milenahaustein Reviews

Spinning Out (2020)

interesting

[8/10 · 3 April 2021]

If you like morally grey/complex characters and figure skating this show is good. I really enjoyed it, and I will try to have sort of a structure in this review.

Plot/ Pacing: The main plot is not insanely creative, but the side plots make up for that in my opinion. The pacing gets quite slow in the middle and I actually stopped watching for several days here, but when I continued (around episode 6) it was pretty fast-paced, while leaving room for slow emotional moments. The plot at times felt a bit too convenient, a lot of problems were fixed surprisingly fast, but this wasn't that bad, there were quite a few things that actually took a long time to resolve, so it was a good mix.

Depiction of mental illness: Very exaggerated. Especially Kat in the later episodes felt even to me overly dramatic, and looking at the reviews from people with actual experiences made that even more clear. Nonetheless, I do think they nail some conversations about mental illness that hit close to home, just when it came to actual depiction of it they could've done it better.

The Skating: As a figure skating fan, but not a skater myself, I'm not the most reliable person here, but I personally enjoyed it. From my understanding it was portayed fairly accurately and there are several beautiful choreographies you get to see, so I enjoyed this part of the show.

Characters: Like I said, be prepared for annoying characters, because at some point in this show, everyone is completely stupid and mean. That being said, I liked that part a lot, I thought it was realistic. I liked to see the different perspectives of a situation and it was pretty easy to understand most characters even when they were being stupid. But yeah, if that's not your thing I can safely say you're not going to enjoy this show. My favourites here were definitely Jenn and Dascha, who were just amazing. Serena, despite being very whiny and annoying, made me feel a lot, she felt pretty realistic for being a teenager in my opinion.

Wokeness?: I saw some people talking about this in their reviews so I thought I'd mention it too. It is a very diverse show, but for the most part I liked how they portrayed this. The most obvious example of this is probably Marcus, who later has a very explicit storyline about being black, but I did think a lot of the conversations about this topic are really good.

Call Me Kevin (2016– )

What a great TV-Show

[10/10 · 17 March 2021]

Sorry, I can't write more, I've been searching for BEANS all day and it's 3 in the afternoon so I'm exhausted.

The Key Man (2011)

I've not laughed this hard at a movie in a long time

[10/10 · 15 March 2021]

I'm not sure whether this movie is intentionally bad. It surely felt like it at times. I first gave this movie 3 stars, but I was far too entertained to keep it that way. My personal highlight was the transition of the movie where a picture of a fish was duplicated a lot, it was very weird. Another highlight was the scene at the end with the cars, which felt like a fever dream, but to be honest this whole movie sort of felt like one. But in general, this movie failed on every single level. I usually don't notice bad music or cinematography or acting, but in this movie it's was too much to not notice. Made me laugh nonetheless. In conclusion, if you want to watch an obscure movie that you just want to laugh at, this one is perfect. I'd recommend watching it with a friend also.

Mortal Engines (2018)

No. Just no.

[3/10 · 1 February 2021]

I honestly have trouble coming up with something that was truly good about this movie. The only good thing was that the visuals were quite good, and I had fun laughing at it with my friend. I hadn't read the book, so I had no clue before watching it. The characters aren't engaging, too many are introduced randomly so you can't get attached to them. I didn't understand the plot, and I really really really don't like this movie.

Freud (2020)

Dissapointing

[4/10 · 1 December 2020]

It started out well. I'd probably give the first two/three episodes seven stars. But the issue was the topic change. While I didn't expect an accurate representation of Freud, it's still a fictional show,I expected it to be about psychoanalysis, which at one point, it wasn't anymore. This would've been cool, if it wouldn't have been advertises as being about that topic. In short: Don't expect it to be neither accurate nor about his works and topics, but if you like mystery horror you'd probably enjoy it. There was nothing objectively bad about it, but it was advertised the wrong way.

Dash & Lily (2020)

Definitely worth a try!

[6/10 · 19 November 2020]

I just binged this show, so here I go: In general, this was fun to watch. It has cliches, but the premise is pretty interesting and fun to watch. Just some keypoints for more structure:

Characters: I like most of the characters, the biggest issue is that the main characters are not the greatest. I have some issues with Lily. She's the stereotypical "Not like other girls", she doesn't have any female friends (on that matter, not any friends at all, but more on that later), which I really don't like. Girls are constantly portayed as bad beside from her, which is just...not great. She doesn't have any friends, which I don't think is realistic, even the "Weird" people usually have friends, as a fellow introvert and bookworm, I can indeed confirm I actually have friends. I do like her character growth in this Dash is a bit better, and I actually think he becomes more likable over the course of the story. I don't love him, but he was quite enjoyable to watch. He's not super fleshed out, but he's ok. I like the side characters quite a lot, Sofia is great, and the ending made me really happy for her. In general, the side characters are pretty cool.

The story/Pacing: Nothing insanely creative, but intruiging enough to keep watching. Especially the first three episodes are really good, after that is definitely gets worse. You could've wrapped this up in maximum 6 episodes, and it would've been better. I started to become a bit bored around episode 4, and I was already in too deep to stop, so I finished it.

The Romance: It starts of good, but their chemistry isn't that good, which makes the whole story a bit...pointless?

After I've mentioned quite a lot of criticism, I enjoyed this show. It's a cliche christmas show, but if you're into that, you're going to enjoy this one as well. It's also quite short, so even if you didn't absolutely love it, you didn' waste that much time. Is definitley worth giving a try!

Skam (2015–2017)

A show that made me the person I am today

[10/10 · 19 November 2020]

This is the most realistic portrayal I've ever seen in a show. In its four seasons it captures all types of people and opens you eyes a bit more every episode. Eva in S1 is one of my favourite characters ever. The pain of losing your friends and feeling alone, is so so well portayed. The soundtrack, simple yet effective cinematography and the concept of clips coming out in real time, which you can't experience anymore, was so easy to get into and made everything seem so real, I still can't really fathom that it wasn't actually happening in reality. The acting is really good, and all of the topics are so important and for the vast majority extremely well handled. One downside to me still is that the show doesn't really portray a certain kind of introverted people. Pretty much all of them love going to parties, spend a lot of time with their friends. (I still gave it ten stars, so that didn't bother me that much apparently) It's been 3 years since this show ended, and I still think about it so much. Like I said, this is the most inluential TV-Show I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing, and I strongly encourage everyone to watch it. You can't go wrong with this one.