July 26, 2018

SeedSing Classic: I Don't Watch "Game of Thrones", and I Thought the Last Season Was Pretty Great

July 26, 2018/ Ty

SeedSing classic is a look back at our most influential articles. These pieces have been presented in their original form. No Star Warsesque special editions. Enjoy

The most recent season of "Game of Thrones" just ended, and there has been a lot of chatter that this was the "worst" season, or it was "too scatterbrained", it was "illogical", basically, most of the "people in the know" didn't think this season was as good as the others.The question of the day is, Was "Game of Thrones" that bad this year.

First off, I do not watch "GOT". I tried. I watched the first three episodes, and it was just too much for me. I'm smart, but I'm a slow learner, and "GOT" seemed to introduce a new character every 5 minutes of the show. I just couldn't keep up. But, my wife and father love the show. They watch it together in fact. My folks would come over every Sunday, we'd all eat dinner together and, after the kids were put to bed, my wife and father would turn on "GOT". I did not pay much attention, but I was present, as was my mom, when the show was on. I'd go in and out of each episode. I didn't want to be a bother, so I didn't ask many questions and, when I did watch, I just kept quiet.

From an outsiders point of view, I thought this most recent season was kind of exciting. I'm a pretty simple guy, so when I see flying dragons breathing fire, I think it is cool. I thought the battle scenes that I was privy to were very exciting. Those 2 sisters, I want to say their names are Sansa and Arya, their interactions with one of the bad guys from "The Wire", the congressman on that show, were creepy, but very well acted. The dude with the metal hand seems like a badass warrior. And the lady that flies the dragons and treats them like her own children, she rules. So, while I am even lower than a novice when it comes to "GOT", I thought this season, at least what I saw, was very enjoyable.

I do not understand all the flack that this most recent season is getting. I asked my wife about it last night and she said she loved this season. I had lunch with my dad today, I asked him the same question, and he said that it could have been better, but he still really enjoyed it. They are the 2 biggest "GOT" fans that I know. Even my mom, she is on the same level with this show that I am, said she liked what she saw. So, I was confused. Also, for the people calling the show "illogical", it is a fantasy world. The moment you try and find logic with flying dragons, "white walkers" and all the other science fiction involved with "GOT", I lose any respect for you as a reviewer or writer. That is like trying to find logic in a "Looney Tunes" cartoon. This is all fantasy. None of this is real. It is a TV show. Get over it.

The more I think about all the negative stuff being said about this season of "GOT", I kept thinking about a great dialogue between Bart and Geoff Albertson, AKA Comic Book Guy, on the excellent "Itchy and Scratchy and Poochie Show" episode of "The Simpsons". After the first Poochie episode appeared, everyone hated it, except for Homer and Flanders, even though Flanders did call it "Impy and Chimpy". But, the next day Bart and Milhouse are hanging out at the comic book store and Comic Book guy says, "last night's episode of "Itchy and Scratchy" was by far the worst episode ever. As I viewer I demand better. Needless to say, I was on the internet complaining about it in minutes". Bart counters with, "what do they owe you as a viewer? They have given you countless hours of free entertainment. Again, what could they possibly owe you?". Comic Book Guy comes back with, "worst episode ever". I feel like that is the current state of critics of TV shows. I'm just as much to blame for complaining about TV shows on this website. TV shows I get to watch for free. I despised how "Mad Men" ended. Never mind the fact that the first couple of seasons were great, I only focused on the stuff I disliked at the end. I gave up on "the Walking Dead" because I felt like they needed to show me which character they were going to kill off in the first full episode with Negan. They don't have to show me shit. Also, that pilot, and first 2 seasons of that show were phenomenal. But, I felt like they "owed me something". Neither of those shows owes me a thing. I've complained about a show I like, "Snowfall", trying to be too many other hit shows. Again, I like this show a lot. I have continued to watch, but I still found something to complain about.

This is the current state of TV watching. No one is ever satisfied. We all find something to complain about no matter how great the show has/could be. We complain about shows sticking around too long, even when they are still very good. The dopes that say, "The Simpsons hasn't been good since season 7", drive me nuts. They are griping about a show that has been on for almost 30 years, and is still relevant and great. We are never satisfied. I'm trying to get away from that attitude, as far being too hard on TV shows I watch. These people, for the most part, work very hard and they are putting it out there for all to see, and for most to find fault in. I'm not going to be as hard on shows that I truly enjoy.

