Yeah I watched it about a month ago. It was shitty. A doc with mostly live and recording footage would have been great, but they felt like they had to make a cLeVeR, non-linear collage piece because Pavement was smarter than you or something (the doc's perspective, not mine). The musical, movie, and museum exhibit (especially the cover band performances at the museum) were all cringey.

I feel a little bad for bands that 'make it', because the external narrative always takes over and there's little they can do about it after a certain point. Can't control your fanbase, etc.

^ Fully agree.

Anyone interested in Pavement should watch the recently released Gary Young documentary (Louder Than You Think) instead of bothering with Pavements.

I have not seen Pavements yet.

Many critiques of Pavement miss the facts that they have a beating heart and that it's pretty obvious a lot of the time.
Stop Breathin, Silence Kid, Gold Soundz, From Now On, all of Watery. Like half of Slanted.
Grounded for fuck's sake the best thing they ever did probably.
Father to a Sister of a Thought.
Type Slowly.

Not that there aren't elements of archness and ambivalence, mostly about revealing oneself through one's art and the value of that art in the first place.
Sure there are.
But just because that bit is the easiest part to grasp (and discuss) doesn't mean that's the part that matters the most. It's the least interesting thing about the band.

It's like how critics focus on lyrics--that's because writers understand words.
They might know the feeling they get when someone communicates to them through sound.
I mean I would hope that feeling is why they're a critic.
But it's so hard to put that feeling into words that, almost inevitably, they focus on what they know--the available text.
Which is never the most important part of it, not by a long shot.

Watched the rest of The Bear Season 4. My wife, who loves the show, thought the last episode was total shit. I watched all the episodes, hoping things would get better. It seemed to do that, but then the last episode justified for me why I hate this show.

Pee-Wee as Himself is good.

enframed wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 10:17 am Pee-Wee as Himself is good.

Man it was and he was so guarded.....you could tell his trust in humans had been eroded throughout his life.

Surface on AppleTV+. Totally "mid-TV" but pretty fun. One Reddit review wrote something like, "Wow, that was so fucking stupid. Now gimme season 3." Pretty much sums it up.

Frankie99 wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 4:55 pm

enframed wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 10:17 am Pee-Wee as Himself is good.

Man it was and he was so guarded.....you could tell his trust in humans had been eroded throughout his life.

It's incredible. He was really a brilliant guy. I like how effortlessly it depicted the deep sacrifice he made for his shit.

mr. mayor is like 30 rock with hidden mom jokes that i love and it feels like the good place had a baby with parks and rec in hollywood and the baby is animal control

So I just got a year of BritBox. What's good?