TV Writeups

Where I blather about tv and link things. My more popular ATLA/LOK blog is here.I super believe in Tad Cooper and am lacking in meow meow beenz.

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How much collecting is too much collecting?

I'm now in the phase at looking at fandom merch for research purposes and I understand having products because the fans will want to buy something anyway. What is troubling to me is the amount of merch and the packaging of the same item 12 or more ways to get the completists to buy everything. It feels damn exploitative.

People are free to do what they want with their money and these things exist because fans want these things. But... yeah... feels exploitative on whatever company's part.

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HYBE x Geffen got me confused. Like, really confused.

I had planned on writing something about The X Factor, Sixteen, and Pop Star Academy / Dream Academy but I might just focus on Sixteen and Pop Star Academy since they're both "K-pop" and featured public fan voting to cast individual members.

Both had a "rate the other members" challenge which... like... I dunno.

I just watched the SAINT SATINE thing and I have no words but I was wondering what they were going to do with the trainees who didn't make it.

Surprised that 14 of the 16 trainees on Sixteen ended up debuting as idols though. That's a pretty high rate for a survival show.

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tvw and reality survival shows

The algorithm strayed and took me away from the entertainment industry-based reality shows to a niche in Survivor which was the "Heroes vs. Villains" Ponderosa. I think it did this because the jury members at Ponderosa formed a band called Dragonz for the funsies.

It made me relive some memories.

I used to watch Survivor until my father passed away. I stopped because I realized it was only really something I watched and enjoyed for the bonding time with him.

I only watched two seasons after that: "China" and "Heroes vs. Villains." I watched China because someone asked me to tape episodes (VCRs, y'all) while they went on vacation. To my surprise, one of my old, former friends (lost touch) was one of the contestants. I only watched "Heroes vs. Villains" because she was on that season too. If you know your Survivor lore you probably know who I'm writing about here.

The thing is, coming up with songs and writing amusing lyrics is the kind of stuff we would do in our peer group so it was really par for the course as an activity. That this sort of thing has never happened on Survivor again given its many seasons is something that both surprises me and doesn't surprise me. It just makes me think that the people I grew up around were such an amusing lot to hang with.

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Pretty convinced there will never be an artistically successful staging of Chess in my lifetime.

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Turned out I wasn't exactly watching Debut: Dream Academy but Netflix's Pop Star Academy: Katseye. Not sure if I should re-watch it to write about it or just use the internet to re-examine some info.

Went back to Sixteen and you know you've gone deep with the k-pop when you've taught yourself to read some Korean! They don't totally caption the names but after watching Time to Twice: Rank Battle I taught myself the members' names so I could read where they all ranked one another.

It's been helping me identify all the trainees who didn't make the group when they show their names onscreen during Sixteen!

Seriously though, knowing that 나 = "nah", and ㅣ = 'ee" is serving me really well! (Lord help me with the Chaeyoung, Chaeyeon and Chaeryeon though!!!)

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Ooof, Sixteen is a hard watch. I got through one episode and a few minutes and it feels brutal.

...so I tuned in to the Katseye casting show, Netflix's Dream Academy, and it feels kinder but I'm just on the training part and haven't reached the competition part. It feels like it mashes up two different kinds of k-pop pre-debut shows -- the documentary of a group training together and a competitive reality show. What I'm finding really confusing is the trainee time period for all the hopefuls in Dream Academy. I had to go to the internet to look up the timing. The ages ranged from 14-21 (Sixteen was 14-19) and it appears that HYBE/Geffen's max training time ranged from 7 months to 2 years. (If math is correct, the 15-year-old Korean started training around age 13).

I also watched some The X Factor clips about One Direction. (Unfortunately, full episodes are harder to come by.)

Obviously I'm watching the shows after knowing the results so I don't have to deal with that high of a level of tension and drama. Still, Sixteen is hitting in a way that feels extra rough.

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tvw watches Sixteen

At the end of March one of my cousins who I hadn't seen in nearly 20 years visited. As we walked by TD Garden I commented that in all my time living in Boston that I had never attended a single event inside TD Garden. (I had gone to the old Boston Garden as a child.) He was surprised by that as it's so accessible to me and suggested I go see something there.