Let's be real, even if this most recent season of "GOT" was its "worst", is it really that bad? The show is a mega, mega hit and is always on people's top ten lists every year it is on TV. Lets give these creative types a little time before we shit all over the things they write, produce, direct and act in. They are working hard and putting themselves out there wounds and all. It's time to ease up a bit.

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He is eager to tear apart the latest television show that someone worked hard on. Maybe "The Gifted" will be the lucky show.

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August 30, 2017

I Don't Watch "Game of Thrones", and I Thought the Last Season Was Pretty Great

August 30, 2017/ Ty

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

April 04, 2016

No, "The Walking Dead" Will Never be Great Again

April 04, 2016/ Ty

Time to take a barbed wire stick to "The Walking Dead"

Last night was the season finale of "The Walking Dead", and I wrote about it's hopes of me continuing to watch it afterward last week, and it was so maddeningly, infuriating, boring and a stupid waste of 90 minutes of my life. I understand that I have gotten to watch this show for free for the last seven seasons, and I understand that they don't owe me anything at all, but come on, this was absolutely atrocious and, if you call yourself a true fan, you should feel the same as me.

This finale was everything that has been wrong with this show for about 4 seasons now. It was so boring. It was wildly stretched out to inconceivable measures. The story was dumb as hell. All the lead up to Negan was for naught. I didn't care that the original survivors kept getting caught by Negan's crew. I kept checking my phone every 5 minutes to see how much time was left in the episode. I absolutely loathed all the slow, no dialogue parts. I hated the beginning part with Carl and his weirdo girlfriend. Basically, this episode, in my personal opinion, was terrible in every possible way, especially the stupid, moronic, spit in the face that was the ending.

This stunk.

That ending was so, so stupid. The show runners and writers and producers and AMC are getting way too big for their britches with all the stupid ass tease endings that they do on their scripted shows now and this "Walking Dead" finale was the high point, or low point, if you ask me, of this new trend. I thought this finale was ten times worse than the "Mad Men" series finale, and I hated the "Mad Men" series finale. This ending though, what the hell? What a load of dog crap. This was absolutely ridiculous. Sure, there may be some spoilers coming up, but not too many with the dumbass way they ended this season. Let's get into it.

So, we finally meet Negan, with about 15 minutes left in the episode. Everyone knew he was being played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who is a very talented actor, but his portrayal, I thought, was way too over the top. He gives about a 10 minute speech and, instead of being filled with tension and heart pounding moments, I found it very dumb and Morgan couldn't have chewed more scenery while performing said speech. He said each word as if every single thing he said was as important as the next. In all seriousness, he was basically giving a speech about how he was going to brutally beat up, possibly murder, one of Rick's crew. It was a pointless speech for what he ended up doing. The camera kept panning around from the original survivors to Negan and his crew, and it was frustrating and very irritating. I HATED everything about this monologue. God, it was dumb as hell. Then, to decide who he is going to beat up, Negan plays the old kid game, eenie meanie minie mo, changing from person to person, with the camera showing all of the original crew. Hated this as well. Then, when he finally and mercifully picks someone, they decided to not show the viewer who he picked. They have teased a big name death all season long, and when they finally get to the scene where Negan picks someone, all we see is a fading image of Negan and his bat, Lucille. We have no idea who he may have beaten to death.

Screw you "The Walking Dead" for doing this.

