What I’m Watching, March

Obviously a busier month than normal. Let’s get to it.

Narcos, season three
Maybe not quite as excellent as the first two seasons, largely due to the end of Wagner Moura’s epic run as Pablo Escobar which carried the first two seasons. The move from Medellín to Calí still made for compelling TV. Despite that move, there was still a revelatory performance, this one by Matias Varela as cartel head of security Jorge Salcedo.

The season hit a peak at about its midway point and carried that all the way to its finale. An outstanding end to the first chapter of a great series. I’m excited to see what the move to Mexico for seasons four and five brings.

A-

Jack Ryan, season two
Ugh, so disappointing. The writing felt lazy and manipulative. Some of the major plot developments made no sense. And the last episode was damn near unwatchable. Seriously, a State Department liaison can just order a US helicopter to fly into another country’s presidential palace on its Election Day and start shooting the place up? Bullshit. Sad that John Krasinski and Wendall Pierce are attached to this crap.

C- most of the season but episode 8 was an F

Curb Your Enthusiasm, season three
I watched this series in about two days. It was really solid. I don’t know that it had an episode that matched season two’s The Doll, but it was still highly entertaining.

B+

El Camino
I finally got around to watching this last Saturday. I did not do what some had suggested and go back and read Jessie Pinkman’s Wikipedia entry to remind myself of everything he went through in Breaking Bad. The recap at the beginning helped, but I was still four or five years from watching BB and certainly forgot a lot.

I thought this was really well done. It was ironic that Pinkman was the original BB character that people were rooting for by the end. So it was fitting we got to see how his story played out. Seriously, poor fucking Jessie! The balance of both moving his life forward and filling in some holes of his relationship with Todd in the final year of BB was excellent. It had just the right tone to match that of the original series, and was filled with Vince Gilligan’s amazing eye for how to shoot a show. And Aaron Paul remains amazing.

A

No Laying Up’s Tourist Sauce, season five
My prime golf media connection is with these guys, via Twitter, their podcasts, and their web series. Tourist Sauce is their big travel series that drops twice a year and is centered on an extended golf trip somewhere. The first four seasons hit Australia, Scotland, the California coast, and Ireland.

Season five focused on the Carolinas. Because of that I think it lacked some of the emotional impact the other seasons had, especially the Scotland and Ireland seasons. Seriously, if you are even vaguely into golf, if you watch those seasons you will be ready to book a trip to go play your way around one of those islands.

The Carolinas just don’t have that feel. Well, until the final episode, which took place at the Tobacco Road course. That is a course that has the feels and I would love to go play.

B+

Trinity and Beyond
I came across a recommendation for this documentary about the US’ nuclear weapons testing program randomly and found the flick on YouTube. It is basically 90 minutes or so of video of the weapons testing the US did between 1945 and the late 1960s over dramatic, martial music and some narration by William Shatner. The footage is incredible to watch, but it does get a bit monotonous after an hour or so.

B-

Captain Marvel
Avengers Endgame
Spider-Man – Homecoming
C and L are into the MCU movies so we watched these three. L loved Captain Marvel. She even watched it again last night. I thought it was pretty cool, but I don’t get into these as much as they do. I was thoroughly confused by Endgame, but I know it got great reviews and reaction from fans, so I’ll accept that it was a good movie even if I didn’t get it. And this was our second viewing of Spider-Man – Homecoming since L is into Spidey. Can’t go wrong with your friendly, neighborhood Spider-Man.

Captain Marvel B+, Brie Larson A+
Endgame B?
Homecoming A-

Raiders of the Lost Ark
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
I talked L into watching some old movies with me. We started with these three. She seemed to like the Indiana Jones movies ok, but I forgot how silly and campy they were. I don’t think she got that at all. [1] They certainly felt dated.

Watching the Marvel movies got me wondering if she would enjoy The Lord of the Rings movies. I explained they were basically the Avengers with wizards, elves, dwarfs, hobbits, and orcs. She was game and we watched The Fellowship of the Rings over two days. She was thoroughly confused. It is amazing that for a nearly three hour movie how much they had to leave out from the books. I was constantly explaining things to her. I guess we could have watched the extended version which is an hour longer. I told her the next two movies are better. We’ll see if I can get her to watch them.

Raiders B+
Last Crusade B+
Fellowship B-

Back of the Net
L found this movie about a high school soccer player on Netflix and watched it over the weekend. It’s not very good. L thought it was pretty dumb, too. But when you’re looking for a way to waste a couple hours during the lockdown, you’re going to have to watch some crap to find the gems.

C