verydarkmagic

Cyberpunk: Edgerunners (2022)

Surprisingly good

"Cyberpunk: Edgerunners" is a Netflix Original Anime Series set in the Cyberpunk 2077 game universe. Under uneasy circumstances, the main character David has to suddenly drop out of his corpo school to become an edgerunner. The story vaguely rings back to the game story. Also main characters follow the archetypes of game characters albeit not very close. Same locations like Afterlife, the Mox club, Embers. So yeah.. Cyberpunk, Netflix... These two are no strangers to disappoint their fans. However I found the series suprisingly good. First of all its the visual. MY GOD THIS IS BEAUTIFUL. The colors are bizzare, glitchy, sometimes even absurd to the point when you pause and spend few seconds trying to understand what are you looking at. I'm serious - hats off, I'm bowing before the art director, designers, the people who actually drew it, all the crew. Y'all freaking nailed it! The atmosphere on point, exactly the way I imagined Night City would feel. The characters are also bizzare yet inviting and develop really well that you instantly care for them. So yeah against all odds the show was epic, I loved it. Well done.

The Killing (2011)

Not very good

After watching the pilot episode I thought "okay this seems like a pretty lame setup.. how are they gonna milk it for THAT many seasons"? It seemed like high probability this is going to be unnecessarily drawn out. But due to overwhelmingly positive reviews I watched it anyway.

It was indeed drawn out and lame-ish. Its nicely acted and everything but a very big part of the show is just people being miserable in their grief. Tears, rage and self destruction are shown in a very non inventive way and it's kinda daunting to watch. Tere isnt any viewer engagement built up so youre just an observer. Bottom line is you wanna see "something like this" but actually interesting and emotionally engaging at the same time, go see "Bordertown"

The OA (2016)

Quite impressive even with all its flaws

Let me first say that this series definitely stands out from the average netflix content. It's very ambitious albeit sometimes shoots itself in the foot. The pacing is irritatingly inconsistent between the parts and the story kinda lacked that feeling of progression. There's also like a LOT very long dialogues which are quite dry on content and feel like fillers. Overall it feels chaotic and a tad unfinished, inconsistent, unpolished. However there is some interesting camera work especially around the part where OA is blind. You can notice how camera centers on OA most of the time and you can't really see whats around her. It gives that mild anxiety of having to navigate without seeing. Also the sound design was amazing. I'd say this show you need to watch with proper headphones or surround system on high enough volume to experience it. This show is very similar to Dark (2017) and Steins;Gate (2011) however its story and idea is still in early stages of.. conceivement(is that even a word?). Bottom line is, this is above average netflix series with a lot of potential, however it feels like creators should spend another few years polishing their story, idea and the message they want to broadcast. I hope they do and end up creating something truly brilliant.

Jujutsu Kaisen (2020)

Entertaining but shallow

I found this show entertaining for a bit but ultimately its just fighting with magic powers. And white it has nice visuals and stuff but story is quite shallow, the frequent "flashbacks" into characters memories are cringe attempts to provide backstory and development.

I think if you like action anime with fighting as main theme then you will like this one. For me its just not my cup of tea.

Ingress: The Animation (2018)

Generic junk, kickass sound though

The plot is generic urine. Same as characters. Visually it has a lot of annoying colorful particle diarrhea.

I did like the sound effects and music selection though. Honestly sound is the only part about this show that doesnt suck.

Death Parade (2015)

Odd and beautiful

I really appreciated this take on afterlife as I never had seen anything like this before. The older I get the rarer it happens. Death Parade presents a curious angle on human life and its end. Even though I'm not a big fan of the whole religion-smelling heaven-hell concept but it's not very focused on. But it poses curious questions. Are people pushed to the limit - still the same people? Is darkness in the soul always there, or is it survival instinct? The series is visually beautiful, slow paced and sounds very charming. It perfectly pins that haunting atmosphere of a weird bar playing jazz when its raining outside(hope one day to visit a Death Parade themed bar if there is one). All in all I really recommend watching this.

The Gray Man (2022)

Quite trash

The film has quite lame plot, long fighting scenes which i had to skip, no character devrlopment, basically no nothing at all its an incredibly shallow and generic action picture. There were a few beautiful shots here and there and that's it. Most pathetic part is that highly CGI-d action scenes like plane/train crash are all muddy and "fogged" which i guess is a shortcut for not putting in enough work to make quality picture.

