What are you watching right now?

[Felstaff]

(up until the end of series 6, where the show should have ceased entirely until Grant 'n' Naylor sorted out their creative differences).

Have you watched Series X? Because it's actually really darn good. I was extremely pleasantly surprised, especiially after the disappointing Back to Earth.

Not yet! I even had audience tickets for it, but I couldn't go
Back to Earth was the worst thing I'd seen in a while, and I don't think I finished watching series 8. I'll give it a shot. I'm trying to get my hands on the books again. I was very young when I read them and I think I'd appreciate/understand them more now.

[smiley_cow]

I watched through Jessica Jones. Mostly I liked it, though I was disappointed they didn't take more of an episodic noir take on it. But I guess that's just the Netflix format. I'm really looking forward to Luke Cage's show.

[Kaharz]

I've only watched the first episode. I'm not thrilled with the villain choice, but we'll see. I was hoping for a fairly noir episodic air with a build to the seasonal plot, so I'm disappointed on that. They pretty much jumped right in feet first.

[smiley_cow]

Yeah, I was really disappointed when I found out who the villain was too because I thought 'this is going to be really rapey'. And it was, but I guess at least it was handled better at least than I'm used to seeing rapey things handled? Like at least they actually called it rape.

[Kimra]

I liked Jessica Jones more than I liked Daredevil.

[Astrogirl]

Tell me more about Jessica Jones and can it only be watched on Netflix?

[Edminster]

I can't say anything about it because I haven't watched it yet (and given the contents it might be a while) but yes, it is exclusively available on Netflix.

[Edminster]

finished watching the first season of Gotham and yeah the violence was intense for the first few episodes

it tones down a bit into more 'traditional' just-offscreen stuff but it will not shy away from graphic violence for effect

i was astounded at the level of cinematography for the show, though. a surprising number of clever scene-change transitions and verrrry clever framing, not *quite* to the point where i was paying more attention to the camerawork than the plot but it rode that edge

i can see how the kids would get annoying but ultimately i think they were refreshing bits of... not innocence per se but at least generally a reprieve from the intensity of the goings-on in gotham proper.

i also watched Flash season 1 which was fun and cute and Arrow seasons 1-3 which were... passable.

i no longer have any excuses to not watch jessica jones but i still don't want to because ~triggers~ but that's not a valid enough excuse to completely excise it from my life

blugh blugh blugh

[smiley_cow]

If it makes you feel any better the worst stuff in Jessica Jones is off-screen and takes place before the show even starts. The focus of the show is very much on recovery, even if it doesn't shy away from heavy topics at all.

A quote from the showrunner:

For me, if I never see an actual rape on a screen again it'll be too soon. It's becoming ubiquitous, it's become lazy storytelling and it's always about the impact it has on the men around them...It's damaging.

Also if you're going through superhero shows, have you watched Supergirl? I'm caught up and I'm kind of in love with it.

[Kimra]

Jessica Jones certainly addresses triggery issues. But I loved that unlike shows like Game of Thrones, they didnt' feel the need to ram the horror down your throat. As Smiley said, it was all off screen / past. I don't trigger from rape on screen, but I despise it and it sickens me, and I had no troubles at all with this show. Not saying it's 100% safe, just throwing in my 2 cents.

Astro: Jessica Jones is about a ex-superhero who has become a private investigator. Her main enemy is a man from her past who can make people do anything he tells them to (i.e. he says it and they just do it without control of their actions). As you can imagine with a bad guy like that in her past Jessica Jones is a bit broken. (I used spoiler tag but I don't feel that's actually a spoiler, more the premise, but I'm being over cautious.)

Is that the sort of thing you wanted to know Astro?

[Astrogirl]

Yep! Thanks!

[Lethal Interjection]

Lengthy post forthcoming. I'm blacking it out both because it has some spoilers but also because of triggers, and I do go a little deep/dark. Maybe more philosophical, but I did find myself searching for more delicate phrasing. So that might be warning enough.

