For Fedora, replace the current installer (Anaconda) with the openSUSE Tumbleweed installer.

One of the aspects I love about the openSUSE TW installer is the ability to remove groups of packages for the initial install. This is particularly useful if you never use certain programs or intend to replace them with the Flatpak version.

making analysis or historical commentary on film

I’ve been really enjoying the podcast Four Play on the Last Free Nation Culture channel: https://piped.video/@LastFreeNationCulture https://www.youtube.com/@LastFreeNationCulture

3D Pinball Space Cadet

Pokémon Blue

Season 4 of The Boys

Release of KDE Plasma 6

I use Stremio + Torrentio and the torrents that are cached show up but can’t play anything at the moment.

I am also encountering this; “Playback error, please try again” is the error message that Stremio presents.

Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams (joint UK and US production, premiered first on Channel 4)

great ones that never took off in the states

This TV series fits this description to a T because I reckon that most people, when thinking of a sci-fi TV anthology series, would bring to mind Black Mirror.

I watched Electric Dreams shortly after finishing the latest season of Black Mirror; I found the former more enjoyable and poignant than the latter.

I want an android style permissions menu

Same. In addition to the prompt-based permissions that @Kusimulkku@lemm.ee brings up, I’d like to see more granular control of permissions. For example, a flatpak app’s access to webcams, controllers, etc. are all controlled through just one permission: --device=all (aka “Device Access” in KDE’s Flatpak Permission Settings).

Recently, I watched…

Batman Returns (1992): The scene of the cats congregating around Selina Kyle after Shreck threw her out of the office window (and before she’s reborn as Catwoman) is so iconic. I remember seeing that scene on television when I was a child. Danny DeVito’s performance as The Penguin is also mega.

Blade Runner (1982): My eyes got heavy while watching it because all of the scenes are visually dark, which is certainly intentional. The world-building is amazing.

12 Monkeys (1995): It was interesting to watch this movie after having seen the TV series when it originally aired. The TV series is my second favorite sci-fi show, but I thought the movie was fine.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Hades, and Portal

I completely agree with the last sentiment you shared! I think of Cloud Atlas as a flawed gem and am glad to have watched it at least once.

When I feel very bored, I go to the Wikipedia page of a movie that I do not intend to watch anytime soon and just read the entire plot write-up, as well as the “Critical Response” subsection.

Cloud Atlas (2012)

I didn’t think the plot of the film was too confusing, but trying to keep track of which cast member played which character in each respective time period while watching the film was challenging.

I didn’t grasp the implications of the final scene with Aaron and the workers until I checked the plot write-up on Wikipedia.

Hopefully, this release also includes this fix for forced Vsync for fullscreen games under KDE Wayland.

I watched The Maltese Falcon (1941) for the first time yesterday. The story is super engaging and Humphrey Bogart absolutely crushes it as Sam Spade.

EDIT: If you’re looking for just a watch list, then images like this might be up your alley [Link to original tweet containing the image] [Nitter link]. The watch list is posted on Twitter or YouTube around the time the Four Play podcast finishes a film genre and announces their next one. (The image I linked is a watch list for film noir posted around the time they concluded a month of 1980s vampire films.)

If you’re up for another recommendation, something that I’ve been enjoying that fits your request is the podcast, “Four Play,” hosted on the Last Free Nation Culture YouTube Channel. Here’s the premise of the podcast quoted from the video description of one of their most recent episodes:

Four Play selects four iconic films from a theme or genre to meticulously analyze and place in their proper historical context. Hosted by veteran esports commentators Richard Lewis, Duncan “Thorin” Shields, and Christopher “MonteCristo” Mykles, Four Play showcases both legendary Hollywood movies as well as hidden gems outside the mainstream.

What this description doesn’t mention is that episodes drop once a week and the theme of the month, as well as a list of the four films selected, are announced in advance on their YouTube community page or Twitter page.

To address specific aspects of the Criterion Channel in your post that Four Play also provides:

put together a list of 6-12 movies

After they review the last of the four films of a selected theme, they recommend a list of films of that same theme that did not make the four, but are worth viewing if you’re interested in that theme. For example, here’s their list of cosmic horror films at the end of their review of From Beyond (1986) [timestamped Piped link] [timestamped YouTube link].

overview of the theme

Whenever they begin a theme or genre, they give an intro to the genre and the historical context. They provided an overview of cosmic horror in the inaugural episode of the podcast in which they discussed The Thing (1982) [timestamped Piped] [timestamped YouTube].

the curated list for a given theme gets me to branch out from what I may typically watch in that I know it’s generally going to be a good movie

For me, at least, I generally enjoyed the films that were introduced to me through this podcast. I think what they excel at is recommending these lesser known films that you might find are underrated bangers. In their month of cosmic horror, for example, they reviewed The Thing and Annihilation (2018), two well-known movies that have been in the cultural conversation, but also Event Horizon (1997) and From Beyond, two lesser known movies that are, if not severely underrated, worth watching at least once for the experience.

The Thirteenth Floor (1999)

I watched The Dark Knight (2008) for the first time just now. It was a film that I wanted to watch for a while.

Aside from the Two-Face scenes, which get old very quickly, I think that the Dark Knight is an absolute banger of a film.

I watched Primer (2004) yesterday and finished Tenet (2020) just now. I like both films, but prefer Primer for its smaller scope.

I think that both films are very rewatchable because the main conceit that structures both films (time travel and doubling) entices you to re-examine certain details in the earlier parts of each film.

In my opinion, though, I think that Primer plants these details more meaningfully: the line of dialogue about the attic needing pest control, the line from Robert or Philip calling Aaron a hero, Abe’s change from bearded to shaven, among other examples.

Jacob’s Ladder (from 1990)