mtrifonov's Reviews

Ozark (2017–2022)

3/10

It started good and then the megalomania ruined it

27 May 2022

I reduce my score from 8 to 3 ✨

The original idea is very interesting and the first two seasons are really good. The cast, the place, the local characters and the conflicts are all top notch.

And then instead of stopping the show and let it be great they decided to artificially add more seasons and made it from a interesting local story to meaningless global story. It became completely ridiculous and illogical. They put top level politicians, the FBI chiefs, the biggest Mexican narco cartel into the game circling around one accountant and his wife. And one casino. Everybody is obsess with this one casino.

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Vikings (2013–2020)

10/10

It should have been 2 different series: one for Ragnar and one for his sons

23 January 2021

Both of them I would gladly rank 10 stars without any doubt.

Actually the series about Ragnar are quite different from the series about his sons and this why many reviewers think that the show was getting worse after he died.

Many people spoiled by brainwashing machine called Hollywood want to see good heroes facing (and mandatory winning) against supervillains and when something is out of this narrative they find hard to choose who to like and this results in negative ratings and comments. With Ragnar these kind of viewers had their superhero and with his death they lost their sympathy for the show.

This show cannot be rated below 10 stars as it surely have all the ingrediencies: religion, mysticism, love, lust, betrayal, forgiveness, redemption and much more. Each episode is a masterpiece.

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The Strain (2014–2017)

7/10

Enjoyable, intriguing and even predicting the future in a certain way

1 December 2020

I write this comment in Dec 2020!

I just rewatched the show and wanted to give my opinion about it.

First, people who say there are huge flaws in the script are right: no doubt about it. All of them could be avoided if the authors spent more time thinking about the big picture. For example: I would make the Master a wiser creature with a more appealing plan for the future who is gaining a large network of human collaborators with the promise of healing deadly diseases.

Anyway, the story is interesting and the characters are well developed. The effects and the atmosphere is engaging. Some of the plot twists are really hard to predict.

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Dark (2017–2020)

7/10

Watch ONLY season 1 (my advice)

7 November 2020

I watched season 1 in 2 days: it was so engaging and enormously interesting. Season 2 I watched in one week. Season 3 took me something like 3 months and I had to force myself to reach the end.

So what went wrong and why a true 10 stars series depreciated like this.

In my opinion they had materials for a season and a half but decided to force more series artificially. And somewhere in the middle the genre changed from being a drama, mystery and horror to fantasy (or if you prefer sci-fi).

Let's state the obvious: the cinematography, the cast and sounds are all top-notch. The scenes with cave and the sounds in season 1 were exceptionally influential.

The most important thing: the story: season 1 I thought it is genius. Seasons 2 & 3 got really messy (illogical) and over-complicated that I prefer I had never watched them.

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Knightfall (2017–2019)

5/10

Children's movie

4 November 2020

It's all based on the Hollywood scenario: a super hero and a super villain engaged in a super fight. If you like this kind of simple and easy to predict story it is for you. Basically children's movie closer to fantasy or fairy tale than to historical drama.

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Rome (2005–2007)

10/10

Brilliant! A real 10 star show!

17 October 2020

This year I re-watched it again for the third time and still I love it. The characters are realistic and vivid. You can like them and dislike them at the same time. There are no superheroes or supervillains just people in their best and worst moments. Humor and drama mixed in brilliant way. Cinematography and sounds at the highest level.

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Messiah (2020)

7/10

Brave, even bold but too naive

2 April 2020

I admire the authors for the bravery to touch so sensitive subjects not particularly within the US mainstream narratives.

It's actually not a story but a mix of a few and they were all left with very open endings. Everyone can interpret them the way they prefer. You can presume all: from the main character be Jesus reborn through him being a successful manipulator to even being the anti-Christ himself. Everyone can watch a different story.

Regretfully I find it quite naive in too many aspects. It is targeting people with very low knowledge of Middle East, intelligence agencies and Geo-politics.

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Dracula (2020)

8/10

Smart, entertaining and sexy! I especially like the third episode

16 March 2020

Let's start that it NOT a horror movie so most probably people with the bad ratings and comments are disappointed with this. It is not the classic book adaptation either. It is a very smart movie asking very serious questions using humor. Especially the third episode is great, it is original and full new concepts.

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The Outsider (2020)

9/10

One of the best King's adaptation ever made

13 March 2020

I like the show a lot. It has just the right pace: not too fast and not too slow. The characters are quite original and well developed. The cast is phenomenal: all of them blend in to the story well.

And the story itself is very intriguing. Knowing that King is making a thorough researches before writing I can't help myself to wonder how much of this is based on true stories.

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Wataha (2014– )

7/10

The story is way too over-cooked

9 March 2020

Warning: Spoilers

Starting with the good staff: excellent cinematography, a nice cast and good sounds.