This is a cop out and a slap in the face to the viewer. This show has never done this before, but this season, and last season for that case, has been all about bull shit teasing. This is so maddening. They can't promise the viewer something all season long, then not deliver. If I did something like that to my kids, promised them something, but then not deliver, I would be viewed as a mean parent. Why do shows and show writers think they can continue to do this? What gives them the right? It is the worst kind of cop out that a show can do. The people heavily involved with this show have been clearly persuaded by the uproar over the rumors of Daryl's impending death from the internet. It was rumored all season long that Daryl would be the big time character that would die, then when he got shot last week, rabid fans of the show took to the internet to openly complain that they shouldn't kill him, going as far as to start a petition. So, I think all this gave the writers a tough decision and they chose a tease ending instead of just doing what they had planned all season long. This is exactly what happened last season when they supposedly killed off Glenn, only to reveal in the next episode that he was covered by another guy being eaten by a zombie. That was bull shit and so was last nights finale. As I wrote last week, horrible things are supposed to happen in the horrible world that the "Walking Dead" creators have created. They killed off a lot of important people early on, Shane and Rick's wife to name a few, but they seem to be giving in to the mass media and public now. That really pisses me off. I can't think of another show, in the same vain as "The Walking Dead", doing what they have done over the past three or four seasons. It has been one cop out after another.

Besides this terrible excuse for the ending, the rest of this episode was a pile of garbage. I mentioned the opening scene with Carl and his girlfriend. That was dumb. All the Morgan and Carol stuff was pointless. I didn't care about the guy trying to make Carol suffer. I didn't care about Morgan finding a horse. I didn't care about Carol leaving Morgan's care. I just flat out didn't care about anything the two of them did or said to each other. It was stupid. I didn't care about Negan's crew showing up everywhere Rick's crew went. I didn't care about the preacher. I absolutely hated the "hero's" sendoff they gave to the guy with the mullet, I can't remember his name. I just didn't really care about anything that happened or about anyone in this finale, most of all being Negan. We were told all season long that he would be the "best villain ever on TV". He was going to be like no one we had seen on basic cable before. He was supposed to be great. Well, we got 15 minutes with him that seemed at times rushed, but then, at other times, very slow. He was a very uneven, very boring character. As I said before, I hated the monologue and he didn't scare or fill me with any tension whatsoever. The people most involved with the show built this character up way too much and I felt that he didn't deliver at all. Some of that is the writers fault and some is Morgan's fault. There's all kinds of blame to throw around.

In my article last week, and at the beginning of this post, I told the readers that this finale was going to be my decision maker as to if I was going to continue watching "The Walking Dead" and I can equivocally and without hesitation say that I will not be watching this show anymore. I loathed this finale and I do not care to continue watching. I had hopes that they could return to past glory, but they continued with the terrible and boring writing and stupid teaser endings that they have hung on to for the last four years. I feel like a weight is off my shoulders now that I'm done watching this show. I don't have "homework" on Sunday night anymore. This finale was terrible in every sense of the word and they lost one viewer last night. Good riddance to what has become bad rubbish.

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. With his new found free time on Sunday nights, he wants to catch up on recent pop music. The guests on last week's X Millennial Man Podcast have some ideas. Like Ty's ideas? Follow him on twitter @tykulik.

December 30, 2015

The SeedSing (half) Year in Pop Culture: The Top Five Television Shows of 2015

December 30, 2015/ Ty

Day three of my best of 2015 countdown will be my top five shows pf the year. All the shows are in their second, third or fourth season except for one of them. The shows don't have to necessarily be shows that premiered this year. Sometimes the second or third season of a show is the best. Take the US version of "The Office". That show peaked in year four but they went on to make five more seasons. The majority of my countdown is all comedy shows. That's what I prefer. Sure, there's one show that could be considered a dramedy, but I'm a comedy fan. No "Mad Men", which I loathed this final season. I also don't watch any of the superhero one hour shows, be they on Netflix or basic cable. So, don't expect what the majority has put as their best of 2015. Comedy takes a certain taste and most publications writers don't have that taste. On with the countdown.

