Anyone else binge-watching TV series during the coronavirus quarantines?

[Xulonn]

I haven't subscribed to cable TV for more than 25 years now, and anything I watch these days is via internet streaming or downloads. Although I mostly watch movies from around the world, I still enjoy some TV series - and a couple of time a year, I will download a season and binge-watch all of the episodes over a few days.

I really like science fiction, books, TV and movies, and I watched Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker a few days ago. In spite of the criticism about it, I enjoyed it thoroughly, because I don't expect such films to be intellectually fulfilling. To me they are pure entertainment, and enjoy the epic quality of such well-produced "space-opera" films.

Then, Last night, I watched the first four episodes of season four of "The Expanse." I plan to watch three more episodes tonight as soon as I finish this post, and finish off the last three tomorrow night. I like the gritty, down to earth style of The Expanse, and I think that the interplay of human ambition, ego, frailities, and emotion is well done.

I will probably watch a couple of seasons of various other series every week for the next month or so. Any recommendations for other SyFy or fantasy series? (More of "Black Mirror" is already on my list.)

Although I am not a big fan of detective stories, I enjoyed the first two seasons of Amazon's "Bosch" series, where detective Harry Bosh has a vintage vinyl/vacuum tube stereo system that is featured as part of his "down-time" enjoyment. His system is a McIntosh MX110 pre-amp/tuner, Marantz 6300 turntable, McIntosh MC-240 power amplifier, and Ohm Walsh loudspeakers - and a classic equipment stand/credenza with LP storage. His living room (pictured below) has to be horrible for acoustics.

It is interesting that in the Bosch books, he supposedly listened to CD's, not vinyl/tubes. It looks like Amazon if going to finish up with the 7th season as the final one, so I will see what's available up until now.

 

[pozz]

Less TV shows than movies that I haven't had the chance to watch. Most recent ones are Valerian by Luc Besson and Ryuzo 7 by Takeshi Kitano. For kicks I watched Johnny Mnemonic to laugh a bit again at what was made of William Gibson's story.

 

[Doodski]

Not me. I have a TV operating at my desk all the time but it's mostly just for background noise and for watching The History Channel Forged in Fire. I've been playing the first person shooter sniper game Sniper Elite 4 and I have 4 other newer games lined up for when I finish all the levels and expansion pack in ~2 days. Between those and this website I am keeping occupied.

 

[pozz]

Harry Bosh

I think I remember reading the detective books where Harry (Hieronymus) Bosch was the lead. Can't remember much beyond that.

 

[Daverz]

Wireless Ohms! I'm sure I'll binge the new season of Bosch, but I'm not sure I could tell you the plot of any other seasons.

 

[Xulonn]

Wireless Ohms! I'm sure I'll binge the new season of Bosch, but I'm not sure I could tell you the plot of any other seasons.

Must be battery powered, too - I don't see any power cords!

 

[Martin]

I love the Expanse - you must read the books - they are great.

I've got Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga coming in 4K tomorrow so I'll be bingeing that for the next few weeks. I'll start with Project 4K77's version of Star Wars just to set them mood. I haven't yet decided on whether to watch the Saga in release or chronological order...

The wife and I have been bingeing on Bones. I never got into it when it was on. She likes it and I'm getting more and more into it. A nice follow-on to The Closer/Major Crimes binge we did last year.

And I want to get to the second season of Altered Carbon and the third of Ozark...

Martin

 

[Hugo9000]

I love The Expanse. You might check out Altered Carbon, I really enjoyed season one, and will be starting season two tonight. Lost in Space is fun. I wasn't expecting to enjoy it, having grown up watching the original show and at first being a bit put off by some of the changes they made for the new series.

My favorite Sci-Fi tv series of all time is Eureka, for its bizarre blend of science fiction, comedy, mystery, and romance. The cast was delightful, and although the show ended up being cut a bit short of their original plans, they at least managed to tie everything up very well in the final season. I don't know if Eureka is available for streaming. I bought it on Blu-ray from Germany since it was only released on DVD in the U.S.

