tv_talk | Speak Up Saturday

Let me just start by saying that Catherine O'Hara's death really shocked me. She was just in The Studio. 71 seems too young nowadays :(

I didn't get around to much last week, but I did manage to watch Agatha Christie's Seven Dials. I didn't know anything about the story going in, so the solution was good and kind of a surprise. Usually I'm all for novels getting adapted as mini-series. Seven Dials could have been a movie. It was pretty slow at times and I feel like some things could have been cut/condensed. Other than that, I liked it. The cast is great. Edward Bluemel is in which now gives me the urge to watch People We Meet on Vacation. If I can't have more of My Lady Jane, I at least can see both of them again. Funny that they both have Netflix productions released around the same time.

Apparently I wasn't completely done. I watched One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5 last week. I think I've seen more about this than the actual finale online, nearly all of it negative. I went in with an open mind, but there is definitely something off about the Duffers and how they work? The scripts were not finished, but everyone kind had to work around them (sets, costumes etc.). You are the ones responsible for this super expensive operation and you don't do your job? Honestly, some of the crew, especially the ones building the huge sets didn't seem too happy. The ending was very emotional, but a lot of moments in this documentary seemed strained on account of the Duffers not doing their job properly.
For playing a fan favorite, Joe Keery was kind of a non-factor in this making of. The focus wasn't on the actors in general, but it was noticeable that he was barely in it.
At the end, when they show the big emotional series wrap for the younger cast and whole crew, only Natalia and Charlie are on camera from the older cast who had wrapped shooting previously. Obviously it's possible that the others (well, Maya and Joe, but also David and Winona) were somewhere in this huge group, but I feel like they would have put them all together. It's not like shooting this making of was purely coincidental...

I'm two episodes behind on Fallout. Wonder Man was released and I heard about it the day before. Apart from some gifs posted by a general MCU tumblr account I follow, I haven't heard anything about it.

I was startled by it as well. Another SCTV alum gone 😕

I also watched all of Seven Dials, even though I almost didn't because I've been so fed up with recent adaptations. However I thought they did well with it, because the book itself isn't one of her top ones.

I'm only halfway through the One Last Adventure so I haven't noticed it that much, but I also watched the making of the stage play this week. Wow, did that go through so many changes, right up until the first public (not preview) show! Some was because they had overly ambitious ideas of what they could do on stage, but an awful lot of it was rewrites. This was surprising given that it had been workshopped for a considerable time. But they felt it wasn't grabbing audiences enough so it wasn't until the previews that they made a lot of changes to the storyline, mostly cutting but also some adding.

I also have heard nothing about Wonder Man until Disney+ popped the trailer on me.

I skipped the making of The First Shadow since it seems unlikely that I'll ever watch it. But what you're saying does not surprise me.

We're still watching Barry, and it is shock-funny, but everyone is pretty awful and the murders are starting to get to me, so we're looking around for something else.

Keeping up with The Pitt, which is much better (people trying to help people \o/!), but one episode a week is not enough.

Rewatching season 2 of We Are Lady Parts -- this is an amazing show. I love them all so much!

Watched half of Better Man, the Robbie Williams biopic where he's an ape. And watched the first episode of Hacks, which it's too soon to tell if we'll keep going. Also, we're planning to try Bones now it's on Netflix.

In Kdramas, I finished Can This Love Be Translated?, which I enjoyed very much until the final episode left me going, "What? WHAAAT???" at the screen a lot. I mean, Kdramas are almost always off the wall, but this felt out-of-nowhere shark-jumpy to me. And I just started Beyond the Bar on my brother's recommendation.

I found Hacks kind of difficult to stay with in parts of S1 and S2. However the seasons always have really strong finishes. I found I really liked it by S3.

That's good to know about the season finishes. (I'm easily put off, so you saying you found it hard to stick with means we've changed focus to a couple of other shows, heh. But we might still get back to Hacks, idk. :-)

Oof yes I both love that the Pitt is spacing out episodes and also am being driven crazy by it 😂 I need to know what happens next!

Also, love We Are Lady Parts, I should rewatch that sometime soon ❤️

I need to know what happens next!

Yes! I think it's a show that really benefits from momentum. *drums fingers impatiently, lol*

Also, love We Are Lady Parts, I should rewatch that sometime soon ❤️

It definitely stands up to repeat viewings! So good!

