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Silo (2023) s01e08 – Hanna
This episode, “Silo” assumes a conspiracy thriller mode. Sheriff Rebecca Ferguson starts the episode on the run, only to pull one over on Common and his goons again so there can be an episode. She’s also going to find out who and who she can’t trust—despite some solid direction from Adam Bernstein, he totally whiffs… 📖
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Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022, Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert)
Quite appropriately, Everything Everywhere All at Once is all the things. At once. And more. The film’s a relatively simply told multiverse comic book action-comedy-family-drama-romance-horror story with time to do a traditional hero arc, then deconstruct it. The film gives stars Michelle Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu, and Ke Huy Quan constantly changing roles as we meet… 📖
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City Lights (1931, Charles Chaplin)
About halfway through City Lights, I realized most of the gags repeat. Especially when it’s Chaplin and his de facto sidekick, Harry Myers. But instead of making the bits seem rote, the repeat value just makes them funnier. There are some differences in how the jokes work, but not very much; Chaplin also lays into… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e07 – The Flamekeepers
Iain Glen’s back this episode, and, wow, I had forgotten his lousy accent. I think it activates Rebecca Ferguson’s worse accent instincts and suddenly she’s slipping. Though it’s a great episode for Ferguson in terms of performance. Returning directors Bert & Bertie (thank goodness) put her through the paces without emphasizing it. Ferguson’s basically having… 📖
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The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)
The Lineup is a spin-off of a TV series, an adaptation of a radio show. What is the difference between spin-off and adaptation? The movie has some of the same actors as the TV show, while the radio show didn’t share stars with the TV series. The movie came out before the series was even… 📖
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One Touch of Venus (1948, William A. Seiter)
While One Touch of Venus only runs eighty-two minutes, it manages to do three sets of romantic arcs. It’s able to fit them all because lukewarm towel and ostensible lead Robert Walker disappears for long stretches of the movie. Sometimes Walker goes so Dick Haymes can serenade Olga San Juan; sometimes he goes so the… 📖
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Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #269
The cover promises the Fatal Five’s return; while they do return, there’s also a mystery villain who starts the issue. He flies off towards Earth in his mystery ship; a ship crash lands on Earth, and the Fatal Five emerge from the ship, attacking Mon-El and Shadow Lass (who ditch Princess Projectra to get busy… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e06 – The Relic
No one dies this episode of “Silo,” which be more of an improvement if the first quarter of the episode didn’t seem like a retread of last episode. New sheriff Rebecca Ferguson goes to see judge Tanya Moodie, who’s not feeling well, and lets Common do most of the talking at the meeting. Also going… 📖
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Wild Life (2023, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin)
Wild Life has a “what if Douglas Sirk did an epic filmed over multiple years” feel to it. And Wild Life, though the film never acknowledges it, was filmed over multiple years. And not by directors Vasarhelyi and Chin. The subject of the film—Douglas Tompkins (the lead is his widow, Kris Tompkins, but it’s all… 📖
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What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993, Brian Gibson)
Not counting the ill-advised, if still not wholly unwelcome epilogue, What’s Love Got to Do with It ends about ten years before the film came out. Love’s a biopic of Tina Turner (played by Angela Bassett except for the adorable then rending prologue), almost entirely focusing on her time with Ike Turner (Laurence Fishburne). Just… 📖
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Do a Powerbomb (2022) #7
Creator Daniel Warren Johnson’s art on this last issue of Do a Powerbomb is fantastic, some of the best action art. In the series and beyond. Johnson really ups the ante with the final wrestling match, which has newly reunited (sort of) father and daughter wrestling team Cobrasun and Lona fighting God. God’s a big… 📖
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Side Effects (2022)
Side Effects feels like a series of public service announcements strung together. It doesn’t feel like mandatory public service announcements, which is something, but earnest only gets you so far. In the case of Side Effects, there’s nothing past so far. It’s a competent graphic novel about college freshman Hannah experiencing a mental health crisis… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e05 – The Janitor’s Boy
“Silo” threads a tiny eye of the needle and manages to kill off yet another character, fully introduce the conspiracy behind their murder, introduce two potential patsies and one killer, resolve that murder arc, and do an action sequence. All with a script credit show creator Graham Yost, who hasn’t had his name on the… 📖
