chicago_kab Reviews

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)

Who is laughing?

[1/10 · 15 January 2024]

Considered a dark comedy, this campy fare gave the anti-science crowd a reason to watch a Star Trek movie.

Where Wrath of Khan is considered the best of the movies, this is the most popular. No need to relate to an episode that first aired in the 1960s, the simple time travel mechanism gets rehashed.

Beware the rubric movie that ticks the boxes for the year it was made, it won't age well.

Does it make any sense that 23rd century scientists and linguists can't replicate whale sounds even though they can replicate actual food? Don't care!

Why wales? Go big or go home! The environment!

Is the late 20th century so obscure? Most people have a fairly good idea of what life was like 300 years ago and that's without computers that react to voice commands. I'm looking at you Scotty.

The science that makes Star Trek plots plausible and thought provoking are replaced with Druidic paganism and messages worthy of discussion only at the fourth grade level, most people already got the lesson before the title sequence.

Love Island: Episode #9.1 (2023) Season 9, Episode 1

Sharks are circling

[3/10 · 17 June 2023]

Is this the "jump the shark season"? If only that were true - maybe it already happened with Davide and Ekin-Su. They got their Joanie loves chachi program and now we're watching the replacement actors try and be the original cast.

The first group has zero personality, just traits that we've seen before.

Very young stage performer. Someone with a minor disability, but not impactful. Competitive gym rats. Conversations displaying lack of basic English vocabulary. Announcer trying to make a comedic theme about a contestant.

The contestants haven't shown any connections to each other and they don't seem to be having a good time. Everything is for the camera and get to the formula.

Producers should hire a new casting director to get people who gel, keep them together and create a cohort before bringing in a bunch of bombshells. The drama comes from caring about the contestants.

Murder in Aveyron (2014 TV Movie)

A little cliche

[6/10 · 9 June 2023]

The scenery is gorgeous.

There is a lot of dialogue and if you don't pay attention, you might lose the plot. For a series intending to feature the vistas of the French countryside, watching the subtitles is counterproductive.

The use of both surname and given name to identify characters is unhelpful. It would be easier to follow the narrative if they picked one name and stuck with it.

There are a lot of strange choices for what I can only imagine as time filler. Things that don't add to the plot or the subplots, but are there anyhow.

Maybe this is the quality when you are on a deadline and no one can work overtime?

I like murder mysteries and my wife will let me pick almost anything if it is in French so she can practice listening. Otherwise, probably would skip.

The Peripheral: The Doodad (2022) Season 1, Episode 7

Good action, bad storytelling

[3/10 · 1 May 2023]

This episode failed to adhere to the previous declaration of the tech. Whoops.

So angry haptic blacked out and killed a guy.

Threat appears and haptic doesn't react.

Uh. Continuity gap?

Major plot hole opens and the whole story falls into it. What a waste.

Chloe grace moretz still can't get past kickass which is a shame. She needs to fire her agent and take on a role that involves no stunts or fighting if she wants a career which apparently she does.

This show had potential but feels like a call of duty bro send up instead of something with poignancy.

Amazon seems to have thrown in the towel in regards to decent original content.

Shotgun Wedding (2022)

Not a romcom. Not an axiom. It's a Farse!

[8/10 · 12 February 2023]

This is a classic farse and if you go in watching it that way, you will have fun.

It's not romantic.

The action is sily.

The plot is silly.

Enjoy it for what it really is and not get upset for what it isn't.

A fast paced, joke-filled, ridiculous romp that laughs at itself and wants you to laugh along.

Making J-lo the star against a no name male lead is brilliant. Ryan reynolds could have started in this and blown it. Sorry for the stereotype, but how Canadian to know when to not be the star of your own movie and let a woman shine.

Making a movie about a woman on a second go-round at marriage and having someone older play the part? Omg, how was this movie even made?

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law (2022)

Messy and derivative

[2/10 · 10 December 2022]

Is it a superhero legal drama?

Is it a break the fourth wall comedy?

Is it a cameo laden zany satire?

This show can't figure itself out and lurches along like frankenstein's monster built by committee.

Some episodes have marvel tags after the credits. Others don't

Sometimes Jen is a down to earth lawyer with scruples.

Then she is a brilliant trial lawyer oppressed by the patriarchy.

Then she is a superficial, shallow, break any rule to get her way bore.

Then she is a hopeless incompetent with the executive functioning skills of a fifth grader.

Also, drunk gags haven't been funny in years.

Anything for a gag, but it's not funny.

Bosch: Legacy (2022– )

Poor writing and underwhelming direction

[4/10 · 6 December 2022]

The plot lines lack originality. Someone dumpster dove through the recycle bin.

