This month’s list is short:
TV/streaming:
The Witcher: Full first season finished.
Film:
Star Trek: Into Darkness – I like it – 8/10
DCs Watchmen 7/10.
Watched April 2021.
2
Category Archives: scifi
Watched January – February 2021.
Not a massive amount watched , but here we go.
TV/Streaming series:
Sense8, season 2 (Netflix) (re-watch)
The Expanse (Amazon Prime Video) (re-started due to not remembering enough):
Season 1 – 5, very good 8/10 overall, this may change on a re-watch.
Cobra Kai, seasons 1, 2, 3. Good fun and some very good moments, 7/10
Films:
Jupiter Ascending (Wachowskis) – 8/10
Interstellar 9/10 – I like the philosophical aspects. Also the use of family communication made me think of Contact, and also a bit of Babylon 5.
Starting (part re-watch of) Marvel Cinematic Universe:
Iron Man 7/10
The Expanse TV Series
A few years ago I started watching The Expanse on Netflix, then it was moved to Amazon. Unfortunately Amazon (Prime/Video) was not available in Denmark at that time, so I only got to watch a bit of the series.
Now I do have access to Amazon Prime, so it is time to revisit The Expanse.
Because I had forgotten large parts of the story, I started all over again. That is a good move, I think, because even if I recall some stuff, I can enjoy what I (re-)discover in the series.
Another reason is that at the latest Fedcon in 2019 we had a string of star guests from The expanse, whetting the appetite for the series when it became available.
Many have compared The Expanse to my favourite story on TV, Babylon 5, so I am looking forward to diving deeper into the story. It just might have the same re-watchability.
Until now I have watched seasons 1 to 5, and I am enjoying it very much. Excellent story telling and beautiful visuals.
A final season 6 has been announced, here is to hoping that it will be up to expectations.
Memories: Early Science Fiction I Was Exposed To. Tintin.
Some of the first science fiction I read was actually a set of comic books: The series of “Adventures of Tintin”.
OK, some of it is just general earthly adventures of a young journalist man in different parts of the world. Hergé (real name George Remi) started creating the stories of Tintin in 1929 as a strip in the conservative Catholic newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle.
Later he had a series of albums, or graphic novels, as we now call them, beginning in black-and-white with the story “Tintin in the Land of the Soviets”. This exists, as far as I know in an album, but I have not found that one.
Some stories, like The Seven Crystal Balls/Prisoners of the Sun (1943 – 1949) have a more fantasy/mythical theme, but the solution to their last problem is quite scientific.
The Destination Moon/Explorers on the Moon (1950 – 1956) is actually science fiction, well, it was written before the space age started in October 1957, and long before the first moon landing in 1969.
Let’s face it. The stories are not complex, but fun adventures with some humour interspersed. Especially, some of the names of the characters are quite funny.
A fun little story I experienced. In 1991 a group of Hergé fans made a rather large exhibition of Hergé’s work, in the town of Welkenraedt in the Western part of Belgium, including building some models from some Tintin stories. The first one I recall very well was a model of the top of the rocket used to go to the moon, with quarters etc.
The second one was quite ingenious. You could walk in the cave in where Tintin found his friend Chang (Tintin in Tibet), but when you followed it to the end of the tunnel you were suddenly standing in the same place as Tintin in the drawings of another story, and just like Tintin in the story, I just stood there saying “The Blue Lotus!” Going there was, of course, a bit like going to a convention, meeting lots of other fans of Hergé.
One more thing: When I moved to The Netherlands to live for some years, I wanted to learn the language as fast as possible. Given that most Dutch people speak English quite well, and are proud of it, that way proved more tricky. Fortunately, I did find a Dutch colleague with one of the same interests, and we agreed that after a year we would speak Dutch only. I did. The other thing I did was finding some comic books (yes also Tintin) to read in Dutch. Yes, I will use every trick in the book, or sometimes outside the book if I want to learn a new language.
This is one of my first adventures in science fiction, I think there will be more.
Watched May – December 2020.
Even while being in isolation, more or less, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, not a great amount of TV series or films have been watched. Other activities, such as some electronics building projects, have taken some of the time, so here is the list:
TV/streaming series:
Better Than Us (Netflix), season 1, 8/10
Star Trek: Picard (Netflix), season 1, 8/10
Agents of SHIELD, season 2, 7/10
Good Omens, season 1 (Amazon), 8/10
The Umbrella Academy, season 2, 7/10
Agents of SHIELD, season 3, 8/10
Dark, seasons 1,2,3 (Netflix) 8/10
Star Trek: Discovery, season 3 8/10
The Flash, season 6 up to episode 19 Season finale?
Sense8, season 1 re-watch
Films:
All the Harry potter movies, from
– Philosopher’s Stone – to – Deathly Hallows. I had seen most of them, but not Deathly Hallows It was good to revisit this universe.
At Christmas I got 2 books in the Dresden Files series, and I should find time to read them, too.
The graphic novel “The Resistance”, vol. 1 written by Straczynski came in. I had seen the separate issues online, but still need to read the story as a whole some time soon. There is a second series on the way, and I am looking forward to see that.
I just started watching “The Expanse”. I had seen a few seasons on Netflix when it was available there, but because Amazon Prime was not yet available until lately, I had not seen recent seasons. Also, I did not have the story present in memory, therefore starting all over again. What I have now (re-)watched is better than I remembered, so I am looking forward to watching more.
