Jump to content

austingirl

Legacy Members
  • Posts

    1104
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by austingirl

  1. 6 hours ago, The Dude said:

    He’s not a good killer right?  I mean he has all these rules and mantras but he isn’t very good at what he does. He’s a legend in his own mind. Isn’t his whole revenge tour against his own rules?

    This is exactly what I said - from the first botched hit to everything else. Some other thoughts:

    Spoiler

    The entire plot of the movie hinged on him avenging the attack on his girlfriend, which was a violation of one of the rules he kept repeating.

    The nail gun death - he miscalculated that shit, too.

    The voiceover narration was a bit much. My 15-yo was playing video games and halfway watching and at one point early on he goes, "maybe he wouldn't have missed if he hadn't been talking so much in his head". I loled but seriously.

    I hated how he killed everyone involved except for the guy who ordered the original hit. WTF? You won't spare Dolores but you'll spare that guy? 

    I do generally like Fincher. Just didn't love this one.

    • Like 2
  2. What an absolute dickhead.

    Quote

    Goss asked if there were any other payments his team might have missed. “Possibly a minute amount here and there,” Capps replied, “when [Rajena] was calling and begging for some money to buy groceries.”

     

    • Rage+1 3
  3. On 10/30/2023 at 2:16 AM, TexLonghorn said:

    Then watched We're All Going to the World's Fair (2021, Max).  Didn't get it.  This is horror?  This is what I always pictured Gossip Girl was like.  Grade: D for horror, B- for Gossip Girl.

    The lead actress is really great, but this was one of the most boring movies I've ever seen. It had an interesting premise but just didn't work for me.

    I read about Lake Mungo in a list of movies that Mike Flanagan loves, and noticed it streaming on Shudder so I watched it last night. It starts as a "documentary" about what happens to a family after the daughter dies, but it turns into something else as it goes along. I enjoyed it a lot and will be thinking about it for a while.

  4. 1 hour ago, Guadaloopy said:

    Nailed it.  Each episode reimagines a classic Poe tale as the method of death for each of the Usher descendants (don't think that is much of a spoiler).  There are bonus references throughout the show and even a bonus reimagining of "The Cask of Amontillado" that isn't in an episode title.  The character names are fun references - Roderick's wife is Annabel Lee, his granddaughter is Lenore (lost love in "The Raven"), August Dupin is the "detective" in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", Carla Gugino's character is Nerva - an anagram of Raven, Rufus Griswold (the evil CEO of Fortunato) has the same name as an editor/anthologist with whom Poe had a famously contentious relationship, and of course Fortunato (the Usher's company) shares the name of Montresor's rival in "The Cask of Amontillado."  There are lots of other Poe references that are fun to look for throughout the show.

    It's a fun series, though far from perfect.  But having Gugino in the show papers over a lot of flaws for me.

     

    This article details all the Poe references in the show.

    • Hook 'Em 2
  5. On 10/17/2023 at 4:07 PM, BeardIP said:

    Been seeing a lot about this and being a Poe fanboy, I'm sorta interested. Let me ask your take:

    My concern with not knowing anything about Flanagan or his previous stuff and the stills and reviews I've seen is that this some modern interpretation infused with satire and a "fresh" take on Edgar A. Poe complete with fashion forward beautiful people, witty dialogue and gratuitous sex and vulgarity for the sake of itself. How would you describe the this show? I don't want to waste my time on a Succession-meets-Poe. The way the episodes are named, is this an anthology or are each episodes a treatment on a Poe short story classic?

    I went back and read the short story last night and think it scratched the itch, but still curious.

    It's an expanded version of the story The Fall of the House of Usher. Different Poe stories/poems are heavily referenced in each episode, and in this universe, they all come together to form the larger story of how the house of Usher fell. Obviously, many liberties are taken with the details. It's not perfect, nor my favorite Flanagan vehicle, but I still enjoyed it a lot. If you're a book nerd and Poe fan, you'll find it interesting, at minimum.