In other genres, I need to watch season four of Better Call Saul, and I got a notification tonight that another season of Ozark is on Netflix, so I'll be watching that as well. I love Laura Linney. I guess I have a while to wait for season 7 of The Blacklist on Netflix, since it's still airing on NBC. I hate every character on the show except the lead played by James Spader haha! Most of the characters are such hypocrites and quite annoying, but James Spader is completely delightful.

 

[amirm]

I love the Expanse - you must read the books - they are great.

We started to watch the first few episodes and it was so hard to figure out what was going on, and the pace so slow that we gave up. I think that is the last binge watching we did!

 

[pjug]

Just started Unorthodox. My wife picks. If I don't like what's on I just surf ASR. But I like this one.

 

[astr0b0y]

New series by the director of Deus Ex Machina, Devs. Nice slow burn mixed with disconcerting soundtrack.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8134186/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

 

[stunta]

We started to watch the first few episodes and it was so hard to figure out what was going on, and the pace so slow that we gave up. I think that is the last binge watching we did!

Same here but my friend recommended I stick with it so I did. I've watched all seasons twice already. Sound effects are really good.

I would also recommend The Counterpart on Amazon. Very interesting.

Does anyone else find the sound quality on Amazon way better than that on Netflix?

 

[Blumlein 88]

Yes, +1 for Altered Carbon. Of course if you are more a reader try the novels instead. They are even better.

A series I really liked seemed to get overlooked when released. It is "The Night of" on HBO. Really good in my opinion, most especially how the ending is done. "Beforeigners" is a recent series on HBO. A little uneven, but rather different. A situation where people show up from other times in history in the modern world. Time migrants of a sort.

And yes for anyone who hasn't do check out "Better Call Saul" to see how the attorney in Breaking Bad, Saul Goodman, came to the place he was.

On Netflix, "the Witcher" if sort of fantasy stuff is your taste. "Giri/Haji" is another sleeper of a series. Set in Tokyo and London. Then there is "Babylon Berlin" set just before WWII. "Mindhunter" is very good based upon the real events that went into the development of the FBI's profiling of criminals. Also reality based is "Unbelievable" which is quality programming about actual events. For something more light heart-ed comedy try "the Invention of Lying" with Jennifer Garner and Ricky Gervais. A world like ours, but where no one ever lies, and never does or has. Yet an out of work Ricky Gervais discovers lying is possible. He must deal with the implications of that.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Does anyone else find the sound quality on Amazon way better than that on Netflix?

I think it depends upon how you get the stream. If done from some devices, Amazon is better as it usually is DD+. While some streaming devices aren't streaming in DD+, merely stereo or DD. Yet something like the Roku presents Netflix as DD+ with pretty good sound quality. My pet peeve is the awful sound quality if you use Youtube TV.

 

[HemiRick]

U-Tube TV is nothing better than stereo in my experience, and yes this makes watching movies preferable elsewhere.

 

[PierreV]

+1 for the expanse, and the books ofc
black mirror - some episodes are amazing indeed.
I also liked "The Man in the High Castle" a lot (but I grew up partly on Dick's novels and short stories).
Altered Carbon - season 1 was decent too good, did not like season 2: too many plot holes, incoherence, and inconsistent characters. Books are better.

My semi-recent favorite remains "Westworld" though. Great plot, great music, great acting, great cinematography.

 

[nm4711]

If you have/get Disney+, The Mandalorian is worth watching.
You could try The Orville. The setting is similar to Star Trek, but it is comedy. Sometimes it is a bit dumb.
I just finished Star Trek Picard.

For none Scifi:
Money Heist is a pretty good show.
Tom Clany´s Jack Ryan is good, too.
And Chernobyl was really interesting and a bit scary.

