Tag: television

Nothing surprises me anymore at how far this country is willing to sink

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

NPR: Pentagon reports intention to livestream the military execution by firing squad of Nidal Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people and wounded 32 at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009

A few years ago, a report like this would elicit an are you kidding me? response, because it really does seem ludicrous the idea of televising the killing of another human being regardless of how much they deserved it.  But nowadays, the reactions not just from me are pretty nonplussed, unsurprised, and just the continuous sense of disappointment in the country we live in, at constantly crashing through floor after floor at how low it’s willing to sink.

When I was in high school, I don’t know why my friends and I went to go to see it, but we saw 8mm in theaters.  I don’t remember who’s idea it was to go see it in the first place, but back then the company was more important than the activity, and I think it had more to do with the fact that we were little edgelord teens who loved the idea of being able to get into R-rated films, regardless of what the film actually was.

Instead, we walked into a trauma-fest trainwreck, where the takeaway walking out of the theater was now knowing what a snuff film was.  And that films like this really don’t come into existence if there weren’t shreds of truth scattered throughout the origin story of this script, and understanding that there truly are some fucked up people in existence.

Livestreaming the execution of another human being is basically tantamount to a snuff film, except that this is being sanctioned by the highest forms of the American government, which is going to convince a lot of uneducated people out there that this is okay.

I think the worst part about it for me is knowing that without any question, this is somehow going to end up being monetized and someone(s) will be making a substantial amount of money on this horrific endeavor.  Perhaps the livestream will be hosted by YouTube, or HBOmax, if not one of the batshit right-wing media conglomerates out there these days; that being said, FOX seems logical to throw their name in the hat to host a live feed of someone getting shot to death.

And undoubtedly, the execution itself on-site, is going to be an event.  Similar to like the UFC on the White House lawn, this is going to be some live event spectacle where tickets will command a hefty dollar, and there will probably be shit like merchandise and souvenirs to commemorate the occasion, even if it is the extinguishing of another human being’s life.

I doubt many, if any, earned dollars will go to any of the victims of Hasan’s kill spree, either.

I find it ironic that barely a week ago, I learned about Christa Pike from her botched execution, where the mutant somehow withstood two lethal injections and ended up surviving and waking up a week later.  I remember thinking about how a different form of death penalty clearly was needed, and my mind immediately went to firing squad, because as barbaric as it might seem for many to open fire on a defenseless perp, it does seem like a fairly humane and quick end for a crook to receive such a mercy.

And here we are week later that a firing squad is in the news, as being on the table for a different criminal, but now we’re also talking about how his execution should be broadcast to the world, because sure everyone wants to see a human life come to an end from the comfort of their couches.  And that’s seemingly okay to even suggest, because that’s the world we live in now.

I can only fantasize about being Agent Kim

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Normally, I tend to steer clear of lots of K-Dramas, mostly on account of the fact that Koreans are notoriously long-winded (like me) and it shows in their television programming, because most seasons of Korean television are usually like 26 episodes, 95 minutes each or something that signifies an intimidatingly long time commitment, and as I’ve gotten older, the more I find merit in shows that are shorter in episode count as well as run-time cumulatively.

And if you do watch a K-Drama, they are in fact the crème of the crop when it comes to Asian media, but in most cases with Korean television, the storylines do tend to get a little convoluted at times, usually there are some red herring storylines that either don’t go anywhere, or are poorly inserted to deliberately misdirect the viewer, or they drag on for the sole purpose of creating ambiguous endings, as if they’re always leaving the door open for future seasons when (usually) one is enough.

But thanks to some clever reels I saw over social media outlets, I found myself sucked into watching 김부장 or Agent Kim: Reactivated on Netflix.  At the root of the fairly simple plot is the story of a dad who just wants to protect his daughter, and such a premise is all I really need to hear to be interested in it.

The kicker is, “Mr. Kim” is a former North Korean military agent with basically super soldier training and a ruthless killer instinct ingrained into him, and when his daughter goes missing, it isn’t really so much a police drama as much as it’s a triggered vigilante doing whatever it takes in order to pursue his child.  Although the genre of such a story can be categorized as thriller or crime, to parents like me, this is definitely in the realm of fantasy, as in I fantasize about having such skills, and the tenacity and opportunity to flex them onto criminals who would dare endanger my children.

