What's a "bad"/controversial episode or film in a series you actually like?

[Benji]

Personally I adore the 90s episode of The Simpsons where Homer has a grunge band. People moan because it "messes with continuity" whilst ignoring that Simpsons continuity has been on a sliding scale the entire time, but the content is actually pretty charming and I'm convinced if one of the best episodes of the show wasn't the classic "Lisa's First Word" set in the 80s then people would be more receptive to it.

Also the cover of "Glycerine" by Bush is amazing.

[John MickClane]

I have a fondness for certain weaker installments of various film franchises, and while it's not really defending the movie per se, it's more along the lines of defending it against misguided hate. 

For example...Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull. "He survived a nuke!" As opposed to...being drug under a truck, going into the world's largest snake pit, jumping out of a plane in nothing but a *life raft*, and somehow not having serious fucking problems after a dip in a petroleum well. YEAH, I can see how the nuke is problematic here. 

Honestly, I feel like people just want to shit on stuff because they can. 

[Commander Komander]

Community's "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" episode is fairly cut for Chang's weird dark elf blackface but the rest of the episode is one of my favourite of the whole show.

[K]

I feel like that one was unfairly cut tbh. I think that one works a lot better than the 30 Rock blackface episode(s).

[Bobfoc]

The Series 4 episode of South Park called "Pip" seems to be the most common pick for the worst episode ever. I find it funny.

Regarding The Simpsons, I see a lot of people saying that it's been unwatchable for the last 25 years. I took that as true for a long time and didn't bother watching it, but having a guest account on Disney+ prompted me to take a look. I think most of it is perfectly fine background comedy that has the misfortune of being compared with a classic era that's never likely to return. Obviously, the brand name helps keep it going, but I think it generally holds its own against a lot of other cartoon sitcoms you see nowadays.

[John MickClane]

14 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

The Series 4 episode of South Park called "Pip" seems to be the most common pick for the worst episode ever. I find it funny.

Except for Pocket, who died of Hepatitis B

[Your Mom]

2 hours ago, Jericcinno Jones said:

Community's "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" episode is fairly cut for Chang's weird dark elf blackface but the rest of the episode is one of my favourite of the whole show.

I hate that one for the way Pierce was mean to the DM. Was too much I thought

[gunnar hendershow]

There was a clear point in Community where the cast & writers all started to hate Chevy Chase and it was likely before that episode where they had him be absolutely insufferable.

I don't really know what episodes I love that aren't considered "good". People have long since decided that "Fly" was a good Breaking Bad episode I think. Most shows are so serialized these days that a bad episode or a good episode doesn't matter, we go off good/bad seasons.

There are likely some episodes of The Simpsons or other older sitcoms I haven't watched in eons that I find funny which diehard fans don't find as funny or good.

[King Ellis]

A lot of horror related stuff here which I have definitely already touched upon in the horror thread over the years:

Nightmare on Elm Street 2. Very much derided as 'the gay one', which is something I didn't pick up on initially, this is one of my favourite 'shades of grey/is this actually happening or is the protaganist just crazy' type movies where a young guy moves into Nancy's house from the first movie and gets wrapped up in the mythos of Freddy. It's the example I always use but slashers can get a bit tedious to me when you setup within 5 minutes that Jason is going to stab another bunch of horny teens and proceeds to do so for the next 80 minutes. Instead of doing a sequel that just repeats the first one again, it's more interesting to me how these horrific events can, even subconciously, spawn this copycat killer. Really neat documentary about the main actor, Mark Patton, that came out a few years back that covers his story and has a wider look at the gay panic that was sweeping Hollywood around this time due to the outbreak of aids.

Halloween Ends. Much like Elm Street 2 deals with the fallout of the first movie, I loved this most recent trilogy's look at how the events of the original Halloween have shaped Haddonfield and the the ripples are still felt 40 years later, whether that's Laurie herself, the local population as a whole or more specifically individuals like Corey as we see in Ends. It felt like a lot of people's criticims started and ended with 'Not enough Michael' as if we didn't just have Michael going on a rampage in Kills. It's like that old addage of people wanting something new that's exactly the same.

You can maybe throw in Halloween 3 as well whilst we're talking about that series but it feels like Halloween 3 already went through it's redemption arc like 20 years ago and is just generally accepted as a good movie now. That was the original 'Where's Michael? movie, it walked so Ends could run.

Friday the 13th Part VII. Jason stabs another bunch of kids? Yawn. Jason stabs another bunch of kids but oops, turns out one of them is essentially Carrie? Now you have my attention.

