Photo: Amazon Studios
Our weekly thought-starter asks you (and us) a simple question each week: What pop culture did you consume this weekend, and what did you think of it? If you have suggestions for AVQ&A questions, big or small, you can email them to us here.
38 Comments
I fixed Mr. Sinister’s neck because ribbed tutlenecks don’t mix with popped high collars!
X of Swords should not be allowed to have more than ten installments yet it clocked in at twenty-two. I probably would’ve appreciated Saturnyne’s whimsy if it didn’t clash with the event’s portentousness. Apocalypse nearly gets Earth invaded by demon hordes because of his
selfishness & still essentially gets what he wanted anyway? That’s actually pretty on brand for the Krakoa era where everyone inexplicably acts like Xavier the hypocrite
I started my rewatch of The Legend of Korra. I seem to be one of the few who consider this show superior to Avatar: The Last Airbender. The characters are all three-dimensional people. I really love the gritty texture Republic City gives the first season. The animation might be even better than in Avatar. I love the steampunk (or is it dieselpunk?) look of the new tech.Season one feels a little rushed in places. Perhaps the Equalist plot needed a little more time to breathe? I think maybe a little more time spent showing how non-benders are mistreated by benders would have helped. Amon is a great villain, and while rewatching it appreciated what a tragic character Tarrlok is. His life was fucked up right from the get-go. If I have a favorite character, it’s probably Tenzin, who seems to know what his priorities are even if everyone else sees him as uptight. Then I started season two, which I remember as the weakest. I’ll have some more thoughts on that next week.
I started season four of the The Big Bang Theory. Is it just me, or are the female characters stronger than the male characters? Penny, Bernadette, and Amy are all pretty awesome, especially when interacting with each other. The show’s weakest character may actually be Sheldon, since so many of the jokes are basically just “Sheldon acts like a dick and Leonard puts up with it for some reason”. It reminds me of the Benedict Cumberbatch iteration of Sherlock, in which a character’s brilliance is supposed to justify their complete lack of regard for anyone else’s needs or feelings. Hopefully he will grow at some point. I like Raj though.
I got to Avatar late, so I wasn’t gripped by it in the way I would’ve been in its time. The Saturday-morning tropes in TLA and teen drama in LOK kinda rubbed me the wrong way. Tenzin was totally the most relatable character.Those “smartest person in the room” shows are the fucking worst. That trope is totally to blame for Rick and Morty’s obnoxious fanbase.
It’s a shame, because I actually really like Rick & Morty as a deconstruction of that “being smart justifies being an asshole,” thing that Sherlock and many other shows do. Rick’s just portrayed as an inexcusably horrible person, especially to his family, and his abusive treatment of them has deeply fucked them up. But somehow, a segment of the fanbase sees him as a role model.
Thanks to the storytelling and cultural mythology, Avatar will always be the superior show to me, but there are things Korra does better. The animation for one, and music are an improvement, and the villains and their ideologies are a lot more interesting.
I love both ATLA and LOK. You’re not alone in preferring LOK. I personally like ATLA better for two reasons. I like that Aang doesn’t want to fight. There’s a serenity that exists in the sequel but it isn’t infused with it the way the first series is. And Uncle Iroh is my favorite character throughout either series. He’s the best. I definitely agree that the villains are better fleshed out in LOK. Henry Rollins is fun. I think that the final season of LOK is the weakest which is also disappointing. Still great, but not as great. You know?
Others will talk about Avatar so I’ll talk about BBT.Once the girls show up, BBT is a very good to great show. Yes it runs out of steam like any show that goes on too long. That brings in new writers who laugh at the characters and not with them.But end of S2 through like S6, maybe some of S7 is very good stuff.
Sheldon’s popularity is an eighth wonder of the world to me…baffling.
kicked back listening to some ole Johnny Cash, I’ve heard his stuff before but listened with a renewed appreciation given the recent events in Washington D.C. another chronic warbler, like a time capsule from the past to now of the way things used to be.
It saddens me that he died long before all this. Knowing how he felt about the poor and downtrodden, he would have loathed Trump like no tomorrow. I’d kill to live in a world where a nearly 90 year old Johnny Cash writes a song about how shitty Trump is.
Steve Earle helps fill that gap, and you may want to listen to his latest, Ghosts of West Virginia.
Trump bashing’s the national pastime. You can bet they’ll never talk about Pres Elect Biden that way. Four years of relative safety, productivity, and stability.
yeah, we need more like Johnny Cash. is there a contemporary equivalent in America, you reckon? or irreplaceable?
Someone mentioned Stever Earle above. I’d also check out Todd Snyder (and according to him and I don’t disagree), Jason Isbell, Hayes Carll, Justin Townes Earle, Sturgill Simpson, Amanda Shires, and Elizabeth Cook.
I know most of those singers. Love them, but its just not the same.
