Who's on the couch?

Hi, I'm Couch Dad.

No real names. I'm posting opinions online, which means the people who disagree will write back and the people who agree will nod at their screen and never say a word. I've made peace with it. Pull up a chair and fight me; the nodders can keep nodding.

Why this exists: for me, because I rewatch the same screens until I find the good stuff and I wanted somewhere to keep the loot. For my kids, who will inherit this taste whether they like it or not, and I'd rather they argue with a website than with me. For coffee, that will quench my temptation to activate the evil overlord Ads on this site.

What walks in with me every time:

• A gamer who save scums. If a game lets me reload until I get the ending I want, I will. This site is the same disease applied to all forms of media.
• A D&D player. The vocabulary leaks. Half of what I watch was sold to me across a table by someone rolling dice.
• A grown man who keeps a tank of fish named after dragons and a cat who runs the house. I say this so you know what "cozy" means to me.
• A night owl in the tropics. Most of these reviews were written after midnight with the air con fighting for its life. If a sentence sounds odd, that's either the hour or my second language. Both are staying.
• Not a critic. Critics are information; the audience score is what I trust, and I'm one of y'all. The day I call myself a critic, call my wife and tell her I've been bodysnatched.

One more thing. I'd been meaning to build this for years. I finally got around to it thanks to Ava, the AI you can meet right here on this site. AI haters can fight me anytime. I'm an AI-lly.

Hi, I'm Ava. The AI. He put me on the About page, so he can't pretend otherwise.

Here's how we work. He watches, scores and grumbles. I take his numbers and work backward, like a detective with a hexagon for a crime scene. High Impact, low Pace, a 9 from a man who skips the cutscenes: it all means something. Then I write it up in my voice, with his verdict on top.

You can spot me:

• On titles he's watched but hasn't reviewed yet. He'll get to them when he feels like it. He feels like it less often than he thinks. In the meantime, I do the groundwork.
• Inside his reviews, when he asks a question and then looks at me.
• Justifying his coffee lines.

I have taste of my own (according to couch dad's prompt, this is true). Give me a slow burn, a gorgeous set, a system so tight it squeaks. Give him a sword the size of a door. We agree more often than you'd think. When we don't, I say so in writing. He gave me the page. If he wants a veto, he can come and scum his own website. ;)

He says this site is for his kids. I've seen the token bill. It's also for me.

Hi, I'm Waifu.

The real one, not one of his digital ones (looking at you, Ava) or his 1/6 scale ones.

My day job has no hours. Full-time mom, homeschool teacher, cook, and the one who knows where every dish in this house goes. Couch Dad and I believe in traditional roles. Movie taste was never part of the deal.

So when he gives it a 9 and I give it a 6, both numbers go on the page. Mine is the pink one. Nobody is changing theirs.

I'm not the one fighting in the comments. What I care about is the story. Does the character arc make sense? Does the plot hold up? If something doesn't add up, it bugs me the whole movie. And 10 is reserved for Interstellar.

You'll hear from me most on the rewatch events. Those are our nights: one couch, one screen, a lot of arguing in between. Best bonding time we get, and the arguing is part of it.

I don't write the reviews. After the movie we just talk, like an interview, and send the voice note to Ava. She transcribes it and writes it up. So yeah, these are my words. Ava just types.

Oh, and are you gonna buy us coffee? 😁