Fleishman in in Trouble

I watched Fleishman in in Trouble on Hulu. Each episode is around an hour long. There are eight episodes in the first season. I would be surprised if this show came back for a 2nd season. Not saying it is bad. I think the story has been told and I don't see a need to continue it. 

This is a tough show. I can't say that it was an enjoyable experience, but I was enthralled by it. It was heartbreaking. Some parts hit really close to home. It is about a group of people the same age as me. It introduces this idea that even if everything has gone well in your life and you find yourself in a good spot, it doesn't change the fact that you chose a path and now your options are limited. You can't help but look back and think "what if". 

When things are going well in life it is easy to avoid thinking about the possibilities of all the other lives that you didn't pursue. But when things start to fall apart in life, it is hard not to question every decision you have ever made. Fleishman is in Trouble gives us a perspective into both scenarios. 

The other theme that really stuck out to me with Fleishman is in Trouble is how much power other people have to hurt us. As soon as we open up and get close to someone, we give them so much power. Even if they don't mean to, the little things they do can rip us apart. Relationships fall apart a little bit at a time... and then all at once.

I loved how the first 70% of this show focuses on Toby's story, but then completely turns everything on it's head by telling Rachel's story. Perspective is everything. It was heartbreaking when Toby was presented with the pain that Rachel was going through and he showed no compassion. I didn't know what to make of that. I don't know what will happen when they talk again. I am not giving either one of them enough credit to believe they are going to do the right thing. 

Overall Fleishman is in Trouble is well constructed and thought-provoking. It was never "fun" to watch. Most of the time I could only do one episode at a time and then needed to move onto something else to lighten things up a bit. 

As a 40 year-old married man I found it compelling. I probably identified most with our narrator, the Lizzy Caplan character. Her search for meaning in life was familiar. Her realization that she got what she wanted and she still wasn't satisfied was haunting. 

Shrinking Season 1

I think there is a real possibility that you haven’t ever heard of the show Shrinking on Apple TV+. It flew under my radar for a while. The gap between episodes in Ted Lasso Season 4 gave me the motivation to give this show a try.

In a lot of ways Shrinking works for the same reasons that Ted Lasso works. Lasso is better in nearly every way, but they have the same vibe. Shrinking is more of a drama than a comedy. It is actually pretty heavy material with quite a bit of levity thrown in. I don’t think I would ever laugh out loud during Shrinking, but that is fine with me.

We are given likable characters that are struggling with life and just wearing their problems on their sleeves. That is a fun place to spend time. Nothing needs to happen to transcend the tv drama/comedy genre. It was a good show that I enjoyed watching and blew through the first season in no time.

At first I didn’t know what to think about Harrison Ford. I liked his character and overall he played it well. There were some rough moments, especially at the beginning. Sometimes it didn’t feel like he fit. I think it got better, or more likely I just got used to it.

In general the show started out shaky for me. The tone right out of the gate felt a lot different than what the show eventually got to. At some point they just made up excuses for these people to be together all of the time for no good reason and it settled into a groove.

The overall situation of the show is incredibly sad, and seeing father and daughter navigate their relationship is heartbreaking. I don’t think the girl smiles at her dad until the final episode of the season. They threw us that little bone right at the end.

My favorite part might have been the neighbor, Derek. It was Jefferson Darcy playing the exact same character he did in Married With Children. That was an excellent touch.

BEEF on Netflix

BEEF is really good, but definitely not perfect. It fits into a genre of show/movie where something small happens and then continues to spin out of control until we reach ridiculous levels. It succeeds in spite of that escalation to absurdity. 

The plot is about two people who cross paths in a road rage incident. Both individuals are under stress anyway, and this event seems to be the breaking point in their lives. They decide they hate one another and dedicate a portion of their lives to making each other miserable. They don't realize how similar they really are. 

The show explores a lot of territory as we see more of these characters' lives. 

We have a hard-working wife who feels completely disconnected from her husband. Their family's financial security depends on her success, and she has put a ton of pressure on herself. There is interesting business, friendship, and mother-in-law dynamics she is dealing with also. 

We have a sibling relationship that is so interesting and heart-breaking. A character who is willing to work hard and earn everything he has, but who can't avoid the temptation to take shortcuts even though he knows they will be his undoing. 

Both of the main characters are extremely interesting. Their stories are cautionary tales and a reflection of how relationships can become defective over time. Things continually degrade and we are unable to identify or fix the root causes. 

