djdrew103 Reviews

68 Whiskey (2020)

What's all the 'Where's the Beef' Reviews About?

[7/10 · 25 May 2020]

I was RegArmy 1975-79 64C30 Transport Operator Heavy, so yes, IMHO the show isn't accurate or distinctly following military protocol. But I enjoyed it none the less. If I had of not given it a chance like many most likely failed to do, and went into it with a prejudiced opinion from reading the low ratings, I might have disliked it also and given it a poor rating.

But I did give it a chance as I know ratings are not always on-the-nose so to speak. I see all the bad reviews from prior-duty or active-duty US Military and they seemed to hate it as a majority. But then the show isn't promising to be a detailed, accurate or historical documentary. Its a comedy/drama show. To each there own of course, and no foul done, but.

I saw a few "Watched episode 1 and it stunk! Won't be watching anymore." What I get from those reviews is an error possibly by over-judgmental opinions to give ANY show a chance, maybe?.

Just about any new series doesn't really warm up until a few episodes get written and acted out. They almost all take a while to get off the ground unless they are one of the gifted, blockbuster series that we are rewarded with, but then not all shows are 8's or higher.

Many seasons don't even get to a 6.5 or 7 until season 2 hits, but that's because actors get acclimated to the scenes and each other, and writers get really warmed up. But if people happen to give out their condemning reviews early on, actors are not uplifted and writers fall under the burden of non-approval and we get struggling shows far too often doomed to fail.

I hope not with this one. This is is worth watching if it isn't shot down already and then it will be a pity to have lost it to reviews that just demand too much out of writers, actors and producers.

This is enjoyable if you get in and give it a chance. I gave it a 7 because you can't rate anything in 1/2 to give it a 6.5 that it well deserves. Its not an Emmy winner but then not all shows are. People all have their own opinions of course, and people have their own likes and dislikes. But I think too many are being too critical of an otherwise enjoyable show if given the chance. Just like episode 10, I liked the way it left you fulfilled and comfortable, without leaving you in a clutch from a cliffhanger dilemma like so many shows do, just to buy into anxiety driven curiosity.

Black and Blue (I) (2019)

They don't have 6.5 stars which this movie certainly is worth if not more.

[6/10 · 31 December 2019]

It would have received more from me if only the writers of the movie, not the book, would have followed the story-line and had followed the story of the book more closely. The actions sequences which some chose to denigrate were in my book, action packed and well done, choreographed, correlated and accurate with little if any goofs in timing or cut/paste accuracy.

The first part of the movie was perfectly aligned, with little time wasted on character development or story scheme presentation. The story in whole was well put, interesting, attention grasping and well played.

In an era where correction officers in West Virginia in the academy are caught sitting one-and-all in a class group and 100% are giving the Nazi Hi-Hitler salute along with three training officers, a script like this based on a factually presented story put it in a perspective that we all should accept as real.

It made a believer out of me in like comparison to true stories such as Walter Scott's murder by a cop, Micheal Slager who got 20 years for murder, with 5 cops writing false reports to lie and try to allow the officer to get away with it, but those who had the courage and righteousness stood up for the truth and allowed the judicial system to put that cop in jail.

The old saying that there are more good cops than bad still rings true, but the more those good cops stand up for and falsely enter fraudulent reports and lies to protect the bad cops, the faster those numbers of good cops decline. If they wish too retain respect and honor they need merely to righteously stand up against the bad, not join in.

This is only one of dozens of example stories in recent years of cops murdering suspects. So the story was well played as I said, its content real and authentic, and any condemnation of the movie for other than merely opinion purposes only goes to prove how rancid society has become racked with hate and racism.

American Gods (2017–2021)

Awesome exciting series but....

[19 July 2017]

Beyond the norm in sit-drama, the concept that our heavenly realm is not made up of one supreme all knowing being but rather a compliment of gods at each other's throats is new and refreshing. That they are preventively bound, or rather are supposedly restricted from taking actual physical action against or for humans, and can only suggestively hint for humans to take action on their own behalf but in a god's preferred directive, is far better at explaining why our modern day calamities occur without the supposed divine intervention we are preached to of and false-promised in organized religion. Yes it is just fiction but in good fiction, reality is based on plausible conceptual backgrounds.

This show takes that to a new level in successful bounds and hurdles.

Alas though, as with this common era of short series seasons, this one takes the dump too. With only 8 episodes in a season, the anguish and frustration of the audience seems to be killing otherwise good series. The ratings on this were sky high when it first started and then blammo, with the onset of the last episode and foreknowledge that the season was only 8 episodes long, the ratings took a dump. People in viewing audiences with these new shows are tired of being treated like idiots, with the networks disregarding any fan opinions as unimportant sideline comments.

