Television programmes [2]

His first half dozen films were worth watching, then he lost it.

Well I finished Des.

Rather disappointed, to be honest. I looked over the real-life interview with Des Nilsen and I liked how Tennant was able to play him--quite a good impersonation--but, ironically, I found the dramatization of the story to contain too much fabricated drama. It's something in real-world retellings that I've been noticing for a while now, and have become increasingly bothered by.

It takes a great deal of skill to translate actual events into a digestible film or show without the selective-focus of the film-makers giving the whole thing a feeling of contrivance. Unfortunately, that happened for me at several points in the show. "Ah, well this scene between detective and upper-brass officers wouldn't play out this dramatically", I would think, or "Hey, why are we dwelling on the jury needing to take until the following morning to decide on the case? Surely not to simply wring more tension from the scene: tension that will deflate disappointingly when a unanimously guilty verdict is delivered."

It's a problem that is avoided by very good productions, but crops up in all the bad and mediocre ones. False-drama is cheap and quickly forgotten.

I was also disappointed by the movie's take on Nilsen. In a story like this, you want some greater insights into the mind of the killer to emerge. Of course, the problem is that the writers only have so much insight with which to work, and adding more beyond that is a disservice to the real people involved. Now, one might say that the point of the story is to highlight that we don't know exactly why Nilsen did these things, that--as Masters says in the show--those who retell these events must not subjectively interpret them but rather objectively put forth what they know. I don't think that makes for a good story, is the problem. I don't think that Tennant had enough to work with here to satisfactorily deliver a complete character.
I mean, in the court-room scenes, when he is silent, I found myself unable to tell what he was thinking. By that point, towards the end of the show, I would have liked to have understood the character. But his development from self-reporting, meek serial killer to high-minded seeker of the truth to petty, bratty accused left me confused about who the heck he was.

It's not much of a feather in Tennant's cap, more like a check in his pocket. The acting is good, the writing serviceable, but the direction and development of the series was ultimately disappointing and makes for a forgettable project.

(Got into kind of a critical rant there for a bit, so in the end I'd say that I rate the whole thing more like a 5 out of 10).

It must be a hard balance, some of his victims families must be still alive, and really sometimes there aren't 'reasons' people do these things, like with Shipman, they still don't know why he did it. they are inherently unreasonable. I think it is better to go full on Hannibal Lector than half cocked. it is a chance for Tennant to do something dark, but he was pretty gloomy in Broadchurch as well. I prefer him zingy and happy to be honest.

{{ It was precisely the understated and unresolved nature of it I liked most. That it didnt pretend to offer any insights or answers, it just gives you the man and fouses on the effect he has on those around him, police, biographer and family of some of his victims. There is no pat he did this because of this excuse for it, and thats precisely what for me made it work.
Des himself is not even really the subject so much as the enigmatic pivot around which the rest revolves.
As to the stuff between the lead officer and top brass, its heightened for drama sure, but not without basis. In interviews with the officer from before he died he talks about the pressure to get names to bodies for the conviction, the need to do so initially within the 48 hours allocated by law they can hold him without charge before having to release him, and the need to at some point close and convict even while they were still trying to add more names to the list to charge him with- the bit for example about the last victim they did manage to identify not being accounted as one of the murders, as they found out too late, is emblematic of all the others he never was charged with because they had to convict on what they had at that point. I think how they did that was a fair way to convey to the viewer that not all his victims got justice.  }}

For some outrageous cases Id agree that more info would have better. Extreme cases need extreme telling. The police in the Nilsen case had to work with a case they had never dealt with before. Trying to get as much evidence whilst feeling amazement at this cool, calm man, someone so bland in his appearance & looks can sit there speaking calmly of killing someone & making his mind up about disecting that victim, how would you feel if you were a copper ? I think its still true today that the police are under pressure to get quick convictions & are equally pissed off if perpertrators are let off in court or never even get to court. I liked this tv version of Nilsen. I liked the fact that it felt like a day to day finding out this & that. It wasnt OTT, false arm flinging, F-ing every other word & stupid out of date cockney rhyming slang, or any other slang for that matter.

