I normally watch the local morning news on the UHF channel so had the TV set to this station when I turned it back on after planting my garden until 8pm after work. This crap show was on. Is this for real? It has to be staged, who would go on a show like this for dating? As far as who is bad...all of them. Every single one of these women looked like lowlife strippers and christ what is up with the tattoos? Over half of the women are covered with them like a sailor. What is wrong with people these days, even if the show is fake, the tattoos on the actresses look real. They guys look like young actors as well, it's obviously all staged, any guy desperate enough to lower himself to such a farce if it were real would probably resemble Paul Giamatti in Sideways. I can't believe Americans are so low to consume this, hopefully the ratings are trash. This UHF station used to run some Canadian sitcom that was a knock off of the Wonder Years during this time slot that at least was clever at times. But this crap? Does the entertainment industry actually think the public is this degenerate they want this? What happened to the days when JFK wanted to better the culture? Seems Idiocracy came true.
Reviews
14 Reviews
Ax Men
(2008– )
A bunch of jerks cussing each other out.
7 January 2023
They are running this old series all day long on the local UHF rerun station. Wow are these guys ever a bunch of jerks, the way they disrespect each other and cus each other out. Is this staged or does this kind of conduct fly in this kind of dangerous work? Then the disregard for safety? There is always some jerk boss demanding some dude run around on top of slippery logs and jump on top of a still moving pile to undo the steel knot. Evidently speed is more important than safety. The worst is the way that old guy who fishes logs out of the river talks to his son. About the only guys who seem to act professional are the old bald guy with the missing hand who owns one of the companies and his son. Wonder if they encourage the cast to ham it up? This seems to be from the last days of cable era when all we got served up was reality TV on every channel, even those that formerly used to run more highbrow programing. Is it no wonder most people have cut the cord?
The series best episode was followed up by this big mistake?
4 September 2022
Warning: Spoilers
One of the best written, true to life aspects of the show so far had been the fundamental futility and painfulness of Odo's longing for a woman who could never return the favor. The episode where the changeling impersonated her in the cave and pretended to be dying by some growing rock consuming her while Odo struggled to free her was one of the best treatments of this topic. A real life dynamic as old as literature itself, unrequited love. This never works out by the way in real life so you want to keep reality in the show. Instead with this episode the writers must have felt The Fonz was approaching the shark and time to jump because having Kira and Odo become a couple was cringeworthy and also a very bad moral lesson for all the nerds who need the opposite message from popular culture to hopefully prevent some real world stalking fiascos.
Combine this with hobby horse Vegas Casino Lounge Singer Mafia type content that didn't belong on DS9 and the by now annoying over reliance on "holodeck" episodes that had worn out their welcome long ago by the middle of STNG seven year run and you knew the writers were just padding in material. If you don't like this one you'd better get ready because there are going to be a lot more of these bad holodeck episodes over the final year and a half and none of them are anything but cringeworthy.
Combine this with hobby horse Vegas Casino Lounge Singer Mafia type content that didn't belong on DS9 and the by now annoying over reliance on "holodeck" episodes that had worn out their welcome long ago by the middle of STNG seven year run and you knew the writers were just padding in material. If you don't like this one you'd better get ready because there are going to be a lot more of these bad holodeck episodes over the final year and a half and none of them are anything but cringeworthy.
The show has jumped the shark.
4 September 2022
Warning: Spoilers
I have re-watched most of DS9 on Netflix over the past decade with repeated viewings of some of the best episodes. However I had pretty much avoided season 7 since suffering through debut broadcasts in the late 90s and when this episode came on the rerun station at my moms house this weekend I knew exactly why. The show had simply jumped the Shark by then with silly plot-lines like Dukat leading a "Heaven's Gate" type cult, endless holodeck episodes, endless dumb "parallel universe" episodes, the Dukat becomes Bajoran and romances Kai Winn, the mousy little girl with a boy's hairdo they forced on us after refusing to renew Terry Farrell's contract, the nonsensical relationship between Odo and Kira when it was very clear it was a one way longing never to be consummated.
This has to be one of the worst episodes of all. Must be some of the screen writers own hobby horse interest in baseball or something, none of the cast really fit into this mess. Just a gratuitous attempt to force unnecessary silliness from the whole ensemble onto the show. Nor is it even believable that everyone would bother to be part of this dumb thing. The Quark we knew from the show would never walk out on his beloved business to goof off with this while the underlings embezzle the day's profit. Just dumb, if you were already sick with the endless out of place Vic Fontaine episodes, they found a way to make one even worse.
