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The Haunting Of Hill House (2018) A (Mildly) Belated Review

Released through Netflix a couple of years ago, The Haunting of Hill House is a 10 part mini-series based on the famous haunted house novel by Shirley Jackson which was made twice before into movies, the most famous of which was the Robert Wise directed version, called The Haunting, and released in 1963.

Here’s the thing, though: While the mini-series bears the same name as the novel and has a few of the artifacts which are present in it, including the look of Hill House (which is almost the very same) and several characters who have the same names, this mini-series is very much a reimagining of the story, to the point where it is hard to call it more than “inspired by” the original novel and -to a degree visually- the original movie.

Which is not to say this is a bad thing!

The fact of the matter is that The Haunting of Hill House is an incredibly ambitious and at times spectacular mini-series which sadly, IMHO, falls in its concluding moments.

But we’ll get to that in a moment.

The series expertly moves in time, from the past when a young Hugh Crain (in the past played by Henry Thomas and in the present by Timothy Hutton) and his wife Olivia (Carla Gugino) and their large family consisting of Steven, Shirley, Theodora, and young twins Luke and Nell arrive at Hill House to “flip” it. Through flashbacks and scenes set in the present, we learn that a great tragedy occurred at Hill House and, soon enough, realize Olivia died there and that all kinds of eerie, ghostly events occurred as well.

The events of the night of Olivia’s death are slowly hinted, and their repercussions in the present are shown in a shattered family, now consisting of grown ups, with all kinds of hang ups. The very youngest of the Crains, Nell (who we find was born only 90 some seconds after her twin brother Luke), tries to call her siblings but is unable to for various reasons.

Worse, her father -who the now grown kids all view as flaky, to say the least- are put off when he calls to say he spoke with Nell and is worried she’s about to do something bad.

As it turns out, she returns to Hill House and once there, appears to commit suicide.

This proves to the be the singular action that brings the remaining members of the Crain family together, and in the course of the show’s episodes, we come to learn what happened to each individual member of the family when they were young kids… and come to learn what they’ve become as adults and how they eventually deal with the horror they faced in Hill House.

At times, the mini-series is flat out brilliant. There is one episode in particular that features a very long “one take” (I’m sure they cheated a little here and there, but still!) at the funeral home where Nell’s body is on display. As a fan of movies, that sequence took my breath away.

Further, the movie gives you some genuinely creepy moments and well earned scares. We feel for these people, each and every one of them, and by the end I even let out a couple of tears…

…but…

It really pains me to say it but the movie’s final episode, actually the final half hour or so of the series, while very emotional and caused me to wipe a few tears away also subverts what came before it to such a degree that, when all was said and done, I felt more and more bothered by it.

It’s a tough thing to say, after some 8 and 1/2 hours of pretty damn brilliant work to feel let down by the last 1/2 hour or so, but I have to be honest: It bugged me.

I don’t want to get into SPOILERS so I’ll do so after presenting the mini-series’ trailer. Even then, I’m going to try to tread lightly because, frankly, even with the disappointment I felt after the fact, I still loved so much about this mini-series that I recommend it strongly regardless.

Perhaps others won’t be quite as bothered by the ending and I sincerely wish I could say the same.

Still, strongly recommended!

Just for the heck of it -and before we get into SPOILERS- here’s the trailer for the original version of the book, 1963’s The Haunting…

SPOILERS FOLLOW…!

YOU’VE BEEN WARNED!!!

Still there?

If you have any interest in seeing this mini-series, I strongly urge you NOT to proceed. As I said above, I will try not to spoil everything but nonetheless I’m going to be talking about what bothered me about the series’ ending and, by doing so, I will inevitably spoil quite a bit.

So, please, if you intend to see the series, do so before proceeding.

You’ll be happier.

Otherwise…

OK, so here goes:

The Haunting of Hill House essentially has the various members of the Crain family come together -reluctantly in many of their cases- because of the death of the youngest member of the family, Nell, who returned to the dreaded Hill House, where their mother died, and apparently committed suicide there.

By being brought together, however, we revisit what they experienced in Hill House originally, and through the course of the mini-series we come to find that they saw many ghostly creatures and, understandably, came out of this not all that well.