I thought most serial killers were good at seeming perfectly normal. It's how they gain trust of their victims.

Stranger Things?

OMG it's a Bluebottle sighting!
(embedded in that wave is the implied "where ya been and why?")

No, some BBC show about a serial killer.

{{ Blue!!! Good to see you }}

Finished the first season of Warrior Nun. It was the actress playing the title character that kept drawing me back - a very endearing young critter. I think I was fascinated by a Portuguese girl who talks and acts exactly like an American teenager. Turns out they all talk like that: taught American rather than British English in school. It's a nice reminder that everyone's basically the same, so if you make them sound the same you can't tell the difference.

{{ Spitting Image is back! }}

I'm not quite sure what Schitt's Creek is, but now I'm intrigued

https://medium.com/@tressiemcphd/the-three-people-you-meet-when-you-dont-like-schitt-s-creek-acc33c6e5996

Love those Petty.

I watched the entirety of the first seasons of Dark and The Boys last weekend.

The former I thought good, but too in love with its own complexity, dragging out mysteries to the point that they remained mysteries. Great cast though, I enjoyed seeing actors and actresses little-known to me but who I recognized from various foreign films: the playwright's wife from The Clouds of Sils Maria, or Sebastian from Land of Mine.

The latter I thought good, but too slow in the second half of the season. The episode about the faith rally should have been cut, along with about half of the character development overall. The show slowed way down while exploring all these stratagems and mysteries surrounding the South-east Asian super and lost its way. It was strongest in its high-concept ideas: girl killed by speeding super-hero, hijacked airplane, the corruption of the Vought corporation and the lies it told the public, etc.
When it came to things like Starlight struggling to find herself or breaking up with the main character because of his deceptions it bordered on tedious. Similarly, the terrorist-super woman that they capture and befriend is largely unlikable. She is meant to be "wild" and "untameable" or something, but after the fourth time she freaks out on the main characters for little reason and then breaks Mesmer's wrist... She reached the level of annoying DMPC from a bad tabletop RPG session. I wanted to yell at the screen, "She could kill any of you at any time! Lock her up, are you insane!?!" It was like watching a friend be bitten by her dog repeatedly and the friend explaining that the dog simply has a high temperament. Well, where I come from we call that grounds for taking said dog for the short walk into the woods, if you know what I mean.

Anyway, I watched these while house-sitting and it screwed up my sleep schedule through staying up so late. I was so tired last night that I went to bed early and slept for over ten hours.

Bluebottle wrote:I'm not quite sure what Schitt's Creek is, but now I'm intrigued

https://medium.com/@tressiemcphd/the-three-people-you-meet-when-you-dont-like-schitt-s-creek-acc33c6e5996

I saw part of an episode, it was not very good as I recall. What does the article say? It is locked for me behind a sign-up page.

{{ Not sure how many if any folk here have read the Discworld novels, but the trailer for the upcoming tv show is out, and whatever the hell it is its not even vaguely like Discworld. Looks godawful.  And guessing Vetinari is a woman now too because of course they are- cant have a white man ruling the city can we?! Cheery is now a tall dwarf without a beard, Carrot has shrunk by about 2 foot, dont see Detitrus but its ok we have a 6ft cross dressing dwarf instead? and Vimes is like a shitty Captain Sparrow, oh and the Watch now play in a punk band?  I dunno where to start with this trailer, there is about a hundred things wrong in every single frame!  I think the trailers  like to dislike ratio speaks for itself.
Why bother getting the license to make a tv show out of massively popular books globally if you have no intention of adapting the very things people love about them and you change absolutely every aspect?   }}

I wanted to get into the Vimes world but never really could. The mix of mythical creatures with modern technology didn't click for me. Too discordant.