Needless to say, I found the show to be entertaining and satisfying, even if I know my mom would immediately label this as 엉터리 테레비 or trash television.  It feels like Taken but in television form, and the star of the show 소지섭 looks like Korean Bob Saget, except he’s going around beating the ever living piss out of gangsters and anyone else who would dare stand in his way.  No obstacle or situation seems insurmountable, and the rate in which he defeats people feels like a speedrun, except in Korean television speeds, meaning ten episodes at 70+ minutes.

And true to Korean television standards, just when I thought the show had ended, seeing as how the general core plot of the show seemed to wrap up in seven episodes, after returning to the Netflix menu after watching episode 7, I was mortified to see that there were still three more episodes left.

Naturally, they were wholly unnecessary and honestly served to eliminate a position where the show could have easily milked it into a season 2, but in a way, I’m glad that they wrapped it up in ten, instead of did seven, and then make me wait another year for a second season of 7 moar convoluted episodes before getting to a nicely gift-wrapped ending.

But again, the appeal of the show is simple in the fact that it’s basically just a story about the lengths a dad will go through in order to protect his children, and that’s definitely something that resonates deep in my psyche, and gives me something to live vicariously through, watching dad pwn the shit out of all sorts of opps who cause danger and harm to his family.

WTF is WWE doing #312

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Turnabout is fair play, and I can be just as critical about the WWE as I can about AEW or anyone else when I think they’re doing something stupid and asinine questionable.

And the topic in question is the decision the E made to not air the Worlds Collide show that took place and was taped on September 26, and held it off until September 30.  The originally described rationale was that the E did not want to explicitly go head-to-head against AEW’s All Out show, which happened on the same night, also in the city of Chicago, and that they would save the airing of the show until the following Wednesday, so they could plop it down right on top of a similar time slot to AEW’s weekly Dynamite programming.

In doing so, it’s kind of like they symbolically threw in the towel at remotely even trying to compete with AEW on the 26th, and thought that they could use the content to muck with the ratings game on the 30th, but the issue I had was the fact that the internet has no capability of shutting the fuck up, and that it would be inevitable to make it from the 26th to the 30th, without some, if not all of the results of Worlds Collide being spoiled by then.

It also didn’t help that in the gap between taping and airing, was a live RAW episode, and whether they took it into consideration or not, they basically spoiled another Worlds Collide match when Roxanne Perez was featured on RAW, not carrying the AAA Reina de Reina’s Championship blet, which spoiled the fact that she did not defeat La Catalina, and anyone with a brain paying attention would know that when it airs on the 30th.

This, was extra salty for me, as I’ve grown quite high on Roxanne Perez and her match at Worlds Collide was one that I was really looking forward to watching.

One thing that nobody could have ever anticipated either, was the unfortunate and untimely sudden passing of Benjamin Satterley AKA Pac AKA Neville on the 27th, because everyone knew that the Dynamite on the 30th was going to immediately pivot into being a tribute show to Pac, and the optics are poor on the WWE to try and run counterprogramming to a tribute show, for a guy that was apparently very well liked, respected and cared for by performers all across the industry, regardless of who they were working for.

Naturally, the WWE didn’t budge, and they still plopped Worlds Collide on the 30th.  Despite how much I wanted to see it, preferably live, I didn’t watch it yet, because like many wrestling fans, I was upset by the passing of Benjamin Satterley, and I had tuned into AEW; a little weird to see the decisions to bring Bryan Danielson and Wardlow back on this specific night, but the Will Ospreay and Ricochet match was amazing, and it was a pretty good night of just pure wrestling and working, in the name of honoring the life of Pac.