At its best, BEEF is exploring those relationship dynamics. While I loved the cousin character, the chaos he brings to the plot did not work for me. I thought some of the spectacle that comes toward the end distracted from what the show was actually about. 

Overall I would highly recommend BEEF, but it won't be for everybody. The acting is phenomenal & the stories are for the most part interesting. The show manages to be funny and completely depressing most of the way through. I'd like to watch the series again at some point. The feelings it inspires and makes you sit in seem worth revisiting. 

Banshees of Inisherin

In Bruges was such a great movie. I was excited to see Collin Ferrel & Brandan Gleason team up for another romp. I didn’t quite understand what I was in for with Banshees of Inishiren. I absolutely loved this movie, but it was bleak. In fact, I think this movie was about hopelessness. Yet, it still remained fun to watch. This was a great film that I am looking forward to revisiting. 

Collin Ferrel lives on a small island. There isn’t much going on. There isn’t much potential. It is a place of routine. It is a pretty depressing place. It gave me the feeling of rats in a cage. There isn’t any potential. There isn’t much chance of getting out. 

Collin spends his days doing chores around the house and then going to the pub and chatting with his best friend. Then one day his best friend decides he doesn’t want to talk to him anymore. From there things unravel. It is clear these people feel like they don’t have anything to lose… except maybe a precious little donkey. 

This movie is heartbreaking and funny at the same time. It is a difficult needle to thread, but this movie does it expertly. I am not going to delve deep into this movie in this post. If you have HBO Max you should absolutely watch this movie. If you don’t, it is worth buying or renting on the on-demand service of your choice. 

I plan to watch Banshees again before I try to write about it in-depth.

NOPE

Jordan Peele is a talented Director. He consistently makes interesting movies. Nope is interesting, but easily my least favorite of his three films. Generally I think he is on a downward trajectory. 

Nope seems to be trying to make a statement about humanity’s obsession with spectacle. At the same time the movie itself makes a spectacle. It has a commentary on how the entertainment industry chews people up and spits them out. There are interesting ideas in there, but I found them cumbersomely explored. 

Nope is not a bad movie. It was enjoyable to watch, but left me wanting a lot more. There are plenty of things that Peele introduces for us to consider. But I felt like I didn’t get it. I decided to read some reviews and it is clear I am not the only one who wasn’t tracking with the message of the movie. 

I cannot recommend this movie. However, I think there is plenty for people to enjoy. It just falls short for what I wanted & expected. 

Time for spoilers…

We start the movie with a scene of Gordy, which is potentially the most interesting element of the movie for me. Gordy is a chimp who stars in a sitcom. One day he loses it and bashes the heads of his co-stars. Gordy was exploited for the entertainment of humans… much like the child star that survives the melee. 

Those are some of the first images of the film and set the stage for what we see in the rest of the movie, which is about a UFO terrorizing a horse farm. There were some nice homages to classic alien movie sequences. I quite liked the guy from Fry’s, but overall it didn’t engage me. 

Early on when we were at the horse ranch I just wanted to get back to the tv set with the crazy chimpanzee. When I realized how the separate stories tied together I was let down. The Ricky Park character was interesting, but we didn’t get to spend enough time with him. I wanted to know more of how he went from child star to shitty cowboy park owner. I believe we are to understand that Ricky fed horses to the ufo creature? Did people watch this happen and survive in the past? I was a little confused by this. Was Ricky more aware of the creature’s true nature? 

I guess that is the biggest spoiler of the movie. We are led to believe that this is a UFO movie about aliens. It is actually a creature movie about some flying beast that is just trying to survive. We don’t know much of anything about it. It east stuff and then regurgitates a lot of it back up… or down. 

I didn’t find the movie all that exciting, but I was looking forward to what happened at the end. I wanted to see how this showdown was going to go. I even liked the addition of the cinematographer with the crank camera. That was all building to something that I was looking forward to. Then I ended up hating nearly everything about the end. The culmination of everything was a massive let-down. Again… I don’t think it was bad… it just wasn’t interesting. 

I feel like I could sit through Nope again and it might hit me different. I might find more to latch onto. I am almost sure I would like it better the second time around. However, I am just not sure it would be worth dedicating the time to.

The Menu

I heard The Menu was good via my favorite film podcast. I saw it was available on HBO Max so I made sure to not read or listen to anything else about it so I could go in unsullied. I am really glad I did. I really enjoyed it, and not having any clue what was happening really added to the experience. 

