tv review
Reviewing insightful and thought provoking science fiction TV and technology.
Review of 'Foundation' 1.3
I said in my review of the first two episodes of the Foundation series on Apple TV+ last week that the relationship among the Cleon clone triumvirate -- Brothers Dawn, Day, and Dusk -- was fascinating, and "one of the best parts of the TV series not in the Asimov stories". In episode 1.3 that relationship took up at least the first third of the narrative, and it was easily the best part of the episode.
By Paul Levinson4 years ago in Futurism
Review of 'La Brea' 1.1
Well, I thought I'd take a look at La Brea, which debuted last night on NBC. One on the one hand, a time-travel sinkhole story is right up my alley. On the other hand, science fiction on network television all too often turns out to be annoying. Or, if not -- like Debris, which was pretty good -- it's cancelled after one season. Gone are the days of Star Trek the original series on NBC, or Lost on ABC. But it's time travel. I won't say no to at least giving a time travel series on network television a chance.
By Paul Levinson4 years ago in Futurism
Review of 'Foundation' 1.1-2
I've been saying on Twitter and Facebook and anyplace with an eye or an ear that I've been waiting most of my life to see Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy and then series on a screen. That's surely a prescription for disappointment. But I just watched the first two episodes of Foundation on Apple TV+ and I thought they were superb. Not perfect, but more than enough to be not disappointed but thrilled.
By Paul Levinson4 years ago in Futurism
Star Tracks
" You are in your own little world, are you not " , said someone to me, just not in those exact words. If I recall I had no interest in whatever he was insinuating ( somehow I imagine this now seventy something year old guy has little if any even ex Ivy League fake prestigious instructor memories of his own smart ass attitude that day ) . Virginia, there may be a Santa and a Clause or two but I challenge you to ever introduce me to an Ivy Leaguer worth two shakes of a lamb's tail, to be polite about things. Do not let us get started on the relative worth of said grad versus what comes out of the space under the sheep's tail.
By P. B. Friedman4 years ago in Futurism
Series review: Mr. Robot
They are the most entertaining episodes in the series - for example if you see one of the show's most compelling computers - but much of the plot is revealed in episodes of two show people - where the characters who weren't connected three seasons ago sat down and talked to each other. In the first episode of the series the main villain Elliot Alderson is so cut off from reality in the first episode that some of the characters in the series appear as ciphers, unwanted and different.
By Zuvin Maharzan4 years ago in Futurism
Machine Learning is Our Only Hope
https://medium.com/neodotlife/computational-psychiatry-c05a32f20705 Directors Cut And so like Obi-Wan Kenobi before him the great Jedi Machine Learning (direct descendant of the greatest of all Jedi, Artificial Intelligence) was hailed as the only one who could save the princess and ourselves from tyranny and oppression at the hands of the evil, human psychiatrists with many years of medical school training, clinical experience, and actual (not made up) intelligence. led by the terrifying Sith Lord Darth Prescriptius Maximus. Unfortunately for the legendary Jedi the fact that he was a logical contradiction and logically impossible made it difficult for him to exist let alone save anyone. Luckily Konrad Kording had a backup, Padawan Dell 5720 All-in-One. Although Padawan Dell 5720 was also incapable of learning and in no way intelligent like his non-existent Jedi master, he did in fact exist and was a fast enough computer to run the software package that analyzed the data from the studies. And so using ancient but tried and true methods of computing handed down from at least 15 years ago, the exact same lessons were learned and conclusions drawn without need for the great but fictional Jedi master Machine Learning. In an unfortunate twist of fate the conclusions turned out to be way off base thus heralding the return to power of the dreaded human psychiatrists led by Darth Maximus and their legions of well educated, well informed, generally effective if somewhat too quick to reach for the prescription pad, shock troops. Jedi Machine Learning has returned to his home planet of Sil-Val to retrieve the one weapon of power that may allow him to turn the tide of war back to the good side, the long rumored Artificial Neural Network. No doubt once armed with this powerful computational model based on (what we think we understand about) the structure and functions of biological neural networks and the human brain, Jedi Learning will be able to banish the humans from their places of authority and power forever, restoring peace, justice, and balance to the universe.
By Everyday Junglist4 years ago in Futurism
Dystopia: 7 Imaginings that Test Human Limits
If you look at what’s happening around you, in your country, the world, what do you feel? 2020 was seen as a bad apple year, this egregious curse on our calendar, #cancelled. Everything about the way we must think and live is markedly different, nothing in 2020 went as planned, or thus far in 2021. Hate was rampant. Weary people, sick of injustice, took to the streets (Some of which were set on fire). The foundations of capitalism were momentarily rocked, to the point where in the U.S. we all were freely given money to keep the whole system afloat. We faced Climate change, fake news, nuclear weaponization, technological surveillance. COVID-19. People are angry and scared, the world is heating up, and the weather is going crazy. The ocean is creeping unto our coastal cities, and won’t be stopping any time soon. A quickly mutating, highly transmissible virus is killing, quickly.
By Autumn Faithwalker5 years ago in Futurism
