I couldn't get to the end of...

[Tiplodocus]

So what have you started reading/watching/listening fully intending to enjoy but never actually made it to the end of... (not stuff that you haven't seen or have no intention of seeing)

Books
ON THE ROAD - Jack Kerouack. "Then we went here and did this. Then we went there. Then we went back here." Yawn.
 
BLEAK HOUSE - Charles Dickens. "And then the key witness sponataneoulsy combusted".  Even a coincidence too far for Dickens.

Film
FROM HELL - I've tried three times now. First time, I stopped at the first scene of Aberline doing drugs and second time it was him having visions (or was it the other way round)
ULTRA VIOLET - Started watching last night with the full intention of lots Mila goodness but just couldn't watch...

Television
HEROES - No, lost it in Season 2.
V (the new one) - Didn't grab me after three episodes.

[Wils]

Book-wise, I didn't get very far at all into The Eiger Sanction, which I enjoyed the Eastwood film of, mainly due to its god awful writing. I'm all for cheesy 70s books (I've all but one of the Shaft books), but I draw the line at vomit-inducing stuff like this (which is paraphrased, but basically how it is).

[Female Special Agent] Dr Hemlock, I'm Special Agent (Whatever her name is). I've been assigned to overlook things.

[Hemlock] Yes. I can tell that you will be good.

[Female Special Agent] At my job? I like to think so.

[Hemlock] No. When we make love.

Cue Special Agent getting angry at his comment then immediately doing an about-face and stepping out of her knickers.

[mygrimmbrother]

Films - The Nightmare Before Christmas and Chinatown - fall asleep everytime, without fail. They both have a very strange soporific effect on me. Blood Simple used to do the same, but I made it through in the end. It's not even that I dislike any of the above - I'm generally a fan of Tim Burton/stop-motion animation, Jack Nicholson/Polanski/noir and The Coen Brothers. Strange. Like white noise ot something, they just knock me out.

Films I've walked out of the cinema or switched off at home - Transformers (walked out when Bumblebee 'urinated' all over John Turturro), Charlie and the Chocolate factory (just to contradict what I said above), Once (utter garbage), Into the Wild (can't relate to this portrayal of rich american kid burning money then setting off in to the wilderness only to die stupidly on a bus) and Resident Evil: Apocalypse (turned it off after 20 minutes - just terrible).

Books - The Two Towers & American Gods.

TV - yep, Heroes.

[Keef Monkey]

ULTRA VIOLET - Started watching last night with the full intention of lots Mila goodness but just couldn't watch...

I've made it to the end once upon a time, but tried to give it a rewatch last night too! I adore Milla, she's top of The List for me, and she does look incredible in the movie BUT I still can't watch it. It's truly atrocious, an absolute mess. We were talking last night about how it feels like the 4th in a franchise, it's so laden with backstory and recappery. I can't quite fathom just how much of a dogs dinner it is. I think it's the guy who made Equilibrium, which I know isn't exactly a masterpiece but I did like that movie a lot so looked forward to this. Rotten.

[TordelBack]

BLEAK HOUSE - Charles Dickens. "And then the key witness sponataneoulsy combusted".  Even a coincidence too far for Dickens.

But that's the best bit! 

[Professor Bear]

TV: Supernatural - gave up a couple of episodes into the current series.  Utterly tiresome television.
Heroes - about four or five episodes into the last series I stopped watching.  Awful.
Farscape - the one with the team winning a legal argument on a technologically advanced planet of lawyers by setting a stick on fire with lasers like in a fairytale and the lawyers get scared and drop the charges.
Law and Order: Los Angeles - the episode where a woman gets her just desserts for being an adulteress by having her kids burned to death in a drug fire caused by a blonde blue-eyed muslim terrorist lady who only wants to be loved by a man, a man who uses the freedoms America gives him to run it down.  I know this is coming from me, but the writers of this show really need to get out more.  Maybe feed the ducks, speak to a non-white person now and then - it'll do them good.

[locustsofdeath!]

Books:

Dunction Wood: I like the story, but the writing is soooooo bad and the language dull. Still, I'm about three quarters of the way through and pick it up now and then - because I'm determined to finish it. So maybe next year this won't apply anymore.

