TV Series you will like to watch in the fall of 2016

For how much we may love Summer, TV Shows fits perfectly in our routine only in the Fall. Therefore I thought it could be a good idea to present a list of shows that I am expecting, with release dates, comments, etc. Of course, it is a product of my limited time to actually watch such shows, it is not expected to be a comprehensive list. 

Running shows

Let's begin with the easy part, shows that are known and I recommend because they triggered something in me in the past.

The Big Bang Theory, season 10, premiere on September 19, 2016. It has lost a lot of its brightness, but still remains a nice source of fun for 30 minutes a week. It is a show that hooked me up in my early university years, giving me characters to identify myself with, or anyway similar to what my friends are. Thus the affection to the show is strong, even after all these years. The almost complete absence of a main plot, as a sit-com requires, guarantees that until they can make nice jokes and stay away from too many repetitions (harder and harder after so many years), we can have fun with our favorite nerds.

Gotham, Season 3, premiere on September 19, 2016. It is a Series centered on villains, telling the story of commissioner Gordon years before the existence of Batman. It has great cameo, brand new origin stories, a dark, brutal atmosphere mixed with the cartoonesque tone. It moves the plot with decision and good paste, all supported by a good credible acting. If you are not a comic books nazi, this is your show.

The Flash, Season 3, premiere on October 4, 2016. I love the superhero since I was a kid, therefore I am pretty damn biased. Nevertheless, the tone of the show is funny and entertaining, forget about the modern dark comic books, The Flash will not use those shades, without avoiding to deal with tragedy. It has its own epic moments, the first two seasons had a good climax and I have no reason to expect otherwise from this one. If you can survive to a few first episodes usually not so great, you will enjoy it.

The Walking Dead, Season 7, premiere on October 23, 2016. I spent the last 6 months thinking about if it was fitting in such a list, that is remarkable since this blog didn't even exist. It is true that every season AMC is giving us a show substantially made of 3 or 4 breathtaking scenes in an ocean of filler hours where people is essentially walking around for no reason. However, if you got this far, you want to see it, you secretly hate yourself for that, but you want to see this new world that Negan is bringing to the show that, to be honest and considering all the problems mentioned above, still looks pretty fresh to be in its seventh year. We have the ultimate bad guy (he stole the show in only 11 minutes), that just killed one of the main characters (and we don't know who is yet), and we have a group that became really cocky in the last 3 years literally on their knees. And then there is Lucille. 

And.She.Is.Awesome.

New Shows

Now the most difficult (and interesting) part. Shows that will be aired for the first time. It is very difficult to keep up with all the new shows, these are just a few of them that had a trailer that evoked the right emotions in me or captured my attention for the plot. I try to cover both comedy and drama and these are the titles that stepped out.


Better Things, premiere on September 8, 2016. A comedy show on a divorced actress raising her three daughters by herself. It captured my attention mostly because Louis CK, that based a lot of his material on his own similar situation, is one of the creators. Here is the trailer, I am looking forward to this show.

Quarry, premiere on September 9, 2016. The trailer of this series is great, it hooked me up instantly. It is the story of a marine who returns from Vietnam and find himself not accepted by the society and not ready to accept the society as well, therefore we will see his life falling apart on a very bad path.

Kevin Can Wait, premiere on September 19, 2016. It's a sit-com about a retired cop, it is meant to be light and funny, the trailer shows this two aspects so it ended up on this list. I can see myself giving a shot to this series as well as abandoning it because too similar to the dozen of other shows.

The Good Place, premiere on September 19, 2016. As you can see from the trailer, it is a comedy show about a young woman that dies and ends up by mistake in The Good Place, therefore she is now trapped in a world full of good people that cannot curse. It is a premise promising enough for me to give it a shot.

Speechless, premiere on September 21, 2016. A comedy show that will be focused on disability. The trailer is very promising, we have a family full of different personalities that will just collide with the rest of the world, it looks an explosive show addressing in a smart way the difficulty that the society has with respect to dealing with a disability.

Pitch, premiere on September 22, 2016. It tells the story of the first woman in the major league. The trailer reveals that the fictional main character will have, as you may expect, to face the skepticism of the public, and the expectations of her father. Therefore I am curious to see how they will develop the story, how she will deal with such pressure and how they are going to execute all of it.

