slowpulse Reviews

The Regime (2024)

Strong start, anemic ending

[7/10 · 17 April 2024]

There's a lot to like about this show. The depiction of a geographically vague old dictatorship in Europe is spot on. It reminds of old autocracies like Romania or present-day Belarus , and constantly balances between amusingly farcical and quietly frightful. And Kate Winslet is absolutely at her peak here, as a nutty, narcissistic ruler.

It's a good thing that they've written it as a mini-series too, because the absurdities could have easily become stale after too many episodes. Unfortunately, the energy built up by the first five installments is not matched by what is essentially a cowardly sixth and last chapter. It opts for an unfulfilling ending that refuses to pick sides and leaves plenty of unanswered questions.

Still, it's highly entertaining and deserves to be watched.

Beef (2023– )

A dire lack of the proverbial chill pill

[8/10 · 11 March 2024]

I love a show that keeps surprising me with each new episode. Here, the two main characters are so incurably flawed as human beings that witnessing their lives spiral out of control eventually feels like watching a car crash: it's gruesome and yet you can't look away. The background to the titular beef is so perfectly banale that every subsequent, preposterous turn of event almost feels logical.

The show features a strong cast, with plenty of well-rounded supporting characters that help move the story forward. And while almost none of them is a particularly likeable person, they make the show more interesting.

The Brothers Sun (2024)

Strong start that progressively fizzles out

[6/10 · 11 March 2024]

Overall it's an entertaining and watchable product. The well-coreographed ass kicking alone makes it worth a look, but the strong start is not matched by later episodes that get successively more bogged down in family theatricals and sermons about traditions and blood. All the while, we're essentially asked to root for people who are Asian mafia elite, who've accordingly based their whole lives on the ruthless exploitation of other human beings. For that to happen, we need charismatic and playful characters, but I personally couldn't quite find it in my heart to cheer for these ones all that much.

There's also a very weak love story buried in here that really stretches believability, but fortunately it doesn't take up too much running time. All in all, there was enough production value and dedication put in this to make it worthwhile, but it's probably a good idea to limit it to one season.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (2023– )

Needs more monsters

[6/10 · 5 February 2024]

A more apt title for this would have been "Monarch: Scarcity of monsters", because they don't get nearly as much screen time as they need.

The constant flashbacks to set up the origin story for the Monarch organization are well done and interesting, and using Kurt Russel's real-life son to play his younger counterpart is an absolutely brilliant choice. However, what drags the story down are the incurably annoying and entitled young characters, whose sole reason for getting so much space just seems to be to give young viewers someone who represents their demographic. And of course one of them is conveniently a computer wiz - because how would a sci-fi story ever progress without one nowadays, right? These young ones stumble their way through several plot resolutions in a way that reminds more of Shaggy and Scooby-Doo's shenanigans than actual analytical work.

It remains an entertaining show nonetheless, but with better pacing, fewer daddy issues, more monsters and the actual hunting left to professionals, it could have been so much better.

Drops of God (2023)

Compelling a well-done

[8/10 · 14 August 2023]

What a treat. It's not often I stumble upon a series that keeps me guessing the entire run, without resorting to a Lost-like barrage of unanswered mysteries. Moreover, the characters aren't all just good or bad, but rather go between stages of believable humanity - sometimes you root for them; other times you marvel at their obtuseness.

I enjoyed the fact that they were allowed to speak their own languages most of the time - French, Japanese, a hint of Italian - and employed English only when communicating in-between nationalities. It gave the show an extra layer of authenticity. As did the unusual artistic choice of often letting background sounds be heard, whether inside a busy bar or out in the open. It's one of many small details that made me appreciate it more.

I truly enjoyed the actual story and its peculiarity, and the way they ingeniously illustrated how the main character "feels" the flavors that make up individual wines. At times, it even positively inspired me to cork up a bottle myself.

Mrs. Davis (2023)

Confusion is not a good substitute for excitement

[5/10 · 25 July 2023]

The quintessential Lindelof series, if there ever was one. Take an interesting premise, but don't give any background to your viewers; then introduce many characters little by little, but without revealing enough details about them; and finally add so many confusing twists story-wise that there will be dozens of possible interpretations by the end, but none will give anyone a clear picture.

