-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e14 – The Returned
I’ve really liked co-writer Oanh Ly’s episodes in the past, so The Returned being such a mess is a bummer. Even if it weren’t for the problematic resolve to Miranda Otto’s love affair with visiting witch Skye P. Marshall—who gets a big spotlight this episode to have it torn away twice—or how Lachlan Watson’s Romeo… 📖
-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e13 – Deus Ex Machina
Four episodes until the finish and “Chilling Adventures” is still bringing in new worlds—in this case, the Parliament of Worlds in Celestial Realm, where Metatron (Pollyanna McIntosh is fine but would you really recast Hans Gruber) is witnessing a crisis unfolding. Hell and Earth are having dimension-quakes because of Kiernan Shipka splitting into two, one… 📖
-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e12 – The Imp of the Perverse
The strange thing about “Sabrina” doing an alternate universe episode is its taken them so long to get around to it. Unless I’m forgetting one. It’s also strange it’s strange, like alternate universe episodes are just the norm of most things I watch these days. Anyway, this episode’s an alternate universe because Richard Coyle strong-arms… 📖
-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e11 – The Weird
I feel like “Sabrina” hasn’t known what to do with Richard Coyle forever—if not longer—but when his latest Eldritch Terror shows up and tells him he’s not a worthy vessel and they want Sabrina (Kiernan Shipka), it doesn’t really make up for him being spare parts, but it is a fairly awesome moment. Really fun.… 📖
-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e10 – The Uninvited
This episode opens with lead Kiernan Shipka having her date with new potential beau Peter Bundic—well, wait, it actually opens with this terrifying sequence of a… okay, wait. It’s going to be hard to describe this guy. He’s not actually experiencing homelessness, but he’s an Eldritch Terror personified as a person no one will ever… 📖
-
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018) s02e09 – The Eldritch Dark
“Sabrina,” season four… wait, season two part two, wait, part four, wait… anyway. “Sabrina” starts this series(?) with lead Kiernan Shipka bummed out everyone else has a partner and wants to do partner things instead of ghost-busting—witch-busting—things. Human ex Ross Lynch is happily dating Shipka’s best friend, Jaz Sinclair, warlock ex Gavin Leatherwood is hooking… 📖
-
The Double (2013, Richard Ayoade)
The Double opens with a look at lead Jesse Eisenberg’s monotonous, solitary life. He takes the train to his job, where he’s worked for seven years and only one person has bothered to learn his name, he’s got a crush on a girl (Mia Wasikowska) at work who doesn’t seem to know he exists, and… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e11 – Storia Americana
This episode runs under forty minutes. The first few episodes ran over an hour. So why does “Fargo: Season Four” need a coda? I mean, besides them not finishing the story last episode so they could eek out just one more. The episode opens with a montage of all the people who have died this… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e10 – Happy
Is it sunny and nice in Kansas City in the winter? This episode presumably takes place in January 1951 and unless there was an unexpected heatwave… it’s like they forgot what month it takes place. The episode opens with a lengthy montage sequence showing the gang war in progress, along with some grim and gritty… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e09 – East/West
East/West does not make up for the previous episode but it does call the whole shark-jumping into question. Because East/West is director Michael Uppendahl and writers Noah Hawley (I really want to know how much he does on these episodes where he’s co-credited) and Lee Edward Colston doing a big ol’ Barton Fink homage. A… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e08 – The Nadir
It’s pretty obvious episode director Sylvain White has seen The Untouchables a bunch and maybe one of the Godfather movies–III probably—but there’s no evidence he’s seen, you know, Miller’s Crossing, Fargo, or even an episode of “Fargo.” Despite the episode seemingly having a bigger budget than most, it’s startlingly poorly directed. The Nadir isn’t where… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e07 – Lay Away
I was really happy to see Dana Gonzales directed this episode because the direction’s bad and since I no longer have any confidence in “Fargo” anymore whatsoever I was worried it was one of the good directors this season going to pot. This episode seems to reveal the big problem—and not just co-writers (with Noah… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e06 – Camp Elegance
