Reviews

The premise of the show is intriguing, but certain casting choices hard to swallow. As someone who works at a top university and occasionally crosses paths with remarkable scientists, many of whom are seasoned with significant experience (over the age of 40. . . At least), frankly, the characters seem too young to be 'remarkable scientists.' This takes away from the believability of the story and makes it a hard watch.

I'm probably a stick in the mud on this, but for me characters have to align in age or approximate age with the character's professional background. That's like my pet peeve. I mean, a 20 year old super scientist doesn't work for a serious storyline, unless it's a comedy. And really, is there any, allow me to create a word, "scientisting" going on here? This is typical Hollywood over the past 30 years. Let's target the age of who we think will view this movie. Never mind the actual story and characters.

There's more, the story lacks a connection to the characters. It's possible that this disconnect is from the overarching focus on a future event, coupled with it being a series. A television series provides ample opportunity for character development, but with this targeted under 21-30 audience and no feeling for the characters this also makes it a hard watch.

I am intrigued by the premise and curious to see how it unfolds, but as it stands, I may not be on board to finish this season.

Maybe I should read the book!

We are the food! We waited one and a half years for them to deliver roughly 5.5 hours of a Top Boy catastrophe. The characters were out of character for the entire 6 episodes. They really should explain this to the fans. Nothing was right here. Dushane was always the barometer, Sully the thermometer, yet they decided to mix everything up. They even let Jaq go mad, a character that only ever demonstrated loyalty. I give it and the season 5 stars just for episode one. They really setup the confrontation between the Irish and Sully so well, that storyline could have worked for an entire season by itself.

That line delivered a powerful moment in the movie. Sidney Lumet's direction is flawless. Of course helped by Mamet's intricate story telling and Newman's Oscar worthy performance. The Verdict pulls you in during the first 15 minutes as Newman is self destructing and it never let's you go. A down and out ambulance chaser gives it one last shot to rescue his career, his life and his self respect. Its great to see a movie where the dialouge, moments of silence, and facial expressions carry the day. Easily one of the best directed, written and acted movies ever made! A must see. To this day, I dont understand how a biographical film wins the day at the Oscars that year. Lumet, Mamet and Newman were robbed. 10/10.

So I am a TV snob. All my "shows" are on pay TV I admit. Occasionally, I will dabble with FX. So when a friend, who had the series saved to disk, asked me to watch the series, I decided to humor her. She said Sophia Bush is in it, I said who? Anyway, I humored her and I watched 2 episodes but it really only took half of 1 episode to realize my friend needed an intervention. The 25-35 yr olds have too much power in Hollywood. This show should never have been green-lit. Stay far away! Who would approve a yong doctor being supervised by her Dad, who then in turn gets supervised by his daughter, while both are being managed by the Mom? Only a 25-35 yr old approves this crap! A hot mess!

A few things keep this series from being great. The editing and direction at times are not up to par. Too many cuts with surprisingly great writing mixed with bad writing. That's hard to stomach and an uncommon phenomenon. Usually great writing breeds more great writing. The problem is that most of the poor writing involves the Siobhan Quays character. The Decourcy/Siobhan coupling isn't working and it never has. Especially Siobhan, that character is becoming an eyesore.

Kevin Bacon is amazing! Much of the police/FBI storyline has great acting and makes it worth a watch. Barely.

Fantastic writing and acting. Sully's past can not be cured. He has been battling the past for the last two seasons and it finally came to a head. An Incredible ending to a short but great return in 2022. Hopefully they filmed the next season over the long Covid break. We need another 8 episodes this year!

This episode sums up why Top Boy is the best crime drama available streaming, TV, wherever and however. Nothing is better. Start from the first season under the name Top Boy Summer house and watch every episode. Thank me later!

There was something fresh about the first three seasons of Billions. Season four tested our faith in the show, and we gave billions a pass. We gave it a pass because we genuinely enjoyed the first three seasons. Season five barely survived the pandemic, as we all barely survived the madness. But this season is overcooked.

In movies, television series and acting in general, there is a fine line between make believe and realism. If you can believe it, it works for the audience in comedy, drama, and fantasy. If you can't believe it, but the story is good, it may still work as fantasy. Billions is not supposed to be fantasy. The character writing is so beyond how people (Wall Street or not) speak; the lack of ideas for this season has forced the writers into adding more unrealistic verbiage. So much so that each scene comes off as sketch. The believability has been lost and we are done here! It was a good thing while it lasted, but the countdown is on.