For every revelation in this series, at least two or three new mysteries are added each episode. Side stories and flashbacks abound, which is not bad per se, but they often add more confusion than reveal anything useful. And I'm sure a lot of people like this sort of storytelling, but for me, it just gets tedious after a while.

Space Force (2020–2022)

Fun while it lasted

[7/10 · 27 April 2023]

A perfect vehicle for Carell's brand of comedy. He was born to play this kind of determined, slightly stiff government official, whom things keep happening to, but who can weather any storm with common sense and a big heart. All the while, tomfoolery arises all around him, courtesy of a ragtag band of oddballs and doubters. None more funny than a pitch perfect John Malkovich. And that's where the show is at his strongest, with comedy that is just the right balancing act between screwball and tongue-in-cheek.

By the middle of the second season though, it's clear that the budget and the ambitions have been downsized a bit. Pity. There was room for many more seasons of high jinx and developing characters.

The Imperfects (2022)

Perfectly entertaining

[7/10 · 27 April 2023]

I liked it. It's sort of a more streamlined Umbrella Academy, geared towards a simpler but still engrossing storyline, without particularly intricate philosophical meanderings. There's ample time for plot twists and cliffhangers nonetheless, but the focus remains solidly on the three leads and their quirky adventures, not on the nature of their special powers vs. The common man.

There's a good mix between 'monster of the week' episodes and overarching main plot. And although some of the resolutions to the obstacles were a bit too convenient at times, I enjoyed the overall look & feel of the show, and wouldn't mind seeing more of it, if they decided to do more seasons.

Modern Love (2019–2021)

Season 1 is exceptional, season 2 just okay

[7/10 · 13 January 2023]

If I had only seen the first season, my vote would've been a categorical 9. The episodes in the first run are so unique and engaging, that I had to go back and re-watch several of them. The actors are all at the top of their game, which is made somewhat easy by the sensational writing. And they tackle difficult subjects as well, such as potential relationships undermined by mental disorders, age, or profound loss. Truly remarkable stuff.

Unfortunately, season 2 doesn't quite hold the banner equally high and offers more ordinary stories, that sometimes even lack a real ending. It's odd, because it looks like they kept the same showrunners, but maybe they had spent most of their resourcefulness on the first season. It's still overall a noteworthy achievement and I would definitely recommend at least season 1 to anyone who loves short, complex, intriguing stories.

The Sandman (2022– )

Uneven but ambitious look at a strange universe

[7/10 · 14 December 2022]

Having never read the graphic novels, I came to this show without preconceptions or expectations, only knowing that the foundational work contains a very expansive universe, that's also spawned several parallell series.

While I enjoyed the overall tone of this particular adaptation, I was occasionally a bit lost among the maaany characters introduced in the first season. It almost felt like the authors didn't want to miss a single beloved figure from the graphic novels, in case there would not be more seasons, so as not to disappoint any of the fans. It made for a choppy plot, where I didn't quite know which characters were worth remembering and which ones were only passing by for a short visit. Still, not a bad first season.

Some of the story lines were a bit silly, while others were fairly impressive. It was clear in any case that the showrunners took this world seriously, with all its excesses and its imperious tone. And that certainly made the ride enjoyable.

The Wheel of Time (2021– )

Surprisingly good

[8/10 · 25 November 2022]

I admit I've never read any of the books, so I don't know - nor care really - how faithful this adaptation is, or how much better the original work might be. All I can judge is this show for what it is, and I genuinely enjoyed the first season. I hope there will be more. They did a good job of introducing the many many characters in a well-timed manner, while also gradually exposing the rules and mythology of this particular universe. I never felt lost, and instead wished to learn more about its peculiarities.

