(no subject)

[slemslempike]

I have been watching Nothing Trivial, a New Zealand TV show about a pub quiz team. It is pretty goddamn great (when the characters aren't being uncorrectedly homophobic). I also like the casting, everyone is in their late 30s/early 40s, and out of the core 5 cast members, 3 are women, and 2 are black.

The best part, of course, is that every episode they go to at least one pub quiz, and there are questions that you can think about, and then answers you can hear a bit later. And the quiz is part of the script, and new characters come in and show their true colours by how they interact with the regular team and how they answer the questions. There is a whole plot point about another team cheating, and another about the quiz master being replaced with a rubbish comedian. Good solid quizzing stakes, in amongst the more typical relationship, parenting and work issues.

I have also been led into a mad crush on the guy who plays Mac - he was also Loki in The Almighty Johnsons, a character that I found repulsive, so it is very confusing to be so very attracted to him now. (Mike from TAJ is also in it, but hasn't changed my opinion of him.) His name, it turns out, is Shane Cortese, but I strongly suspect it is only Mac I like and not actually him. There is a very nice scene when he and another character are frantically about to have sex and he pulls her knickers off and I commend it highly to you all.

Unless the remaining season I have goes to pot, I think this is going to be one of those shows that leaves me feeling bereft for several days after I get to the end. I wish I was like Holly and could wipe my brain of culture so that I could experience it for the first time again. But then I might not like things so very much in a different time and place, and then I'd be without the pleasant memories I had to start. Maybe you could wipe it so that it was like meeting it for the first time but you retained the ways in which the media had affected your taste, and other associations with it? Actually, I'm now noticing that the only things I want to be wiped are the things that feel a bit throwaway - so I don't want to wipe and relive Antonia Forest, because I get so much pleasure out of revisiting her books, and the same for JUMP! Street, which I love to rewatch with new people, but I would like to come freshly to Two Guys and a Girl because I don't think I'll get much out of rewatching it, and Nothing Trivial is something I mostly like to see what happens in, but probably won't enjoy as much once I know.

Comments

[girlofprey.livejournal.com]

You know I never had that 'I wish I could rewatch stuff' thing - mostly because I don't always finish stuff, I guess, and because I get immediately obsessed with whatever plotbunnies they give me. But I have it now for probably the first time with Borderlands 2 - I would love to be able to wipe my memory of that game and play it for the first time again. But like you say, I might not like it as much another time, and I'm getting quite a lot of joy out of replaying it on harder and harder settings (also a first for me). And yeah, just wondering how things would be different if I hadn't been so influenced by it - who would I be if I hadn't been so obsessed with Handsome Jack for years?

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I think I would not be me if I hadn't read Antonia Forest, and most girlsown, quite early on. I might still be me if I didn't know JUMP! Street, but it seems very unlikely.

Except for Civilisation, where I go for easy+1 to avoid the tutorials and pretend that I'm really trying, I have never played a game on anything other than the very easiest settings, and often using cheats when even that gets too hard. But I rarely play anything that's very tricky. (I am currently "playing" cookie clicker, which is about my level.)

[girlofprey.livejournal.com]

It's funny, sometimes the harder a game is the more fun it is. Like sometimes I get stuck in a game with my character half-dead and hardly any healing stuff to my name - and it's nice to (after saving first) keep going and see how long I can last, because it forces you to be more strategic. I wouldn't necessarily want to play a whole game like that, but it can be quite bracing to do it that way. Probably more for people who play games a lot though.

On Borderlands it's pretty cool, because the 'harder' mode is restarting after finishing the game, and you get to keep all your equipment and abilities you've built up. And you can keep gaining abilities as you go through it again and you get more chance at the best equipment, having fights at higher levels, so in a lot of ways it's like a new experience. And Handsome Jack talks to you just the same as he did before. It's just also more challenging with a lot of mechanics I won't bore you with.

[the_antichris.livejournal.com]

I liked Nothing Trivial a lot. The women are great.

Shane Cortese was evil on Shortland St many years ago and I haven't been able to trust his characters entirely since. I don't know what he's like himself but it makes it weird watching him be someone nice. Possibly a brain wipe would help with that.

I still kind of want to wipe my brain of Harry Potter, because it was so much fun reading it for the first time. I don't want to wipe Antonia Forest, but it would be nice to be able to take off a few layers of rereads, because I don't want Cricket Term to get stale.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I don't think I watched Shortland Street when Shane Cortese was on it. They stopped showing it in the afternoon slot before Neighbours when I was about 15/16, so I end there.

Yes on making things stale! I was sad after I finished The Players and the Rebels a while ago, because I knew I couldn't leap straight back into reading it without affecting the pleasure of its company.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Also, I wastched the longer finale this weekend, and I was rather sad that the ending was them all coupled up and dancing.