57 Channels and Only This Is On: May 19, 2024

  

The Challenge All-Stars 4:  Trivia is usually the best week, but Challenge trivia, especially about the season they are doing, was kind of lame.

 

Under the Bridge:  Oh joy, more unnecessary flashbacks.

 

Survivor:  Lol, four straight people go home with an Idol thinking Q was the target; Q finds an Idol and finally gets voted off.  This season is so stupid. 

 

Hacks:  Cool, they got Shooter McGavin back on a golf course.  It is probably obvious he won the tournament.  But I was a little surprised Debra did not get the job.  What are they going to do the rest of the season?  Watch her do some YouTube late night show.  I just hope the guy that got it gets canceled and they have to go with Debra as their second choice.

 

Pretty Little Liars: Summer School:  Is Mouse really that stupid that her grandma with dementia was in charge of getting her to the party?  She probably should not be driving. 

 

A Gentleman in Moscow:  Oh yeah, I completely forgot about Chekov’s guns.  But what a heart racing finale.  Unfortunately the ending was very vague.  They used the 3:4 aspect ratio for flashbacks, I wonder what the significance of them here.   I got the sense that it was a dream sequence.   I seems like Rostov did not get out, but what happened to Anna?  It seems like she should have gotten to Finland with Osip’s help but why was she not able to get to Sofia?  Was she just to famous to not get caught like Osip suggested earlier.  They played the ending like reality where we would not learn what happened behind the Iron Curtain, but this was fictional, I would rather have gotten a definitive answer to what happened to Rostov and Anna other than some vague dream sequence.

 

The Chi:  So just how long of leach does Emmitt have to kill the person Douda told him to?  And will he use her to get back at Douda?

57 Channels and Only This Is On: May 12, 2024

 

The Veil:  I am beginning to think I would like this show much more if Josh Charles was the main character.

 

The Challenge All-Stars 4: I thought it was silly when Janelle volunteered to go in the first women’s elimination, which would be a very long time she would need to hold on to that Star.  But that begs the question, when is the right time to volunteer so you can get a Star.  Obviously Nicole, a firefighter would send herself in with a choice of two lightweight and a physical challenge.  So now she has her Star, but presumably she will have to try to keep it for five more eliminations with eight people left.  Though, I wonder if they do a musical chairs situation when there will be four people left when it is time for the finals, but only three Star holders.

 

Survivor:  Bad move by Charlie.  Marie is clearly going with I want to sit next to lay-ups at Final Tribal strategy.  She is going to get rid of him as soon as she can.  He should have teamed up with Venus and Liz and do his own lay-up strategy.  But how stupid can Venus be.  Two straight weeks Q was the decoy to get out someone with an Idol.  Why would she think that would change this week? 

 

Hacks:  Wait, Debra is all of the sudden offended by jokes.  Making things makes less sense, she grew a conscious the episode right after her very own Roast.

 

Pretty Little Liars: Summer School:  So are they just doing a reverse Friday the 13^th where the serial turned out to be Jason’s mother and then Jason became the serial killer in the second movie?  But I put all my money on the shrink to be the “mom.”  But this show is still really horrible with way too many pop culture references.  Noa remains the only interesting character.  And apparently she is a lesbian now.  Cool.

 

A Gentleman in Moscow:  I am not sure if it were screeners and it will be added later, but my version did not give us any dates as to when this takes place.  Thankfully Stalin died and it is easy to find out that was in 1953, or 6 years since the last episode or 14 years since we last Mishka if my math is correct.

 

This episode answered a few questions I have had.  I wondered if the characters would ever learn what really happened to Lena and it turns out the manager knew and even had a hand into what happened to her.  I have also wondered if Rostov actually wrote the poem that saved his life and we got that answer this week too.  Now for the biggest question of the series, with one episode left, will Rostov leave the hotel?  This episode does end with him saying that they need to leave that place.  Now the question is, will he be able to get away.

The Chi:  So the cliffhanger of the mid-season finale was Victor heading off to kill Douda.  Then moments into the midseason premiere he runs into someone and was just like, naw.  Meh, just how many times is this show going to almost kill Douda before giving him a reprieve?  And now Douda will spare Emmitt if he kills the person that sent Emmitt to kill Douda.  Ugg, just kill of Douda already.  He is really bogging down the show.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: May 5 2024

  

The Veil:  My only take away from the first two episodes is that at least someone called Elizabeth Moss out for that poor accent.

 

The Challenge All-Stars 4:  Instead of trying to get into the middle group to help LeRoy, should Kam not try to get into the bottom?  If her team is in the bottom, then it is less likely that LeRoy’s team gets in the bottom.  Though I have to wonder why Kam was not penalized for taking her bobblehead off before the challenge was over.

 

Under the Bridge:  The problem with shows that should have been a movie is we get completely unnecessary episodes like this.  We really did not need to see the dead chick’s parent’s meet cute.  But I was surprised she mentioned her killer at the start of the episode.  I thought they would tease why exactly she had the boots in her closet.  Instead they confirmed she killed her in a very nonchalant way.

 

Survivor:  Lol, you think after Hunter got blindsided last week after being convinced Q was the easy vote, no one would get duped again.  Except they pulled the exactly same play this week.  Of course they are not going to vote out Q, everyone wants to sit next to him at Final Tribal.   Sitting next to him, Venus, and / or raving lunatic Liz will be one of the easiest wins in the history of the show.