At number five I have "Better Call Saul", the dramedy of the group. I was very skeptical of this show when I first heard about it. I thought the writers of "Breaking Bad" did an excellent job of tying up the story of Saul Goodman, so why make a prequel type show for him? I began to get on board when I saw that Vince Gilligan and the majority of the "Breaking Bad" writers were hired to write the series. Then I watched and I couldn't look away from the TV. This was a show when it was on, I was focused. No cell phones or computers to look at, "Better Call Saul" needed my undivided attention. The show has many characters but make no mistake, this is Bob Oedenkirk's show, he's the star. And he does a damn fine job as the title character. We meet him as Jimmy McGill, his name before he became a "criminal" lawyer and he's a schlubby, down on his luck kind of guy. He lives in his brothers shadow, played excellently by Michael McKean. His brother has a melt down and won't leave the house, so Jimmy tries to take up the slack. There's a ton of great episodes in the first season. Jimmy becomes a lawyer for the elderly, he gets some skateboarders involved in a hit and run scam and he even helps a family launder thousands of dollars. You can see early on that he is a shady person. The best episode, by far, of the first season was when we get Mike Ehrmantraut(Johnathan Banks) back story. We all remember Mike from "Breaking Bad" and this episode lets us see why he does what he does on both shows. It's an incredibly moving and powerful episode. It's one of the finest 44 minutes TV has had on in quite a while. "Better Call Saul" goes into season two in February and if it's half as good as season one, we will have a mega hit on our hands.

My number four show is "Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp". This show was perfect in every sense. I love that all the original actors from the cult hit "Wet Hot American Summer" recreate their roles. They've all aged the 10 or so years since the movie, but they're actually playing younger versions in this series. The fact that it was on Netflix was awesome because I watched the whole thing in one day. I loved this show. I also like that they brought in new actors like Kristin Wiig, Chris Pine, Jordan Peele and Jason Schwatzman. They were all great. Jon Benjamin as the camp counselor that becomes the can of talking vegetables was hilarious. This show was great in every possible way. Paul Rudd shines once again and Michael Showalter was just as hilarious. My favorite episode was when Elizabeth Banks, who's a reporter at a magazine, poses as a teenager to get a story on how real teenagers act. All she has to do to look like a teenager you ask, pull her hair into a side ponytail. Hilarious. I hope they do more episodes because this show was just what the fans of the movie needed.

My number three show is "Last Man on Earth". When we left the first season, Phil(Will Forte) and Carol(Kristin Schaal) were on the move from Tucson. We picked up this season with them trying to find a new place to live. Nothing was as good as Tucson so they went back to find it completely abandoned. We come to find out that every else moved to Malibu. When Phil and Carol end up in Malibu, that's when all the hilarity starts. First of all, we get a cameo from Will Ferrell. He doesn't say one word and is spooked to death by Carol, literally. Everything else that ensues is great. Phil, who is now going by his original name, Tandy, is put in stocks and has an electric dog collar on until they find it fit for him to live with everyone again. Carol is her usual upbeat self, even when the worst things are going on around them. Todd(Mel Rodriguez) and Melissa(January Jones) break up. The other Phil(Boris Kodjoe) professes his undying love for Carol, but finds out he's impregnated Erica(Cleopatra Coleman). And Gail(Mary Steenburgen) is deeply distraught by the fact that her lover, Ferrell, was scared to death. There's a lot going on this season and the season finale was very heavy, but this show was pretty damn funny all season long.

My number two show is "Review". This show is the weirdest, most innovative thing I've seen on TV ever. Andy Daly plays Forrest McNeil, a guy that reviews everyday life. Not movies or TV or music, just life situations much to his and the people he loves demise. This season saw him start a cult and lose the cult to his girlfriend. The girlfriend he got in an earlier episode was from a review that was to sleep with a teacher. He gets his first girlfriend locked up for stealing pills from a hospital on the first episode of the season. He now lives with his dad and he got both his dad's home and summer home destroyed this season. He also tries to get the perfect body, but becomes addicted to steroids. Everything is so hilariously messy and the best episode was when he had to review, "killing someone". He doesn't want to, obviously, but he accidentally kills a man that he was in a fight with earlier in the episode. This leads to him going to jail and reviewing life experiences from jail. He says that the producers of the show are not who he thinks they are and that they want him to struggle and lose everyone he loves. He even has a chance to get back together with his ex wife, but that blows up in his face as well. "Review" is an excellent show and I love that Andy Daly finally has a project that suits his comedy to perfection.