Not too much news, but I expect to be a bit more active on the blog this year.
Watching Activity January to April, 2020
This year has been crazy.
I managed to go to a single convention before our lives were turned upside-down by the COVID-19 pandemic. I expect to be more or less isolated, at least until the end of this year, as I am in the group with higher risk of complications if I catch the virus.
During the isolation I had expected to watch more films and TV series, but following the news and building some electronics projects has taken more time than I expected. Here is the list for January to April 2020:
TV series:
Re-watch of Sense8. As always, excellent.
DC: Arrow, seasons 6 and 7. Pretty good. 8/10
DC: Titans, season 2. 7/10
Forbrydelsen (English title: The Killing, Danish crime drama) Season 1. 8/10
DC: Crisis on Infinite Earths, This year’s cross over mini series. I liked it. 8/10
Matador (Danish drama series from the late 70s, early 80s) (English title: Monopoly (as the board game)) Very good. 9/10
DC: Black Lightning, Season 3. I like it a lot. 8/10
Kingdom (Korean SF/Netflix) season 2. Good story. 8/10
Re-watch of Babylon 5, seasons 1, 2 and 3. As always excellent. 9/10
Film:
Marvel: Venom
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. 8/10
That’s it. Maybe I will get to read/watch etc some Hugo Award nominees.
I am glad that J. Michael Straczynski’s autobiography “Becoming Superman” was nominated. It was a stunning read, even if I knew some details.
Re-Watch: Babylon 5.
After a pause in binge watching of Babylon 5, I re-started, because I expect to meet with a lot of other B5 fans soon.
I just finished the first season, and I will say that I still do not understand the people calling Michael O’Hare’s acting “wooden”. It may be a bit understated, but at times, just a facial expression tells more than many words.
While season 1 is not the strongest of the series, it serves very well for setting up the story, and a great introduction to the main characters, and a glimpse of what is to come.
Here is an example: The much maligned episode TKO has one of the really strong character moments for Ivanova. I know that many skip the episode, but then they miss out on this excellent character moment, and a follow up to a small thread from a previous episode.
I will rate my re-viewing of this season as 8/10
Watched, Read and Listened To: July – October 2019:
A little less because of travels and other planned activities. This came out a bit late, but I shall endeavour to continue this type of posts, maybe monthly, maybe covering a few months at a time.
Here is the list with quick ratings:
TV:
Finishing The 100, season 4 re-watch 7/10
Finishing season 5 of “The 100”. Good show Final 2 episodes 8/10, all over 7/10
Finishing The Americans, season 6, with a friend8/10
Jeremiah, S1 continue/DVD with a friend
Finishing Scorpion, season 2 7/10
Chernobyl mini series 10/10
Sense8 re-watch, whole series. still 10/10
Krypton Season 2 finished 8/10
Into the Badlands: finished 2nd half of season 3, average 7/10
Scorpion: Season 3: 7/10
Scorpion: Season 4: (it went down hill) 6/10
Scorpion as a whole: Average 7/10
The Flash, season 5 a solid 7/10
Film:
Spiderman: Homecoming 8/10
Gravity with a friend 8/10
I Am Legend, a solid 7/10
The Dark Crystal 7/10
Read:
Becoming Superman – JMS 10/10
Babylon 5: Technomage trilogy – Jeanne Cavelos:
“The Passing of the Technomages”
1) Casting Shadows
2) Summoning Light
3) Invoking Darkness
I like this trilogy a lot
9/10
Graphic novels:
Superman: New Krypton, vols 1 – 4:
Enjoyable, interesting take on Zod’s character
8/10
Yoko Tsuno: vols 2,3 and a few more.
#29 arrived at Fantasticon – “Engle og Falke” (Danish title, Eng.: Angels and Falcons)
7/10
The Flash TV Series, Season 5
Brief review of The Flash, season 5, telling the story of the daughter of Barry Allen and Iris West Allen.
Lots of time travel, and good character moments.
Much good fun and excitement in following the journey of Nora West Allen, also known as the speedster XS (excess), and the quest to stop the unstoppable Cicada with the indestructible (or not) lightning shaped dagger.
I was well entertained and will rate this season a bit over average, 7/10.
Scorpion TV series (4 seasons)
Over the last few months I have been watching “Scorpion” on the recommendation of a friend.
The series rums over 4 seasons, and is the story of a group of people with genius level IQ helping out Homeland (and others) with seemingly unsolvable problems.
The group is assisted by their (non-genius) partners, their Homeland handler and a former waitress who happens to have a genius son.
The problems range from saving a puppy, over environmental disasters to preventing the apocalypse.
The characters are reasonably well drawn. There is an amount of character development, and going from having an EQ of almost nothing to some EQ is not nothing.
Lots of fun moments during their problem solving makes it quite entertaining.
The series is somewhat formulaic, each episode having a problem almost solved something goes horribly wrong and then has to be solved. It always works in the end. I would have liked to see cases that they could not solve properly.
Sometimes the solutions are, to me, at least, obvious technical/scientific mistakes, making them ridiculous. OK, that’s part of the fun to me.
I think the 4th season is not as strong as the first 3. it feels to me like the writer(s) were running out of ideas.
I like the series, but it does not warrant a repeat viewing. There is better stuff out there, and a lot of stuff that I have not seen yet … priorities …
I rate the series as a whole to an average 7/10.