TV ROUND-UP

Just a quick post to comment on some recent TV.

Sunday: 

BEING HUMAN (UK): After a weak and focus-free start, the return of Herrick has made this show good again.  The only show on TV about Vampires worth watching.  Season Finale this Sunday!

OUTCASTS (UK): Boring and almost entirely imagination-free.  Good actors wasted on weak plots and at time, painful scripting.  Season Finale this Sunday.  Finally.

Monday:

BEING HUMAN (US): Not as bad as I was afraid it was going to be.  Each week makes me groan, but I watch and find myself moderately engaged and satisfied.  Kind of limp and bloodless compared to the original.

STARGATE: UNIVERSE: Finally back for its last 10 episodes.  Already canceled, but well worth watching.  The characters are good, if a little too grounded in the mundane.  What I wouldn't give for a show with a basic scenario like this, but with insanely free imagination guiding it.

Tuesday:

LIGHTS OUT: Just when they introduce a character I can finally get behind and enjoy (Romeo), they drop him.  Lights Out, you are killing me with your borderline entertainment value.  This is the show, right behind Being Human (US) that I am least interested in watching each week, but watch anyway, and get some enjoyment out of.  The end result here is a little better than with Being Human.

Wednesday:

SYM-BIONIC TITAN: Best cartoon on television right now.  Genndy can do no wrong in my book.  It's rated PG, so we actually get death and destruction with repercussions and moral implications.  Last week's look at the coup on their home planet was fantastic.

JUSTIFIED: Gets better and better each week.  Boyd Crowder may be the best character on television at the moment.  His only rival is Walter Bishop on Fringe.  Boyd's the best "bad guy" though.  He's starting to rival Lost's Benjamin Linus in my affections.

FACE-OFF: Season Finale this week!  I'm loving this Top Chef with Make-up Effects Artists show.  I really hope enough people are watching that we get more.  Also love that the craft drama involved in designing and implementing the make-up effects are more centrally focused than the personal drama between the contestants.  In the end, anyway.

Thursday:

THE OFFICE: Regardless of what people say, this show still makes me laugh out loud every single week.

PARKS & RECREATION: Only comedy on television that I would actually miss if it were canceled.  So much funnier than any of the other Thursday night line-up.  Most of that crap I can't even watch.

THE MENTALIST: Always entertaining, if not all that smart.  Still love the dynamic between the characters, and Patrick Jane is the most appealing and unapologetic atheist on television.

Friday:

SUPERNATURAL: Season Six is just as good as any prior season.  Glad they did it.  It's gone until April, when we'll get our final push toward the season finale, and it is going to be mightily missed.  Hopefully, they'll do another season.  Don't see why they wouldn't at this point.  It's all good and still firing on all cylinders.  The most entertaining show I watch.

FRINGE: Tied with Justified for best show on television, in my humble opinion.  With Supernatural coming in at a very tight 1.5.  Every week, no matter what reality we're focusing on, Fringe brings great casting together with entertaining scripts and imaginative plots to make me giddy.  Walter is great.  I'm really hoping they plan on keeping Jorge Garcia around as Walter's late-night pot-smoking buddy.

Saturday:

Nothing.  Finally.

MONDO MARVEL #31: OCTOBER 1964

Yes, Mondo Marvel is back for another round of jibber-jabber obsessed with early Sixties Marvel comics.  You know what you're getting into.  No get into it!

F.O.O.M. (Flashbacks of Ol' Marvel) #21: "Shelved - Fantastic Four (1994)"

I watched The Fantastic Four so you don't have to.  Roger Corman produced it in 1994 for 1.4 million after the original budget called for 40 million.  If that doesn't explain just about everything wrong with this film, I don't know what does.

WHAT LOOKS GOOD #347: SO MUCH FOR BALANCE!

I'm back with another What Looks Good column, and it's all TV, Movies, and Music this week.  Oh, and I do mention a couple of comics, briefly at the end.

