What I watched: Holby Blue, a mediocre two-season “spin off from Holby City (1999) and Casualty (1986), taking place in and around Holby South police station and focusing on the police who work with the doctors and paramedics from Holby City and Casualty.” The lead character is a miserable SOB who doesn’t deserve his lovely wife, the one nice guy’s arc ends in tragedy, and in general I do not think the show has much to recommend it, aside from being filler or background noise.
Season One Clip:
What I read: The Untold Story (The Invisible Library Novel Book 8) by Genevieve Cogman, a seriously excellent end to the series, or jumping off point for another range of stories. The blurb from the first book says “Irene is a professional spy for the mysterious Library, which harvests fiction from different realities. And along with her enigmatic assistant Kai, she’s posted to an alternative London. Their mission – to retrieve a dangerous book. But when they arrive, it’s already been stolen. London’s underground factions seem prepared to fight to the very death to find her book.” There are dragons, fae, multiverses, and more – the entire series is engaging.
I also binged A. S. Fenichel’s four book demon hunter series (with a fifth book due out on Tuesday). Regency society meets slayer styled action, what’s not to like? Here is the blurb from book four, Defiance, “Tad Douglass is furious his fiancée has enrolled in the Demon Hunters’ school. Admittedly, he should have been more attentive after her capture by demons, but important Hunter business demanded his presence. Now, he’s forced to watch her transformation from an innocent young woman to a formidable Hunter. He’ll use every resource at his disposal to change her mind and return her to the simple life of a debutante.” Fun stuff!
What I listened to this week: The Districts – Outlaw Love; So Kindly – Send Me a Sign; and Black Sea Dahu – Glue.
So, dearest, darling DeadSplinterites, how are you doing? What have you watched, read, or listened to? Please check in, tell us how you are, and share what you are up to! (As for me, although double vaxxed and boosted, I am still feeling covidtastic, sigh.)
Have you read Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next books? I think you would really like them. The first one is called The Eyre Affair – if I remember correctly.
My dad – who lives with us – tested positive for covid( he kept saying he had a cold – we kept telling him it was covid) but the rest of us tested negative – which I find very strange. Dad is fine – had a mild fever, sore throat and and runny nose for a few days. He’s vaxed and boosted.
Thank you to whoever recommended Station Eleven a couple of weeks ago – I’m too lazy to go back through posts. It is excellent.
…I’d second that recommendation…the thursday next books are an absolute delight…but I’d also throw in a good word for the “nursery crime” ones…of which I believe there are two
…the big over easy being about humpty dumpty’s demise…& the fourth bear being probably my favorite interpretation of the goldilocks story…they’re set in the same world as the thursday next stuff but aren’t part of that series in a narrative sense
I only read The Eyre Affair but it was huge fun. I meant to read more but somehow never followed up.
I saw The Green Knight which I loved. It’s not a conventional swords and sorcery movie.
In some ways it’s a very modern take — Sir Gawain is played by Dev Patel and his mother by Sarita Choudhury, and the imagery is very cinematic. But in other ways it’s very anti-modern, treating medieval morals as real, nonironic matters and following the beats of old storytelling.
I read Sir Gawain and the Green Knight a long time ago, and the movie is pretty faithful to the plot. I think it probably helps to have read it, because the original is pretty odd by modern standards and it doesn’t necessarily make sense the way a modern story does.
Iris Murdoch, RIP, had her own take on The Green Knight. I am a big Murdoch fan so I really enjoyed the book, but she isn’t for everybody. After the book first came out I happened to be flying alone to the West Coast, retrieved it to make the flight pass, but my seatmate noticed it. What ensured was a SIX HOUR colloquium on The Works of Iris Murdoch. We kept our voices down but even still I hope those immediately around brought their portable CD players and/or enjoyed the in-flight movie, unless of course they wanted to listen in on this informative sharing of insights.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Green_Knight_(novel)
I want to see this, I’ve read a lot of the Arthurian legend books, and heard it was great.
that’s one I wanted to see, but missed the brief window it was in theaters due to the rising cases of Delta-Covid.
And, now I’m still avoiding the theater due to Omicrom-Covid.
fuckin plague rats…
@Lymond and @SplinterRIP thank you for the Jasper Fford suggestions. I added both the Eyre and the Humpty to my Kindle. After cooking ahead for the week I will be exhausted, and a good book or two will be much appreciated. Even vaccinated covid is a bear.
…hope you enjoy them as much as I did…& that you feel better as soon as is humanly possible
Hope you feel better Ellie! Hopefully, The Eyre Affair will take your mind off being sick.
I read the first couple of Thursday Next books and agree. I think you’ll enjoy them. Feel better.
Take care of yourself and take it easy. Best wishes for the recovery.
Watched: Mrs. Butcher got season 4 of The Crown for Christmas so we’ve been watching that. It’s actually pretty sad to watch this season, knowing how things will turn out for Diana. I keep feeling like screaming at the TV “turn back! It’s not too late!”