Other fantasy that mixes the two has one world as a bit of an intrusion on the other, but they are clearly separate. Only vampires seem to work when welded with the modern world. Not trolls, elves, etc.

{{ The books are NOT a mix of mythical creatures and modern technology. Discworld is a mirror of worlds, so stuff leaks in sometimes, but normally only for the length of the book, so Soul Music theres a magic music thing that creates rock music in just that book before its destroyed, and in Moving Pictures they invent the 'clickies' (or rediscover it via alchemists to be more exact) which likewise doesn't survive, but the technological level of Discworld, which evolves over the books starts out in Tolkienesque time periods, later moves through towards a sort of vaguely early Edwardian era, its also dependent where on the disc you are- Omnia is amix of desert cultures and the Catholic Church at the heightof the inquisition, Ephebia is like ancient Greece, full of philosphers and more gods than you can shake an incense stick at, Uberwald is a sort of Transelvianian landscape of trees, castles and vampires and werewolves, only Ank-Morpork seems as advanced as say 17-1800's as its the most developed and oldest city on the Disc (and only then in later books, prior to that its more like a middle ages city), each area is representive of some histroical period or outlook or belief- its not this. (Good site for examples- https://discworld.fandom.com/wiki/Discworld_geography#.C3.9Cberwald ) None of the characters are recognisable, Vimes hates authority but having him give the Patrician the finger could not be more out of character for him. Lady Sybil is not some hot redheaded woman she is a rather domineering but kind hearted rich Lady of a 'certain age' a mature women of diginity and gravitas, stockily and solidly built with a no nonsense, dont make a fuss attitude. Angua is tall and has long blonde hair, not a short arse with shaved hair. Cheery is a female dwarf, with full beard, and you know dwarf height, not a tall cross dressing human. Just every frame is wrong- there is no electricity for example in Discworld. Weapons are crossbows, swords and the like still. I dunno what the hell that trailer is based off, but it seems the creators of this series have about as much knowledge of Discworld as you do Halfy! Its like they based it on someones vague recollection of a synopsis they once over-heard second hand in a noisy bar whilst very drunk, and so everything is wrong.}}

{{ Even Sky's versions, though I didnt think they picked the best books, are at least recognisable as the Discworld. This is Going Postal, which is a later book in that Edwadrian style period of Ankh-Morpork, in which theyve invented something sort of half way between telegrams and the internet via the Clacks towers. But everyone looks like their descriptions, its follows the plot reasonably closely and it doesnt go out its way to change anything it doesnt have to save for budget and time reasons. }}

{{ Uploaded the BBC radio version of Night Watch- a Watch book adaptation. Even if you only listen to the first episode, then go back and rewatch that trailer I think the gulf between an actual adaptation and whatever the hell thats supposed to be becomes raher stark! }}

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1f4ruIffTdaaQFQNMD8J3bmSa9iKHfZK9?usp=sharing

Pettytyrant101 wrote:{{Why bother getting the license to make a tv show out of massively popular books globally if you have no intention of adapting the very things people love about them and you change absolutely every aspect?   }}

Edit: but yeah, pretty ridiculous.

{{{ Got to admit this looks better than I thought it would. }}

Ive read all the Pratchett books, and after reading what Petty said I didnt even look at the trailer. Yes I did & it was so utterly bad I felt sick. NONE of what I saw happened in the books. This travesty, this abomination, is what I would expect from America. Discworld still held an English flavour so that even tho the stories were unusual they still felt touchable because they had that English touch. The characters may have been odd but they were odd in an English "Olde Worlde " way. I wont watch this shit. Id rather strip naked, smear myself in Marmite & sit in the lion den at London Zoo.

{ Az- I think itsmade by BBC America, which might explain it, a bit, still no excuse even for Americans.

Recorded in 2017, Pie's Live Show }}