[Scarabin]

Watched the third season of "The Killing" (Danish) which ended last night. The series returned to the high standard of the first season - "trim,taut and terrific", but I found the ending utterly unconvincing.

[kenberg]

We all have our pleasures that cannot really be explained or defended. Me, I enjoyed watching Castle. Note the past tense. The first show of the fifth and final season aired last Tuesday. Who wrote that drek? Beckett (Stana Katic) has accepted Castle's (Nathan Fillion's) proposal of marriage and moved from NY to DC to accept a new job. OK, two career and two city families are part of modern life, I know several examples, and this could have been an interesting twist. It wasn't. I suggest that for the season's second episode Beckett stays in DC, Castle stays in NY, they call off their engagement and close the season and the show. Alternatively, they could send whoever wrote the first episode out for donuts and give the writing task to someone else.

[billw55]

kenberg, on 2013-September-26, 06:25, said:

We all have our pleasures that cannot really be explained or defended. Me, I enjoyed watching Castle. Note the past tense. The first show of the fifth and final season aired last Tuesday. Who wrote that drek? Beckett (Stana Katic) has accepted Castle's (Nathan Fillion's) proposal of marriage and moved from NY to DC to accept a new job. OK, two career and two city families are part of modern life, I know several examples, and this could have been an interesting twist. It wasn't. I suggest that for the season's second episode Beckett stays in DC, Castle stays in NY, they call off their engagement and close the season and the show. Alternatively, they could send whoever wrote the first episode out for donuts and give the writing task to someone else.

I was also disappointed with this season's premier, but I'm not writing off a good show for one bad episode. Besides, I predict Beckett goes back to NYPD.

Who said this was the final season?

[kenberg]

I was looking up the show on the web to see if there were comments (there were, some thought this episode the best ever!) and somewhere I saw that the fifth season is the last. Most shows stay around long past their natural expiration date so I'm fine with that if it is so.

I also looked up Valkyrie. I was vaguely aware of the notion. Becky (my wife) was pretty sure it was Norse and she was right. I thought it was a Norse place or castle and I was wrong. The Wik, of course, has an extensive entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valkyrie
Yes, it's part of The Ring. I have seen, and even enjoyed, a fair amount of opera but The Ring has always seemed to me to be a severe overdose of Wagner.
We shall see what they do with that idea.

Castle is always tongue in cheek and of course this presents a danger of falling over the edge. This time they rushed headlong to the edge and jumped off.

[billw55]

I'm pretty sure the current season is the sixth. Maybe someone used "last" to mean "previous", when referring to season five?

But yeah, they have a delicate balance to maintain, it can't be easy.

[kenberg]

billw55, on 2013-September-26, 07:11, said:

I'm pretty sure the current season is the sixth. Maybe someone used "last" to mean "previous", when referring to season five?

But yeah, they have a delicate balance to maintain, it can't be easy.

Probably so.

[hrothgar]

kenberg, on 2013-September-26, 06:25, said:

We all have our pleasures that cannot really be explained or defended.

I have a deep and abiding love for Married with Children. It lowered the standards for everything that came after.
I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I really enjoy The Big Bang Theory and Two and a Half Men.

What I find amusing it that some many of my favorite shows are still cartoons...
(The Venture Brothers and Archer are two of the best shows on TV)

[billw55]

I also liked the first season of Elementary, the modernized/Americanized Sherlock Homes show. New season starts tonight.

That and Castle are about all I watch regularly. Sometimes Modern Family. Once in a while Person of Interest.

My son loves Big Bang Theory but it just annoys me. Although I have had guilty pleasures in the past .. Scarecrow and Mrs. King and especially A-Team.

Newhart was an often overlooked comedy that I really liked. Hi, I'm Larry ...

Quote

Most shows stay around long past their natural expiration date

Seconded. We could make a long thread just about that.

[ggwhiz]

I was in South Africa in 1997. They were very late getting network tv and bought the cheapest schlock they could find. I watched an episode of the Beachcombers (the worst Canadian show of all time) dubbed into Zulu and couldn't stop laughing for a week.