Some examples that could have been fixed without even a rewrite:

Serial peeping Tom runs around in broad daylight dressed in black and a hood?

TO training is not rookie hazing, it's a grooming program to mold new cops to the force. Lazy writer thinking police force is the marines.

DNA for a legal matter needs to be collected at the lab or by a sworn officer.

So much paper. Modern policing uses electronic documentation.

Also, Acting is better than a soap opera, but not much. Lines are delivered WITH EMPHASIS.

Most of the cast has worked before including on the series, so it appears they are holding onto muscle memory, but they are more wooden.

Love Island (2015– )

Up and down but okay as background noise

[6/10 · 15 April 2022]

When it's good, it's a bit of fun.

When it is bad, it's really really bad.

Season 2 was nasty and glad the Spanish government forced some rules.

Season 4 was horrible with no dynamics, no passion and no love. Zero chemistry between couples. Zero chemistry with each other.

Britannia: The Return of the Chosen One (2021) Season 3, Episode 1

Backstory that makes no sense

[3/10 · 22 January 2022]

Why did they write in Hemple this way? So lazy and makes zero sense with seasons 1 & 2. Hate when writers shoe horn an actor in and now the entire series up to this point looks stupid and poorly acted. Do your job better.

Shepherd (2017 TV Movie)

Unbelievable

[2/10 · 12 August 2021]

Convoluted story with improbable scenarios and unspeakable violence.

Doesn't hold up from a believability perspective. The ridiculously short episodes have as much depth as the Sunday comics.

Homeland (2011–2020)

Incongruent plot

[6/10 · 24 June 2021]

Spies have sex to get intel and leverage. There is no reason to not use that as a cover. Huge plot hole.

The Nevers (2021–2023)

Agents of shield 2.0

[2/10 · 26 April 2021]

Another Whedon hot mess.

First, this isn't science fiction. Maybe SyFy, whatever that is. But it's an ensemble cast of superheroes set in the Victorian era. Do we really need Joss Whedon's meandering story arcs with ambiguous morality and unrelatable characters? Agents of shield was bad, redoing it in Victorian London won't fix it.

Farscape: A Constellation of Doubt (2003) Season 4, Episode 17

Fundamentally flawed

[1/10 · 1 February 2021]

Another episode that makes zero sense just to dig up the "documentary" trope.

The aliens don't speak English. A few had a weak vocabulary and spoke slowly when they tried.

How did Crighton get the final product when his nephew talks about the aliens in the past tense?

Why is Crighton wallowing in his misery? So out of character.

The expert interviews are clearly constructed by someone who did no research about expert interviews.

Basically a lot of filler to get to the next episode.

The Crown (2016–2023)

Speculative Fiction peddled as history

[5/10 · 21 January 2021]

Many of the events are based on real events, but timelines are off - sometimes making events that took place 3 years apart appear simultaneous and connected. Diana goes to NYC in Feb 1989 at the same time Thatcher resigns in Nov 1990 and we see Prince Harry is at a school for 8+ but was born in 1985. Everything is telegraphed and characters hatch fully formed rather than developed. We know Charles will divorce Diana, but we don't see his relationship with women transform from wanting to be with someone like his mother/sister to hiring the princess of Wales. It's all centered around Camilla even though in reality they had several periods apart. Princess Margaret is rolled out every decade with some caricature episode that fails to do her justice. The show does a great job with each decade, some of the actors look like spitting images of who they are playing. The one real acting failure is Anderson as Thatcher. Anderson is roughly the same age as Thatcher, but they aged her for some odd reason so 1979 Thatcher looks like 1992 Thatcher. She also speaks like she already has dementia.

Tales from the Loop (2020)

Same plot for every episode

[2/10 · 4 November 2020]

First, every episode has the exact same plot.

1 introduce characters with some kind of sadness 2 add some kind of magic (I hate to call it science fiction as most of the plot devices have zero connection to reality) 3 work through this new reality 4 characters end up being even worse than before.

Second, acting is awful. In some cases, it's like they are doing a read-thru of the script and calling it done.

This isn't science fiction, it's magical realism. There is little connection to the "loop" and most of the plots. There is no rhyme or reason for anything most of the time. There are strange artifacts that seem like from another era but not so old that no one should be discovering them.

It fails to make the loop important, unique, special.

Rock the Block (2019– )

Must have been scripted

[2/10 · 13 November 2019]

Everybody won "something"?

Every one of these women know how to add value - just watch their real shows where they always add square footage, bedrooms and bathrooms and consider the market. This felt canned by episode 2.

Notice how they never showed the original price and the new value? The rule of real estate is location and no one moved their house.