+1 for The Witcher, Eureka and The Man in the High Castle

 

[Ceburaska]

Largely re bingeing old favourites such as Buffy and Battlestar Galactica.
The following are entirely my opinionated views, feel free to ignore.
I have enjoyed the Expanse, although only halfway through S4, hasn’t quite grabbed me yet. I read the books with the expectation that all the deep political skulduggery in the show would be even richer on the page. It wasn’t. Far from it. Probably the only time I’ve ever felt that. So I’ve stuck with the show since.
Altered Carbon...well I got to the end of S1, somehow. Some good ideas and set up, but didn’t pay off in an interesting way. Not recommended.
Westworld had a great S1, with a disappointing finale. Then carried on being disappointing. Worth watching for S1 though.
Black Mirror is very uneven, but I far prefer the earlier series. National Anthem must be the weirdest, most shocking debut episode of any show ever.
Man in the High Castle suffered from huge changes in writing staff season to season. S3 and 4 feel quite disjointed vs S1-2. But overall I enjoyed it (even S4), and Rufus Sewell is outstanding.
Mindhunter is quite good. Tries to be Mad Men in the FBI. But isn’t. However the serial killer interviews are incredible.
Witcher was mostly fun, with a pointlessly complicated structure, but some good performances. Look forward to S2.
Chernobyl is possibly even better than Band of Brothers. It’s fictionalised. But captures the feel and tone of 80s USSR like no other show.
Having rewatched Dollhouse late last year I would recommend it. It’s only two seasons. Joss Whedon. Starts a bit slow but covers a lot of similar ground to Westworld. But far better in my view.
Firefly, also by Joss Whedon, is only 14 episodes, but pure genius. Beloved by anyone who has ever watched it, even non Whedon fans. Space western. The greatest collection of characters ever in space.
The Westworld showrunner also did Person of Interest. I hesitate to recommend as S1 is largely a by the numbers police procedural. Then it starts to become interesting. It’s final season is one of the best conclusions I’ve ever seen.
Frankly most good fantasy and sci fi remains literary. So I have re read Dune recently (all the books except godawful God Emperor). It will be very interesting to see what Denis Villeneuve makes of it with his (two?) films.

 

[Hugo9000]

+1 for Mindhunter and The Witcher! (Although I hate to admit that I was a little confused by the timeline shifts on The Witcher at first. My excuse is that I was tired as it was very long past my usual bedtime haha!) My only problem with both of those shows is that there aren't enough episodes, and before I knew it, I was finished and having to wait for the next installment, which could be a while haha! So then I go back and binge-watch an old favorite like The X-Files, which takes up a lot of time (9 old-fashioned full-length U.S. seasons of 20+ episodes, plus two movies and the later addition of three 'event' series).

Another Life is pretty good. The star is Katee Sackhoff of Battlestar Galactica (reboot) fame.

A long-time favorite corny fantasy show, Supernatural, is finally coming to an end after 15 seasons. That's probably the last show with full-length seasons to survive on television (most seasons had 23 episodes). You have to like the stars, otherwise the show might be somewhat awful? I'm probably not a good judge, since I've managed to enjoy it very much despite at least one idiot showrunner stearing it off-course for a while haha! The lead actors keep the show's 'universe' consistent, like Sigourney Weaver did in even the worst of the Alien movies haha!

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina is another fun but corny fantasy. Michelle Gomez is my favorite on the show.

I still need to get around to watching The Man in the High Castle. I'm sure there are a few others I've missed. I've watched most of Black Mirror and generally quite liked it, except for the pig episode. That was ridiculous to me. Perhaps because I'm not even remotely a monarchist? Who would do that for some random person who happened to be born with a title and some celebrity? LMAO. But the way the world is, and politics specifically, who knows, perhaps the episode was somewhat plausible? haha!

 

[nm4711]

I've watched most of Black Mirror and generally quite liked it, except for the pig episode. That was ridiculous to me.

This pig episode made me stop watching Black Mirror. I should give it another chance. The episodes before were quite nice.