Re-watchable Shows

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

Speaking of British shows, Spaced is becoming something to revisit frequently. Pegg and Stevenson's chemistry is enough, but recalling the jokes or remembering Wright's different tricks always makes me want to watch a few episodes again.

Almost as bizarre, I spent two weeks last month watching FLCL again and that didn't get old, either. Something once inexplicable makes sense, but never detracting from the constant craziness of Haruko or Naota's home life. Not understanding everything always demands a rewatch, but the more I watch the show the more it makes sense yet still retains its initial attraction. I have no idea if the creators of either show anticipated its popularity so many years later.

[feihong]

FlCl is so fantastic. When the discs first came out, I watched each episode, and then watched each one again immediately afterwards. It really doesn't date; it's concerns and interests only deepen.

[FerdinandGriffon]

Haven't rewatched FlCl, and must have totally missed the greater dimensions of it on the first go round all those years ago. Looking forward to a reappraisal though!

Recently went through the entirety of Absolutely Fabulous again. What a perfect show, and a delightful antidote to all of the talk about Girls I have to endure living in NYC.

I'd probably be up for another round of Blackadder too if I hadn't been forced to watch it so many times when I was in boarding school in England.

[colinr0380]

Speaking of anime, I have just picked up that new US Blu-ray edition of Serial Experiments Lain both for the animation lists project and because I've been hearing many good things about it in general for a number of years. I wonder if this might become a new favourite re-watchable show, although it will have to be good to beat out Neon Genesis Evangelion!

[FerdinandGriffon]

Speaking of anime, I have just picked up that new US Blu-ray edition of Serial Experiments Lain both for the animation lists project and because I've been hearing many good things about it in general for a number of years. I wonder if this might become a new favourite re-watchable show, although it will have to be good to beat out Neon Genesis Evangelion!

Lain is another show that must have gone a little over my head when it first appeared on DVD, so it's good to know it's on Blu now. Will have to pick it up someday. I'd love to see Evangelion again, though I'm also curious about all of the films that have come out since the series, even if I can't say I understand what they are exactly: elaborate remixes/reduxes of the show?

I also remember Texhnolyze, from some of the same people as behind Lain, as being quite good, an extended dystopian mood piece with a lot in common with Sogo Ishii.

[colinr0380]

There is the Evangelion film Death and Rebirth/The End of Evangelion which both summarises the events of the TV series and then provides a more expected action packed ending to the entire show, which seems to have been made following the bewildered and/or outraged reaction to the audacious and extremely interior last couple of episodes to the series which all take place inside the head of the main character (and which regularly degenerate into black and white line drawings and even filmed storyboards as the world collapses and gets reordered again)

You are right about the more recent films: Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone; Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance and Evangelion 3.0: You Can (Not) Redo are theatrical revamps of the series with more modern CGI and a few tweaks in the narrative again (I bracket these together with the Ghost In The Shell 2.0 reworking - interesting but I still have more affection for the originals!)

While we are on Ghost In The Shell, the TV series Stand Alone Complex was my go to series about three or four years ago for when I only had a couple of hours and wanted something to dip into. A little like The X-Files, it has a great mixture of standalone episodes and ongoing ones advancing the wider narrative (I'd recommend the second series in particular). I think that, All About Lily Chou-Chou aside, one episode of the series set in a internet forum discussing the events of the series up to that point "Chat! Chat! Chat!" is one of the better representations of the internet there has been so far.

I love the line in the soap opera 'The Bureau' where a series of shattering events inspires the manager played by Steve Coogan to announce the shocking news that "I'm CLOSING the Bureau de Change...for half an hour"

"WE'RE GOING TO HAVE TO CLOSE THE BUREAU DE CHANGE!!" is probably the least likely quotable-in-all-kinds-of-circumstances line ever (at least in our household), though "In 1975. . . no-one died" etc. comes very, very close. "Ta-ra, ya shitter," "And what about this? Cool, is it?," and "Fancy Lady!" have a bit more obvious general application. Yes, it's an exciting life chez nous.

Brass Eye is wonderfully quotable too, although you have to really know that the person you are speaking to knows the series and will appreciate the quote before using "You're wrong, and you're a grotesquely ugly freak...Thanks!" or "The future for these little fuckers?" in general conversation!