Maybe it was the inheritance tax? Rich kids seem lazier today.
The 3rd season of the Mandolorian wasn't as good as the first two. Unless it gets better. I don't like the creepy scientist or the perky recovering Imperial officer.
Isn't Netflix infamous for canceling successful shows in their third season likely because that's when contracts would be up for renegotiation?
I don't think Ibn Khaldun was familiar with Netflix
Is that the stereotype about TV shows? I thought it was more like: brilliant first season, sophomore slump, familiar and comforting but not great anymore.
We should explore this a bit. Should we be letting in the masses at the border, and kicking out third generation immigrants? My kids are going to have to lobby hard to count me as first generation.
I'm also intrigued by Barry's 4, but playing the Netflix apologist that, trust us, it's going to suck and it's better to end it this way.
You'll always be a second generation American to me.
This is going to save me a lot in college costs.
Demographic cliff. You'll save money regardless.
This doesn't speak to the many popular shows where the first season or two are something you "just have to get through" (or skip). Not only Parks and Rec but the majority of Star Trek shows.
TNG, which I'm currently watching, didn't start to get good until maybe season 3 or 4, and got more lazy and baroque in 6 and especially 7.
I'm not sure Netflix is particularly unusual about canceling series before they have to pay everyone more money. That kind of practice came up in coverage of last year's actors' and writers' strikes. But it seemed to be associated with the streaming model as a whole and Netflix is a convenient shorthand, since they probably started lots of bad practices for actors and writers.
The thing I find really frustrating is shows that start out as episodic procedurals and then decide they need mythology and serial story arcs in later seasons. The X-Files is the most famous example of this, but it happens all the time. Person of Interest and Grimm come immediately to mind. I also mourn for the first 3 or so episodes of Revenge when it still seemed like every episode was exacting revenge on a new person.
The quality curve for TV series is bell-shaped, gradually rising as characters and ideas are established, then tapering off as the writers run out of ideas.
13: The problem with X-files was not that they did an over-arching mythology, but that they did it incoherently.
It may have only been elsewhere that I proposed that JJ Abrams made his thing the "mystery box" to retroactively justify that he never came up with a resolution to Lost.
13: I guess Fringe was derivative that respect as well. But I got bored with the episodic procedural* part and initially quite liked the larger story arc part. But for me it definitely had the bell-shaped quality curve. I have not seen X-Files.
They guy who played the bald Observer, September, is doing a David Bowie Tribute concert as part of the free concert series in a local county park.
*I liked how Senior Agent in Charge Broyles would say "This is a weird one" every week as if
16: JJ Abrams was doing it before Lost, though. One of the reasons I didn't watch Lost was because I had been through just that with Alias.
Good 90s TV dramas:
Season 1: bold new concept. Actors not quite sure what they're doing, but neither are the writers, so it's working out. Showrunner knows what they're doing, and vision is good enough to keep going.
Season 2: always a slump. Doesn't matter if it's good, bc expectations. Actors settling in, writers figuring out what works for their actors.
Season 3: Return to form, but plots are paying off, actors know what they're doing, writers on target. Probably the peak.
Season 4: Showrunner's idea is probably done, but show pivots to Big Conspiracy or Teasing Romance or Grand Arc and everyone knows what the fans want. If Season 3 wasn't the peak, this one is.
Season 5: We're running out of gas, but it's OK. Actors are having a good time, there are more in-jokes, and probably enough budget to do some cool things.
Season 6: Past its prime, but if the series has one amazing forever episode, it's in here.
Season 6: Past its prime, but if the series has one amazing forever episode, it's in here.
I immediately thought of the Buffy musical episode.
I really need to watch Buffy at some point.
I'd say Hush over Once More With Feeling, personally.
Once More With Feeling is one of the best episodes of Buffy (maybe one of the best episodes of any network tv series?), but I actually loved all of Season 6.
I wasn't a huge fan of the X-files mythology but it felt built into the series because of Mulder's background. Elementary is a show where the longer-running story arcs about some super-criminal underworld (IIRC) really felt tacked on.
I loved OMWF and Hush and just about all of Buffy, even the seasons most people didn't like much.
B5 really suffered because the showrunner had five years of plot planned out from the start. He'd included exit excuses for all the main characters in case they had to drop an actor (and they did in a few cases). Then he got unexpectedly told, after season 3, that the show was getting one more season and that was it, so he frantically crammed two seasons worth of plot into season 4. Then he got told, whoops no, you're getting a fifth season after all!
OT: Hypothetically, do people wear suits to funerals in Texas in the summer? To pick a random place, Dallas.
27: Few people did to my dad's in April, in central Texas. Technically that was a memorial.
In Texas some weird piece of string counts as a tie, so I guess anything goes.
I always thought of that as being more of a Nevada-Arizona thing.
I have two string ties. One was high end campaign swag from a guy running for governor of Montana, and has a silver clasp. The other was a gift from a client -- an Indigenous group in New Mexico -- with a large turquoise on the clasp. I haven't worn them in court yet, but have in slightly less consequential venues.
My grandfather was very into them.
My dad's court rules forbid bolo ties and cowboy hats. I know because I typed up the rules.
My dad's court rules forbid bolo ties and cowboy hats. I know because I typed up the rules.
26 is interesting and makes sense to me in terms of the pacing of seasons 4 and 5, but I actually liked season 5 a lot. I loved all of Buffy except season 7, and most of season 1.
One of the reasons I like Korean TV is that the 16-episode single season arc is the perfect length for a TV series. (The show I'm watching right now is so dumb it's giving me brain damage, but the pacing is unimpeachable.)
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French pole vault pole fail leads to one of the best ArtButSports ever.
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oops, link (Bluesky)
https://bsky.app/profile/artbutmakeitsports.bsky.social/post/3kyu44z7mm426