Serial Bingeing

I don't stream, computer being on its last legs and I don't want to shock it.
I'm responding since I loved the Brit House of Cards, perfect.
I also liked a series I'm not sure you would, Phoenix, but maybe. It was a series called Glittering Prizes, written by Frederic Raphael, the fellow who wrote the movie Two for the Road (starred Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney). I think there was a second Glittering Prizes series, but I didn't see that one.

I too have recently discovered the joy of watching something when I want, and only as much, or as little as I want.

I started off with House of Cards, the American version first. Maybe because I'm a huge Kevin Spacey fan I enjoyed this ever so much more. I found it much more sophisticated, and surprisingly more subtle than the British version, which (obviously considering the age of it) seemed dated, but also flat and lacking any "I wonder what happens next" feeling. I really developed strong feelings toward some of the characters in the American version. I really like the character Stamper. In the Brit version, he just seems a "by the way" person.
I'm really looking forward to the next season.

That's just me though, I can respect and appreciate liking the English version better.

I generally watch one show a day, between 5am and 6am....on the weekends maybe 2 or 3 in a row.

After House of Cards, I went through "Orange is the New Black" I almost didn't watch the 2nd episode, not that impressed with the first one. But something in the first episode grabbed me I guess, and onwards I went. Really liked it after that. Although there was a lot of serious stuff, I really got some great laughs too....."I THREW PIE FOR YOU!!!"....later on...."but...she threw pie for me!"

Anyway....now I'm on Breaking Bad.

It's actually depressing me, but the story has me hooked (no pun intended)

I've got another thread on this, but I'll tell ya, dropping cable and getting NetFlix was one of my better decisions.

"Do you stream? Can you suggest any goodies?"

No, but I have a box where you can pause live TV, rewind it or set it up to record a single programme or the entire series, while you watch other channels.

Goodies? Definitely a series called Broadchurch. They're going to make an american version soon, but the Brit one is excellent and well worth a look.

Lordy, when we had cable we could do that, and my husband did record shows and watch.

Honestly, that never turned me on much. It was kind of a pain.
First you had to actually figure out what shows you wanted, then the setting up recordings (I know, not that hard, but still), then dealing with fast forwarding past previews, commercials etc)....plus the cost was really high, and that was without the premium channels like HBO.

How does TV viewing work in England? I assume you have cable if you want. Here you have to get different plans, can't buy a la cart. Can you view Hulu, netflix, amazon etc.? Like I've said on my other thread, it only cost $8 a month, and it's like you have an entire film and tv library at your fingertips. There's no way you can ever watch it all, or find something you wanted to watch. I'll tell you the truth, it's renewed my interest and faith in watching television. I'd gotten to where I never even turned it on, everything was so stupid, and the waste of time w/ commercials and all.

I'm curious as to what options you have.

Phoenix! Hi! It's good to see you here again.

I have Netflix and just signed up for Amazon Prime's free trial.

I'm convinced this is the way to watch TV. The only bad thing is when the new season of a series starts on television and you know it will be a while before it ends up on Netflix.

One series I got hooked on was called "The United States of Tara". I'd never even heard of it before. It stars Toni Collette and I like her in anything.

I've also watched:

Mad Men
Breaking Bad
Downton Abbey
Orange is the New Black

And probably a few others that I can't think of right now.

How do you like Amazon Prime?

Hi Boomer!
I am a diehard Amazon shopper, so I ordered Prime a few years ago for the 2 day shipping. The streaming movies were an unexpected "extra".

I find that some of the shows that I watch that are free on Netflix,(after you pay the monthly $8 fee) cost on Amazon. For instance, the original Law & Order has the series up to year 8 free on Netflix. Amazon has a lot more episodes, but I think that the are 2 bucks apiece. The way that I watch that show, the cost could really add up.

I have seen Mad Men, Breaking Bad and Downton Abbey, I watched the first episode of Orange is the New Black, and will check out the next one in the series.

