Haven’t watched it yet. Heard it was gory. Still on the fence. 
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In my area HxH is leaving on Netflix by now, although another place has it only subbed. Not sure if it is affected too, but I notice it is from a different distributor (I assume the dub from Funimation is Netflix, while the other one is only Japanese but with another service), so maybe not.
Speaking of dubs, boy I have been blessed to not hear the Squid Game dub until after I’ve seen it. With all due respect to the actors, the translators, sound mixers and more in VSI Los Angeles, it does not seem to be the greatest job out there. I guess compared to dubs of animated works (especially anime, at least imo), live action works have something more against it in my eyes.
Hmm, that’s odd. I guess they’re doing it while working, haha. That can be a legitimate reason why they watch (or listen to it) dubbed, perhaps. Speaking of dubs, personally was not too big on the HxH dub from the one (or is it two) episode(s) I decide to catch it on there before jumping to another platform.
Also yeah, Squid Game’s pretty good. Im not sure how they can follow it up, but if they do expect it to not be as good or even be bad. We are living in a post Stranger Things and Game of Thrones world after all.
I’d say stomach through the first 2 episodes, as they are rather heavy on the themes and drama imo, although it is at its most compelling with its social commentary until the final episode. But with a 45 minute runtime, i say watch it in your pace depending on how comfortable you’re with these kinds of shows.
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Agree with @smellyworm that you can watch at your own pace. It’s got a lot of blood and gore throughout, so there’s no getting around it. What this show does is that it really involves your imagination, and engages you to think about the “what if” situations a lot and lets you think past what is present on screen, even though the screen has a ton of blood and other things spewing all over. If you cannot stand the sight of people getting killed actively, then maybe it would not be a great show for you. There’s no avoiding the camera or seeing things in the blurred background, etc. Almost all of the killing is front and center, focused.
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Well, well, well!
The 4400, one of my favorite sci-fi shows, apparently has been rebooted under the title of 4400! It’s obviously not connected to the OG show, but I’m excited! Gonna sit down and watch the first 2 episodes now! Hopefully it is good. 
(This means never give up on a show return. It’s always possible!)
Summary
EDIT
Oh noooo! CW made it! Well, since Superman & Lois has been AMAZING, I won’t judge this too soon.
EDIT
Well, okay… lol
Summary
Here are some of the glaring problems.
- Racism in shadow of anti-racism. The subject is brought up at first very seriously and very well done. (and admittedly, what drew me in when I was second guessing). You’re given the perspective of a 1920s (40s?) black man from Harlem and he’s just completely taken aback by 2021. He sees a 1990s (may be early 2000s) black woman (whom is a lawyer of a prestige firm) demanding a cop let her out and tries to stop her in fear she will be hurt. This was really played out well, especially by how the actor carried the fear and unease, and I’m glad they didn’t try to avoid the reality people of color face every day (especially here in the U.S). However, as the episode progresses, you start to get this very distinct impression. Racism is bad…until it isn’t? What do I mean? Well, in the first 25 minutes, you are given only one white person who doesn’t want to beat or kill people of color. I’m not even exaggerating this and if you don’t believe me, you can watch EP1 yourself. Every white threatens non-whites with violence or tells them they’re property of the U.S government. I’m well aware of how corrupt and racist this country is, but how is it right to paint an entire race like that? I guess I will never agree with that kind of stance…
This may not be a dissuading point for other viewers though and I certainly don’t suggest you stop watching it–especially only at EP1–simply because of this. Not all things are done with intention, so I will give the show the benefit of the doubt.
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Poor acting on the non-main (third) characters (main chick Shanice is really good though, and the woman from the 1920s). It breaks the immersion of a serious scene when the actor is even worse than a soap opera actor. This though is not as much as a deal breaker for me as it might be for others. I stuck through soap operas myself, so… xD
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Too many perspectives jammed into EP1. They really needed to just focus on maybe two or three characters for EP1, with Shanice being the first one. Definitely. They opened her up strong to the audience and she’s consistently delivered as an actor but also as being interesting and humanizing. The 4400 obviously will deal with more characters, just think it was a mistake to start off that strong.
Now that’s what it is doing wrong. Here are the things I think it’s doing right.
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Insanely good effects and CGI, especially so for CW.