The CGI work wasn't always flawless, especially when presenting the forces of evil, but the sets were opulent and exotic enough. And I liked the colloquial nature of the dialogues, which lent a particular credibility to the characters. I hope they can build upon the compelling groundwork and develop the story further: this is an original fantasy setting that avoids many of the usual tropes of the genre, while obviously adhering to the inevitable battle between good and evil, but even then with a few imaginative twists.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (2022– )

Delivers in spades

[8/10 · 25 November 2022]

Well, I'm hooked. I have read the Silmarillion and the Trilogy, not much else, but I understand enough of Tolkien's monumental work to know that this show is what Middle Earth should feel like. The backdrop is monumental enough; the dialogues are just the right kind of grandiose; and the plot lines are allowed to breathe and develop properly.

There's a huge number of characters to introduce, and an entire world with its back story and deities and creatures. I don't fault the writers for keeping a moderate pace initially, to give the viewers time to digest what's going to be the backbone of the show. Smartly enough, they even keep certain figures nameless for a while, so as not to overload us. But then the momentum increases and things heat up considerably. The opulent sets and the gorgeous CGI certainly help to get oneself immersed, the way Jackson's Trilogy did.

The only negative are the dialects: why have them at all? It's not like we would confuse dwarves with harfoots or elves, if they all spoke with a neutral English accent. It just doesn't make much sense to hear obvious Irish or Scottish from any of the characters. In any case, it's a minor gripe: I'm ready for more seasons, please.

John Adams (2008)

Uneven and jumpy, but nonetheless entertaining

[6/10 · 1 July 2022]

The target audience is clearly an American one, because a lot of the background story is either barely hinted at, or left out completely. The same goes for the characters, who in many cases are well-known names, but not always. Viewers who've grown up in the US are probably familiar with the story presented here, so I suppose the authors didn't want to bore them with widely-known details.

Nevertheless, as an outside viewer with a soft spot for history, I somewhat enjoyed it, despite my needing to fill in a lot of blanks on my own. However, the storytelling felt a bit choppy at times: it either lingered far too long on lesser details, or rushed past entire decades in other instances. It helps to have fine actors like Giamatti and Linney among many others though. They made each scene interesting just by being in it.

Hotel Portofino (2022– )

Hotel Anachronism

[5/10 · 17 May 2022]

If a high school theater ensemble made a Riviera rehash of "Downton Abbey", with a reverential scent of Jane Austen on everything, this is probably very close to what the finished product would look like.

It's not completely bad, but everything feels slightly campy and counterfeit all the time. The "bad guys" are almost all cartoonishly shady, bordering on old-school mustache-twirling villains - even the women, constantly displeased and scheming.

And the many anachronisms surely don't help either. Back in the 1920's, Italians didn't speak English: it was not taught in school, it was not heard on the radio and was not read anywhere. So it's utterly lazy writing to have them magically understand the show's English characters. Even worse, this was when religion and fascism ruled unopposed: the show's young black woman wouldn't have been allowed to sashay around like she owned Portofino. In reality, she would've been arrested, or even publicly beaten by Mussolini's Black Shirts. Simply put, several of the characters don't make much sense.

Severance (2022– )

Peculiar but strikingly intriguing

[9/10 · 5 May 2022]

It's rare to find a new voice in today's sprawling TV landscape, but this show might just be one of those oddities. It may be too introspective or weird for some, but I personally enjoyed it immensely. While the initial premise is harmless enough, the plot thickens with each new piece of the puzzle, keeping the tension at just the right level.

The direction is excellent throughout. There's a focus on production design and architecture that is deeply interesting and the show deliberately fluctuates between modern and obsolete technology and milieu. It all works to keep the audience off-balance, and does it well. Almost all the characters have different layers that are exposed in different episodes and as a viewer, I want to know more about all of them. It's up to the us to decide if the underlying message is one of hope or judgement concerning employer vs. Employee. Very well-done indeed.

Peacemaker (2022– )

A big serving of irreverent fun

[8/10 · 25 April 2022]

What a treat. If one is able to abandon for a short while the traditional mold of serious, rational superheroes, and instead dip into a world where a B-list, borderline villain anti-hero is called upon to save humanity's collective bacon, this show has a ton to offer.