I felt the same way about "Orange................", but will give it another look-see.
The American version of House of Cards was more sophisticated and modern than the British one, but Ian Richardson's facial expressions and asides were fantastic.

Osso- Glittering Prizes is unavailable to stream, but I checked it out on IMDB, and it really looked interesting. I will keep an eye out for it.

Yeah, I remember him (Richardson). I never saw the american version, I might like that too for different reasons, but I remember the brit one as some of the best tv, maybe my favorite relative to Glittering Prizes, and some damned show that might or might not have had Alec Guiness (or someone as good) in a Graham Greene story, or maybe not Graham Greene. Set in a parisian restaurant, a mere bon mot of a thing.

If I can wrangle a new computer I'll stream netflix - then I'll be in hog heaven. Such a backlist I have. Wondering if they kept my old movie data; not the ones they mistakenly thought I'd like, but the discs I ordered and got by mail.

Oh, good, I'd be interested in what you think. That was on a long time ago but I was sucked into it, the characters, the environment (the noise and the people!). You'll get that comment if you see it.

I.... couldn't possible comment on that....

Adds, the imdb review (seems the only one), was pah! or the newer word, meh!
GoodReads re the book behind the series has a take on the storyline much closer to what was going on in the series. I admit I also have the book, but I found that at goodwill something like 30 years after the show.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1013681.The_Glittering_Prizes

We have cable, sattelite or just ordinary ariel, plus all the broadband stuff like Netflix etc.
You can pay as much or as little as you like, really. From the most expensive, all bells and whistles packages right down to paying nothing.

Me? Several years ago I realised that I was paying Rupert Murdoch a fortune for thousands of hours of predominantly crap TV, which I didn't have time to watch, even if I sat there grazing for 24 hours a day.
So, we cancelled Sky (Murdoch) and purchased a set top box which got the signal from our sattelite dish.
It's called Freesat (there is also Freeview, which gets its signal from an ariel.....antennae) and cost me about £120 to buy.
Once plugged in and tuned, it gets about forty channels, including all the main Brit ones, all for FREE!
To be honest, with so much good stuff on our four or five main channels (BBC1, 2, ITV1, 2, CHANNEL 4) there is never enough time to watch all the stuff worth viewing anyway, so why pay for an extra ton of moron TV.

If a new series starts that is good, I simply press the record button and it asks me whether I want to record just the one episode or the whole series.
I invarioubly click whole series, and it does it all for me for however many weeks that the series is on.
It gets stored on the hard drive in the Freesat, and I can record roughly 500 hours of programmes.
It frees me up to do other stuff and come back to watch the quality programmes when I want to. I find that the moron TV takes a total back seat nowadays, because as soon as we realise that there is nothing worth watching, we open up the recorded log and pick a series or film to watch.

As far as House of Cards is concerned, I haven't seen the American series but can say that our original version went down a storm here when it was televised all those years ago. People keep mentioning that it seems dated.
Well.....when was it on? The 80's was it?

Another series worth watching......

The Returned.....A French series with subtitles, about dead people suddenly wandering back into town. Totally weird and wonderful, as only the French can do so well. Second series due early next year and I can't wait.

We do the same here and thus get about 2000 free channels, including 20 or HD-channels.
Unfortunately, we support Murdoch, because the most interesting foreign programs come via Sky, not to speak about Premier League. (We have only subscribed to sports/football and the international [news] channels.)

We would have hundreds more channels if we didn't whittle them down and delete the junk, Walter.
How many channels of your 2000 would you consider total rubbish?

What was it that Pink Floyd sang?

I watch just football, some news channels, the various sports channels and maybe local stations. The missus uses some 30 more. So, more than 1850 could be deleted (plus 2000 more, because we can't watch them anyway due to missing cards)

I think '76, but I forget already.

Because I'm so addicted to TV and video, I wonder what it'd be like to not have a single channel. I still have 4 novels to read in case of power failure. good ones too.

It came out during Major's premiership, so sometime in the early 90s.