Coming in at number one is "Nathan For You". What else is there to say about this show that I haven't already said. He's made man caves in women's clothing shops, he's walked a tight rope to make someone else famous, he made a play that was literally just people sitting at a bar smoking cigarettes and talking about absolutely nothing. He did so many crazy things this season. The best for me was the outerwear that supported Holocaust history and the fitness craze, The Movement, that he started. The Holocaust thing was absurd, upsetting and hilarious. The setup he had, with a rabbi's blessing, in that store was downright appalling, but he found a way to make it funny. He's also earned over 300,000 dollars for Holocaust awareness due to his new line of jackets and hats. The fitness craze episode was just bizarre. He convinced a body builder type guy to be the spokes person for losing weight and gaining muscle by only lifting and moving boxes. The episode as a whole is one of the most cringe worthy, yet laugh out loud funny things on TV all year. I'm currently reading the book that a ghost writer wrote, who Nathan Fielder hired off of Craigslist, wrote in two days. "Nathan For You" is by far the best show on TV and I cannot wait to see how he tops himself in season four.

So there you have my top five TV shows of the year. Come back tomorrow for the best podcast episodes, in my opinion, for 2015.

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man podcast. He is building muscle mass by moving Christmas presents from one house to another. Learn all about his secret by following Ty on twitter @tykulik.

May 18, 2015

Cloves and Fedoras: Ty has a few issues with critics proclaiming the Mad Men finale as great television

May 18, 2015/ Ty

If you have not seen the Mad Men series finale DO NOT READ(come back when you are ready). This review is full of episode spoilers

Last night was the much anticipated series finale of Mad Men and in my opinion, it fell completely flat. Lots of spoilers coming, so beware.

This particular episode of Mad Men was like any other episode in the series, not a finale. Most of the episode took place in a hippie commune where the people there all talked about their feelings, it was very boring. There was also the three phone calls that Don Draper(Jon Hamm) made to the three important ladies in his life, Peggy Olsen(Elisabeth Moss), his daughter Sally(Kiernan Shipka) and his ex wife Betty(January Jones). This was interesting, but it came and went. I felt like you got little to no closure with these calls and then it was done. Then back to the boring hippie commune. There was also Joan's(Christina Hendricks) closing story. Very fast and very unexplained. First, she took the buyout from the new company, goes on vacation with her much older boyfriend(Bruce Greenwood), does cocaine for some unknown reason and then starts her own production company. Very unfulfilling. Then Peggy and Stan(Jay R Ferguson) fall in love with each other very predictably. Pretty lame. Pete(Vincent Kartheiser) and Trudy(Alison Brie) got back together and he took the job that Duck(Mark Moses) offered him in the previous episode. Who cares. Roger Sterling(John Slattery) and Marie(Julia Ormond) stay together and presumably get married and live happily ever after, because now Mad Men is apparently a romance show and not a hard drama. And poor Betty, smoking a cigarette just waiting for the lung cancer to kill her. I felt the worst for her, in fact she was the only one who I felt any feelings for in the finale. But the icing on the crap cake that was this finale was the final shot of Don Draper sitting in the hippie commune meditating, close up on his face and then pull back to the show the famous "If I Bought the World a Coke" commercial. Of course Matthew Weiner decided to give Don a happy ending because what does every drunk, wife and girlfriend cheating, workaholic a hole deserve? Apparently a happy ending. The fact that Matthew Weiner said, prior to the finale, that he doesn't owe anyone anything was very apparent watching the finale. He only cared to stroke his own ego and say look how smart I am and how dumb all of you are who don't get it. He's an a hole as well.

Reading the reviews the day after made me even more angry. Publications like the AV Club and Uproxx saying how genius it was, come on, you didn't get it either, you just want to sound like a pompous intellect and spoiler alert, it's not working. You sound like a bunch of wannabes. This was an emphatic thud of a finale and real fans of the show deserved better.

Let's just say, Matthew Weiner owed us more.

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for Seed Sing. He enjoys good television, and does not enjoy indulgent series finales.

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SeedSing Classic: I Don't Watch "Game of Thrones", and I Thought the Last Season Was Pretty Great

I Don't Watch "Game of Thrones", and I Thought the Last Season Was Pretty Great

No, "The Walking Dead" Will Never be Great Again

The SeedSing (half) Year in Pop Culture: The Top Five Television Shows of 2015

Cloves and Fedoras: Ty has a few issues with critics proclaiming the Mad Men finale as great television

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