This has to be one of the worst episodes of all. Must be some of the screen writers own hobby horse interest in baseball or something, none of the cast really fit into this mess. Just a gratuitous attempt to force unnecessary silliness from the whole ensemble onto the show. Nor is it even believable that everyone would bother to be part of this dumb thing. The Quark we knew from the show would never walk out on his beloved business to goof off with this while the underlings embezzle the day's profit. Just dumb, if you were already sick with the endless out of place Vic Fontaine episodes, they found a way to make one even worse.
The Fourth Kind
(2009)
Horrible, Where are the aliens?
18 March 2010
Warning: Spoilers
I want my money back. Comcast had highlighted this movie as it's premiere coming attraction for this week's OnDemand HD movies. I didn't expect a great movie, but I expected to be entertained by some special effects footage of aliens. We don't even get a cheesy CGI abduction sequence, all this film gives us is a potpourri of home video quality scenes of bad actors acting scared.(Mila Jovovich hasn't aged well I may add) This film is so low budget it is on par with garbage like "Blair Witch" Now I don't believe in any of these so called alien abduction stories, never the less they make for great fictional horror stories and I loved Christopher Walken's Communion where we get some truly terrifying scenes in the middle of the night in his remote cabin. Fire in the Sky was fairly boring, but at least the final abduction sequence delivers when the aliens hold him down with space saran wrap and stick a needle into his eyeball. This film had none of that! You mean to tell me Mila has gone from A-level effects features like "Fifth Element" to this? How low budget was this that we don't even get to see the monsters? This felt like an overly long episode of "Outer Limits" rather than a movie. Even the audio effects are terrible with the aliens for some reason speaking in Babylonian(?) with the tape running at half speed sounding just like the cheesy scenes in the Star Trek episode "Lights of Zetar."
Had they shown us some effects the film also suffers from a second fatal flaw; some strange narration technique where the movie begins with the actors telling you they are actors just playing roles, allegedly interspersed by "real" footage. This is a horribly clumsy directorial technique that takes the audience right out of the cinematic experience, worse, the "real" footage is obviously fake as well. I've seen some of the National Geographic Channels "Alaskan State Troopers" and know what Nome Alaska looks like. This "Nome" is obviously another set in the Vancouver area...Capitol of the B Sci-Fi made for TV movie industry. Nome is on the flat, treeless Tundra; more of a distribution and administration point for all the Eskimo villages along the Bering Sea than a picturesque "Northern Lights" type town amidst the Douglas Firs. I've seen the construction of the buildings in Nome and never did I see anything remotely resembling the fancy middle class dwellings seen in this movie. Nome looks more like the McMurdo base in Antarctica than what we see here, trailers and single level plywood shacks built to conserve heat in the polar winters. Most of the areas around the Bering sea are also Dry and the FBI visits alluded to in the end involve bootleg liquor gangs and a high rate of violent crime due to rampant alcoholism amongst the natives, NOT alien abduction as the film implies. Stay away from this one, an insurance seminar would be a more pleasant way to spend your time than sitting through this.
Had they shown us some effects the film also suffers from a second fatal flaw; some strange narration technique where the movie begins with the actors telling you they are actors just playing roles, allegedly interspersed by "real" footage. This is a horribly clumsy directorial technique that takes the audience right out of the cinematic experience, worse, the "real" footage is obviously fake as well. I've seen some of the National Geographic Channels "Alaskan State Troopers" and know what Nome Alaska looks like. This "Nome" is obviously another set in the Vancouver area...Capitol of the B Sci-Fi made for TV movie industry. Nome is on the flat, treeless Tundra; more of a distribution and administration point for all the Eskimo villages along the Bering Sea than a picturesque "Northern Lights" type town amidst the Douglas Firs. I've seen the construction of the buildings in Nome and never did I see anything remotely resembling the fancy middle class dwellings seen in this movie. Nome looks more like the McMurdo base in Antarctica than what we see here, trailers and single level plywood shacks built to conserve heat in the polar winters. Most of the areas around the Bering sea are also Dry and the FBI visits alluded to in the end involve bootleg liquor gangs and a high rate of violent crime due to rampant alcoholism amongst the natives, NOT alien abduction as the film implies. Stay away from this one, an insurance seminar would be a more pleasant way to spend your time than sitting through this.
Somebody should have gotten fired for this Turkey.
16 January 2010
I remember this movie came out and vanished from the theaters shortly thereafter with little fanfare. It looked bad in the commercials but when it came out on video I thought "Well Connery is in it so might as well give it a try." Even though I hadn't expected much, my worst fears were confirmed the moment Captain Nemo started spinning around doing Karate moves. Oh my gosh, I thought to myself, is this ever bad. It only got worse and eventually I found myself laughing...not because the movie was any good but that someone in the industry actually had the audacity to put out something this bad. Not only that, but were expecting to milk a sequel out of this Turkey as well! Careers end over such train wrecks, and to think, Connery quit his Bond gig to do stuff like this? Who the heck at this studio has the job of filtering out bad scripts? Sirens should have been going off in their heads when they read the lines "And now masked henchmen burst into the library and Captain Nemo starts spinning around doing Judo chops on the villains." Somebody had to have gotten fired for approving MILLIONS OF DOLLARS to waste on such a dreadful concept. About the only positive thing to come out of this is that Hollywood seems to have finally given up on putting out "Steam Punk" genre movies.