Read: Mrs. Butcher got me a couple of gardening books so I’ve been going through those. One is called Homegrown Pantry by Barbara Pleasant and the other is The Vegetable Gardner’s Bible by Edward C. Smith. Both are very readable and have lots of good information that I plan to put into use this year.
Listened: The latest stop on my trip through the greatest engineered albums of all time brings me to another Beatles album – Abbey Road. Some fun facts: this was the first Beatles album to be recorded on an 8-track machine with a solid state recording console and the first one to be released in stereo. Alan Parsons was an assistant engineer on this album (and also on Let It Be–you can see him a few times if you watch the Hulu series). Alan was later the lead engineer on The Dark Side of the Moon, so he clearly had chops. Also, regarding the song posted here, the former president of Apple Record’s US division related this story about a conversation he had with John:
“‘Hold you in his arms you can feel his disease.’ What does that mean?”
“Nothing, I just made it up.”
John went on to explain that he and Paul were getting tired of wracking their brains to write lyrics only to realize that almost nobody got the meaning they were trying to convey. So, they just stopped bothering and went about writing lyrics that just sounded good to them. Then, if someone offered an interpretation that they liked, they would say, “yeah, that’s what it’s about.”
i watched da 5 bloods
it has quite a lot to say about many things…its a little messy in places but i liked it
the trailer makes it look like its just another nam flick tho..doesnt really do it justice
and listening…..eh…i think i posted enough last night to skip that one for now
get well soon ellie
I saw this awhile back but only remember it getting ugly at the end. May have to rewatch.
I watched Encanto. Gabriel Garcia Marquez is one of my favorite writers, I’ve read a good deal of his work so I know a bit about Columbia and it’s violent history. I like how the movie references it without defining the Colombian people by it. I was also impressed by the way they approached the magical elements. Magic is a big part of Colombian culture, Garcia Marquez rejected the label of Magic Realism saying everything he wrote was rooted in the truth. Or something like that, I’m too lazy to look up the exact quote. Anyway, it was a very Colombian kind of magic, nothing Harry Potter about it. The movie was also a nod to One Hundred Years of Solitude, Garcia Marquez‘a best known book. The animation is amazing, but the music was slightly disappointing to me. There are only two songs I loved. The rest may grow on though if I rewatch it.
Ooh I want to see that!
I read Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi. It was the best written YA novel that I’ve read in a long time. I can’t do it justice by summing it up in my own words but I’ll try: It’s about a world where magic was real but only some of the population was born with it. Those with magic lived by Utopic principles and strove to better all of society. Eventually those in power became corrupt. Then the regular people warred against them, eliminated magic, and stripped the previously magical population of their culture, language, and rights. Many of them were enslaved. And this is where the story begins.
Thanks for the Reservation Dogs recommendation DS. I loved everything about it.
Of course I watched some action movies to report back on. Venom was just so-so. The back and forth between Brock and Venom wasn’t as funny this time. The real disappoinment was that Carnage did not live up to his name… possibly for PG-13 reasons?
Copshop was a decent effort for a talkie-shootie movie. Frank Grillo is officially on my “will watch anything he’s in” list. I’m glad to have him there since Bruce Willis knocked himself off that list years ago. I’m tired of being suckered into watching a BW movie only to find out that all he provides is a half-assed cameo. Then again, he lost mojo (decades ago) and I don’t think I want to watch a whole movie starring him. But that leaves me somewhat torn about Reprisal, in which they both star. Has anyone watched it? Do they cancel eachother out? Or can I count on BW having a small roll and FG being the real star of the show?
…hmmm…thought I’d seen venom but now I’m finding I don’t seem to remember it…not sure if that says something about me or the movie?
…will keep an eye out for the other two, though…thank you kindly
To clarify, I watched Venom: Let There Be Carnage which is the sequel. I also know that I watched the first one but remember nothing of it other than that the dynamic between the host and symbiote was funny…and maybe that is a false memory since they are barely entertaining this time around. Plot-wise you don’t need to see/remember the first movie in order to understand what’s going on in the second one.
…yeah…aside from knowing tom hardy was in it I figured out basically everything I thought I remembered was actually from comics…in which the carnage stuff went somewhere kind of interesting as I recall…so I’ll probably check it out at some point (the sequel, that is) but will keep my expectations in check
Oh shit. Don’t watch the Copshop trailer. It reveals too much. Sorry, I posted it without watching first.
Thanks to everyone for the get well soon wishes. I am isolated normally because I’ve worked for a totally remote company for 10 years; the pandemic has exacerbated the isolation. This caring DS community of smart, supportive, and wickedly funny people means the world to me.
I need some new BritBox or AcornTV British cop shows. I’ve watched all the obvious ones, and we’ve run out. Better still if they are Scottish, Welsh, or Australian because I dig the accents. Nothing to frothy, like Father Brown or Death in Paradise please. My favorites are the detective in remote places who can’t keep their private lives together but still manage to solve crimes. Crime, Shetland, McCallum, Jack Irish, like that.
a touch of frost is good..if you havent already seent it
tho hes not in a remote place
A Touch of Frost looks good. And, there’s 15 seasons, which should keep us busy through the weekend.