BREAKING DOWN (an original screenplay)

Please take some time from your busy schedules to read and comment on this Horror script that I've entered into Amazon Studios' scriptwriting competition.  All comments and discussion would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

MONDO MARVEL #30: SEPTEMBER 1964

It's Mondo Marvel time again!

F.O.O.M. (Flashbacks of Ol' Marvel) #20: "We Are Both Tragedies - Captain America (1990)"

Wherein I go back and re-evaluate what is generally considered one of the worst Marvel movies ever.  Seriously, it's not that bad, when all is said and done.  Here's the link: F.O.O.M.

WHAT LOOKS GOOD #344: A SORT OF BALANCE?

And here's this week's What Looks Good column!  Enjoy!

WHAT LOOKS GOOD #341: BACK TO THE GRIND

Oops.  Forgot to post a link to this What Looks Good column from a couple of weeks ago.

Mondo Marvel #29 - Annuals 1964

Ring in the Holidays with me as Mondo Marvel #29 takes a look at Fantastic Four Annual #2 and The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1 over at Comics Bulletin!

Motörhead - (Don't Need) Religion

Happy Birthday, Lemmy!

MISFITS 2.07 Review

And with that, we say goodbye to our Misfits until next Fall sometime.  And from what I understand they're talking about extending the third season with more episodes and a variety of writers.

Which, I have to admit, I'm not very excited about.

On the one hand, I'd love to see more of our heroes, but on the other, it may spread the show out too thin.  It's impossible to tell at the moment, but I'm looking forward to the new season with a touch of hesitency.  Especially given how this season has wrapped.

But then again, maybe the way this season wrapped sets us up for a more extended approach next time.

We'll see, I guess.  But now, Spoiler Alert!

Film Review: BLACK DEATH (2010)

Black Death
Written by Dario Poloni
Directed by Christopher Smith

And our journey through the films of Christopher Smith comes to an end (for now), with his latest, Black Death.  This is a bit of a departure for Smith, as not only is it the first of his films that isn't straight horror, it's also the first time he's working from someone else's script.

As such, it doesn't demonstrate the leap in creative growth that we've seen through the course of his previous films (Creep (2004), Severance (2006), and Triangle (2009)), but it's still a sure-handed piece of work that lives up to its full potential.

For the uninitiated, Black Death is set during the late 14th Century during the height of the Bubonic Plague in England.  A young monk, Osmund (Eddie Redmayne) is struggling with his love of a young lady, Averill (Kimberley Nixon) and his duties to the monastery.  In order to save her from the spread of the disease, Osmund sends her away from the city, where she promises to wait for him in the nearby forest for a week.  If he doesn't decide to leave the monastery by then, he'll never see her again.

After praying for a sign from God to help him make his decision, Ulric (Sean Bean) arrives.  Ulric has been tasked with investigating a local village where it is rumored that the dead walk the earth and the plague has not struck, all thanks to the villagers' pact with the Devil.  As this village is very near where Averill is waiting, Osmund takes this as his sign and volunteers to lead Ulric and his motley band to the village.

Spoilers Ahead!

MISFITS 2.06 Review

When is a finale not a finale?

When there's an extra Christmas episode later in the week, that's when.

But technically, this is the Series Two finale, and we get the wrap-up of the major storylines of the previous five episodes.  Most of it is pretty entertaining, but I must confess to having narrative problems with the way everything comes together in the end.


Spoiler Shields Up!

MISFITS 2.05 Review

We're moving quickly toward the season finale (and the Christmas Bonus Episode!), and visions from Curtis' little jaunt to the future are starting to occur.  Last week's hanging from meathooks was the first event, and this week Simon becomes a man and we get to see what was actually happening up on the rooftop between Curtis and Nikki. 

Here's a hint, it's not superheroic at all, but is pretty graphic.  She wasn't kidding about not wanting to get cum on her dress.

And she's not the only one with that concern as this week; everyone is getting busy.  Ironically, except for Alisha.  Oh!  And except for Nathan.  Poor Nathan.  At least he gets murdered again.  What's all that about a connection between Death and Sex?  I don't think I'll ever get tired of watching Nathan get murdered over and over again.  Is that wrong?

