If ever I despair of my abilities as a writer…

[EmilyMiller]

…I can console myself by thinking that I had absolutely nothing to do with the script for season 3 of Outer Banks. People got paid to write this shit, it beggars belief.

Now it was never Breaking Bad, more of a pandemic escape, but at least seasons 1 and 2 were semi-coherent. Season 3 was probably the worst season of a show I have ever been unfortunate enough to watch.

So why watch it? Well mostly Madelyn and Madison in short shorts. Sadly none of the boys are my type. But even that got a bit old. I was reduced to wondering why, when when camera angle changed by 90 degrees twice in rapid succession, Madelyn’s ass was still pointing straight at it. I mean it’s a nice ass, but please.

And this gets a fourth season while 1899 is cancelled? WTF Netflix?

Em

 

[onehitwanda]

Season 3 was probably the worst season of a show

Witcher season 2 would like a word, Napdragon.

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm always surprised at how badly written so many TV shows and movies are. You'd think with the hundreds of millions of dollars at stake they'd invest a bit more in good writing. Good writing makes a huge difference.

 

[tenyari]

And this gets a fourth season while 1899 is cancelled? WTF Netflix?

I've tried to put mental logic to Netflix's cancelation choices many times and always come up empty.

Did the show not make money because it was too expensive to film, was it unpopular, was a key actor not available anymore, or what...

The only rule I can find is: If I like the show and it seems popular among the corners of the Internet I slip into, it's doomed. If the show seems to be really flawed, it's getting renewed. But that's absurdly anecdotal based on my frustration of the moment.

Netflix loses a lot of money, I don't think they've been profitable for some time. On the one hand that 'kinda shows' with their weird choices of what to renew, on the other hand it helps understand why so many things get cancelled or greenlit for one season - the notion of seeking something that will make money.

I read an article a few months back where the writer was saying their real problem is they don't understand why people subscribe to them... so they keep doing the wrong thing. The author had their own ideas on this - but I don't recall what the point they went for was.

 

[EmilyMiller]

The only rule I can find is: If I like the show and it seems popular among the corners of the Internet I slip into, it's doomed. If the show seems to be really flawed, it's getting renewed.

You realize it is a federal offense to reveal the confidential business plans of listed organizations, right?

Em

 

[EmilyMiller]

Witcher season 2 would like a word, Napdragon.

Never watched it, not really my thing. Did it have any girls in short shorts and bikinis?

Em

 

[EmilyMiller]

I'm always surprised at how badly written so many TV shows and movies are. You'd think with the hundreds of millions of dollars at stake they'd invest a bit more in good writing. Good writing makes a huge difference.

They invest in large teams of writers. It shows.

Em

 

[EmilyMiller]

Did the show not make money because it was too expensive to film, was it unpopular, was a key actor not available anymore, or what...

I loved 1899. Then I watched all of Dark in the original German (with subtitles).

Em

 

[SimonDoom]

They invest in large teams of writers. It shows.

Em

Right. The "too many cooks" problem. Writing by committee can be like paint by numbers.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Right. The "too many cooks" problem. Writing by committee can be like paint by numbers.

My understanding is that they have separate teams working on different episodes with the show runner (sometimes aided by a team) focusing on overall arcs and consistency of characterization. It can work. Or it’s can be an utter failure like OB3.

Even the cast seemed bored.

Em

 

[onehitwanda]

Never watched it, not really my thing. Did it have any girls in short shorts and bikinis?

Em

You missed her:

 

[EmilyMiller]

You missed her:

So I thought it was fantasy / GoT lite (never watched GoT either - I like original Tolkien, Jackson’s take on it less, and second-rate rip offs with a bit of War of the Roses thrown in not so much).

Em

 

[onehitwanda]

So I thought it was fantasy / GoT lite (never watched GoT either - I like original Tolkien, Jackson’s take on it less, and second-rate rip offs with a bit of War of the Roses thrown in not so much).

Em

The first season is very gothic horror / dark fantasy. The second season shits the bed in a big way. Highly recommend you watch the first season. 100% with you on Tolkien; I am still angry about the hobbits in Osgilliath and the Elves at Helms Deep and Eowyn being turned into a bad cook.

 

[EmilyMiller]

The first season is very gothic horror / dark fantasy. The second season shits the bed in a big way. Highly recommend you watch the first season. 100% with you on Tolkien; I am still angry about the hobbits in Osgilliath and the Elves at Helms Deep and Eowyn being turned into a bad cook.