But overall, poor form on the WWE and their gradually deteriorating soulless operations.  The choice to not run Worlds Collide live to me, seemed cowardly in not wanting to run in direct opposition to AEW, as well as disrespectful mostly to the AAA talents that were on the card, because they don’t get nearly the same exposure as all of the main roster and NXT talents do, and needlessly manipulating the airing of a show where they were going to get some larger billing, seems disrespectful and inconsiderate to their travel and effort.

I will watch the show when I get a chance, because I’m high on the AAA product, and anything they’re involved in is usually very fun and good quality, but massive egg on the E for handling this the way it was done.  Tf are you bean counting cocksuckers thinking?

We all know that college football is mostly rigged, but goddamn

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

ICYMI: #16 ranked University of Michigan avoids getting upset by unheralded Western Michigan by virtue of refs allowing them to have a second chance at a Hail Mary in spite of them running out of time on the final play of the game

Throughout the history of sport, most sports fans have seen their share of bullshit finishes in just about every sport that they follow.  Questionable calls on hits or pitches, foot on the line in basketball, blatantly missed call in football, a phantom offsides in futbol or hockey, it really doesn’t matter.  If there’s any form of competition, there will inevitably be a controversial finish every now and then.

But this game, between Michigan and Western Michigan, is definitely up there as one of the more notable instances in modern history, because it’s not often that we see on a such a national level, flagrant favoritism and game-rigging, with their absurd ruling to finish out the game.

The television clock, the scoreboard clock, and even the clock shown on the camera operators all showed that time had expired, when Michigan failed to convert their initial Hail Mary game winner, which for all intents and purposes would have meant WMU defeated Michigan, and we’d have the upset of the year on Week 1 of the CFB season, calling back to about 20 years ago when Michigan lost to Appalachian State on the opening week of the season.

But instead, we witnessed one of the most blatant cases of game-rigging in the history of sport when the referees spun a masterclass of bullshit, citing all sorts of moonspeak about clock accuracy, some sort of grid, global time and space continuum and other nonsense, but the conclusion was that there was actually still one second left in the game, repeat second down.

In all fairness, Michigan did have to convert the Hail Mary, but given a second chance, QB Bryce Underwood clearly recalibrated his throw, and didn’t overshoot the end zone, and the Michigan receiver was able to haul it in, for the game-winner, but the obvious reality is that this attempt should never have been allowed to take place, without the obvious fixing of the game to ensure that Michigan was supposed to win.

I have no doubt in my mind that if Michigan failed to convert on their second attempt, there would’ve been a late flag thrown, probably for a phantom pass interference, and they would’ve gotten a third attempt, but 15 yards closer, since games cannot end on penalties, and probably a fourth attempt and a fifth attempt, and so forth, until the desired outcome was reached.

‘Ball don’t lie’ is a fate-based phenomenon where whenever a bullshit call occurs, an equally improbable occurrence happens not long afterward to rectify the imbalance of fairness; but is still dependent on there being game time available in order for the scales to balance.  In a perfect world, WMU immediately picks off Underwood and returns it for a pick-six to close out the game, but I think the situation was so egregious that even the mythical gods of sport were too busy cleaning out their ears and glasses to realize that Michigan had capitalized on their second chance before they could do something about it.

Unsurprising, the Big-10 and the NCAA have tripled down on their stance, absolutely denying all accusations of game-fixing, and have been trotting out all sorts of supposed experts and league officials and technology talking heads to try and explain to the rest of us peons why there was absolutely, irrefutably one second left in the game, in spite of just about every official clock in existence saying otherwise.  The masterclass of attempted gaslighting is crazy and impressive, and later on in the season, fans are just going to hit a point where they’re just going to say that nobody’s going to be mad, we just want to hear someone admit that the shit was fixed.

And to think I thought week 1 of this CFB season was a snoozefest with absolutely no upsets, with all the notable teams just blowing out scrubs by Madden scores.  Even the James Franklin era beginning for Virginia Tech where they hung 70 points on VMI was so boring I went to bed early, and have little to say about it except I was disappointed that they still allowed three points.

Hopefully, the Ball Don’t Lie gods are quite disappointed in this situation, and we see Michigan falter to some unheralded team later this season, because WMU was screwed and Ball demands the scales be balanced.  Would be funny if Michigan gets bounced by like UTEP or Rutgers as retribution for this farce, but with the higher powers clearly on their side, it’ll take some Herculean scoring and evidence to make sure they’re irrefutable.