Again, I don’t want to spoil everything, but the series’ climax has them returning to the house to try to save one of them, who has returned to the house to destroy it, not realizing that by doing so they may well be feeding its evil.

They arrive, mostly separately, and there they are placed in the “heart” of the house, the place where it wants them, to feed of them, to have their souls.

Here’s the thing, though: after spending some 8 and 1/2 hours or so being told how evil the house is, how it killed both their mother and youngest sister/daughter, the finale of the series shows them confronting the house and their fear and, despite the fact that the house still wants them dead, makes this very, very sharp turn where the spirit of their dead sister/daughter makes them realize they need each other and, I don’t know, where their love for each other makes them come together. All but one of them leave this place all happy and with their terrors resolved. Also, we’re given one more plot addition, another last minute victim of Hill House whose parents -preposterously- allow their child’s death to pass and agree to hide it. Years later these parents return to the house to, I don’t know, join the spirt of their daughter more fully as they pass away.

So this house that for 8 and 1/2 hours is presented as this black, evil thing, is suddenly this place where all these traumas are resolved for everyone and even come back to the house to seek peace!!!!

This makes no sense given all the horrors we see earlier on and the very clear indications that Hill House is evil.

Yeah.

Again, I really, really hate to go after such a magnificent series but the change in tone at the very end of the series proved simply too great for me. It was the equivalent of story telling whiplash.

I’ll say no more because, again, I don’t want to spoil everything. Suffice it to say, perhaps it won’t be as bothersome to others as it was to me.

Still, even with that ending, I still loved the mini-series. Next up is The Haunting of Bly Manor, released this year and featuring many of the same actors in a story of a different haunted house.

When I see it, I’ll give you my impressions!

TV

Nightflyers: Season 1, a (partial) review

Presented on the SyFy Network and based on a short story by George R. R. Martin (Game of Thrones), NightFlyers is a science fiction/horror hybrid involving a spacecraft heading out into deep space to try to contact an alien race, and the eerie things the crew encounters as they travel on.

The show’s been on for a while now and, at least according to IMDB, the first season has 10 episodes, all of which have been shown.

I set my DVR to tape the season and wound up watching the first three episodes in one sitting and enjoying myself reasonably well.

The show features a smallish “central” cast in an enormous star ship that, as I mentioned above, is on its way from Earth to meet up with an alien race somewhere out in the distance.  Earth is apparently dying out and it is hoped contacting the alien race will help them to save humanity…

…or some such.

Again, I enjoyed the first three episodes fairly well, though it seemed like the makers of the series were deliberately withholding some information and/or were simply inept at presenting the information clearly.

For example, within this star ship is a psychic individual who, other crew members have stated, was responsible for some kind of mass killing.

Or was he?

He is initially presented as potentially evil and dangerous character but as those original three episodes play out, we get a sense that he isn’t quite as dangerous as something which lurks within the vessel’s machinery itself.  The reveal of what that is is… ok… I suppose, but hardly shattering.

I left the show and returned to see the fourth episode and, in the interval of time, I found my opinion on the show had soured somewhat.  The fourth episode wound up being something of a chore to watch and it occurred to me that the series is being deliberately obtuse to the point of being frustrating.

In four hours of time, I as a viewer remain unclear why exactly the potentially dangerous psychic individual was brought on the ship.  It was stated he was there to communicate with the aliens psychically, but a later episode shows his ability to psychically “talk” to anything beyond humans is at best very limited.  So it would seem the risk of taking this potentially VERY dangerous individual on this vessel was a risk maybe not worth taking.

Further, the big reveal of the entity within the vessel itself also seems like a very idiotic thing.  I mean, how could so much money, time, and effort be made on building this massive star ship and then essentially load a (SPOILERS!!!!) person’s “soul” into it, especially one that is oh-so-hard to get along with.

Again, I’ve made it only four episodes into the series but as of now, I’m wondering if I’m going to make it through the remaining six.  Further, this series is based on a short story/novella by Mr. Martin so one wonders if a second season is in the offing and whether the makers of this series are stretching the story waaaaay too far out.

At this point and without having seen the rest of the series, I have to sadly say the show is a thumbs down from me, despite some decent acting, effects, and a somewhat intriguing initial premise.

