Tag: entertainment

So Many to Chose From

Daily writing prompt
What movies or TV series have you watched more than 5 times?
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Well, ol’ Robbie was fully enveloped by a nasty head cold by the time he went to sleep last night. Last week his wife dealt with it and was pretty much better by yesterday. For poor ol’ Robbie though, he got to the airport to pick up his step daughter and felt a little twinge in his throat. Uh oh. Two hours later he was planning on calling in sick to work the next day (today). Now he’s sitting on the couch with a nose too stuffy to breathe through and a throat sore enough that breathing hurts. Yippee.

What was I talking about (and why was he doing it in third person)?

Oh yeah, the daily writing prompt. TV series or movies that I’ve watched more than five times. There are a lot of them. I’m old. They pile up.

Star Wars. All of them. I’ve watched them all at least five times. Probably closer to 50 times. I can watch ’em over and over and over again. All of them. The same can be said of most of the Star Trek movies. The good ones at least. Not the one Shatner directed, but the ones that are worth watching. The top of the line Marvel movies are probably over five views by now. Winter Soldier, Infinity War, Endgame. Antman too, which is odd. Harry watched that puppy over and over again when it first hit iTunes.

As for TV shows, I don’t know if I’ve ever hit five views of anything. Dead Like Me is probably close. So is The League. The Mandalorian isn’t there yet, but it will be some day. Same with Andor. Maybe I might give Andor another watch while I’m sitting here sick today. Yellowjackets might be another show that hits five views. It’s at two right now and it’s only been out for a bout two years. The Walking Dead might get there too. I’m in a rewatch now. Season one has probably hit five views. I can’t think of anything else right now. I’m too sick.

Wish me luck today.

The Hobbit: An Expected Worry

I’m worried about The Hobbit.  I’m afraid it’s going to end up as nothing more than a visual sleep aide.  I’m afraid it is going to be to the Lord of the Rings trilogy what the Star Wars prequels were to the original Star Wars trilogy.

The Lord of the Rings is a seriously long story.  Three books.  A massive amount of information.  Almost every character is developed in detail.  Most of them are dealing with deeply personal issues on top of the whole end of the world crisis.  There is just so much there.  If they had shortened the films at all an enormous amount of important story would have been sacrificed.  Even more than there already was.  The story required three ridiculously long movies.  There’s no way it would have worked otherwise.

The Hobbit is, what… 400 pages?  For the most part it’s a light weight tale of short people wandering around a fantasy land.  Compared to the intricacies of Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit is kids stuff.  The good guys are good, the bad guys are bad, no one except Bilbo does any growing or changing throughout the story, and Bilbo only does in that he acts in ways that are unexpected.  He doesn’t so much grow as a person as roll with the punches.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the book.  I just think it’s a little insulting to have this story ballooned into three, three hour films.  It’s going to result in exactly two things.  One, a shit load of money in the studio’s bank account.  Two, lots of really bored movie goers.

There, I said it.  It’s going to be boring.  Really boring.  Even if they add in mountains of content from the Lord of the Rings appendixes and what not, it’s still going to be hours on end of a bunch of Dwarves walking around with a Hobbit.

I still want to see it, but as the reality sinks in… we’re looking at nine hours of movie to interpret a 400 page book.  Even if it’s decent, it’s still never going to live up to the Lord of the Rings.  It’s never going to live up to its own hype.  This whole thing is a disaster waiting to happen.  I hope I’m wrong, but somehow… I don’t think I’m going to be.