Tag Archives: Drama Television

TV Review – Westworld: Season Two

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TL;DR – When it works it is some of the best TV on the planet at the moment, when it doesn’t well at least it is still well shot and acted.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Season Two. Image Credit: HBO

 

Review –

With The Passenger (see review) coming to a close we have reached the end of Westworld’s Season Two. It was a season of competing timelines, the coming of a war, a mother searching for her child, and a lone warrior standing up when everyone needed him too. Today we are going to look at the highs and lows of Westworld’s sophomore season as we return to the holiday destination now turned into a massacre. So say goodbye The Maze and hello to The Door.

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TV Review – Westworld: The Passenger

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TL;DR – It is the end and more than I expected they actually brought the timelines to a conclusion, whilst providing more and more questions for every answer they answered.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is a Post-Credit Scene.

 

The Passenger. Image Credit HBO.

 

Review –

It started all the way back in Journey into Night (see review) with someone washing up on a beach while surrounded by death at every turn and as the season has gone on it has been more of the same. There has been slaughters, a jaunt into The Raj and Shogun World, betrayals, love, loss, and a threat of a mecha bison. Well after all this time, today we come to the end of Season Two as multiple timelines rush together and we finally make it to the Valley Beyond.

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TV Review – Westworld: Vanishing Point

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TL;DR – We are back to where the rest of this second half of the season has left us, and well I just wish at this point it was a bit more.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

 

Vanishing Point. Image Credit: HBO.

 

Review –

Today we get into the pointy end of the season with the penultimate episode, where lines are drawn, armies marshalled, and the endpoint is in sight. I do have to say coming into this episode I am much more optimistic than I have been for a while. As Season Two has progressed it has felt like it has been a season of diminishing returns as the Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood) and Man in Black (Ed Harris) storylines really started to drag. Indeed, one of the few things that have been getting me through the season has been Maeve’s (Thandie Newton) story of trying to get back to her daughter (Jasmyn Rae). However, all of that changed in last week’s Kitsuya (see review) when we were introduced to Akecheta (Zahn McClarnon) properly was a jolt to the system, but can it continue, well let’s see.

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TV Review – Westworld: Kiksuya

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TL;DR – In a dramatic return to form, Westworld shows that when it is firing on all cylinders it can be so very good, and this week we see it as we focus in on only one character.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

 

Kiksuya banner

 

Review –

Well, this was a complete surprise and I honestly didn’t see it coming. In a season that has all been about jumping timelines, exploding trains, mystery boxes, and rampaging warriors. However, this week we take a step back and focus in on really only one character someone who has been there all season on the periphery and now we find out that there I much more to their story.

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TV Review – Sense8: Amor Vincit Omnia

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TL;DR – The Series Finale brings closure in a way only Sense8 could by focusing on family and the power of love. If you have liked the show up until this point you will want to see how it ends, if you haven’t I don’t think this will change your mind.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Sense8 banner

Review –

Endings, no one wants their favourite show to end, lest of all when it is not ending on their own terms. The television landscape is filled with shows that I have deeply loved and we will never know how they ended, and while every now and again we get a Brooklyn Nine-Nine or Farscape many more shows have left the world on a cliffhanger never to be seen again. For a long time, it looked like Sense8 was going to join the long list of shows that never got to say goodbye properly, which was a real shame. While it didn’t always work, the show was always fascinating and it had a level of detail you don’t normally see as the show gallivanted across the globe. However a show like this was expensive, and while I was disappointed I understood when it was announced that it would not be picked up for a third season. However, if it is one thing you should never underestimate that is the power of fans, and in this case, that power has used for good, and today we get to see the outcome of that with a special final episode Amor Vincit Omnia or Love Conquers All.

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TV Review – Westworld: Les Ecorches

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TL;DR – As we move towards the end of the season the different timelines have started to fall into place and I can see the heart of the story it wants to tell, but I don’t know if I am in for the ride to the end.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

 

Les Ecorches banner

 

Review –

At the end of last week’s Phase Space (see review) I was beginning to wonder how all the timelines crashing together was going to work given what we knew already this season and I postulated that there must be either multiple copies of some of the hosts or that the timelines were not adding up. Well today in Les Ecorches we discover that I was both wrong and right, as we find out that there were two different occupations of the Mesa that included Charlotte (Tessa Thompson) and Ashley (Luke Hemsworth) that had been spliced together, however we do discover that someone has had a couple of clones made, so part marks? And as always a reminder that we will be looking at the episode as a whole so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

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TV Review – Mystery Road: Season One

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TL;DR – Mystery Road is a mystery ‘who done it’ where every reveal has weight and you have to watch every episode just to see what happened next.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

Mystery Road

Review –

Australian TV is kind of going through a period of uncertainty, how does it adapt to a changing global marketplace where streaming services are the new norm, or to governments that do not feel like supporting the arts is a good thing any more. Indeed, when you look at the list of currently running drama series in Australia it is almost anaemic compared to even ten years ago. Within this world, it is an unfortunate reality that you have to make each chance count, and with today’s Mystery Road we have a show that does just that. Now before we move onto the review proper just a couple of points. Firstly, this is based off a series of films created by Ivan Sen that I have unfortunately not seen, however, if you are like me in this regard, don’t worry because anything you do need to know about them is told in the show so you are not missing out. As well as this, we will be looking at the series as a whole so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead, but we will leave discussions about the final episode to a paragraph all to itself so you can skip that if you don’t want to find out the conclusion.

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TV Review – Westworld: Phase Space

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TL;DR – It is the second half of the season and finally the timelines are starting to crash into each other in interesting yet not completely clear ways

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Phase Space banner

 

Review –

One of the things Westworld is known for is its many intersecting storylines and timelines, and Season Two has been no exception up until now. We have the story of Dolores’ (Evan Rachel Wood) rebellion as she builds an army to possibly take over the world, also Maeve (Thandie Newton) and her hunt to find her missing daughter as she puts together a ratbag team to help her, we have the Man in Black (Ed Harris) trying to get to the heart of the final narrative Robert (Anthony Hopkins) planned for him, and then we also have Bernard (Jeffrey Wright) whose history database got messed up by the head shot and so we see him jumping across different timelines. Well in today’s episode we not only get all of these stories we get them just as timelines come crashing together … maybe.

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TV Review – Westworld: The Riddle of the Sphinx

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TL;DR – In an interesting turn of events, this is an episode with probably the biggest reveal so far in the series but it also feels like the weakest so far.

Score – 3 out of 5 stars

 

The Riddle of the Sphinx banner

 

Review –
Well, this is an interesting episode, to say the least, in many respects, it drove the narrative forward in leaps and bounds, something I have been hoping for after the last three episodes just felt like moving people into place. However, while it was great to finally get a look at the Delos’ endgame, somehow I left today’s episode feeling more than a little lacklustre. So in today’s review I will try and reconcile those opposing forces, and as always we will be looking at the episode as a whole so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

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TV Review – Picnic at Hanging Rock

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TL;DR – A surreal experience that plays on the power structures of the time, an important retelling of an Australian classic that everyone should watch.

Score – 5 out of 5 stars

Picnic at Hanging Rock banner

Review –

“What happened to the girls at the Hanging Rock?” It is one of the most famous questions in Australian mythology. Was there foul play, did they run away, was it something out of this world? The book by Joan Lindsay and the fictional yet presented as the real account is one of the most important works of literature to out of this fair country, and it was turned into a very successful film in 1975. Well, that was over forty years ago and today we have a new take at adapting the classic book into a mini-series format. Today we take a look at the world at the turn of the twentieth century, a world of pomp and ceremony, and a world of oppression and conformity.

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