Television

The disparity between IMDB ratings and reviews is quite interesting. It's averaging 8.2 after nearly 69,000 ratings, so you'd think the reviews would be overwhelmingly positive, but it's actually very mixed. Sorting them by review date reveals that a lot of people rated it 10/10 based on the first episode, while a lot of the negative reviews came later from people who became annoyed by the pacing. I haven't watched it myself, just thought it was interesting how controversial the show seems to be.

If we're talking betty gilpin surreal shows, I preferred Mrs. Davis

I enjoy the show, but also agree with the pacing issue. The season is nine episodes long, and we spend one of them following a guy driving up the coast for 20 minutes. No mystery, no conflict, just a guy and a slippery rock.

The cinematography is beautiful, but the show lacked any stakes for 80% of the runtime, and didn’t explore the implications of the scenario with nearly enough gusto. I would give it leeway on this by looking at is as a slow-paced character study, but the only character in the show does not feel developed either.

Overall the show is enjoyable, but I did not feel guilty using the skip button to get through the most egregious scenes

Don't know how anyone can call this show slow and boring. One of the best new sci-fi shows this year, IMO.

I had no problems with the pacing, I was enjoying it. However, characters are flat and underdeveloped (Impressive, considering theres only 2 characters for most of the season) Carols behaviour in the last episode was unconsistent and in service of the plot. And the plot was quite predictable.

It was an ok show, it entretained me and I really like the premise but the execution was bland.

The last interview with Vince made me a little sad

“Yeah, it’s going to frustrate some folks, just to be honest. We work at the speed we work at, much like glaciers melt at the speed that they melt at. For my own sake, as much as anybody, selfishly, I wish we could get this job done quicker because I don’t know how many years I’ve got left. I still want to do more things, but I go slower than I used to. So it’s going to be a while between seasons; it just is. Unless we invent a time machine or figure out how to stop time, it’s just the nature of the beast.”

Half the comments I've seen around the show involve the slow pace.

It's an issue. To the point of immersion-breaking and showing a lack of technical artistry.

No, I don't need to go watch Fast and the Furious, I can criticize a show I like.

Elsewise, the show was interesting. Very well acted. But I think someone like Carol would be asking a lot more pertinent questions than they did.

Writing needs to tighten up and then some. Particularly with a sci-fi trope that's been as explored as this one.

Carol, "can you take me to my eggs."
Zosia, "certainly!"
Carol destroys her eggs when she gets there
IMMEDIATE PROBLEM SOLVED

Carol, "can you set up everything you need to create robots that can pick fruit and give me a simple [YES]/[NO] prompt for them to do so? ...?

The show can do more with less while retaining it's thoughtfulness. The acting is there, the mystery-box is present. It just needs a push.

I like it. I appreciate the pace chosen by the artists.

We've watched three episodes so far. I'm really enjoying it. I have so many questions and can't wait to get some of those answers.

Big disagree from me, but I also stopped watching after episode 6 so maybe it picked up these last few episodes.

If we get a second season, I'll watch it. Possibly, by the time the second season arrives, I'll have forgotten about this show.

I was bothered the whole show about how inconsistent Carol is. She figures out they can't lie, then learns that she can't use drugs to force them to tell her what she wants to know, then... falls in love with Zosia? WTF? I suppose that does make some sense, Nightingale effect and all that, maybe, but it derails the progress until Manousos shows up in the last episode.

It's a little tedious to watch, with so little pay off for the effort. But, it's still better than anything else I've had to watch these past few weeks.

It feels like the producers don't care about pleasing their audience after they get the contract. They just make whatever pleases them, perhaps expecting that no matter how well the show does, it's a crap-shoot whether it will be picked up for another season. It's hard to blame them, if that's the case.

Some of my favourite shows have a very slow pace. But so much of this story was frontloaded in the first 2 episodes, it created a stark difference in pacing compared with the rest of the season. I thought it'd likely return to the fast pace in the finale. I imagined Gilligan's process setting up the premise and having some big twist planned, with the middle episodes mostly serving as a means to get there. But now it seems like he just came up with the premise and once established, now wants to explore it slowly and methodically. That's totally fine for me, but can totally understand it having less widespread appeal than how it initially seemed

Loved it!

SPOILER:

My theory is that the alien is an allegory for artificial intelligence. 🤷

I assumed it would be slow, that's what he does, and his shows have gotten progressively slower.

Meh. I saw a bunch of people absolutely obsessed with it and I just didn't see the appeal because it was so slow and boring. Obviously that's just because it's not my type of show, but that doesn't make the claim any less bullshit.

I view people who complain about things being slow and boring the same as Mike from RLM. Doesn't need to be defended. Go watch Fast and Furious and let me enjoy my show.

Disagree. It was slow, boring and focused on the worst kind of character for 90% of its short season. The last episode tried to give viewers something to cling on to while they settle in for a wait that is likely to be 2+ years before the next season trickles out. Trump and AI will have burned the world to ground by then.