X-Men ’97 S2: the speedrun continues

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As part of my holiday weekend, I had the luxury of being able to do something I hadn’t really done in a long time, which was to sit down and simply shotgun a show.  I had X-Men ’97 season 2 on my list of things to watch, and I admittedly drug my feet a little starting it, mostly because I had such questionable feelings about the first season of the reboot.

Primarily the fact that the pace of the show moved at a breakneck speed, rushing through a number of arcs that in the comics would’ve been 5-9 months worth of storylines, somehow condensed and absolutely blown through in a single episode, and sometimes two, when they’re rushing right into the next one without any sort of pallet cleansing.

So after sitting down and watching all of S2 of X97, I can say that nothing changed, and the show picked right up going 280 mph, and covering at least five notable arcs and touching on at least two others, within the span of nine 30-minute episodes, which seeing that in writing is absolutely bonkers.  To my recollection, they dealt with Days of Future Past, X-Cutioner’s Song, X-Tinction Agenda, Fatal Attractions, that one arc surrounding the Brood, and a couple of other arcs that I don’t remember the names to and can’t really reference the plot without giving things away.

The series moves so fast between everything that it’s difficult to breathe, and I admittedly like to glance at my phone sometimes when I’m lazily imbibing in television, but I can’t really do that with X97 because they’re cramming so much context into every second of the episodes, that I found myself having to constantly rewind 10-20 seconds to figure out what’s going on before punting on multitasking.

It actually becomes comical just how fast they’re moving, because there are events that happened in the last episode of season 1, and they come full circle in 4-5 episodes in season 2, which was funny to me, because it took nearly three years in the comic books from event A and event B occurring, with a tremendous amount of fleshing out and making some interesting storylines in between.

The Brood are basically reduced to a single episode, and Apocalypse’s Horseman of Death is limited to the final 2.5 episodes of the season, and the crazy thing is that by this point, I became very casual with my following of X-Men comics, and even still I think that these were rushed to the moon and I can’t believe just how rapid-fire the series executes.

That being said, I’m not sure I’m going to continue watching future seasons should there be more coming.  It’s absolutely nothing like the FOX Kids cartoon from the actual 90s, that gave episodes time to breathe, and for viewers to develop rapport and attachment to characters.  I know all the players, but the show doesn’t really ever stop to let viewers care about anyone that the show isn’t intending on you to focus on.  It’s clear the show has a real big hard-on for Rogue, and Gambit by proxy, and they spent a lot of time on Professor X, and feeding into the current narrative of his general slow burn character assassination of today, seeing as how Charles’ go-to attack tactic is to make his opponents re-live traumatic moments in their lives.

It’s ADHD pace makes me less inclined to want to continue watching it, and seeing as how the show is close to having caught up to as far as in the general X-Men comic arcs that I actually followed, it might not be a bad place for me to bail on the show, seeing as how I’d be missing things that I hadn’t even known existed, so out of sight, out of mind.

Batman: Caped Crusader – tf did Alfred do to deserve all this disrespect?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When it comes to mediums outside of comic books, it’s no secret that DC Comics has struggled bringing to life most of their property, regardless of how iconic, how much potential and how much of a layup it really should seem.  Fortunately, James Gunn and John Cena seem to be on what I think is a positive direction with a potentially entertaining DC Cinematic Universe akin to what Marvel has accomplished, and I love the idea that Peacemaker, that John fucking Cena seems to be the lynch pin that could be the basis for it all, much like Robert Downey, Jr. did as Iron Man for the MCU.

Animation, has clearly been the strong suit for DC, and they’ve done a pretty good job of bringing stories to life in animated form throughout the years.  The whole saga starting with the Flashpoint Paradox was pretty enjoyable, and of course, a lifelong top-10 possibly top-5 show for me was and always will be, Batman the Animated Series.

