So as I’ve mentioned once or twice, for a while now we’ve been watching Mad Men* streaming on AMC+. I haven’t done a “Not a Review” of it, mainly because it never puts my wife to sleep, barring extenuating circumstances, such as starting an episode right before bedtime (and even then she still might stay awake for it). This puts it right up there with Breaking Bad** and The Queen’s Gambit*** on the short list of “Shows That Never Put My Wife To Sleep”, but also leaves me with not much to write about it, since I, of course, don’t do actual reviews myself, on account of I like everything. Except August Rush.
Continue reading “Inaudible the Agency”Tag: breaking bad
Random Thing From My Files: “Oh Boy” Magazine
So this week I decided to reach into my giant stack of rejection letters. As usual, I went to random.org to decide which section of the file to pull from, and it told me that this week, it would be the letter O. Despite its ubiquity as a vowel, my file folder for the letter O turned out to be virtually empty. (O, The Oprah Magazine wasn’t in operation when I was submitting a lot of short stories places. Not that I would have submitted anything there anyway, since that wasn’t exactly my target market.) However, I did find something a little unusual: Submission guidelines to an ancient fanzine called Oh Boy.
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Not a Review of “Game of Thrones”
So recently, having waited over six years for the next book in the A Song of Ice and Fire series to come out, with no end to the waiting in sight, and being tired of missing out on all the delicious things that have been happening in the HBO adaptation “Game of Thrones” since it went past the end of A Dance with Dragons―Tyrion meets Dany! Starks return to Winterfell! Jon meets Dany! Dragons meet Lannisters!―I decided it was finally time to bite the bullet and wade through the discs from Netflix.
Not A Review Of “Jessica Jones”
What’s this? Two “not a review” posts in a row? Inconceivable! But true. You see, some may remember that a couple of years ago my wife got hooked on crystal meth “Breaking Bad“, AKA “The Best Show Ever“. It took a while for us to get through all the episodes, after which I was charged with finding my wife another show to watch. Not surprisingly, this turned out to be a pretty tall order. Aside from the six-episode “Happy Valley“, I didn’t have much luck coming up with anything that held her interest.
Until now.
Neither A Review Of “Better Call Saul” Nor “Gone Girl”
So although most of my recent posts have involved formatting, proofing, rejecting, reformatting, reproofing, and re-rejecting the print editions of Shards and Ravels, killing trees isn’t the only thing that’s been going on around here. We’ve also been getting caught up on the first two episodes of the “Breaking Bad” spinoff prequel “Better Call Saul“, as well as the Gone Girl spinoff “Gone Girl“. Oh, and my wife has been getting caught up on her naps.
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Not A Review Of “Happy Valley”
As some readers may recall, about a year ago we discovered “Breaking Bad” on Netflix, in which seemingly mild-mannered chemistry teacher Walter White transforms himself into feared crystal meth lord “Heisenberg”, and my wife promptly became addicted to it. (The show, not crystal meth.) After we ran out of “Breaking Bad” episodes, my wife charged me with finding another show that was just (or at least, almost) as good. That search did not go well … until “Happy Valley” came along:
Still Not A Review Of “Battlestar Galactica”
So we’re in the home stretch of the “Battlestar Galactica” reboot now, nearly halfway through season 4. And by “we” I mean “me”, as my wife has more or less tuned “BSG” out at this point, except for some of the scenes where Al from “Quantum Leap”* (AKA Dean Stockwell) shows up, and the occasional conversation like this that ensues if she happens to be awake when I start an episode:
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Freezing Bad; Or, Not A Review Of “Frozen River”
So, it’s been a while since I posted a “movie review”. The reason for the dearth of recent writeups is not that we haven’t been watching movies, but that she hasn’t really been paying attention to them lately, for various reasons, including that none of them is “Breaking Bad“. Anyway, here’s a sample of some of the selections that have arrived and departed unremarked. (Longtime readers will recall that the ratings system I use is, “How many minutes did it take for this movie to put my wife to sleep?” By that standard, none of these did very well.)
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Not A Review of “Battlestar Galactica”
So recently I mentioned that, after any number of other series were rejected, I decided we would start watching the 2003 reboot of “Battlestar Galactica”. Obviously this show could not possibly be as good as “Breaking Bad”, because what is? But it’s still pretty good. It tends to put my wife to sleep in 15-20 minutes or so, which is longer than most movies can keep Mr. Sandman at bay. But does she actually pay any attention to it when she’s awake? For a while I didn’t think so. She didn’t really seem to know or particularly care who anyone was, leading to conversations like this:
Broken Bad: The Search for Another Show
So I previously mentioned that, having finished “Breaking Bad“, I have now been charged with finding a new show that can catch and hold my wife’s attention. Although there’s been no shortage of suggestions on shows that might fit the bill, those who are familiar with my movie rating system (“This movie put my wife to sleep in X minutes”) will not be surprised to hear that the search is not going well. WARNING: Minor spoilers below!
Viscosity 