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Reviews
3 Body Problem (2024)
More fun than the book. Less intense though.
I'm enjoying this screen adaptation. I also enjoyed the book. My recommendation is that if you plan on reading the book, it would be better to do that first before watching the series. This is because the suspense of the book depends on the reader not knowing anything much about it. I read the book not even knowing what it was about, except that Barack Obama loved it, and that was a really fun way to get my mind blown as I flipped through the pages.
The first book is a mystery sci fi thriller and this first series largely spans that. I think they could have stretched it out to 10 episodes and simply allowed the first 3 episodes to be purposely slow, mysterious and increasingly unsettling.
The introduction of numerous new characters definitely is a better way to tell the story on screen. I wish that the characters were built better though, allowing some mundane scenes in order for the audience to better relate with the characters. The actors were strong but I feel like it would have been better if certain characters had very plain 'ordinary' looking faces. Eg. Theres something both scary and believable when a villain looks like anybody on the bus you take to work rather than a AAA supermodel.
Theres alot of CGI and it's a hate it or love it thing. They do sacrifice the science from the book to create better action and visually impressive scenes. However, I hope that doesn't leave an impression upon hard core sci fi fans, making them feel this is cartoon Hollywood science.
Foundation (2021)
Great sci-fi world building. Character development ok
Alot of the negative reviews come from the disparity between the source material and this TV adaptation. Good news is that if you have never read the source material, and you enjoyed sci-fi epics on screen like dune or the expanse, then just ignore those negative reviews and jump right into this series.
The script for some of the source characters are excellent, but sometimes you can see where the modified characters motives/script don't quite make sense and it's in this areas where I think the screenwriters are trying to fit a square into a circle.
The combat scenes are the most illogical sequences in the show (worse than an army of stormtroopers missing their mark point blank). You get important characters in battle scenes just standing in an open field without seeking cover. You get stereotype villains and heroes being caught only to escape again and again multiple times within the same episode. CGI helps but these are done poorly even compared to sci-fi series/movies of yesteryears. (The CGI in scene setting/backdrops are fantastic, but in battle scenes they look like a joke rather than anything truly menacing). They do make an effort but it's so inferior compared to the rest of the show and it's world building that it detracts from what they are trying to accomplish. They need to make it less 'Disney' with their action sequences, more 'Dune' or maybe like many of the newer ww2 flicks, (where there is real risk for the characters rather than them parading around in plot armour).
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (2023)
Terrible plot, characters and motives that don't make sense
This series is very bad.
The monster scenes are great but few. The action scenes are high class for a TV series. The scene setting is great.
Now the cons:
95% of the series is bad drama. We basically have three young adults who are portrayed like 8 year olds embroiled in a high class government agency that is also highly incompetent that it could be run by a 6 year old... So it's up to the 8 year olds to come to the rescue. Not a big spoiler but one scene says it all where the boss of monarch tells the 8 year olds that she will definitely not send in amateurs into the field. The 8 year olds then say 'look at what happened when you sent in professionals the last time'. The boss then says ok why not and proceeds to send the 8y olds to a spot with gamma radiation and a titan, to go against a rogue army. That's not even within the top 10 nonsense narrative they have.
The character motives are all so silly as well. There are constant flashbacks to the origin characters in the story, but their actions are so misguided and disastrous that you wonder if they should be the main antagonists of the story. Yet, the scenes drag out trying to show their plight, the romance, their sacrifices. So in the end the characters become completely unrelatable because you already know how stupid things become.
A better way to have done the series is to have titans causing chaos from the start and monarch winning small battles by chasing them away but not really being able to defeat one nor predict when the next attack might occur. Then they can get their 8y old involved (one 8 year old is enough), with flashbacks to a mislabeled team of scientists thought to have gone rogue by worshiping Godzilla. That would have been a far better starting point with plenty of opportunities to introduce side characters as well as a feeling of impending dread (even without that many action scenes). Instead, we have this soppy drama with characters that nobody cares for.
Leave the World Behind (2023)
If you like thrillers and dystopias... Not so much mystery
I'll keep it short. A dystopia thriller with midsommar vibes.
The movie is great in several aspects. The characters are well developed and truly grey. The acting is great and engaging. The camera work is interesting and coupled with the music, reminds me alot of escalating horror movies like hereditary or midsommar.
Alot of criticism comes from some events not making sense but that's usually the case for thriller/horror movies. The ending is also somewhat open to interpretation which is another hallmark of the horror genre. I think the start of the movie makes it feel like it's a mystery movie with a who dunnit vibe which misleads viewers expecting to find a bullet proof explanation at the end for all the questions they've kept aside, waiting for the big reveal. Rather... this movie has to be approached with the expectations of an entertaining thriller where scenes might be there to just weird you out and these are beautifully shot by the way.
Painkiller (2023)
Extremely dramatised and dumbed down
It's a sad true story about profiteering at the cost of an insane amount of still ongoing damage to lives and entire societies.
The show however felt very one dimensional. Even the music and pacing was that of an upbeat thriller. I haven't watched dopesick and I still felt that this was a terrible TV series. These sort of true events can be re-enacted more truthfully like dark waters or spotlight.
For example; there's 3 old investors discussing about the idea of putting oxycontin on the market. They openly discuss using simple language that they are fully aware of the dangers and they are very excited to put it on the market anyway. The discussion is only 5 short sentences long, the scene lasts less than a minute and it ends showing them shaking and almost dancing in excitement... that is really hard to believe to have happened in real life.
In another scene, where drug sales people are being inducted for training. Ive been to many lectures but have never seen anything close to resembling that. It was like brainless cult members chanting in unison as the leader pronounced to them that they were going to conquer pain, change lives and reeducate doctors. After shooting themselves in the foot with a scene like that, it then makes it really hard to believe that the cult members could convince anyone to sell oxycontin. It's as though none of them could perform a simple internet search to find out more about what they were selling. Information about its addictive potential etc existed from the start. Any salesman would also need to know a little bit about its competition which was other painkillers including morphine. In the real world everything is much more grey... there will be researchers and politicians who benefit or be on big pharma's payroll. There will be doctors and drug reps who knowingly peddle these for profit... and 'patients' who knowingly seek these out solely for a fix... even some who use their prescriptions, modify it and sell it on the street.
Overall, this oversimplification of characters and needless over the top dialogue/acting isnt going to answer the hard questions of how exactly did it happen, how it managed to go on for so long and how those involved can get away with it. Those who enjoy documentaries or a very thoughtfully retelling of events should try elsewhere.
Pieces of Her (2022)
Mystery suspense drama let down by plotholes and frustrating characters
The first episode draws you in and is decent, enticing the viewer with what grand mystery and secrets may unfold. Well, it goes downhill from there. No spoilers here, but the main mystery is not grand and its unfolding is tedious. The characters seem silly and their actions unnecessary which is not helped by a boring, and sometimes unrealistic dialog. With plenty of holes in the plot and character actions, you'll need to turn off your brain when watching this or suffer frustrations... in which case why watch this at all.