DuWayne Steurer

While I would have liked to have seen what Feliciano could do with some part-time at bats, I'm good with this move. Backup catcher shouldn't amount to more than 1/2 a win to a win over 80 games, one way or the other. Caratini is pretty much the definition of a mid-tier, average back up catcher. For all the hand wringing over Severino's suspension caused, backup catcher who's going to start 22 - 30 games for half a season just isn't going to impact enough AB's/plays/games to make enough of a difference in the W/L column.

I think it's safe to say that almost ALL fiction has some political undertone (except maybe Thomas the Train Engine!) so I think let's just discuss what we like, what we're reading, be cool about it, and not derail the thread. That being said, the last couple two-tree years (damn you Sveumrules!) I've dove head first back into graphic novels (or "comic books" if you will) as I often do. I'll take a 3-4 year hiatus, and then see what's cool, relevant, or trending, and then grab a 6 - 12 month supply. I just finished the last volume of "Low" by Rick Remender not too long ago. If you're into Sci-Fi, the art is simply stunning. It's got a really limited color palette that kind of forces your perspective, and at times, it's simply bizarre. I've heard reviewers say the last volume felt rushed and incomplete, but I didn't get that feeling at all. The story says what it has to say without feeling like it limps along and it's a really good 5 volume, complete story for Sci-Fi fans. Also just finished up "East of West" by Johnathon Hickman. Another excellent sci-fi/fantasy Series. A little longer ( I think 10 volumes/60-ish issues) but the pacing is excellent, and it's got (again) a really excellent palette that brings the art to life and helps tell the story. I have 3 huge Omnibus volumes of Usagi Yojimbo (signed!) that I'm only about half way through. Stan Sakai is such a great storyteller. The art sometimes leaves a little to be desired. He's going for a serious, sometimes violent morality tale, and the art is really 'kiddy', so it clashes, and it's hard to mesh the two sometimes (for me, at least) but it's such good storytelling that I keep going back. And I'm sure if you're reading this and you read graphic novels, you're reading "Saga", so you don't need me to tell you to get into it.

Film Fest Friday again.... Nightmare Alley -- I find Guillermo del Toro movies hit or miss. This one really hit the mark for me. Excellent cast, really dark period piece (which I'm into lately, for some reason), and it didn't have a monster with eyes in it's hands. Really enjoyed it, and not being familiar with the original source work, I was able to go into this one fresh, and not really know how the ending was gonna pop.

Haha yes. I avoided talking too much about the movie in case there are those who haven't seen it yet. Despite the massive box office haul, I'm sure there are those that didn't see it in theaters.

Good sunday morning my movie watching friends! Watched the new Spider Man flick this weekend, and boy do I have thoughts. I enjoyed the movie. Tom Holland has been without a doubt, the best Peter Parker. I think they crammed a lot (maybe a little too much) into a 2 1/2 hour movie. I think so far, the MCU and Feige and the writers have done a *pretty good* job of avoiding plot holes and contradictions with 24-25 movies and a bunch of tv shows, but this multi-verse business is going to make things pretty sticky (IMO, of course). We'll see how it goes. I'm looking forward to the new Dr. Strange flick. Watched The Courier after that as a cool down. Cold War era spy flick. And honestly, seems kind of relevant right now.... This was an excellent movie. Kinda flew under the radar (as a lot of movies have during the pandemic) and I really enjoyed it. There's a very intentional pacing and tension that builds pretty quickly and keeps you hanging on. Pretty interesting story too, based on a couple of real dudes who put in some on-the-ground grunt work to try to stop the Cuba missile crisis.

Watched "The Green Knight" this afternoon. My goodness what an audio and visual feast. So many people have complained and downvoted this movie for not having enough action and fight scenes, but if you know the story of Sir Gawain and The Green Knight, you'd know going in that it's not really an action/adventure story, but a story of discovery. Within that framework, it's an absolutely mesmerizing film that just crushes the visual aspect, and if you have surround sound, just absolutely crank it. Disappointed I missed this one in the theater, because it feels like it deserves that kind of viewing experience.

