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Professor Shark
May 22, 2012

Netflix dropped the new Lost in Space series a couple days ago. It's based on the campy series from the 60's, which was made into a gritty movie in 1998.

The series focuses on the Robinson family, who become stranded on an uncharted planet while traveling to Alpha Centauri, fleeing a dying Earth. The series is an action/sci fi/ adventure that uses flashbacks to see what happened to the imperfect family before their decision to leave Earth.

Here is a quick look at the series regulars, taken from Wikipedia:


Toby Stephens as John Robinson, Maureen's husband and a former U.S. Marine.


Molly Parker as Maureen Robinson, a fearless and brilliant aerospace engineer taking her family on the mission to colonize Alpha Centauri for a chance at a new life on a better world. She is the mission commander.


Taylor Russell as Judy Robinson (LEFT), 18-years-old and the eldest of the three Robinson children. She is Maureen's child from her first marriage, before John.
Mina Sundwall as Penny Robinson (RIGHT), the second Robinson child.


Maxwell Jenkins as Will Robinson, an 11-year-old and the only son and the youngest Robinson child.


Brian Steele voices the Robot, an alien being that Will first encounters on the planet his family crash lands on. The robot has a different form from the ones on the previous series and movie.


Parker Posey as June Harris, a criminal and a sociopath who uses other people’s identities to claim their belongings. After arriving on the planet, she attempts to sabotage the Jupiters' chances of returning to the Resolute while manipulating and gaslighting the survivors to avoid awaited trial for her crimes back on Earth. In the series, Harris assumes the alias “Dr. Smith”, a reference to the character of the same name appearing in the original TV series.


Ignacio Serricchio as Don West, a roughneck smuggling luxury goods.

So far this series is okayish, with enough money put into the visuals to be entertaining, despite some weird issues with the writing (I think the first 2 or 3 episodes must have been filmed separately from the others?). I'm on episode 5 right now, so almost halfway through the season, and I'm enjoying it enough to stick it out until the end.

Professor Shark fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Apr 15, 2018

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Rhyno
Mar 22, 2003
Probation
Can't post for 10 years!
How long do we have to go before we can post without spoiler text? A week?

Professor Shark
May 22, 2012

Rhyno posted:

How long do we have to go before we can post without spoiler text? A week?

According to the Rules thread:


quote:

SPOILER RULES: Netflix shows "air" all at once, so once they go up, there's no need for spoiler tags in that show's thread. You should still use them in other threads that might mention the show for at least a month. poo poo like this falls under the "common sense" clause.

spaceships
Aug 4, 2005

i love too dumptruck

guacamole aficionado
this show is pretty rad

don owns

TMMadman
Sep 9, 2003

by Fluffdaddy
You made that title and didn't include a picture of Debbie the Chicken? For shame!

Rhyno
Mar 22, 2003
Probation
Can't post for 10 years!
Debbie the Chicken = Breakout character of 2018.

TMMadman
Sep 9, 2003

by Fluffdaddy
For anyone who wanders into this thread before the spoilers start to happen.

I say give the show the full season and don't drop if after the first few episodes. Yes, there is some of the standard issues of any TV shows, but I think it does a pretty good job of setting up what could be a good series.

And Parker Posey is absolutely fantastic in her role throughout the entire season.

spaceships
Aug 4, 2005

i love too dumptruck

guacamole aficionado
i get thoroughly angry whenever she opens her mouth

Escobarbarian
Jun 18, 2004


Grimey Drawer
Mods please change the thread title to whatever we decided in the general chat thread

TMMadman
Sep 9, 2003

by Fluffdaddy
Also, to bring this from the general chat thread:

Lycus posted:

I think the eldest daughter would've worked better if she was a little bit older and they did less sister bickering.

Rhyno posted:

They vaguely set up the West/Judy thing and it feels really creepy as he looks like he's firmly 35 and she looks like she's 14.

Lycus posted:

Oh yeah, that's another aspect of what I'm thinking. She should've been in her twenties.

I was actually thinking the same thing. I don't mind the sister bickering so much, but she almost looks like the younger of the two sisters. I just looked up the two actresses and I am honestly surprised that Taylor Russell is 23. I wouldn't have put her past 20 to be honest.

Rhyno
Mar 22, 2003
Probation
Can't post for 10 years!
Well poo poo, I'd read that she was the same age as her character (18) which made it even worse.

esperterra
Mar 24, 2010

SHINee's back




ty prof shark

esperterra
Mar 24, 2010

SHINee's back




Escobarbarian posted:

Mods please change the thread title to whatever we decided in the general chat thread

also this

HUGE SPACEKABLOOIE
Mar 31, 2010


I think they spent about $7.50 shooting that first episode, good lord.

