#SetTheVCR: August 21-27, 2023

Monday, August 21

Moving On (Anytime / Prime Video-Canada)

Two old friends reconnect at a funeral and decide to get revenge on the widower who messed with them decades before.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: SOUND OF THE POLICE (ANYTIME / HULU)

This documentary examines the fraught relationship between African Americans and law enforcement from slavery to the Present Day.
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Ah the best thing documentaries can provide is context. Before I can become interested in the news or even why Colin Kaepernick took a knee to protest police violence context comes first. “From the origins of the first police forces in the South during slavery to the mob violence that erupted against African Americans in the North after the great migration this sounds like it covers the badly needed context that is missing from so many (online) conversations.” How did we get here? It’s 2023 nothing happens in a void. Helps is this co-directed by Stanley Nelson. So let’s focus on the past before we blindly react to the present because that’s how we shape the future. Also a solid tune by KRS-One.

Tuesday, August 22

Untold: Swamp Kings (Anytime / Netflix)

This 4-part docuseries explores how legendarily ruthless football coach Urban Meyer turned the ragtag 2000s-era Florida Gators into a ferocious winning machine.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: SAN FRANCISCO SOUNDS: A PLACE IN TIME (ANYTIME / MGM+)

The two-part series highlights the rise of such Bay Area acts as The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin and Sly and the Family Stone.
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Damn hippies and their damn music.

Wednesday, August 23

Star Wars: Ahsoka: Season 1 (Anytime / Disney+)

The latest Star Wars TV show follows the former Jedi Knight Ahsoka Tano as she investigates an emerging threat to a vulnerable galaxy.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: INVASION: SEASON 2 (ANYTIME / APPLE TV+)

The aliens adapted. Humanity will too. Right?
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It’s time to extinguish humanity. I wanna see humans lose one of these massive full scale alien invasions. It’s Time. Remember how M Night’s Signs was a movie about an alien invasion but hyper focused on a family on a farm in upstate Pennsylvania? Invasion is like that (an alien invasion is seen through the different perspectives of various people on different continents across the world.) but bigger: the budget was rumoured to be around $200 million. Season 2 picks up just months later with the aliens escalating their attacks in their War of the Worlds. Go aliens go!

Thursday, August 24

NFL: Preseason: Indianapolis Colts at Philadelphia Eagles (8 p.m. / Prime Video-US)

Thursday Night Football returns to Prime Video and kicks off today with a Pre-Season Game. The season officially begins on September 7, 2023 and ends on January 7, 2024.The Super Bowl is on February 11, 2024.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: CAPTURING THE FRIEDMANS (ANYTIME / CRAVE & MAX)

Documentary on the Friedmans, a seemingly typical, upper-middle-class Jewish family whose world is instantly transformed when the father and his youngest son are arrested and charged with shocking and horrible crimes.
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There’s are only a few silver linings to the current 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. One of them is the rationing of the new TV shows and movies creates an occasion to review overlooked gems. Just like music…don’t just listen to the new stuff, go back and listen to stuff from the 70s and 80s…maybe even the 90s. One overlooked TV gem is Capturing the Friedmans a 2003 HBO documentary directed by Andrew Jarecki. This is a captivating documentary because the truth is elusive. The news will do that dull thing and put 2 POVs to debate a topic: A Republican and a Democrat, say. But this isn’t vapid politics. Most stories have more than 2 sides and there isn’t always a conclusive and clear truth. In 1984 authorities began to investigate Arnold Friedman for receiving child pornography from the Netherlands in the mail. Arnold’s home was raided in 1987. And from there the story gets murky. Turns out in that home Arnold taught computer classes for preteen boys in his home. Some of those students alleged they had been subjected to physical and sexual abuse at the hands of Arnold and his youngest son, Jesse, a young adult who assisted Arnold with the classes. But…is that what happened? Mob mentality creates irrationality. Which is why the truth is difficult to ascertain. Ambiguity is frustrating because clarity especially in legal issues involving the health and safety of children is paramount. So what did happen? What exactly are Arnold and Jesse guilty of? Watch and find out.

Friday, August 25

The Winter King: Season 1 (Anytime / MGM+)

The Winter King is an Arthurian legend based on Bernard Cornwell’s Warlord Chronicles. Set in the fifth century, long before Britain was united, in a brutal land of warring factions and tribes, where lives were often fleeting. The series follows Arthur Pendragon as he evolves from outcast to legendary warrior and leader.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: THE FLASH (ANYTIME / HBO MAX & CRAVE)

Barry uses his superpowers to travel back in time in order to change the events of the past. But when his attempt to save his family inadvertently alters the future, Barry becomes trapped in a reality in which General Zod has returned, threatening annihilation, and there are no Super Heroes to turn to.
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The Flash tagline is: “Worlds collide.” General Zod returns from previous DCU movies. As does Michael Keaton as Batman. Welcome to the DC Comics multiverse. Flash slides into corny occasionally (I detest fan service) but it’s not a terrible movie. That’s good, right? Based on the box office most people have not seen it. Streaming will give it a solid boost. Though beware it’s got an open ending. And with the way things are going over the DCU it’s ending that may never be resolved.

Saturday, August 26

Jesus Revolution (Anytime / Crave via Starz)

The true story of a national spiritual awakening in the early 1970s and its origins within a community of teenage hippies in Southern California.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: YOU ARE SO NOT INVITED TO MY BAT MITZVAH (ANYTIME / NETFLIX)

Stacy and Lydia are BFFs who’ve always dreamed about having epic bat mitzvahs. But things start to go comically awry when a popular boy and middle school drama threatens their friendship and their rite of passage.
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Are You There God? It’s Me, Adam Sandler. Or rather his daughter Sunny Sandler your classic almost-13-year-old struggling with her tumultuous emotions, her BFF and the Torah leading up to her Bat Mitzvah. The middle-aged Adam Sandler made a coming of age movie. Huh. As all Adam Sandler Netflix movies…you either Hustle to the couch and Just Go With It or Click away like Grown Ups.

Sunday, August 27

Beautiful Disaster (Anytime / Prime Video)

College freshman, Abby, tries to distance herself from her dark past while resisting her attraction to bad boy, Travis.
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SAMMY SUGGESTION: VACATION FRIENDS 2 (ANYTIME / HULU & DISNEY+ CANADA)

This sequel finds newly married couple Marcus and Emily inviting their uninhibited besties Ron and Kyla, who are also newly married and have a baby, to join them for a vacation when Marcus lands an all-expenses-paid trip to a Caribbean resort.
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Fine. Whatever. Vacation Friends is about…eh it doesn’t matter it is what it is. Take a Summer vacation from common sense and…plot and “enjoy” this sequel to the 2021 movie. Streaming is good for stuff like this. It’s not worth money or pants to see this in the cinema but soon as it streams you’re like eh…why not?

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Sammy Younan is the affable host of My Summer Lair: think NPR’s Fresh Air meets Kevin Smith: interviews & impressions on Pop Culture.