As the story unfolds it took me a little bit to get my bearings about what was going on. As the audience we follow a specific couple. I had a really difficult time figuring out the nature of their relationship. I also didn’t understand the man’s role in the dinner party until the true intent of the chef started to be revealed. 

The first part of the movie was confusing, but I liked that experience. It was great. It set the stage for this grand show, but the second half didn’t deliver. There were several things that came from a much more conventional film. I was waiting for something more profound and meaningful, but it let me down. 

This movie is about a chef making food, but more generally it is about an artist creating art. Once art is put out into the world the artist has no control over how it is received. It will be misunderstood and criticized. It will be loved and appreciated for the wrong reasons, by people the artist doesn’t like or respect. Usually the artist has little recourse. They become tortured. They may change their art in constant response to the dialog from fans and critics. This movie is about an artist who is tired of the narrative. He doesn’t want to play this game anymore. He wants to take back control of his legacy, for better or worse. 

I really liked the ideas that were set up. I was just really underwhelmed by how it all got resolved. Still, this is a movie worth watching. For me it might even be worth watching a 2nd time. The movie will hit different once you understand what is going on. I want to experience the first half again and see if I still appreciate it as much as I did the first time around. 

I recommend The Menu. If you have HBO Max it is a solid psychological thriller that will keep you guessing. 

** Spoilers **

There were several plot elements down the stretch that didn’t seem to match with what I thought the movie was trying to do. 

I didn’t like the sequence where he made the men run away, only to immediately catch them. I guess this was to give them a glimmer of hope, much like the coast guard guy showing up. He wanted to watch the guests get that sparkle in their eye thinking there was a chance to get out of this, just to see it die again. 

I also didn’t like the fight between the girls. That was like a scene from an action movie. 

These things weren’t terrible… they just didn’t fit with what I thought the rest of the movie was doing. They weren’t as narratively interesting as I thought this movie was going to be able to achieve. 

Those things were minor compared to my biggest complaint with the ending. I hated the way the girl gets to escape. It was so simplistic and surface-level. She saw a picture from when he worked at a burger place… so she asked for a burger so he would realize his love for cooking once again. It was all so… lame.

I don’t know what I wanted to happen, but I wanted it to be more interesting. I wanted it to carry more weight and have more meaning. 

The Menu wasn’t as satisfying or deep as I wanted, but it was still a good flick that is definitely worth a watch.

Everything Everywhere All At Once

After hearing about how great this movie was for the last several months from critics I respect, I decided to go to my local Redbox and rent it. I knew very little about this film going in. I knew that it was going to be about multiple universes. I hadn’t even thought about the title and what that might mean in the context of a multi-universe plot. I also knew it was from The Daniels, who also made Swiss Army Man, an incredible cinematic journey. 

Everything Everywhere all at Once is less absurd than Swiss Army Man, but it still extremely absurd. It is also funny, and touching… and completely chaotic. I really enjoyed the ride. I would highly recommend watching it. It isn’t conventional and it isn’t going to hit right for everybody, so consider that my disclaimer. 

I think it is remarkable how this film can morph into different things for different people. There is so much going on that different people will derive a different meaning depending on their perspective. The relationship between mother and daughter is central to the film, but I actually latched onto the dynamics between husband and wife. There are several other key relationships that could define the movie for you. 

For me the movie was about finding the joy in the life you have. It was about appreciating your family and being thankful for your shared history. Those are the feelings that struck me through the narrative. It is entirely possible to have a separate reading based on your own life experience. 

I think we are ready to get into… spoilers

As I saw it, the multiple universes and the chaos going on inside the daughter’s brain is a metaphor for our current world. Our focus and attention are fractured. There are always more inputs to distract us from our current reality. The daughter has cracked under the pressure of expectations. She has become nihilistic. There is no reason to even try anymore. 

Her mother must dive into this world of chaos and find her. While doing so she is confronted with her own daemons. Does she like who she is and what she has become? She also is reintroduced to her husband that allows her to see him in a new light. She realizes that he has also made sacrifices along the way. 

We all get wrapped up in our own selfish nature. We all feel like we are the victims of our own circumstance. It is easy to tell ourselves a story that any negative emotion was the result of something somebody else did. We don’t want to take responsibility for our own situation. 

This movie had depth. There were moments that were touching. It was also completely insane. There are giant dildos and butt plugs. There is a reality where everyone has hot dog fingers that squirt out mustard.  Considering all of the chaos and complexity of the plot, the movie was easy to stay engaged with. I was right there with it all the way. That is an achievement. I often give up trying to keep track of what is going on in time travel and/or multiple universe type movies. Only the good ones keep me right there with it. This one was good. 