Marvel's Luke Cage, available on Netflix on September 30, 2016. Introduced in the first season of Jessica Jones, he is another component of the soon-to-be-aired The Defenders TV Series. Netflix has proven itself to be a major player in the Marvel universe, presenting an innovative crossover techniques better explained in this post. I don't know much about him, except what I saw in the trailer and in Jessica Jones, but I have no reason to expect anything less than another good quality product, with the action of superheroes coming from comic books, and the deepness that Netflix usually introduces in its shows. It can also be a good methadone while we wait for the new The Punisher show, coming next year.

Frequency, premiere on October 5, 2016. It is the story of a detective that lost her father 20 years ago, however she ends up speaking with him through time via ham radio. This inevitably changes history, but not her memories, leaving the main character in a life that is not hers, mixing all of that with her professional career. I like the idea, but to be honest I suspect that it will be canceled at the end of the first season. In the meantime, here's the trailer.

Timeless, premiere on October 3, 2016. A series on a similar tone that it is probably going to last longer. A criminal steals a time machine and goes back in time to destroy the USA. As we can see from the trailer, a woman is sent back to save the day, there will be considerations about American history and race issues. If you like time travel stories it should be entertaining.


This is my list, I am well aware of how partial it could be, so please let me know in the comments what did I miss.

If Stephen King had written the Goonies 30 years ago: Stranger Things

I'm getting used to the good quality of the Netflix original series and, to be honest, I am still recovering from the punch in the stomach that Orange is the new black gave me. Nevertheless, the new series Stranger Things has managed to enter into my mind. To give you the taste of how surprised I was about how good it is, I have to confess that I watched it twice. Back to back.

Being a not famous series (yet) and being fairly recent, this review will be completely spoiler free.

It a story that takes place in the '80s and breathes '80s at every step. In a classic small quiet town, those where everyone knows everyone, where there is a school with bullies and romance, something happens and everything goes sideways. A kid goes missing, another kid with superpowers mysteriously appears and the show moves very straightforwardly from that (episode 1, scene 3) to the end. 

If you very much appreciate a simple story line (simple, not trivial) that without wasting any time leads you to the next turn, this is your show. It masterfully plays the citation game. There are continuous references to classic movies of the '80s, either in dialogues, situations or in random shots. In principle it is something that I don't like, especially when it is done so constantly. However, in Stranger Things it just works, since it maintains its identity, it has its own story. The effect is creating in the viewer an almost unconscious nostalgic feeling while seeing something new. I personally went back to my childhood, sitting on the couch on Saturday morning, raining outside and a VHS playing on the TV. 

The atmosphere is dark, I found brilliant the use of lights and absolutely functional to the story, as well as the soundtrack. It is undeniably a good quality product, Netflix is really stepping out. Some locations are common with the one in the first season of The Walking Dead and I liked the choice because some shots were familiar and yet way more terrifying.

The story is unraveled from 3 points of view: the kids, the teenagers and the adults. 

The kids are this new version of the Goonies, they face a dramatic situation as kids do: softening from time to time the atmosphere with some comedy or, you know, by being kids. The acting is credible, all of them are very well characterized. The trick is done by not trying to make them too tridimensional, but giving tridimensionality to the group. So we have Mike, that is the leader, the master in their D&D story, smart and cautious. Then there is Lucas, living next door, full of energy, more reckless and determinate. Dustin, being the comic component of the group that keeps the group together. And, there is Eleven, a mysterious girl with superpowers (remember, it is a spoiler free review).

The teenagers and the adults are less central and in them we find more sides in the same character, although we can't talk about an evolution of them. This makes sense since the all story takes place in a week or so. The result is a very natural acting and I think that when the characters manage to be transparent to the story that they are telling us, it's a big win for the show.

The three points of view give us a perspective broad enough to not need any further explanation since very often such explanation ruins the mystery. In Stranger Things we see just what the characters see and it is sufficient to make us understand bits of the plot at every episode, without spoiling the full story. 

One last consideration. The episodes very often end by opening an arc of tension, that is very annoying when it is done consistently by TV Shows since then you have to wait a week to see how it ends. For a Netflix show, again, it just works, you can simply watch the next episode and such tension is usually resolved in the first few minutes. I've personally appreciated having this kind of possibility, to have the freedom of choosing how to deal with such tension. Sometimes I decided to live with it for a day or two, let the tension grow for a bit, sometimes I just decided to sleep one hour less.

