sunriseinyoureyes

This is a show for adults, and a great show for adults at that.

BoJack is an anthropomorphic horse who, in summary, hates himself and takes it out on everyone around him. He was once a successful actor who achieved great fame and fortune after starring in a cheesy but successful 90s sitcom. Since that show's end, he's resorted to stagnating in his LA mansion, living off his seemingly bottomless riches and distracting/comforting himself from all his issues (loneliness, emptiness, mundanity, etc) with booze, philandering, indulgent nostalgia from the good ol' sitcom days, and basically cursing the world in as many ways as possible.

Despite BoJack's cynical persona, over time he proves himself to be a thoughtful and incisive person intolerant of BS yet also someone who wants to care but is terrified to. He ends up being a character we're all familiar with: a hurt softy taking refuge from himself and society in the protected darkness of a hard shell.

The story progresses in a number of ways, but is primarily hinged on the exploration of BoJack's psyche, which is incrementally revealed through his interactions with the many (fun) characters in the show, particularly with Diane Nguyen, a ghost-writer tasked with writing a tell-all autobiography of BoJack's life.

The writing is great; it's clever, hilariously parodies TV and societal tropes, and it's unpredictable. The voice acting is spot-on for the characters. And although the animation is somewhat crude, it depicts the vibe of the show well. In all, I highly recommend this show. It's a trip.

Chris Tucker is clearly a naturally funny dude. It's obvious that he lives his humor, and that his performances are, in large, him just continuing to live that humor but in front of an audience.

In this live show he gives us half a lifetime of stories, many from his apparently humble beginnings (i.e. growing up in a Black American family), and many from his post- stardom high-profile experiences (e.g. select highlights from his friendships with Michael Jackson and Bill Clinton). The variety of subjects covered in this 90 minute special was incredible and kept the show fresh and unpredictable. There is a laugh somewhere for everyone.

In all, Tucker was having fun on stage and it showed. His animation, expressiveness, and flare permeated the entire set. He not only told his stories; he performed them with theater-like intensity. Watching him in his zone is an immersive experience, as you're made to feel like you're right there with him in whatever moment he's recalling.

I had never heard of this show when, by pure chance, I happened upon it while mindlessly clicking through channels in a hotel room one boring morning. Something about the 5 seconds I gave it to make an impression made me stop changing channels and tune in. I ended up binge-watching it the entire first season that very day (because it happened to be a marathon leading up to the second season premier).

In the small town of Beacon something is amiss. A (VERY) diverse group of purported alien abductees, calling themselves "Experiencers," routinely meet at a local church to try to get to the bottom of their extraterrestrial suspicions. And as they uncover new pieces of the puzzle and share old and new experiences, they form bonds unlikely to have formed otherwise. I think watching these extremely disparate characters gradually grow together is the most satisfying aspect of the show.

This show is a breath of fresh air. It's not deep. It's not cerebral. It's not a game- changer. It is simply storytelling done well with a grab bag of distinctive entertaining characters that contrast and complement each other perfectly. The characters and their conversations are set in the same world and time as us viewers, except with aliens (debatable, I know), which makes the show incredibly relatable and often laugh out loud funny. Viewers are bound to find resemblance between people they know and the characters in the show.

If you want to kick back and relax with a lighthearted unpretentious comedy, this is the show for you.

Black Mirror is a reality check. It is not a feel-good show, but manages to redeem its perturbing quality with its penetrating insight and indictment of mainstream society. It's m.o. is poignantly portraying and exploring the role technology is playing in our present through a series of futuristic, somewhat hyperbolized sci-fi scenarios where society has arguably mal-adapted to technological advance.

The thing is… despite the futuristic setting, the show resonates intensely with the now, I guess, as good sci-fi should do. A sample of themes from season one:

-How absurdity, grotesqueness, and even violence have been trivialized to the extent of becoming entertainment at times. How trauma, depicted so readily on screens these days, has become something to watch primarily for stimulation. How, in many ways, we've become sadistic spectators or at best desensitized unconcerned bystanders.

-How a system that commodifies human life and energy (particularly lower and middle- class human life and energy) i.e. "a dead-end job" is maintained by aloof sociopathic elites through the brainwashes of materialism, distraction, and dream- selling. AND how society is complicit in this basically by being satisfied with the comfort of minimal needs being met, no matter how vapid and mundane this renders their life.

