What We’re Watching Wednesday | Subtitles

Each Wednesday I share what my wife Kim and I are watching in terms of movies and TV each week in a feature called “What We’re Watching Wednesday.” This week, it’s subtitles.

My wife and I don’t mind subtitles. In fact, to be honest, we prefer subtitles over badly-dubbed English. We like to hear the language in which the show or movie was done and to watch the lips match the words that are coming out of the characters’ mouths. For me, I think it began with watching early Jackie Chan movies. Lately, it’s extended to many shows on Netflix including a couple I’ve mentioned here on the blog such as Narcos and Money Heist.

This past week, we discovered together an Argentine comedy on Netflix that has been on TBS Latinoamérica called Psiconautas about a Spanish con man who flees to Argentine to start another con as a psychotherapist to a group of people at a cafe. We are only a few episodes in, but so far it is hilarious. The trailer below does not have subtitles, but you still get the idea:

On my own, I also discovered a Japanese anime show called Aggretsuko, also on Netflix about a red panda who works in an office, but has a secret life at night as a death metal karaoke singer. I’ll admit that I’m not really into anime, but the show came up as a highlight recently and I started watching it. As with Psiconautas, I’m only a few episodes in, but I’m enjoying it. In parts, it is a commentary on office life and being a young woman in a male-dominated workplace. However, I won’t lie: I love the death metal karaoke sections.

So how about you? Watching any good TV this past week? Movies you’d recommend? What do you think of subtitles? Like or dislike?

What We’re Watching Wednesday | Zombies

Last week, I started a new feature here on the blog called “What We’re Watching Wednesday,” (graphic to come later), where I’ll be sharing what my wife Kim and I are watching in terms of movies and TV each week. This week, it’s zombies.

Kim and I aren’t really into zombie TV or movies, but for some reason, I thought I’d give Santa Clarita Diet on Netflix a try anyway when it first came out last year. The trailers actually looked good…and I was surprised to find that I did like it. After only a few episodes, I stopped watching to wait for Kim to catch up. The show, starring Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant, is now in its second season. Yes, it starts with a bit of gross visuals: vomit and blood (hit fast forward or do the fake lookaway), but after the first few episodes, it hits its stride with the interplay between Barrymore and Olyphant’s characters at the forefront, with Barrymore playing a newly-discovered undead person and Olyphant, her ever-supporting husband. And by then you’re hooked, or at least we were.

Last night in anticipation of this theme, I watched the South Korean zombie movie Train to Busan, also available on Netflix. Kim had no interest in this so I decided to watch it while she is away for a few days this week, visiting her sister and mother in Delaware. Unlike other zombie movies that we both have liked, such as Shaun of the Dead and Zombieland, which were comedies, this one isn’t a humorous romp. This one is more akin to 28 Days Later, although not quite as bleak and with some surprisingly poignant moments within it (not shown in the trailer below). At the center is a father accompanying his daughter to his ex-wife’s, which is set up with a backstory at the start of the movie that makes one wonder at first if the movie ever will pick up. But believe me, it does…and once it does, it never lets up until the very end.

So what you have been watching lately? Movies and/or TV? Anything worth sharing? Share away in the comments.

What We’re Watching Wednesday | Only The Brave & Money Heist

Today, I’m starting a new feature here on the blog called “What We’re Watching Wednesday,” (graphic to come later and after thinking about it might change to “What We’re Watching This Week,” since it’s not just on Wednesdays that we’re watching), where I’ll be sharing what Kim and I are watching in terms of movies and TV each week.

This past weekend, I watched on my own Only The Brave, not knowing what the movie was about and purposefully not looking online to see the true story on which it was based. However, I had a feeling that it wasn’t going to end well, and it didn’t, but it was really a good movie. I don’t know if the performances were great, but the story was great about a group of forest firefighters in Arizona. Once I knew what was going to happen, I started crying and didn’t stop until after the credits rolled. If you’re going to watch this movie, get from a Redbox or a similar outlet, so you can watch the special features on the true story.

And for our TV pick this week is one I’ve mentioned before and one I’ll probably mention again called Money Heist on Netflix. It’s a Spanish series and we just finished watching Season 1 this past week and started watching Season 2, which we didn’t even realize there was going to be until a few weeks ago. The story focuses on a group of supposed bank robbers who end up kidnapping a group of people in Spain’s head bank. However, it ends up being more complicated than that with the series focusing on the robbers/kidnappers, the hostage negotiators, and the hostages themselves and how all three interact with each other. Yes, it has subtitles, but it is more than worth the effort. My wife got me watching a few Spanish language shows, starting with Narcos, and I haven’t been disappointed yet. I don’t think you will be either with this one:

So what you have been watching lately? Movies and/or TV? Anything worth sharing? Share away in the comments.

Pushing Forward Back March/April 2018

Midway through the month, I said I was in a holding pattern and that pretty much was the theme for the month. It began and ended with Kim being away for a few days each week as she visited her sister and mother in Delaware, meaning that we put on hold a couple of shows we were watching on Netflix and Amazon Prime: the first season of Money Heist on Netflix and the fourth season of Mozart in the Jungle on Amazon Prime. Also on hold was, and is, the weather that just doesn’t want to seem to break into Spring quite yet and my reading, which is stuck in one series, The Lord of the Rings (on the third part, The Return of The King) while trying to start another, All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot.

However, together Kim and I watched movies connected with this year’s Oscars, from I, Tonya, which Allison Janney won a Best Supporting Actress to Three Billboards from Ebbing, MO, which was nominated for Best Picture and for which Frances McDormand won Best Actress and Sam Rockwell, Best Supporting Actor to Lady Bird, which also was nominated for Best Picture. Personally, I liked Three Billboards, but Kim didn’t, and we both enjoyed I, Tonya and Lady Bird, the latter of which we knew was our kind of picture from the moment we saw the first trailer. We also watched Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, which was fun.

We also got a subscription to Britbox and I started watching A Touch of Frost and Dalziel and Pascoe, two British crime shows. I tried watching Scott & Bailey, but gave up after one season because it seemed more like a soap opera than a crime show.

On the music front, a few ditties caught my ear, but this one from February was still turning on my virtual turntable:

Pushing Forward

April begins with Kim’s birthday this coming Friday, which we’ll be celebrating Thursday night with a birthday dinner at a local pub called The Roost. We’re going then because work earlier that day than I am on Friday, giving us more time plus it won’t be quite as busy as it might be on a Friday night.

At the end of the month, I’d like to see the last Avengers movie, but I wanted to see Black Panther also and didn’t…yet. In between the beginning of the month and the end of the month, we have nothing planned, but if the weather warms up,maybe we can go out to the nearby Pennsylvania Grand Canyon for a hike. As with everything in life, we’ll see.

I’ll leave you with this funny clip from Seth Meyers (even though it’s two years old, I’m just getting to it):

How about you? How was your month of March? Any highlights with your reading, TV and/or movie watching, music listening? Any big plans for April?