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Ash vs Evil Dead (2015-18) Third Season review

I’ve noted before I’m a fan of the original three Evil Dead films.  The first one, released in 1981, was a low budget horror film that, for its time, was eerie and quite scary.  The character of “Ash” Williams, played by the irrepressible Bruce Campbell, first appeared in the original Evil Dead.  His character, as presented in this film, is very different from what it would become…

As presented in this film, Ash was just a nondescript “other” guy in the group of doomed youth who headed out to a cabin and stumbled upon the Evil that was there.  Unlike the others in his party, Ash manages to survive to the end of the film but those closing minutes strongly imply he’s toast, too.

A few years later and in 1987 Evil Dead 2, the remake cum sequel to that original film -and in my opinion the best of the Evil Dead works- came out…

In its opening minutes Evil Dead 2 essentially “remade” the original film, then went off on its glorious own, having Bruce Campbell’s Ash Williams go mano-a-mano against the supernatural forces haunting the cabin he was trapped in.  The thing that made this movie work so gloriously was that the makers/stars realized there’s a thin line between humor and horror and they pushed both to their limits, making the character of Ash Williams a weird goofball who acted at times like one of the lost Stooge brothers… only with a lot more blood and gore.

In 1992 came the third Evil Dead film, this one titled Army of Darkness, and it further evolved the character of Ash Williams, this time making him more of a smart ass/know-it-all and the biggest joke, of course, was that he was a total idiot… though one with an affinity to battle evil…

This film is my second favorite Evil Dead work, though it does lose a little steam in its second half (curiously, in the commentaries provided on the BluRay, director Sam Raimi noted the same, saying at one point that he lamented the fact that the film became a Ray Harryhausen-like film and lost, to a degree, Ash Williams).  Despite this, the opening and closing acts are an absolute hoot.

The movie, alas, was a flop.  It didn’t do well at all in theaters and the property appeared all but dead (pun intended?!).  However, the Evil Dead films did extremely well in the home video market and, many years later and in 2013 (yup, twenty years later), a new theatrical remake of Evil Dead was released to theaters and, though Bruce Campbell’s Ash Williams didn’t show up but for a few seconds at the very tail end of the film and after the credits, it did reasonably well and seeing Ash Williams once again seemed to kick start an interest in bringing more of him.

Which led to Starz! taking up a new series, titled Ash vs Evil Dead, to premiere in 2015.

Now, I liked the first two seasons of the series though I didn’t like either season’s endings.  The first one was too damn open ended for my taste while the second season, it was revealed later on, was hastily assembled at the very last minute because of friction between one of the series’ producers and head writer/showrunner.  The later would leave the show after the second season and I worried as to how the third season would turn out without him.

Welp, I’ve just finished seeing the rest of the episodes in the third season and… its OK.  Not the best, but there are enough really good things to make it worth pursuing.

This season, unlike the two others, to me lacked much of the near constant wicked humor that made the first two seasons so damn good.  Further, there is a helter-skelter quality to the story presented, a sense of throwing things in but not resolving them or resolving them lamely, storywise.  It almost felt like the writers were more killing time with little bits and pieces here and there before getting to the end and those bits and pieces wind up not mattering all that much.

For example (mild spoilers) toward the very end of the third season we get an extended sequence involving Ash’s daughter Brandy (Arielle Carver-O’Neill) that plays out like a remake of one of the better sequences in Evil Dead 2 (I’ll not give everything away, but that sequence has an Ernest Hemingway Farewell to Arms punchline).. yet 1) its not as good as the original and 2) when its over the story moves forward and what Brandy went through is all but forgotten.

Characters such as Lucy Lawless’ Ruby Knowby are reduced to a somewhat ordinary “bad guy” status and is scheming and looking eeeevvvvvilll at the camera but otherwise isn’t given much of a chance to strut her stuff, especially against Ash directly.  Given how important she was supposed to be as the main antagonist in this season, it was weird how she was ultimately dispatched (SPOILER AGAIN!) without Ash doing much of anything to get rid of her.  We also have a situation where for the first half of the season the main characters are curiously on their own, Ash over here, Pablo over there, Kelly doing her thing, and Brandy (a new character) taking up a lot of time with little result.

Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against Arielle Carver-O’Neill.  For a young woman she’s already got a good resume and I assume she’s a good actress but as presented here, she never seemed to work well in the Evil Dead mileu.  It might have been better to have Dana DeLorenzo’s Kelly turn out to be Ash’s daughter -as was originally intended- and not have to introduce a new character so late in the game.

But perhaps the biggest disappointment of the season is the fact that the wicked humor which was so prevalent in all Evil Dead works since the second film, the general tone of season three of the show feels more focused on gore and horror which, I suppose, was one of the reasons there was friction between the producer and ex-showrunner.

I like horror, but Evil Dead worked as well as it did because it balanced horror with humor.

Still, there are moments here and there where the show works, including the welcome return of Lee Majors as Brock Williams, Ash’s father and a climax and conclusion that, frankly, was pretty damn cool… though given the fact that the show wasn’t renewed -and the fact that Bruce Campbell has announced in no uncertain terms he would not return to the role of Ash Williams again- we’ll never see what happens after those closing minutes.

Ah well.

Look, if you’re a fan of the series, seeing the third season is a no-brainer.  If you’re not a fan or if you’ve never seen Evil Dead before, you may want to check out Evil Dead 2 or Army of Darkness first before checking out Seasons 1 and 2 of the series before going to Season 3.

Otherwise, if the idea of mixing gory horror and humor isn’t your cup of tea, you may want to stay away.

If this is indeed the last we’ll ever see of Ash Williams, let me say here and now: Thanks Bruce Campbell and company.  You created a unique character in Ash Williams, one that evolved and changed but was almost always fun to watch.

You’ll be missed.

TV

Legion: Season 1 (2017) a (just about right on time!) review

Earlier this week FX played the 8th, and final, episode of the first season of the series Legion.

The series, tied in to the Marvel Comics X-Men series and, coming into it, I heard it was an ambitious, at times mind-bending work.  How “close” it was to the various X-Men comics it is I cannot say.

What I can talk about is the series itself, which I found incredibly entertaining, with some caveats, the biggest of which is that at times the show ventured from weirdly engaging to just plain weird.

The show’s pilot was, as I stated in my original review, was humorous as weird but at times one admittedly had to have patience.  The story was intriguing enough to keep me going, though even at a mere 8 episodes there was at least one which maybe could have been trimmed out without much loss (I forget which one it was…I think it might have been episode 6 which was simply one wild head-trip).

The show concerns David Haller (Dan Stevens) who is mentally disturbed and in an institution…and may have the mental power within him capable of destroying the world.  One of his best friends there is Lenny Busker (Aubrey Plaza) who may or may not be real.  The nature of Lenny becomes a central plot point of the series and Aubrey Plaza is a delight in a humorous and at times very scary role.

Into the institution appears Syd Barrett (Rachel Keller) who has secrets of her own, and the two are drawn to each other.  Turns out Syd also has her secrets and her interest in David extends beyond mere attraction.

There are also a group of military figures who are interested in David and they kidnap him from the institution which, in turn, sets off Legion’s story.

I don’t want to give away more than this but suffice to say the series is intriguing, creative, suspenseful, and at times howlingly funny.

I also believe I know one of the show’s biggest kept secrets, which I’ll get to in a second (it does involve rather huge SPOILERS).

Anyway, if you haven’t given the show a try, do so.  It’s weird and at times requires a bit of patience but it gets better and better as it goes along and its final two episodes, in particular, were knockouts.

Now, for those pesky…

SPOILERS

(abandon hope all ye who enter here)

 

Still there?  Required statement: You have been warned.

So Legion involves a group of mutants led by Dr. Melanie Bird (Jean Smart) who are running from the government.  The government, rightly, fears the mutants and wants to stop whatever they’re doing.  The mutants, of course, want to survive.

In the course of the series Dr. Bird, it is revealed, has a husband, Oliver Bird (Jemaine Clement) who is apparently a very powerful mutant who got himself stuck in the “astral plane” for the past 20 or so years.  He figures into the series, particularly the conclusion, and is at this point a confused individual who fancies himself a beat poet.

Ok, here’s the big SPOILER/SECRET I believe the show has hidden in plain sight:  Dr. Melanie Bird and Oliver Bird are somehow the future/older versions of Syd Barrett and David Haller.