First episode showed promise for the first 30 minutes. Then came the club scene! Cheaply done! This is what Power suffered from early on but with better acting and a stronger script it survived. They need to put the money into the production and script. Scenes with 2-3 people in them, no volume background shots to add that believable ambience, no spacing and pacing to the direction. And the club scene had maybe 20 people walking around. You could see that the same people were walking around in circles on camera. If this is a scene which shows a poppin club night for a big guy in the dope game, come on?! I know Starz Paid 50 but he isn't putting it into his production. 2nd episode had us laughing. Again, cheaply made, poor acting and unbelievable script.

Obviously, the last two episodes Mr. Lewis had Covid19. Looks like they just turned it into Axe speaking remotely through zoom and facetime. Good episode as the plot thickens, but beginning to feel like the show has maybe jumped the shark. I'm thinking one more full year and its out to pasture for Billions. I just wish they would give Chuck a really satisfying win with Wendy. Maybe next episode?

Pleasant surprise when I caught this on TCM. The first 3/4 of this movie was an adventure involving the dangers of train hopping from NY to LA, with two acquaintances finding love on the way. The leading man has never found his way in life, and the leading female, a teenager, thinks getting to LA is her way in life. Hopping trains gives you a nostalgic look at the life of the "hobo" and shows the despair and hopelessness of that lifestyle. When our characters get to LA, the promise land, what we see is some of the finest acting I have ever seen in film; a really good ending follows.

There is an understated reaction by the two lead characters to what develops in Los Angeles, and the result is a very moving finale. The emotion is well played by Michael Parks, and it will sneak up on you. The strongest guy in the room may find himself looking for a hanky or excusing himself from the room. If you have the chance to see Wild Seed, it will be time well spent.

Daniel Kaluuya an utterly amazing performance! This brotha showed some acting chops here. A must see for Daniel alone, but the director deserves a nod too. The director and screenwriter deserve Oscars for that matter. The director took what could have been a PBS documentary and turned it into movie magic. Now let's tell the story of the Oakland chapter. Same director! The shootout on Magnolia. I was a child 1/2 a block down the street when the shots started flying everywhere and Bobby Hutton was killed.

Denzel is a master at the little things that make you believe the roles he plays. And here, as in most of his films, Denzel is a 10! I disagree, wholeheartedly, with some of these reviews which state it's a run-of-the-mill detective story. Not at all! I admit that I was hoping it would go further into the mind of a killer, and give us the creepy killer scare factor. And as the movie progressed, I could see it was not going to go there. But I was okay with it, because I bought into to where it was headed.

The fact that the movie doesn't go further down the gore, creepy road, is exactly what was desired here and needed to deliver a whodunit in disguise. This road created a more cerebral movie. These cops believe they have the killer the whole time, and we believe they have the killer as well. The ending twist was good and the final ending was touching. Which leaves you wondering if the killer was actually caught - exactly what the writer was hoping for.

2 points removed, because of a scene where Rami's character does something so removed from what a detective or cop would do, you will go into "no-way" mode. Also, because I don't think Rami plays a convincing detective. Whereas, Leto, I feel could play a detective much better. Give Leto a haircut, a suit, and he could play the role. Rami, on the other hand, would have been really good playing Leto's character. Malek's creep factor is on the surface moreso than Leto's. Its a solid 8 out of 10.

"Work makes you happy? Maybe you don't know what it is to be happy." Classic line delivered in the opening episode. We Americans work and work and work. Are we happy? Anyway, after that it was all downhill. Too many cliches and stereotypes. My experiences in Paris, they did get the French workers animosity towards Americans working in France down pretty good. I rate it low but someone 30 years my junior, with little work experience and little travel under their belts would probably rate it 7+. I only wish the lead was about a more mature woman.

Even the live ones like DiCaprio, Hanks, Blanchett, DeNiro and Streep. There is not one celebrity on the show. These are TV personalities by virtue of, you guessed it, reality TV! We should call them Reality TV stars. It is blasphemous to the craft and work put in by actors if you dont use the phrase "Reality TV" when you mention them. It is unreal the destruction reality TV has done to our minds, our viewing options, the writers guild, and the way we categorize a celebrity. I will always believe a celebrity is a popular iconic film personality. Then there are TV stars whose careers are TV based but are true actors and are celebrated for their popularity. Then you have this mess! And it is messy. All of it! I unfortunately saw this in my Snapchat discovery. I watched one episode, before hiding it from my Snapchat discovery, and it reminded me of the problems the under 40s face today. Too much self! Avoid!