What I appreciated about Jessica Jones was how it gave a broader idea of involuntarily giving up personal control, but also didn't take away from the discussion of rape. In fact, for me, it actually brought me into a better understanding of what a rape-survivor goes through.
Each of Kilgrave's pawns gave up their free will at some point. Of course, none as much as Jessica, who had every bit of herself taken away by Kilgrave. Unfortunately the first word that comes to mind even for the lesser Kilgrave victims still comes around to 'rape'. It's not accurate, and might seem like it minimalizes rape, but we also don't really have a word for it. Understandably, I guess. I mean the symptoms are the same for the systematically abused, but that isn't as immediate as what Kilgrave can do.
But as I watched the support group (and Jessica) deal with what Kilgrave had done to them, even the simplest thing of him making them give him an item of clothing or whatever, it made me think about what it would be like to realize that you'd been made to do something without any personal say in the matter.
Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, this was even further highlighted by the way that some of these Kilgrave victims were introduced. Jessica and the lawyer put out something like a class-action call for anyone who felt like they'd been the victim of Kilgrave. And so these people sit in front of the screen and give testimony about how they felt they'd been mind-controlled into doing something. And basically every story seemed like there was no way this was Kilgrave. Some were not, but I was shocked how many turned out to be legitimate. And if they would've left it at that it wouldn't have left much of a mark. But they bring these people back over several episodes as a support group, and we hear their thoughts and feelings about it.
And that forces the viewer (well, active viewers, anyways) to consider how involuntarily giving up personal control would affect you. And, I hope, that will lead to a better understanding of rape victims.

[Lethal Interjection]

Finally got around to watching season 3 of Hannibal.

I'm surprisingly satisfied. I've loved the show, and was really disappointed when it was canceled. But when I was looking up the future status of show I stumbled upon an article about how Graham's character is essentially a combination of both Graham and Starling from the books (this was about half-way through season 3). And it made total sense. Vague intimacy, will they/won't they, and a magnetic draw between the two is not something Graham and Lecter had in the books. Graham did have the empathetic, dutiful, and brilliant crime-solving in both. So while I was looking forward to them folding Starling into the mix, I'm not really sure how they would've done it without totally reworking that character. Doubly so after having finished season 3.
But I was really happy with the ending, future episodes or not. Season 3 was pretty decent, though rough-going in the first few episodes. And the series as a whole was pretty excellent. I'd be happy with more, but am okay if it's done.

[Felstaff]

The Man in the High Castle. (I was tricked into subscribing for a free trial to Amazon Prime when purchasing Christmas presents, so I'm making the most of it).

Spoilers cover around episodes 4-7ish.

I am impressed and astounded at how they can make a Nazi war criminal's character so complex. I'm sure it's never been done so comprehensively, aside from the odd Nazi-with-a-heart-of-gold side character you might find in films like The Counterfeiters, but Rufus Sewell is for-fucking-midable as the callous Obergruppenführer. For an inhuman monster, the humanity he manages to hint at, yet obfuscate, is one helluva talent. In one scene it's inferred that he had a significant and active role in the genocide within the concentration camps during the war, and then only a short time later has to contend with euthanising his erstwhile healthy son, who's just been diagnosed with a degenerative disease (and therefore must be euthanised as per Aktion T4 --IRONY!). The pain and humility he portrays, whilst almost simultaneously handing over his old friend as a traitor to the secret police for interrogation, gives a villain so richly complex and intriguing, I'm enjoying every minute of his screentime. But I shouldn't be! It's like finding out Darth Sidious likes to tend to sick orphaned kittens at the animal hospital in between bouts of saying "wipe them out. All of them".

It's surprisingly close to the book, just with the action beefed up, and a few extra layers of cloak-and-dagger intrigue, plus some active catting-and-mousing between the Japanese, the Nazis, and the resistance. The subversive novel The Grasshopper Lies Heavy is now a collection of alternate-reality propaganda film reels, and Juliana plays a more active role in the subterfuge. Childan is exquisitely cast, and maintains his perfect Japanese mannerisms whilst simultaneously betraying his racist thoughts against them. Frank is a bit too much of a clean-cut hero, in my eyes. Torn between pacifism under oppression and the desire for bloody revenge against the oppressors, he has a constant 1000-yard stare and a permanently gritted clean-shaven chiselled jaw. I know in the book he was a war vet, but I always pictured him with a certain meekness and introversy. He's a bit too macho-in-the-face-but-pained-in-the-heart for my liking (like Owen Hart, really). Overall, though, the show captures the nuance and spirit of the book in its own unique way, which is a good thing.

Anyway, aside from an overly-hammy grizzled bounty hunter who tries too hard to sound like Christian Bale's Batman, I'm starting to think Amazon might just have a toehold in the bloody Box-Set Binge Wars. This has "high production values" splashed all over it, and I only have two more episodes to watch.

[Kaharz]

I've been meaning to check it out. I've heard mixed reviews, but most of the positive reviews were by people who have the read book. A lot of PKD stories blend together in memory, so I'll probably reread the book before I watch it.