Hellraiser Inferno. This probably the best of a bad bunch, certainly when it comes to the direct to video, 'shoehorn Pinhead into someone's script' releases that started here but I think even as early as 2 critical ratings start to take a sharp nose dive. Still, I really liked the detective, police procedural, noir thing this has going on where you have a cop investigating the murders that seem to surround the puzzle box. It's a neat way to keep things fresh and take the series in a slightly different direction.

Back to the Future 3. Not horror for once, I think a lot of the derision for this comes down to how out of place it feels taking place in the old west but it's not like the series hasn't taken drastic shifts already. Sure it's a lot grander in terms of them now time travelling 100 years rather than 30 but going forward to flying cars, rehydrated pizzas and hoverboards feels just as big a setting change as cowboys, indians and actual gun fights instead of light guns does. Clara is another big issue and, yes, she is annoying at times but it does allow us to see a different side to Doc Brown and leads to his and Marty's dynamic being reversed. Lots of fan service as well with nods to the other movies or stuff like Marty 'inventing' the Frisbee. Even little things like the scene that takes place the night before they intend to go back to 1985 where Doc and Marty are sleeping under the stars, it's just this quiet, chill moment that I enjoyed whilst also linking back to a similar scene in the first movie where Doc and Marty are sleeping in the living room of Doc's mansion the night Marty first arrives.

 

[gunnar hendershow]

Back to the Future 3 is great because it stands on its own. Totally does its own thing, and at a time when trilogies became the norm it "wrapped up" a trilogy whilst also being its own movie. Like, you still need a bit of the first film to get it but you won't be totally lost like if you dove in with Return of the Jedi.

I've increasingly grown to like the 2nd one less because 1) we somehow live in that world now, 2) so much is just rehashing the first one but instead now they're in the future.

I cannot get behind Nightmare on Elm Street 2 though. Never have. Especially sandwiched between 2 classics in the original and Dream Warriors.

I'm not keen on any Halloween sequels but you are correct that Halloween 3 did have a redemption of sorts.

I would throw The Exorcist III into the hat. Maligned production and the recent director's/final cut has the VHS footage spliced in which is like when you watch a restored silent film and half the reels were shot to hell. It's really enjoyable with one spectacularly good jump scare.

Also, I suppose one day in like 15 years this thread/discussion will happen and people will be throwing Maxxxine in. Always interesting how perspectives change.

[Benji]

14 minutes ago, gunnar hendershow said:

Back to the Future 3 is great because it stands on its own. Totally does its own thing, and at a time when trilogies became the norm it "wrapped up" a trilogy whilst also being its own movie. Like, you still need a bit of the first film to get it but you won't be totally lost like if you dove in with Return of the Jedi.

I almost wrote that near exact thing last night and then got distracted. It was actually the first of the three I saw and it - along with LOTR - is my favourite trilogy.

[Skummy]

On 22/11/2024 at 16:55, Jericcinno Jones said:

Community's "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" episode is fairly cut for Chang's weird dark elf blackface but the rest of the episode is one of my favourite of the whole show.

It was the first episode I watched, and convinced me to watch the first few series, so I'll always have a soft spot.

There's a few post-peak Simpsons episodes that are still great. I was talking to my brother recently about how several of my favourite Simpsons gags are in New Kids On The Blecch - "the Statue of Liberty, where are we?", "Lieutenant LT Smash", "superliminal advertising", and "YVAN EHT NIOJ". 

Not so much "actually like", but I'm doing a Twin Peaks rewatch, and just got to the Diane Keaton-directed episode in Series 2, that's pretty universally seen as a low point. It suffers from being focused on a James Hurley storyline that nobody cares about, and the awful Ben Horne Civil War stuff, but some of the directing choices are more authentically Lynchian than anything not touched by Lynch in the rest of the series (there's a scene where a cop is questioning someone, and when they walk away they're followed by two smaller, silent cops walking extremely close together, and it's pointless and weird and silly in all the ways Lynch is), and Miguel Ferrer is an absolute delight in it. It's not good by any stretch, but it's not measurably worse than any of the other episodes in a pretty dismal slog.

[VerbalPuke]

The entire first season of Iron Fist for me.

[gunnar hendershow]

4 hours ago, Skummy said:

Not so much "actually like", but I'm doing a Twin Peaks rewatch, and just got to the Diane Keaton-directed episode in Series 2, that's pretty universally seen as a low point. It suffers from being focused on a James Hurley storyline that nobody cares about, and the awful Ben Horne Civil War stuff, but some of the directing choices are more authentically Lynchian than anything not touched by Lynch in the rest of the series (there's a scene where a cop is questioning someone, and when they walk away they're followed by two smaller, silent cops walking extremely close together, and it's pointless and weird and silly in all the ways Lynch is), and Miguel Ferrer is an absolute delight in it. It's not good by any stretch, but it's not measurably worse than any of the other episodes in a pretty dismal slog.

