What I watched on TV in June

-

June meant watching a lot of these shows on my iPad on airplanes. The small screen was very literal for me this month. Here's what I managed to watch during my travels. 


Black Mirror - *sigh* Black Mirror is one of my all time favorite shows but these new seasons just have not felt like Black Mirror. To break it down:

Joan is Awful - This very much felt like Black Mirror but they tend to lose me when they go full meta like this. I had the same gripe about Black Museum in season 4. It had a few funny parts, but I didn't care for it over all.

Loch Henry - Someone on letterboxd mentioned that some of these episodes felt like they belonged in the VHS movies and this is definitely one of those. It's one of the better ones of the season because Black Mirror is always at its best when it's being very British, but it still doesn't stand up to anything in seasons 1-4.

Beyond the Sea - Easily the best of the season. I really enjoyed this episode and it got a lot darker than I thought it would. One thing that did get me - I love Aaron Paul, but he has iPhone face. I do not believe for a second he would exist in the 60's. He's a great actor, and he's great in this role, but he never fully looked the part.

Mazey Day - This is officially the worst episode of Black Mirror. It makes me want to give The Waldo Moment, Metalhead, and Bandersnatch another go. 

Demon 79 - The chemistry between the two leads was fun, but ending the season on something that again, doesn't feel like Black Mirror was a bit of a dud. 


The Clearing - Teresa Palmer in a movie about a cult? Was this made for me? I haven't finished this yet. I still have two episodes to go, but so far it's equal parts frustrating and fascinating. Palmer is a fantastic actress but I wish she'd get to do more than look like she's about to have a mental breakdown every time she's on screen. I hate to ponder if someone can have "too much" PTSD. But she always looks seconds away from collapsing into a pile. 


House of Hammer - I couldn't resist and watched the Hammer doc. This man and all the men in his family are trash.


Secret Invasion - They kill an OG character in the first episode and I'm kind of sad about it. I've only watched the first one, but I am looking forward to more Nick Fury, even with that very annoying first episode. 


The Idol - This show is so frustrating. There IS a good show in here, but The Weeknd sucks the life out of it. I would love for them to just completely do it over without him. He's awful. Love him as a musician, but he needs to head right back to that lane because HE is the problem with this show. I don't even want to finish it and there's only two episodes left. He's THAT bad.


The Bear - The second season is amazing! The actors are bringing their A-game and I loved the extra time we spent with some of the side characters. I also have two episodes left of this, and I'm looking forward to finishing it. 


Shiny Happy People - In case you missed it, I did a separate post on this here. 


Comments

  1. thevoid99July 17, 2023 at 3:23 PM

    The only thing from your list that I saw is Secret Invasion which I like but I'm still not over some of the deaths in the show. The last episode was a bit of a mess for me though I do hope Nick Fury and his wife Priscilla do make it. I'd like to see them more as a couple. Maybe at the end of the show, they go to Haiti and just relax there while meeting Queen Shuri, Nakia, Prince T'Challa, and Okoye. Plus, there is a place the Skrulls can live in. New Asgard. They have weird aliens in that place so I'm sure there's room for the Skrulls. After all, who better to entertain them than Matt Damon and Melissa McCarthy? Oh wait, they're on strike unless doing theater work doesn't violate the rules of the stroke.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamJuly 18, 2023 at 7:53 AM

      I haven't watched Secret Invasion beyond the first episode. I keep forgetting about it, I might just save it up for my next flight and binge it all at once.

      Delete
  2. SJHoneywellJuly 17, 2023 at 11:13 PM

    The only of these I can comment on is Black Mirror. Only Joan is Awful and Beyond the Sea felt like actual Black Mirror episodes. The others felt more X-Files/Twilight Zone. A bit disappointing overall.

    Interesting that Joan is Awful seems to be playing out in real time right now.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamJuly 18, 2023 at 7:52 AM

      I agree with that assessment. The rest belonged on Twilight Zone or VHS. Black Mirror again is predicting the future. Any day now the world will be overrun with killer machine dogs.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thanks for stopping by, let's talk movies!
(comments are moderated to reduce spam)

Popular posts from this blog

Random Ramblings: The Radio Flyer Conundrum

-
Image
Recently, I was talking to someone about who I thought were the best child actors when I was also a child.  Two that really stood out to me were Elijah Wood and Joseph Mazello, and one film those two were in together was called Radio Flyer.  Then I was reminded about the uniqueness of this film. Instead of reviewing the film, I wanted to have an open discussion about the ending. It deals with a tough issue; child abuse. What I’ve noticed is the way that the film ends is interpreted many different ways, and the filmmakers never came forward to say what was right and wrong. I’m interested in hearing everyone’s opinions on it. How did you interpret the ending? Obviously spoiler alerts will follow.. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the basic premise is this: Two young boys, Mikey (Wood) and Bobby (Mazello) move in with their single mother and her boyfriend, who refers to himself as ‘The King’. It doesn’t take long for The King to start physically abusing ...
Read more

Indie Gems: Behind The Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

-
Image
Passionate about your profession? I had never heard of this film until it ended up on one of Jason's favorite horror movie lists around Halloween. It immediately sounded interesting to me, so of course I threw it in my Netflix queue. (and if I'm just now watching it after adding it around Halloween, you know how ridiculous my queue is) Taylor (Angela Goethals) is a journalist who, along with a film crew decides to follow around a serial killer named Leslie Vernon. (Nathan Baesel) He plans on doing the typical slasher thing - getting a bunch of drunk teens in an abandoned house and knocking them off one by one. He gets advice from a retired serial killer, Eugene (Scott Wilson) and is threatened by a man who's on to him, Doc Holloran (Robert Englund) Taylor and crew are there capturing it all. Leslie Vernon is fucking hilarious to start with, and clearly very passionate about what he does. He tells Taylor all of his secrets and can barely contain his excitemen...
Read more

My Favorite Movie Youtube Channels

-
Image
Starting around 2018, I started watching Youtube for more than just movie trailers or music videos whenever a new one dropped. Now I'm in full blown subscription mode and don't bat an eyelash at watching a Youtube video that's over an hour long. I watch Youtube for a few different categories of content, but one of them that I love most is movie/TV essays and commentary, and that's what I'm going to talk about today. Below is a list of my favorite movie related Youtube channels. Let me know if you're familiar with them too, or if you have any you'd like to recommend to me.  Double Toasted - I'm honestly surprised this channel isn't bigger. I first came across Korey and Martin when they reviewed War for the Planet of the Apes a few months before it hit theaters and I thought they were hysterical. While their full length videos stream on Twitch, they often upload their movie reviews and commentary on youtube and they're always hilarious. They've...
Read more