But how was the episode, you ask?  Put your spoiler shields on to find out!

FRINGE 3.09 "Marionette" Review

Fringe
3.09 "Marionette"
Written by Alison Schapker & Monica Breen
Directed by Joe Chappelle

Say goodbye to Fringe for until January 21st, folks.  And when it returns, it's going to be on Friday nights.  You know, the Friday nights on FOX that signals the end of all things Sci-Fi on the damned channel.  Let's face it.  Nothing has survived Friday nights since The X-Files, and while one might argue that Fringe is the natural successor to that show, the ratings aren't great.  And if they're not great on Thursdays, what are they going to be like on Fridays?

Remember, Friday scheduling helped kill Firefly.  It helped kill The Sarah Conner Chronicles.  It helped kill Dollhouse.  Hell, just check out this: The Friday Night Death Slot.  While one might argue that Friday isn't instant death for a show, this is FOX we're talking about.  Look at those numbers.

Hopefully we'll at least get to see the rest of the season, but I have no hope for a fourth.  I mean, the first episode back on Friday the 21st is called "Firefly" for Pete's sake.

Anyway, back to this week's episode, "Marionette". 

Look!  Spoilers!

DEXTER 5.11 "Hop A Freighter" Review

Dexter 
Episode 5.11 "Hop a Freighter"



And here we are, one episode left in the season, and I'll be quite honest.  I have no idea what's going to happen next.

For those of you late to the party, Dexter (Michael C. Hall) is in love.  Sure, it's with supremely damaged Lumen (Julia Stiles), with whom he shares the urge to murder wrongdoers, but it's love nonetheless.  Last week we discovered that Jordan Chase (Jonny Lee Miller) was an alias and that his little group of rapists and thugs had been engaging in their funny games for years.  Maybe a decade or more.

And it all started this one time, at camp.

Dex and Lumen had tracked down the last of Chase's pals and, um, disposed of him, while Chase tried to set them up to be caught by Deb (Jennifer Carpenter) and Quinn (Desmond Harrington).  It was a near miss, but thanks to a stray footprint in the mud, Deb was able to start intuiting just what was going on.

Much to Dexter's dismay.

And oh yeah, Liddy's (Peter Weller) caught Dex and Lumen on tape, preparing for a kill.  Oops.

Spoiler Screens Up!

WHAT LOOKS GOOD #338: MULTIMEDIA POTPOURRI

I'm at the helm for this week's What Looks Good column over at Comics Bulletin, and there are lots of interesting things to see in comics, movies, and television this time around!

THE WALKING DEAD Episode 1.06 Review

The Walking Dead
Episode 1.06 "TS-19"
Written by Adam Fierro & Frank Darabont
Directed by Guy Ferland

And with that, we say goodbye to our cast of characters until sometime next year. 

And it's going to be a long year.  But not as long as it could have been, thanks to the convenient tying up of narrative lines that, if there had only been one season, would have been a nice, if bleak, open ending.  Instead, it serves as a way to start the Second Season with something of a clean slate. 

I'm a little surprised that the episode wrapped up as neatly as it did, to be honest.  And with nary a zombie in sight.

I was expecting some sort of crazy scientist twist, with Dr. Jenner (Noah Emmerich) deliberately infecting someone to continue his research into a cure, or something along those lines.  Instead we get something a little more believable, a little less melodramatic (in a pulpy way), and a little more disturbing.

Spoiler Shields On.

MISFITS 2.04 Review

Misfits, Episode 4, took a dark turn this week, but it wasn't entirely unexpected.  I'm going to assume that folks have had enough time to get caught up with last week's revelation about the identity of Super Hoodie?  Well, this week we get a little more exploration of his character, the dynamic between he and Alisha, and the roles these characters are going to be assuming as the series goes on.

Okay, that last bit is more speculation than anything, but I think there are clues already around that this episode kind of brought more into focus.

All that and a new member of the crew.  Sort of.  Two new members, really.  But really, kind of just one.

More on that below the break.  Spoilers Ahoy!