Ratatouille
(2007)
Good movie but could have been better
30 December 2009
Warning: Spoilers
Ratatouille is a good entertaining movie in the Pixar tradition. The rich imagery of the copper pots and pans, the Paris skyline, and the food which looks so good you could taste it are all superbly animated. Along with an amusing ensemble of rats and an "evil" food critic who turns out surprisingly sympathetic at the end.
However my main complaint is a horrible, unlikable, moron of a main character who undergoes absolutely no character growth through the course of the film. The "slapstick" scenes of the mouse pulling his hair like a marionette are creepy rather than funny. SPOILER: When we find out the lead human is really the illegitimate son of the deceased master chef I had expected that the plot was going to lead to the mouse awakening some latent ability in him and having him mature into a great chef himself. But alas in the end he remains just the same bungling, inept moron that he begins with. This lack of character maturation and creepy, gross slapstick was a major flaw in the plot, I really wish the writers had taken a different direction. I also wish there was some other less disgusting way to have had the rat influence the cooking other than the "hair pulling" i.e. perhaps just talking to him, this is a cartoon after all. Then this could have been a 9 out of 10 film rather than the 7 of 10 I am giving it.
However my main complaint is a horrible, unlikable, moron of a main character who undergoes absolutely no character growth through the course of the film. The "slapstick" scenes of the mouse pulling his hair like a marionette are creepy rather than funny. SPOILER: When we find out the lead human is really the illegitimate son of the deceased master chef I had expected that the plot was going to lead to the mouse awakening some latent ability in him and having him mature into a great chef himself. But alas in the end he remains just the same bungling, inept moron that he begins with. This lack of character maturation and creepy, gross slapstick was a major flaw in the plot, I really wish the writers had taken a different direction. I also wish there was some other less disgusting way to have had the rat influence the cooking other than the "hair pulling" i.e. perhaps just talking to him, this is a cartoon after all. Then this could have been a 9 out of 10 film rather than the 7 of 10 I am giving it.
Star Trek
(2009)
The character of Captain Kirk reduced to a juvenile delinquent or 'Fast and Furious' redone with Starships.
8 May 2009
Warning: Spoilers
I was eagerly anticipating this release for the last few weeks and went to see it opening weekend. The first scene started out with a well done space battle but things immediately started to deteriorate when the battle turned out to be the birth scene of James T. Kirk, an unnecessarily overly dramatic writing of Kirk's birth. Things didn't improve when we next met the orphaned Kirk racing around Iowa and recklessly destroying his uncles antique Corvette. Very out of character for the command officer James T. Kirk we know from the series. As a matter of fact I doubt that those familiar with the series are the intended audience of this film as the aforementioned scene seemed merely and excuse to throw in a classic muscle car and a song by AC-DC.
Throughout the movie James Kirk behaves like a wild undisciplined punk nothing at all like anyone who would ever be able to function in a military environment. The writers took some character nuances of Kirk and totally overdid it. A good example of professional military officers who also like to joke around and enjoy the ladies is found in The Right Stuff. Yes they break the rules now and then but nowhere in that movie did you doubt the Mercury 7 were professional military officers responsible for advanced aerospace technology. Spock was right in his decision to throw Kirk off the ship after his near mutiny in time of war by a starfleet cadet. Most of the rest of the familiar crew members are caricatures of themselves delivering clichés of the shows dialog as if this is a Saturday Night Live skit. Bruce Greenwood was good as Captain Pike, but he got fairly little screen time. Zachary Quinto was OK as Spock, though he had to work through a few ridiculous love scenes with Uhuru thrown in senselessly by the writers.
Here we encounter another common movie-making flaw, Too Many Cooincidences. Turns out Kirk, Bones, Uhuru, all went to starfleet academy together. There is little indication on the show that the Enterprise bridge crew all had deep relationships with each other predating their assignment to the Enterprise, and such a situation would be highly unlikely in the real world. Kirk was known as being quite young for a captain, but he was always insinuated as being senior to his bridge crew with the exception of the Dr. and Chief Engineer.
