Bald Move Pulp - Kingdom, Black Earth Rising

Jim and A.Ron give their thoughts and opinions on the entire first season of Netflix’s Korean medieval zombie series, Kingdom, as well as the first two episodes of Black Earth Rising. Kingdom is much needed breath of fresh air in the mouldy zombie genre, with lush locations and sets, impressive costuming, excellent plotting and performances, and genuinely creepy and terrifying monsters. The boys both were very into the premise and promise of Black Earth Rising, but are worried two episodes in from the series penchant in getting distracted with Jason Bourne types of intrigue and assassinations as well as the complex and confusing personal lives of the main characters. Whether the excellent performances and important questions the show has to offer can overcome the clunky writing and execution remains to be seen. 

Bald Move Pulp - Polar (2019)

Jim and I have seen the new Netflix original movie, “Polar”. Based on a graphic novel of the same name, “Polar” is an ultraviolent revenge flick combining elements from “John Wick”, “Crank”, and “Sin City” with an engaging and energetic performance from Mads Mikkelsen as anaaginh hitman. Unfortunately, it’s also a tonal mess, careening from slap stick humor to gory horror and back again, never sure of when to take itself seriously and commit to a point of view.

Bald Move Pulp - The Punisher Season 2 Wrapup

Jim and I haven’t finished The Punisher season 2 yet, but we’ve seen enough to tap out. As we discuss in our spoiler filled review, The Punisher has the chief sin of these Marvel/Netflix collaborations; a bloated 13 episode runtime, and adds to it ludicrous character details and plot-points until this grimdark ultra-violent fantasy pushes through the drama boundary and hits unintentional comedy. 8 episodes in, we still don’t know why we should care about Amy, or what makes the Pilgrim tick, or why Frank let Russo off the hook when he should be worm food except, oh right, this is a 13 episode season instead of a more reasonable 8-10 episode season and if things made sense and had dramatic urgency they’d be five hours of content short. 

Bald Move Pulp - Fyre (Netflix) and Fyre Fraud (Hulu)

Netflix and Hulu had dueling documentaries on doomed Fyre music festival, Fyre, and Fyre Fraud respectively. With slightly different focuses, the documentaries broadly outline how founder Billy McFarland built several ponzi schemes on the idea of selling a fictionalized “baller” lifestyle to young, naive, rich people and took them for a ride. Built on the back of a few dozen paid influencers and a long list of impossible promises, Fyre was supposed to be the event of the decade. Instead, it barely avoiding being a genuine humanitarian disaster. We discuss influencing, the morality of excess, and engage in the kind of barely contained glee at seeing narcissists fall from grace that you’d expect in this discussion of all things Fyre.

Bald Move Pulp - Black Mirror: Bandersnatch

Jim and A.Ron have explored the latest Black Mirror mindf$#%, Bandersnatch. Essentially a choose your own adventure book turned into an interactive Netflix app, Bandersnatch periodically pauses to ask you how the narrative should proceed as you attempt to guide a troubled young 1980’s programmer on the cusp of creating an acclaimed video game of the same name. With branching parallel storylines that can have outcomes that can be mundane, psychotic, or extremely meta, we ask if this is the future of television? We stay spoiler-free for a good portion of the beginning of this podcast, so if you’re curious if it’s worth your time feel free to listen up to the spoiler segment!

Bald Move Pulp - Altered Carbon Season One Wrapup

We spin up Netflix’s Altered Carbon after we’ve decanted it for a few weeks, to see what we make of it in our final analysis.  Cool concepts, excellent design, and decent sci-fi action are slightly undercut by sometimes silly and hammy execution, and a failure to take ideas to their logical conclusion.  Still, we’re always down to ponder futurism and human singularities, so we dig it.  It will be interesting to see if and how they decide to proceed with future seasons!

Bald Move Pulp - Altered Carbon First Impressions

Jim and A.Ron have seen the first two episodes of Netflix’s new sci-fi film noir series Altered Carbon.  Hundreds of years into the future, the wealthy elite change bodies like we change clothes, and a fallen rebel from a long ago civil war is brought back to life by a rich immortal who wants him to investigate his own “murder”.  Intriguing premise, looks amazing, with fantastic action sequences, but we’re a bit worried that some of the lofty ideas and world building are half baked.  Nothing fatal, which, what does that even mean to a series featuring unlimited lives?  But we’re hoping for some satisfying answers and payoff in the weeks ahead.