Being Bulgarian myself I did enjoyed listening to Polish.

Regretfully, the story is very inconsistent or as I see it over-cooked. Obviously they wanted to make it like a Hollywood thriller maybe to please more viewers but the result is that it is too predictable. For example: it was easy to guess that the police chief is a traitor even from the start of the series. I wanted to understand it so I made a list of the main characters with their motivations and what they do and they just don't add up in many times. But the bigger problem is that it is not a complete story but something like many stories that are just added to each other without any serious considerations. For example: how can you justify that a DA (district attorney) in a middle of investigation in clear self-defense to shoot somebody is worse that a wanted criminal who is under suspicion (or tried) for multiple homicides. It's very strange. Other very obvious example is start event with the mass murder of a dozen border policemen. I believe in such a case all of the Polish law-enforcement agencies would go in and make a very thorough investigation and not just send one young DA to deal with all of it. And many more examples like this.

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Servant (2019–2023)

10/10

Absolute masterpiece

16 February 2020

Warning: Spoilers

People who don't like the show don't really understand it. It is not "cooked" for the average viewer who want everything to be chewed up and served for fast consuming.

I will give just one example: people are asking: "In the end it is a real baby or a doll?" and the right question is more like this: "Can a baby be a doll in the arms of one woman and a baby in the arms of another?"

It is very smart show asking very complicated questions and it is entertaining at the same time. I strongly recommend it.

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Babylon Berlin (2017–2025)

10/10

I love this show but my score is 8*

1 February 2020

I re-watched the series and correct my score to 10*.

Let's start with that: the main female actress Liv Lisa Fries is making hell of a role. I think her charm is giving the show huge boost.

A lot of nice staff: unique atmosphere of Berlin between the two wars; original and totally new (at least for me) music; interesting story with a many unexpected twists. I personally learned a lot of curious historical facts I had no idea about Germany just before Hitler.

What I don't like are a few very obvious flaws is the story. I don't want to give spoilers so I will not describe them in details but they are quite irritating.

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The Expanse (2015–2022)

6/10

Seasons 1-2: high quality original sci-fi; seasons 3-5: just a Hollywood cliche

1 February 2020

I have to downgrade my overall score from 10* to 6* .

The first two seasons is excellent sci-fi which I highly recommend. Most probably it is based on a book.

The next seasons are just the next Hollywood cliche. All the characters I already saw on other movies. All the conversions I already heard dozens of times.

I just watched season 4 and for me it totally ruined everything. It is illogical and full of meaningless scenes. I am sure the author is different than the original and they were wondering how to fill the time to make 10 episodes.

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Doctor Sleep (2019)

3/10

Too much Hollywooding ruined a great story

21 January 2020

If someone didn't read the book most probably will understand very little of the movie.

First, the pace is too fast. I understand that it is difficult to input this book into 2 and a half hours but you'd better not do it at all if the result is crippling the the whole story. Missing major characters and major events is not acceptable.

Second, typically for Hollywood the cast is very inappropriate. Except from Rose the Hat none of the others is suppose to be extremely good looking. It shouldn't be a fashion show.

Third, I understand that Hollywood is trying to fight racism with changing some characters which originally are white to be black. In my opinion it is contra-productive and the only lead to loosing some of the story's elements.

Fourth, smoothing some of the sexual and violence parts is making it a children's movie. Loosing realism to gain this too sweetened taste of typical Hollywood's production.

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Stranger Things (2016–2025)

3/10

Season 1 - 8*, Season 2 - 5* and Season 3 - 1* (absolute cliche)

3 January 2020

I really liked the first season - it has its charms. The second season was watchable. The third season is a complete failure. It makes virtually no sense at any moment. Everything about it is so illogical that it looks like a parody. It is as if they picked the worst Hollywood comedies and horrors and made a mix out of it.

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Shadows of Sofia (2019)

3/10

So ridiculous that it's entertaining

5 September 2019

Being a Bulgarian I can say I enjoyed this movie (I can't say it is documentary as it does not present any facts but some not-so-randomly selected people opinions) so I consider it as entertaining. My favorite and (one of the fannies moments) is when when the author says: "Sunny Beach... people come for cheap counterfeit Russian liquor.." I understand that according to the author we (Bulgarians) are intellectually decapitated people living in ghettos but still couldn't we at least get the credit for producing our own fake alcohol. Should he give even the fake alcohol to the Russians? Really? No point in commenting on other topics the movie is covering. Most of the stuff is either not true or twisted in a strange way. I recommend it to all Bulgarians. Everybody have to watch it and try not to get angry or irritated. It's a good exercise for mental stability.

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Friday Five Sharp (2015– )

10/10

National treasure

8 November 2018

This is a national treasure in Bulgaria. His humour is unique - one of the very few actors that can really make me laugh.

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