So, I run this through WordPress, and they have a daily prompt all the time, which I ignore. I did have to laugh at today’s prompt, thinking how loaded of a question it is. Are you patriotic? Somehow, explaining that feels like the most profound prompt of our time. Oddly, the day after President’s Day. Weird.

TV Shows Watched: A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms: S1E5 (HBO MAX) with audio description, Free Bert: S1E1 (Netflix) with audio description,Percy Jackson: S2E5 (Disney Plus) with audio description, Last Week Tonight: S13E1 (HBO MAX) no audio description yet, and The Lincoln Lawyer: S4E1 (Netflix) with audio description

A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms- Totally brutal. Duncan sustains so many injuries and somehow is still tall. It’ll be interesting to see how that final moment plays out for his future, and if the shitbirds will honor what transpired. Gory, bloody, and for once, tonally even. The AD was great, and if something took a shit this episode, I’m glad I didn’t know about it. We should, but at the same time, I’m over it. This episode finally felt like the solo heroic journey we’ve been waiting for, not some sophomoric attempt to extend a franchise.

Free Bert- The one-joke comedian gets to curb his own enthusiasm as he plays a version of himself, with a wife and two kids, and he tries to balance being a stand up comedian with being a dad. It isn’t multi-cam, so the Curb comparison is closer, or even the intentionally forgotten Louie. The first episode was mildly entertaining, with an odd focus on Rob Lowe wanting to see Bert shirtless, and Bert leaning into what is ultimately an inside joke later in the episode where it doesn’t make sense. Bert got cameos from a couple celebrities here, so this might be a fun show to stick with.

Percy Jackson- It’s amazing that they are trying to gaslight us into believing Tyson died. A son of Poseidon lost at sea? Ummm. Even if I didn’t know how this ended, I’m surprised the kids don’t at least kick around the possibilities in their head of Tyson surviving, and maybe Poseidon claiming him. Meanwhile, things are not good for Grover, and his new trapped friend. Percy also has to face off against someone intent on showing him his greatest weakness, and turning him into… well.. you’ll find out. This episode was fine, both in content and in description.

Last Week Tonight- John Oliver returned with a lot to say, but really focused in on ICE and the DHS. Because, of course he did. If we were placing bets on the first topic back, ICE would ahve been my bet. If you want apolitical humor, skip to the end to see a montage of news anchors discussing iguana pizza. I guess that’s what we do now in Florida? I know some places serve gator, but I’ve made it this far in life without trying reptiles or amphibians. I’m good. You do you though.

The Lincoln Lawyer- So many surprises this year. Roy Samuelson has stumbled into yet another fresh take on audio description. So, while he’s part of the new team at Will Trent, a show that persistently had subpar audio description, he’s now with VSI doing Lincoln Lawyer, a show I’m not as concerned over. The previous team did a lot right, but also did stumble. I remember being impressed at how even in its third season, they were finding ways to continue to progress descriptive text about what Mickey looks like. There were several instances where we got deeper descriptions on characters and places we’d already been, filling a richer environment late into the run of the show. Most shows don’t give a shit about continuing to describe things already present for three seasons. But, they also failed to translate some of the Spanish dialogue, and I do remember seeing complaints about that online. For a bilingual character, if he slips into Spanish, my only question is if it got a subtitle, why did we not get description? If not subtitled, then a sighted audience that doesn’t speak Spanish would have the same experience. Color me surprised to find out Netflix has decided to fix the problem, one that wasn’t that profound, and now Roy and VSI are here to save the day. They immediately show why they got the gig, as the Spanish translations are done with clear intent, and they bring in a female performer to read for the female character (his mom).I love Roy as an AD performer, but I’m not totally sure we needed to fully replace the previous team. I have other shows where the AD is in more trouble, and this just wasn’t on my radar. While I can’t remember who just lost the gig, VSI isn’t at the top of my list either. It’s a mostly lateral move, with another solid voice performer, but direction on making sure the translations come through. It’s amazing how one little thing can be the downfall of a contract on AD continuation. Roy does some nice work, I’m not terribly concerned that he’s not Latino, as the show doesn’t really get into the culture vibe nearly as much as it should. Plus, I think that is a switch they made for this adaptation, especially since author Michael Connelly has just made Mickey and Ahrry Bosch half brothers. So, now he has to be believably related to Titus Welliver, should Netflix and Amazon ever agree to a crossover. Plus, it isn’t like the new AD team is going hard on ethnic/racial description, as the new characters mentioned are introduced as homogenized as possible. Defaulting. It’s hard to make an argument for representation in narration when the track approaches characters with the ethnic ambiguity that eems to suggest the characters are whatever race you think they are. If it isn’t important enough to be included in the description… then can it be important enough to find a Latina narrator? I definitely didn’t turn on Lincoln Lawyer expecting to have profound thoughts, but congrats on rocking my world. However, unlike the dramatic improvements made for Will Trent and The Traitors this season, I’m not really feeling the benefit of change here.Also, don’t misread this to say this is in anyway bad, but I just don’t know if the trade offs made for a better overall track. It feels very lateral to me.