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From: Arthur Lipscomb <arthur@alum.calberkeley.org>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: What Did You Watch? 2025-05-29 (Thursday)
Date: Fri, 30 May 2025 19:20:45 -0700
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On 5/30/2025 12:37 PM, Ian J. Ball wrote:
> On 5/30/25 1:30 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
> 
>> What did you watch?
> 
> Just 3 episodes of "Andor":
> 
> Andor (Disney+) - Ep's #2.7-2.9 (again, these were "one year later", so 
> were up to BBY 2).
>     These were quite good, esp. ep. #2.9. (Everyone on Reddit raves 
> about the second-to-last episode of "Paradise" being so good, but I 
> though "Andor" 2.9 was more suspenseful (even though we already know Mon 
> Mothma's fate).)
>     So, both seasons of "Andor" follow the same pattern - a slow start 
> (arguably a *really* slow start), but then gets really good in the 
> middle and at the end.
>     The first two episodes, ep's #2.7 & 2.8, primarily are concerned 
> with the fruition of the EVOL!1! Imperials plan to "liquidate" the 
> population of Ghorman, which Cassian witnesses first-hand, in order to 
> get the sacred mineral(tm!) that they need for the EVOL! (secret!!) 
> Death Star. Somebody in this set gets righteously wasted, but another 
> villain is given more silliness to make he seem "human" (they shouldn't 
> have bothered...).
>     Ep. #2.9 concerns the Ghorman fallout, with Mon Mothma set to give a 
> speech to the Imperial Senate which will get her arrested, so Luthen 
> tasks Cassian with the job of getting her off-planet afterwards, as Bail 
> Organa's extraction crew has been infiltrated by Imperial assassin 
> scum!! Cassian handles the task with murderous aplomb (much to Mon 
> Mothma's shock and horror!). So we finally find out how Mothma gets to 
> Yavin, like in the moovee!!

Almost.  You need to watch the Star Wars Rebels episode "Secret Cargo" - 
Season 3, Episode 18. That will pick up where this episode ends and show 
the actual trip.


  In the end, Bix shines Cassian on, just to
> keep him working in the rebellion! (I wonder if we will see Bix at all 
> in the final 3 episodes?...) Ouch! But, it's OK - at the very end, 
> Cassian gets a new droid friend!!  :)

Yeah!  :-)

>     Looking forward to the last 3 epies - likely won't get to them 
> today, so I will save them for Saturday.
> 
> 
> What did you watch?
> 


This will be a multi-day catch up.  This week, I watched:


Family Guy - I finally caught up.

Welcome To Wrexham - "Built to Last" -  Season 4, episode 4.  Nothing 
new to see here.  They just keep on winning.


Sherlock & Daughter - "Doubting Thomas" - Episode from last week.  I 
already forgot what happened.


Law & Order Organized Crime (Peacock) -	"Fail Safe" - With most of the 
cast still missing, they wrapped up the terrorist art group storyline. 
It was actually pretty good.


Murderbot (AppleTV+) - "Escape Velocity Protocol" - Murderbot vs. a 
reprogrammed android trying to kill him and his humans.  This episode 
was way too short.


Fear Street: Prom Queen (Netflix) 4th entry in the Fear Street series. 
Mostly background noise.  Before watching I googled to confirm it's not 
a direct sequel to the first 3, but apparently it's set in the same town 
or something.  I think some of the clips shown at the start were from 
the earlier movies.  But this one, was boring.


Karate Kid: Legends (theatrical) This is the sixth movie in the 
franchise and combines the original 1984 film series that starred Ralph 
Macchio with the 2010 movie that starred Jackie Chan.  I have mixed 
feelings about this one.  The plot starts out as more or less a 
continuation of the 2010 movie with Jackie Chan's character still in 
China and now running his own Kung Fu school.  His nephew (Ben Wang) is 
a student in the school until his mom (Ming-Na Wen) decides to move to 
New York.  At this point the movie is basically a rehash of the 1984 and 
2010 movies.  Right down to Wang meeting a love interest who just 
happens to be the ex of the school bully.  Of course everything will be 
settled in a tournament and Jackie Chan recruits Ralph Macchio (there's 
an in movie reason it has to be Macchio) to help train his student in 
Karate.  I'm guessing you're not allowed to use Kung Fu in a Karate 
tournament.

Where this movie differs from the other movies in the franchise is the 
inclusion of a subplot involving Joshua Jackson as the owner of a pizza 
restaurant who Ben Wang trains to fight.  Jackson's character is also 
the father of the love interest.  Unlike the other movies when this one 
starts Ben's character is already an excellent fighter.  Yes, his 
opponent is apparently better, but only because the movie's writers say 
he has to be better.  Otherwise it's just not believable on screen that 
Ben couldn't have had a better than even chance of winning the fight 
without first learning "Karate."

The other problem is this movie is painfully short.  At 94 minutes it's 
by far the shortest movie in the franchise.  If you're not familiar with 
the franchise, it may not be obvious, but they (Karate Kid 4 not 
withstanding) are actually really good movies, and solid dramas in their 
own right.  And they have things like character development.  Sure 3 is 
campy, but I love it all the same.  This movie jettison's all of that. 
There is some halfhearted attempt at character development but I'm 
guessing most of it got left on the cutting room floor.  And the so 
called tournament is a joke.  There are so many problems with the so 
called tournament I don't even know where to begin.  The other thing I 
noticed was the lack of any theme music during the fight.  There needed 
to be a moment during the fight where Bill Conti's theme music kicked 
in.  And that never happened.  Now that I think about it, I'm not even 
sure if they did a proper training montage.

Anyway, it's an OK movie.  But Jackie Chan, and Joshua Jackson really 
carry the movie on their backs.  And honorable mention to Min-Na Wen who 
is always a delight to see.

It just occurred to me, it would have been so much better if the movie 
followed students from Jackie's school, Cobra Kai, and Miyagi-do dojo in 
a three-way battle with no idea who is going to win at the end.