As long as we keep getting short seasons with only 6-8-10 episodes in the season's plot, people will continue to be frustrated with even good series like this. Just look at the scale by the ratings readout on IMDb's page site for this series. You see the sharp decline? It isn't because for some reason the plot dissatisfied the viewers. It is because they realized they would have to wait for another full friggin year before the season took off again.

Interest is lost by then, and viewers again renew interest in other series that come out and show 12 to 20 to 24 episodes in a season that now overlap the re-entrance for outcomes of new season's premieres of shows like this for their 2nd season. We need good producers and intelligent network executives who have a brain. They are killing their own ratings by being stupid and thinking the audience is in turn stupid. Sounds pretty stupid to me.

Sherlock (2010–2017)

Stupidity as an art....

[1/10 · 16 July 2016]

The actual series is great, one of the finest for story plot and acting. Problem is, anyone who thinks people wish to wait a year on merely 3 episodes, and then in season 4 they have ONE episode and expect you to wait a year for the continuing saga? I think they have lost their minds, as people will not pay attention to such foolishness and find something else to watch, merely viewing it "IF" they happen to be on the tube at the right time at the right channel on the right night and in the right mood. Its pervasively ignorant plotting for episodes which makes a person react with displeasure at the mere site of the show, once they learn of the ignorant scheduling.

Good lord, they use to have Gunsmoke on every week for 20 years with 20-26 episodes straight.

They had Perry Mason on every week unfailingly for 11 years with 30 episodes straight through.

Even Sanford and Son ran 24 episodes straight.

there is no such thing as too much of a good thing in good TV shows.

People like it, if its good, they will watch it like clockwork.

Either the directors are fools or the actors are spoiled. Actors unions or not, we need a good 14-20 episodes if we have to wait full seasons before the series continues. They ruined the whole format by being lazy and stupidly arrogant in the time lapse of the series.

Sense8 (2015–2018)

Blacklisting lazy producers

[3/10 · 21 February 2016]

The series as a whole is outstanding, requiring focus and mental fortitude to keep track of an ever changing scenario of multiple cast members and their stories as they unfold. But I gave this a poor rating because of the most obvious feature of the series, its lazy producers and executives.

You are going to have to wait two years for the next season and that is totally unheard of.

TV series have been adulterated by overpriced fees and cost of productions. Then again writers tend to consider viewers as morons and unintelligent bloob tube fanatics. SO we see plots that leave us dumbfounded as to why they wrote the script so stupidly, the ever present main characters fleeing the bad guys but don't pick up the gun the crook dropped as they run off etc.

But this continuing abuse of writing 6 and 10 episodes series to where a person must wait a whole year to watch the continuing saga is ridiculous, and personally I wish we could form a union and blacklist the shows when they air, and watch the rerun version way past the air date to cost these idiots their advertising profits.

Now we are having to wait two full years for this series to continue and if I had known that, if many of us had know that, we would have naturally changed channels to watch something that leans towards the truthful entertainment of the audience and not lazy producers who refuse to work a schedule contemplating a happier audience. It may be the networks executives, or their upper echelon idiots who have decided to ignore the viewers but this manipulating of the series is such a far cry from the old days when we truly planned our week sometimes to be able to watch our shows, and could always catch a rerun during the week.

Soon they will manipulate the episodes to a point where they will intentionally cancel one during the week to make us buy the stream episode or DVD to catch up on the episodes missed.

Its bad enough that our year is filled with series such as Game of Thrones, great entertainment but having to wait after a mere 10 episodes to catch the net year's story-line evolving. What happened to the 16 to 24 episode series that kept you glued to the program and filling your yearning and thirst for full entertaining shows?

Penny Dreadful (2014–2016)

Ready to ....

[17 July 2014]

I am not sure if the networks decide this or if it's the producers or writers. But I'm flat fed up! Great shows with grand promise and fantastic plots and acting are absolutely RUINED by "lazy scheduling"!

Now I'm not asking for 52 weeks a year like in the old days when "Gunsmoke" was there every week for faithful followers. I'm not even asking for 24 episodes in a row, like NCIS or some of the more modern greats of prime-time.

But "I AM ABSOLUTELY FED UP!" with lazy, slack scheduling idiots that cut the season off "AFTER 6 EPISODES?". Others cut it skinny at 7, 8 or 10. I say we should all blacklist any and every network that does this to us. Who wants to wait 6 to 10 months to watch the next season to find out what is happening?

If they realize that the next season's first episode was an audience bomb in protest, maybe they'll get the point after having to refund a few $hundred thousand dollars$ in lost advertising fees and lost revenue.

They "have" to have some chimpanzee scratching out dates on a calendar with a crayon? Common sense tells a person that people will lose interest if they start watching the new season and have forgotten pertinent details that even episode recaps leave them lost and frustrated. Someone needs to slap them upside the head and ring their bell hard enough to wake them up!

