HenriTheDane

I liked the concept: gangsters running the port in Barcelona, with some family drama and internal tensions. The actors were good. At first, it wasn't trying to be too clever.

As the episodes wore on, the bad writing kept decreasing the enjoyment for me, until I positively disliked watching the last two episodes. I kept watching hoping it would redeem itself, but it only degenerated into implausible subplots and gratuitous diversions.

Others have pointed out some of the poorly written scenes, but it's even worse than that: the timelines don't even match up. Miki will head out in his car at night and then arrive in broad daylight, even though we know the two places are not that far apart. Other times things are happening with characters that are clearly meant to have happened before other scenes. I'm not talking about the flashbacks, which are also annoyingly overdone and distracts from the main storyline, but at least they make it clear when it's a flashback.

With only slightly better writing, this could have been a good watch. As it is, I recommend skipping it.

I am one of the viewers who did not appreciate the ending.

The rest was stellar. It's a slow burn and relies more on moody lightning and imagery than action and dialogue. If you like that kind of movie or show, I highly recommend checking this out.

The premise is a bit far-fetched, but not unusually so for the genre. Rosa enters this mysterious club with her close friend Jacob. They have to navigate the initiation rituals and the politics and competition with the other initiates. One nit I have with the early story is that Jacob kept wanting to leave, and it got old watching repeated scenes of the senior acolytes convincing him to join the others and Jacob wandering around the strange halls. In the meantime, Rosa is trying to make the best of her membership. The arc of the two friends approaching Ares differently is well done overall though and has a terrific payback in the conclusion.

I won't go into the details of the ending to avoid spoilers, but here is what I didn't like. Some images suddenly appear that does not seem to have anything to do with the rest of the story. As other reviewers have pointed out, these are social commentary. When I first saw those images in the show, I had built a confidence in the story and assumed there was some subtlety to them. I figured I wasn't understanding an intricate plot point. In the end, and after reading reviews here, I agree there is no other explanation than the obvious one. After watching a good story unfold in an artful way, I was let down by this abrupt heavy-handedness.

Only giving it a 5 due to that disappointing turn, but if you like the moody slow-burns, I do recommend it.

I liked the opening scene: Adil/Said is driving through a beautiful desert landscape when he has an accident, flipping the car and passing out. After that, he is ordered by some kind of gang boss to find a person. Then the movie slows down inexplicably. They are now in Istanbul, so the nice landscape is gone, and the next 30-60 minutes is spent on Adil/Said talking to various characters. Some of the dialogue probably gets lost in translation. It does not come across that interesting.

During these scenes, Adil/Said ends up taking on another job, introducing another plot to the story. The way this was done in the script makes it seem pointless and it's never really woven into the main plot that well, unless I missed something.

One bright spot is his Adil/Said's pseudo-niece, who is gorgeous and vivacious and gets a fair amount of screen-time.

The ending was decent, but the pacing was too slow and there were too many distractions from the main storyline. Giving it 6/10.

It's not really Noir. I can't explain why without spoiling it, but wanted to point it out if that's what you are looking for.

I try to be careful with my 9s and 10s, as I want to reserve those ratings for movies I found truly great. After careful reflection, I decided this one deserves a 9.

It is a movie that moves slowly from scene to scene, and I would call it a slow-burn, but it does a good job of setting up the central tension immediately. It then moves the viewer along into a mystery that only partially unravels, attenuated by dramatic fighting scenes. The gorgeous scenery helps, but my attention was drawn intensely to the protagonist and his fate as he gets caught up with these ominous characters.

The critics are correct that many questions are left unanswered. If you don't like that in a movie, maybe this is not for you. They are not correct there is no story. There is a story and it's a good one.

I don't want to spoil it, but these plot points are established early on: Core (the protagonist) is peaceful nature. We know this from him talking about how it was difficult to kill even a dangerous wolf, and later it's confirmed by some of his actions. Vernon Sloane is a violent character. We see him killing people as soon as he is introduced. Medora is a mysterious character, with some forebodingly odd behavior from the get-go. Seeing Core getting mixed up with the Sloanes sets up wonderful tension, and it doesn't let up until the end.

I haven't read the book, and it's true the movie doesn't answer exactly what is going on with Vern and Medora. As a viewer, you don't need to know those details to appreciate the challenges, both moral and practical, facing Core. He doesn't know those details anyway, so the movie stays true to the 3rd person limited perspective it's mostly aiming for. That said, there are some clues in the conversations with Cheeon and the old woman shaman.

If you like a story with an interesting protagonist faced with some inscrutable people and tough dillemmas, but where everything will not necessarily be laid out for you, then I highly recommend this.

I believe most of the negative reviewers dislike this show because it does not follow the original Dracula narrative. The story here starts in roughly the same place as Bram Stoker's, and has the same characters, but the last show in particular tells a different story from the novel. The central tension is still between Van Helsing and Dracula, and the contest between them is absolutely wonderful in this production.

Another big difference from the novel is the humor. The battle between Van Helsing and Dracula is as much on wits as it is mechanical, and there is never any combat between them. One component is a cascade of puns from Dracula. As one small taste, take the below exchange. Dracula has entered the home of Kathleen and Bob and he has already tasted the husband. Then he goes upstairs and finds Kathleen in her bed.

