Stranger Things is the best TV show this year

 

The best publicity a program can get is via word of mouth. Even after all the advertising and campaigning and social media posts, what really matters is good content. Good content drives good reviews, and results in good publicity. I just finished binge watching the first season of ‘Stranger Things’ , which debuted on  Netflix. It is an awesome piece of TV fiction. The story sound cheesy, there are kids running around un-supervised, monsters from another dimension, and evil government projects run by shady old men. But the treatment of this work and the spectacular acting by the cast of this show convinces us, the viewer, that everything depicted actually took place.

I guess that convincingness the core of this story. The internet is going ga-ga over all the 80s culture references sprinkled across the episodes. But the simplicity of that time before internet and cellphones allowed a little more realism. Today there are too many scenes in shows and movies depicting charachters simply talking into their phones. And there is an app for anything. The joy of the analog radio , ham radios, and big cathode ray televisions denotes simplicity.

But the best part of this show is the cast. Specially, the young cast. The chidren. There are 11-12 year old children playing the primary protagonists inthe show, and their controlled acting was mindblowing. Most hollywood actors of today can’t act even half as well these young studs. I was similarly surprised last year when that TV show The Whispers aired. The child actors of that show were years ahead of their adult peers, but the show itself suffered from shoddy writing, and went bonkers. Stranger , however, is supported by excellent writing, and witty dialogues.  Crown jewel is of course Millie, who plays the telekinetic young girl, and she has the least number of dialogues in the show, at times communicating only with gasps and meaningful stares. This girl is going places. My favourite charachter though, was Dustin.

I can’t wait for this show to be renewed, so I can continue this time travel to the good old eighties….and what happened to Will ?

Aug 7, 2016

Today I read this in my news.

It just proves that every state does not have the guts to implement rules which ensures saftety of its people. The no-helmet-no-petrol initiative was started some time back in some districts of Kerala state with immense success. Petrol bunk operators were asked to refuse fuel to two wheeler riders not wearing helmets. Soon other state governments started copying the initiative and decided to implement the law at a state level. But then came the opposition from the citizens and opposition parties. In some states, Public Interest Litigations were filed against the law, and in other states, people’s protests lead the government to drop the policy.

Just goes to confirm that Indians are lazy, but not concerned about safety.

Hello from Orkut

 

Remember Orkut ? That nice little fast and simple social network from Google ? The creator of that social network has now created a new social network. Its called Hello. Orkut Buyukkokten announced the creation of his new social network on Orkut, where he gave a simple introduction and the reason for starting the new social network.

 

His original creation was much loved, until google decided to kill it. Will have to wait and see how the new venture is going to turn out. Personally, I am shocked to know that that simple domain hello.com was even available !

Rain and strike..on a beautiful day

 

I had a wonderful day today. A bandh had shutdown the state of Karnataka today. All shops ,companies and public transport was shutdown. But the roads were free. And it was slighty drizzling all through the day.It was the perfect day for a drive in Bangalore city itself. Clean, traffic free roads all through the city. I travelled all the way to Whitefield, and went up to Electronic city, just because the roads were open. It was a beutiful experience cruising lazily across the city.

This may sound strange. I wish everyday was a bandh at Bangalore. And everyday was as beutiful as today.

Bangalore flooding

 

I was going to write about the incessant rains in Bangalore on the weekend, but looks like the rains beat me to it. After 15 hours of continous rain, Bangalore is now officially flooding.

The city is back to being the city of lakes, as two of the biggest lakes have started overflowing. But those living near the areas are trying to cash fish that the floodwaters have brought out. They even got the boats out for rescue.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another city under flood attack is Gurugaon. And the media is still calling the city that name, and not by its ‘new’ name Gurugram.