I watched it only because Ryan and Ana. Hope they getting good moneys out of this because movie is boring trash.

Steins;Gate (2011)

Wow

Honestly I can't remember when a tv show touched me so hard. Maybe when I was a kid. Steins Gate was amazing. It takes time to pick up the pace but its well worth. The dreamy visuals, the soundtrack, story progression, everything - perfect. At first it was kinda annoying, then I "tuned in" and it was just sweet and nice, then you kinda fall in love and you start longing and worrying, and then theres this sweet sweet ending.. Stop reading reviews and go watch it.

The Blacklist (2013)

8 seasons of cringe buildup for ultra cringe ending

Dont watch if you intend to pay attention. Ill give you a taste. For 8 seasons straight the FBI office 'post office' is located underground. In every episode there is literally a shot of someone getting down to it in an elevator. It. Is. Underground. Now at some point someone is breaking out of the facility... And how they do it? Blow off the roof and fly off in a helicopter. Apparently the facility changed from being underground to being situated on top floors of a building. But if you dont mind... same episode has shot of someone getting DOWN into facility via elevator. The writer obviously thinks his viewers are either not paying attention.. or completely dumb. Either way. This is but a taste of how little sense or effort the show makes. But I guess it could do fine as background noise to playing games on phone.

Gantz (2004)

Not my cup of tea

GANTZ has somewhat interesting start but there are a few annoying things that I couldn't continue past episode 6.

First if all, the atmosphere is jumpy between serious and teenage comedy. There is a lot of talking in wrong places like an action scene is extended to half episode by some blabber. The sexual component is straight up repelling. Closest comparision to this anime I guess would be Elfen Lied but even that show at least had some common atmosphere and feeling, while GANTZ felt just.. flat. Nothing.

Young Wallander (2020)

Average netflix but filmed next to my home

I liked the actors and cinematography, but the story was weak-ish. Honestly can't say if I would have finished watching it if it weren't for filming locations in Lithuania. First I thought "damn this elevator looks like ones we got in old apartments", then I thought I was tripping seeing Liejyklos st., but the police station - omg its based like 200 meters from where I used to live :D Could see my apt in one shot on the roof after sniper caught.

As with many Netflix show this is a one time consumable content with low effort script. Boo.

Pacific Rim (2021)

I'm not into mechs but this was fine

With both seasons adding up to like 5 hours total play time, I watched Pacific Rim in one day. It was fine, some things I enjoyed are :

• it didn't have fillers
• its drawn nicely
• good characters allthough.. not very inventive. Well in general the series aren't very inventive, with forseeable plot and twists and character development. But I respect it for just sticking to basics and not overdoing it with cringe tropes. This is a very forgettable watch but if you have nothing better to do then this series is fine. I'd rate it 6 but a couple of dreamy weird sequences like Shanes neural dive, cafeteria dancing, mother goodbye pulled it up to 7.

The World's Most Extraordinary Homes (2017)

Relaxing watch

Beautiful series about design and perception of living spaces. Its very interesting and inspiring to look at these different crazy high end homes. Though sometimes I feel its glancing over too many interesting technical details and overall maybe giving too little screen time for each home. Which is ironic considering its a netflix show. Anyway good content, lovely hosts, worthy watch.

Travelers (2016)

A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one

I went into this with very low expectations, but I finished it quite surprised. After a slow start, it picked up pace around season 2. This show starts off in the old "one mission per episode" approach, but gradually fades into "main story only". Not great but I guess putting all the fillers in the end would have harmed way more. The characters are really likeable and played pretty well (I ended up hating Kat!). I also really respected that the show made effort for technical accuracy while maintaining the "fiction" in "science fiction". There is a bunch of useless dialogue and the ending is a little abrupt and not everything gets resolved but. I was still surprised how well this series turned out compared to say, Altered Carbon. Nice watch.