Kathleen: Drunk? (as in, is Bob drunk) Dracula: That is certainly one way of putting it.

Dracula acquires some of the knowledge and memories of his victims when he drinks their blood.

Dracula: I've acquired some of your husband's memories. I think you would say I've downloaded them.

Wife: How?

Dracula: Orally.

Through all 3 episodes, Claes Bang delivers these puns in wonderful deadpan. The acting from the entire case is superb, and Dolly Wells and Claes Bang make the show worth at least a sampling.

As mentioned, the last episode, and the ending in particular, are quite different. I personally liked it. I would not call it profound, but it's neat and internally consistent, and still light-hearted enough to fit in well with the humor and playfulness of the rest of the show. I don't mean to imply it's pure comedy. The tension between Van Helsing/Dory Wells and Dracula/Claes Bang is real and deadly. There are several terrifically tense moments when Van Helsing is standing right next to Dracula, using his limitations to taunt him. The ending itself brings in themes of death, mortality, fear and love.

Don't watch this as pure horror, but if you like humor mixed in with a serious battle between two clever antagonists, this is a must see.

I only watched the 2nd season. According to the other reviews, even the positive ones, that was by far the better.

I agree with both the criticisms and the compliments from the other reviews. Amanda Peet was indeed excellent as Betty Broderick. Christian Slater is a tougher pill to swallow, but worked reasonably well in this role as the caddish husband.

I don't know if I was supposed to feel any sympathy for Betty. It was nigh impossible. She was self-absorbed, self-righteous, selfish and obstinate. She refused to follow any direction or advice from lawyers, judges, therapists or friends. She was going out of her way to be nasty to her ex-husband, the mistress, people that were trying to help her, even her kids. She was being destructive, spiteful and in the end, violent. It may be true that she ought to have received psychiatric help, but as events unfolded, she definitely belonged in jail at the end.

That's not necessarily a negative. It's alright to have an unsympathetic protagonist. The biggest problem here is the pace. The show drags on and on going over minor points. For instance, scenes with Dan building up an interest in Linda (the mistress) goes one for most of one episode, with a lot of redundant material. An expert editor could easily have cut the length of the show by at least two episodes.

Still might be worth watching if you like soapy dramas. There are some court scenes and the last episode is mostly about her trial at the end, but I wouldn't call it a legal drama. Even the scenes taking place in court is mostly about character interactions and not about law or process.

Max, the protagonist portrayed by Alba, escaped from an advanced military research facility while still a girl. She is genetically enhanced and trained in both covert and martial skills. This is a bit of a trope, but not a bad one. You would expect this backstory to give the writers plenty of opportunity for action, thrill and suspense.

The show does contain elements of that, including a couple of spectacular scenes, but not enough to stay interesting. A lot of time is spent on the drama going on with Max's friends, her work situation, or watching her cruise the streets and hang out in bars.

I can accept 2-dimensional characters and stilted dialog, but you have to make up for it with pacing, action and scenery. This show contains too much of the former and not enough of the latter.

Rated it 7, going on 8. The reviewers rating it poorly tend to ding it for the superficial background, especially why there is a war and even who is fighting. If this kind of context is important to you, the movie might not resonate with you. The lack of back-story did not bother me at all, since it was not important to the events. Stipulate there is a war in Northern Sweden. Follow some reservists that happen to be great skaters make their way across the ice to a remote island. Enjoy the ensuing ride.

The story and the acting is fine. The action is good. The scenery is gorgeous, with some really nice shots of the skaters way out on the ice. The pacing is great. It has everything an action movie needs.

I liked the story and Mamoudou Athie as Dan, the tape fixing nerd. The show starts off well, placing Dan in a creepy, isolated compound where he restores video tapes from a building that burned. This is a great setup for horror: there are two parallel horror-mysteries going on, one with Dan and why he is asked to restore these tapes, and the other with the girl on the tapes and what happened with the fire in the building.

The biggest draw-back is Dina Shihabi. She overacts almost every scene, and as she's playing the other main character, that gets old. Another drawback is the way the characters act out as their stories start to unravel. They start acting aggressively, even towards their friends. Repeatedly shouting the F-word is not a coping mechanism. It doesn't even make sense when it's not directed at the villain or his/her helpers. It was so bad at the end I started to wish Melody/Dina Shihabi was part of the cabal. (Maybe I got my wish and maybe I didn't :).)

The climactic finale was also disappointing, but they often are in horror. I did like the very ending, though.

I only watched about 10 minutes of this, but the first scene is a hot-shot prosecutor who could not defend herself against a self-righteous student during a Q&A. I found that so ludicrous, I lost all interest in watching further.

The episode is a short treatment of a concept, so does not contain a full story. The Earth has been invaded by aliens, which not only have superior technology, but also some kind of mind control over humans. They have conquered much or all of the planet. They seem to have wiped out most humans, while keeping some of them alive, torturing them and conducting experiments.

A band of scrappy survivors are fighting the invaders. One of them are interested in the people that survive the alien experiments. She believes they are some kind of Savant that contains the power to defeat the aliens.

Can the savants be the key to humanity's survival?

It was an interesting premise. I would want to watch if this was developed into a movie or show.