Author: Andrew Wickliffe
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Will Eisner (editor, script, pencils, inks) Joe Kubert (colors) Zoltan Szenics (letters) The Spirit ends his first adventure leaving three burning questions unanswered. First, why is he remaining officially dead—we’ll loop back—second, why doesn’t he think everyone will recognize his blue suit, and, third, how does he have those little tombstone calling cards carved already.…
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Gilda (1946) D: Charles Vidor. S: Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, George Macready, Joseph Calleia, Steven Geray, Joe Sawyer, Gerald Mohr. Too long, impressively moody noir does well on an obviously limited budget. Ford’s a gambler down on his luck in Argentina, Macready’s a megalomaniac looking for a pal, Hayworth’s the dame who drives them both…
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Doctor Who (2024) s02e06 “The Interstellar Song Contest” [2025] D: Ben A. Williams. S: Ncuti Gatwa, Varada Sethu, Anita Dobson, Freddie Fox, Miriam-Teak Lee, Kadiff Kirwan, Charlie Condou. Excellent, Eurovision almost tie-in (Gatwa was going to host for BBC but didn’t) has an unrecognizable Fox taking over the intergalactic version of the concert. Good thing…
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Doctor Who (2024) s02e04 “Lucky Day” [2025] D: Peter Hoar. S: Ncuti Gatwa, Varada Sethu, Millie Gibson. On hiatus companion Gibson returns for a feature, all about her romance with alien enthusiast podcaster Jonah Hauer-King. Gatwa and Sethu get a little (Sethu less), and if it weren’t for the many big twists, it might feel…
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Faster (2010) D: George Tillman Jr.. S: Dwayne Johnson, Billy Bob Thornton, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Maggie Grace, Carla Gugino, Tom Berenger, Matt Gerald. Depressingly (because director Tillman just cannot hack it) bad car action picture about the Rock hunting down those who wronged him before he went to prison. Thornton is the cop on his trail,…
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Daredevil: Born Again (2025) s01e09 “Straight to Hell” D: Aaron Moorhead. S: Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio, Michael Gandolfini, Ayelet Zurer, Wilson Bethel, Deborah Ann Woll, Jon Bernthal. Smart, savvy season finale brings Woll back–presumably to be a regular–to give Cox a pal since he may be surrounded by (problematically?) female Judases. Most of the episode’s…
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Anora (2024) D: Sean Baker. S: Mikey Madison, Mark Eydelshteyn, Yura Borisov, Karren Karagulian, Vache Tovmasyan, Luna Sofía Miranda, Lindsey Normington. Good but overlong story of stripper Madison and son-of-a-Russian-oligarch Eydelshteyn going from a professional arrangement to a quickie wedding. Except then his family finds out. The “courtship”’s way too long (with shockingly little character…
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Today, a full month later than I’d hoped but a couple weeks before I feared, I’m dropping The Comix Section #1, an e-zine of comic book criticism. If you have a good color printer, lots of ink, legal-sized paper, and a powerful stapler, it can also be a paper zine. It was meant to be…
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Daredevil: Born Again (2025) s01e06 “Excessive Force” D: David Boyd. S: Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio, Margarita Levieva, Nikki M. James, Clark Johnson, Michael Gandolfini, Ayelet Zurer. Another strong episode implies we’re definitely after the creative team change (and their reworking of shot material). D’Onofrio’s got professional troubles, both as a crime boss and the mayor,…
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Daredevil: Born Again (2025) s01e03 “The Hollow of His Hand” D: Michael Cuesta. S: Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio, Margarita Levieva, Nikki M. James, Clark Johnson, Michael Gandolfini, Ayelet Zurer. Outstanding episode gets away with very little follow-up to last episode’s semi-cliffhanger. Cox is going to trial on Kamar de los Reyes’s case; he has a…
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Monster from the Ocean Floor’s a low-budget creature feature; tourist Anne Kimbell becomes convinced there’s an irradiated sea monster off the coast of her Mexican vacation village. Her pseudo-beau, Stuart Wade, is convinced she’s wrong. He’s a marine biologist. His boss, played by Dick Pinner in an (eventually) absolutely delightful turn, thinks Wade ought to…
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Daredevil: Born Again (2025) s01e01 “Episode 1” D: Aaron Moorhead. S: Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio, Margarita Levieva, Nikki M. James, Clark Johnson, Michael Gandolfini, Ayelet Zurer. After making some big cast changes and punting some other decisions down the line, the show gets going with D’Onofrio returning to New York to run for mayor. A…
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The 39 Steps (1935) D: Alfred Hitchcock. S: Robert Donat, Madeleine Carroll, Lucie Mannheim. Early Hitchcock spy thriller has a good first half as average man-in-a-plot Donat flees London for Scotland, complete with good chemistry opposite spy Mannheim. Then Carroll comes in as the actual love interest, and the film stumbles and the pacing never…
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The Asphalt Jungle (1950) D: John Huston. S: Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Sam Jaffe, Jean Hagen, James Whitmore, John McIntire, Marc Lawrence. Beautifully directed look at a caper unfolding, with newly paroled planner Jaffe trying to put a team together. Hayden’s the ostensible protagonist but not really. Strongest performances are Jaffe, Whitmore, and Lawrence. The…
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Agatha All Along (2024) s01e05 “Darkest Hour / Wake Thy Power” D: Rachel Goldberg. S: Kathryn Hahn, Joe Locke, Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn, Debra Jo Rupp, Patti LuPone, Aubrey Plaza. The episode does a big death and a couple twist reveals, but it’s a tad slight. The gang gets to Hahn’s trial and the show…