But most egregious is once again another grandiose time travel plot, this time with a Romulan (well played by Eric Bana) coming back from the future to destroy the federation. The whole bit about Romulus being destroyed in a supernova is preposterous to anyone with an astronomical background as Stars that go supernova are too short lived to develop habitable planets, and they are also unstable for thousands of years before they go boom which would have caused anyone living nearby to have abandoned their planets as the star went red giant and threw off shell after shell of gas. There is way too much time travel in sci fi these days. In a comedy like Star Trek 4 it works because the movie is never too serious in tone, but time travel leaves too many logical conundrums to make good sci fi.(i.e why don't the Klingons just go back and destroy Earth in the past) Time travel is something that most probably is impossible.
Worst of all is the writers "re-imagining" Star Trek by destroying the Planet Vulcan in the new Star Trek universe. I had expected that Kirk and Spock would restore the time-line at the end, but no they let this travesty stand. The re-imagined Battlestar Gallactica was a much more thought out improvement over the original despite some annoying feminist overtones. This re-imagining was essentially 'Fast and Furious' redone with Starships. On the positive side the action and special effects are spectacular in this film, but aren't they in most all films these days. In summary if you are unfamiliar with the Star Trek franchise you will enjoy the fast paced action effects sequences which are quite enjoyable. But if you are a fan of the original you will detest the slaughtering of the characters.
Throughout the movie James Kirk behaves like a wild undisciplined punk nothing at all like anyone who would ever be able to function in a military environment. The writers took some character nuances of Kirk and totally overdid it. A good example of professional military officers who also like to joke around and enjoy the ladies is found in The Right Stuff. Yes they break the rules now and then but nowhere in that movie did you doubt the Mercury 7 were professional military officers responsible for advanced aerospace technology. Spock was right in his decision to throw Kirk off the ship after his near mutiny in time of war by a starfleet cadet. Most of the rest of the familiar crew members are caricatures of themselves delivering clichés of the shows dialog as if this is a Saturday Night Live skit. Bruce Greenwood was good as Captain Pike, but he got fairly little screen time. Zachary Quinto was OK as Spock, though he had to work through a few ridiculous love scenes with Uhuru thrown in senselessly by the writers.
Here we encounter another common movie-making flaw, Too Many Cooincidences. Turns out Kirk, Bones, Uhuru, all went to starfleet academy together. There is little indication on the show that the Enterprise bridge crew all had deep relationships with each other predating their assignment to the Enterprise, and such a situation would be highly unlikely in the real world. Kirk was known as being quite young for a captain, but he was always insinuated as being senior to his bridge crew with the exception of the Dr. and Chief Engineer.
But most egregious is once again another grandiose time travel plot, this time with a Romulan (well played by Eric Bana) coming back from the future to destroy the federation. The whole bit about Romulus being destroyed in a supernova is preposterous to anyone with an astronomical background as Stars that go supernova are too short lived to develop habitable planets, and they are also unstable for thousands of years before they go boom which would have caused anyone living nearby to have abandoned their planets as the star went red giant and threw off shell after shell of gas. There is way too much time travel in sci fi these days. In a comedy like Star Trek 4 it works because the movie is never too serious in tone, but time travel leaves too many logical conundrums to make good sci fi.(i.e why don't the Klingons just go back and destroy Earth in the past) Time travel is something that most probably is impossible.
Worst of all is the writers "re-imagining" Star Trek by destroying the Planet Vulcan in the new Star Trek universe. I had expected that Kirk and Spock would restore the time-line at the end, but no they let this travesty stand. The re-imagined Battlestar Gallactica was a much more thought out improvement over the original despite some annoying feminist overtones. This re-imagining was essentially 'Fast and Furious' redone with Starships. On the positive side the action and special effects are spectacular in this film, but aren't they in most all films these days. In summary if you are unfamiliar with the Star Trek franchise you will enjoy the fast paced action effects sequences which are quite enjoyable. But if you are a fan of the original you will detest the slaughtering of the characters.
Who on Earth thought that Creedence would make a good soundtrack to SG1?
2 May 2009
Warning: Spoilers
Now I'll admit I do enjoy this cheesy B grade sci-fi show, despite it's contrived happy endings and ridiculous character development. But the problem with this finale is that they take this production way too seriously culminating in a ridiculously bad, pretentious montage to a misplaced, overplayed classic rock song. This was such bad art it made me cringe to watch this sequence, and this music just totally didn't belong here. Clearly the writers and production staff are B grade too. We also got more typical bad makeup jobs of our main characters growing elderly in a time dilation field and putting on razzie worthy, tear jerking scenes of pretentious sentimentality. Thrown in is possibly the worst bit of dialog I've seen since the Star Wars Prequels where for some reason Daniel goes on a ridiculous rant rejecting Claudia Black's character's sexual advances towards him. Who on Earth wrote this scene? They have absolutely no understanding of what a man would do in such a situation. Daniel is supposed to be Nerdy, but Nerds aren't against sex, often it's all they think about (i.e Revenge of the Nerds.) Nerds are just socially awkward and don't know how approach women, often harboring secret fantasies of the woman being the aggressor.(i.e Crumb) When Daniel Jackson instead went to deliver an idiotic moralistic speech following Vala's come-on I was overwhelmed with shock just how bad this bit was and that the production staff previewed this yet still allowed it to air. You'll have to see this to believe it, one of the all time worst love scenes in the history of entertainment. Staggeringly bad it makes the dismal, contrived teen love affair in The Great Outdoors seem Oscar worthy in comparison. A truly disappointing finale to this series, the silly but fun "class reunion" episode a few weeks before would have made a better send off than this atrociously bad effort to produce "art".
