I highly doubt it, but I wonder if I’m the only person who goes through this: I sit down to watch some streaming television, and after I open Netflix/Plex/Hulu/WWE Network, I find myself browsing and searching through these gargantuan catalogues of content, and before I know it, 45 minutes have passed, and the time I earmarked to watch some television is mostly gone. A 60+ minute episode/movie doesn’t really fit into the schedule, and nothing I want to watch is one of those 22 minute shorts. Ultimately, I end up watching nothing, but have added ten new things to the watchlist that I’ll inevitably ignore in the future and repeat the process all over again.
To say that there’s a wealth of content out there is an understatement. The catalogues of crap out there are never ending, and the fact that it’s all over the internet reinforces the notion that it can be cycled in and out of circulation at the drop of a hat at any given time of the day, week, month or year.
This is why shows have such short lifespans, because the pressure to immediately succeed is so high, and failing to get an 11 out of 10 often times means cancellation, or falling by the wayside by the next avalanche of programming that’s waiting in the wings at all time.
Frankly, it’s mind-boggling just how much stuff is out there, and I’m having a really hard time of keeping track of what’s decent, what’s not worth investing time into, and I’m finding that my standards are kind of molding into modern standards, because I’m not giving shows enough time to mature and develop, because they themselves aren’t giving themselves enough time to do such, and begin to suck, and I’m already thinking of what I could be/could have been watching instead.
What originally started as a post about choice paralysis in regards to television, I’ve decided to kind of rapid fire share some of the things I’ve watched recently, because most are worth mentioning, but none are worth dedicating an entire brog post towards.
The End of the F***ing World – this is a show that lots of people have been talking about recently, and gushing over at how good it is. And although I thought it was an okay show that breezed by, and really loved the fact that it was just eight 22 minute episodes, it wasn’t as good as other peoples’ reviews claim it. I guess it’s a fairly clear view of how turbulent being a teenager is, but I have a hard time relating to people in general enough to where I can feel like I’m injecting myself into their shoes. Not a bad show, very watchable, and would watch more if there ever is any.
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter – the first film was pretty good, and I liked it a lot, but the rest of the series went downhill on a very steep slope, and the only reason I watched this was pretty much solely based on the fact that I had invested time in watching all previous chapters, I may as well just finish it out for the sake of it. It was as bad as it was expected, and the increasing grunge of the apocalypse reduces the eye candy that is Milla Jovovich. The story is crap, the ending is crap, and it’s a series that really needed a mercy kill, like four films ago, but at least it’s over.
Gypsy – this was a Netflix series that their algorithms seemed to think I really needed to watch, and because I’ve always had a thing for Naomi Watts, I decided to give it a whirl. Watts plays a therapist who apparently has a penchant for secretly prying into the personal lives of her clients, and creates relationships with the people they talk about, for what I’m assuming is to get a better understanding of they themselves, but it’s not really established. Three episodes in, and I’ve decided to punt, because it’s just not that good, and I’ve already found out that Netflix themselves have pulled the plug on the series and will not make a second season, which implies the end of the first was open-ended. No sleep lost.
House of Cards – I’ll be honest, I loved the first season. I loved the second season, and the third season was pretty decent too. I really felt like watching the series, especially in the current political climate we live in now was kind of apropos, because the show always operated in the manner in which I always believed Washington D.C. politics did themselves. But the most recent seasons have become uncomfortable for me to watch, and made me realize what I liked about the show up until this point: the joint manipulation and teamwork between Frank and Claire Underwood, as they rose to power. But with them currently at odds, with it not seemingly like there will ever be any sort of reconciliation, now it just seems like a show where the two of them will endlessly troll each other, like a political and fucked up version of Tom & Jerry. I don’t anticipate myself watching any more of the show and will probably read about the rest of the series’ episodes’ synopses on Wikipedia.
Erased – Japanese television series about a twenty-something who has the ability to go back in time for variable periods in order to change history to prevent bad things from occurring. What starts out as preventing car accidents turns into him needing to prevent his own mother’s murder, and him going back in time 18 years to his childhood to figure out what he needs to do. The premise is fairly fresh as far as Japanese storytelling goes, and it’s a pretty watchable show of ten sub-30 minute episodes. But the ending is very much Japanese, which is to say they carry on the tradition of being capable of writing a decent ending. But honestly, it’s still better than 75% of anime series out there that fall way flatter on their faces.
Anyway, at the time I’m writing this, Atlanta’s just been hit with snow and ice all over again, and because this is Atlanta, less than an inch of snow is more than enough to debilitate the city, because there are like, no plows to clear the roads, and with the temperatures well below freezing, the snow coverage is going to become ice coverage, and it’s only going to become worse. So in spite of there being less than an inch of snow, I’m actually not likely to go into the office today; which kind of sucks, because as an hourly slave, time not spent at the office is time in which I am not getting paid for.
It’s funny how when we’re children, we can’t wait for snow days so that we can be free from going to school, but when we’re adults, and adults that are in similar circumstances as I am in, snow days absolutely blow. I like the overtime in which being hourly occasionally entails, but if I had my preference, I’d rather be salaried and get to enjoy the privileges of snow days that I once did as a kid, or a government worker. At least I’ll have a little bit more time to not get as content paralyzed as I normally do in the evenings, and maybe I’ll find something innately watchable on this cold and icy day.
