Quaran-TV, part 5
Sep. 30th, 2020 04:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolorosa_12This is a very brief recap of the handful of things I've been watching this month: three completed TV series, and two films.
Early on in the month, we watched the six-part documentary I'll Be Gone in the Dark, about the efforts to determine the identity of the notorious 'Golden State Killer'. This drew very heavily on the posthumously published book of the same name, written by journalist and true crime writer Michelle McNamara, and it weaves an account of the (horrific) crimes and efforts to bring justice and closure to those affected by the actions of a serial rapist and killer with an biographical portrait of McNamara. It also serves as commentary on the rise of true crime as a form of entertainment, and the people involved in this community both online and off. It's very well put together, and it takes pains to emphasise that it is the story of the survivors and their fight for justice, but I felt it protested too much. This perhaps reflects my own feelings about true crime, especially when its enthusiasts focus their attention on unsolved crimes whose survivors (or the relatives of those who were murdered) are still alive — yes, it's good that unsolved mysteries get solved as a result, but the whole thing feels a bit exploitative and voyeuristic.
We also watched the latest season of Strike. The quality of this series rests entirely on the chemistry of the two leads, who are excellent together, and it remains a really well put together crime drama, tropey and twisty in all the right ways, my personal irritation with Rowling and her transphobia notwithstanding.
The final series we watched in entirety this month was Teenage Bounty Hunters — a ridiculous Netflix miniseries about the eponymous twins who fall into bounty hunting by accident and take copious advantage of their privilege as young, beautiful, white, wealthy evangelical Christians in suburban Georgia to do so. (To be clear, the show is profoundly critical of this, and of US gun culture, etc.) I prefer the series when its focus is on bounty hunting and less on the teenage angst side of things, and unfortunately it tipped more and more in the latter direction as the episodes continued, but it was absurd enough to keep me watching until the end.
Like everyone else on the internet, I watched Enola Holmes last week, and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you're looking for a satisfying Holmesian pastiche, this is not it, but if you're looking for a fun Victorian mystery with a teenage girl sleuth and just the right touch of social justice, you've come to the right place. The Sally Lockhart Mysteries novels have my heart when it comes to Victorian women sleuths (the less said about the BBC adaptation, the better), but this was pretty great, too.
Inspired by a throwaway mention in one ofnyctanthes's posts, I also watched The Wise Kids, which is a slow, meandering, bittersweet coming-of-age drama about a trio of teenagers brought up in an conservative, evangelical church community in the US. One comes out as gay, one struggles with doubt and agnosticism, while the third remains resolute in her beliefs and feels abandoned and judged by her two friends for not feeling any need to move on from the norms and values within which they were all raised. The film grapples with the terrible truth that sometimes the only thing possible for people who no longer accept the beliefs of their families and community to do is to cut ties with that community, and how painful that realisation can be. It also features portraits of older secondary characters in their twenties/thirties who have remained part of the community, but only at the expense of extinguishing and denying the parts of themselves that their community would find unacceptable, and the toll that that takes.
Like a lot of media created prior to 2016 that deals with US politics or sociocultural issues (I'm looking at you, The Good Wife and Hamilton), this film reads a lot differently to me in 2020 than it would have done in 2011 when it was made. I find a lot of this earlier media, created in the Obama years, to look dangerously naive in hindsight, and The Wise Children is no different.
And that's my (completed) viewing for September. What have you all been watching?
Early on in the month, we watched the six-part documentary I'll Be Gone in the Dark, about the efforts to determine the identity of the notorious 'Golden State Killer'. This drew very heavily on the posthumously published book of the same name, written by journalist and true crime writer Michelle McNamara, and it weaves an account of the (horrific) crimes and efforts to bring justice and closure to those affected by the actions of a serial rapist and killer with an biographical portrait of McNamara. It also serves as commentary on the rise of true crime as a form of entertainment, and the people involved in this community both online and off. It's very well put together, and it takes pains to emphasise that it is the story of the survivors and their fight for justice, but I felt it protested too much. This perhaps reflects my own feelings about true crime, especially when its enthusiasts focus their attention on unsolved crimes whose survivors (or the relatives of those who were murdered) are still alive — yes, it's good that unsolved mysteries get solved as a result, but the whole thing feels a bit exploitative and voyeuristic.
We also watched the latest season of Strike. The quality of this series rests entirely on the chemistry of the two leads, who are excellent together, and it remains a really well put together crime drama, tropey and twisty in all the right ways, my personal irritation with Rowling and her transphobia notwithstanding.
The final series we watched in entirety this month was Teenage Bounty Hunters — a ridiculous Netflix miniseries about the eponymous twins who fall into bounty hunting by accident and take copious advantage of their privilege as young, beautiful, white, wealthy evangelical Christians in suburban Georgia to do so. (To be clear, the show is profoundly critical of this, and of US gun culture, etc.) I prefer the series when its focus is on bounty hunting and less on the teenage angst side of things, and unfortunately it tipped more and more in the latter direction as the episodes continued, but it was absurd enough to keep me watching until the end.
Like everyone else on the internet, I watched Enola Holmes last week, and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you're looking for a satisfying Holmesian pastiche, this is not it, but if you're looking for a fun Victorian mystery with a teenage girl sleuth and just the right touch of social justice, you've come to the right place. The Sally Lockhart Mysteries novels have my heart when it comes to Victorian women sleuths (the less said about the BBC adaptation, the better), but this was pretty great, too.
Inspired by a throwaway mention in one of
nyctanthes's posts, I also watched The Wise Kids, which is a slow, meandering, bittersweet coming-of-age drama about a trio of teenagers brought up in an conservative, evangelical church community in the US. One comes out as gay, one struggles with doubt and agnosticism, while the third remains resolute in her beliefs and feels abandoned and judged by her two friends for not feeling any need to move on from the norms and values within which they were all raised. The film grapples with the terrible truth that sometimes the only thing possible for people who no longer accept the beliefs of their families and community to do is to cut ties with that community, and how painful that realisation can be. It also features portraits of older secondary characters in their twenties/thirties who have remained part of the community, but only at the expense of extinguishing and denying the parts of themselves that their community would find unacceptable, and the toll that that takes. Like a lot of media created prior to 2016 that deals with US politics or sociocultural issues (I'm looking at you, The Good Wife and Hamilton), this film reads a lot differently to me in 2020 than it would have done in 2011 when it was made. I find a lot of this earlier media, created in the Obama years, to look dangerously naive in hindsight, and The Wise Children is no different.
And that's my (completed) viewing for September. What have you all been watching?
no subject
Date: 2020-09-30 05:10 pm (UTC)We watched the Sherlock pilot, "A Study in Pink," only TEN YEARS behind everyone else! This is my typical viewing speed! It was quite enjoyable, Watson and Sherlock were both a lot better than their fanon versions in all the fanfic I'd read, lol, and it was very funny. I'd like to watch Elementary, since so many of my friends loved it and I love Lucy Liu, but I also have a kind of block about watching long seasons of episodic TV right now. I could try the first season, anyway.
We rewatched all of the 12 Monkeys series -- something like the third time through -- and it still holds up beautifully. Next up we might rewatch Farscape.
I am still really jonesing for that Black Widow movie. sigh.
no subject
Date: 2020-10-01 06:48 am (UTC)I agree with you that starting long series is a really daunting prospect at the moment. Elementary is delightful, but it's also really, really long!
I am still really jonesing for that Black Widow movie. sigh.
SAME. I fear it's going to get pushed back further and further, because, honestly, who would go to the cinema with the world being what it is?
no subject
Date: 2020-10-01 08:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-10-01 11:54 am (UTC)