Just like in the excellent "The Suicide Squad", the tone is tongue-in-cheek and the characters grow and interact in interesting ways. The show flirts with absurdity at every turn, but also relies heavily on good old-fashioned action and flippant one-liners. And it's carefully paced and structured, splitting a continuous timeline into a limited number of episodes, rather than procedurally offering a villain-of-the-week setup. It's a fun ride - give it a shot.

The Tourist (2022–2024)

Cools off after a great start

[6/10 · 22 April 2022]

After the first few episodes, I thought I was in for a possible all-time classic. The ingredients were all there: a big mystery with puzzle pieces judiciously dispensed at careful intervals; an enigmatic lead character with an unknown past; and great visuals, with Australia's vast wilderness being a fresh change from the usual North American settings.

But alas, the sizzling start wasn't matched by the ending, which kind of fizzled out, as the various plot twists ended up not being all that compelling. Also, the show tried to shove in one plot twist too many in the end and the overall plot suffered from it.

DMZ (2022)

Disappointing and soulless

[5/10 · 22 April 2022]

The premise of this is odd to say the least: there is a second civil war going on in the US, which would be a big deal worthy of a true blockbuster series, but the show spends roughly 15 seconds talking about it, and then we're just stuck following inconsequential people the rest of the way. Mostly a mother looking for her long-lost son, or petty gang bosses holding small-time political rallies. It's such a weird waste of a potentially phenomenal backdrop.

What made the graphic novel so successful, albeit uneven, was the ambitious scope of the story, detailing the effects of the war on so many people stuck in the DMZ, struggling each day to survive. Whereas here it barely registers as a conflict. Probably as a way to save money, but then why take on such a grandiose source material, if you're just going to keep a few characters and a minor fraction of the plot? Parks are a little less tidy and here and there there's a burnt vehicle, but mostly Manhattan seems unaffected by a supposedly brutal war. People are living a normal life, with electricity, running water and block parties with music and street food. It's as ridiculous as it is pointless.

The Afterparty (2022–2023)

Fun idea, but not close-knit enough

[7/10 · 30 March 2022]

The basic idea is actually pretty neat: a classic, almost Agatha Christie-esque whodunit, with a cunning detective tasked with finding a culprit among a wide gallery of inconspicuous characters, in this case told through several episodes rather than one long feature film. It could have been really good, but I feel the authors never really landed on one specific theme, opting instead to be all over the place, almost as if they thought this would be their one and only chance to shine.

The different motifs that dictate each different episode, from a musical to a cartoon to flashbacks to something else, are aesthetically nice, but lack cohesion and frankly feel more like someone trying to show off than to drive a narrative forward. The plot loses its momentum halfway through, particularly because the same scenes are shown over and over again, albeit from different characters' perspectives. After a while, I got a bit tired of that.

Like I said, it's a fun idea, but needed a more focused approach.

Succession (2018–2023)

Equal parts compelling and irritating

[6/10 · 15 March 2022]

This show is a strange animal: I physically hate every single character, none excluded, and yet I've continued watching it for three seasons. Maybe I'm unwholesomely curious to see how low people are prepared to stoop to gain more authority and recognition, despite already being unfathomably wealthy and privileged.

However, the direction and cinematography lose their novelty pretty quickly: I get it that the bleak colors and the jittery, hand-held camera work are supposed to give us a sense that we're watching a covertly filmed documentary, but that trick gets old already after the first season.

At the end of season three, honestly, the soup they've been cooking is looking pretty diluted. Sure, there're occasional sharp turns of events and cliffhangers throughout the seasons, but the plot still mostly rehashes the initial tenet: an oblivious old patriarch repeatedly dangles the prospect of his succession to his overly eager offspring and to his increasingly tragic underlings. And none of them ever gets any wiser. That's it.

The Defeated (2020)

Good idea, flawed execution

[6/10 · 3 March 2022]

I was initially very excited about this series. The historical period right after the end of WWII is not as well documented in movies and tv shows as the war itself, for obvious reasons. And I do love the overall mood and the work of the art department here.