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Bridge of Spies (2015) D: Steven Spielberg. S: Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance, Amy Ryan, Alan Alda, Sebastian Koch, Austin Stowell, Billy Magnussen. Milquetoast, profoundly problematically jingoistic “thriller” about successful attorney Hanks defending an accused Soviet spy (Rylance). The storytelling (despite a Coen Brothers rewrite) is hackneyed and bland. It’s visually bland, too; all super high…
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The Rig (2023) s02e01 “Episode 1” [2025] D: John Strickland. S: Emily Hampshire, Iain Glen, Martin Compston, Rochenda Sandall, Owen Teale, Abraham Popoola, Nikhil Parmar. Last season’s cliffhanger resolves real quick when it turns out they’re just on another RIG. By the end of the episode, Hampshire and Glen are commanding another undersea mission (anyone…
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Doctor Who (2024) s00e05 “Joy to the World” D: Alex Pillai. S: Ncuti Gatwa, Nicola Coughlan, Jonathan Aris, Joel Fry, Peter Benedict, Julia Watson. Ultimately disappointing Christmas special has Gatwa stumbling into a hotel mystery. Complicating factors is the hotel being a time travel tourism location so there are plenty of trips to various periods…
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The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994) D: Stephan Elliott. S: Hugo Weaving, Guy Pearce, Terence Stamp, Bill Hunter, Sarah Chadwick, June Marie Bennett, Rebel Penfold-Russell. Popular Sydney drag queen Weaving up and takes a gig in the middle of nowhere, then invites Pearce and Stamp (playing a trans woman) along for the…
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Agatha All Along (2024) s01e04 “If I Can’t Reach You / Let My Song Teach You” D: Rachel Goldberg. S: Kathryn Hahn, Joe Locke, Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn, Debra Jo Rupp, Patti LuPone, Aubrey Plaza. Fantastic performances make up for the “oh, another escape room” nature of the episode (and, perhaps, show?). It’s Ahn’s episode…
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Batman: Soul of the Dragon (2021) D: Sam Liu. S: David Giuntoli, Mark Dacascos, Kelly Hu, Michael Jai White, James Hong, Jamie Chung, Chris Cox. Kickass animated Batman feature set in the 1970s, in a groovy, butt-kicking karate picture. It’s a team effort with Bats (Giuntoli, who’s fine) just a cog as he reunites with…
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Rivals (2024) s01e01 “Episode 1” D: Elliot Hegarty. S: David Tennant, Aidan Turner, Alex Hassell, Nafessa Williams, Bella Maclean, Katherine Parkinson, Claire Rushbrook. Little bit too horny British period (1986) show (airing on Disney+!) about nouveau riche Tennant’s rivalry (get it) with old money Hassell. Tennant’s a commercial TV producer, Hassell’s an MP. Turner is…
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FROM (2022) s03e09 “Revelations: Chapter One” [2024] D: Jack Bender. S: Harold Perrineau, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Eion Bailey, David Alpay, Elizabeth Saunders, Scott McCord, Ricky He. Penultimate episode of the season and the cliffhanger reveal is something from last season, unaddressed until now. Or it’s new. It’s impossible to tell without paying too much attention……
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The Crazies (1973) D: George A. Romero. S: Lane Carroll, Will MacMillan, Harold Wayne Jones, Lynn Lowry, Lloyd Hollar, Richard Liberty, Richard France. Inventive low budget action thriller about a virus outbreak in a small town, specifically when the army arrives to clamp things down. Only a couple performances are, you know, good (Hollar and…
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FROM (2022) s03e06 “Scar Tissue” [2024] D: Alexandra La Roche. S: Harold Perrineau, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Eion Bailey, David Alpay, Scott McCord, Ricky He, Corteon Moore. It’s one of the better (if not best) FROM bridging episodes. Considering it’s an extension of last episode’s bridging episode… though this episode does have a couple solid reveals.…
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Not to be overly pedantic, but the title should be Nights of the Blood Beast. While the “Blood Beast” part is a little complicated, the film does take place over a couple nights. Two Nights and Four Days of the Blood Beast. The Beast is a space monster. Maybe. It’s definitely a space creature, but…
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Attack of the Giant Leeches stops more than ends. Some plot elements seem to go unresolved, but since the film never actually explains those stakes, maybe they don’t. Director Kowalski likes long lingering shots implying giant leech attacks, except there’s little distinction between ominous shots with leeches and those without. Since the characters never pay…
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Alien: Romulus (2024) D: Fede Álvarez. S: Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, Aileen Wu, Daniel Betts. Nearly okay ALIEN mid-equel (after ALIEN 1, before ALIENS, but tied into PROMETHEUS) eventually collapses under too much unironic “homage.” If lead Spaeny were better, someone might be able to hold it up. Fearn…
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The Devil’s Hour (2022) s02e01 “DI Chambers” [2024] D: Johnny Allan. S: Jessica Raine, Peter Capaldi, Nikesh Patel, Benjamin Chivers. Given season one was a timey-wimey, multiverse of madness, it’s a little weird to see season two start with a straightforward detective procedural for Raine and Patel. Things do start getting strange and Capaldi does…
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Agatha All Along (2024) s01e02 “Circle Sewn with Fate / Unlock Thy Hidden Gate” D: Jac Schaeffer. S: Kathryn Hahn, Joe Locke, Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn, Patti LuPone, David Payton, Debra Jo Rupp. Oh, so the show’s going to be about a misfit coven of witches risking life and limb to get their magical powers…
The Stop Button 