Octopus Overlords

Since I know a few others have read it, please do enjoy a trailer for the upcoming show on AMC:

Don't miss the series premiere, Sunday, June 2 at 9/8c.

EDIT: Fixed broken Youtube link

Could be interesting. I remember liking the book.

Can't wait!

The A.V. club was not impressed.

Joe Hill’s fiction allows for mental flights of fancy that can be tough to translate to the big or small screen. The very idea of mixing Christmas mythology with that of Bram Stoker conjures imagery in the reader’s mind of everything from shiny ornaments to bloody stakes. It could have resulted in a playful, crazy, over-the-top piece of escapism that emphasizes the surreal, dark whimsy of its source material. For reasons that will never make sense, no one involved with NOS4A2 seems like they were interested in making that show. The familial comparisons may be unfair, but here’s one more: AMC’s NOS4A2 needed the energy of the best cinematic Stephen King adaptations and it got the meat-and-potatoes treatment that his books did back in the heyday of the network TV miniseries.

Airs this Sunday.

AFAIK, they didn't like A Discovery of Witches either, yet Mrs. Kub and I are enjoying that too.

I've got this set to record, but we'll see if I get around to watching it. I'm still only about half-way through the first season of The Passage.

ImLawBoy wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 11:16 am I've got this set to record, but we'll see if I get around to watching it. I'm still only about half-way through the first season of The Passage.

Is that any good? I read the first 2 books, and own the 3rd, but it feels like it will be a grind for the payoff.

Pyperkub wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 1:34 pm

ImLawBoy wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 11:16 am I've got this set to record, but we'll see if I get around to watching it. I'm still only about half-way through the first season of The Passage.

Is that any good? I read the first 2 books, and own the 3rd, but it feels like it will be a grind for the payoff.

I thoroughly enjoyed the books, but I think they're taking the wrong approach with the show. What drew me into the books was the post apocalyptic setting of the isolated community just trying to survive each night. That led me to care about how we got to that point. The show is taking a chronological approach, however, and starting with how the virals came to be in the first place. It's just less compelling this way. The saving grace is the chemistry between Mark-Paul Gosselaar (as Wolgast) and Saniyya Sidney (the girl playing young Amy).

My problem with the 2nd book was mostly about pacing. I wanted more hunting, not trapped and then 3 may fix that, but when I started it, I just couldn't get any traction.

Caught the premiere of this last night. I really had not much idea what to expect, I thought it was going to involve vampires but thus far there was nothing that suggested traditional vampire lore. The premiere opened with a semi-horror type of scenario, but the remainder of the episode was rather slow and ordinary. I don't mean to say it was boring, because I actually found the cast and writing rather engaging. I got a very slight Buffy vibe, but with the main heroine being a small time girl wanting to get out who possibly has some sort of supernatural power. She's also got the makings of a Scooby crew, a druggy guy friend and a witch that uses scrabble pieces. Her best "friend" is from an upper class family who introduces her to a super cute rich guy so they've got the classic setup of teens from different sides of the track. Her dad is a cheating drunk, but played well and even somewhat sympathetically by the hacker guy from Punisher. Her mom is not supportive and comes across less sympathetic until you find out she's being hit by her drunky husband. So there's a lot of meandering character material while they slowly introduce the supernatural stuff.

This review sums up my feelings really well:

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/t ... story.html

I read the book (NOS4A2) when it first came out years ago. I don't remember much about it so I started reading it again a couple days ago. We'll watch/stream the show once more episodes become available.

It was kind of meh, I'll give it a few episodes though. The old man and the Rolls was creepy, I really liked that part, the girls reaching into the Harry Potter bag was just stupid to me. You can get scrabble tiles out of the bag without reaching into another dimension. The bike and the bridge were interesting.

Can all this be neatly tied together? We'll see as I have not read the book.

And I thought vampires also...

Pyperkub wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 1:34 pm

ImLawBoy wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 11:16 am I've got this set to record, but we'll see if I get around to watching it. I'm still only about half-way through the first season of The Passage.

Is that any good? I read the first 2 books, and own the 3rd, but it feels like it will be a grind for the payoff.

Passage was cancelled by Fox.

NOS4A2 is a vampire story (I mean, it'd be hard to avoid given the title), but to avoid spoilers I'll just point out that it's a non-traditional vampire story (i.e., no blood sucking, turning into bats, etc.).

Nitrous Oxide Systems for Ann Arbor?

Anyone still watching this? I like the show, but it really does seem to have a unique kind of relaxed to it. Last night was supposed to be a "must see" episode, and while it featured the first confrontation between the protagonist and antagonist, it just felt a bit lackluster. Now it seems like they are going to waste time by throwing our hero into an asylum, oooh that's never been done before.

The premise is interesting and different, and the show never feels exactly "boring" to me, but somehow it's also just hard to get excited about. I find myself wondering why the lead's hair looks like it's from the 70s or 80s instead of paying more attention to the story. And yet unlike many other shows I watch, I don't seem to be falling asleep, so that must mean it's engaging to me for some reason. Given that I'm not a big Spocklar fan, it isn't him so I really don't know what it is.

I think this show would have worked better for me as a Netflix-type release where all the eps came at once, and preferably in the winter time close to Christmas. As it stands I really can't recommend it but I'm curious if anyone else has a different take.

I'm still watching (haven't watched last night's episode yet, but am otherwise caught up). It's entertaining, but I agree it's not fast paced. The fact that it hasn't fallen back into the chaos of my DVR is a good sign (I really should try to watch the most recent season of The X-Files). I havnen't read anything about how long they're going to try to stretch the show for, but it certainly doesn't look like it'll get wrapped up in one season. It'd be hard to do for more than 2 (or maybe 3) seasons without really deviating from the source material, though.

FWIW, I think the entire first season is streaming from AMC somehow (AMC Premier?) if you want to just binge the rest of it.

So last night they showed the last two episodes of the first season. Most of it was really action packed, and it was definitely the most entertaining the show has been. Overall I felt like the show dragged in some portions and some of the episodes felt redundant. I didn't mind the pacing so much as I did kind of the same plot points retreading multiple times. It felt like they could easily have jumped to the events of the finale much sooner and continued from where it ended last night. It seems like they deliberately wanted to pace it for a second season, so hopefully they will give it that to finish the story.

rittchard wrote: ↑Mon Jul 29, 2019 5:34 pm So last night they showed the last two episodes of the first season. Most of it was really action packed, and it was definitely the most entertaining the show has been. Overall I felt like the show dragged in some portions and some of the episodes felt redundant. I didn't mind the pacing so much as I did kind of the same plot points retreading multiple times. It felt like they could easily have jumped to the events of the finale much sooner and continued from where it ended last night. It seems like they deliberately wanted to pace it for a second season, so hopefully they will give it that to finish the story.

My exact feelings also, I did enjoy it though, more than I thought I would at times. So I am looking forward to season 2.

The actress playing Vic is very talented. Hope to see her in future roles as well.

msduncan wrote: ↑Tue Jul 30, 2019 7:12 am The actress playing Vic is very talented. Hope to see her in future roles as well.

Yeah she definitely has a lot of potential, but I wish they'd fix her hair. It looked like Jennifer Beals from Flashdance or something lol.

Finished this up the other night. Overall it was really well done. I thought that it stuck to the book really well, and I'm looking forward to next season. If they continue sticking to the book the ending should be interesting - I'm not sure if TV budget limitations will show through or not.