Quality TV

[Gerry557]

I know it's a personal thing and you like what you like but the following couple of shows are worth a watch. I think they are a cut above average and in my opinion have been great so far.

Unfortunately not on the BBC yet.

The first is Masters of the Air and the second is Shogun.

Masters is WWII following flying B-17 "Flying Fortress" heavy bombers from England, known as the Bloody 100th. Impressive air scenery and great sounding. Watch on the big screen. There are a few episodes out now so hopefully it will maintain standards to the end.

I vaguely remember Richard Chamberlain's 80s version. This is an updated version. Japan in the year 1600. Swords, samurai warriors, honour and death. Another fantastic looking series after only two episodes. Be warned it has subtitles for the Japanese parts but worth but if you can't stand them it's probably worth learning the language. It stars Hiroyuki Sanada who is great in most things.

I'm not sure of anything on TV that's better quality than these two currently.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2640044/
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2788316/

[SalvorHardin]

I can't comment on Masters of the Air as I don't have Apple TV.

Shogun OTOH is excellent (on Disney+). I remember the 1980 version fairly well, it was event viewing and was far better than everything else that was on at the same time.

As to other current series, The Lincoln Lawyer on Netflix gets my recommendation as does the first series of The Witcher (but not the second and third series which are merely good). And for Star Wars fans the first two series of The Mandalorian (not the third though) repairs much of the damage caused by the prequels and the last three films (The Mandalorian is essentially a Spaghetti Western in the Star Wars universe).

My problem is that I find a lot of modern series are what I class as "good not great", so I find myself watching older shows which were great when I originally saw them. Currently ploughing through my DVDs of Hill Street Blues and China Beach, both of which are as good as I remembered.

[Gerry557]

SalvorHardin.

Wait for Masters to finish and try a free trial. It will be worth it. Yes the The Lincoln Lawyer is very good and so is the film. I note Henry Cavill left the Witcher because as a fan he thought they were straying too far. I remember watching some Hill street I might look at getting the series and do a proper watch. I think I have series 1 in the loft.

it probably looks dated now in mono sound and a 4.3 picture Sill it might have been under this heading if written some years back

[SalvorHardin]

SalvorHardin.

Wait for Masters to finish and try a free trial. It will be worth it. Yes the The Lincoln Lawyer is very good and so is the film. I note Henry Cavill left the Witcher because as a fan he thought they were straying too far. I remember watching some Hill street I might look at getting the series and do a proper watch. I think I have series 1 in the loft.

it probably looks dated now in mono sound and a 4.3 picture Sill it might have been under this heading if written some years back

Thanks. In all probability I will end up subscribing to AppleTV.

Channel 4's app has Hill Street Blues, they have all seven series. I've tried downloading episodes on the Sky box but they aren't available. Whilst it was filmed in 4:3, the DVDs and my fairly new smart TV show it in widescreen and the picture quality is pretty good. I've seen about 30 episodes in the last few weeks on the Shout Factory DVDs (complete set, released in December 2013). IMHO it's as good as ever. A key difference between it and modern dramas is that the actors don't mumble and the music hardly ever drowns out the dialogue.

https://www.channel4.com/programmes/hill-street-blues

For those who haven't heard of Hill Street Blues, it's a 1980s American police drama, set in an unnamed city that according to its creator is an hybrid of Chicago, Pittsburgh and Buffalo. It was truly groundbreaking, with many characters (13 regular cast members in the first episode credits), multiple plotlines which ran for many episodes (sometimes several series) and weren't always resolved, whilst lots of the filming was done with handheld cameras. Back then about the longest plot you'd get was a double episode, shows had fairly small casts and characters didn't change all that much over time. Hill Street broke that mould.

Here's a clip showing the start of the first episode including the opening credits (and then cuts to the closing credits at 4 mins 45 secs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krFqTE9n5r8

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_Street_Blues

[AJC5001]

I see Channel 4 have all episodes of the X Files available on All 4
https://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-x-files

Adrian

[bluedonkey]

I recently re-watched all episodes of the following on BBC iPlayer, I think they rate as quality:

The Fast Show
The Thick of It
Episodes

[Gerry557]

Yes the Dvds might be slightly better quality and stereo mixed. I might try the link and compare the stream. The offset will be advertising annoyance. Hopefully channel 4 don't put it in the middle of the program.

I could rip the discs to the NAS but as screens have got bigger it shows the flaws with older tech.

I have a film in dvd, bluray and UHD which highlights the improvements.

[1nvest]

I know it's a personal thing and you like what you like but the following couple of shows are worth a watch.

TV - transvestite?
BBC - is that black-bi community or a more cruder big..... reference?
Not woke myself.

One tv stream I've found is https://thetvapp.to/tv - but its not woke/rainbow, just regular stuff.