I lost the plot with how Jackson mishandled The Council of Elrond.

Em

 

[onehitwanda]

I lost the plot with how Jackson mishandled The Council of Elrond.

Em

It could have been worse - at least Sebastian the Hedgehog wasn't there.

 

[tenyari]

So I thought it was fantasy / GoT lite (never watched GoT either - I like original Tolkien, Jackson’s take on it less, and second-rate rip offs with a bit of War of the Roses thrown in not so much).

I couldn't stand GoT.

It seemed to be nothing but how violent and miserable can we make the next scene, and if not, can it have one of the blonds having sex instead or as well?

Some years back when one of the child actresses turned 18, there was much fanfare in the GoT community because they'd all been clamoring to see her have sex for years...

Witcher is in the middle space between that and Lord of the Rings. I enjoyed both seasons of Witcher, personally. It wasn't the brutal gore fest of GoT. The character tries to not be a hero but he is. I guess my liking Witcher Season 2 is an outlyer opinion. I don't remember it well enough to say why though so I could hardly debate the point - and that I don't remember why also implies that I only must have just 'enjoyed it' rather than been impressed or appalled. Every last scene of GoT I've been forced to watch by fans of it I know in real life has left a lasting horrible feeling in my mind akin to being forced to watch grissly horror movies after reading about a real life grissly murder - as in... some of them gave me mild PTSD...

My impression is the Witcher TV show has less nudity / sex than the video game it was based on - but while I ended up with a copy of the game through some random grab bag sale, what I know of it is mostly from articles.

GoT's got the HBO treatment - so it's a softcore porn horror gore flick.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I stopped reacting to tv shows and movies, even if it's something I would normally be excited to watch. The reason? Almost everything made in the last 10 years is absolute garbage. Writing is terrible, and the absolute priority of any tv show or movie is to be exceptionally diverse and woke in spite of everything. Doesn't matter if the movie or show is about today's society or about Middle Ages, or even Stone Age. I wouldn't be surprised to next watch a tv show about Spanish Inquisition and then see them portrayed as diverse and sexually liberal. Besides that, writers are pure trash. Half of people here would write better plots and dialogues than Hollywood writers nowadays. 1899 was crap btw. "Dark" had amazing two seasons, then fucked it up in the third. And Dark is a rare gem compared to most other stuff.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I stopped reacting to tv shows and movies, even if it's something I would normally be excited to watch. The reason? Almost everything made in the last 10 years is absolute garbage. Writing is terrible, and the absolute priority of any tv show or movie is to be exceptionally diverse and woke in spite of everything. Doesn't matter if the movie or show is about today's society or about Middle Ages, or even Stone Age. I wouldn't be surprised to next watch a tv show about Spanish Inquisition and then see them portrayed as diverse and sexually liberal. Besides that, writers are pure trash. Half of people here would write better plots and dialogues than Hollywood writers nowadays. 1899 was crap btw. "Dark" had amazing two seasons, then fucked it up in the third. And Dark is a rare gem compared to most other stuff.

Season 3 of Dark was very complicated (how everyone was eveyone else’s parent or grandparent in a horrible twisted loop). I religiously tracked the enormous cast of characters (yes I am anally retentive, and not just of semen) and I think that helped me to enjoy the final season more than others maybe did.

I liked 1899 as well. I loved what they tried to do with the multiple languages. I loved the cinematography and how they used The Volume (or whatever the tech they developed on The Mandalorian is called) and I adored Emily Beecham (as in multiple masturbatory fantasies featuring her). It was uneven, but I felt they were trying something different.

Em

 

[Djmac1031]

Witcher season 2 would like a word, Napdragon.

I finally watched Witcher after my girlfriend literally broke down my will after months of begging me to.

The first season was pretty good but it took me awhile to warm to it. It's just usually not my genre.

Season 2 was...okay. I say this in the spirit of generosity. And not having any attachments to the original source material.

But we just tried watching the prequel mini series Blood Origin and I was out after 15 minutes.

It's absolutely the worst Exposition Theater, "Tell don't show" writing I've seen in a long time.

Funniest part: I went to bed, my girlfriend stayed up and watched all 4 episodes.

Then told me "yeah, it sucked."

If she'd only listened to me, it would have saved 3 hours, 45 minutes of her life

 

[onehitwanda]

yes I am anally retentive, and not just of semen

 

[onehitwanda]

I finally watched Witcher after my girlfriend literally broke down my will after months of begging me to.

...