It's certainly NOT the chimpanzees' fault!

Click (2006)

Great movie finally, that's not a stupid funny movie !

[8/10 · 2 April 2011]

This is a refreshingly new idea for a movie, that's crisp and funny. Imagine...a magical remote control where Adam Sandler discovers he can adjust the scenes of his life at will. Wife a bit crabby this morning? "Mute" her. Gotta take the kids to a school play? Fast forward it. Wondering how the new project is coming out at work? "Click" a button!

But alas, the same old scenarios come into play, do you really want to know your future or even have that much power over your life? Trying to control your own time-line still brings into the play the same inequities and personality quirks that you used to handle (screw up) the present with, and the same mistakes can easily affect your renewed intentions.

Christopher Walken plays the "mystical owner" of a store that has more purposes hidden behind it's curtains than what might first meet the eye of a prospectively innocent new customer, and it is here that Adam Sandler's life begins to change when he purchases a "new tech" remote control to rid himself of all the separate controls that continue to be misplaced around the house.

Walken's role was perfectly cast, but they could have used more flare and more acting spots to further evolve his character. Problem with most people is that they try to play a role all by themselves of heavily gifted movie critics, and thus this movie has been greatly underrated for its wonderfully entertaining, attention keeping and tickle funny creative concepts.

rent it, buy it, watch it, for it is well worth the "8 star" rating I generously gave it, as I would watch it again and then maybe once more again over a small spell in between, just because I remembered the depth of perception they included in a comedy that gave it its worth and meaning.

The Will Ferrel type of stupidity isn't in this one to grasp a hand towards an excuse of a movie just to claim its a comedy.

Memphis Belle (1990)

Highly under rated

[9/10 · 21 March 2011]

I cannot believe that this only received a 6.7 rating. It just shows how little you can actually trust people's input when it comes to how much they like/dislike a movie. I mean, if you're a pacifist you're not going to like, or probably even watch, a war movie. Yet, for the general movie goer, who wishes to be captivated, entranced, entertained and held captive for their bucks worth, this movie depicting the personalities, emotions, chaotic environment and casualties of air war cannot be held to a candle by few bomber movies out there. I mean, really folks. Compare it to any other bomber film out there and name that many that had the cinematic, story line, actor input and visual effects this movie offered, delivered and gifted to the audience.

People need to quit pretending they are hifalutin' movie critics and give an "atta boy" when its deserved. People that lessened this and cheated others out of watching a good film should feel shame for exhibiting a haughty pride in themselves and quit being so tasking on film makers and actors.

This movie DELIVERS!

All the Pretty Horses (2000)

Depth, meaning and simplicity

[7/10 · 20 March 2011]

It's not "True Grit" but it has its own purpose that deserves far better ratings than some give it. Some people tend to take their "mood of the day" and enlist it in their otherwise bland perception. This movie deserves more. It's not high excitement, and action adventure, but its noteworthy.

A simple story of three young riders that pursue a goal to travel to Mexico to take stock of a situation concerning legitimate horse trading and breeding, and how the ethnic differences and history divide and interrupt otherwise normal life sometimes to inevitable consequences.

Tragedy, sickened personalities and lack of justice involve the audience into what one can't help but be pure genuine interest in the plot and storyline.

Dull to some, but life wayn't chuck full of lightnin' fast draws and gun playin' nor overwrought with nothing other than second by second action scenes but more of an intrigue in personalty, honorable characterizations and simplicity of human nature and sometimes it's flaws fighting itself for virtuosity performed and carved out of the countryside between Mexico and the U.S.

The eventual climax of the movie should leave the viewer with a satisfaction for watching a movie that didn't waste your time.

Spartacus: Gods of the Arena (2011)

Less than it should be....

[5/10 · 17 March 2011]

I found the first season entertaining and put together well, yet the second season seems to make a poor attempt to merely fill the screen with fillers and non-essential story line. They've more or less attempted to take the action of "Gladiator" and mix it with the drama of "Rome" and failed miserably to do so. Some have written that the fight scenes are well choreographed but I disagree.

There are a small percentage of actual well fought scenes mixed in with others that create a slow motion attempt at a bunch of muscle bound heathens rolling around in the sand hugging each other, (you will catch allot of mis-ques and scenes that needed cut) with overplayed CGI blood and guts spewing around to intensify the matter...then played them alongside a multitude of sex scenes that seem to pop in and out of the story so frequently you can use them for an break intermission once you tire of the repetition and go to the bathroom unless the actress is someone you wish to see what she has to brag about. This may seem like a very negative review but it is, merely because I was disappointed in the writers for failing to do what many will see as a "so much more to offer" series. It will keep you in suspense for a while until the newness wears of, then half way through this season, I won't doubt to see an extreme fall off in the ratings, and won't be surprised to find it dropped.