Author: Verse

True Detective: Season 4 (2024) 2.5/5

Categories 2.5/5, Crime, Drama, Horror, Movie and Series Reviews, Mystery, Thriller

Season 4 of True Detective benefits a lot from its cast, with everyone involved turning in great performances. Kali Reis and Jodie Fosters, the leads this go around, give nuance to their characters that make them compelling to watch. Reis has to play it a bit more straight while Foster gets to come across more as an antihero, and it is legitimately fun to watch. Reis does get an interesting romantic relationship though that flips what we are used to seeing and that was exciting.

Not all of the supporting cast can say they get as much to do. Christopher Eccleston is a presence that is around until he suddenly isn’t, and Fiona Shaw is mysterious and underdeveloped for the role that she plays. Again though, nobody does poorly with what they get.

The first episode sets high expectations and is truly unsettling. Unfortunately it did not pay off, and the final episodes explanation just made me wonder if these were really True Detectives if so much went unnoticed. What is worse is the use of horror-like elements sometimes come across cheap. An orange can be a powerful way to connect ideas together and imply something going on with a persons mind, but what are we to think of random spirits behind our characters that they never see? There is no story there, unless the implication is that the audience is hallucinating or going through something spiritual.

Benefiting the show is its cold atmosphere, set in the remote town of Ennis, Alaska. The sets are great and become a bit of characters themselves. Visually, the show should be commended. It really sells this cold setting and the cast leans into it.

Jodie Foster’s character asks people around her to ask the right questions, but you aren’t rewarded for doing that here as the audience. Why was there a need for secrecy in these two peoples relationship? There wasn’t. Why did that guy sit up in his bed and say what he said? Spooky vibes. And on and on. The show wants to be really smart, but it does not stand up to even the most basic questions.

By the end of it all, I felt a bit cheated. It never reaches Lost levels of not paying off, but it doesn’t slouch either and its final explanation and whimsical sendoff did not feel good. This is a story that promises a lot and delivers very little. If you can survive on vibes alone though, they are there and they are good. I’m not really mad, just feeling a bit let down. For a show that started so strong, and felt like it had something to say, it could have gone with a much stronger writer to make it all feel connected. I may never know who wrote, or had the time to write, “we are all dead,” but I certainly died a bit from the lack of cohesion.

My Jack Nicholson Adjacent Story

Categories Travel

I saw an article about Jack Nicholson, living out his retirement, and I remembered hitchhiking my way through Colorado. I may expand on that story some more in the future, but not now, as it all feels like pieces of me rather than a singular story. It was not just me, though—Realeo was with me, and we got picked up by a guy whose name escapes me. It may be written on my massive hiking pack that I purchased immediately before the trip, as we asked each person to marker their name and anything else they wanted to. Most people wrote something. I’ll have to take a look.

This was my first long-distance journey, and so I thought getting the largest pack made the most sense. Dear reader, it did not, and I paid dearly. I remember the pain being only compounded by the mixture of items the internet assured me we would need for our journey: metal spoons, gallons of water, a tent, two sleeping bags, one of the fancy water containers every single nurse owns, cans (yes, cans!) of food, and much more. We even gave away items as we traveled. That all being said, I wouldn’t take it back and still look back fondly on the journey. I’ll just say that if you’re ever going far and carrying it all, consider the value of plastic spoons and bottles over fancy, unnecessary items. Less is often better.

Anyway, along the journey we had people we met sign the hiking pack. This guy apparently had worked in construction on a home in Aspen belonging to Jack Nicholson. Nicholson wanted a complete remodel of the kitchen, and the guy described it as a million-dollar job. When the job was done, the guy said Nicholson took one look at how it turned out and then paid again to redo it in a completely different style.

So that is it. That is my Jack Nicholson story that I was not even there for. I just found it interesting—that level of opulence. It was especially interesting, as I pondered the items I shed along the journey. Now, in retrospect, I realize that I was having the best time while having had the least I’ve owned.

Fedora: Solving “initframfs” Kernel Panic Issue

Categories Tech

This is not much of a post, so much as a reminder for myself. Something specific to my system makes it so that occasionally Fedora issues a Kernal Panic warning, and I have to select a prior version to load. Three times now I have had to locate this Stack Exchange web page to fix the problem, so I thought I should just record the way to solve the problem here. Although I think I may end up trying Debian with Gnome next time I have time to rebuild my system. I think I would get a lot out of the stability that both offer. I think using Gnome instead of KDE will be the largest adjustment, but also will be fun to try.

Read more

Teleprompter Apps for Linux

Categories Tech

A lot times when people record themselves, you see their eyes slowly drift down as they read through their script. An easy easy way to make it look like you know what your doing is to use a teleprompter app. It is not perfect, but at least it will keep your eyes in one place. For myself, I tried out two before settling.

Teleprompter by Nokse [link]

This is such a clean interface and very straight forward. I think Teleprompter fits right at home in a clean environment like Gnome. However, I am hoping to see more fine tuning control over the speed of the teleprompter, as I needed it to go just a little bit slower than it would allow me to lower the speed down to. I have opened a request on github for this, and hopefully the creator will be open to doing so, as I love the simplicity of Teleprompter.