No, seriously.

Take a look at these images of Dr. Melanie Bird…

Image result for legion fx images

…and Syd Barrett:

Image result for legion fx images

As the series progressed, I was struck by how similar these two looked, as if one was an older version of the other.

Syd Barrett’s mutant power is that whomever she touches “switches” bodies with her.  This process is painful to Syd and therefore she wears gloves and makes it a point of not touching people.

In the entire 8 episode run we’re never told -at least not to my memory- what Dr. Bird’s powers are.  Why not?  She runs a mutant enclave…surely she has a mutant power as well, right?  So why make a secret of it?  Could it be that revealing it would reveal she has the same powers as Syd?

My evidence, beyond simple visuals: Dr. Oliver often wears gloves, just like Syd.  She also doesn’t touch others.  Whenever Dr. Oliver talks to Syd and Syd tells her she’s going to do something -sometimes something Dr. Bird looks about to protest- Dr. Bird nonetheless holds her tongue and doesn’t question Syd’s judgment.  It’s almost as if she realizes that Syd and her are the same person and therefore, how does she question the judgment of her own, albeit younger, self?

There’s a further point: Dr. Bird reacts very curiously to the attraction Syd has for David.  It’s almost as if she realizes the person Syd loves is the same person she loves, which leads to the following:

If Syd Barrett and Dr. Bird are the same person, could David Haller and the astral-plane stranded husband of Dr. Melanie Bird, Oliver Bird, also be the same person?

Here’s Oliver Bird…

Image result for legion fx david and oliver images

…and here’s David:

Image result for legion fx david and oliver images

There is less visual similarity between the two versus Dr. Bird and Syd, but note the curious resolution presented in the show’s finale.  When the parasitic creature within David is finally drawn out, it bounces around but where does it ultimately land?

In Oliver.

If Oliver is an “older” version of David, where else would a parasitic creature go to but to the one whose “soul” it most knows?

Now, as I stated before: I never read the comic books which featured these characters and therefore don’t know if this is an already known story concept (or, indeed, if I missed some clearer hint to this in the series itself).

Regardless, these are my theories.  Perhaps they’re close to true?

TV

Legion (2017) pilot, a quick review

Is actor Dan Stevens a chameleon or what?

My first big exposure to him was in Downton Abbey though this was far from his first screen appearance.  Then, when watching the 2014 film The Guest, I just knew I recognized the actor who played “David”, the mysterious homicidal killer.  It was, of course, Mr. Stevens, this time very buff compared to his more doughy look in Downton.

Well, he’s about to appear in the Emma Watson starring Beauty and the Beast (and he plays the Beast!) but, in the meantime, we have the premiere, yesterday, of Legion, an FX series with ancillary ties to the famous X-Men universe wherein Mr. Stevens plays the show’s primary role, that of the mutant David Haller.

Once again Mr. Stevens disappears into the role.  Unlike both Downtown or The Guest, here Mr. Stevens looks, dare I say it, scrawny and his character has great difficulties dealing with reality.  His telekinetic mutant powers, however, may well be among the strongest in this show’s universe, and that makes him a target of at least two rival forces.

I enjoyed Legion, though the first half of the premiere episode, IMHO, was much worse than the second half.  There was a little too much crazy in that first half but once the plot started to reveal itself the show became very intriguing.

Having said that, what’s also intriguing, at least to me, is the influence David Cronenberg’s early films, particularly his 1981 film Scanners, continues to exert.  The fact of the matter is that one could almost view Legion as a modernized update of Scanners, complete with telekinetic mutants and shady government forces try to control them…

Granted, the X-Men comic books came before Scanners, first appearing waaaaay back in 1963.  However, it wasn’t until around the time Scanners first appeared (a little earlier, granted) that they became very popular.

Was Cronenberg influenced by older X-Men and then the newer, more popular X-Men were influenced by Cronenberg?

The timing is curious, to say the least.

Anyway, Legion’s premiere was intriguing and, at times, quite humorous.  Kudos to Aubrey Plaza for playing one of the inmates in the mental ward who has the ear of David.  The third biggest character in the premiere is Rachel Keller’s Syd Barrett (her name being an obvious nod to one of Pink Floyd’s founders who dropped out of the band after he had mental issues…and was a great source of inspiration to the band during their golden years).  Ms. Keller has an intriguing screen presence and I’m curious what we’ll learn regarding her character.

