The new year isn’t off to the best start. I just watched Kaleidoscope and I feel cheated of the thrilling heist experience I was promised. This series has been stretched out so much that it has lost all of its meaningful substance. This series was a waste of time, do not watch it.
The series starts with a man in prison who spends his day growing increasingly bitter about life and plotting his escape. A terrible diagnosis turns his plans into reality. As a free man, he gathers the sloppiest crew to pull off a heist from one of the most secure banks in New York City. Can they come together in time and make off with $7 billion? Or will this be the end of this generic showrunner?
It makes me sad to see such an excellent cast wasted on such a boring series. I came into Kaleidoscope expecting interesting characters and adrenaline-pumping heists, but instead, all I got was pointless drama. The heists are fine at best, but they are overshadowed by how boring everything else is. They could have cut this into a two-hour movie, and life would have been better.
My biggest complaint with this series is that it tries to do too much. There is too much backstory for characters no one will care about, and there are too many uninteresting plot threads to unravel. The series has an interesting gimmick where it plays with the timeline, but it doesn’t work here. The series will jump around between different characters and times, building up to its disappointing heist. Instead of experiencing the heist as it happens, you get to watch the excitement of planning, relationship problems, and its uninspired aftermath. It was a mistake to have the heist come at the end because I had already checked out long before then. Sometimes starting at the end makes a narrative interesting because you need to know what happened. Here, it made me care even less about this series.
If you like heist movies, watch one of the better ones. This series is a waste of your time. You can watch it on Netflix, but I wouldn’t.
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Series Review: Murderville (2022)
Murderville aims to be this quirky improv crime drama, but one that ends up being mediocre. While the concept is interesting, it isn’t consistent enough to be worth the trouble. This series seems to have been made with a very specific audience in mind, but unfortunately, I am not in that group.
The premise of this series is to guide a famous person through this interactive crime drama experience. The experience is led by actors who mostly follow a script. The guests know nothing about what is going on. A lot of the humor relies heavily on how well the guest can adapt and react to certain situations. What this series ends up being is a collection of sometimes funny improv exercises. If you are considering watching this series, I recommend watching a highlight real on YouTube instead.
The problem with this series is how much the entertainment falls on the guest. Not every guest is going to be good, and there are already a couple of episodes to prove this. The main draw to this series is to have actors you know reacting to this silly mystery, but it isn’t going to be consistently good. Most of the guests didn’t have the improv skills to keep the flow going. This leads to a lot of awkward moments. It was fun to see the actors working hard to try to make it all work, but the series as a whole is mediocre.
If you like to improve the guests, you might have a better time, but it is still a hard sell. For this format to work, you need guests who can be as entertaining as the actors propelling the narrative. This isn’t a bad show, it has some funny moments to it, but your time is better spent watching them on YouTube. But if you like this format and are a fan of the guests, you can stream this series on Netflix.
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The Legend of Vox Machina Season 2
It’s finally happening! The second season of The Legend of Vox Machina is set to premiere on January 20, 2023, on Amazon. If you haven’t seen the series, now is a great time to start. Check out my full review of the first season for more information. Trust me it was a fantastic season. Even if you aren’t a fan of fantasy, this series will blow you away and leave you wanting more. It has everything you want in a show. It has fantastic characters voiced by amazing actors, a great story, mayhem, and lots and lots of blood. If you aren’t a fan of fantasy, prepare to be one. It has beautiful art, epic action, and lots of humor. It is a bit on the adult side so viewers beware.
This post isn’t sponsored, I am just very excited about a series I absolutely love. The trailer has just dropped, leaving me incredibly impatient for what is to come. This second season promises an even more epic adventure as Vox Machina must band together and save the world from dragons! Why have the dragons banded together to attack humanity? Why dragons? It is probably Tiamat, but we will have to wait and see. Check out the trailer, mark your calendars, and go watch the first season!
Series Review: The Peripheral (2022)
The entire season of The Peripheral is finally available for streaming, and it wasn’t worth the wait. I started watching this series as it came out but quickly gave up when I lost interest. Having this series be a weekly release was a mistake because there isn’t enough happening to get you excited for the next episode. If you are looking for a good sci-fi series to binge, look elsewhere.
Flynn Fisher is the best VR gamer in the world, but she is also poor. She and her family live paycheck to paycheck and use Flynn’s gaming skills to make extra money. One day, a mysterious benefactor offers to pay her to test a new VR headset. Flynn finds herself in a hyper-realistic simulation where she must complete dangerous tasks to earn her paycheck. But there is an evil cabal working against her benefactor. Flynn finds herself in the middle of a deadly conflict where she and her family must fight to survive. Can Flynn get to the bottom of this mystery before anyone she loves dies?