    • Hook 'Em 1
  6. Finished last night. I generally liked it, although it's not my favorite Mike Flanagan series. This (very spoilery) article outlines all the Poe references throughout the series if you want to brush up. Some general thoughts.

    Spoiler

    1. Did anyone else think Frederick (Henry Thomas) seemed gay coded? I can't articulate exactly why he came across like that to me, but I was definitely surprised to see he was married to a woman. I also didn't like HT's acting in this role, although I usually like him in Flanagan stuff.

    2. Roderick agreeing to the ending of his bloodline after already having two kids was COLD. Even Madeline looked disturbed.

    3. I'm glad they didn't cop out of killing Lenore just because she was the most likable Usher, although it was nice to see Verna tell her all the good her mother would do after her death.

    4. Hated Roderick reciting the Annabel Lee poem as if he wrote it. I gave myself a headache from rolling my eyes so hard.

    5. Juno's character seemed really random. I kept thinking she would end up as part of some plot twist, like being the informant, but she mostly seemed to be the closest thing the show had to...comic relief?

    6. Gucci Caligula would be a great band name.

     

    • Hook 'Em 1
  7. I have some thoughts but I don't know how bookfaggy we want to go so I'll spoiler. I'm 4 episodes in and the most useful analysis, IMO, comes from Poe's stories.

    Spoiler

    Carla Gugino's character is called Verna, which is an anagram for "raven". While Roderick is clearly a character from The Fall of the House of Usher, I think his character incorporates a lot of features from the narrator in The Raven. He's lamenting the loss of someone he loves, and keeps asking the raven, even knowing that the only answer it ever gives is "nevermore". So far, each of the siblings that have died have been visited by Verna in some shape or form, and she's given them a warning that the path they're on is dangerous, but they each choose to ignore her and after doing so, death follows. It's the same warning that ends in the same outcome, each time. My take from the poem was that the raven was more a harbinger than a cause of death, and in this adaptation they are trying to make her both. As for why she's directing everything at the Ushers, it could be the Faustian thing y'all have mentioned, or she could be a physical manifestation of hubris. I also get a Monkey's Paw vibe (even though that's not a Poe story) - be careful what you wish for.

    There are other, more obvious ties to his stories but the one above is, I think, the most interesting.

     

    • Hook 'Em 1
  8. 5 hours ago, Gene Parmesan said:

    The Midnight Club.  Terminally ill teenagers get together and tell scary stories.  I don't remember if I finished it or not.

    A bunch of those kids are in Fall of the House of Usher. I liked Midnight Club enough but it could've been because of 90s nostalgia. It does end on a cliffhanger and they didn't renew it, fyi.

  9.  

    On 9/26/2023 at 1:04 PM, 4th&Five said:

    Adam became easily my favorite character over the course of the series.  I loved the first 2 seasons but the last 2 fell a bit short or were just too different.

    Adam and the horses cracked me up. "Their faces are a totally normal size." 😂

    I did shed tears in the finale. For the most part*, it was a great way to wrap everything up. And I loved Isaac's character and was glad to see him have a major role this season.

    *

    Spoiler

    Didn't love how they wrapped up Jean's storyline re the baby. Are she and Dan and her sister going to be a in a weird co-parenting relationship all together at her house? And I guess the writers felt like it would be too nice of a story to have Jakob be the father, but I was bummed when he and Ola left. I really liked his character and thought he added a nice measure of stability to balance Jean's flightiness.

     

    • Hook 'Em 1
  10. On 9/22/2023 at 12:39 PM, Beau Vine said:

    I know that the other actors sitting behind him were coached to sit there smiling agape, but I was sitting on my couch with the exact same expression.  

    I love that they got Williams back there getting into it and jamming to his song. She's a Tony-nominated actress IRL.

×
×
  • Create New...