The Bible: Oh, I've read the end. And the beginning. After the Old Testament, God becomes a wuss- and frankly, boring. So I skipped all that New Testament nonsense and got to Revelations, the good stuff. Sadly, I will probably never finish the Bible.

Movies:

Walked out of Transformers as well. Fell asleep during Where the Wild Things are.

Television:

I haven't got much use for television. Struggled through The Walking Dead, but made it through all SIX tedious episodes. I do like the new V series, but apparently I'm in the vast minority.

[Albion]

Books
ON THE ROAD - Jack Kerouack.

Same here.

[SmallBlueThing]

Most recently: Rama II by arthur clarke and gentry lee. A horrible, boring, rerun of the first book but with all the fun and wonder taken out. Just about the worst sequel ive ever experienced.

more generally, the first lord of the rings. I actually threw this one actoss the room, kicked it about, and put it in the bin rather than risk anyone seeing it on one of my shelves.

Films: the godfather, the second lord of the rings film, wolf creek (godawful, amateur cack). I walked out of gladiator in the cinema when the tigers appeared, to get to an appointment, and have never been interested enough to revisit, and recently turned off the zombie chronicles after three quarters of an hour, after deciding a quid was too much to pay for someone's home movies.

I tried the new V, gave up after two. Ditto true blood, and outcasts after one. The sarah jane adventures i lasted as far as one story of series two, before my desire to slap the entire cast, and everyone involved, grew too strong.

SBT

[radiator]

Observe and Report - I find watching an unfunny comedy excruciating, especially if you're watching with a group, and doubly so if you're the one who recommended it. I had to switch Observe and Report off after twenty minutes it was making me cringe so much. I'd been informed it was an underrated and misunderstood satirical black comedy - it's none of those things.

The Scott Pilgrim graphic novels - borrowed the first two from the library and returned them before finishing book two. Would probably think they were great if I were 15 years old and had never seen the likes of Spaced do the same sort of thing but infinitely better.

Alan Moore's A Small Killing - tried to read it a few times, and never managed to get to the end. I think the biggest stumbling block for me was the ugly, garish and dated artwork.

Robo-Hunter - bought the Droid Files 01, which promptly went on eBay, unfinished. Much as I love Wagner, Grant and Gibson, this series just isn't my cup of tea.

Aliens Vs Predator: Race War - I remember paying the best part of £20 for this about ten years ago, and being unable to slog through it. Turgid, incoherent, pretentious nonsense that bore little resemblance to either of it's source properties.

Heroes and Lost I had enough of after the first series of each.

By far the thing I tend to abandon before the finish line is games, especially long-winded RPGs and the like - I get really addicted to them, spend every waking hour playing them, then very suddenly lose interest right before the last dungeon/boss and never play them again. I've done this with several of the Final Fantasy and Zelda series. I think it's because I enjoy the journey more than reaching the destination.

[radiator]

Aliens Vs Predator: Race War - I remember paying the best part of £20 for this about ten years ago, and being unable to slog through it. Turgid, incoherent, pretentious nonsense that bore little resemblance to either of it's source properties.

Actually a quick check on Amazon confirms that it was called Deadliest of the Species and was written by Chris Claremont.

[Proudhuff]

Tips' stand up  

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

What about stuff that's meant to be good rather than accepted rubbish? On this list:-

Catch 22.

Apocalypse Now.

Braveheart (We might be Scottish, but the wife and I wanted to leave after the first hour. We sat through the next hour using the logic: "Everyone says it's great. It must get better." It didn't.)

Dead Space Same old meh. I'm going to try again soon as the sequel gets good reviews.

All Superman stuff (apart from Superman 2). Dullest hero ever? Seriously, where's the drama in an all powerful immortal do-gooder?

[davethomson]

I have never made it to the end of any Shakespeare work. Not even in English class at school. Even our teacher got bored of getting us through King Lear so he cracked out an old film adaption. We didn't make it to the end of that either, the teacher fell asleep and the class quietly buggered off.

[radiator]

Apocalypse Now.

Me too! Never managed to watch it all the way through - a boring and meandering mess of a film.