So it’s another lackluster episode and it’s hard not to notice Dana Gonzales directed this one too. And Noah Hawley has three co-writers on it. Enzo Mileti, Scott Wilson, Francesca Sloane. Not sure any of them are at fault more than any of the others. Though the one who had private hospital doctor Stephen Spencer… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e05 – The Birthplace of Civilization
Until the end of the episode—which brings in the Fargo theme fully for the first time—everything is character revelation and potentially development. Oh. And a Trump reference. The Trump reference is really bad. The most character revelation revolves around dirty cop Jack Huston. We find out from Chris Rock some of his back story—while Huston… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e04 – The Pretend War
It’s the end of the first act, with normal guy Andrew Bird making a big mistake and now everything afterward is never going to be the same again, which is kind of what “Fargo” stays consistent about, season to season. I think. Bird pays off he and Anji White’s debt to Chris Rock—in one of… 📖
-
Fargo (2014) s04e03 – Raddoppiarlo
I’m sad “Fargo” turns out to need Timothy Olyphant so much. I noticed him in the credits online but figured they’d cut him out so much he was barely appearing, but he gets the opening of this episode. Before disappearing. He plays a Mormon U.S. Marshal who can’t shut up about religion and eats carrot… 📖
-
The Killer (1989, John Woo)
When The Killer introduces second-billed Danny Lee, it certainly seems like Lee’s arc is going to be the most important in the film. He’s a Hong Kong cop who starts chasing professional hitman Chow Yun-fat and gets in the middle of Chow’s fight with crime lord Shing Fui-on, with tragic results for everyone involved. And… 📖
-
The Invisible Man’s Revenge (1944, Ford Beebe)
When Leon Errol saves lead Jon Hall from drowning, even though they’ve previously established The Invisible Man’s Revenge takes place in England, I was sure they’d teleported to Australia. Errol is very Australian. Openly Australian. He’s also the closest thing to amusing as Revenge gets. Despite being the fourth in the series, starring the same… 📖
-
Invisible Agent (1942, Edwin L. Marin)
Just about an hour into Invisible Agent, Axis allies Cedric Hardwicke and Peter Lorre have a falling out. See, Lorre’s smart, actually, while Hardwicke’s just devious. The film had been establishing those traits from the first scene—when they try to strong-arm the Invisible Man formula out of Jon Hall—but what I didn’t realize was Lorre… 📖
-
The Invisible Man Returns (1940, Joe May)
The best thing about The Invisible Man Returns is quite obviously Cecil Kellaway. He’s a Scotland Yard inspector who’s spent the eight years since the last movie preparing for another invisible man attack, making sure the Yard’s ready to go technologically. Worst thing about The Invisible Man Returns? It’s a little long? There’s nothing really… 📖
-
The Invisible Man (2020, Leigh Whannell)
The Invisible Man is surprisingly okay. I mean, once you realize it’s just going to be lead Elisabeth Moss in constant terror of an invisible abusive partner lashing out at her and Moss is good at being terrified for long periods, it seems like a bit of a gimme, but until the middle of the… 📖
-
Back Page (1934, Anton Lorenze)
It makes sense director Lorenze never made any other films after Back Page because there’s no easy way to describe the disinterested direction. Well, outside Lorenze and cinematographer James S. Brown Jr. using the same exact camera composition for what seems like ninety percent of the film. When there’s an actual reaction close-up of someone… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e15 – Ezekiel Patrol
In terms of ambition, scale, and execution, I’m not sure there’s anything better than Ezekiel Patrol. Writers Tamara Becher, Jeremy Carver, Shoshana Sachi, director Dermott Downs, the cast—they set a new bar. With Ezekiel, even though it’s from Grant Morrison, “Doom Patrol” has just fulfilled the concept of Vertigo TV. It’s sophisticated… okay, not suspense.… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e14 – Penultimate Patrol
It’s a superb episode. Lots and lots of content—including some surprising devices to extend the narrative, which seems iffy at first but ends up working out great. Although you see the budget when it comes to a Groundhog Day-esque montage and the exact same footage keeps getting reused. “Doom Patrol” is even more impressive when… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e13 – Flex Patrol
Devan Long is back this episode—looks like he might recur the rest of the season in fact—and he’s so good I almost want to watch his other stuff. He’s got the right amount of humor and the right amount of heart for the show. He’s stuck with Matt Bomer, Diane Guerrero, and Robotman (Brendan Fraser—and… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e12 – Cyborg Patrol
