Change Your Image
ldmede-48385
Reviews
House of the Dragon (2022)
GOT Lite
You could tell from the visual opening credits that GOT was something special and grand. The beginning of the HOTD has no memorable opening, no sense that an epic story is about to unfold and no compelling characters.
Perhaps the acting will improve as the storyline moves forward but hardly anyone in E1 has distinguished themselves in that regard.
Don't know what mood the show runners were going for but dark, fuzzy lighting will only take the storyline so far. Hopefully, we'll see the characters in the light of day every so often.
Westworld (2016)
Season 4: Not Westworld!
Having relished seasons 1-3, season 4 is just relish gone bad. Slow moving, meandering storyline and too many plot holes to list.
All the main characters are there, but there connection to their predecessors is negligible. For such a opulent production (they did spend a bucket of dough), the computer generated graphics are surprisingly artificial. Too many scenes look like a white blotter.
Sad to say this season should be retitled Borden World.
Nothing Trivial (2011)
Top-notch
Great storylines with well drawn characters. Light hearted and fun, so don't be too surprised to find yourself smiling and nodding in acknowledgement.
This show is about human relations which is never pitch perfect. Watch it and decide for yourself if it's anything but positive and life affirming.
Hotel Portofino (2022)
$$$ not well spent
Multiple storylines; too many, in fact. Perhaps if the characters were not cut from the same piece of cloth we might have a watchable series. The setting is gorgeous, if a little too polished and artificial, but it's not enough to makeup for tepid writing and cookie cutter characters.
If you want a really binge-worthy experience, try the Spanish series, Grand Hotel.
Stranger Things (2016)
S4: Kind Of An Alien Ripoff
Just think we have Season 5 to mull over more monsters in the closet. Cheap trick: linking three story lines together with a 10 minute monologue by 001.
I suspect The Duffers are probably working on a fine GOT ending.
Fargo: The Land of Taking and Killing (2020)
Does lack for lackeys
None of the subtlety of the original. Lack humor, nuisance and fun. So much for fallow follow ups.
Danger Signal (1945)
Tight noir
Great B noir with a darn good cast. Zachary Scott plays a deadly womanizer, a copycat of the role he played in Mildred Pierce.
There seems to be a bit of misinformation about which movie was filmed first. Mildred Pierce started filming in late Dec. 1944 and wrapped in late Feb 1945. Danger Signal started filming in March 1945 and ended in May 1945. Likewise, Mildred Pierce was released well before Danger Signal.
Regardless, both films firmly established Scott's screen persona for the rest his career. He remains a key actor in the early noir cycle.
Stranger Things: Chapter Eight: The Battle of Starcourt (2019)
Wasteland!
Season 3 was a disaster. The wonderful, edgy ambiance of the first two seasons was missing-in-action. Instead of weird & terrifying we were place in a stupefying slumber. Probably little chance of an awakening in season four.