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Strong main characters!
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Very interesting so far. They kick off the “oh my god, what’s going on?!” stuff very early, and they do that very well in my opinion. Not as good as OG 4400, but still really good.
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Good pacing for the story itself (this depends on my earlier complaint though; they need to bring down how many characters get screen time per episode. It’s okay to have secondary and even third(ary? lol) characters to help support the main cast)
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Good sound effects + good ambient soundtrack
This is all for episode 1 though. I don’t generally judge and leave a show until EP3-4, so I’ll watch EP2 tomorrow. Hopefully it addresses some of these issues.
Also…I really like Isaah! I think that’s how you spell it? Whatever! lol I’m tired as hell. xD
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Well, this just reminded me of how impressive and absolutely gorgeous the Skyrim soundtrack is. Jeremy Soule outdid himself and created a master piece that will go down in video game history as the best or among the best ever created.
EDIT
Just binged Arcane. I didn’t think I’d like it, because of League of Legends, but it has been great so far. I’m hooked on the two main characters and how beautiful the animation is. Almost makes me want to play LoL but I know the show and game are nothing alike. lol
some spoilers
Powder specifically is a very engaging character. The way they wrote her has been top notch. I like Vi too, don’t get me wrong, but Powder feels more like an alive character. She’s also got a pretty sad life. 
Also, it has a KICKING theme song.
EDIT
Just watched Wheel of Time’s first 3 episodes.
I’m so crushed by how bad this show is. And by bad I don’t mean production quality is garbage or the actors can’t act, I mean it’s nothing like the books. You may think I’m exaggerating, but I promise you, out of 3 episodes there was literally only 1 scene they took from the book and it heavily edited. You might think “well that’s not so bad!” but I haven’t even mentioned that they changed all of the lore and settings.
I wish the show had never been made. I feel like I was spat on and I’m not even the author…
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Thanks for the heads up… I think I will just skip it altogether. It’s too bad they had to do this, might as well give it a different name/setting and keep it separate from TWoT completely.
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What is the point of adapting an existing work if you’re not going to use it?
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They should have, with what they did. The worst part was that the show creators kept lying to people and saying it was “faithful”. The most crucial element of the story’s lore was broken within 1 minute of EP1.
The creators incorrectly believed the original was “sexist” and “not inclusive”, I guess. If you read their commentary on it, it “works better” this way. 
They should have just said this was very loosely based on Wheel of Time, or borrowed from its roots.
It’s like the Foundation show. It’s almost completely different from Asimov’s books. Gender swapped stuff, characters completely removed/altered or given new purposes etc etc. Loosely based on Foundation, but not Foundation.
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Well I suppose it was, men able to channel were systematically and ruthlessly hunted down and killed. I mean for a decent reason but still, the whole setting has a built in “guilt by association” thing going on. You might say it portrays male power as inherently tainted by evil. It’s an interesting set up though and as a result you have a world spanning organization run by and for women that meddles in everything, wherever there’s power to be had an Aes’sedai will be pulling the strings.
Then you have the Aiel where men and women are pretty equal as far as we can glean from the books, except for the part where only women are allowed to own property for some reason, I don’t remember it if there was one. Though I think there was something about men having multiple wives but not the other way around. So there’s some give and take there.
Overall though, most who complain about sexism tends to do so on a female basis, I don’t feel like they have a very strong leg to stand on here.
Oh and the sea people, I don’t remember much about them but they hold women in very high regard as “sea singers” or something. Basically because they can channel and control the weather and winds.
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Spoilers
I don’t think imposing actual issues into the story is a problem, to be honest. To talk of issues doesn’t indicate the condonement of said issues. For example, the treatment of male channelers is not indicating that men should be treated as if all guilty, it’s just the “natural ramifications” (which is not to say the right or natural way is sexism, just that its a blight humanity creeps too all of the time) of a society to act on. As we have seen time and time again even in our own history. Societies tend to have these ugly factors about them. It’s not a good thing. It’s a bad thing, but one thing the Aes Sedai do because they feel there is no other course available to them and to not do so would mean the literal destruction of the world. Well, except for the Red Ajah, they do simply hate men to their core. It’s about the lesser evil–Gentle them now or let the world burn.