I am happy this series has a recap before every episode because I struggled to remember the plot. The plot isn’t confusing, but it is boring. There clearly wasn’t enough plot for a whole series because they drag out what little plot they have over the eight episodes. This series is terribly paced. This series needed to be thrilling, fast-paced, and suspenseful, but it isn’t.
The cast is decent but they are wasted on flat characters and dull narrative. Flynn is a Betty Sue who seems to care the least about being in this series. She is much too perfect and will easily beat every encounter she faces. Any suspense and action that could have saved this series from being an abysmal flop are poorly executed. The action scenes are lethargic, the build-up is slow, and the big reveal comes out of nowhere. This is a series that suffers from a severe identity crisis as it struggles to try to define itself. There are too many plotlines fighting for your attention, and none of them will earn it.
I haven’t read the book this series is based on, but I can assure you it is a very loose adaptation. If you are here because you are a fan of the book or the Westworld series, prepare to be disappointed. This series was a waste of time. You can stream it on Amazon, but I wouldn’t bother.
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Series Review: The Bear (2022)
You should be watching The Bear on Hulu. It is a fast-paced, anxiety-inducing story that will keep you on the edge of your seat. My heart is still racing from this hectic experience, and I love it.
After his brother’s suicide, Carmy moves back to Chicago to try to save his family’s restaurant. Carmy inherited this restaurant from his brother. Carmy is a classically trained chef, and he brings with him new innovative ideas. But saving the restaurant won’t be easy. The staff is stubborn, and his brother left the business in shambles. Can Carmy bring the staff together and help bring the change necessary to save the restaurant?
I am still shaking from the stress and anxiety this series gave me. The Bear does a fantastic job of showing a realistic view of the fast-paced and stressful environment that is in the kitchen. The series deals with hard topics such as depression, anxiety, and death while telling a powerful narrative.
This series is best at showing the worst of the human experience. You follow as characters are crippled by stress, anxiety, depression, and other complications in such a real way that it gets uncomfortable. Watching people live with their mental illnesses is something that resonated with me deeply, and I am sure I am not alone in this. it is an aspect of the show that is sprinkled expertly throughout the series as it tells its story.
What I enjoyed most is how the character processes their grief about the suicide. It is a slow process that all characters worked through as the series progressed. I loved watching the characters change through their process as they each went through the different stages in their own way.
The Bear is a fantastic series, and I hope I did it justice. If you like cooking shows, heartwarming shows, or shows about mental health, go check this out! Go watch it now on Hulu and thank me later!
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Series Review: Wednesday (2022)
I have seen enough bad Netflix adaptations and spinoffs to be skeptical about the success of Wednesday. While the casting seemed perfect, I refused to get too excited. I was pleasantly surprised by this spinoff. While it may not be perfect, it is a solid series that you should consider watching.
After a terrible prank, Wednesday is sent to Nevermore, a school for gifted outsiders. The school is full of werewolves, vampires, and people who just don’t fit into the rest of society. Wednesday is resistant at first but slowly comes to tolerate the change. There is something sinister lurking in the woods around Nevermore, and Wednesday loves sinister. Wednesday finds herself in the middle of a mystery full of murder, mayhem, and conspiracy. It is enough to put a smile on her otherwise pale and gloomy face. Can she get to the bottom of things before the year is out?
This is the fourth show in this supernatural school genre I have seen this year. While I noticed that are a lot of parallels, it manages to be a unique enough narrative. The story and lore are tame and easy to follow, the aesthetic is visually appealing, and Wednesday is a fantastic protagonist. Some of the writing and acting aren’t great, but it isn’t bad enough to stop watching.
The mystery in this series is well-developed. It will keep most audiences guessing until the big reveal at the end. I can assure you that there is enough misdirection to muddle your theories as soon as you make them. If you are paying enough attention, there are enough clues to solve the mystery early on. It isn’t overtly obvious unless you know what you are looking for, so I would avoid spoilers. It is refreshing to see a mystery with good attention to detail. There is nothing worse than watching a sloppy mystery where the solution is over-rationalized nonsense at the end.
The characters in this series are fine, although they get sloppy the farther removed they are from Wednesday. The acting is inconsistent between the supporting actors unless they are close to Wednesday. It isn’t bad, but it is noticeable. This might be intentional since outside of Wednesday, most characters are one-dimensional.
Wednesday is a fantastic protagonist. I was afraid they were going to make her a generic brooding goth girl, but there is some surprising depth to Wednesday. I like that Wednesday isn’t perfect. She makes mistakes, loses, and is even wrong sometimes, but she learns from her downfalls. She may not admit when she makes mistakes, but she tries harder, attempts to make amends, and experiences meaningful character growth. The series does a tremendous job of building up her growth and highlighting those important moments. Wednesday will not end in the same place where she started her journey.
