jamesstean Reviews

The Castaways (2023– )

Its been compared to Lost by some.......

[3/10 · 31 December 2023]

..... a plane crashes on a remote island and there are survivors and thats where the similarity ends. Each episode deals with the present time (NOW) and the island (THEN).

Every character cliche for any survival based series and movie is here. Add to this, that the characters are unbelievably dimwitted. It doesn't help that the acting of this group is atrocious. This sums up the THEN portion, trust me, there is no more depth to it than that.

On to the NOW portion, the only reason it gets 4 stars. The plot holes are numerous and the main actress is unintentionally funny. Bad acting but it was funny. One of my favourite parts is when there is techno music playing and the sister is at the computer. Cool, some hacking, this has promise. Then we see the computer, its just a search engine. Nevertheless, she still manages to pick up a trail of breadcrumbs the police didn't find. Ha! This is one of the smaller plot holes. Other stupid things like a girl who is badly beaten, with blood pouring from her nose is asked how she is doing and then veers into family drama, eventhough her captor is still there. One would think there are slightly more pressing issues at hand. This sums up the NOW portion.

The remainer of this series stumbles along a well walked path, with so called twists you can see a mile off. In summary, if you don't watch this, you won't get FOMO.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (2023– )

Better than expected.

[8/10 · 14 September 2023]

I'll keep it brief. The synopsis of this show was not very appealing to me. Dead City was well up my street until it fell apart during the final 3 episodes.

Anyhow, I'm not sure my rating is due to my expectations being on the floor. Daryl has always wanted to be a part of something but is also a kind of loner.

It's a good story, some different twists, Vis a Vis the dead, a couple of villains and a new quest. It has a kind of world building feel the original TWD seasons had. Like a step into the unknown.

I am cautiously optimistic for episode 2 but I must say a very interesting first episode.

Apologies, it was supposed to be brief but didn't realise there was a minimum character limit.

Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)

I had no interest or intention to watch this....but

[8/10 · 1 June 2022]

To start with my credentials. Never reviewed before and I felt moved enough to write this. I have purposely left this vague, as I wouldn't like anyone to spoil it for me, retrospectively.

I had no interest to see this series, as I believed it would betray everything I loved about A New Hope, we all know the line, Vader vs. Kenobi.

However, I must say the first couple of episodes up until; the near end of Ep. 2 were average / above average. Don't get me wrong, Ewan McGregor is great here.

Episode 3 of this series was really good and I'm not just talking about the action. I felt it was really good character development and quite effected me. Whom we are invested here are the supporting characters. Yes it's good to see the big names but we know what happens. It's a great supporting cast with a very nice split thread; Obi-Wan trying to get back in touch with the force / Qui-Gon and the realisation that he has unfinished business, to his surprise, with Anakin / Vader.

Give it a go. I didn't regret it, probably because my expectations were on the floor. I guess my next stop will be Andor, a character, again, well we know what happens there. Could be fun.

Peace ✌