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Tomb of Dracula (1972) #36
This issue’s a wonderful showcase for how seemingly nothing can go right for Tomb of Dracula, but thanks to the creators—even as writer Marv Wolfman crafts a silly tale, he’s still got the right artists with Gene Colan and Tom Palmer to give the issue a pulse. The cover promises Dracula’s coming to the United… 📖
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The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1959, Ranald MacDougall)
The World, the Flesh and the Devil is one of those rare films where even the opening titles are spoilers. Devil is an end-of-the-world picture, all about coal miner Harry Belafonte emerging from a cave-in to discover he’s the last man alive. Except we’ve had the titles, so we know we’re also watching a movie… 📖
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Monkey Prince (2022) #2
Wait, is Batman just supposed to be a bad dad? Did DC really not think giving him a kid through? Or does Monkey Prince writer Gene Luen Yang just get to flash his bonafides and characterize Batman as a complete dipshit? In addition to Batman attempting to gaslight and emotionally manipulate Robin (who’s now his… 📖
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War Story: Condors (2003)
After Condors, I’m even more decided on the idea—Garth Ennis wanted to write a play. I’m not sure if he wanted to be a playwright or just write a play, but Condors is a play. The entire comic takes place in a bomb crater with four different soldiers fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Only… 📖
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American Gothic (1995) s01e12 – Ring of Fire
Paige Turco has been one of “American Gothic”’s more unsteady actors to this point. She’s had some good moments, but she’s had more uneven ones, and the show doesn’t seem to know what to do with her in general. She vaguely flirts with Jake Weber, vaguely hate-flirts with Gary Cole, and vaguely hangs out with… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e04 – Truth
I spent a while this episode worrying last week’s superior episode was a fluke, but, no, “Silo”’s found some great footing, even with the still wonky future accents—which make even less sense because we flashback to Harriet Walter when Rebecca Ferguson gets down to the engineering department as a kid, and Walter doesn’t have the… 📖
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The Zero Theorem (2013, Terry Gilliam)
I had been planning on opening this post about The MacGuffin—sorry, I mean The Zero Theorem—with a quip about how it’s faster to just Google “Terry Gilliam Brexit” than to watch the movie but Gilliam’s actually not one of the bad Pythons on Brexit. So I had to fall back to The MacGuffin quip. Zero… 📖
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Room Service (1938, William A. Seiter)
Room Service appears—well, sounds like—it sounds like it ends with Groucho Marx singing along to a spiritual in a stage play and breaking into occasional mimicry of a Black woman singing. For no reason. Like there was a subplot about a racist parrot they cut from the movie (it runs seventy-eight minutes, so it’s not… 📖
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Penelope (2006, Mark Palansky), the family-friendly version
Between film festival premiere and eventual U.S. release, Penelope went from 104 minutes to just under ninety, apparently to get a family-friendly PG release, which makes sense since it’s based on a kids’ book. Except it’s not. Leslie Caveny’s screenplay is an original, meaning some of the film’s problems no longer have reasonable excuses. Penelope… 📖
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Werewolf by Night (1972) #32
When I was a kid, this issue of Werewolf by Night was the most expensive because it featured the first appearance of “The Moon Knight,” a comic book weirdo. Werewolf proper hasn’t done any superhero crossovers, so Moon Knight could just be a seventies cosplayer. He’s not—he’s Marc Spector, mercenary, hired by The Committee to… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e03 – Machines
Is Machines a great episode, or is it a sign “Silo”’s going to be great? It’s a phenomenal fifty minutes of television (in an hour-plus episode), but the show’s still got all the existing problems. There’s just this one outlier. So far. But the episode, writing credit to Ingrid Escajeda, is fantastic. If director Morten… 📖
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Black Rain (1989, Ridley Scott)
Black Rain features one of the worst action movie fight scenes. It’s unnecessary—they could’ve just worked around it since participants Michael Douglas and Matsuda Yûsaku are bad at it, the fight choreography is terrible, and it manages to be the most embarrassing thing director Scott oversees in the film and Black Rain’s chock full of… 📖
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My Name is Julia Ross (1945, Joseph H. Lewis)
The funniest part of My Name is Julia Ross is when May Whitty, just after having local vicar Olaf Hytten visit, says son George Macready needs to kill Nina Foch before a doctor shows up because while they might be able to convince no-nothings like the vicar, a doctor would be able to tell she’s… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e02 – Holston’s Pick