In conclusion, it is a TV Show that I fully recommend, it is entertaining, it has a good sci-fi story, it brings you 30 years back in a good way, it has lovable characters, great soundtrack and, generically, it is very well executed. The perfect summer gift.

Independece Day 2: We got old

Synopsis: We are 20 years after the events of Independence Day, the world is living an era of peace and cooperation. We are even on the moon, building weapons and shit, but something goes horribly wrong. The aliens that we destroyed 20 years ago, are coming back and very very pissed at us. They brought a new ship, that is bigger and lands on 1/4 of the planet, they kill hundreds of millions of no one and a few someone for about 10 minutes, then we fail a couple of times to take them down and when they are about to win, they don't because fuck them. Oh yeah, there is also an outrageous amount of time spent to set up a sequel, but after this post I will not dedicate any minute of my life to it.

As you may have noticed, I didn't like at all the movie, so I will try to be calm and explain myself. 

First, the confrontation with the past is inevitable if you call your movie Independence Day 2. The first one was the perfect storm of blockbusters, it was funny, there was tension, the practical effects were great, there were messages that even the child version of myself caught from now and then, there was the best president in USA history (we will get to him in a moment) and the. best. extra. ever. 

On top of that, there were emotions, so well displayed that even today I cry watching that movie. Therefore, knowing that such a masterpiece could not be beaten, the confrontation is not going to be generous.

The major emotion this movie transmits is 

Holy crap, 20 years? Seriously? Daaamn, look at him! How old he got!

The movie starts slowly. If the first scene of the 1996 masterpiece was the arrival of the aliens near the moon, this time we have to wait 30 minutes (at best) to see the plot moving to what we came for.

The building up of the new characters is too specific and doesn't make much sense, being such characters absolutely flat and uninteresting. I mean, Will Smith was a pilot dreaming of going to space, facing the ruthless politics to get such honor. They explained that to us in one minute, while moving the plot along. This made us more involved in his emotions when he finally got into space. This time, for 20 minutes we collect the existence of new characters and still we have no reason at all to care about them. For a while they feed us this Top Gun-like rivalry, except that is lost in like a second and ultimately irrelevant for the plot.

The feeling is that, since the main purpose was to set up the universe for the sequel(s), they just introduced too many characters without having nothing to make them do. At the same time, they wanted to keep part of the old cast, that worked perfectly for the 20 years effect but sometimes is also too much. For example, it was good to see the old general at the commemoration of the independence day (like 5 seconds, I felt something, well done), but show us Will Smith's wife that now is a doctor and dies without doing anything was too much. Her death on screen is justified by a horrible dialogue happening an hour later, it just makes the movie crowded.

One of the most memorable aspects of the first movie was the USA president Whitmore, by far the best president in history. A man that does not leave the White House in a crisis to make people feel safe, a man that leads his troops from the front line, and I don´t care if his healthcare policies were sloppy and he did nothing for gun control, that speech is still inspiring humankind. The producers know what incredible gem they found in 1996 and they want to keep that fire on. He gives another good speech, that is one of the many winks to the fan, but it just happens in a random moment, to a random audience. Therefore they just go big and mix the amazing president that he was to another old character, forever remembered as a loving father, alcoholic pilot, and true hero.

  

This guy

To sum up, it is a movie poorly executed. The uninteresting characters for an unwanted sequel, the visual effects that somehow looked better 20 years ago (as practical effects usually do with respect to CGI), the constant references to the first movie that are funny 20% of the times at best, the completely impersonal death of millions (in contrast with the first movie, where the victims were characterized enough to look human), and the slow development of the plot are just a few of the critical point of this mess.

Nevertheless, there are reasons to think about few interesting aspects (but I admit it could be just me overthinking to fill the page). 

The first though regards the aliens, 20 years ago they were so much better than us and they still are, we copied their technology but they still beat us. They seem to be more evolved than us, living in constant connection to a collective mind. However, it turns out that such collective mind and consciousness was not collective at all, but rather shared by their queen, the only mind that matters. At the same time, for 20 years humankind appears to have experimented something very similar to a collective consciousness, living in peace for a common goal. Indeed there is no need to have any major asshole on the human side (as the Secretary of Defense of the first movie was). And still, the only one that matters is America, Fuck Yeah. I found it an interesting parallelism.