[barmar]

hrothgar, on 2013-September-26, 08:44, said:

I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I really enjoy The Big Bang Theory and Two and a Half Men.

I watch both. I can understand considering 2.5 Men a guilty pleasure, but feel no shame about TBBT.

Quote

What I find amusing it that some many of my favorite shows are still cartoons...
(The Venture Brothers and Archer are two of the best shows on TV)

My favorite is South Park, which also came back last night, but I haven't watched it yet.

I tried watching Archer when it first came on, but wasn't hooked, and there was too much competition for me to make more of an effort.

[Scarabin]

The second season of "Prisoners of war" and the third season of "Homeland" have just hit our screens. Both addictively watchable but amazingly different.

[Winstonm]

hrothgar, on 2013-September-26, 08:44, said:

I have a deep and abiding love for Married with Children. It lowered the standards for everything that came after.
I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I really enjoy The Big Bang Theory and Two and a Half Men.

What I find amusing it that some many of my favorite shows are still cartoons...
(The Venture Brothers and Archer are two of the best shows on TV)

Ditto, except that the new Two and a Half Men I don't follow - I guess it isn't shallow enough for me now that Charlie Sheen is off the show.

[blackshoe]

There's a new new Two and a Half Men, featuring Charlie's long lost lesbian daughter.

I might watch a bit of it every once in a while these days, but it's off my dvr list.

[Fluffy]

My wife loves to watch CSI and all the copies made of it, also some other police series like Castle.

I like sitting with her at the beginning and watch until the first non regular character appears, then I point him and say: "that's the assasin"... even if he is the chief firefighter all time friend of the victim who was killed by a pyromaniac it doesn't matter, my success rate is amazing.

A-team is really awesome I think my all time favorite.

[barmar]

Fluffy, on 2013-October-03, 17:16, said:

I like sitting with her at the beginning and watch until the first non regular character appears, then I point him and say: "that's the assasin"... even if he is the chief firefighter all time friend of the victim who was killed by a pyromaniac it doesn't matter, my success rate is amazing.

I had a similar feeling about Isabella Rosselini on this week's "The Blacklist". You don't hire her as a guest star to just make her a victim, there has to be a twist.

[y66]

Scarabin, on 2013-September-25, 23:42, said:

Watched the third season of "The Killing" (Danish) which ended last night. The series returned to the high standard of the first season - "trim,taut and terrific", but I found the ending utterly unconvincing.

Looking forward to seeing that someday on Netflix. For now, the only way to see it in the U.S., I think, is to get the European format DVD and a machine that can read it and output to U.S. TV format.

[GreenMan]

barmar, on 2013-October-03, 18:57, said:

I had a similar feeling about Isabella Rosselini on this week's "The Blacklist". You don't hire her as a guest star to just make her a victim, there has to be a twist.

Haven't seen that show, but in general any non-regular with a familiar face is likely to be the culprit; if not, that person will have some other key role in the denouement.

[Scarabin]

y66, on 2013-October-03, 20:01, said:

Looking forward to seeing that someday on Netflix. For now, the only way to see it in the U.S., I think, is to get the European format DVD and a machine that can read it and output to U.S. TV format.

Sorry to be unable to help. We are on Pal format and copyright classified as zone 4.

[mike777]

SPIRAL

someone here...not sure who recommend Spiral. French tv cop show on Netflix.


The French tv cop/court system is weird..this show is weird.

It shows Paris and France in all the ugly tv cop/court ugly side.


If the reality is France is 50% of this wow.....really wow.
I understand for years and years the suburbs of Paris are aflame....in every sense of the word. Paris is small.

[kenberg]

We saw the pilot episode of Masters of Sex, based (realistically?) on the life and work of Masters and Johnson. We weer channel hopping, got in after about five minutes had already passed, and almost dumped it. I'm glad we didn't. It is very sexual, no surprise there, but Becky and i also thought it to be very good. The portrayal of Virginia Johnson was impressive, and I like to think accurate. For a woman of that era, she stepped pretty far out. . Masters comes across as a very weird duck. Interesting, not particularly pleasant, and very weird.

Anyway, I hope the rest holds up to the promise of the pilot.