#8217;s as though it were filmed in someone&#8217;s backyard with a camcorder.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Warehouse_13\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Warehouse 13<\/a> &#8211; Brings to mind a cross between <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bones_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Bones<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Fringe_(TV_series)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fringe<\/a>. A nice mix of episodic stories, overarching plotlines, and character dynamics&#8230; though the dialog can be cringe-inducing at times.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Z_Nation\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Z Nation<\/a> &#8211; The camerawork is all over the place, which gives a distinctly amateurish impression.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Movies<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Aut%C3%B3mata\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aut\u00f3mata<\/a> &#8211; Decent enough. Feels more like a TV miniseries than a movie though.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dredd\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dredd<\/a> &#8211; A solid, entertaining action movie.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Green_Lantern_(film)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Green Lantern<\/a> &#8211; There&#8217;s a lot going on here, most of it extraneous. The childhood flashback and related family drama along with the whole alien-autopsy subplot, for instance, could&#8217;ve been removed without losing anything. Aside from that the only notable aspect is the pretty great CGI.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Rogue_One\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rogue One<\/a> &#8211; Better than <em>The Force Awakens<\/em>, but the characters just didn&#8217;t grab me.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sherlock_Holmes_(2009_film)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sherlock Holmes<\/a> &#8211; Good action scenes.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sherlock_Holmes:_A_Game_of_Shadows\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows<\/a> &#8211; More madcap than the prequel. Which is a positive.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Star_Wars:_The_Force_Awakens\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Star Wars: The Force Awakens<\/a> &#8211; Average I guess? Neither the characters nor events are particularly interesting and it has the air of fanfiction.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On a whim I decided to check out some of the many, many non-Anime TV shows I&#8217;ve been ignoring for the past 12 years or so (along with a few movies as well): TV Shows Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. &#8211; Everyone&#8217;s far too smug. Almost Human &#8211; A very good buddy-cop action series. It&#8217;s practically criminal it only got one season. Alphas &#8211; Not bad; the pieces are all there&#8230; they just don&#8217;t cohere into something greater. It&#8217;s serviceable and no more. Andromeda &#8211; Eh. Everything about it screams low-budget. Caprica &#8211; I don&#8217;t know what I was expecting really, but it wasn&#8217;t this. It&#8217;s an odd collection of disparate elements that don&#8217;t really work on any level. Dark Angel &#8211; Deliberately avoided watching this in the past for no particular reason. Checked it out now and something about the atmosphere\/tone\/look doesn&#8217;t quite work for me. Defiance &#8211; Reminiscent of Farscape and surprisingly good. Both expansive and structurally coherent with an engaging cast of characters. The third season however goes too far off the rails. Falling Skies &#8211; Could do with less children and the protagonist&#8217;s constantly bemused expression is annoying. Those issues aside it doesn&#8217;t seem to know whether it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[319],"tags":[172,180,174,464,176,197,423,192,241,62,412,471,411,30],"class_list":["post-2971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-tv-related","tag-action","tag-comedy","tag-comic-adaptation","tag-dc-comics","tag-drama","tag-literary-adaptation","tag-marvel-comics","tag-movie","tag-novel-adaptation","tag-science-fiction","tag-series","tag-star-wars","tag-televised","tag-urban-fantasy"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.offkorn.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}