As is the way since, what, “The Shield” in 2002, “Silo” changes its opening titles to adjust for last episode’s big “surprises” as far as lead actor deaths. Also in this episode’s titles is Harriet Walter, which made me happy. I couldn’t wait until Harriet Walter showed up. And I’m glad she’s getting work other… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e01 – Freedom Day
“Silo” is about future humans living in a giant, hundreds of levels deep silo because the outside atmosphere is toxic. They don’t remember why it’s toxic; just it’s toxic. They also don’t know how they got to living in the silo. If you say you want to go outside, you have to go outside. And… 📖
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Night of the Lepus (1972, William F. Claxton)
Night of the Lepus is about giant bunny rabbits. The movie’s got lousy special effects. The composite shots of regular-sized bunny rabbits blown up to giant-ish size are bad, but the life-size giant killer bunny rabbit arms and body parts—only used for rapid-cut action sequences—are worse. When they have the bunny rabbits run around on… 📖
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Shock Corridor (1963, Samuel Fuller)
Writer, director, and producer Fuller ends Shock Corridor’s main plot so quickly, it’s like he’s in a hurry to get to the epilogues. Except the epilogues are where Corridor falls flat and doesn’t have the time to get back up. As the film progresses, Fuller makes some significant achievements and builds up such an incredible… 📖
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The Terminator (1988) #6
Truth be told, I have a hard time motivating myself with The Terminator. It’s not bad in peculiar ways related to the licensed property, and it doesn’t have some undiscovered talent doing fantastic work on it. But it’s had its moments. It’s also had irregular writers, with the original writer (and copyright holder on new… 📖
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Catwoman (2002) #11
Presumably, regular writer Ed Brubaker needed someone to cover for him so he could work on Catwoman Secret Files, so Steven Grant fills in on the writing here–Brad Rader’s on pencils, with new-to-the-series Mark Lipka and Dan Davis on inks. It’s an outstanding issue for Rader. The issue’s entirely action, with Catwoman breaking into a… 📖
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Suspicion (1941, Alfred Hitchcock)
Suspicion is a peculiar picture, both in terms of content and context. It’s one of those Hollywood pictures from late 1941, before Pearl Harbor, but it takes place in England, which was already in the war. So it’s set before the war. It’s an all-British cast (not to mention director Hitchcock) making an American film,… 📖
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Black Panther (1998) #6
The issue begins with an Everett K. Ross scene; he’s debriefing the President about his latest adventure with Black Panther, only to quickly offend and have to roller-blade his way out of there. Writer Priest knows how to play Ross for comedy—I guess they couldn’t do the whitest white boy in the world in the… 📖
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Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #268
I’ve always had a soft spot for Steve Ditko’s art. Even thirty-ish years ago, when I was starting to recognize creators in Silver Age books—hunting down older comics to read—Ditko was already a reclusive, right-wing crank. No doubt complaining about wokeness since 1985. History’s just proven his being quiet about it was the only difference… 📖
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Do a Powerbomb (2022) #6
For the first time on Powerbomb, there’s cause for concern. I’m not actually concerned because I’ve got faith in creator Daniel Warren Johnson—he’s more than earned it by this point—but this issue’s at the “shit or get off the pot” moment in the series, and Johnson’s approach is to ask for five more minutes. The… 📖
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Kingdom of the Spiders (1977, John ‘Bud’ Cardos)
Kingdom of the Spiders opens with some scary music for the title reveal, then an original country song by Dorsey Burnette starts playing over the titles, extolling the virtues of Verde Valley, where Kingdom takes place. It’s a terrible opening titles sequence, followed by the film’s first failed attempt at suspense. Unfortunately, it will not… 📖
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Blankman (1994, Mike Binder)
Blankman is surprisingly good. Even after showcasing its initial strengths, then taking a second act tumble, the movie picks itself up for a strong finish. Given the subject—a neurodivergent-coded man becomes a superhero—there are plenty of poorly-aged, ableist jokes. But the jokes made at hero Damon Wayans’s expense always say more about the teller, with… 📖
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Tomb of Dracula (1972) #35
Besides the cover art having very little to do with the issue content—the cover shows Brother Voodoo fighting zombies; more on that adventure in a bit—this issue is an exemplar Tomb of Dracula. Writer Marv Wolfman has time to go overboard with the narration and exposition while still fitting a full horror comic story into… 📖
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Monkey Prince (2022) #1
I’m not up on modern Batman takes, but… has everyone just agreed he’s a dick? Monkey Prince starts with a Batman cameo, then brings him (and Robin) into it for the cliffhanger. In addition to him being a dick, does every new book have a Batman cameo for the sales? Though Batman’s only on one… 📖