QPrompt by Javier O. Cordero Pérez [link]

QPrompt does so many things. It can be complicated if you see the bar at the bottom and get overwhelmed, but it does not need to be. That is all stuff you can play with, but do not have to. Just click the little wrench icon and you can then adjust the “step acceleration,” or the speed of the prompter. This is what I ended up using for my needs, but I felt like this may be a lot for my simple needs. That being said, clearly a lot of effort went into QPrompt and it will probably serve more of the KDE mindset better. You have all the options you need, like opacity, alignment, velocity, countdown timers, backgrounds, and so on. If your like me, you can just paste your text in and set the speed and go as well. It should be noted that QPrompt runs on Linux, Windows, macOS, and Android.

Looking for a Challenge, Found a Disappointment

Categories Video Games

I find it odd to be writing about The Elder Scrolls Online after having not played it for some months. It sticks in my mind though, as the game feels like home in a lot of ways. I love the world and how the controls feel as you move around it. I even enjoy the questing at times, despite how simplistic the characterization can often be. Mostly though, it is just a vibe and I will probably be back sooner rather than later.

That all being said, there is some heavy salt to it for me as well. Update 45 has just released and while there are some nice changes, like finally making the map readable and boosting mounts, it feels also like an affirmation that I see things differently.

Broken Combat

Light and heavy attack weaving is not fun, if only as a consequence of animation canceling. Mixing in light attacks between other, more grand abilities, is a neat thing!

However, animation canceling to do so is very very not-fun. What is worse, is this was not originally an intended aspect of combat. Zenimax Online Studios has just decided to leave it in for over ten years, and build the game around it. So now you get this silly thing where your characters grand spell-slinging gestures get stopped as soon as it starts. This is all so that we can break another aspect of the game that I will talk about next.

Read more

Alien Romulus (2024) 3.5/5

Categories 3.5/5, Horror, Movie and Series Reviews, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Alien Romulus is ahead of the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth films purely by not being upsetting. There is probably reason to be upset for some, in fact I am sure of it, but not for me.

The cast are doing well with what they are given, even if some side characters feel purely like stand-ins setup to die and little else. Everyone has the benefit though of not being asked to say or do stupid things compared to prior films in the series.

There is a scene I would strongly like to change. I’ll stay vague, but it uses a piece of dialogue that is famous from the third film and it should have just stuck to using half of the line to feel more honest to the new character. As well, there are two instances of face-to-face with an alien that lasts some seconds too long. The film could do with some more immediacy to the dangers within it.

My final hope is that the Weyland Corporation is shown a little differently next time. Aliens (Alien 2) showed the Corporation as unpleasant as ever, but I did not have the sense that they could casually double workloads. The mustache twirling takes away from the tangible evil of the corporation, done better even in the franchises lesser films.

All that having been said, I like Rain and Andy. I actually am open to seeing more of these two if that is the direction it goes. Andy is inherently interesting and Rain is flawed and could become more compelling. More importantly, both actors were enjoyable to watch. I may even be tempted to get the Rain skin in Dead by Daylight at some point, if only though because Ripley does not look like Ripley.

Overall, I feel this is the most honest Alien sequel since the first two. Is it perfect? Definitely not. Is it even amazing? Not really. However, it didn’t offend me in any glaring ways and that is the most that I can say about an Alien movie in a long time.

The Knick: Season 1 and 1/2 of Season 2 (2014-2015) 3/5

Categories 3/5, Drama, History, Movie and Series Reviews

The Knick is treated to an excellent cast and some incredible direction leads to scenery that is captured in fantastic ways. However, I couldn’t bring myself to finish the series even after so much time invested. It was just sitting there, and I did not want to look at it.

There is an interest in the first season that is inherent. Seeing medicine in a period of time and without reservations is compelling. The drug fueled medicine feels unique, even in a world where House exists. Clive Owen, the shows center-focused lead, is both awful and endearing as he threatens to sew a nurses mouth shut. None of the other cast members are slouching either.

Still though, season 2 just was not the same for me. The concerns of the show seemed to have changed and my interest went with it. I think I deserve credit for sticking it out, I believe, a good five or six episodes before sort of wandering off. I had the time, but I just did not want anymore. Perhaps if it were sewn as tightly as the first season.

The Deep House (2021) 1.5/5

Categories 1.5/5, Horror, Movie and Series Reviews, Thriller

It is actually very shallow. After watching the flick, a quick search showed that the leads are as follows: someone who primarily identifies as a model and Jagger’s son. She does a serviceable job. He does something else. I really needed to know why he seemed so out of place, and that explains it enough for me.

What is worse, is the wastefulness of the setting. The movie initially holds some promise. How exciting is it to do a haunted house film underwater? That is a great idea! So why then is the whole house experience cliche after cliche! It is absurd because the setting actually works and the film stands a little taller despite what may have been a smaller budget, and yet it inflicts self-wound after self-wound while trying its best to sap out any originality that held promise.

Also, why are the only two characters for the majority of the movie constantly calling out to each other by name? Even underwater, wired directly to one another, they constantly speak to each other in this weird way. You would think that they had just met, not that they were partners.

I’m mostly just frustrated after watching The Deep House. A great idea does not make a film alone, and the execution here just is not it. Not the direction, not the script, and the cast is tied down. The movie is haunted.