I also found interesting seeing that 20 years ago one of the themes was the fear and mistrust of technology. The aliens were using our satellites against us, a mysterious computer virus can take the aliens down but is looked with skepticism, etc. Now technology is naturally part of our life and the movie reflects that very well. On the same level, 20 years ago the importance of recycling and preserving the world was embodied by the main character and here apparently not even he is giving a fuck about it anymore. It could be the recognition of a lost cause, it could be that the battle is won and such message is unnecessary or, more simply, it could be the poor writing appreciated along the entire movie.

All that being said, if you are thinking to spend your time and money to watch this train wreck, I strongly recommend you not to. It's luckily a movie that is going to be forgotten very soon, at least by me as soon as I reach the end of the period. 

Orange is the new black will tear you apart

I have just finished watching the 13 episodes of Orange is the new black, season 4. I begin with the main message: it is, by far, the best season of this show and, in my opinion, one of the best seasons on the technical point of view of any show.

There will be no spoiler until the picture. Then you can expect some minor spoiler.

This Netflix show was one of the most addicting since the very first episode, the structure itself is designed to this specific purpose. A blurry main plot, almost in the background of the inmates' lives, personal details unraveled flashback after flashback, painting for us the character chosen on that particular occasion to move the plot along. The result is almost always a perfect arc of tension, resolving itself into the next one. 

This aspect is somehow enhanced in this last season, where we can see a firm change of tone in the narration and in the themes faced by the show. Season 4 reaches new unexplored levels of darkness, finally fully addressing very important issues plaguing our society.

There is still comedy, a lot, stuffed inside casual dialogues, you barely see the punch line coming and therefore you really feel it. Occasionally you will find yourself in tears for the jokes, the references to common problems of our society, and, most of all, the great majority of the characters is built up to be hilarious.

However, OISTNB is also about the hundreds of tragedies that brought those characters to be in prison, to be who they are. The result is a perfectly grotesque representation of the human condition, being the inmates and the guards a reflection of our nature. The show makes us laugh about them, in order to take our own problems less seriously for a moment, the moment in which we can see the funny side of it.

It is only at that point that the show hits harder on the viewer. Right after making us appreciating how funny the deformations of the grotesque style can be, the show makes them disappear, leaving us naked in front of the tragedy that it is really telling us. This show is about broken people, what you don't expect is how broken you can be once that you realize it.

I will try to develop this concept in the spoiler section of this post, for the time being let's move on to the second innovation of this season.

Piper was initially introduced as the main character, but we soon realized that her life wasn't more important or relevant than the other dozens that are orbiting around her. This season finally takes the step further and reveals the true role of Piper. I see her as nothing but the narrator of a story where she as a minor role, exposing the tales of the true protagonist and simultaneously antagonist of the show: the prison. 

The prison is the reason why every little story matters to us and it is, as an institution, the evil character providing the real plot. OISTNB is about how devastating the prison is, expressing this concept in an innovative manner.

The innovation is not in showing how brutal can a specific prison be (like other prison shows do, for example Oz), but rather illustrate how emotionally and physically devastating is the prison as an institution. The characters' lives are, on this point of view, the background over which the viewers can appreciate this brutality, feeling it deep in their bones. 

While the true main character (i.e. the prison) moves its plot along by crushing everyone's life, the humans in the show are just powerless actors in a twisted game. They are there in order to make us identify ourselves with them, to make us feel the darkness of a society that needs prisons to feel safer. Everyone in the show is embodying a primordial aspect of human nature, it can be sexuality, it can be the fear and the consequent discrimination, they embody the prejudices we don't admit to have, the delusions we build all around us to look like decent people.

As anticipated, minor spoilers ahead (just revealing major themes, not events), but it is difficult to be more specific otherwise.

Once that you set up a season with a darker tone, you can dig deep in major themes that made Season 4 an absolute masterpiece. The first theme of the season is racial discrimination and segregation. If in the past 3 seasons it was on the background, one of the major problems of our society is finally elevated as the driving force to move the plot along. The stupidity of this plague is exposed episode after episode (here the grotesque style works perfectly), until the main character, the prison, starts revealing its intrinsically evil nature against everyone with no exception.

Moreover, the choice of having veterans as guards is enforcing a strong parallelism between prison and another great brutal equalizer such as war. 

It is true that in many parts of the world the process leading to prison is affected by different levels of racial discrimination, but the common feeling the society has towards the inmates is not about race and takes the voice of the captain of the guards

It seems that, somewhere along the way, everyone around here forgot the only thing that matters. You are criminals and you deserve nothing. And if I have to make an example of each and everyone of you to back this place back in order... well, that will be my pleasure.