The next day I looked up what events were happening at TD Garden that week. The sporting events felt shockingly expensive. There was a Cardi B concert but the cheapest ticket was over $300. The most affordable ticket I could purchase was an upper balcony seat to the TWICE concert so I went with that.

I've fallen down a TWICE rabbit hole ever since (enough to have a bias and then get that bias wrecked). I'm wishing that I had the time, motivation and energy to write about the journey. It's essentially been a vitamin to me and has managed to fill the space that had been reserved for a certain song contest.

I'm at the point now where I'm going to start watching Sixteen. I've held off watching it this long because the bits I've heard about it feel somewhat cruel and possibly manipulated. Earlier this year, after Jessie Buckley's Oscar win I had tried to rewatch parts of I'd Do Anything, the British musical casting show. When I watched it many years back I remember loving it but in revisiting the show I found there were parts concerning Jessie Buckley and Samantha Barks that hit me like a truck in how uncomfortable they felt. This is not to say that other contestants didn't have unpleasant moments but there's an extra yuck to the comments made to Buckley and Barks as they were 18 and 17 respectively at that time.

Which is to say that Sixteen might even feel worse since Nayeon is 17 and the oldest contestant on the show!

I anticipate having a lot of thoughts.

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Is it wrong to speculate on a celebrity possibly being autistic if you keep your speculation off the internet and only share it with a couple of people?

There is just so much content and I can’t unsee it.

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Because I am refusing to follow a certain event this year I have been filling the gap with deep diving into KPOP.

It’s been giving me a lot of thoughts.

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One of the reasons we have the humanities in higher education (or education in general) is so we can learn about things like the French Revolution (and other revolutions) and be able to have some context and understanding for what has and can happen in the world. We learn about literature to help us pique our curiosity, paint pictures in our minds, and develop empathy skills. We learn fine art to feel, experience, or glimpse into the minds and times and places in which these artworks were created.

You then get to hopefully synergize all these things to get an idea as to what is happening right now.

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My hectic life schedule and continual tiredness meant I only got into KPop Demon Hunters about 6-7 months late (it randomly popped up on my YouTube feed somehow — probably via Grammy and Oscar campaigning) which meant I missed out on all the fun, most hype stuff.

I have tons of thoughts but just gonna drop a few here because, as I mentioned before, my time is limited:

It has the best movie prologue I’ve seen since Fellowship of the Ring

Probably something more recent than LotR but the whole intro to the movie (before the title pops up) is an absolute delight and it will take me a while to think of the last example.

I know this is getting a Criterion release but this is one of those movies that screams for at least one extra disc of creator / behind-the-scenes content.

Controversial take here but I think it’s the best movie musical since South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut (and better than that)

Anyone who’s read any of my creative writing knows how much I love a double entendre. This movie has so many double meanings that I have nearly ascended!

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Just one more comment: so much reflection on movies from long ago!

…making one wonder if movies in the past 15 years were just crap after all.

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Someone from one of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “let’s cast someone in one of the musicals I’m producing” shows won an Oscar.

…who through that show got hooked up with some Shakespeare appreciating by CamMack.

Weird how the world works sometime.

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They need to cut down these scripted presentation bits.

I hate that other folks’ speeches are getting cut down for some of these skits.

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Me watching young New England Patriots fans:

You spoiled little b!tches.

I am completely indifferent to them winning or losing.

Win? Oh, the folks in my city will be happy for a while.

Lose? I don’t have to hear a billionaire owner make a cringe speech about us all being “patriots” while a certain government agency prepares to go full force on my city.

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I don’t understand how a New England healthcare worker who has to drive in inclement weather from time to time will choose a rinky-dink sedan as their primary vehicle

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The latest iOS update is the worst update I have ever experienced and I had Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition!

Everything I do is slower. The search bar doesn’t let me hit “enter” to choose the items — it gives me to arrow down and scroll after waiting a few seconds for content to populate!

My batteries on both my phone and MacBook drain like crazy. (I’ve never used my MacBook to the extent that it’s drained until this update kicked in and it’s happened twice in the last two days and that’s already with disabling Liquid Glass!)

Whoever designed this needs fired!