My only complaint about this series is that the ending is a bit sloppy. I lost interest because the pacing feels rushed as the series tries to close up all the different plot threads it’s set up throughout the season. It still remained an enjoyable experience and one that I recommend to everyone. This is a different tone than any of the source materials. This is a lot more serious dark and structured more like a teen drama. It has a lot of similar themes, but with a lot less fan service. That said, this is honestly one of the better ones of the genre I have seen. You can stream it now on Netflix.
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Series Review: The Mosquito Coast (2021)
The Mosquito Cove is quite possibly the most boring and preachy thriller I have seen this year. The series has two seasons, but I couldn’t gather the strength to finish the second one. I try my hardest to finish everything I review, but this one proved too much for me.
The series focuses on a family of fugitives on the run from the US government. We don’t know what they did to become outlaws, but you will get clues throughout the series to figure it out. The family flees to Mexico where now they are also being hunted by one of the cartels. Trouble seems to be the only constant in their lives, and they seem to be running out of places to hide. This life puts a great strain on the family, and they keep finding it harder to want to keep going. Will they ever find a safe place to call home, or will their dark secrets catch up and destroy them?
There are some interesting concepts in this show that I wish were explored better. I like that there is a dark mystery that follows the family and causes friction between them. The parents did something bad in their past, but no one is saying what that is. The kids grow suspicious of the parents and each day become more defiant. You get the sense that the dad might be the bad guy, but this narrative takes too long to unravel, and I lost interest. I like the idea of having the protagonist be the bad guy so that we, the audience, can slowly learn to hate him along with the family. It would be interesting to be trapped like this family, knowing they should leave but have nowhere to go because of the situation. The series does attempt to touch on this idea, but it isn’t done well.
Eventually, you find out that the parents are wanted, environmental terrorists. This isn’t a spoiler; this series is pretentious about its environmentalism and anti-consumerism messaging. Every episode has at least two speeches about how humanity is destroying the planet or some anti-establishment criticism. It is tiresome. I don’t mind this type of messaging and believe them to be important, but not when it’s this abrasive. It is hard to have to constantly sit through a dull lecture when I was promised a thriller.
The pacing is a huge problem for this series. This story drags without ever getting to the point. As a result, there isn’t enough urgency or suspense for this series to work. I found myself mostly waiting around for anything interesting to happen. I kept hoping this family would get caught so I didn’t have to suffer through this series any longer, but the villains proved too incompetent.
The Mosquito Cove lacks the stakes needed to be considered a thriller. Anytime the family gets into trouble, whether they are being chased by the cartel or caught by the FBI, they easily escape through poorly written ex-Machina. This series likes to pretend to be technical and realistic but bends the rules of reality to allow the family a chance to escape. This isn’t even a family of highly trained spies. Instead, this is a normal family fumbling through the sloppiest of escapes.
I wish this series had the courage to kill off one of the characters. It would make for a better story to have the family deal with death on top of the danger. If one of the kids died, the dad would have to live with the guilt as he continues trying to hold his family together. The mother and the surviving sibling would want to leave but find themselves in a situation where escaping isn’t an option. It would create this crazy dynamic where they need each other to survive, but the grief has since split them apart. Honestly, anything would have been more interesting to watch than what this show actually is.
I couldn’t make it through the second season. It was clear this series wasn’t going to get better, and I have since run out of patience. You can stream this on Apple TV if you have a subscription, but I wouldn’t bother.
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Series Review: The English (2022)
The English is an Amazon original that left me feeling disappointed and a little bit offended. At its core, this is a white savior narrative disguised as something empowering.
Cornelia Locke has made it to America in search of the man responsible for her son’s death. Now she, with the help of a Pawnee Indian she meets along the way, scours the western frontier seeking her revenge. Can she survive the unforgiving landscape of the new world and find the man she’s looking for, or will the unforgiving plains claim another victim?
The show is an average western at best and very preachy. The acting is great, but the story and its pacing aren’t. The series jumps between different stories ineffectively, making this a disorienting experience. While I appreciate the attempt at a more complicated narrative, there is a lot of filler. This is a series that takes too long to get to the point.
The biggest issue I have with this series is how it tries to whitewash history. I was a bit disgusted by the lengths to which this series goes to prove that not all white people during this period were terrible. I don’t believe all white people are bad, I just don’t like how hard they try to prove this.
There is clearly a white savior complex and some virtue signaling at play in this series. You can see this with Cornelia and how she carries herself. Every episode has a moment where she has to talk about how brown people aren’t bad and that we should respect them as people. She has a whole speech about how white people are stealing from the Native Americans. It gets a little much, and I had trouble caring.