 

Ghosts:  Really, they are doing another cliffhanger?  I wonder if Isaac will be missing for as long as Flower was this season.  

 

A Gentleman in Moscow:  Interesting, they switched from days the gentleman has been to the exact year.  So no more long division, but now I need to try and remember when the first started.  I believe that was 1921.  So that put it at about 26 years, or about 8 years since the last episode if my math is correct.

 

I always assumed Rostov would leave the hotel at some point, but I figured that would be the final scene of the series, I really was shocked that it actually happened in this episode.  With two episodes left it seemed obvious he would find his way back into the hotel, the only question was how.  I guess it makes the most sense that Osip was the one to show some humanity and empathy for Rostov.  Now I wonder if the show ends with Osip letting Rostov out.  Maybe he helps fake his death and can leave that way.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: April 21, 2024

  

Shōgun:  We finally get Crimson Sky and it was… someone killing herself at sundown?  Definitely not what I was expecting.  I thought the ninja at the end were going to be Crimson Sky, but they were there to get Mariko. 

 

The Challenge All-Stars:  Poor, Cyrus, shows up only to be sent in.  I really wish there was a 40 year old age limit floor so the old folks like Cyrus could actually have a chance.  But I wonder if that elimination is the new, safer version of Hall Brawl.  They tried and failed by adding puzzles and other lame things, but this is more interesting alternative.

 

Survivor:  We have had plenty of bad players to play this game, but no one has a further gulf between how bad they are and how good they actually think they are playing that Q.  I never thought anyone would surpass Coach in this category, but here we are.  That was just a clusterfork of a Tribal.

 

Ghosts:   It was kind of lame that a basement ghost was sucked off and no one even noticed just to hide that Flower was still around.  But now we have a crazy Chekov’s Puritan Ghost floating in the ground somewhere.  And just where was this hole they all fell into?

 

A Gentleman in Moscow:  Just two short episodes Lena was a precocious little girl, and now she is leaving a precocious little girl in the hands of Rostov.  This show is moving really fast.  I assumed the narrator of the show was Lena, but I guess it may actually be her daughter.  Though I am still confused why Lena spent so much time as a child in the hotel and why she had the skeleton key.  And then, what will become of Mishka? They arrested the guy they needed to bring down to save him, but he was spreading news of the famine which I assume the party does not want getting out.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: April 14, 2024

The Regime:  Good riddance to this dreadful show.  It should have been good but just failed the execution.

 

Shōgun:  Considering the next episode is entitled “Crimson Sky” kind of a filler episode with Tauranga sulking around defeated all episode as if he is actually going to turn himself over to the council.

 

Survivor:  Things looked very dire for Venus those first couple episodes, but luckily her tribe never went to council.  Now I think she just may end up being the token no vote finalist this season.

 

Ghosts:   Okay, the Ghost stuck to the person was really funny.  Though we know the car ghost died in a car accident, just how exactly does someone wearing a baseball jersey get stuck to someone?

 

A Gentleman in Moscow:   It is interesting that everyone in speaking English, yet all the text, the book, the signage, is in Russian.  Then the precocious kid has turned into a weird teenager.  Nina also interacted with another person and we saw Rostov’s younger sister in a flashback and it definitely did not look like Nina, so there goes that theory.  So the question with her goes back to just where is her family and how did she get the skeleton key?  Now I am thinking maybe she is the child of one of the workers.

 

I am not sure why they bothered teasing Rostov killing himself.  It is only episode three; of course he is not going to kill himself.  But I do wonder what will happen in the last episode.  He has to leave the hotel one way or another, be it through a door or off the roof.   If it is a door, is it the front of side door?   He got chummy with his jailor; will Rostov help him so much that he will let him leave?

Previewing A Gentleman in Moscow

 

The communist revolution of 1917 in Russia saw the execution of the royal family.  During the next four years the Leninist re-organized the country.  The tsarist aristocracy was eradicated.  This is the setting for A Gentleman in Moscow where Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan) plays Count Alexander Rostov, whose life is spared after a poem attributed to him is presented at his hearing.  Though he has been sentenced to live the rest of his days in the hotel he had been living in.  Though he is resigned to the servants quarters of the hotel and if he ever leaves the hotel he will be shot on sight.  But hey, he eats for free at the very upscale restaurant inside the hotel. 

 

The story picks up when he runs into a precocious young girl who just happens to know all the secrets of the hotel.  Where are her parents?  Who knows.   That she does not interact with anyone else in the first couple episodes will lead to some speculation.  Is she even real?  It is she is the narrator of the show.

 

Another occupant is Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Asoka).  She is usually good in everything, but she does not really pull of a glamorous Russian actress.  The wig and accent (which, much like The Great is not Russian, but English) really do not work here. Thankfully the wig disappears after a couple episodes.  Johnny Harris (Without Sin) plays Rostov’s jailor with menace.  Fehinti Balogun (Dune) shows up as Rostov’s old friend who was also part of the revolution.

 

A Gentleman in Moscow is a well-crafted miniseries that can humorous as it is heartfelt.  In just eight episodes, the writers get you to get really invested in these characters, even the ones that do not even show up until the second half of the season while the story barrels to a thrilling conclusion after spending decades within the hotel.

 

A Gentleman in Moscow premieres today on Paramount+ with Showtime and will air Sundays at 9:00 on Showtime.