If she'd only listened to me, it would have saved 3 hours, 45 minutes of her life

If you're at all interested in the lore, then there's a Netflix animated movie : The Nightmare of the Wolf, which predates the Witcher by... call it thirty years of time in the universe. It's... reasonable, actually.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I'm always surprised at how badly written so many TV shows and movies are. You'd think with the hundreds of millions of dollars at stake they'd invest a bit more in good writing. Good writing makes a huge difference.

Billy Wilder had Hollywood down pat seventy years ago. "If we made it a girls' softball team, put in a few numbers, it might make a a cute musical. 'It Happened in the Bull Pen: The Story of a Woman.' "

 

[SimonDoom]

I couldn't stand GoT.

It seemed to be nothing but how violent and miserable can we make the next scene, and if not, can it have one of the blonds having sex instead or as well?

I can understand not liking it. It's dark and cynical and at times very brutal to its characters, especially (though not exclusively) to its women characters.

But it's well-written. It has clever plot points and extremely well-developed, multi-dimensional characters who had interesting relationships with one another. The dialogue was often quite sharp and memorable. It infused the darkness of the story with some comic relief. I thought the first five seasons were a great example of how one could write a fantasy series well, even if the violence/brutality level was very high. The writing was not as good in the last three seasons, because the writers didn't have the advantage of having GRRM's source material to work with. There was a big difference as the series reached its end.

The prequel series is a good example of writing that's nowhere near as good. The humor is all gone. The characters are less engaging. It feels like there are so many missed opportunities with the dialogue and the characters and their arcs.

 

[NoTalentHack]

I've tried to put mental logic to Netflix's cancelation choices many times and always come up empty.

I can actually explain this, partially. They cancel shows early because of the ways that standard industry production contracts are handled. Essentially-- and I may get some of this wrong, it's from an article I read like four years ago-- the way shows have traditionally been done is that the brunt of the production costs for the first three shows go on the production company. It's still profitable for those companies, mind, or they wouldn't make them, but after the first three years, most of the contracts are written in such a way that continuing witht he show sees the network/streeaming service paying for more of the costs; stars want pay raises, producers become more in-demand, showruners have to be convince to stay, etc. It makes sense.

Netflix blew all that up. They basically realized that there was no major downside to screwing production companies out of work after those first three years. They've never published viewership numbers; there's no Nielsens for streaming services, and the numbers either aren't shared with production companies or are under NDAs. Therfore, Netflix can simply say, "well, it wasn't seeing the numbers we wanted to," and then skate.

Maybe it's even true. In the world of comic books, new number one issues do WAY more better than established series. There's a reason that Captain America, Superman, etc. all get new and rebooted series every two or three or four years, to keep reader numbers up. It's hard to get new readers to dive into an existing, long-running series.

So the possibility that it holds true for streaming series is not out of the question. There's a place for diehards, but Netflix is like they gym: they'd much rather have people join thinking that they're going to want to do everything, to run and lift weights and wallclimb, to absolutely be sure they'll get in shape this time, and then just fail to cancel their memberships. It could make them a lot of money, managed correctly.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I can actually explain this, partially. They cancel shows early because of the ways that standard industry production contracts are handled. Essentially-- and I may get some of this wrong, it's from an article I read like four years ago-- the way shows have traditionally been done is that the brunt of the production costs for the first three shows go on the production company. It's still profitable for those companies, mind, or they wouldn't make them, but after the first three years, most of the contracts are written in such a way that continuing witht he show sees the network/streeaming service paying for more of the costs; stars want pay raises, producers become more in-demand, showruners have to be convince to stay, etc. It makes sense.

Netflix blew all that up. They basically realized that there was no major downside to screwing production companies out of work after those first three years. They've never published viewership numbers; there's no Nielsens for streaming services, and the numbers either aren't shared with production companies or are under NDAs. Therfore, Netflix can simply say, "well, it wasn't seeing the numbers we wanted to," and then skate.

Maybe it's even true. In the world of comic books, new number one issues do WAY more better than established series. There's a reason that Captain America, Superman, etc. all get new and rebooted series every two or three or four years, to keep reader numbers up. It's hard to get new readers to dive into an existing, long-running series.

So the possibility that it holds true for streaming series is not out of the question. There's a place for diehards, but Netflix is like they gym: they'd much rather have people join thinking that they're going to want to do everything, to run and lift weights and wallclimb, to absolutely be sure they'll get in shape this time, and then just fail to cancel their memberships. It could make them a lot of money, managed correctly.

None of that explains a future Outer Banks season 4. It’s inexplicable.

Em