Decent Recent TV

[mik]

I do my best to avoid Clarkson - have seen a few mins of his farm shizzle and it just looked like contrived bollocks to me. Happy to accept this isn’t aligned with popular opinion.

[tim]

I watched the first of the new season this morning. As excellent as the previous one, with slightly less tomfoolery to boot.

[Ascender]

Really enjoying Clarkson's Farm - I think it's as honest a "performance" as you'll see from him. You can also see how much of a bond he has with his animals and how he's trying to not get attached to them but in some cases is clearly fighting a losing battle. And how content he is when just out working the land? You can tell how much if a passion project this is for him.

I can't believe how the council treated the planning application though given what it could have done for the local farming community and the number of jobs it would have created. But then I've seen first hand how irrational some of these planners can be - it's not a massive leap to suggest there were some who were relishing the chance to oppose Clarkson.

And who is the smug resident who hired a planning barrister to work on a case against it all?

[McSwede]

The Mandalorian season 3 starts in March. Can't wait!!

[Ascender]

Caught up on Happy Valley which was very good indeed. I'd only seen the first series it turns out so rewatched that and then the other two.

Only downside was that the finale was rushed - they seemed to have tried to cram 2 or 3 episodes in to one due to time constraints which meant it was a bit all over the place. They failed to stick the landing.

[Gavster]

Been watching the new series of Clarkson's Farm which is again excellent. It focuses on how ridiculous the council are and at least gives me a crumb of comfort that everyone deals with this shit.
2 enforcement visits for repairing a 120 year old forestry track so far, another enforcement visit for a log store, yet a new 3000 house town being pushed through. Guess only one of them raises additional council tax eh.

Clarksons Farm is the best bit of PR that farmers have had in forever.

[Rich B]

Been watching the new series of Clarkson's Farm which is again excellent. It focuses on how ridiculous the council are and at least gives me a crumb of comfort that everyone deals with this shit.
2 enforcement visits for repairing a 120 year old forestry track so far, another enforcement visit for a log store, yet a new 3000 house town being pushed through. Guess only one of them raises additional council tax eh.

Clarksons Farm is the best bit of PR that farmers have had in forever.

award winning PR you might even say.

[tim]

Mayor of Kingstown - fucking hell that's some brutal stuff, just finished S1 and really enjoyed it.

Yellowstone - another new find for me, really enjoyable. Cowboys vs Indians with added tits.

[Brannen]

Been watching Full Swing on Netflix. Apparently it's the golf version of Drive to Survive - I've not watched Drive to Survive, but if it's anything like this, I might have to go and watch that as well.

Makes you want to route for people in the show (well maybe not the ones who went off to LIV Golf). But it's filmed during that whole saga, so pretty interesting to see the different takes on it.

Might be slightly biased view as I really like golf I can't remember seeing anyone on here talking about golf, but could be the sort of thing to peak some interest.

[dinny_g]

Golfer here Brannen… playing 45 years and still can’t get under 14 handicap

Wasn’t aware of this but will check it out. Cheers for the tip!

[240PP]

Golfer here Brannen… playing 45 years and still can’t get under 14 handicap

Wasn’t aware of this but will check it out. Cheers for the tip!

I’ve been playing 20 years, average twice a year

A bloke I work with plays off two. I asked him what it would take to get to scratch, he said give up work, social/home life, devote everything to it..

I don’t watch F1 but loved Drive to Survive so I’ll watch the golf one.

[Brannen]

Good to know there's a couple of golfers around these parts. I've only really been playing about 10 months, but thoroughly addicted. Can't wait for the lighter evenings to be able to go out after work and play. My brother plays off a 5/6 I think, and my goal is to get close to him, but I'm currently a long way off. No official handicap, but normally get into the 90s over 18. Got my best round of 84 last Saturday with some bad holes, then Sunday, back to the 90s. Golf is hard

Finished Full Swing last night, completely binged watched it, shame it was only 8 episodes long.

[dinny_g]

80 is my record but I was pretty proud of it -it was on a really tough windswept links course on the west coast of Ireland. 84 is bloody impressive for only playing a few months.

Missus is out tonight so I'm planning to order Domino's, drink some beers and watch a few episodes of full swing

[dinny_g]

Been watching Full Swing on Netflix.

Well I’ve binged watched all 8 episodes this weekend. It was really good and a bit of an eye opener with respect to LIV etc.