It’s like the slavery of Aes Sedai in the books. It happens, but it’s not Robert’s attempts to say it’s okay. The complexities of the book is in how its not all that different from our own history, in how we treated each other. The “book experts” they consulted for the show clearly did not read the books or care for the nuances of its meaning.
That doesn’t even begin to beg the question…what is there to fear of the Dragon if it can be a woman, whom cannot touch a tainted source and go mad? If they get a dude, keep killing him until he pops back up as a woman. But see, this doesn’t only break the lore in that there’s no reason for the Dragon to be feared, but it also breaks reincarnation–which is HUGE in The Wheel of Time.
It’s a comedy show, is what it is, but it will appeal to idiots who only find interest in modernized society reforms in all kinds of media because they incorrectly because the lack of indicates the support of.
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Oh man, they fucked it up THAT bad? Talk about not understanding or even caring slightly about the source material. You also make a great point about media touching tough subjects does not mean they condone those subjects, even if they’re not explicitly disavowed. You can have a world be harsh and shitty without having anyone having to directly mention that that’s a bad thing, or even try to change it. Our contemporary culture is really weak minded about these sort of things and it’s a shame because it makes it really hard to tell good stories about complicated matters.
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Well I am not going to waste my time on it either. When CNet calls it “an inoffensive TV adaption”, I will take a pass.
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I’ve given up on it. It is so shameful what they have done. I’ve lost all interest, and I’m obsessed with the books. Obsessed. That’s how much of a failure it is.
At least Arcane was phenomenal all the way to the end, distracted me for a while on how disappointed I am over Wheel of Time. 
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Yeah, Arcane was a great surprise.
I don’t believe it to be flawless masterpiece some make it out to be but it’s super good and very enjoyable. Just be warned - age rating is there for a reason.
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Arcane post
I thought it pretty much touched masterpiece levels. What they achieved with the characters and the sheer amount of depth and care they took with them is extraordinarily rare in television, let alone a show based on a video game that hasn’t exactly put down a game (before Arcane) dedicated to straight up story and character building. It also had beautiful animation and incredible acting, and an absolutely slapping soundtrack throughout the entire act.
If this doesn’t touch masterpiece levels, it’s the closest you can get that’s rarely achieved by other content.
Anyhow…got that soundtrack burned into my brain. I’m pretty sure they just secured a die hard fan in me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_fB0IMbq54
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5tSoaJ93ac
EDIT
Watched the Hawkeye series. They did a good job at making the musical really embarrassing and cringey. lol
Gonna start the new season of Hanna now. Hopefully it gets better. 
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I’m watching all the Marvel series to prepare myself for Spider-Man: No Way Home, since it’s gonna talk about multiverse and be a “bridge” of sorts between WandaVision and Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness.
Yesterday I completed the aforementioned show, which was nice and interesting. Now I’ll watch Falcon and The Winter Soldier and then Loki will be the next to the list.
I’m also planning to watch Arcane and the movie Tick Tick Boom.
As for music I’m enjoying these albums:
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East coast > west coast ANY day. I could listen to Wu-Tang Clan ALL day. Extreme lyrical genius and talent.
I hope you love it as much as I dooooooooooooooooo. 
I have shamelessly watched it a few times over. ahaha
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I look forward to it. It’s gonna be an interesting experience for sure. 
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I’ve watched The Event recently. It was pretty good, Syfy sure knows when they have a quality show on their hands, how else would they so consistently cancel them?
We got one season out of a show that set up at least 3 seasons worth of interesting ideas and world building. So the end is of course not what you’d want it to be, but everything leading up to it is really well done. Not that the ending is bad, there’s just so much more to the story waiting to be told.
It’s pretty much a spy thriller and political drama with a soft science fiction backdrop, focusing heavily on characters. While the first episode is kind of a mess, it tries to set up a lot of the things going on through heavy use of flashbacks within flashbacks, the show and the writing finds it’s footing pretty quick after that.
The one aspect I found most interesting about the writing is how while the different sides and characters struggle against each other to achieve their goals there’s almost never a clear winner or loser. In every encounter everyone comes out of it a little bit worse than they hoped, but having achieved something that moves the story along.
I found it rather engaging and interesting through out, there’s certainly a lot of worse shows out there you could spend your time on.
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Eddie singing. Because he can do anything.
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