Netflix

[cellio]

For my birthday I received a gift subscription to Netflix (I'd been considering it but never did anything about it on my own). This is excellent. I've populated my queue with enough stuff to get rolling, but I figure suggestions are always good. Here is your invitation to evangelize DVDs you think I'd like.

Recent TV I've enjoyed has included Merlin, Pushing Daisies, and Journeyman (last year, short-lived). I enjoyed West Wing, the first three seasons of LOST (more now on the way), Firefly, and the first season of Heroes. I'm a big B5 fan and have seen all the modern Star Treks. I don't get out to movies very often; the profiling there is likely to be unsurprising. If you're reading this, you probably have some other clues about me. I can of course pour all that data into automated suggestion generators; I'm providing it here for a bit of context in case it matters.

Anyway, fire away. :-) (A hint about why you think I'd like something would be much appreciated.)

Comments

[tsjafo.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday!

[cellio]

Thank you!

[alaricmacconnal.livejournal.com]

I think you'd enjoy the HBO Mini-Series "Rome".

Also, Stargate SG-1.

[osewalrus.livejournal.com]

Ask fatlefty about Rome the miniseries. He was impressed with their ability to get so many little details right and nearly every single significant historic detail wrong -- but amusing story.

[alaricmacconnal.livejournal.com]

I can't disagree with you there :) I did enjoy it anyway.

[cellio]

Thanks. I've heard good things about both; thanks for reminding me.

[alfiechat.livejournal.com]

Seems like your journal got gakked or something... I miss Journeyman a lot, and wish it was out on dvd. You might like the Mentalist, who's first season comes out shortly, it stars Simon Baker, who is tremendous. Also, on a Simon Baker theme, his previous show, called The Guardian, also releases on dvd shortly.

[cellio]

NetFlix is accepting requests for Mentalist now, FYI.

[alfiechat.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's already in my queue./

[osewalrus.livejournal.com]

I liked the first season of Showtime's Dead Like Me {2nd Season was less good).

[cellio]

Thanks.

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

Whoa, you got some.. interesting initial suggestions. I do not think Netflix carries those. ;-)

If you haven't been exposed to the new version of Doctor Who, it might work for you. I'd second The Mentalist, and possibly toss in Chuck, although it's more towards the humor side. I would always recommend the first seasons of Red Dwarf. And if you have any inclination towards anime, I could try to suggest something.

By the way, you can access a lot of Netflix content online (or via a Roku-style device) and effectively have on-demand. After working through most of their westerns/anime/king fu, these days I tend to get a random disc or a recent movie and stream everything else. Even if you don't want to watch at your computer, it provides preview functionality so you don't waste half a week waiting for and returning something unwanted.

[cellio]

Yeah, dunno what was up with the spam comments, all from the same IP address. Someone testing a bot, I guess. They're all gone now except for one that I screened (in case I need to refer to that IP address again later).

(Substantial replies later...)

[alfiechat.livejournal.com]

have another suggestion for you: Leverage, the show with Timothy Hutton as the leader of a group of former thieves, is a wonderful show. I especially like the computer nerd. Wonder why.

[cellio]

Humor's fine so long as it's not vulgar -- e.g. M*A*S*H good, South Park bad.

Does the new Dr. Who rely on having seen old Dr. Who?

It looks like I could watch some content online on a Windows machine but not a Mac. But either way, I much prefer to watch my TV on the big TV screen while sitting in the comfy chair (optionally sipping a cold drink), so I pretty much only watch things online if I missed an episode of something I cared about and I can find it online. The Roku gadget is interesting, though; at $100 it's a lot cheaper than a TiVo upgrade. The Roku won't record TV for me, but at a ~$400 difference maybe I don't mind continuing to manually set the TiVo. (It's series 1; I can do manual recordings of channel 3 and it's up to me to set the DTV box to the correct channel.) I hadn't been thinking in terms of a single-purpose box, but it might be the way to go.

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

South Park bad.

Definitely. I would never recommend anything like that.

The new Dr. Who is better if you've seen the old one, because you can catch references, and when the old enemies appear.. well, I can't necessarily say it is more intense because I could only experience it one way. And I still prefer the old one, but I was practically weaned on it.

I like my Roku; got it about a year and a half ago, and my only complaint is that it takes up another set of inputs on my TV. It also does Amazon video on demand (erm, I think that's public; I was an alpha tester), which costs money per show but allows for a different selection. Dropping my Netflix subscription from 3-at-a-time to 1-at-a-time means it pays for the Roku in under a year, and although most of the stuff you can get streamed is older there's still enough content that I have 85 items in my list.

