Dune Prophecy and other TV notes

It’s been awhile since I’ve done a TV notes so this one is going to cover a lot of territory.

I enjoyed the first season of The Rings of Power, but was an outlier. Most people hated it. Some have come around for the second season due to its increased action, but it remains pretty fashionable to condemn it as tragically mishandling J.R.R. Tolkien’s material. As a long time Tolkien fan with an in depth familiarity with the source material, I’ll admit there are things the show could do better. The role of Tom Bombadil in particular seems poorly conceived. But the show has figured out a way to show stories few people other than Tolkien nerds will ever read. I think it deserves some charity. In any case, I’m still enjoying it.

I guess it was only a matter of time before there was an anime addition to the Terminator franchise. I know some people who don’t like Terminator Zero, but I enjoyed it. Like most anime it has its plot twists. Unfortunately, also like most anime, it’s hard to discuss without dropping spoilers. I’ll just note that it ends up having a much more nuanced view of AI than much of the series.

The first season of Arcane was exceptional. I was blown away by the animation and story. It managed to make me feel the stark pain and dilemma of the characters, most of whom are either just trying to survive or take care of the people they love. But the different factions find themselves on unavoidable collision courses.

The second season continues much of that. We also get to see how the damaged Jinx might have turned out if her life hadn’t gone sideways. But while I definitely enjoyed the second season, I found the plot a bit convoluted. Still, I recommend it. This is reportedly the final season, although it sounds like there will be other League of Legends shows. If they’re made in the same manner, I’m looking forward to them.

The last season of Doctor Who had its moments, but I ultimately found it disappointing. I don’t have any issues with Ncuti Gatwa as the Doctor, but the episodes seemed short, there weren’t very many, and too many seemed like throwaway silliness. And while the final two had a lot of promise, with their tie in to the classic Pyramids of Mars serial from the 1970s, the conclusion, in my view, didn’t deliver on the implied promises. Certainly I can understand leaving some mysteries for the next season, but we should have at least seen some of them resolved, and what we did see, such as Ruby’s mother, felt lame.

This year’s Doctor Who Christmas special was moderately entertaining. We get to spend more time getting to know Gatwa’s Doctor, something that felt lacking in the main season. My only beef is the Doctor ultimately ends up being irrelevant. In the end, things appear to play out just as they would have if he hadn’t interfered.

I’m hoping the next season is better. The trailer at least looks promising.

Silo is about people living in an underground environment gradually learning more about their world and how it began. The second season is still in progress. I’m enjoying, although the answers, as usual for these types of shows, come maddeningly slow. I might have more to say when it’s done.

Speaking of characters learning about their world, that’s what the kids in Skeleton Crew are basically doing. They appear to live on a peaceful fully domestic looking world, something of an anomaly in the Star Wars universe. Then they discover a space ship, and while exploring it accidentally launch it and themselves away from their world. They then discover a large old broken down droid who talks like a pirate, but can pilot the ship. The show is about them trying to find their way back home. But it turns out that their home planet is regarded as a legendary treasure planet by the rest of the galaxy, one no one knows the location of. And the treasure garners the wrong kind of attention.

The show is obviously kid oriented. And it’s Star Wars getting back to its carefully pasteurized form of entertainment, one at this point they almost seem trapped in by the fans. The franchise is sometimes rewarded for exceeding those bounds, as in Rogue One and Andor. But other times seems to be slammed down, like in The Acolyte. I’m enjoying Skeleton Crew for what it is, but don’t expect anything more than light entertainment.

If you want more serious entertainment, then Dune Prophecy may be the place to look. It’s in the Dune universe, but about 10,000 years before the movies. It’s only a few decades after the Butlerian Jihad, and while the taboo against thinking machines is already in place, there are still a few hidden around. The show is about the early years of the empire and the beginnings of the Bene Gesserit sisterhood. The major families are all already in place, with the Corrinos on the throne, and the Atreides and Harkonnen feud already generations old.

This is mostly following the source material, but calls to mind two beefs I’ve long had with this universe. First, we’re 10,000 years before the events in Dune, but the world looks almost the same. It has the same technology, spaceships, personal shields, and overall aesthetic. Even the powers of the Bene Gesserit are mostly already in place. And the governing structure and families don’t seem to evolve much in those millenia, which has always struck me as implausible, at least without an explanation.

And that’s related to my other beef. The Harkonnens are always the nasty ones, and the Atreides always the more attractive and nicer seeming ones. (I say “nicer seeming” because Frank Herbert made it clear that it’s a mistake the regard the Atreides as heroes.) When I heard the show would be about Harkonnen sisters as early leaders of the Bene Gesserit, I thought maybe it would break out of this mode, but no. While they’re portrayed much more sympathetically than their descendants, the sisters are exceptionally ruthless. And the Atreides are portrayed as reasonably pleasant and virtuous. I find the idea that every member of a family is vile or every member virtuous, simplistic. And the idea that it holds across 10,000 years seems cartoonish.

The show is mostly palace intrigue and political maneuvering, which matches the feel I remember from the books. I found the early episodes a bit slow, but it does pick up toward the end. On the whole, it was moderately entertaining, although it seems like it could have been better. But I enjoyed it enough that I plan to watch the second season, if there is one.

That’s some of what I’ve been watching. Have you seen any of them? What did you think? Or are you watching anything else worth checking out?