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Kevin Klemme
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Mycelia Board Game Review

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December 12, 2023
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December 07, 2023
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River Wild Board Game Review

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November 30, 2023
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Outback Crossing Review

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What TV SHOWS are you watching?

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12 Mar 2021 10:32 #320460 by jason10mm
Finished up Invisible City (or "Cidade Invisivel" in portugese?) on netflix. Pretty interesting set-up and seems to draw heavily from brazilian folklore, which is WAAAAAY wacky (though Greek, Norse, NA stuff is just as weird when you think about it), assuming it isn't just made up for the show. It is a slow ass burn though with a lot of completely unnecessary "Environmental Police" drama and even with dubbing and subtitles on I feel like a lot of the plot is missing. Not sure if these things get edited when they are brought to the US. Still, only 7-8 eps and it goes by pretty fast.

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12 Mar 2021 14:54 #320495 by Msample

Jackwraith wrote: Since I'm in the middle of reviewing the whole run of Batman: The Animated Series, I can't really watch it casually. So.i figured I'd indulge in another Batman property and started watching Gotham. The full run is on Netflix. I'm up to episode 8 and it's decent so far. I like the portrayal of young Penguin as a more ruthless and devious character and the cast is pretty good, including some Wire veterans, like Rawls. Jim Gordon's Boy Scout routine is a little tedious but I recognize the need for that plot element. It's not gripping but it's interesting enough to keep watching.


GOTHAM started out ostensibly as a Bruce Wayne origin/Jim Gordon origin story but like so many of the Batman movies, the writers realized that the villains were more interesting. Not far into the series they started cramming way too many different guest villains etc into the picture IMO and the series started to groan under their collective weight. Still worth a watch for some of the performances; Penguin is among the standouts as well as Alfred and Gordon's partner, Harvey Bullock.
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12 Mar 2021 15:50 #320504 by the_jake_1973
The relationship between the Riddler and Penguin really stands out to me as one of the better handlings of DC villains.
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16 Mar 2021 07:40 #320671 by mc
Replied by mc on topic What TV SHOWS are you watching?
Space Force - remember hearing about this a year or two back. It's pretty good - nothing you haven't seen before, but has some fun moments. POTUS is unnamed and communicates through text and couldn't possibly be based on anyone (wink). Carrel is doing Carrel but in a gruff military kind of way, John Malkovich is fun as the suffering science guy. the rest of the quirky cast do their thing. Some of the jokes you see coming a mile off but there are also some unexpected ones at times.

Maybe worth a look if you like that offbeat sit com thing.

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16 Mar 2021 11:47 #320690 by Shellhead
After a tense commute home followed by clearing the driveway with a snow blower, I was in the mood for some light humor. So I watched two early episodes of Danger 5: I Danced For Hitler and Lizard Soldiers of the Third Reich. The show is deliberately dumb and has very low budget fx, to campy effect. Despite being set during WW II, the clothes and especially the music make it feel like the show was produced in the early '60s. There is a ludicrous amount of violence, sexual innuendo but no nudity, and the jokes usually land with clumsy timing. Even so, Danger 5 is occasionally funny and maybe worth your time.
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18 Mar 2021 12:10 #320804 by Shellhead
Still enjoying Danger 5. The show is 1/3 recurring gags and 2/3 wildly subverted tropes, but I really like the recurring gags, which include:

1. Somebody dies in Pierre's arms, just after whispering their secret recipe for their favorite cocktail.
2. Hitler escapes certain death by diving through a closed window.
3. A minor character does a quick commercial for a random product just before the end of the episode.
4. Credits roll as the whole cast does happy hour, in costume but out of character, including Hitler.

