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I don’t think it was just poor acting that did it. Even Ben Barnes, who I think is a really good actor, couldn’t make up for the poor writing and direction. He was definitely still the highlight for me, but watching him in this versus The Punisher or season 1 of Westworld really showed how much the material was lacking here.
There certainly were some actors I wasn’t particularly enamoured with, but I think quite a few of them did as well as they could with what they had to work with. I think fairly flat direction and undynamic scenes were the biggest issue, even more so than the not-so-great writing.
In general, though, I found it just felt very “young adult fiction”, and not in a good way. I never ended up finishing the first season either.
I read the books after watching the show. Honestly, no. Couldn’t get through the third book.
I started with books 4 & 5, not realising there was anything before them. They were much better. They’re a bit too YA for me, but I needed something to scratch the Gentleman Bastards itch.
Ah Gentlemen Bastards… now there’s a rabbit hole with a spike pit at the bottom.
I thought the premise was a pretty interesting idea to make a gripping political fantasy show. What I got was a one-guy-bad-one-teeny-superhuman chosen one bullshit. There was one character I liked, and only because he rolled his eyes et everything.
Man, we were spoiled by got… It feels like we had a peak with this one show and it’s all downhill since including got itself
Ok nvm there was at least andor
If you’re looking for a better show in this genre, check out His Dark Materials. It’s not as good as early GoT, and the middle of each season drags some, but overall I’d say it’s worth the watch
It was my favorite book as a kid and the adaptation not only did a good job, they elevated the entire story. It’s, honestly, the best adaptation I’ve ever seen. Can not suggest it highly enough.
Actually watched it. I read the book as a kid but forgot most of it. I think they did such a good job, I had multiple flashbacks where I thought: wait did I imagine it exactly like this or is this just from the picture I’m seeing and retroactively think I imagined it like it is shown in the show. Unfortunately the political component is not doing it for me.
Yeah, I really liked the premise. I never got into Game Of Thrones purely because it felt to me like it relished the violence, gore, sexual abuse, cruelty, etc, too much. I’m not some puritan who’s against stories featuring those things, but I don’t enjoy seeing them constantly depicted in detail.
Anyway, the idea Shadow and Bone being this fantasy show with in-depth politics without leaning too heavily into all that stuff was appealing to me. But yeah, it ended up just feeling rather tropey, flat, and very “young adult” (in a bad way).
Also: hell yes to Andor! It’s easily my favourite show from the past few years.
For me as well. Andor started a little bit slow, which makes it hard to recommend without warning to at least watch the first 4 episodes (which i think comes partly because our brains have been trained to have shorter and shorter attention spans). But then… Boy was it gripping. And there were real stakes! When was the last time in star wars that characters had to go into a high security building AND you were not 100% sure they all would come out unharmed? What? Like empire strikes back? And the usage of storm troups has never been better! I find it funny that I’d rather want to heare more about these no name characters than all these blant main chars from the movies. I think I could watch a whole series about the ISB… Fuck I’m rambling! Anyways. Agreed it’s good!
It’s funny you say that because in this case we do know that Andor would have to make it out given the events of Rogue One. However, I’d argue that you’re still right and that makes it even more compelling. We know Cassian’s fate which makes his entrapment even more impressive for how the hell he’d ever get out!
Yeah you are of course right regarding Cassian himself, and it’s certainly suspensful to see how exactly they get in/out. though at least in the 2nd arc I’d argue that it’s also interesting to see if they succeed or not. The money is a huge mcguffin, but it’s also one that the rebels can live without. Normally in star wars they steal something or someone that is important to further the story, but the money basically doesn’t matter and we see it not having any tangable effect on the rebels (though of course the heist increases the activity of the isb). That makes it unclear if they will even succeed. On the other hand there are a bunch of characters that conveniently get introduced so we can fear that they might die. And the do die.
I didn’t even know it got a second season. I watched the first, having read all of the books (and enjoyed Six of Crows) but it did nothing for me, and the characters I actually liked who were introduced about 3 seasons too early were around from the start and really disappointing.
I get why, because otherwise when it got up to book 4 we would have had a total change of setting, cast, tone and even genre, but the Crows were so useless. And the Nina backstory thing should have had its own flashback episode when it became relevant instead of mixing it into a completely unrelated story. I dunno, stick to the books for this one I think.
First I’m hearing of the show
netflix, like valve, can’t count to 3
