What have you seen recently? 4

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Penfold

Sergeant-at-Arms
Dec 29, 2009
9,134
3,050
Worthing
www.lenbrookphotography.com
I went and saw 'Wicked Little Letters', yesterday, starring Olivia Coleman and Jessie Buckley. Very funny, although a bit sweary, and filmed locally in Worthing and Arundel. They even used our shop at The Studio at The Lido, but it was unrecognizable due to the false frontage they had built on it for the set. Oh, and it's based on a true story as well. :)
 

=Tamar

Lieutenant
May 20, 2012
13,311
2,900
I finally got to watch Good Omens Season Two. It had some good moments but I think it suffered a little from middle-book-of-a-trilogy syndrome. Now looking forward to Season Three in a couple of years.
 

RathDarkblade

Moderator
City Watch
Mar 24, 2015
17,725
3,400
48
Melbourne, Victoria
I finally finished watching the entire run of M*A*S*H*. Good fun. I wonder why I'd never seen the entire thing before.

(Possibly because it's only available on DVD, and the boxset costs a fair bit?) =P
 

Quatermass

Sergeant-at-Arms
Dec 7, 2010
7,909
2,950
I recently watched more of House of the Dragon, and I sort of slogged through it. This is, admittedly, partly due to my attention span problems lately, making it harder to sit down and watch a TV show or a movie at home. But I think it's also because I'm becoming more and more discontented with this particular type of dark fantasy, specifically the sort that is basically less fantasy, and thus less wonder. Which is, admittedly, mostly stuff like House of the Dragon and Game of Thrones.

I actually love dark fantasy as a genre, if done right. The Nasuverse is a good example. So too is the recent animated series Arcane. Hell, even Berserk, for all that it ladles on all the gore and squick, still has a sense of wonder to it. But I find myself tiring of stuff that's more drama and conflict than wonder. I would've thought that fantasy was about escapism, even dark fantasy.

Don't get me wrong, I love Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon, and the parent series of A Song of Ice and Fire. But it feels unrelentingly bleak at times. I mean, even the part-George RR Martin-penned story for the game Elden Ring has more than a few optimistic endings, or at least ones that are bittersweet.
 

Quatermass

Sergeant-at-Arms
Dec 7, 2010
7,909
2,950
Bumped.

Well, not that long ago, I watched on SBS on Demand an interesting and scary documentary. It was called Edward & Wallis: The Bahamas Scandal Revealed. Now, I knew they were Nazi sympathisers, and that Hitler and his lot wanted to make them puppet royals if they managed to take over the country, and I was well aware of the Great Abdicator (as I call him sarcastically) meddling in the investigation into Harry Oakes' death and framing Alfred de Marigny (thanks to A Question of Evidence, an excellent book by Colin Evans and well worth a read for anyone interested in controversial cases), but there was a lot in the doco that I'd never heard of. Aside from being Nazi sympathisers, they were bloody p***ing money up the wall at a time when virtually everyone in Britain was under rationing!
 
Likes: Tonyblack

RathDarkblade

Moderator
City Watch
Mar 24, 2015
17,725
3,400
48
Melbourne, Victoria
*shrug* There's nothing "revealed" about it. Everyone who knows about Eddie the Abdicator knows (or should know) that his stuttering brother made him Governor of the Bahamas in order to get him as far away from Europe as possible.

Eddie was basically messed up. He was very sensitive as a kid, so his dad sent him to the Royal Navy to "toughen him up", as was the style at the time, which basically broke him emotionally. He was trying to be close to his mum, who was emotionally distant and put duty and country before family. No wonder he had no idea how to behave with women, and idolised so-called "strong men".

The 30s were, of course, the era of "strong man rule" in Italy, Germany and Russia, so the Abdicator idolised Hitler in particular, since Hitler was the geographically closest and strongest.

As for p***ing money up the wall ........... show me one royal who didn't do that, back then or since. :p At least Elizabeth (and now Charles) took and are taking their responsibilities seriously. But Charles is in the same boat as "the Great Abdicator": sensitive boy (conscious of his "sticking out ears"), emotionally-distant mum, dad who had no time for him (and sent him to Rugby College, where he was bullied), grew up and didn't know how to talk to women, ended up in a scandal. At least the public -- mostly -- forgave him, I guess?

The Prince Harry scandals seem to be similar. Little boy with a distant dad (and this time, seemingly loving mum ... who then dies), grows up and goes into the army (like Eddie went to the Navy), gets bullied a bit, gets involved in scandals -- got naked in Vegas, cheated in school ... and that Nazi uniform scandal (just like the ones that Eddie the Abdicator adored). The more things change. :rolleyes:

P.S. I'm not a royals watcher, but when they do something stupid, all the news channels go on and on and on about it, so it's hard not to be aware of it. ;)
 

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