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18 Mar 2021 23:45 #320841 by RobertB
I just couldn't get into Halt and Catch Fire. I was about six episodes into it, and decided I didn't like anybody except maybe Gordon's wife and King Ezekial's assistant from The Walking Dead. Then they had some Star Trek style tech issue that was bullshit, and at that point I checked out. I guess I have to find something else, because my wife is watching Banshee again, and the boobs and blood don't save it from being the dumbest show on the planet.
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19 Mar 2021 07:08 #320845 by jason10mm
Banshee was ludicrously fantastic. So dumb but it was NEVER boring. Great fights too.
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19 Mar 2021 09:30 - 19 Mar 2021 09:30 #320855 by Jackwraith

RobertB wrote: I just couldn't get into Halt and Catch Fire. I was about six episodes into it, and decided I didn't like anybody except maybe Gordon's wife and King Ezekial's assistant from The Walking Dead. Then they had some Star Trek style tech issue that was bullshit, and at that point I checked out.


You lasted longer than I did. I didn't get past the second episode. I kept pointing out so many problems with basic story structure, to say nothing of the factual basis of how things worked ("Star Trek style tech"), that my girlfriend was getting annoyed. And, yes, most of the characters are extremely unlikeable. I have no idea how it lasted as long as it did, except that many critics probably either don't remember the early 80s or don't have much idea about how anything worked back then.... which still doesn't explain the basic plot problems.
Last edit: 19 Mar 2021 09:30 by Jackwraith.

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19 Mar 2021 09:45 - 19 Mar 2021 09:52 #320857 by Sagrilarus

Shellhead wrote: Still enjoying Danger 5. The show is 1/3 recurring gags and 2/3 wildly subverted tropes, but I really like the recurring gags, which include:

1. Somebody dies in Pierre's arms, just after whispering their secret recipe for their favorite cocktail.
2. Hitler escapes certain death by diving through a closed window.
3. A minor character does a quick commercial for a random product just before the end of the episode.
4. Credits roll as the whole cast does happy hour, in costume but out of character, including Hitler.


Where are you getting Danger 5? I'd love to get back to it. The humor is ludicrous as hell.

I love shows like this from outside the U.S. The leader is a guy with an eagle head, presumably to represent a cliche American. But the magic is that they didn't do a good job with it. If this was an American show they would have CGI'd in some really impressive display of graphics with feathers on his body and the like.

Danger 5 (Australian I think) goes with a big honkin' mask that doesn't move. The guy bobs his head to show when he's talking. Part of the humor is that it's so poorly done. It's just . . . "we know we're low budget, we don't care, kill Hitler." They turned a weakness into a comedic strength.
Last edit: 19 Mar 2021 09:52 by Sagrilarus.

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19 Mar 2021 10:22 #320864 by Shellhead

Sagrilarus wrote:

Shellhead wrote: Still enjoying Danger 5. The show is 1/3 recurring gags and 2/3 wildly subverted tropes, but I really like the recurring gags, which include:

1. Somebody dies in Pierre's arms, just after whispering their secret recipe for their favorite cocktail.
2. Hitler escapes certain death by diving through a closed window.
3. A minor character does a quick commercial for a random product just before the end of the episode.
4. Credits roll as the whole cast does happy hour, in costume but out of character, including Hitler.


Where are you getting Danger 5? I'd love to get back to it. The humor is ludicrous as hell.

I love shows like this from outside the U.S. The leader is a guy with an eagle head, presumably to represent a cliche American. But the magic is that they didn't do a good job with it. If this was an American show they would have CGI'd in some really impressive display of graphics with feathers on his body and the like.

Danger 5 (Australian I think) goes with a big honkin' mask that doesn't move. The guy bobs his head to show when he's talking. Part of the humor is that it's so poorly done. It's just . . . "we know we're low budget, we don't care, kill Hitler." They turned a weakness into a comedic strength.


Danger 5 is free to Amazon Prime viewers. Another great thing about the guy with the eagle head is his weird hostility towards the blonde agent. In the latest episode that I watched, she asked a question about the mission and he pointed a flashlight in her eyes and flicked it on and off a few times instead of answering her question. In another episode, he responded to her question by inviting her to compare the number of stars on his uniform with the lack of stars on her uniform.