Znaki (2018)

It started off like really nice and ended horribly

The show started off really nice as crime/detective thing. I was honestly excited and even proud that I found a decent show made in neighbouring country. But soon the "alernative" storylines completely took over while main storyline didn't really move. To make matters worse at the end of season one they completely trashed the setting by adding some scifi/fantasy elements Was "secret nazi project of gravity defying device" a thing on Trash Netflix Bingo card and someone really wanted to win? But it didn't stop there. Season two was just ton of blatant fillers, main storyline basically didnt exist, no detective work either it was just series of cuts from one to another 'alternnative storyline' which are somehow related only through 'ze nazi secret' ohh anyway.... This show had its moments, the cinematography was awesome, good acting, accurate enough depiction of rural Poland. The scene with old lady dancing on drugs had that 'Requiem for a Dream' vibe. It really had its moments. Soundtrack was also really good. But the problems I meantioned above soon made it unbearable to watch.

Stay Close (2021)

Meh but then turned worse

It had potential but turned out pretty poor, like most netflix shows it suffers script-wise. Story pacing felt weird and inconsistent. Actors did a great job I gotta admit this. But there is one breaking point after which I kinda had to force myself to continue watching it.

Everything happens in desolate ish town in UK which seems like a summer resort but wrong season. Closed arcades, ferris wheel stopped, empty beach. Calm, lonely colors and moods occupy this show. But suddenly. Couple of hired psychopathic assassins/mercs show up. They look barely legal age. They wearing pink. They dance. They used to be in school theatre group. They mercilessly kill people left and right, do unimaginably cruel things without blinking an eye. There is a scene where they drive to dispose of the body, start doing two minute long dance, and he accidently touches her breast and goes like those japanese animes "OH MY GOD ONIICHAN I TOUCHED YOUR BREAST IM SO SORRY" and then they continue disposing of the body.

At this point I couldnt continue trying to watch it seriously. Its just clown fiesta show with cheap netflix tropes thrown in for idk what reason. Its cringe. Its extremely misfitted. Everyone involved in this decision should go do something better with their lives. This was the final nail in the coffin of this already not very good show.

Was 5 different ppl working on different parts of show but two of them refused to communicate or align with the others?

Archer (2009)

Everything I was missing in Bojack Horseman, found it here

I really love how this show kept the entertaining nonsence bull***t up for so many seasons. Archer has explosions, guns, spies, drugs, alcohol, puns and PHRASING and SPLOOSH and im a bit sad i almost finished it. Its just really entertaining, wicked and fun to watch. When Bojack decided to get his s*** together, Archer just popped another 10 bottles of whiskey in a jungle while hunting crazy island treasure statue made of uranum. And that kind of straightup, random nonsense is something I really missed in Bojack, which quickly became well to relatable to be comfortable or entertaining to watch.

Mandy (2018)

Well done Panos

I really liked "Beyond the Black Rainbow" so I had an idea what kind of film it will be. "Mandy" is absolutely fantastic. Super colorful and trippy visuals. Amazing droney/doomy soundtrack, bit of shame I couldnt turn up speakers all the way. Its very slow paced. This film is not a story type its more audiovisual kinda thing so a lot of people won't enjoy it but ehh its their loss. Cage is brilliantly insane, Andrea is dreamy and beautiful. Anyway great time spent watching this, hope Panos is busy cooking up another masterpiece as im typing ;)

Erufen rîto (2004)

its a good watch but

The amount of nudity was unnecessary and kind of revolting. Honestly the whole show feels a little revolting. Maybe if you havent seen "anything like this" it will blow your mind but it didnt blew mine. Im just left feeling uneasy, and every time I hear the intro song you get another tide of sadness and unrest.

I guess bottom line is when you're you've seem a lot of dark stuff and stopped enjoying it then there is no point to watch this. Its a good watch but honestly sometimes I wish I didnt see it.

The Witcher (2019)

The series is horse ****

I just finished it, its bad. Don't wanna go too much into detail since I wasted enough time already by watching it. Scenes are so weirdly chopped up, the transitions feel awkward, a lot of content is not thoroughly explained nor dismissed. The story is presented in non chronological but the joke is that the film doesn't say that ;) so you get super confused when you start suspecting it. Characters look pathetic, Yen is some botox-lips-too-much-makeup barbie, Geralt is way too young, no beard, ONLY 1 SWORD. Anyway this show is absolute garbage P.S. You are welcome to check my other reviews, because I have them. Compared to all the people who created new account just to review this title 10/10 ... :))

The Neon Demon (2016)

This film explores topics of beauty, jealousy and vampires

I watched this film like a week ago. I was impressed, but after thinking more and more about it, I am ready to say that this was one of the best films I've seen in life. Don't want to talk too much about visual and soundtrack - they are STUNNING and could make this movie alone. You can find that in other reviews. I want to talk about what else this film has to offer.

