For me, its Xena.
Few years back, height of covid epidemic, was living in homeless shelters. Overcrowded slums, everyone miserable, yelling, screaming, fights, abuse, rage. At one point, could feel the anger building in me. Powerless, a victim, desire for retribution. What good was trying to be better person, when all it meant was people walking over me.
Started rewatching xena, hadn’t in years. Big message of the show: when surrounded by hate, violence, it’s tempting to give in, to not be a victim. But you have a choice, to not continue the cycle, to make a better world. I so needed to hear that message at that time in my life.
What tv show helped you?
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The Good Place.
That show is so good! But the ending fucked me up for like a week.
Also, how are you watching Xena? I used to love that show when I was a kid!
One of the best-written series finales I’ve seen in a long time, but I know, that scene with the wave in the ocean, so bittersweet.
Have an external hard drive filled with tv shows, been collecting for years. Most via torrents.
The way to go these days. Arrr!
That is my answer too! The ending is the only media I’ve ever seen that comes close to my own philosophy/beliefs about the afterlife. I think about the different philosophies the show presented all the time, and especially wonder “how many points would I get/lose if I do this” lol
Oddly enough the good place and Bojack horseman were ending around the same week, so I watched both finales back to back and I assumed I’d be sad after Bojack but the good place is what really made me an emotional mess. It was so good. Also I suggest the podcast. Host by marc Evan jackson(he plays Shawn) he is so good as a podcast host that I feel like he needs to do so more often.
With Bojack, the last episode was a nice ending that wasn’t a full ending for the characters, rather a catharsis. The second-to-last episode gave me existential dread I haven’t felt before or since.
Yeah, I ugly cried for a good 30 minutes from the end of The Good Place. It was excellent but it hit me really hard.
Currently rewatching the Good Place (mid season 2). So good.
The Bermaga-Era Star Treks (TNG-ENT). For better or worse, they were some of the best television made in that time, and a guiding light for morality, ethics, and hope for what the best of humanity can be. Eventually…
Ya know, after we nearly annihilate ourselves in a few decades in WWIII, then invent warp drive, get visited by aliens, and decide to form a democratic socialist world government that puts the worst mistakes of humanity behind us so that we can finally begin exploring the stars.
It doesn’t get mentioned much outside that one movie, but all that has to happen first before humanity gets over its collective bullshit. I’ll probably be dead by then, though.
All of the Star Trek show, especially TNG, Voyager and Emterprise, because I’ve watched them so many times when I was a kid at my grandparent’s house.
I was fascinated by the various captains. They were always so smart, capable, full of resources, curious, charismatic and generally great leaders, mostly coherent with their morals. They were basically badass scientist explorers and I identified so much with them without even realizing it.
Now whenever I find myself in any leadership position, I ask myself what they would do. I could choose to be logical and intellectual like Picard, empathetic like Janeway or brave like Archer. This shaped me more than I could ever imagine.
🖖
That’s weird, I think of Janeway as the least empathetic captain. She denied the doctor’s humanity against his will, and gave 7/9 humanity by force without trying to understand its own perspective.
Stargate SG-1
Indeed.
Same. This show had such a massive impact on the way I think and feel that I can still see the effects 20 years later.
Stargate reminds us that we are all just bumbling, falliable humans just trying to survive, learn, and grow in a mysterious and sometimes frightning universe full of evil parasitic aliens.
Also that the very young do not always do as they are told.
Dark really sucks me into a dark damp place that is just really calming when I’m feeling down.
Dark really sucks me into a dark damp place
Very few places are darker or damper than Winden!
Hands down, best show on Netflix.
If I had to pick three things in my life to experience for the first time again Dark would be in the top three.
Yea, I love rain movies and on the second episode of dark I was like, oh is this whole place just raining all the time? I love it. Just started it this week, coincidentally, I’m only on episode 5
You’re in for quite a ride.
Star Trek, of course. Especially TNG has been the best role model for humanity that’s ever been on TV.
Yeah, TNG was the most inspiring, Captain Picard always commanded with integrity. The only time I can recall he disappointed me was when he sent Ro to spy and pushed her to do things she wasn’t comfortable with.
Firefly helped me realize perceptions are just that and don’t have much bearing on people, also that there is a liminal space between society and revolutionaries.
Deadwood helped me understand that personalities are expressed, refined philosophies.
Cowboy bebop reminded me how dreams and life are made of the same stuff and that nothing is permanent, stagnant or impossible.
I’m interested in your comment about perceptions, could you unpack that a little more?
It ties into the comment about liminal space; how one is viewed and views others, while it can control the way a society functions and how we act toward and behave around each other, doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the people these perceptions are directed at and further, for perception to affect anything, it must be paid deference.