Gildiss
Aug 24, 2010

Grimey Drawer
This series is about Earth's most ambitious mass Dunning Kruger experiment.
Telling the dumbest people we have that they are the best and brightest, and launching them into space.
I hate every character and hope that they die, in space.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light
I'm sad to see they went the 1998 movie route and made the family dysfunctional. At least they didn't destroy the Chariot, though.

I'm just two eps in, though.

nessin
Feb 7, 2010
So after three episodes every ounce of drama is on track to be based on people not communicating critical and important things in the middle of a life or death situation while stranded on a planet they know nothing about. Is that the way it plays out through the entire run? I'd prefer to just save myself the annoyance now if that is the case.

Edit:
Holy poo poo. I started episode 4 and about halfway through I had to stop. I don't watch a whole lot of TV anymore so maybe I'm just not all that well exposed to the dregs of script writing, but how in the world could any self-respecting person write the script for that episode, especially Wil's, and actually submit to anything but an incinerator? I can honestly say I've never seen writing so bad in a serious character drama before.

nessin fucked around with this message at 03:16 on Apr 16, 2018

mcmagic
Jul 1, 2004

If you see this avatar while scrolling the succ zone, you have been visited by the mcmagic of shitty lib takes! Good luck and prosperity will come to you, but only if you reply "shut the fuck up mcmagic" to this post!
They do a pretty terrible job of trying to convince you there are stakes in this show since no one ever seems to die no matter what happens to them.

PaybackJack
May 21, 2003

You'll hit your head and say: 'Boy, how stupid could I have been. A moron could've figured this out. I must be a real dimwit. A pathetic nimnal. A wretched idiotic excuse for a human being for not having figured these simple puzzles out in the first place...As usual, you've been a real pantload!

Gildiss posted:

This series is about Earth's most ambitious mass Dunning Kruger experiment.
Telling the dumbest people we have that they are the best and brightest, and launching them into space.
I hate every character and hope that they die, in space.

This was my problem in the beginning as well but it becomes a bit more clear as the series goes on that these are infact not all the best and brightest but rather collection of essentially refugees who either lied, manipulated, were rich enough, or passed a series of tests to qualify.

It didn't make it quite clear enough that while everyone is more competent at doing science stuff than Smith, it's mostly training to get into the program and work your Jupiter, not survive on a random alien planet.

Imagine you and your family moved into a new house and the guy who sold you the house went through every room of it and explained how every room worked, then your house suddenly ended up in the middle of the Congo. You basically only have skills, as they relate to the operation of your house, but thankfully a few people are really smart and know how to survive in the Congo.


mcmagic posted:

They do a pretty terrible job of trying to convince you there are stakes in this show since no one ever seems to die no matter what happens to them.

Every situation in this show went exactly the same way:

Bad situation occurs, odds seem insurmountable.
Situation gets even worse; odds are now impossible!
Situation nears it's end and people say their goodbyes.
Flash of insight or Deus Ex Machina occurs and situation is resolved; probably to never be referenced again.

For all my complaints this show had a good little hook at the end and the back story of the robot makes me interested in Season 2.

Spoiling this since it's mostly speculation with some spoilers. Maureen states that thing that hit Earth and made the dust cloud must have been an alien ship from which they reverse engineered the tech that allowed for more efficient space travel. The last episode it's revealed that an alien thing shaped like an egg was attached to the bottom of the buggy, and is seemingly what drew the Robots to the Jupiter. This egg is later shown to interface with the Jupiter and cause it to create and enter a wormhole leading back to what seems to be the Robot's homesystem. What seems to have happened but isn't quite fully explained is that the Robot came on a ship that attacked the Resolute, took back his egg, then during his escape also crashed on the planet and got rebooted. It's unknown if the Resolute needs the egg to power anything or if they were just carrying it for some other reason. But basically the theory is that the aliens are doing the same thing Earth is trying to do(find a new place to live), and in doing so either came into conflict with humans or if their arrival on Earth was accidental. Things to be answered in Season 2.

nessin posted:

So after three episodes every ounce of drama is on track to be based on people not communicating critical and important things in the middle of a life or death situation while stranded on a planet they know nothing about. Is that the way it plays out through the entire run? I'd prefer to just save myself the annoyance now if that is the case.

Normally I do hate shows where the drama comes from characters lying or hiding things from each other but other than Smith lying to everyone, this isn't really an issue among the main characters. The drama comes much more from characters having to go through cliched near-death situations in order to bond or reconnect.

PaybackJack fucked around with this message at 03:14 on Apr 16, 2018

nessin
Feb 7, 2010

PaybackJack posted:



Normally I do hate shows where the drama comes from characters lying or hiding things from each other but other than Smith lying to everyone, this isn't really an issue among the main characters. The drama comes much more from characters having to go through cliched near-death situations in order to bond or reconnect.