(on a side note, surprisingly my first-generation series 2 likes the Comcast DTV contraption even though many people said it would not, so I may actually stick with cable...)

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

Having seen other comments, I do have to second the recommendations for Leverage and Burn Notice, if they're out.

[cellio]

I'm getting my TV over the air: antenna to DTV box to (splitter to) TiVo and VCR. That last is just legacy; since neither the TiVo nor the VCR can speak any channel other than 3 (with that being a dynamic setting at the DTV box), I could either remove the VCR or put it downstream of the TiVo (one of their recommended configurations). I still have some stuff only on tape, so I'm inclined to keep it wired in.

But anyway... this means I don't have that many choices of channels -- a dozen or so. Another reason that TiVo service would be of questionable value. The Roku is looking quite attractive, at the small cost of having to wade into the wiring once again. (I don't really have thing where I want them, but it works and I was getting tired...)

Good to know about Amazon. (They just sent me a coupon good for a couple TV downloads, which I haven't done anything with because I don't have a suitable device.)

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I highly recommend Burn Notice. It's a fun show, with great chemistry among the characters.

[schulman.livejournal.com]

+1 for Burn Notice. And The Middleman is brilliant (if short-lived).

[cellio]

Thanks. Yeah, any time "something: the complete series" is one entity, you know it didn't last long.

Speaking of short-lived, it looks like, once I get a device to play streams from NetFlix, I can finally see the second (half-)season of Jeremiah! I didn't realize NetFlix had things that hadn't come out on DVD. (And I assume that if this hasn't by now, it's not going to.)

[cellio]

Thanks.

[hobbitblue.livejournal.com]

The Dresden Files if you didn't see it at the time, I love the later books by Jim Butcher but prefer the tv version of the earlier ones, wizard in Chicago beating up bad guys with a ghostly sidekick. If you like conspiracy stuff that doens't take itself too seriously, Fringe has had me on the edge of my seat, investigating futuristic crimes and events. As someone else said, Burn Notice is fun, former agent turned private eye. Hmm, they just started showing Warehouse 13 here but I'm not sure its made it onto dvd yet, too new? Its FBI agents tracking down mysterious artefacts.
If you've not seen Stargate there's a million series of that. The few episodes of Ghost Whisperer and Supernatural I've caught in passing have seemed good, I don't tend to remember to watch tv too often so have missed a lot!

[cellio]

Thanks for the recommendations.

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

I'm with you on Dresden Files; the books are much better at getting into the moralization and inner thoughts, but the show was sufficiently fun. (I was upset that the Blue Beetle became a jeep, though)

Fringe was too medical-intense for me, and Warehouse 13 just felt like a combination of X-Files and the The Librarian/National Treasure movies. But that's probably just me; I'm not much into conspiracy-theory shows.

[risiko.livejournal.com]

Take the time to hunt for movies and series that you like and then rate them. Netflix's recommendations tendd to be good if you take the time to state your preferances.

BTW True Blood is good, as is Farscape. They've got a decent classic Dr. Who selection. They've also got all of the Cadfael and Sharpe series. For something completely different sample Wooster and Jeeves. As for movie, Primer is excellent! So are the Illusionist and the Prestige.

[cellio]

Thanks for the tips. I rated a bunch of things tonight (they suggested at least 50 to get a pool, and I have a good mix of love, like, dislike, and hate in there). I do plan to rate everything I see (or have seen, if I come across it).

[fauxklore]

Given that you like science fiction and Jewish thought, what about Pi? It's got an interesting subplot about the Kabbalah, but is still moderately geeky. (I should add the disclaimer that, while I thought it was wonderful, Robert hated it.)

[cellio]

Pi: Faith in Chaos, 1996?

[fauxklore]

It's 1998, not 1996 and I didn't know it had a subtitle, but it looks like it does. It was Darren Aronofsky's first film and it was interesting hearing him speak about it at the Edinburgh film festival. (Where it was part of a double feature with Cube, a movie I liked considerably less. My favorite of the festival, Tano da Morire, is not, alas, available on DVD in the U.S.).

[cellio]

Whoops, misread the date. (In smaller fonts the digits I am most likely to have problems with are 6 or 9 vs 8.) Thanks.