The middle one (IMO of course) was the weakest. It wasn't bad, but it it just didn't pop the way the first one and the new one did. I loved this movie today. It has a lot less focus on the action and more on building the world and the story, but there's still plenty of set pieces that move along with the story. Ralph Fiennes is simply an amazing actor, and I have never seen a movie he's in that wasn't great.

"Nobody" was great. The end set piece was utterly ridiculous and fantastic. Christopher Lloyd taking part in a violent gun-fight set piece was nothing short of awesome. I know everyone else has said it, but convincingly turning Bob Odenkirk into a bad-ass action guy ..... wow! Movie #1 down on film-fest Friday. Movie #2 is going to be The Kings Man

Peacemaker season 1 was absolutely awesome. The finale lived up to all the hype and then some. Gonna be hard to follow up with a season 2 that matches the intensity. At the same time...... man, Book of Robert Fett on Disney+ was nothing short of a let down. There were a few "hey here's some fan service!" moments scattered throughout, but the pacing, the disjointed storytelling, and the action sequences just all were flat and uninspiring. So many elements included into the show that were unnecessary to make it longer. It could have been compressed into about a 4 episode mini, and been much tighter and cleaner.

Gunpowder Milkshake. -- There's no real earth shattering story here, but Karen Gillan is awesome, Paul Giammati is great in everything he does, and the action scenes are creative, ultra-violent, and the set pieces are super fantastic. The bowling alley fight scene is outlandish and amazing. The little bit of a plot is just cohesive enough to be worth the brutal action scenes. The Dig -- taking it down a notch.... Didn't expect this one to keep me engrossed. Turned out to really be an interesting picture. There were just a few creative liberties taken to make the story interesting enough for a two hour movie, but putting that aside, they took a story about finding an ancient archeological site in the English country side discovered by an excavator just before WW2 and turned it into a great, compelling drama film. Definitely recommend if you're into that type of thing.

I wasn't going to bother with Peacemaker, but still being off work I decided to binge it yesterday. I'm really impressed that the show manages to balance tackling some serious and current social issues head-on, with having some almost slapstick and over the top hero/villain archetypes at the same time.

As far as murder mystery/drama/detective show/time travel/mind bender/ plot twist/horror shows go, I'm one season into Dark on Netflix, and it's pretty good. you definitely can't be doing other things while you're watching, or your'e going to miss plot points and character introductions and key exposition, but it's pretty good so far. Not sure if it got mentioned earlier in the thread, sorry if so. But it's good through one season.

I don't get the people who say "this is a boring movie with a twist ending". It's a great movie that builds to the climax for sure, but it's not boring unless once expected a cowboy shoot em' up because it's labelled a Western. The pieces were laid out really well, the relevant information was set up in all the right places so that when the reveal happened, it wasn't a "huh???" moment, but more of a "oh yeah" moment that with hindsight, was built up to with a lot of intelligent writing. I'll for sure say it's not the type of movie I usually watch, but I went into it understanding that it wasn't an action/Cowboy movie, and got rewarded for having an open mind.

I'm off the next few days. I've been meaning to watch this.

Might need to climb up on the roof & check the antenna? I wonder where the Netflix antenna is.......

Watching season 2 of the Witcher atm. One thing that isn't a spoiler. In the world of The Witcher, it is absolute, always, 100% of the time, always, always, lightly snowing. It is never snowing heavily, and it is never not snowing. It is always, always, ALWAYS, lightly snowing. Amazing.

Unfortunately, unlike in the comics, actors will eventually show the effects of aging. I liked Loki quite a bit, Hawkeye has been ok, and the villain reveal was interesting. I just don't think the new, young characters are going to be interesting enough to keep people interested enough to spend money by the billions the way they have been for the last decade plus

] There's a lot more competition in the streaming market than there is in cable, simply because if you have internet, you can get whatever streaming you want. If you live in an area, you have to get whatever cable option is available in that area. Where I live, it's Charter, AT&T, or nothing. I don't see at least a near future where there won't be enough streaming services competing with each other to keep rates at least somewhat competitive.