-How perfect memory, its storage, and recollection can be a double-edged sword. In a society where everyone has a brain implant that records and stores all audiovisual aspects of an individual experience for playback (and projection for all to see) at any moment, what issues will arise? How would you use it? To what extent would you relive your pains, your pleasures? To what extent would you fact-check your friends, family members, and lovers? To what extent would you chase clarity on events that happened outside of your experience, since you know an accessible recording exists in another person?

The subsequent seasons continue to tackle various heady and humane issues connected in some way with advanced technology (e.g. hacking, terrorism, virtual/augmented reality, racism, social media addiction, manipulated consciousness). Every episode is its own mental trip, has a twist, and most leave you with a sense of psychological vertigo. This probably isn't a show you want to binge-watch because, again, it isn't a feel good show due to its existential tone (even though it has some truly funny parts and scattered gems in the dialogue). But it IS a show that engrosses your mind and gut, and compels you to watch every episode. I like to think this show is like medicine: sometimes hard to palate, but necessary. I took off a star only because some of the endings frustrate far more than they satisfy which, all considered, might be the point.

Great show. Highly recommend.

I'm a Linklater fan. Waking Life is among my top five favorite movies. The Before Trilogy awakened me to the true power of dialogue in film. This Linklater film, however, was way more frustrating than satisfying to watch, and the dialogue was, far too often, a mind-gamey labyrinth of petty sarcasm, passive-aggressive antagonizing, manipulation, and verbal circumnavigation. There were so few moments of clarity, if any, which to the writer's benefit, may have been the point. The prospect of this being the intention, for me, was the only redeeming factor of this movie.

Ten years out from high school, old but distant friends Vince (Hawke) and Johnny (Leonard) reunite in a hotel room in Lansing, MI for the debut of Johnny's first independent film at a nearby film festival. Vince is a somewhat volatile and immature Oakland drug-dealer who recently broke it off with his girlfriend of 3 years; his character is the defensive screw-up whose misery loves company. John is his foil, apparently more stable, idealistic, but whose sense of self isn't very concrete but can still come off inflated, especially when in the same room with Vince. Amy (Thurman) is an old fling for both male characters, but in a way that, whenever brought up, inspires ancient unresolved tensions centered on a nebulous incident in high school, the exploration of which drives the majority of the movie.

I think the dialogue was smart from the standpoint of it demonstrating the emotional and manipulative power that words can wield and the haziness of recollection, but in the broader scope of the movie, over time even the characters themselves got lost in what they were talking about! This is when even an iota of clarity could have saved the movie for me. But for me it never came, which felt unjustified because these are supposed to be ADULTS talking, and none of them can seem to muster a straightforward statement. Hence, this film left me resentfully asking the same question plaguing the characters to the end, "What are we even talking about?"

Overall I thought the acting was convincing and the writing was often insightful in its exploration of relationship dynamics, courtship conventions, and the unknowable fate of attraction. There were a few scenes of syrupy sentimentality and spoon-fed irony whose cringeworthiness was just bearable due to the scenes overtly climactic intent. But there were other intentionally uncomfortable scenes that accomplished exactly what they were meant to; I occasionally found myself hand over mouth or peaking at the screen through thin-split fingers. Given the number of story lines, there inevitably was more breadth than depth here (compensated for by the 2 hour length), but the characters were still relatable enough to sympathize with.

A quick overview of the characters: couple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Aniston struggle with terms of commitment and how to move forward in a 7 year relationship. Bradley Cooper and Kristin Connelly second-guess the authenticity of their feelings toward each other years after their young and naïve marriage, now under the additional stress of a charming vixen outsider Scarlett Johansson who is basically looking for herself while dabbling in other people, namely Kevin Connolly (the quintessential nice guy who's missing something). Drew Barrymore is a somewhat spacey singleton looking for love on the internet. Justin long is a shallow, yet practiced lady's man who serves, kind of oddly, as counselor to our protagonist Ginnifer Goodwin, a high-strung yet sincere hopeless romantic frantically looking for her soul mate wherever she can.

This movie was entertaining for sure. Not sure if there were any lessons or messages to take home in addition to the usual be honest with yourself and others. All considered, it's a good movie; worth 2 hours of life.