Be finishing The Strain tonight and tomorrow night. All the praise this show got from me will either be finalised or revoked depending on the ending.
Next stop “Hannibal” which finally has arrived in its entirety on german Amazon.
Why does everyone keep saying that?
I don’t wanna sound cocky, but maybe beacause of a small grain of truth in my analysis? 
I would definitely recommend that.
I’ve not heard that from anyone else, but then I don’t know many people who have seen it.
On the subject of Netflix, I had to turn off an episode of Dark Tourism the other night. Not made for animal lovers. Should’ve known since it was in Asia…
Was that the one where they blow up animals with weapons for fun? He couldn´t bring himself to do that, in case you missed it.
Uh-oh, here come the funny hats! 
Aye. Then something about sacrificing piggies.
I didn’t even notice that was Milan until I read that!
Oh yeah, I guess you got to look out for the voodoo ceremony in New Orleans, too then.
Even took me a second or two!
What did you like, in particular, in The Alienist?
The whole setting and theme with the male child prostitution in New York at the turn of the century, which I hadn´t seen like this anywhere else.
Also the way it treats the subject and killer itelf which reminded me of Fritz Lang´s classic “M” a lot.
How it didn´t give any simple answers ála “that guy became a murderer because of a rough childhood”.
Some scenes of Hitcock like suspense like the part in the opera near the end.
Many “ooohhh noooo!” moments like when you find out the killer has intentionally distracted the protagonists and lead them on a false trail only to be doing his “business” again undisturbed.
Also the acting and the way it was filmed and the whole style in general of course.
All good points, still I wasn’t really impressed by the series.
The semi-documentaristic subplot about male child prostitution was great.
The only thing in which I really don’t agree with you is the psychological analysis of the killer, which in my opinion was -as always- quite superficial. When Hitchcock did it, he was a pioneer and he had to be quite didactic, since the audience wasn’t used to that. Today I find the psychological explanations of the criminal minds in fiction quite simplistic and superfluous.
Actually, I had the impression it tried to do exactly that.
Another aspect that sometimes bothered me is that more than once I found myself breaking my suspension of disbelief, and noticing things like “what a cheesy scenery… that film set looks so fake”.
And funny that you mention Hitchcock and the scene at the opera. That was another moment in which I lost my suspension. “Come on -I thought-. That’s farfetched! Who the director thinks to be? Hitchcock, maybe?”.
But here I’m purposely just focusing on the negative aspects. My overall rating is fairly good, as I wrote initially. I’d probably watch a second season, if there will be one.
The only aspect in which I thought it did that was how it made him look at the relationship with his own father. His take away on the nature vs nurture debate was basically:“Well if nurture doesn´t mean shit sometimes like in this case maybe I should stop blaming my own mistakes on my shitty father”. And that is the exact opposite of the usual approach I thought.
Really? I never had that even once.
I have nothing against Hitchcock wannabes if it turns out they do a good job in the end. I like my DePalma and Coen Brothers.
But I tried to explain myself enough, I leave the rest of the pro argument to @PiecesOfKate who also loved the show.
Well I just finished the fourth to last episode and I damn nearly clapped at that ending, I love this show so much! 
It’s obviously a matter of taste, but I really liked it.
On the point about cheesy scenery, I didn’t find any of the scenes broke my suspension of belief like it did for @Ema. I found the setting, scenery, costuming and general atmosphere believable, and subtle enough that it was complementary without trying to be the main focus. I liked the Victorian London feel.
I think style was the most appealing thing for me. I’ve not watched many crime-focused period dramas so it was quite fresh and different. I liked that the characters didn’t have the benefit of modern investigation tactics and were trying to figure all that out.
I liked the tension it built, especially the false lead Milan referred to where they go to the wrong apartment, and the bit near the end with the boys in the dingy public baths.
I guess Sara Howard’s feminism angle is a bit typical, but then they couldn’t have plonked a woman in it and just ignored what it would’ve been like.
For the most part I found it fairly unpredictable (though I take @Ema’s point on the opera scene, but I still enjoyed that bit) and not succumbing to clichés. It was refreshing that they didn’t throw in a massive twist or dramatic character death. At the end it just felt like they caught him, there was nothing Freudian about why he did it, some people just kill because they want to and that’s it.
I’m looking forward to another series, though I am wondering what they’ll do with it.
Since there are a few other books in the Kreizler series (and it seems like Caleb Carr is still writing them, there even seems to be a Sara Howard spin off planned!) the new one is said to be based on the book (and thus will be called) “The Angel Of Darkness”. But I will obviously refrain from looking too much into that, so not to spoil anything.
BTW: I´d also be really interested what an actual New Yorker like @yrface thinks about this show if he´s seen it at all.
Also some of the intros of a few recent shows make me wonder if there is an all around busy Saul Bass like intro designer around, because they all share a really distinct style.
The Alienist:
The Strain Seasons 3 and 4
The Terror
The Walking Dead may have been an influence
The Walking Dead
Still I see more of a common style among the first three somehow.
The interiors were great. I refer to a few scattered outdoor scenes: when dark, the immersion was perfect. In full light, sometimes I could exactly tell where the studio ended and the CGI background commenced. But maybe we’re just overthinking it, after all it was just an impression of instants. My fault!
Anyway something I liked about the scenery was the floor was full of horse crap! This adds much realism, compared to the cheap habit of simply covering the concrete of the set with a thick layer of sand and sawdust. Or even comparing to the even worse sets in which the cobblestone is shiny and polished as if it was new.
In this case, I suggest you to check out two series…
The first is “The Knick”, with Clive Owen, directed by Steven Soderbergh. Its setting is the very same New York of the Alienist, straddling XIX and XX century. It’s not a police crime story, though. More into noir and political crimes. And it has a very realistic medical section. All the surgery you see is a faithful description of real techniques.
The second is “Babylon Berlin”, crime story set in Berlin in the 20s-30s, and there’s a strong female co-protagonist as in the case of Sara Howard.
Agree.
No I do kinda know what you mean 
Yeah, totally. So many shows take shortcuts with that like you say.
That sounds good, especially when you mentioned Victorian surgery (I have quite a big interest in the history of medicine and… er… gore!) I don’t think it’s on Netflix though.
There’s another show on Netflix called The Physician which looks good.
)
That works shockingly well!