X-Men Origins: Wolverine
(2009)
Entertaining, but the plot got a bit complicated and hard to follow at the end.
2 May 2009
Warning: Spoilers
Having no knowledge of X-men other than the movies, I can't comment on weather this accurately follows the comics or not. But I do enjoy this series of movies with the second being the best and the third a disaster. Both Jackman and Schrieber look amazingly built, one almost wonders whether Barry Bonds was sought for advise in achieving that look. Schreiber playing Wolverine's evil twin makes a slight attempt to put on a Canadian accent for the role as in this film we discover both were born in the Canadian far north over 150 years ago. However, after seeing Ice Road Truckers, I would expect the two brothers to have very thick Canadian accents based on their origins. In the movie we meet some early mutants led by a special forces commander on ruthless missions. When the goings become to merciless Wolverine quits to seemingly retire to a life as a lumberjack only to have his past come back to tear apart his seemingly blissful existence. We meet several new mutants and there are some great scenes shot in the French Quarter of New Orleans. Near the end there are several revelations which are hard to follow and the "plot" against Wolverine becomes somewhat overcomplicated. One problem I had was that in this film Stryker seemed to have access to science in the late 70's far more advanced than that of the X men in the movies set in the present. Also I seemed to anticipate some sort of entry of Magneto and how he founded his legion of evil mutants in this movie. Especially as I was sure for a moment that we were looking at Mystique in a scene near the end where Wolverine
SPOILER:
encountered his seemingly dead girlfriend at Strykers headquarters in 3 Mile Island. The film is good entertainment, however I wish they would follow this up with more X men film set in the present and forget about the idiotic decision by the writers to kill of Xavier and many of the key characters in the not very good third installment in the X men franchise.
SPOILER:
encountered his seemingly dead girlfriend at Strykers headquarters in 3 Mile Island. The film is good entertainment, however I wish they would follow this up with more X men film set in the present and forget about the idiotic decision by the writers to kill of Xavier and many of the key characters in the not very good third installment in the X men franchise.
Heroes
(II) (2006– )
Too good for TV
23 December 2008
Warning: Spoilers
This comment assumes you've already seen the series so if you haven't don't read on as it contains major spoilers for the show.
I do have to give the execs at NBC credit for taking a chance on this thing instead of giving us more phony reality shows, brain dead sit-coms, or the latest forensic crime lab clone. Similar to Twin Peaks, Heroes is more like a mini-series than a TV show and unfortunately that means if you don't start at the beginning, or miss more than an episode or two you will be lost. Such shows are great for the dedicated fan, but often have more success on DVD or syndication which hurts the first run advertising revenue which is the lifeblood of the network. I saw the first 2 seasons on DVD myself and have only seen 3 episodes of season 3 on TV due to my evening work schedule and am somewhat disappointed that unlike the Discovery Channel networks, NBC neither reruns this show at the wee hours of the morning nor offers it on Comcast's On-Demand menu.(Watching it live I was unaware just how LONG the commercial breaks were, but if that's what it takes to pay for quality TV so be it.)
Unlike Twin Peaks which basically ran out of anything meaningful to say once Laura Palmer's killer was revealed, Heroes has potential to carry on. One thing I did not like at all was the resurrection of the Sylar character for seasons 2 and 3. There's nothing I disdain more than a villain that cannot die, that's Jason or Freddy Kruger territory and this show is clearly in another league from such B movie fare. The first season's dispatching of Sylar by Hiro was a fitting end though I do agree that the fight was somewhat annotated and brief and I had expected a psychic showdown with Peter more reminiscent of that in Dark City between John Murdoch on the head Stranger. The writers did a decent job in making Sylar a despicable villain and I very much wanted to see him come to an end especially after butchering that cute little red headed waitress and robbing us of the future predicting painter, who despite his foul drug habit, had a fascinating power which was so integral to the style of the show. I also appreciated the character development of Clairs father who at first appeared to be a cliché bureaucratic villain, but in reality turned out to be both a good guy and a caring father. The actress who played the girl who could change her appearance was extremely hot, wonder why she didn't come back for season 2 before they killed off her Candice character.