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19 Mar 2021 12:12 #320872 by RobertB

Jackwraith wrote: You lasted longer than I did. I didn't get past the second episode. I kept pointing out so many problems with basic story structure, to say nothing of the factual basis of how things worked ("Star Trek style tech"), that my girlfriend was getting annoyed. And, yes, most of the characters are extremely unlikeable. I have no idea how it lasted as long as it did, except that many critics probably either don't remember the early 80s or don't have much idea about how anything worked back then.... which still doesn't explain the basic plot problems.

I just couldn't keep that much unbelievable tech bullshit afloat, so bailed out right in the middle of the show. "Okay, that's it."

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19 Mar 2021 23:52 #320916 by jason10mm
Goddamn Danger Five took all of 5 seconds to become my new favorite show. "SEXY BITCH MODE ACTIVATED" is my new slogan for life :)

Its almost too fast, no joke has time to breathe. And it is soooooo politically incorrect :)
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20 Mar 2021 23:12 #320948 by Jackwraith
So, after years of varying opinions on Carnivale, some gushing and wailing about how it was canceled too soon and others decidedly "meh" on it, we decided to sit down and give it a try. We've watched six episodes of season 1 and...

You remember those D&D campaigns where the DM would constantly have NPCs hint around at what the grand plot was but never actually give you any hard info about it? How it was always over your head because it was too large and important for you to be involved in and how your PCs felt like fringe characters in a story that they should've been central characters in? How every NPC felt more important and intelligent than you were? And how you finally realized that there really was no grand plot and your DM was just bad at telling a story? That's Carnivale. It's plot trolling and not much else.

We're given a setting that's loaded with little hints of mysticism- Sophie having a one-sided conversation with her mother; the mysterious "Management"; Ben Hawkins's mysterious(!) origin and his healing of one little girl and draining the life of a whole cornfield to do it (He's a Dark Sun mage!) -but we're never given any indication of why that mystical angle exists, beyond Lodz telling us "it's necessary" (but never WHY it's "necessary".) That's paired with the grueling existence of the Dust Bowl during the Depression, which is supposed to attach some emotional significance to this otherwise completely detached magickal situation. But that mysticism and the mystery behind it is still completely detached. We could've just had a drama about carnie life in the Dust Bowl during the Depression and been completely set. There's enough tragedy, romance, comedy, and adventure there without having to involve the mystical stuff. Except the writers apparently also had a story that was completely external to that harsh reality, so that setting was used as the grounding wire for that story that they didn't know how to tell. That's how we end up with an entire episode (6) about trying to exact "carnie justice" for the death of a young woman whose total screen time through the previous five episodes probably totaled five whole minutes. It wasn't like Sophie or Lila or Ruthie or Jonesy died; someone that the audience had developed familiarity with and could feel an actual sense of loss if they went away. No, instead this bit character was used as an excuse to set up a tragic situation that the DM/writers otherwise didn't know how to deliver. And did it with a town of ghostly miners that Management wanted the Carnivale to stop in for no apparent practical reason, none of which is explained (either why the town exists or why they were stopping there), although Lodz makes sure that the audience knows that HE knows why, because he's clearly more important than the audience/player characters. Again, plot trolling.

Speaking of completely detached, we also have this running side plot, taking place 1000 miles away in California, that has nothing whatsoever to do with our traveling carnival, but would actually make a GREAT Depression-era story; the motivated minister who's responding to people's fervent desire for religion to provide answers in this time of great deprivation and whose efforts to solve some of the social issues that are still prevalent today ("We don't want those migrants here!") are sandbagged by corrupt local politics and greed that costs the lives of children, driving him onto the railways as he loses his faith. That's brilliant! But it's also a subplot that has nothing to do with our magic carnival and which we've been watching for six episodes without explanation because, again, the DM (writers) doesn't know how to deliver a story that works for his players (the audience) and instead is just entertaining himself (themselves.)

So, to quote Clint Eastwood on set: "OK. That's enough of that."
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20 Mar 2021 23:15 #320949 by jason10mm
Yeah, Carnival was a weird one. It ended early I believe so I suppose it is possible it would have tied all that stuff together but I have significant doubts.

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