Inara, a Companion, who apparently enjoys greater social honor than the rest of the crew, is quickly reduced by Mal’s vindictive, shameful envy to being “just” a prostitute, by which every crew member treats her according to their perception (jayne - object of physical desire, zoe - independent contractor, Kaylee - aspirational ambassador). Inara has the wealth and social grace to be the only crew member with her own shuttle/gilded cage necessary because of the private nature of her chosen occupation/role. Although Inara is perhaps the only crew member with formal training in martial arts and social arts, and often shows herself to be steps ahead of the others assessing situations, she’s treated the most delicately and rarely included in strategy. Every time Inara is frustrated or stymied, we see a glimpse of the personality behind perceptions in active dissonance. These are all perceptions and roles that can be ignored the same way Mal has ignored his role as revolutionary/defeated soldier, Book ignored his role as terrorist(serenity comics)/religious leader, so on. Everyone is trapped and dictated to by perceptions that are not easily shed but are simply shed, which many characters realize under duress.
In the middle of these conflicting ideas and behaviors from society, the captain and crew of her ship, her shuttle, and herself, that do play a large role in how limited/defined Inara is, is Inara the fundamental character, played by Morena Baccarin conveying assumed desirous perceptions and chosen by the perceptions of a casting director appointed by Whedon, who can only write(and sell) his story if he can figure out how to fit together his perceptions and his supposed perceptions of others close enough together to it’s without breaking the written world.
These characters and people are all living according to recognized or artificial perceptions that may not have anything to do with them, yet control how they live and present their lives as far as the characters and people allow themselves to be controlled.
TLDR all the world’s a stage
Your comment about Deadwood is resonating hard with me. Very well articulated, thank you.
Appreciated
Twin Peaks
Star Trek TNG
I remember taking part and reading up on the megathreads on r/twinpeaks during the airing of season 3.
Yesssss.
The Good Place. My wife and I were going through some spiritual crisis as we were questioning Mormonism. We started watching the Good Place, not really knowing what it was. The philosophy and comedy came at just the right time. It’s a great show.
Out of curiosity, are you still a practicing Mormon?
No. Both of us are out, it’s wonderful.
MASH, is a show that always makes me laugh. It’s also taught me to appreciate the things I have, because the characters in the show don’t have much, but they still find ways to have fun.
I’m surprised this doesn’t have more votes. MASH was just full of great episodes. Including probably the greatest series finale of all time. Just incredible.
I’ve been rewatching it and besides Corporal Klinger’s ongoing cross dressing gag being overly transphobic it’s still pretty good. Plus they got him out of drag eventually and even manages to be trans-sensitive, for the time. Still completely unacceptable these days but it was a very different time. I think it also shows how far we’ve grown.
How was it transphobic? The whole entire show is extremely critical of the wars (Vietnam in theory, and Korea in practice), the military, and the state of society in general.
Stating that it’s transphobic because it just depicts a common practice of draftees seeking non-dishonorable discharge is like stating “Get Out” is a racist movie because it depicts racism.
The only hate ever depicted towards Klinger is by characters that are considered antagonistic. Not to mention the multiple plotlines that are extremely supportive of homosexual characters.
Save for the first three seasons with Hawkeye and Trapper’s overt “womanizing”, it’s an extremely woke show even by today’s standards. Alda even spoke out against his character being written as such. At most, it’s fairly misogynistic. I’m not really sure how you come up with transphobic though, unless you haven’t really watched it.
Sliders. One of those accessible sci-fi shows that helped instill a love of the genre
Loved this show. Started to go downhill when they introduced those nazi aliens though. And without John Rhys-Davis it wasn’t the same anymore…
Arcane. Hands down 10/10 on practically every possible metric, but the thing that really got me was the way they portray trauma and the subsequent impact on mental health. I work with folks who have experienced trauma and I thought this was one of the best depictions of the aftermath I had ever seen in media.
Also, this is a perfect depiction of a Greek tragedy, in the sense that everything ends in tragedy not despite, but because of everyone’s best intentions. As the story unfolds you understand everyone’s motivations and they all make sense. There’s no perfectly good or bad characters, just a lot of people doing the best they can with the cards they were dealt.
Thank you for explaining why so beautifully. I tried watching the show and while it was very well done, for whatever reason I just wasn’t getting into it. But all people ever say is how great it is and I was bummed I was missing out. I have seen enough of the show to see the threads leading to what you described. I understand now why it is so highly praised.
Reading Rainbow.
I’m old and I’m not kidding.
i’ll take your word for it
X Files - scared the crap out of me. Wasn’t a fan of aliens and screw that one episode with the inbred family.
The expanse. Battlestar Galactica. Just how wild things get and the whole “what if” factor of where society is headed and what could be in the black beyond.
Ah yes, the expanse was peak for me too