Unfortunately, where I think the show goes off the rails, is when it tries to cram too many story lines into a single first season, without letting anyone of them breathe properly. It wants to simultaneously be a historical chronicle, a pre-Cold War spy drama, a serial killer hunt story and an organized crime pursuit. But it ends up not really giving a chance to any of those journeys to develop.

And frankly, the thing that annoyed me the most from the start, is the assumption that basically everybody in mid-1940's Germany spoke English. I understand that it makes it easier for viewers who may be too indifferent to subtitles, but seriously, when even Russian soldiers use it to talk to German citizens, believability flies right out of the window.

Landscapers (2021)

Cinematic acrobatics to deliver a different crime tale

[8/10 · 11 February 2022]

Sometimes, being visually innovative may enhance even the simplest plot. In this case, the authors manage to lift "Landscapers" from what would be an ordinary crime story, with two unlikely and hopeless culprits, to a carnival of eye-popping narrative shenanigans. Each episode brings new visual twists, new ways to chronicle the disturbing events that lie at the core of the plot, as well as offer a window into the peculiar minds of the alleged criminals.

And it is no small feat that the authors never clearly spell out whether they believe in the leading characters' innocence or not, despite four long episodes that could disclose it: they leave it to us viewers to make up our minds. And in the end, frankly, it's not even that important that guilt is assigned beyond doubt. It's the storytelling that's central in this mini-series, especially thanks to some truly excellent acting from the outstanding cast, marvelous direction and cinematography for the ages.

Travelers (2016–2018)

If you love sci-fi, do not miss this unexpected gem

[9/10 · 11 February 2022]

I've rarely been more glad to be so wrong. I looked at the characters, mostly young and good-looking, and I was expecting yet another soap operish adulteration of a good sci-fi theme. Boy, was I far off. This show is absolutely stunning: it keeps evolving for three straight seasons, experimenting with new elements and introducing well-timed twists, and it's ambitious enough that it keeps challenging its viewers with an ever-expanding central plot. It doesn't even have to rely on heavy special effects to accomplish the task of painting a grim future. It's a pity that it wasn't resigned past season 3, but it still managed to deliver a magnificent ending. After so many disappointing sci-fi shows that resort to teenage-driven love stories and formulaic procedural episodes, this show is a breath of fresh air for anyone who loves the genre. Don't miss it.

Hacks (2021– )

Funny about funny people

[7/10 · 31 January 2022]

Well-written and enjoyable show about the lesser known topic of stand-up comedians' behind-the-scenes prep work and mannerisms. There's good chemistry between all the characters, both when they get along and when they butt heads, and I appreciated the fact that they didn't try to drag this down to a sitcom level of comicality. Instead they let the dialogues be witty and tempered a fairly high-brow. But they're still funny, of course, and the production relies also on the clash between generations, with Deborah's peculiarity at odds with Hannah's youthful impatience.

I really liked the fact that all the characters, none excluded, are flawed and sometimes unapologetically so. They're self-serving and petty, just like regular folks, but are also occasionally given the chance to redeem themselves a little bit.

Chernobyl (2019)

Superbly well-done

[10/10 · 3 November 2021]

An absolute masterpiece, from start to finish. This is how you tell a complex story, with lots of moving parts and several different characters, without ever missing a beat. The pacing is perfect and the fact that it's entirely based on real events, makes this an even greater feat. They even manage to employ occasional cliffhangers to raise the already high bar.

The story is deftly non-linear, in order not to overwhelm the viewers with front-loaded exposition and give a sense of how lost the eye witnesses might have felt back then. The show balances between tense scenes of raw unease and a portrayal of the absurd life back in the Soviet Union. It even does the latter without gloating, instead merely providing a reason why the catastrophe could happen in the first place.

Like much of tv drama these days, the cinematography is bleak, but here it's definitely called for. Everything feels dejectedly authentic design wise, from the clothes to the locales, and thankfully the actors don't use faux Russian accents. It won't leave you lighthearted in any way, but you will appreciate every minute of it.