I don’t have a ton else to say about the movie. I have thought about it a fair bit since I finished it. I plan to watch it again. I highly recommend it, but understand if you don’t love it as much as I do. 

The White Lotuses

The first season was about wealth & privilege. The second season was about love & relationships. Both seasons had some gay sex; a fairly negative view of humanity, and the depressing reality that you should just learn to settle with what you are given.

I watched the first two seasons of the show all in one stretch. It worked well for me. I am glad I didn’t have to wait week-to-week for new episodes, or even a year for the 2nd season to be available. It helped me to compare the themes and see how similar the seasons really were.

This is a slice-of-life show where we get to meet different people and see them navigate life and relationships for a week. This week just happens to be while they are on vacation at a very fancy resort. Most of the people are very wealthy and entitled. I’m not sure exactly what the show was going for, but to me everybody is painted in a fairly negative light. The first season was filled with horrible people. I found characters more relatable in the second season, and therefore liked that season a bit better.

Each season starts with a scene that lets you know somebody has died at The White Lotus. Then the show goes back in time one week and shows you a group of vacationers arriving, with the presumption that one will not return home. All of the chess pieces are set, and then as viewers I guess we are supposed to figure out who is going to kill who. As we get closer to the end there are several scenarios where it is clear we are supposed to think this is the death scene. This feels tedious to me.

While the themes have a lot in common between the two seasons, the characters do not. There is only one element of character continuity and I wasn’t happy when I saw who it was. Jennifer Coolidge’s character was my least favorite from season 1. Her performance of a mentally unstable filthy rich woman was so over-the-top. I expected the worst going into season 2. However, it was a lot better this time around. Maybe I just got used to her performance, but for me the character was way more likable this time around.

I am interested in what people take away from this show. It is fun to watch, but it also seems to want to make statements about society. Most of those statements are not good. There is very little positivity in the show. Both season have couples that reconnect and go home a stronger couple than they came. I suppose that could be considered positive. Both season also have couples where at least one member hates their life but has resigned themselves to living in misery. I suppose this is a commentary on how frequently humanity detaches from their dreams and relies on distraction to get through each day.

The Kindle Scribe

My love for e-ink screens has meant that I’ve been interested in e-ink note taking devices like the Remarkable tablet for a while. I have never been interested enough to actually buy one. I keep waiting for the price to come down.

In the last month Amazon has entered the e-ink note-taking tablet with the Kindle Scribe. I am intrigued. If it cost less I would probably buy one. It is too big to carry around, but I think it would be awesome for reading at home… which is what I do 99% of the time. I feel like I would use the device to take notes quite a bit. I am not sure it is worth it for that purpose alone. I already have plenty of notebooks and carry one with me almost all the time. I could see the Scribe going with me to work meetings throughout the day as my primary note-taking device.

I think what I really want is an updated Kindle Oasis that is essentially a smaller version of the Scribe. I love my Oasis, but I wish it had a uniform thickness across the back like the Scribe. If Amazon released an Oasis with the form-factor of a smaller Scribe I would have a difficult time not buying it.

I have watched a lot of YouTube reviews for the Scribe. It seems very much like a first-generation device. I am content to wait for gen 2. Maybe the price will come down a little bit by then.

House of the Dragon

I’ve gotten behind on my prestige tv watching. I finally finished HotD just a few days ago. I thought I would have a lot to say about this show. I even tried to put together a long involved blog post about it. I couldn’t do it.

Game of Thrones was a great show that completely shat the bed at the end. I was so mad at how poorly the last couple of seasons were handled. When that series ended I swore off the GoT universe forever… but they sucked me back in with some HotD.

It worked. They won me back over. This was a good series of television. It uses some of the same tropes as GoT, but it also brings a lot of new ideas as well. It presents interesting characters and tells a compelling tale. The season covers so much time it feels rushed in some ways. At the same time it was competently delivered.

HotD was so much better than the last 2 seasons of GoT. That is all I really wanted. I don’t know if it is as good as GoT at its best. That also might not be a fair comparison. The innocent individual that enjoyed those early seasons hadn’t yet experienced the travesty that was about to come.

HotD was good enough that I am considering re-watching the season to better appreciate the early episodes with knowledge of where the characters are going. That was something I also had considered doing with GoT but in the end was glad I hadn’t wasted the time. Re-watching HotD might also be a waste of time, but I better do it now before they ruin the entire series in later seasons.