…not sure about the messy private life part but there’s one called vera that’s not bad?
…I wasn’t a big fan of the fall but many were…so you might have done that one already…broadchurch if it’s on there might fit the bill…david tennant, olivia coleman & jodie whittaker is a hell of a cast, anyway…or the old school touch of frost with david jason…or rebus (think there’s some of that on there?)
…apparently line of duty is a big deal but I’ve never started it…& another older one (if not as old as frost) is silent witness…although that’s more of a pathologist than a detective in terms of the lead
…if you’ve seen all those already I might be able to think of others but that’s all the ones off the top of my head?
[P.S. …I hadn’t seen farscy’s suggestion when I started typing…he’s right, though]
Watched Vera and Line of Duty.
Have you seen Happy Valley?
Has anyone mentioned The Cleaner around these parts?
Got into it this weekend and it’s pretty funny actually.
This looks good!
Greg Davies, David Mitchell, and Helena Bonham Carter? Yes, please.
@Luigi Vuoto
Britbox:
Bancroft, Blue Murder, DCI Banks, Dark Heart, McDonald & Dobbs, Midwinter of the Spirit, New Tricks, The Tower, Thorne: Scaredy Cat & Sleepyhead, and Whitechapel.
Acorn TV:
Dalgliesh, Bloodlands, Manhunt, Hinterland, Hidden, One Lane Bridge, Loch Ness, London Kills, Wire in the Blood, Suspects, The Code, Winter, Whitstable Pearl,
Screenshotting for later
Recently finished Lies Sleeping by Ben Aaronovitch. I appreciate how he’s bringing the series together with the past couple books. I should go request the next one from the library…
Finally finished that dumb computer game that was preventing me from watching stuff. Watched the second season of Locke&Key, I Am Not Okay With This, and The Witcher. Also rewatching The Good Place.
I have to find a couple more things on Netflix towatch before I cancel my account and switch to another streaming service. I think there may be a season or two of Wynona Earp that I haven’t seen, so I may rewatch that. and I think there is a season or two of The Magicians that I haven’t seen, but I was kinda loosing interest in that…
I was going to hit up Amoeba records earlier this week, and wrote down a whole list of stuff to look up (and buy, if available), since I’ve only been there like, once since this whole damned COVID thing kicked off. And, Amoeba was closed that day. :/ so nothing new to listen to for me…
I watched The Eyes of Tammy Faye which was the biopic about Tammy Faye Bakker starting Jessica Chastain and Andrew Garfield. It was okay. It’s clearly relying on the audience to not actually remember them on tv. Specifically her sobbing and begging for money for their ministry while wearing fancy jewelry.
I say that because it really paints her as just this sweet oblivious lil lady into Jesus who just wants to save everyone. Who was completely victimized by her horrible husband who *gasp* is secretly into men.
I don’t know, I think there is a lot of nuance they could have had in there between *sure she’s not a horrible human being* and also *don’t act like it wasn’t a giant grifting scheme.*
My pick for book club this month is called Ladypart by Deborah Copaken…
I always feel self conscious about the book choices I make…will they like it? Does everyone hate it?
The first chapter is aggressive, so we’ll see what others thought of it. I like it a lot.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/608181/ladyparts-by-deborah-copaken/
I watched the whole new season of Cobra Kai which was fun and slightly unpredictable. I’m not usually a fan of zombie movies but watched Army of the Dead. Lots of mindless violence as a zombie movie should be?
Been listening to The Professionals
army of the dead started of really good…and then…sorta…fell apart
it was a bit of a let down….imo
Went in with low expectations & was not disappointed.
fair dinkum
i went in with the expectation of a more or less standard zombie flick..then the start of it got me all hyped for something that would be pretty much lock stock and two smoking zombies
and then…it just got wierd and kinda stupid
neither of which are things i have problems with…as i kinda like my entertainment wierd and stupid…but after the opening the rest was a let down for me
Oh, I just remembered:
This morning’s DOT mentioned Kazakhstan, the murderous kleptocracy run for decades by tinpot dictator Nursultan Nazarbayev. A while ago its state TV made a very Soviet propaganda-like film about the glories of this new state called “In the Stirrups of Time.” It guest stars one of Kazakhstan’s most famous admirers, Tony Blair, who pulled in £5.3 million a year as an adviser to the government.
…fun fact about tony blair…there’s a change.org petition suggesting he should have his knighthood revoked…last I heard it had broken the 1 million signatures mark
This week I watched several true crime series on Netflix, mostly foriegn. The Raincoat Killer (Korea), Donde Esta Maria and Murder by the Coast (both Spain), The Motive (Israel), Dig Deeper (Germany), and Athlete A (USA).
I don’t know if you’ll find this comforting or horrifying, but police are inept, corrupt, and infuriating EVERYWHERE. Caring about crime victims puts you in the minority, and women are completely disposable worldwide.