A sentence that exposes the main theme: prison is not designed to rehabilitate or reeducate, it is designed to be a punishment. Once we admit that, the natural consequence is the destruction of the little bit of humanity left, leaving the viewer naked in front of how worthless and inhumane such a punishing system is. Those that survives to the prison are then abandoned in a world not ready to welcome them back, because unconsciously knows that rehabilitation was what was needed, but not what we (as society) provided.

To conclude, I felt physical pain in seeing how hard the show can throw this reality to my face. A reality wrapped into practical jokes, satirical references, the usual blue note of the flashbacks and a dark shadow all over the present. 

What did you feel instead? Am I just seeing what I want to see?

Do yourself a favor and watch Dark Matter

Tonight the new season of Dark Matter will be premiered on Syfy, so I decided to review the first season, although I am one year late. In my defense, this blog didn't exist a year ago.

I'm always reluctant to watch Syfy's shows, mostly because there is always a good chance that such shows are going to be canceled after few seasons and I, as every viewer, don't want a broken heart. However, I liked Dark Matter so much in so little time that I took my chances.

Before going any further, I promise there will be no spoilers ahead, mostly because this is not Game of Thrones, no one saw this show a year ago. 

Let me begin with the negative aspects of the series, being the least important things for me this time. Dark Matter is a name to attract people like me, I am still trying to figure out the meaning of such title and I don't like it because is basically click-baiting, but (roll credits) titles are complicated. Maybe that's why every episode has no title. I also found the characters a little stereotyped in the very beginning of the season, but they acquired more deepness episode after episode so I didn't mind that much. It is also true that, being a low budget show, you will not find the best acting performances or the best visual effects.

The main plot is about six characters, traveling on a space ship, that wake up from cryosleep with no memories at all about who are they or where are they going. Most of the episodes have a structure founded in some not so important sub-plot that resolves itself within 40 minutes and partially moves along the main story. This is not a structure that I particularly like because very often the show feeds us the answers and, generically and like every TV series with this structure, make it too easy. My issue with shows like that is that sometimes the sub-plots are very boring or not credible.

However, in this case I have to admit that works very well since the main story is always pushed forward (I can complain about a couple of central episodes at most). The result is extremely entertaining because every episode contains action, constant movement of the main characters, without failing to provide us a solid mystery, a reason to see the next episode and to doubt about our own hypothesis. 

In this context, I particularly appreciated the fact that they don't spend much time to set up the universe, we just have the strictly necessary information to understand what is going on. We just know that we are in a future distant enough that Star Wars 36 is considered a classic, that there exists a Galactic Authority that should enforce the law and grant peace and safety, but the real power is held by big selfish corporations. I know that such disregard to the set up is going to piss off some nerd, but the solidity of the plot and the way it is presented make this defect irrelevant.

On top of that, that is almost everything that matters to me for a TV series, there are few interesting themes. 

(Minor spoilers ahead, nothing that you can't see from episode 1 anyway)

The characters shortly find out their real names and stories, in particular that they all have a criminal past. However, they keep their made-up names, so depersonalizing to be just numbers. I found very interesting how every character doesn't let their true self be defined by what the records say, but rather by what they feel right. 

At the same time, they have to face the fact that they can't run away from their past and, most of all, they feel the need to know who they really are. Because it is clear to all of them that somewhere in their memories, there is some traumatizing event that made them criminals, but they can't help their curiosity, their human need of knowledge. They all feel that knowing how they got there is crucial to not fall into the old bad habits.

The dynamic within each character is thus very interesting, constantly moving from one need to the opposite one, constantly fighting to identify themselves in a universe that put a heavy label on them.

Another interesting theme, although very common in the genre, regards the feelings of artificial lives. By asking themselves if such feelings are real although they were designed and assembled in some laboratory, they show how destabilizing is for them the existence of a creator. I found this a very nice way to explore the theme of religion. If a creator exists, there should also be a reason, a purpose, for the character existence. Such purpose is not known and the uncertainty can eventually consume the confidence of the character itself. I assume this is why then humans invented religions in the first place.

To conclude, it is a very enjoyable show, facing deep themes and providing action to move the plot along. Although the single episode can be predictable from time to time, the main plot is solid and every important twist will punch you in the face without you see it coming. 

What do you think about it? Did you enjoy it?