The episode opens with Cyborg (Joivan Wade) imprisoned by the U.S. government—led by Jon Briddell, who is still nowhere near good enough for his part and they also don’t explain how they went from him being missing two episodes ago to the main villain in this one—only Wade has turned off “Grid,” his cybernetics’ operating… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e11 – Frances Patrol
I remember opining “Doom Patrol” might give Matt Bomer a great part, but it was the pilot (I think) and they managed to simultaneously ignore his character development while also doing the peculiar flashbacks to the 1950s and Bomer’s closeted affair with Kyle Clements. Then it got better a few episodes ago, then Bomer took… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e10 – Hair Patrol
Does Matt Bomer get an episode with the electric demon next or what, because he’s really left out of this one, which is the secret origin of Timothy Dalton—including explaining, or at least implying, why he looks so good for one hundred and fifty plus years old. No explanation for Diane Guerrero still but doesn’t… 📖
-
The Falcon and the Snowman (1985, John Schlesinger)
The best scene in The Falcon and the Snowman is when Sean Penn tries to sell his Russian handlers—a wonderfully bemused David Suchet and Boris Lyoskin—on a coke enterprise. They’ve got embassies all over, Penn figures, so why not make some money moving blow through them up from Peru or whatever. It’s maybe halfway through… 📖
-
Red Scorpion (1988, Joseph Zito)
I wasn’t aware of Red Scorpion’s production history, which has original distributor Warner Bros. pulling out because it filmed in Namibia, under apartheid South African control at the time, as well as the investors and producers being pro-apartheid… you’d think Warner would’ve checked. You’d hoped Warner would’ve checked. And, now, if we can “but anyway”… 📖
-
Wonder Woman 1984 (2020, Patty Jenkins)
Outside allowing Chris Pine to charmingly mug for the camera while doing an eighties men’s fashion parade, there’s not much reason for its 1984 setting. Unless they thought it would be absurd if Wonder Woman Gal Gadot pined after dead WWI love Pine for more than sixty-five years or so. No reason for the setting… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e09 – Jane Patrol
Holy shit, they didn’t get a female writer for this episode. Holy shit. Marcus Dalzine. Holy shit. I thought it was…. Wow. Okay. So this episode is about Brendan Fraser—guest starring in person and turning out to not be anywhere near as occasionally amusing in person as when he’s voicing and they’re filtering his voice—but… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e08 – Danny Patrol
I just ran a find on this episode’s cast list because I couldn’t remember who did the voice of the new character, Danny the Street. Only to remember Danny only ever talks in text messages. Not, like, SMS messages, but text they’re able to arrange on the… well, not on the street because they’re the… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e07 – Therapy Patrol
For “Doom Patrol,” there’s before Therapy Patrol and after Therapy Patrol. It doesn’t just have an exceptional reveal at the end, which informs the entire episode–Therapy is fragmented, following each character as they prepare for a morning’s team briefing—and the reveal doesn’t just explain the whole thing, director Rob Hardy and writer Neil Reynolds manage… 📖
-
Doom Patrol (2019) s01e06 – Doom Patrol Patrol
I failed to appreciate how nice it was to have Diane Guerrero not playing her regular character, Jane. Or Hammerhead. Hammerhead is the tough one. Guerrero’s not good at either of them. She’s also not good as the Babydoll one. She’s good as the blue-eyed one, nothing else. Especially not when everyone else in “Doom… 📖
-
Red Heat (1988, Walter Hill)
Walter Hill really likes to make movies about racist white cops (oxymoron, sorry, racist even for a movie) partnering with unlikely people and having big action sequences involving buses, huh? The racist white cop in this case is Jim Belushi, who’s never overtly racist (just overtly transphobic in a homophobic way—it’s the eighties after all),… 📖
-
The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992, Brian Henson), the extended version
There’s a lot great about Muppet Christmas Carol: obviously the Muppet performers (their first outing after Jim Henson died—Rowlf is silent in memorial), Brian Henson’s fine direction, Jerry Juhl’s inventive script, strong special effects, Val Strazovec’s production design, Michael Jablow’s editing, the Paul Williams songs (the repetition even helps); but what makes it so special… 📖