TV/Movies Megathread

[crazy canuck]

Just got back from seeing Kinky Boots, it was great.  And it's also streaming on I think Prime - so also belongs in this thread.   

[The Brain]

Finally watched Euphoria S2. It's still awesome, I love it. One minor thing though [SPOILER]: the actual drama among the main characters is essentially just basic "omg how could you fuck my bf when we're bff??!?" high school stuff. The creator felt, rightly, that the season needed some finale punch, but chose to let that befall a couple of minor characters, with main characters not even getting to react to it. Feels like a cop-out.

[The Larch]

Russell Crowe is in Rome and seems to have gone into full dad mode. 

[crazy canuck]

A lot better than the alternative 

[Josephus]

Westworld anyone?  I keep watching but I really find it hard to follow. yet it keeps drawing me in, like a car crash on the side of the road.

[crazy canuck]

Westworld anyone?  I keep watching but I really find it hard to follow. yet it keeps drawing me in, like a car crash on the side of the road.

I think this season is the closest they've come to the first season. There's a lot going on and if you were thinking about it just in linear terms you are going to get confused.

[FunkMonk]

Westworld anyone?  I keep watching but I really find it hard to follow. yet it keeps drawing me in, like a car crash on the side of the road.

I think this season is the closest they've come to the first season. There's a lot going on and if you were thinking about it just in linear terms you are going to get confused.

Yeah this is easily the best season since the first. Catches a lot of what made the first season special.

[celedhring]

Heh, I guess I will have to get back to it at some point. Season 3 was awful.

[Zoupa]

Gave up somewhere in season 2. So pretentious.

[FunkMonk]

Yeah the writing in Westworld was really carried by Anthony Hopkins' acting. After he left no one could save the writers from themselves.

[Josephus]

Heh, I guess I will have to get back to it at some point. Season 3 was awful.

I'm honestly not sure I finished s.3.

[Josquius]

I enjoyed s1 though completely lost track of what was happening an ep or two into s2.
I shall have to watch it all again when it's done.

[viper37]

The Untold Story of Disney's $307 Million Bomb 'John Carter': 'It's a Disaster'

Ten years ago, Disney's "John Carter" opened nationwide.
Meant to be a potential franchise-starting blockbuster, it was savaged by critics, who called the film "wanly plodding and routine" (Entertainment Weekly), and "a giant, suffocating doughy feast of boredom" (The Guardian), and was met with indifference by general audiences, who simply didn't show up. (It opened in second place, behind forgotten animated Dr. Seuss adaptation "The Lorax").

Quickly, the movie and its fate took on a nearly mythical dimension – it wasn't just a box office disappointment, it was a staggering creative and commercial failure, the kind of movie that is often mentioned in the same breath as other high-profile misfires like "Ishtar" or "Waterworld."

But the actual story of "John Carter" – how it was conceived, what happened during production, and how it all fell apart thanks largely to a misguided marketing campaign – is much more complex and much more interesting.

Most Hollywood bombs are perceivable early on, through a toxic combination of untested filmmakers, iffy (or unfinished) screenplays and unfortunate miscasting, leading to a troubled production that eventually equals an underwhelming film. In the 2006 documentary "Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters," Morgan Freeman equates the making of a cinematic debacle to an airline crash: "It's usually caused by a series of mishaps."

"John Carter" had none of these elements. There were no true mishaps. It was based on a beloved and highly influential property, created by craftspeople at the top of their game, led by a director whose previous films were runaway successes. The simple, sought-after narrative of "what went wrong" quickly falls apart. Or is at the very least obscured. And because of that, it makes telling the story of what happened much more complicated.

TheWrap talked to a half-dozen creative principals involved with "John Carter" for this story, conducting exclusive interviews with co-writer/director Andrew Stanton, writer Michael Chabon, cinematographer Dan Mindel, and performers Willem Dafoe and the Princess of Mars herself, Lynn Collins. (Disney was unable to accommodate TheWrap's request for additional interviews with personnel still at Pixar.)

What emerges is a story of a filmmaker making the uneasy transition from animation to live-action, an unorthodox shooting schedule that left some cast members lost, a flawed and confounding marketing campaign, and how shifting corporate allegiances and mandates left a $307 million adventure, meant to start a franchise and based on beloved source material essentially marooned.

[...]

Nice long read.

Anybody could tell me if the original novels are really worth reading?

I'm one of the few who liked the movie.  Not great, but still good movie, with lots of potential for sequels.  Sad that no one bothered to watch it

[Admiral Yi]

I remember the books as very pulpy.  Sort of on the same wavelength as the Tarzan books.

I can't remember anything that happened in the books.

[Tonitrus]

I'm one of the few who liked the movie.  Not great, but still good movie, with lots of potential for sequels.  Sad that no one bothered to watch it

I suppose I am one of those few as well.  I thought it was rather good.