Recommended shows on Amazon Prime.

[Basualdo]

Due to things beyond my control I was mostly at home and had time to watch a hell of a lot of TV over the summer. So I binged the fuck out of a lot of stuff.
I found myself watching Amazon Prime most of that time. And because I'm bored now I thought I'd torture you all and recommend some stuff I watched there. If you've seen these then please tell me what you thought of them and if I am talking out my arse as usual.

Clue: Yeah, probably.

And if you haven't, then if you can, watch them.

Bosch - Astonishingly well done adaptation of Michael Connelly's excellent detective novels.

The Expanse - Top rate Sci fi thriller, just drags you in. First series is good, then you can almost see the exact point where the makers realised that they had a good thing and started to throw money at it and it gets better. Amazing special effects.

Grand Tour - You can taste the tears of the BBC finance dept at the lost revenue. And see the cavernous depth of Jeff Bezos' wallet.

The Marvelous Mrs Maisel - Everything about this show seemed specifically designed to make me hate it.
It was obviously targeted at wimmin and pillow biters, but it became one of my favourite TV shows of the year.
Not to everyone's taste, maybe, but I just adored it. If that sounds gay, then fuck it, I'm gay.

Amazing and horrifically expense attention to 1950s detail.
I reckon they spent 90% of the budget just on the cars.
Rachel Brosnahan, who plays the eponymous lead, is a revelation and sexy as fuck. She even makes that ridiculous 50s lingerie look horny. And her stand up routines on the show are genuinely funny even if just watched as themselves out of context.

But even she is upstaged by the woman who plays her dumpy lezzer manager.
First series better than the second by a big margin, but second still good.

Lodge 49 - Probably the best and funniest show about crippled surfers, alchemy, esoteric pseudo freemasonry and plumbing supplies set in southern California that you'll ever see.

The Man in the High Castle - I really wanted this post WW2 alternative history to be good, but honestly it's not. It's not totally bad....no, I lied, it is.
The female lead is a really terrible actress, supposedly in her early twenties and obviously pushing forty with a very small stick.
And more wooden than the forest of Dean.

It goes even more downhill fast after the first series and the plot has holes so huge that light can't escape them.

So why am I recommending it then?
Because of Rufus Sewell as the ruthless Obergruppenfuhrer John Smith.
When your most sympathetic engaging character is a fanatical SS leader, then you know something's up. Though to be fair they have set him on a very telegraphed, exceedingly clumsy and very, very long redemption story arc.

Rufus Sewell is fantastic in this though and I'd recommend the show just so that you can see how a great actor can mould shit into something almost worth watching.

[Shedboy]

Bosch

[Basualdo]

Bosch

Good, innit.

When I first saw the actor playing Bosch, Titus Welliver (what a fucking name!) I thought, 'Nah, nothing like I pictured him in the books.'
I thought him more a much younger Harry Dean Stanton type, so didn't expect much. But, by God, he won me over and he now IS Harry Bosch.
And I like they way they've updated it and also changed the dynamic between Bosch and Chief Irvine from the more adverserial nature they had in the books too.

[Shedboy]

I've never read any of the Harry Bosch books so never had preconceived notions of what the character was like.

Mrs S, however, is a big fan of Michael Connelly and I seem to remember her saying Titus, or Tightarse as I prefer to call him, wasn't how she pictured the character but thought he was brilliant in the role.

Nice to see the lovely Jacqueline Obradors of NYPD Blue fame again

Someone needs to take Maddie aside and giver a good feed. The poor lassie's going to fall down a drain if she's not careful.

[Basualdo]

The Jerry Edgar character a bit less sympathetic in the books too. Bosch - whos as prickly and surly on the page as much as he is on screen - holds a grudge against him for perceived bailing on him in one of the books.

And I wonder if they'll introduce Mickey Haller the sleazy but brilliant defenc(s)e attorney into any of the new series?

Spoiler:

He's Bosch's long lost half brother in the books.

.

[Basualdo]

Oh, just this minute seen that RTE's Bridget and Eamon is now on Amazon Prime!

That show is as funny as fuck!
Honestly, genuinely hilarious.

Set in some wretched middle Irish small town in the 80s about a married couple who loathe each other and their 6 to 8 ginger children.

It's no surprise to see so many old Father Ted actors on it. Same type of slightly surreal humour and almost as funny.


After buying a new Ford Orion:

Eamon: "Bridget, today was the happiest day of my life. I'm not taking this car back!"

Bridget: "What about the day our first child was born,Eamon?!"

Eamon: "Bridget, he didn't come out with anti-lock brakes, front and rear heaters and a tape player. This has Dolby! That young fella's thick!"

*****

"Tax?! Sure who around here pays tax?! Tax is for civil servants and Protestants."

[ToRmAtO]

Harrow was good a bit 'Quincy' in its theme (pathologist) but watchable, set in Australia.

The Magicians is Harry Potter for grown ups - very crude and funny at times, surprisingly watchable for me.

[Vespa]

The Boys

[ToRmAtO]

The Boys

I enjoyed that as well.

[Clivert]

The last two episodes of ‘The Boys’ were excellent.

[Zambo]

My Watch List is still big, but slowly getting through

Vikings
Carnival Row
Texas Rising
Hell on Wheels
Jack Ryan
Bosch
The Man in the High Castle
Goliath
Preacher
The Following
Black Sails

[Basualdo]

The Boys

Yeah, that was good. And I normally hate all that comic book capeshit.

[Vespa]

Bosch

The show turned me onto the books. Great show.