Brooke’s Kepka’s story was interesting. He’s had loads of injuries, struggling for form, missing cuts and not getting paid etc. He’s then coming home to the massive house that has to be paid for, he had a wedding to plan, he’s got a team of people working for him (who all have kids, mortgages etc)
. So LIV come and offer you several Tens of millions of Dollars, just to play??? It’s harder to say no.

Same with the older European guys. Poulter, Westwood, Garcia etc.

But Dustin Johnson and Cameron Smith have no reason to do it. They’ll make as much money on the PGA so why go. Easier life but they lose their reputations

[Brannen]

Spoke to a few of my mates over the weekend and they've all binge watched it as well. I think that shows it was really good! I hope they make another season.

Agreed on the LIV sentiment, could see why some of the older guys decided to take the cash as they basically weren't making the cut anymore, and therefore not making any money from golf. But you're right, Cam Smith going off after winning the Open seemed a bit of an odd move. I didn't really like DJ after the show, I don't think he came across very well.

I didn't really like Brooks Koepka either to be honest, I thought he came across as if he was so hard done by. He would have made so much money being no.1 for a while. Some of the money like Rory winning $17.5m for the fedex cup makes me think he just didn't like falling down the pecking order and he might be able to be one of the top guys in LIV.

Although saw he's got "buyers remorse" apparently, and was looking to potentially go back to the PGA...

[dinny_g]

Yeah, that's true- by brother was saying he's injury days are behind him and his form has returned, he's regretting his move. DJ was always a but of a Cvnt to be honest, going right back to before his "Time Off" which, if rumours were to be believed, was a significant Beer and Weed problem.

To be honest, I've no real issue with LIV per se. Yeah it's funded by a regime but Britain trades with them all the time so I can't be too critical. It's them trying to establish themselves as a "proper tour" that deserves World Ranking Points (and therefore, Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup eligibility) that I have an issue with.

The money the players got was, in effect, prepayment of winnings. If a LIV Tournament prize was £5m, they don't' actually get that. It's only after they've "won" back their initial payment do they start to make more money. Therefore you can't guarantee the sporting integrity of the results. People aren't necessarily trying as hard as they could. What's the point - They've been paid anyway. SO it's not fair to give LIV tournaments the same points as PGA and DP tour tournaments where everyone is fighting for the highest position, a bigger payday and more points.

Without Ranking Points there isn't really anything to compete for, other than bragging rights. LIV know their whole experiment hangs on this because without the Ranking Points, it's just an exhibition tour with no competitive edge. It's why they're prepared to go to the courts to fight it on Anti-Competition Grounds

[Gavster]

Outer Banks on Netflix

It's a cheesy, cliched, action-mystery-adventure series that's like a cross between the Famous Five and Baywatch. A group of rough-cut teenagers search for lost treasure whilst being bullied by the rich kids on the island. Great mindless fun for when your brain doesn't want to do any work.

[Ascender]

I have no idea what lead me down the rabbit hole of remembering about the show Hamish MacBeth which was one of Robert Carlyle's first lead role gigs in TV, just after Cracker, but having bought the DVD on eBay to rip to Plex, then discovering there was an episode missing due to copyright reasons, then finding it was all on Prime Video.... I finally got round to watching them.

They've aged remarkably well due to the writing and as well as being a bit too "on the nose" about what it can be like in a Highland village, they were very enjoyable. You have to just go with the early 90s, BBC Scotland effects budget, but I can only hope that in an independent Scotland, there's a whole channel just playing all three series on a loop, 24*7.

We've moved on to Veep now which is fantastic. It goes on for 7 seasons, so much longer than the Thick of It, but the swearing is up there with that show and somehow they've managed to create a character in Selina Meyer with no redeeming features whatsoever.

[dinny_g]

Clips from Yellowstone keep cropping up in my Facebook feed.

Is it any good??

Now Paramount+ is bundled with Sky Movies, we started watching.

It really is very good. We’re half way through Season 2.

Finished all of Yellowstone and it is really good. Looking forward to the conclusion.

However, just binged 1883…

Now I mentioned this on here before but I do love a good western. 1883 is utterly brilliant. Arguably better than Yellowstone itself. Easily 10 out of 10.

On to 1923 next week…

[Ascender]

I was looking for something to binge next, Yellowstone it is. The kids persuaded me to sign up to another streaming service so they could watch South Park...