It seems kind of surprising that it took nearly two decades for a proper spiritual successor to Batman TAS to come out, but then again, TAS holds up so well that it really didn’t need any successor, but all the same, Batman: Caped Crusader on Amazon Prime has been doing an adequate job of spiritually succeeding TAS, as far as I’m concerned.  It doesn’t hurt that Bruce Timm is back in the driver’s seat, along with JJ Abrams, one of the lord of the nerds who has a knack for breathing love into projects that many might think would be too lofty of endeavors.

I don’t know if I would go so far as to say that it’s remotely close to bettering TAS, but it has still been a refreshing watch, and at the time I’m writing this, I’m over halfway through S2, but felt a compulsion to write about it now and often times I have to strike when the iron is hot, but it’s been good.  I don’t think S2 has been as good as the first season was, but I imagine it will conclude with a massive upshot, considering what the show has obviously been doing throughout the season.

But it has done a good job of partially recapturing the magic of TAS, no doubt due to the completely lifted character design and complete auditory homage to the original, but they gain a little distance by going a little further back in the Batman timeline, as well as taking a much more adult theme, clearly intending this show to be nowhere near the after-school FOX Kids lineup or anything like it.

Batman is undoubtedly nerfed, seeing as how he’s earlier in his crime-fighting career, and definitely takes his share of getting damaged, but most of the differences are very heavy handed throughout this universe, primarily with the mass re-imagination of just about everyone from the series, in various ways.

Jim and Barbara Gordon are now black, Harleen Quinzel appears to be possibly Asian in appearance, Selina Kyle is now raven-haired, the Riddler has been made to be more of a bruising gunman, and the Mad Hatter is now a woman.  Renee Montoya is getting a ton more screen time now, but she’s also been made to be kind of fridge build Latina.  Harley’s also been thicc’ened up, deviating from her lithe petite pixie stature of TAS.

I can imagine that there’s a lot of discriminative takes on the massive wave of changes in CC from those who were passionate about TAS, or just traditional source material.  I notice all the differences, but when the day is over, I really couldn’t care about a lot of the characteristic swaps made throughout the cast, except for one: Alfred Pennyworth.

For some reason, Caped Crusader has decided to make Alfred fat, and look more like “Mean Gene” Okerlund than most traditional variations of Alfred, who is usually of a medium-to-lean, unsuspecting build, which is perfect considering the history of the character was that he was basically an MI5 espionage spy in his younger, active days.

Why CC decided to make him fat is completely beyond me, and one of the few things about the show that I really can’t stand by, and get triggered every time I see him. 

To make matters worse, the show has made the younger Bruce Wayne more of an asshole, pretending way too hard to be a pretentious womanizing socialite billionaire playboy when he’s in his alter ego, but the behavior doesn’t seem to end when he’s back under the mask.  Primarily the fact that he only refers to Alfred as “Pennyworth” like he were the senior jock quarterback of the school while Alfred were some sniveling maggot freshman, lucky enough to be in the stratosphere of Bruce Wayne.

The severe disrespect for Alfred Pennyworth throughout the series is the only true serious beef I have with Caped Crusader.  It’s otherwise a very good show, and an adequate successor to TAS, but it annoys the piss out of me whenever Alfred is disrespected so flagrantly.  Seeing as how I haven’t finished S2 yet, I hope this course corrects at some point, and we get back to an Alfred getting a modicum of the respect that he is deserving of.

Let’s talk about House of the Dragon

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

[boilerplate warning for potential spoilers as if I had any actual human readers]

Originally, I had wanted to write about S3 of House of the Dragon sooner, but other topics and a lack of time kept pushing it and pushing it and I never really got to it, but seeing as how the season finale has come and gone, it seems topical enough again to warrant writing about.

But I would have to say that this has probably been the most stressful season of House of the Dragon, or maybe even any season of any other Game of Thrones or sub-brand season before this one.  Not because of all the fighting, bloodshed, death or political cunning, but mostly because of how relatable to real life this season was, in the sense that there was a whole lot of talking, not a lot of action, constant planning and setting up, wheels spinning, character incompetence, and by the time anything really happened in the season finale, it was more a combination of “it’s about fucking time,” and “let’s just get it over with.”