Oh I didn't know The Pitt was only one a week, that is good! I have not had time to start it yet, maybe I'll manage before it's completely done.

Edited (typo) 2026-02-02 20:51 (UTC)

I understand why the service wants to space the episodes out, but I feel like as a show it benefits from being watched closer together. Anyway. Whenever you get to it, hope you enjoy! :-)

A whole lot of new stuff this week. Even Jeopardy added one of the past champion runs sometime in the last two weeks, so I've been watching that as well as the current tournament.

Finished the prior season of Bridgerton and will get into the new one soon. Finished both seasons of The Empress, which is an interesting historical piece I'd heard nothing about prior. Also watched House of Guinness, which had more of a political angle than I expected.

Saw all of The Residence, which I enjoyed, though there were some gaps there I may post about in coming weeks. Saw a bit more of S3 of The Diplomat and am on a season of Great British Baking Show (2 seasons back?) It made me wonder about whether they're using gas ovens and were having leaks with all of the lightheadedness going around.

Watched Thursday Murder Club and thought it could have been a TV series, but I thought they cut things down effectively for a movie runtime. Great cast.

Caught up on all the recent Great British Baking Show Holidays. Particularly enjoyed the all-Scottish show. Cows and horns!

Saw the season of Untamed and was somewhat tipped off about the solution due to casting choices. It did make me wonder if Eric Bana will be back for the next season or they'll be doing more of a True Detective.

Started S2 of Wednesday and it's not grabbing me. I'm hanging in there on Bodkin as my partner's enjoying it, but it's picking up halfway through.

Also started Discovery of Witches and will probably see the whole thing, but it is such blatant wish fulfillment fantasies for teenage girls. There's some interesting world building there with the political angles of the covenant but some of it just makes me roll my eyes.

The real delight this week has been Man on the Inside, which we're several episodes into now. It's been fun. We also started Death by Lightning which is rather sad viewing given what we know, but the political scene of the time is also interesting to learn about.

Thursday Murder Club would have worked well as a mini-series. I feel like with such a famous cast, it'll be a while before we get a second movie if that will happen. I have no idea how the chances are.

A Discovery of Witches is not exactly good, but it grabbed me right from the first episode. Without the chemistry between Matthew Goode and Teresa Palmer, it would have been just plain bad though.

"wish fulfillment fantasies for teenage girls"
Sounds pretty accurate lol

That's a good point about the cast.

You're not wrong, they definitely cast well for the chemistry, and it adds a lot to the show.

Watched Bridgerton S4. It's the controversial one - of the books, hence the reason they delayed it. Why? It's revealed at the end of the last episode of Part I. Part II drops towards the end of February. They are doing the Cinderella trope.

Also watched first episode of The Pitt S2 - which is excellent.

Still watching Buffy and Angel, now on S7 of Buffy (which is better than I remembered) and S4 of Angel (which is good except for the Cordy/Connor arc, which is worse than I remembered).

Fell asleep watching Spectra - James Bond film.

oh noes, i didn't know the second half of Bridgerton already drops at the end of February. Dang. That probably means I won't have a breather between the parts.

They are doing the Cinderella trope.

Well, what else are they supposed to do, the whole book is a Cinderella retelling.

Although if that's not what you wanted to say: I have only seen ep 1 so far, so I don't know what they might have changed. I might be off the mark here. I'm just hoping the other things they add will distract from the terrible book plot. They managed fine so far in previous seasons.

They've not changed the book - per the folks online who've seen all of part I, and read the book? It's actually among the closest to the books. [I have not read any of the books - so wouldn't know? But apparently the only difference so far - is he didn't meet Sophie two years ago at the Masquerade Ball. The Masquerade Ball is in this season, not Season 1. (Which is an interesting choice on the part of the writers - you'd think if they were writing a "series" - they'd have the ball in S1, and have a couple years pass in between like what happens in the books? But they probably chose not to do that - for a couple of reasons, it's actually two-three years in between seasons of the series (the audience would have forgotten about it, even if Benedict hadn't), and they didn't know how many seasons they'd get.