It isn't just lying, or even hiding things. In the first three and a half episodes there seem to be a number of things that become the key drivers to the future of the series (at least based on a casual skim of the remaining episodes):

1) Wil not discussing anything real about the robot.
2) Wil not telling anyone about the gun.
3) Wil, or anyone really, not discussing why Smith was ransacking the supply closet for rations during the emergency.
4) Everything surrounding the three kids in episode 4.

Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.
The other kid promising not to tell about the planet death was bizarre. "Uhhh, no, of course I can't promise that. What's wrong with you?"

Lycus fucked around with this message at 03:38 on Apr 16, 2018

Doggles
Apr 22, 2007

Rhyno posted:

Debbie the Chicken = Breakout character of 2018.

Friendship ended with BLARP

Now DEBBIE is my best friend

TMMadman posted:

For anyone who wanders into this thread before the spoilers start to happen.

I say give the show the full season and don't drop if after the first few episodes. Yes, there is some of the standard issues of any TV shows, but I think it does a pretty good job of setting up what could be a good series.

And Parker Posey is absolutely fantastic in her role throughout the entire season.

:same:

I was absolutely hooked for those last few episodes. Very much hoping for a second season. :pray:

PaybackJack
May 21, 2003

You'll hit your head and say: 'Boy, how stupid could I have been. A moron could've figured this out. I must be a real dimwit. A pathetic nimnal. A wretched idiotic excuse for a human being for not having figured these simple puzzles out in the first place...As usual, you've been a real pantload!

nessin posted:

It isn't just lying, or even hiding things. In the first three and a half episodes there seem to be a number of things that become the key drivers to the future of the series (at least based on a casual skim of the remaining episodes):

1) Wil not discussing anything real about the robot.
2) Wil not telling anyone about the gun.
3) Wil, or anyone really, not discussing why Smith was ransacking the supply closet for rations during the emergency.
4) Everything surrounding the three kids in episode 4.

Lycus posted:

The other kid promising not to tell about the planet death was bizarre. "Uhhh, no, of course I can't promise that. What's wrong with you?"

Each of these things only really lasts maybe an episode or two. Smith is the only secret that lasts more than 3 episodes. Yeah, Wil keeps a lot of stuff from others but it's pretty easily explained in a later episode that "oh yeah, he's still 11 and doesn't want his Dad to yell at him". The writing is really uneven when it comes to Wil and he's terrible.

Planet death is only withheld until it's necessary to tell everyone; after the fuel is lost.

I think the main thing that allows me to handle the lies and such, is that it doesn't turn into a drama point between characters that causes a rift between them that lasts. The last one being the major lie and it's handled fairly reasonably by people who should probably dislike the Robinsons a whole lot more than they do.

PaybackJack fucked around with this message at 03:54 on Apr 16, 2018

Azhais
Feb 5, 2007
Switchblade Switcharoo
Fuel might not have been lost had they told. "Save the guy and we just have to live on this planet" is different than "kill everyone to maybe prolong this guy's life for another week"

E: also has one of my least favorite TV/movie tropes. "They won't be unconscious long, we gotta get out of here" instead of just restraining them or any number of other options

Azhais fucked around with this message at 04:39 on Apr 16, 2018

poolside toaster
Jul 12, 2008

Gildiss posted:

This series is about Earth's most ambitious mass Dunning Kruger experiment.
Telling the dumbest people we have that they are the best and brightest, and launching them into space.
I hate every character and hope that they die, in space.

I agree, Jesus Christ these people suck. I was almost happy when Will loses his grip on the ship and begins to fall into orbit, and hopefully die eventually from lack of oxygen.

So this is a Perils of Pauline reboot, right?

Quinton
Apr 25, 2004

I just wish they had spent a bit of their budget on hooking the writers up with a science advisor or two.

I mean, sure, this is more space-opera-y than hard-sci-fi-ish, but episode one is largely occupied by completely imaginary physics of water.

Look, I'm willing to suspend some disbelief around alien tech or FTL drives or whatnot, but water freezing and thawing is not a mystery.

I actually enjoyed the season overall, even though there was a lot of clunkiness, but the lazy writing around anything remotely science-y and the constant need for extreme peril with a short countdown to death or doom was pretty infuriating. Being stranded on an unknown planet offers plenty of danger and risk without going crazy all the way through the planet is going to be rendered uninhabitable by a black hole in a matter of weeks!!! -- I mean, seriously, what are the odds of that?

I thought the Robinsons were okay -- believable dysfunctional, if you will -- the supporting characters did their jobs, and Dr Smith suffered from not being dialed back a bit from the original series -- she was just way too cardboard villain for a show that seemed to be trying to be a bit more complex.

Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.
I will say that I just don't buy that the half-robot with the four weapon hands was stuck in the tree in the first place, but whatever, they had to bond them.

esperterra
Mar 24, 2010

SHINee's back




Yeaaaah you'd think he could get down hella easy if all Will needed to do to save him was get some cheese wire out and cut a branch.

Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.
Probably would've worked better if the top half was powerless because the power core was in the weaponless bottom half, but oh well.

esperterra
Mar 24, 2010

SHINee's back




Or hell if its arms had come off in the crash. But then we'd have no tension over it hurting Will.

mllaneza
Apr 28, 2007

Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1993-1952




Quinton posted:

Look, I'm willing to suspend some disbelief around alien tech or FTL drives or whatnot, but water freezing and thawing is not a mystery.

Yeah. The writers got tied up in their symmetry between fire and ice being the threats to the Robinson children. I would have accepted technobabble about seed nodes and supercooling, but what we got was just plain wrong. They did pull off some interesting structural things with Will suggesting a way to save his frozen sister, but it doesn't work (because it's raining on a glacier....) so the robot he befriends saves her. That plays off against his real test scores and whether he deserves to be there in an interesting way.

Knifegrab
Jul 30, 2014

Gadzooks! I'm terrified of this little child who is going to stab me with a knife. I must wrest the knife away from his control and therefore gain the upperhand.
My favorite character is ugly Sansa.

I am two episodes in and want every character to die.

Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.

Knifegrab posted:

My favorite character is ugly Sansa.

I am two episodes in and want every character to die.

Watch the first scene of ep 3 and watch Parker Posey become your favorite character.

Knifegrab
Jul 30, 2014

Gadzooks! I'm terrified of this little child who is going to stab me with a knife. I must wrest the knife away from his control and therefore gain the upperhand.

Lycus posted:

Watch the first scene of ep 3 and watch Parker Posey become your favorite character.

I'm really struggling to see this show through.

*Sees robit killing everyone*

"You're not like that anymore, robot I just met" - A mentally deficient child, the protagonist.

Also how the gently caress does it understand english arrggggg

Blind Rasputin
Nov 25, 2002

Farewell, good Hunter. May you find your worth in the waking world.

I’m only on the end of ep 3 but this show is bad and I know Stephen hawking has only been dead for like.. two weeks but that doesn’t mean you can just go and poo poo all over physics already. I guess I’m OK with the idea that an entire spaceship full of humans can survive entering and subsequently exiting a black hole.. that’s one thing. But then one of these impervious-to-superluminal-forces ships just has its front fall off because it’s hanging over a cliff? How the hell does that work? While the Robinson’s spaceship can withstand being crushed under a mountain of ice and rock... Let’s just ignore that hilarious water scene in ep 1 to ask what these ships are made of because it makes no sense.

The wife, Maureen, she is a waking nightmare of a human and I hope she dies in a reactor fire. The way she gave in to the patriarchal husband is a disaster for the #metoo movement and should’ve never happened.

Supercar Gautier
Jun 10, 2006

PaybackJack
May 21, 2003

You'll hit your head and say: 'Boy, how stupid could I have been. A moron could've figured this out. I must be a real dimwit. A pathetic nimnal. A wretched idiotic excuse for a human being for not having figured these simple puzzles out in the first place...As usual, you've been a real pantload!

Blind Rasputin posted:

The wife, Maureen, she is a waking nightmare of a human and I hope she dies in a reactor fire. The way she gave in to the patriarchal husband is a disaster for the #metoo movement and should’ve never happened.

This is funny because my first thought was "Why is she arguing with a guy that probably has tons of real world survival experience?" Then as the episode went on I figured they were purposely making him get the shaft so the tumblr crowd could masterbate over how the show disregards the strong white male protagonist.

I'm normally on the SJW side of things but i really thought in that first episode they were purposefully loving him over at every turn.

Boris Galerkin
Dec 17, 2011

I don't understand why I can't harass people online. Seriously, somebody please explain why I shouldn't be allowed to stalk others on social media!

Ah, this explains it all. Just like that mars rover that crashed because of unit conversion the Resolute only got attacked because they miscalculated something cause of units.

Professor Shark
May 22, 2012

I hope the theme of searching for an important piece of equipment, only to find it replaced with bottles of whiskey continues

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Lycus
Aug 5, 2008

Half the posters in this forum have been made up. This website is a goddamn ghost town.
That "It's okay when a doctor wants payment!" thing was so dumb. She very well could've come back with "That's in a normal economy, idiot. A survival situation is different. I didn't demand payment before examining the woman you saved." Just standing there like he made a point was stupid.

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