I think the blatant attempt to emulate his style divides a ton of people, since there's only one David Lynch. But I do think it's got more to it than most of the other Lynch-less episodes because there is more of an artistic intent. And I'd agree it's not the lowest point it's instead just another part of the nadir before Lynch returned and the show immediately went back to being great.

I do find it someone amusing that the Josie Packard storyline conclusion was apparently entirely his idea, even though a lot of fans associate it with the era of the show that Lynch (and mostly Frost) were not involved in.

[Benji]

2 hours ago, VerbalPuke said:

The entire first season of Iron Fist for me.

I never saw what was so bad about the Iron Fist show, myself. I say this as a massive fan of Iron Fist. It wasn't the story I'd have told, and I don't think it did it as well as it could have, but there was very little actually wrong with it.

[John MickClane]

Gods and Generals; I like the performances of the actors (In particular Stephan Lang, going from the almost dandy-like Pickett to the almost stoic Jackson), what parts of the battles we see are well done (as opposed to Gettysburg, focusing on one, here we get the Bull Runs, Antietam, Fredericksburg and part of Chancellorsville). I like that they got so many people to reprise their roles from Gettysburg, with some of them not even missing a beat it seems (it's more prominent on some of the actors; Jeff Daniels has clearly aged ten years, others have not). 

I do not care for the fact that the rest of the Southern part of the plot is basically Lost Cause propaganda, it's especially telling as Gettysburg focused heavily on James Longstreet, whereas here he does fuck all, and I feel that's as a result of said propaganda, where Jubal Early basically put the Southern defeat on Longstreet and not Lee. There's a scene included where the whole main command staff of the Army of Northern Viriginia all enjoy a show mocking Lincoln, calling Mary Todd Lincoln a whore in so many words (she lifts up her skirt, revealing bagging pantaloons  . Nice detail there is Jackson, ever faithful and as pious a man as a slaveholder can be, looks away), and then they all sing The Bonnie Blue Flag (Which I'm convinced is a favorite of Ted Turner. You hear it in Gettysburg being played by a band, but whatever, it's a Southern Camp and they need to keep morale going, could easily have been Fortunate Son in a Vietnam movie. Then, it turns out Turner had a made for TV film made called 'The Hunley', focusing on a Confederate submarine trying to break through the Union blockade. Donald Sutherland has a striking resemblance to PGT Beauregard, but there's a scene where, as they're being shelled, Beauregard orders Bonnie Blue Flag played to calm there spirts....so yeah, three is not a coiencedence) . The black characters we do see are either is a pair of freedmen to cook in the camp by Jackson (HIRED. Fucking hired. Yeah, there were freemen in the South, but they weren't cooking for the army for pay), or at Fredericksburg where a family is urged to flee by their slaves, the latter saying they'll be fine, then the slaves LIE to the Union soldiers, saying they're free. And the scene adds nothing! If the patriarch at the household was on the fence about joining the cause, but the Union artillery decided to give him a sun roof and he's last seen either enlisting, FINE, it at least adds something, but come on. 

Also the fact that Randy Edelman didn't return after the masterpiece that was his score to Gettysburg is a crime  . 

[Hellraiser]

As far as the two Tim Burton Batman movies go, I find myself coming back to Batman Returns more often than the original Batman just because of how utterly bizarre Returns turned out to be. There is just something about Denny DeVito playing Oswald Cobblepot as a crazed mutant-person who was raised by Penguin's in Gotham's sewers after being abandoned by his parents because he devoured the family cat as a baby that is very entertaining to me.

I'm also partial to Batman Forever as it was the first Batman movie I ever saw. I watched that movie on VHS until the tape wore out and could quote it by heart as a kid.

[LinterWonderland]

I've always loved the X-Files episode Home

[GhostMachine]

On 28/11/2024 at 22:42, Hellraiser said:

As far as the two Tim Burton Batman movies go, I find myself coming back to Batman Returns more often than the original Batman just because of how utterly bizarre Returns turned out to be. There is just something about Denny DeVito playing Oswald Cobblepot as a crazed mutant-person who was raised by Penguin's in Gotham's sewers after being abandoned by his parents because he devoured the family cat as a baby that is very entertaining to me.

I'm also partial to Batman Forever as it was the first Batman movie I ever saw. I watched that movie on VHS until the tape wore out and could quote it by heart as a kid.

Returns is the only Batman movie I went to see in the theaters twice.

 

[Mx. Canadian Destroyer]

I really like the fly epiosde of Breaking Bad.