At any rate, from all reports? Yes, they are doing the whole Cinderella trope thing. Not my favorite trope, but a lot of folks appear to love it? And Part 1 was enjoyable for the most part - even if I kept plotting the deaths of Sophie Peck's Stepmother and step-sisters, also possibly Hycianthe, who was getting on my nerves. (My problem with the Cinderella trope is I can't abide bullies - and the Stepmother is a bully. I have enough bullies in real life - I'd like to avoid them as much as possible in fiction or at the very least watch them killed horribly.)

Oh, the actress who plays the Stepmother, Lady A, is played by the same actress who played Harry Potter's love interest pre-Ginny in Goblet of Fire, all grown up. So if you find her familiar? That's why.

***

Considering it ends on a cliff-hanger? You probably won't want the breather. I didn't.

When do you plan on watching it? Part II drops around February 29. Part I dropped this past weekend.

Edited 2026-02-03 03:08 (UTC)

the audience would have forgotten about it, even if Benedict hadn't

Very likely, yes. :D

also possibly Hycianthe, who was getting on my nerves

Omg yes. :D I love Eloise, and she is just constantly the butt of Hyacinthe's jokes / put opposite her to grumble, and it's getting a bit tedious.

(That I want to kill Sophie's stepmother and sister is a given.)

the same actress who played Harry Potter's love interest pre-Ginny in Goblet of Fire, all grown up. So if you find her familiar? That's why.

Nope, I have no memory of her. :D

When do you plan on watching it? Part II drops around February 29. Part I dropped this past weekend.

We were planning on watching it one ep a week, and actually did manage to watch ep 3 today (after being too ill both Thursday and Saturday, which are our usual watchalong days). So one more ep to go, and not much of a break before the second half, that sounds good.

I am not actually very into this season (as opposed to the previous 3, which I all loved), but it may be because I like neither Benedict nor the Cinderella trope, or it might be because I'm still not feeling 100%, or it might be because watching it with a watchalong creates distance? Idk.

Didn't watch a ton of TV this week bc Queerbait Club was canceled this week (too many folks had conflicts) and I've just been otherwise busy but did watch a couple of things:

1. Pluribus — watched the finale with my parents on Friday! Was not my first time seeing it, but I love to rewatch things and it was great to watch it with them. Seriously fantastic show and I will be waiting with bated breath for the next probably 2-3 years for S2 😂

2. The Pitt — my qpp and I watched the new episode last night! I'm really liking S2 but it's definitely a different experience watching it as it comes out, vs I didn't get around to S1 until well after it was out and watched the whole season over the span of 2 days 😅 I like that streaming services are releasing shows on a weekly basis more often lately rather than dropping whole seasons at once, I think it creates a fun, spread out community experience in fandom spaces that I missed, but man I am also dying for more! Not enough that I'd want them to go back to dropping all at once, mind you, but still, haha. And The Pitt is so tense! Can't wait for next week's episode.

3. She-Ra: Princesses of Power — this has been my latest branch out wrt: my Spanish comprehensible input! I've mostly been sticking to content created for learners and the one non-learner thing I've watched so far, is the Lat-Am dub of Avatar: the Last Airbender, which was really fun. After rewatching it a couple weeks ago and seeing that I've made progress in my comprehension since I last did a watch, I decided to try the Lat-Am dub of She-Ra. It is... definitely a little beyond my current level, mainly because they talk SO fast! But it's still fun to watch even if I'm not catching everything. I watched it all in English when it first came out, so even if I can't always keep up with what specifically is being said, I know enough that I can still follow what's happening and it's a good time. I really struggle with ambiguity tolerance so it's kind of a fun exercise for that too — trying to let go and be okay with not catching every single thing. I think my inability to be okay with that in the past has kind of stunted my progress wrt my Spanish study, so I'm hoping this will help in that regard ❤️

So interesting to hear about your use of the shows to train yourself in Spanish! It's quite fun to hear a familiar show in another language. I did that during a limited Buffy rewatch.

Because I always use captions when watching a show, I've also sometimes noticed distinct differences between what is being said and what is being written when it's a show originally in Spanish (Money Heist and La Otra Mirada, for example). I noticed it in Buffy as well, because there were a lot of phrases in English that were modified.

I watched The Company and The Cross-dressed Union and Love on the Turquoise Land (all cdramas). Plus a very good Chinese movie called Upcoming Summer, and the first ep of Bridgerton s4.

I'm a bit behind on everything now so I'll just link you to my Fannish January post here, where I go into detail about what I watched:

https://tinny.dreamwidth.org/802848.html

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