I wasn't going to switch to Hulu and give Disney my money. Hulu has the same price for the same content as yttv. this was a powerplay by Disney to try to switch people over to their steaming platform and I'm guessing (all my opinion) that it didn't work out. yttv is getting back all the Disney content at the same price point. I hope like me, most of the other yt subscribers held firm and didn't cancel.

Yeah this is bogus. I don't need Hulu, like at all. ESPN+ is just a bunch of soccer, D3 basketball, and ufc

Seems to be the general feeling. Hard to believe a company that big can have such poor customer service and survive. I haven't seen or heard anyone say differently though, so obviously it's a problem. about 10 years ago tds outsourced all of their tier 1 support and sales to an offshore company. not only that, they shipped a bunch of people there for several weeks to train their replacements. half my "I want to speak to a supervisor"; escalations were from people who couldn't understand the person they were talking to. tds doesn't care. cheap labor.

I went to the charter office in Janesville 4 or 5 years ago to change out a box and I was the only person in the office. they made me take a number from the kiosk, and 5 minutes later the dude at the counter looked around and called my name hesitantly. dude. I am. the only. person. here. I think it was about 2 or 3 months later I went through the painstaking hassle of cancelling with them. it's a neck and neck race between charter, tds, and DirecTV to see who can have the most abysmally bad customer service.

a smart tv and a laptop. or a fire stick or just the smart tv and 5 minutes to set it up. you're convinced there's all this crazy next gen gear required, and there just isn't. but hey.... everyone do what's best for them

I like that once I have started watching a show or movie, I can go back and lick it up from the point I left off, or start over from the beginning. at any time, from any device. also. the billing. it's 65 bucks plus tax. there's not 28 extra charges for fees, extra fees, fees for the envelope they sent you the bill in, extra fees for the library fund, fees for the time it took to figure out all the extra things they could charge you for, etc etc etc my us cellular bill had a line on it once with no attached fee, just ...... 98 cents. no fee or explanation, just 98 cents. I went to the us cellular store and asked what it was for. they had no clue. I asked them to take it off. they said they couldn't. lol. it took me 2 phone calls and 45 minutes to get rid of a 98 cent recurring charge for nothing at all I'm not paying a fee for literally nothing. telecom companies will literally charge you a fee for nothing if you don't watch your bill. (us cell is owned by TDS, btw...)

Seriously, once you have youtubetv set up, which takes about 5 minutes of creating an account, it's just like watching "regular" tv. As far as not having as many channels as cable tv.... how many channels on cable do you all actually watch? Like legitimately go down the list and take a hard look at all the 200 channels and legitimately say "I for sure spend an appreciable amount of time watching The Hallmark Channel, the Shopping Network, the Cooking Channel (Diners DRIVE INS, and DIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVES!), and for sure VH1, VH2, VH3, all the way up to like VH8, lololol. You're paying a buttload for a butt load of channels you NEVER watch. You get a channel guide, all the Channels like ESPN, ESPN+ and the local channels FOX, CBS, NBC, etc, that are local to your market, SPIKE, all the turner and news channels, etc, etc. you lose some fluff that most people probably don't bother with. If it's THAT important, get Roku. Save some money. As far as "all the tech stuff" it takes to set up a VPN to watch MLB in market, it honestly takes a few minutes and it's super simple. My neighbor took a trip to China about 4 years ago, and needed access to some stuff on his computer, via the internet, and it took me literally 5 minutes to show him how to use a VPN, and this guy is pretty darn tech un-savvy. If someone just doesn't wanna do it ...... I get it. But it's *not hard*, and there's a lot of money to be saved. I used to pay for Spectrum and not only did I get raked over the coals with their billing, I got So, so, so, so tired of the bullcrap customer service, and frankly, the horrible up time. Youtube TV and AT&T internet and I pay 115 bucks a month instead of 250 bucks a month (and I find online streams for Brewer games) and there's simply no way it's not worth the, literally, few minutes I put into it.