recent watching
Guardian
Which I've already talked about a lot, but hey, how often do you find an amazingly tropey sf/crime drama that's this much fun and also has a delightful active fandom on DW? This is basically a long casefic-type slashfic that got filmed in its entirety and then had all the actual sex and kissing deleted but everything else kept in. Especially the h/c, you've never seen anything like this show for long, long, delightful h/c sequences and more protectiveness than you can shake a stick at. Tearjerker ending, subtitles much more painful than Nirvana in Fire, but well worth it. Oh, and the leads are beautiful. Also watching it is expanding my knowledge of Chinese, which is currently very un-useful due to NiF: I know lots of phrases like 'yes, your highness' and 'princess' and 'the emperor is leaving' and 'KILL! KILL! KILL!' but a bit less on the 'thank you' and what you say when you answer a phone.
Gentleman Jack
Only watched the first three episodes so far but I am absolutely delighted with it and I so, so, so need Anne's coat. I love all the shots of her striding around Yorkshire in it so much, and I love everything about her really and she can break all the hearts she likes as far as I'm concerned. Also I really like how Marion is shown: we see that she's annoying Anne, but at the same time, she's definitely a person of her own with her own opinions and abilities.
Crazy Rich Asians
Good popcorn fun, and the chemistry between Rachel and Eleanor was fantastic. The romance between Rachel and Nick was okay, but come on, Rachel only accepts Nick's proposal when he uses Eleanor's ring, and all the most interesting scenes in the film involved Eleanor. I was very pleased when I looked at the tiny fandom and saw it shared my opinion on this. The mahjong scene was amazing too.
The Favourite
I was surprised by how much I liked this. It seemed like it was going to go off into the cringe/gross side of comic, but it didn't, and instead it was fantastic, a bit surreal, but somehow felt more like real period life than your average period drama. Also I am so in love with the Duchess of Marlborough that I don't even know how to describe it. If I was Anne I'd let her do whatever the hell she wanted too. The scene where she shot Abigail! Mostly, though, I loved seeing women having recognisable-to-me emotions all over the place, and a story in which men were entirely painted and frilly accessories to a complex and fierce emotional three-way tug-of-war between women.
Smiley's People
A 80s tv drama that I saw on a list of really good TV. I am not convinced, and by not convinced I mean the pace was so leisurely that I struggled to stay awake and had no idea what was happening at any point during the story. Admittedly this is my usual response to Le Carre; I never can make head or tail of any of the plots he writes even when they get filtered through a scriptwriter first, I had the same reaction to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and while I've read a lot of his books I don't understand any of them. I guess it's a testament to the fact that he does something right that I keep reading them anyway. I did sort of understand The Constant Gardener, I guess? Anyway, the show was very atmospheric and Smiley was fantastic and I really enjoyed the scene at the end when he breaks the Russian diplomat, but I spent the vast majority of the time wondering what was going on and why.
Also I have just finished a slow rewatch of Nirvana in Fire, this time with my husband, and he has never, ever, ever done this before, but as soon as we got to the end he said we had to watch it again so we're now back on episode 2.
Crossposted at https://philomytha.dreamwidth.org/163415.html. There are
comments there.
Which I've already talked about a lot, but hey, how often do you find an amazingly tropey sf/crime drama that's this much fun and also has a delightful active fandom on DW? This is basically a long casefic-type slashfic that got filmed in its entirety and then had all the actual sex and kissing deleted but everything else kept in. Especially the h/c, you've never seen anything like this show for long, long, delightful h/c sequences and more protectiveness than you can shake a stick at. Tearjerker ending, subtitles much more painful than Nirvana in Fire, but well worth it. Oh, and the leads are beautiful. Also watching it is expanding my knowledge of Chinese, which is currently very un-useful due to NiF: I know lots of phrases like 'yes, your highness' and 'princess' and 'the emperor is leaving' and 'KILL! KILL! KILL!' but a bit less on the 'thank you' and what you say when you answer a phone.
Gentleman Jack
Only watched the first three episodes so far but I am absolutely delighted with it and I so, so, so need Anne's coat. I love all the shots of her striding around Yorkshire in it so much, and I love everything about her really and she can break all the hearts she likes as far as I'm concerned. Also I really like how Marion is shown: we see that she's annoying Anne, but at the same time, she's definitely a person of her own with her own opinions and abilities.
Crazy Rich Asians
Good popcorn fun, and the chemistry between Rachel and Eleanor was fantastic. The romance between Rachel and Nick was okay, but come on, Rachel only accepts Nick's proposal when he uses Eleanor's ring, and all the most interesting scenes in the film involved Eleanor. I was very pleased when I looked at the tiny fandom and saw it shared my opinion on this. The mahjong scene was amazing too.
The Favourite
I was surprised by how much I liked this. It seemed like it was going to go off into the cringe/gross side of comic, but it didn't, and instead it was fantastic, a bit surreal, but somehow felt more like real period life than your average period drama. Also I am so in love with the Duchess of Marlborough that I don't even know how to describe it. If I was Anne I'd let her do whatever the hell she wanted too. The scene where she shot Abigail! Mostly, though, I loved seeing women having recognisable-to-me emotions all over the place, and a story in which men were entirely painted and frilly accessories to a complex and fierce emotional three-way tug-of-war between women.
Smiley's People
A 80s tv drama that I saw on a list of really good TV. I am not convinced, and by not convinced I mean the pace was so leisurely that I struggled to stay awake and had no idea what was happening at any point during the story. Admittedly this is my usual response to Le Carre; I never can make head or tail of any of the plots he writes even when they get filtered through a scriptwriter first, I had the same reaction to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and while I've read a lot of his books I don't understand any of them. I guess it's a testament to the fact that he does something right that I keep reading them anyway. I did sort of understand The Constant Gardener, I guess? Anyway, the show was very atmospheric and Smiley was fantastic and I really enjoyed the scene at the end when he breaks the Russian diplomat, but I spent the vast majority of the time wondering what was going on and why.
Also I have just finished a slow rewatch of Nirvana in Fire, this time with my husband, and he has never, ever, ever done this before, but as soon as we got to the end he said we had to watch it again so we're now back on episode 2.
Crossposted at https://philomytha.dreamwidth.org/163415.html. There are