Hard to watch a show about the FBI and see that the average age of the cast is 25-30 years old. Once it's not believable, whats the point?

I should say out of my misery. After investing 5 season or years in this madness it's finally over. A show with such potential after 2 seasons, that somehow got derailed by its inability to see the light at the end of the tunnel, culminates in more ambiguity. By the end of the show, who cares that main characters actually love each other? Really? Helen's character was so mean to Noah, his daughter so awful towards him, his mother-in-law so devilish towards him, all I ever wanted was a show or two where Noah was happy. Trying to understand the anger inside the female characters in this show was difficult and reuslted in really not caring much for their journey. Which means ultimately not caring much for the show. The only show I have ever invested time in, that made me feel happy when it was over.

Decent imagery, stale stroy and an actor that looks like Marvel's Submariner makes for an odd movie. The colors and imagery get a 5/10. The same stale approach to comic book storytelling and the obvious DC trolling of Marvel's Namor gives it 0/10. Go for the color and beauty, that's it!

I think there is something to be said for movies reflecting reality as much as possible. Unless the category is fantasy of course. In Miss Sloane you have another film with beautiful faces, choppy dialogue, crisp banter back and froth, and unrealistic timely deliveries. None of which is the real world. I've seen board rooms and high-stakes meetings at a smaller level; albeit small organization board rooms and non-profit board rooms, none of them had a room full of everyone around the same age. Also absolutely none had no one above the age of 50! These movies can be made without being so far away from reality and still be beautiful to look at and interesting to listen to. The crisp and timely dialogue comes off as memorized speech - which it is; but, which it should not sound like. No one delivers words this way. Movies can reflect the real world and still deliver a script that audiences want to hear! The dialogue is too sharp and perfect. The cast is too young and the lead character's performance is way over the top.

To be in my 20s and in Paris. . .a dream which once was. Paris does bring out the writer in everyone and the dreamer. Woody Allen does this as well in Midnight in Paris. Amazing if you love the city of lights and good if you are only fond of such an adventure.

One reviewer states the show is unrealistic. He said pimps did not hang out together. He obviously has never been around the pimp game. Another reviewer says disregard negative reviews; listen to this reviewer. I doubt Simon would create a show without doing his homework, and here he has done his work -even more so than the Wire. Here in the Yay Area, better known as the Bay Area, as I hung out in Oakland and areas of SF back in the mid 70s and early 80s, pimps did hang with each other. They did hang with the masses of people in the neighborhood. They would have blended in, if not for their cars and wardrobes. My grandfather was friends with a few pimps and hoes in the 1970s. The Deuce has a gritty element that will attract anyone who longs for real feel TGV and smart programming.

I can remember my dad coming back to the states after Nam, with porno flicks in the mid-70s. I snuck and watched of course. What I found interesting was the mystery behind the culture. Where was this happening? There was a time when it poked its head out from the underground with adult theaters, but the government wasn't ready for the world adult movies. It wasn't ready, because of where Adult movies were originating. They were in the big cities of NY, SF and LA and associated with pimps, hoes, hustlers and drugs; and quiet as kept some good professional actors. This show tells us where it all started.

As a young adult in college in the early 80s, I had the chance to hang out all night with one of those old porn stars. He took us on a ride to a place called the Mansion in SF. We were standing at the corner or Broadway and Columbus in front of Carol Doda's. He said to us, do you like what you see. (Three women in the limo). We said hell yes! He asked us to jump in and said it was his birthday today. In today's world, getting into that limo would be considered a non-starter. The Mansion was where they shot many SF porn vids in the 70s. That night he showed us his world. It was a drug fueled, sex fueled world, which had elements of street with dope and the way the clientele looked. Definitely pimps there from what I can remember. Odd thing was everyone was very nice to us, and had a morale approach to whether we should be at this party of not.

Nothing happened that night, dammit! He put us in a room with movies playing, because some lady mentioned we looked too young. They gave us beers to drink while they were all doing drugs and screwing downstairs. We would peeked out every now and then to look. He starred in several big movies in his day; his biggest was Behind the Green Door.

This world is real, it was the genesis of film booth loops and it is 100% fascinating, not just as TV programming but as a history lesson. Watch it!