Irreplaceable. Some try to fill those shoes and I’m glad people try. But there was only ever one JR Cash. Honestly Country to me died with him. The era of people like Maybelle Carter and Johnny Cash is long over, people like Dolly Parton merely keep the memory alive.
any favourites? there’s a handful of those classic Australian country artists in a similar vein, but they’re depressing, y’know. Cash was more of a cool guy:
Steve Earl got mentioned a few times. I’d say he’s pretty great. Knows the past and the present. I always remember his characters funeral on Treme. They played Will the Circle Be Unbroken, the Carter Family staple. To me that says a lot about his personality. Also he is fun and cool, not dour.
listen to that banjo gooo. Something we don’t have in Australia, they’re mostly guitars. The way things used to be:
have you seen ‘tricky dick and the man in black’ on netflix?
having known nothing about the politics, i found it interesting.
I’ve been watching the last season of Sabrina (got the finale left to watch tonight). I wasn’t expecting much from it, but it’s recovered quite well from the precipitous drop that was season 3. I loved the penultimate episode; though I feel like it would’ve blown me away more if not for io9’s penchant for spoilers in headlines.Been on a bit of a roguelite kick, over the past few days I’ve binged Hades and Binding of Isaac, with a bit of Dead Cells thrown in. atm in BOI, I’m trying to beat Greed Mode with Azazel, which apparently unlocks a character; it’s proving difficult though thanks to his terrible range.
The Bills need to treat Frank Reich to some Ruth’s Chris for fucking up so badly to let them win on Saturday.
Freaky.I heard about the alternate titles for this Vince Vaughn body swap horror comedy. Both “Freaky Friday the 13th” and “Killer Body” would have been better/more fun names for a movie that is better/more fun than I expected. Like “Happy Death Day” before it, they take a comedy trope, give it a slasher spin, and it works! Vaughn playing a 17 year old girl gets the cheap laughs, but young Kathryn Newton as the killer is super convincing. For a horror movie, the body count is somewhat small, (the supporting cast is so likeable, they didn’t want to kill anyone) but the creatively graphic way in which the victims die makes up for it.Knock Knock.Keanu Reeves is home alone and gets a visit from two babes who are stranded and need to get out of the rain. Debauchery ensues. I’d compare it to a lesser, kinkier take on ‘Funny Games.’ I guess the idea is what if every guy’s fantasy turned into their worst nightmare. The girls are psychos, they terrorize him, and it doesn’t make much sense- until the credits reveal it’s directed by Eli Roth, then it makes all the sense in the world, lol. But it’s entertaining enough. (Babe #2, Ana De Armas went on to be the hero in Knives Out!) Keanu gets a big “Free pizza” speech that’s as ‘Keanu’ as any performance he’s given.The Town.I’m trying to remember what criticisms I had of Ben Affleck’s heist movie the first time around, because watching it again, it’s really solid. With gripping tension and great atmosphere, the tone certainly seems to have been influenced by Joker’s robberies in The Dark Knight. I particularly love how dangerous and uneasy Jeremy Renner makes every scene. But Rebbecca Hall’s bank manager, John Hamm’s FBI agent, the whole cast is great. The only thing that probably could use more attention was a subplot with Blake Lively’s strung out ex girlfriend. It would have been something to see what Affleck would do with a Batman film. Set in a Gotham that sounds like Boston.Cobra Kai (Season 3)I think this show has been getting better and a lot of that has to do with bringing back John Kreese in a proper villain role, and getting the Cobra Kai dojo back to being as tough it was, and not populated with a bunch of dorks like how Johnny was running it. Weed out the weak! There’s even a whole origin story set in Vietnam, and Kreese is…sympathetic? This is still a ‘dumb’ show in many respects, (another ridiculous brawl, really?) but it has so much heart it has won me over. How can I deny the feels when Daniel reunites with Kumiko and her big smile? Elizabeth Shue brightens everything up when she returns too.
If I understand this right, the movie was originally called Freaky Friday the 13th but it ran into copyright problems. Either Disney was against it, or it was due to the weird legal battle Friday the 13th is going through. Pity.
I watched the Ryan Reynolds Green Lantern movie for the first time. Personally, I thought it was far less terrible than the reviews/general consensus make it out to be. I’d rate it as a solidly meh superhero action flick. It also made me wonder if I’d ever actually seen Blake Lively in anything or just kind of knew about her from general pop culture awareness, but apparently she was in The Town and I just don’t at all remember anything about that movie aside from Affleck being in it.I also got caught up on Call Me Kat, the Mayim Bialik cat cafe sitcom. I kinda like it I think? In some ways it’s just a standard lame sitcom of ye olden days style, but it also has this undercurrent of weirdness to it that I think is going to keep me watching. Also, Mayim Bialik is super charming and I feel like she has nice chemistry with Cheyenne Jackson. Its biggest drawback is that there are not a ton of cats so far!