I get that Cornelia has a reason to be so kind, but this series goes above and beyond to prove that she isn’t racist. Other white characters in this series suffer from this same complex. Lately, I have been noticing many examples of modern media capitalizing on white guilt and virtue signaling. We don’t need this kind of whitewashing and hand-holding, especially when we are dealing with the terrible aspects of our history. Tell the stories how they are. They are meant to make us uncomfortable because they were uncomfortable stories.
I did not appreciate how this series presents the atrocities of this time as reactions from the good white characters. There is a problematic scene in this series where an entire Native village of Native Americans is slaughtered. You hear the slaughter in the distance, but the focus is on an English man and his overly dramatic anger. I am not saying they should have shown the slaughter, but this type of commentary is insulting. It was as if the series was saying, “we know this was bad, but there were good white people trying to stop this from happening too.” This shifts the focus from a terrible event and puts it on a white man.
I might be taking things a bit too personally, but this theme was too present to ignore. The English isn’t a good redemption story because it is sloppy and lazy. It isn’t a good romance because there isn’t any chemistry, and the romance wasn’t set up properly. It isn’t even a good western because of how cartoonish it becomes. They have great actors who are wasted on such a mediocre story. I am sure there is an audience for this, but it wasn’t for me. I would recommend you skip it, but you can stream it on Amazon Video if you have a Prime membership.
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Image by Philippe Verdier from Pixabay
Series Review: Blockbuster (2022)
I just finished watching the new Blockbuster series on Netflix, and I am here to warn you that it isn’t worth your time. This generic sitcom is a desperate attempt to cash in on people’s nostalgia about the time of video rentals. This is a series that is thirsty for the attention of a modern audience but lacks the charm and humor required to be considered proper entertainment. Even if you are starving for content, there are green pastures elsewhere.
The series is about the last Blockbuster left open and the crew desperately trying to save it from closing. This series is essentially a worse version of Superstore. A version with similar characters and story beats but none of the charm. Go watch any other workplace sitcom instead.
It is a shame that such a talented cast is wasted on such a mediocre comedy. The acting is fantastic, but it deserves better writing. Although Blockbuster makes an attempt at a cohesive story, the jokes are dated, the drama is boring, and the characters are generic. If you are not cringing at how hard this series is trying to make you laugh, you are bored by whatever is left behind.
The biggest issue for this show is how much it relies on pop culture references. Most of the jokes and references are already dated, leaving this series racing toward its expiration. I guarantee that in a couple of months, most of these jokes will be obsolete, leaving the series to fade into further obscurity. I have the unfortunate pleasure of being old enough to understand all the references made in this series, and I can attest that none of them were funny.
The tricky business of relying this heavily on pop culture references as it dates the work. Sure there are some references that remain timeless, and when used correctly, they hold meaning. However, nothing is guaranteed, so it’s best not to use them. You can always tell when a show or movie is lazy when it is desperately pandering to its modern audience. When shows or movies try this hard to be relevant, the script becomes a collection of trending hashtags that will no longer be trending at release. Blockbuster took a dangerous gamble in trying to appeal to both a general and modern audience, but it did not pay out.
I have little else to say about a series this lazy. It is unimpressive, uninspired, and forgettable. Don’t watch it. It may not be the worst show in the genre, but it is a waste of time. For those who don’t believe me, you can stream it on Netflix.
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Series Review: Final Space
Final Space has no right to be as good as it is; you should watch it if you haven’t. I am disappointed that it won’t be getting its proper conclusion anytime soon because a greedy network is holding it hostage. Nonetheless, Final Space is the perfect space odyssey you should be watching!
Final Space is the story of Gary Goodspeed’s destiny. Gary is serving his prison sentence alone in space when a mysterious, planet-destroying space creature finds him. Gary befriends the strange creature and names it Mooncake. But the friendship between Mooncake and Garry sets off a series of events that will change the universe forever. Now Garry and his newly found crew of misfits must save the universe from an ancient evil.
Final Space is an epic and emotional adventure I wasn’t prepared for. Do not let the art style and general goofiness fool you, this is a serious adventure full of love, loss, action, and betrayal. Final Space is sci-fi done right. There is fantastic world-building, memorable characters with proper development, actual stakes, and a narrative that will keep you on the edge of your seat. I laughed, I cried, but I need more.
My only complaint about this show is that there aren’t any plans for a final season. It is also difficult to find copies of the seasons that have been released because it is no longer available for streaming anywhere. You can find the first two seasons on Amazon for purchase right now, but that might change soon. It is worth the trouble if you can find it anywhere else, even if it is a physical copy. I can only hold onto the hope that one day it will miraculously get the proper conclusion that it deserves. Take my word for it, go watch Final Space, and don’t forget to thank me when you do.
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