Season 2 was cut short by the writers strike and as I said I was upset to see there was no closure with the Sylar villain. But I also thought the whole white guy in medieval Japan plot twist was stupid and contrived. After seeing the future Hiro appear to Peter on the subway early in season 1, I was disappointed to see little character growth in Hiro Nakamora in season 2 with him still playing the pathetic, nebbish office worker he was at the start of season 1. Watching him torture himself by setting up his love interest with Adam was pitiful to see. I had hoped that by dispatching Sylar in the season 1 finale Hiro would have become more like the confident, adult Hiro we saw glimpses of earlier. With multi-faceted characters like Adam, Parkmans dad, and Aurthur Petreli there is no need for the continued presence of the Sylar bogeyman, so hopefully his demise in last weeks episode is final.(Doubtful) The Scott Bakula look alike Petreli brother is also turning into quite a villain who is more complex in that he believes he's doing things for the greater good to justify his innate alpha power hunger.
On the whole though, with it's haunting music and stylish imagery and underplaying what could be a cheesy, superhero cliché with lycra jumpsuits and capes, Heroes is probably the best show in it's sci-fi fantasy genre since the new Battlestar Gallactica.
I do have to give the execs at NBC credit for taking a chance on this thing instead of giving us more phony reality shows, brain dead sit-coms, or the latest forensic crime lab clone. Similar to Twin Peaks, Heroes is more like a mini-series than a TV show and unfortunately that means if you don't start at the beginning, or miss more than an episode or two you will be lost. Such shows are great for the dedicated fan, but often have more success on DVD or syndication which hurts the first run advertising revenue which is the lifeblood of the network. I saw the first 2 seasons on DVD myself and have only seen 3 episodes of season 3 on TV due to my evening work schedule and am somewhat disappointed that unlike the Discovery Channel networks, NBC neither reruns this show at the wee hours of the morning nor offers it on Comcast's On-Demand menu.(Watching it live I was unaware just how LONG the commercial breaks were, but if that's what it takes to pay for quality TV so be it.)
Unlike Twin Peaks which basically ran out of anything meaningful to say once Laura Palmer's killer was revealed, Heroes has potential to carry on. One thing I did not like at all was the resurrection of the Sylar character for seasons 2 and 3. There's nothing I disdain more than a villain that cannot die, that's Jason or Freddy Kruger territory and this show is clearly in another league from such B movie fare. The first season's dispatching of Sylar by Hiro was a fitting end though I do agree that the fight was somewhat annotated and brief and I had expected a psychic showdown with Peter more reminiscent of that in Dark City between John Murdoch on the head Stranger. The writers did a decent job in making Sylar a despicable villain and I very much wanted to see him come to an end especially after butchering that cute little red headed waitress and robbing us of the future predicting painter, who despite his foul drug habit, had a fascinating power which was so integral to the style of the show. I also appreciated the character development of Clairs father who at first appeared to be a cliché bureaucratic villain, but in reality turned out to be both a good guy and a caring father. The actress who played the girl who could change her appearance was extremely hot, wonder why she didn't come back for season 2 before they killed off her Candice character.
Season 2 was cut short by the writers strike and as I said I was upset to see there was no closure with the Sylar villain. But I also thought the whole white guy in medieval Japan plot twist was stupid and contrived. After seeing the future Hiro appear to Peter on the subway early in season 1, I was disappointed to see little character growth in Hiro Nakamora in season 2 with him still playing the pathetic, nebbish office worker he was at the start of season 1. Watching him torture himself by setting up his love interest with Adam was pitiful to see. I had hoped that by dispatching Sylar in the season 1 finale Hiro would have become more like the confident, adult Hiro we saw glimpses of earlier. With multi-faceted characters like Adam, Parkmans dad, and Aurthur Petreli there is no need for the continued presence of the Sylar bogeyman, so hopefully his demise in last weeks episode is final.(Doubtful) The Scott Bakula look alike Petreli brother is also turning into quite a villain who is more complex in that he believes he's doing things for the greater good to justify his innate alpha power hunger.
On the whole though, with it's haunting music and stylish imagery and underplaying what could be a cheesy, superhero cliché with lycra jumpsuits and capes, Heroes is probably the best show in it's sci-fi fantasy genre since the new Battlestar Gallactica.
Iron Man
(2008)
What a disappointment.
19 December 2008
Warning: Spoilers
Spoilers: Now I have to tell you up front, I had never heard of the Ironman character until this movie came out. But the word everywhere was that this was one of the best superhero movies to date so not being a theater goer, I eagerly anticipated it's release on DVD. What I saw was horrible. Yes there were some cool scenes of him flying around in the suit, most of which I had already seen on Ebert & Roper. I'll admit, this concept had potential, but the plot was horrendous.