In other words, S3 of House of the Dragon was a lot like a corporate job, and that, was the most stressful thing in the world for me to have to watch, and completely stifled much of the potential enjoyment there could have been.

Despite ascending to the crown, Rhaenyra Targaryen basically turned into middle management, and that was the initial impetus for wanting to write about the season.  It didn’t matter that she had risen to Protector of the Realm, Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, poor Rhaenyra basically spent the lion’s share of the season embroiled in managerial squabbles of overhead consolidation upon a merger, rapid-fire personnel changes, disgruntled customers, as well as the sheer custodial woes of moving to a new office.  She became an overwhelmed and overstimulated corporate manager who thought she was fit for the role but quickly discovered that all was not what she thought it was going to be, and she and her kingdom suffered tremendously as a result.

I couldn’t have cared less about what Aegon and the creepy crippled foot fetish guy were doing on their merry adventures, or what the Hightowers were trying to accomplish in the shadows, but every time I saw Rhaenyra sitting on the Iron Throne listening to the small folk squabble and complain and beg for resources, I’d feel my blood pressure rising, and then she tries to go hide to compose herself, and there are fucking rats all over the castle, and it’s like every person in corporate who gets overwhelmed by their jobs, tries to go home for any bit of reprieve, only to find the bullshit of homeownership waiting for them there.

The season was like Westerosi Office Space and I don’t think George R.R. Martin realizes that he could have a pretty fun project on his hands if he could stop eating lobster and counting his HBO money long enough to add one more thing to his to-do list, a hundred bullet points underneath not-finishing Winds of Winter.

Needless to say, in my personal opinion, S3 of Houes of the Dragon was pretty booty.  Mythical wife and our au pair, whom we all watched the show together, they both were ahead of the curve with turning on the season than I was, and by the time we got to the finale, it was like dragging them into the media room to get this shit over with, while I didn’t really think it was that bad until I really started to think about it.

The biggest takeaway for me from this season, as well as the series as a whole frankly, is the fact that it hasn’t done a very good job of making any characters that I really liked, much less cared about.  I haven’t read Fire and Blood like I did the entire five books of A Song of Ice and Fire so I don’t really know if there will be any characters that I’d like, but as far as the show goes, House of the Dragon does a shitty job of making relatable or interesting characters worthy of liking or caring about.

I loved all sorts of characters in A Song of Ice and Fire, mostly side characters like Bronn, the Hound, and Podrick Payne.  Many other characters commanded respect like Brienne, and Davos, and when the day is over, I clearly am declared to House Stark, because they’re a bunch of honor-bound squares like me that always wants to believe we’re making the right choice.

House of the Dragon has no such characters that I feel any sort of care, relation or really any shits to give about towards, and that was its biggest handicap for me, personally.  Nobody was really likeable, or respectable, and I found that to be key in deciding that the show as a whole is clearly weaker than its predecessor, and nowhere near as good as Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

Otto is no Littlefinger.  Ormond, whom I was not sold on within five minutes, as the big bad of the season, was clearly no Ramsey or High Sparrow as a boss character.  All the kids except for maybe Baela are all dumb shitheads who pretty much all get or are going to get what they all deserve.  Corlys, in spite of his station and title pretty much does nothing, like ever, and let’s not talk about Grand Maester Orwyle who epitomizes the guy in the office that has an important title but goes to extraordinary lengths to hide and do absolutely jack shit.

I kind of did like Gwayne Hightower, since he was this constant voice of reason, who had a knack for surviving, and I had to respect the hustle.  He was probably the closest thing to a character that I had any affinity towards, despite the fact that I wanted to see the rest of his family get slaughtered.  But everyone else could drop dead at any point and I wouldn’t have cared.  Even the main cast, were all obnoxious and neutered and nerfed the whole season, save for maybe Daemon, but by and large, my point remains, there were really no likeable characters in House of the Dragon, and to me, that is pretty much the chief reason why I think the show as a whole suffered, and will probably continue to suffer in future, insufferable seasons.