2020 Year in Review — TV Shows

January 1, 2021
3 min read

With nothing else to do in the spare time because of the pandemic, TV shows became go-to entertainment. The most interesting thing this year is that most of the TV shows I will be recommending were documentaries.

Ted Lasso

This is the best TV show of the year. Apple had some good shows in the beginning, but Ted Lasso is in the league of its own. If you think of the premise — comedy about American becoming a coach of the Premier League team which is actually based on the character from the ad — you’d think creators are mad. But it works on so many levels.

It is delightful, smart and compassionate in the time when we are all fighting and hating each other on Twitter.

I watched it from the begging to the end three times, I can’t think of a better way to recommend it.

The Last Dance

I’m not a basketball fan and this documentary didn’t change that. But I loved watching the story of Michael Jordan and Chicago Bulls. I knew about them since the childhood, but mostly about their existence, what I didn’t know was the story itself.

It is as much about motivation, teamwork and leadership, as it is about sports. Highly recommended.

Drive to Survive

After watching The Last Dance, I decided to start another documentary on Netflix. The first season, which actually came out last year was amazing, before it had a success it had and both Mercedes and Ferrari participated in the next season, which was good, but not as good. As this documentary is about current events it gave me a very nice reference point for races themselves.

I watched all the qualifications and races this year and actually enjoyed them. I would recommend everyone who is not a fan of F1 until now if you want to start — Drive to Survive is an amazing starting point. You will get to know teams, drivers, how it very uniquely combines team and individual sport. After that watching races is much easier.

Also, another thing that helped me was a friend who is a fan for a long time with whom I could discuss races and ask for clarifications if needed.

Tiger King

It’s hard to believe that it was this year when Tiger King blew up. It was everywhere. This is the most surprising documentary. When you think it couldn’t get any weirder — here you go, they show you some totally messed up shit.

The Office

Obviously, not something from this year, but we’ve watched an American version of The Office with my wife and enjoyed it a lot. It’s so much fun, if you didn’t watch it until now I would totally recommend you do, you’ll have to stick with the Season 1 because it’s bad, but after that, it gets much better.

[TV Show] Drive To Survive – Season 1

May 23, 2020
3 min read

I’ve never been a fan of F1. I’ve heard a lot that the cars are becoming more and more the same, so I couldn’t understand why would anyone watch the same cars go around the circuit. But after watching The Last Dance, I’ve decided to pick up another sport related documentary. And I now can say I was wrong. The cars are not the same, they do look similar, but there is a lot of room in engine choice and its calibration. Drivers are very different, with individual talents and styles. And as it turns out, what happens between the races, sometimes can be even more interesting. It’s like a soap opera.

What stood out the most comparing to The Last Dance – the access. Sure there you had all the major players from that time, but it was about the past, people are more open, at least 20 years had passed since those events and nobody from them plays anymore. Here, it is a series about current events and it is really astonishing what the drivers and team principals were saying, considering they see each other at work after the show airs.

The absence of two top teams was very notable. It’s like, yeah, we here grownups are racing and winning and you – afterthoughts. can have your silly documentary.

The F1 itself is a very interesting sport. There are competing teams, but that absolutely doesn’t mean the drivers work together. It is probably the most individual out of team sports. It happens, when two drivers from the same team crash into each other in battling for position. This is madness in close to any team sport, but not unthinkable in the F1.

It is a team sport in regard to mechanics. You can be the most amazing driver in the most powerful car, but when you stop in the pit and a mechanic doesn’t tighten the screw properly, you can finish the race early because of that, unbelievable. Imagine Michael Jordan not finishing the match because a guy doesn’t lace his shoes properly.

“To finish first, first you have to finish”

Regarding documentary itself, it was a bit too focused on drama. You see all the crashes, stops and loses of the drivers and after that you realize the team is in a third place. So it wasn’t all so bad, wasn’t it? As of right now, I am looking forward to the F1 season resuming, I want to watch races. Didn’t choose which driver to support yet, will have to take a look at the whole race. Which is my main concern right now – sure, I’ve enjoyed watching highlights from the whole season, but would the 2 hour race be as enjoyable to watch?

[TV Show] Inside Bill’s Brain

March 31, 2020
4 min read

I’ve recently got a new OLED TV and wanted to see something in 4K, so I started with Netflix and the first thing that popped out was this three part documentary about Bill Gates. It is interesting how it was divided in parts instead of making just one movie, sure there were three different stories, but I don’t think anyone would watch this documentary one by one in a span of couple of weeks. My guess you would either binge it or you would stop whenever.

The visual quality was indeed great, it looked very real on the big screen, although there was some historical footage, which was so blurry you couldn’t recognize faces (but it was very rare).

I’m not a movie critic and I don’t watch a lot of documentaries (unfortunately), but I’ve had a couple of thoughts while watching this I wanted to share.

Western Rich

Although I’m very interested in western culture and I’m much more knowledgeable about it than most of my friends and acquaintances it was still shocking to see two of the richest people in the world talking in the car with one of them driving. I know it is part of the acting, but still, they looked very natural and I don’t see Russian richest people behaving the same way.

The Reason Behind Windows 8

It’s not a secret that Windows 8 was one of the most hated operating systems in recent time, with all those tiles and all-screen interfaces. I didn’t hate it, but it was not loved by me either, but looking at the shots of Gates working I could see how all those decisions got made. Focused management work, you read one article at a time, you write in one document – I bet it worked perfectly for him and a lot of senior management in Microsoft.

Also, as a side note, it was interesting seeing Microsoft ecosystem there, with PCs, Microsoft Outlook, Office etc. As someone who is all-in with Apple, refreshing look.

Books

I was surprised to see Bill reading paper books, I even got a desire to read couple of physical books myself. For the longest time I’m reading either on my iPad or iPhone and lately added audiobooks.

Also the amount of reading is astonishing and those are not thin novels or bullshit leadership books. They are deep and focused on something very niche and to be able to read 14 books in the span of two weeks is just amazing.

Nuclear Power

I actually like the way it was portrayed in this TV show. Because of the two big disasters in the minds of the people of course it has a bad rap in minds, but looking forward it is the most realistic source of energy from what we have available right now.

It looks more like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation ad and story about it and all the work it does than a story about Bill’s brain. It’s not a bad thing, they do interesting and important work, but I was hoping for something different considering the name of the documentary.

All this talk about reading and Gates says almost nothing about it during the documentary. You hear other people describing it, but it would be much more interesting to hear the process from Bill Gates himself.

You get a glimpse of how he manages his time (or someone is managing it for him), but a more deep dive would be appreciated.

Looking at the name of the documentary and my expectations I would love a more personal story about himself and not the foundation.