First of all, I for one, am truly sick to death of hearing about Bush's wars in the middle east and setting most of the movie in Afganistan was a horrible idea. I go to such fantasy movies to escape reality, not be reminded of national tragedy. Besides in superhero movies the villains are supposed to be larger than life. This is about as cheesy as the old comics from the 40's showing Superman fighting Tojo, etc. Setting this in Afganistan very much dates this movie and as current events subside, this movie will become unwatchable in a generation. Imagine if Tim Burton's Batman was about not Batman confronting the Joker, but Batman taking on Manuel Norriega, the victim of the regimes propaganda machine at the time. No one would watch it today, fortunately Tim Burton knew better than to give us such trash.
Another thing that didn't work for me was the flipping back and forth in time. This is confusing, even in a show I like such as NBC's HEROES. I'm not too fond of this technique and wish it were kept to an absolute minimum. And where it works is where the jump is a foreshadow of the very ending like Lawrence of Arabia, or Fight Club. This movie started out with a random scene from the middle of the movie. The chronological storytelling in Spiderman would have been much better here, especially as Ironman isn't as well known to the public as the Superman, Spiderman, or Batman characters.
But the most truly dreadful scene that caused this movie to jump the shark in my opinion was were he invented the Ironman suit as a hostage in a cave. This was so utterly ridiculous, the most sophisticated technology yet created by man in a medieval lockup. The creation of the second suit in the lab I could see, and I wish that point is where this movie began and they rewrote the whole script without the Islamic terrorist crap. On the bright side I did like Robert Downey Jr's work in here and also though Jeff Bridges did a decent job with his new creepy look. But all in all this was a waste of a DVD rental fee and I now have little faith in the taste of all these teenage video game nerds.
First of all, I for one, am truly sick to death of hearing about Bush's wars in the middle east and setting most of the movie in Afganistan was a horrible idea. I go to such fantasy movies to escape reality, not be reminded of national tragedy. Besides in superhero movies the villains are supposed to be larger than life. This is about as cheesy as the old comics from the 40's showing Superman fighting Tojo, etc. Setting this in Afganistan very much dates this movie and as current events subside, this movie will become unwatchable in a generation. Imagine if Tim Burton's Batman was about not Batman confronting the Joker, but Batman taking on Manuel Norriega, the victim of the regimes propaganda machine at the time. No one would watch it today, fortunately Tim Burton knew better than to give us such trash.
Another thing that didn't work for me was the flipping back and forth in time. This is confusing, even in a show I like such as NBC's HEROES. I'm not too fond of this technique and wish it were kept to an absolute minimum. And where it works is where the jump is a foreshadow of the very ending like Lawrence of Arabia, or Fight Club. This movie started out with a random scene from the middle of the movie. The chronological storytelling in Spiderman would have been much better here, especially as Ironman isn't as well known to the public as the Superman, Spiderman, or Batman characters.
But the most truly dreadful scene that caused this movie to jump the shark in my opinion was were he invented the Ironman suit as a hostage in a cave. This was so utterly ridiculous, the most sophisticated technology yet created by man in a medieval lockup. The creation of the second suit in the lab I could see, and I wish that point is where this movie began and they rewrote the whole script without the Islamic terrorist crap. On the bright side I did like Robert Downey Jr's work in here and also though Jeff Bridges did a decent job with his new creepy look. But all in all this was a waste of a DVD rental fee and I now have little faith in the taste of all these teenage video game nerds.
The Dark Knight
(2008)
The cinematic equivalent to a run-on sentence.
17 December 2008
Warning: Spoilers
Spoilers: I am trying to figure out if I saw the same movie all these teenage boys are coming on here and claiming to be the best movie ever. Back in grade school when I was learning to write there was a concept called a run-on sentence. This was including too many ideas in one long un-punctuated line. This is essentially what the filmmakers gave us with Dark Knight. This film is in MAJOR need of an editor.
First off all, there are way too many plots and subplots going on. Both the Joker and the Two Face story lines should have been treated as separate movies. Watching this movie I felt myself to be bored and was constantly looking at my watch. At over two and a half hours, this film was way too long. Compare this to a fast paced, entertaining well edited film like Plains, Trains, and Automobiles and you see how longer doesn't mean better. There were at least 3 incidents with the joker that I thought was the conclusion to the movie only to have it drag on for another long anti-climatic showdown.
Secondly, I had never really thought of Michael Keaton as Batman, but after seeing Christian Bale's portrayal, Keaton is looking better and better every day. Unlike Keaton, or even Val Kilmer, Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne is an extremely unlikeable character. A total jerk I felt little sympathy for unlike the affable Bruce Wayne Keaton gave us in the scene where Vicky Vale is looking at his collection of Samuri outfits. Batman Begins has a stupid beginning and an utterly idiotic ending, but at least the middle portion of that movie was entertaining. The Dark Knight was a complete bore.