Which version did you watch? I saw GL at the cinema, didn’t enjoy it. Now, having mostly forgotten it, I occasionally wonder if it is as bad as it’s reputation and recently watched a YouTube group reaction (FilmJoy) to the extended edition. They have almost convinced me to watch it again so interested to know if it was the theatrical release you saw.
It’s whichever one is on HBO Max, which I think is the theatrical cut based on what I just read about the extended version. I thought it was perfectly watchable but entirely forgettable. It had as close to zero character development as possible, so it was kinda perfect for having on in the background.
Mostly being angry about treason, laughing at Shitstain losing his Twitter account and preemptively losing the place he was probably going to retreat to, and watching the end of Awesome Games Done Quick.Now I’m gonna watch some anime.
My girlfriend doesn’t feel well and binge-watched something like 22 hours straight of a Korean show called 100 Days My Prince. She’s asleep now, but she told me yesterday that she was excited to see that Netflix had so many of these very long Korean period dramas and was excited to watch more.So, in short, I may never watch anything else ever again.
Help me out. For some unexplained reason I’m in the greys… after posting here (AV Club) since the beginning of the changeover. Has anyone else experienced this? What’s the recourse? (acknowledging that this very situation means no one will see this post).
I’m still alpha-testing Skyrim. There’s quite a few bugs left. But with some intense crunch it should be ready for beta-testing and maybe a gold version around 2053. You’ll like it. It’s a bit better than Oblivion and it has dragons.
StreamingWent pre-Medieval on my own ass with two Netflix historical action shows:First up is Barbarians, a European drama about the unification of the Germanic tribes as they battle the encroaching Roman Legion. It focuses on an impossibly pretty young cast (seriously, you’re gonna tell me Thusnedla’s hair is THAT thick and lustrous in 9 AD?!). But the story is interesting and the action is surprisingly good. It’s pretty fun.In tandem, I also started The Last Kingdom, primarily because it stars pretty much half the voice cast of Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla. Both take place in 9th Century England during the Danish raids and have some striking similarities (names, locations, production effects, etc). I’ve only watched a couple of episodes in S1, but it’s good so far.It’s also interesting that both shows feature a character who was raised by “The Enemy” and how differently they react when reunited with their kin.MusicI’ve been playing guitar for almost four decades, during which time I’ve opened for some name acts and jammed with some bona-fide guitar heroes. So how is it that I’m just learning about MIYAVI now?!?! This cat from Tokyo is absolutely unreal! Really digging how diverse, energetic and talented he is!
I got to see Miyavi live at Anime Boston 2019, aka The Last Anime Boston (hopefully not ever), and he was pretty cool.
I’m jealous! He just brings it in every live show clip I’ve seen.
Now that my wife has given me her HBO max login, I’ve finished a rewatch of Lucy, Duaghter of the Devil. I apparently only really remember the same four episodes from the early 2000s, when I was just hoping adult swim would air things the way I wanted. It still makes me laugh, so that’s nice.Aso finished season 1 of Harley Quinn. King Shark and Ivy are my all stars. Kite Man really grew on me.On Disney Plus, I finished season 1 of Agent Carter rewatch. I remember some of the major plot points but I had the sequencing wrong in the back of my brain. I really like Bridget Regan in basically everything.I’ve been binge-listeninf to a bunch of wheel of time recap podcasts for the last week because, uh, why not? Listening to books 2-4 reminds me how much I loved early Perrin.
Bridget Regan is awesome, and I love Dottie. I still need to watch Season 2 of Agent Carter though.
Signed up for Netflix for a month to binge a few things that interested me.The Witcher – so far entertaining though the timeline stuff is unnecessary. Having the Ciri stuff take place in the first episode was only done to match the spectacle of GOT. Move her stuff so that it’s intercut with the episode when Geralt deals with Duny and it’d be stronger.Unfortunate Events – Handler has cleaned up the books a bit to make it easier to consume for TV. It’s good but the stuff in the first season with Will Arnett and Cobie Smulders is pure emotional manipulation (which I get all media is) but it’s unnecessary. And filling in some of what’s happen offscreen does hurt the theme of the books a little since it’s so much about how bad things happen to the kids because of the parents and they don’t realize.Bo Burnham – watched his two comedy specials. What. Is hilarious and we should be talking about how “we don’t know you” and the whole of Make Happy are legendary sets. Like Eddie Murphy “Raw” or Eddie Izzard “Dress to Kill” type legendary.
Finally got the Beyonce’s HOMECOMING THE LIVE ALBUM on vinyl after a month and a half of shipping delays. Magnificent box set, and obviously the album is incredible but I really like the difference between shuffling through the mp3s vs sitting with the whole performance in order. Great shit
I watched the final season of Sabrina the Teenage Witch on Netflix. I don’t know, for some reason I thought it was an alright season. I was hoping more and bigger Cthulhu and as the big bad but didn’t get that. And I’m not happy with how it ended. Kinda makes it feel that it’s not open-ended for possibly other seasons or a one off.