The pacing is slow, not as slow as 2001 but still. Story is pretty simple, a 16 year girl from countryside comes to LA to pursue a model career. She has natural beauty while her competitors have implants and plastic surgeries. In a blink of an eye, all the 'important people' like photographers and designers are thrilled with her. This film explores topics of beauty, jealousy and vampires in a cruel field of beauty business. Beauty is a slippery thing - if you are born pretty, you are lucky. If you're not - you can try and undergo a bunch of plastic surgeries like Sara and Gigi did just to be "OKAY". Then Jessie comes around and you are instantly out of the game, no matter how hard you try. Jessie possesses natural beauty and is genetically superior to any other model in the film. This beauty of Jessie is a gift and a curse at the same time. She falls in love with her self image and then we are presented with Neon Demon herself - a self-confident and arrogant woman who is ready to exercise her unmatchable superiority. Which ultimately gets her killed. But what made the ending so shocking is how understandable and even relatable it felt. The film presents murder, cannibalism and occultism from a perspective of hopeless attempt of 'simple' people trying to fight the nature.

To sum up, The Neon Demon is one-of-a-kind masterpiece. I loved watching every minute of it. I loved remembering it and trying to understand it. I am very sad about people who found it boring or lacking substance. Clearly chickenheads were not the target audience here.

The Umbrella Academy (2019)

Typical Netflix show

I had no expectations coming into this show as I did not read the comic. The story was not told in an interesting way. Most of the time you have characters explaining what's happening thus driving the story. Not the other way around where unfolding story would be implicating characters. The show has recognizable elements and characters from here and there, like Klaus' dream or whatever that was really reminded me of the Red Room intercourse from Twin Peaks, the abusive father figure looks like Freud with a monocle... I mean it's okay but doesn't really make a great show. Not to mention a bunch of not-super-interesting fighting scenes and dull superpowers. Great visuals Ok soundtrack Boring story There you go - another Netflix show.

Altered Carbon (2018)

Cheesy, generic and bland.

Just finished watching this show and dear God the more I think about it the more upset I get. Noir-ish sci-fi series - that sounds pretty cool huh? Well, noir was hiding somewhere in the basement when this was shot. Overall feel of this movie is nowhere near hopeless or even remotely depressing. In fact it has no lasting emotion, no aftertaste at all. It's just generic good versus bad story with superpowers. The plot had few semi-interesting twists and really without those I wouldn't even make it through the series. But mostly it's plain boring. "Ex bad guy" who is really an "emotionally hurt good guy" is chasing his "lost love" and some "bad guy" who is apparently the "worst guy" and oh the "bad guy" is actually his sister and oh it was her who killed his love. I've seen this before :D By the end show just gets ridiculous, I mean for the 3 last episodes the bad sister keeps repeating how much she loves the main character while proceeding on hurting him in every possible way and oh my god you won't believe this - but he kills her in the end. We still get a happy ending. Oh and there's a bunch of generic fight scenes - Netflix better implement that "skip fight scene" button soon.

The main disappointment is that this show could've been NUTS but instead it has this generic cheesy stuff. There are a few interesting dialogues and Poe character was truly beautiful in every way. Lizzy was cool too.

4 is a passing grade where I come from, so this show gets a three.

True Detective (2014)

It's pretty good, but watch season 2 first

So I just finished season 2 and I can say the show was pretty good. Not the best and I probably wouldn't watch it again like old Twin Peaks, but it's good. There is a slight surprising change between season one and two though, the show doesn't continue where first left off. No more mystics and weird stuff, just crime and interpersonal relations. Also season 2 added quite a few shooting scenes etc which I didn't really enjoy. Season 1 plot was good, season 2 between 'meh' and 'ok' - good guys chasing bad guys, turning sides etc etc. What I really loved with season one was the atmosphere of dread and futility. Needless to say, Rust character was marvelous. Season two has that dark atmosphere and great characters too but... it's just not Rust Cohle. Anyway I think it's absolutely safe to watch season 2 first, then season1, so you don't have your hopes high.