Another thing is that Ledger's Joker character came off more like the psycho loner from the original Dirty Harry film than the charismatic villain from the comics. And in this supposedly "realistic" interpretation of the Batman concept, the Jokers henchmen came across as the worst from the 60's TV show.
All in all this movie was a disappointment, a real boring mess.
First off all, there are way too many plots and subplots going on. Both the Joker and the Two Face story lines should have been treated as separate movies. Watching this movie I felt myself to be bored and was constantly looking at my watch. At over two and a half hours, this film was way too long. Compare this to a fast paced, entertaining well edited film like Plains, Trains, and Automobiles and you see how longer doesn't mean better. There were at least 3 incidents with the joker that I thought was the conclusion to the movie only to have it drag on for another long anti-climatic showdown.
Secondly, I had never really thought of Michael Keaton as Batman, but after seeing Christian Bale's portrayal, Keaton is looking better and better every day. Unlike Keaton, or even Val Kilmer, Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne is an extremely unlikeable character. A total jerk I felt little sympathy for unlike the affable Bruce Wayne Keaton gave us in the scene where Vicky Vale is looking at his collection of Samuri outfits. Batman Begins has a stupid beginning and an utterly idiotic ending, but at least the middle portion of that movie was entertaining. The Dark Knight was a complete bore.
Another thing is that Ledger's Joker character came off more like the psycho loner from the original Dirty Harry film than the charismatic villain from the comics. And in this supposedly "realistic" interpretation of the Batman concept, the Jokers henchmen came across as the worst from the 60's TV show.
All in all this movie was a disappointment, a real boring mess.
Uhhgg!
6 September 2008
Warning: Spoilers
Spoilers: I remember looking so forward to this as a kid after loving the first two movies. They had previews for new characters on the back of the action figures boxes I'd get at Toys-R-Us and I'd eagerly wonder what the blacked out Ewok characters would look like. Must have really been something special! I even remember how they switched the name around as "Revenge of the Jedi." This was just going to be THE movie of the summer, and waiting in line to get in while hearing the thunderous noise of the climactic battle as the audience of the screening just wrapping up applauded enthusiastically, I was just SO excited. When I saw it even as a kid I knew it was somewhat of a disappointment, watching it now as an adult...Uhgg! Now I see how Lucas went so wrong with the abomination of the prequels, all the threads started to unravel with this Turkey. (Though Return of the Jedi is still much superior to those aforementioned prequels which had a plot harder to follow than Dune.) First of all are notoriously unbearable Ewoks, even as a kid I HATED them. No adult could possibly find anything watchable about the whole Ewok sequence on Endor. The Emperor is ridiculously "comic book" evil, tyrants usually have charisma and are more like gangsters than lunatics. The choice to add another family revelation by making Leah Luke's sister is stupid and ruins the relationship from the first two movies. The original Cantina scene with the various aliens was creative, here Lucas has gone overboard with a new bizarre rubber masked actor or puppet cropping up every minute. In some respects this whole thing is nothing more than a commercial to sell action figures to eight year olds. And the Climax: Another Deathstar? Lucas, you already did that before, but considering the fecal ideas he spewed out in the prequels, perhaps a rehashing of the end of the first movie was the best we could hope for. After all, to sum up the cinematic ideas going through Lucas' head during this period: Howard the Duck. Don't even get me started on the vandalism Lucas did to the Original Trilogy with the CGI additions to the new copys of the Star Wars movies for sale. The original 1977 print is a piece of American History, to alter the imagery that swept the nation that summer is akin to someone painting over the Mona Lisa.
Still Return of the Jedi it did have it's moments. The Jabba the Hut character is ubiquitously reknown and to this day everyone knows what your talking about if you refer to any gluttonous tard as "Jabba the Hut." The chase scene through the Redwoods is also quite memorable although the excitement came to a quick end with the ridiculously infantile Ewok scenes beginning moments later. The final showdown between Luke and Vader was also a glimpse of what this movie could have been had the same people who worked on The Empire Strikes Back had control over this thing. On the whole, a disappointing, childish end to the first two movies.
Still Return of the Jedi it did have it's moments. The Jabba the Hut character is ubiquitously reknown and to this day everyone knows what your talking about if you refer to any gluttonous tard as "Jabba the Hut." The chase scene through the Redwoods is also quite memorable although the excitement came to a quick end with the ridiculously infantile Ewok scenes beginning moments later. The final showdown between Luke and Vader was also a glimpse of what this movie could have been had the same people who worked on The Empire Strikes Back had control over this thing. On the whole, a disappointing, childish end to the first two movies.
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