I don’t know how close Legion is to the various X-Men related comics out there.  Frankly, I’ve never followed them all that closely though I have read some of the “classic” stories, including all the Neal Adams illustrated issues as well as most of the Claremont/Byrne issues, which included the famous Dark Phoenix and Days of Futurepast storylines.

If you haven’t done so already, give Legion a try.  If you’re anything at all like me, the first thirty or so minutes of the premiere might try your patience but stick with it.  Things come together quite nicely by the end.

TV

Sherlock: The Six Thatchers (2017) a (almost right on time) review

I really like the Benedict Cumberpatch/Martin Freeman Sherlock series.  The show, which first premiered in 2010, just started its fourth season.  This season, like the others, features only a few “episodes”, in this case four.  The first episode in the fourth season, The Abominable Bride, premiered, if you can believe it, exactly one year before this episode, on January 1, 2016!  Though there are few “episodes” per season, truth be told each one is more like a full feature film.

Anyway, what made Sherlock stand out, at least when it originally premiered in 2010, was the fact that it was set in modern times.  This isn’t a new concept, however.  When the original stories were written, of course, they were set in the then “modern” days.  At least one of the well regarded Basil Rathbone Holmes’ film, 1942’s The Woman in Green, was set in the then present World War II era.

Apart from modern technology and its present setting, what makes Sherlock work so well is the great acting, for the most part great scripts, and the laugh out loud moments.  This is not just a good series, but a great one, in my humble opinion.  The only episode of the run thus far I can think of that disappointed me was, ironically enough, their version of The Hound of the Baskervilles (their version was retitled The Hounds of the Baskerville), arguably the most famous of all of Mr. Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories.

For about 1 hour and 20 or so minutes of season four’s second episode, entitled The Six Thatchers, I was completely engrossed and delighted by what I saw.  This was damn good television, first dealing (I’ll try to be vague here to avoid spoilers, for now) with a leftover from a crime presented last season and its coverup before settling on the main mystery involving six busts which, you guessed it, are of Margaret Thatcher.

There were plenty of twists and turns and things don’t always make a heck of a lot of sense (only six such busts were ever made?  And they can be traced to the six people who bought it years before and they still have them?!), but the fact is that Sherlock works even when the plot get overly busy…or just plain silly.  Again, its the breezy nature of the show, the witty and at times hilarious banter, that keeps everything moving.

But those last eight or so minutes of the episode…

Ugh.

I’ll now, alas, get into SPOILERS so if you haven’t seen the episode and intend to, please stop reading right now.  I’ll get into this after the trailer…

 

SPOILERS FOLLOW!!!!

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!

 

Still here?  Ok, I think I’ve offered enough warning.

Between the central mystery, the episode also deals with Watson and his wife Mary (Amanda Abbington) having a child and Sherlock’s (of course) weird reactions/interactions with the child.  As it turns out, the central mystery of the episode winds up involving Mary and, more specifically, her past.

In Sherlock’s reality, the character of Mary Morstan was a highly skilled, super-secret mercenary.  In short, she was a very efficient wetworks officer and part of a group of four who carried on with some very sordid affairs.  She gives this up to be with Watson and has a child but the mystery of the “Six Thatchers” winds up relating directly to her.

In her last mission, things went very bad and Mary thought her fellow mercs were killed.  One was not.  He was tortured for years and, while listening to his captors talk, thought Mary had betrayed the group and therefore he wanted to get her…and get revenge.  I won’t go into more details here, but suffice to say that eventually it is discovered a seemingly mousy secretary was the real culprit and Sherlock and Mary confront her at an aquarium.

Here’s where things get really stupid.

Others show up, including Inspector Lestrade and Mycroft Holmes and several other police.  The woman is surrounded yet she draws a gun.  They talk to her, tell her to put it down, but she’s set off and fires at Sherlock…and Mary jumps in front of Sherlock and takes the bullet intended for him.

She dies.

Christ.

Look, I know the Mary Morstan character dies in the Doyle stories.  Killing off a female, especially one bound to one of a series’ main characters, isn’t a terribly new concept as we then have the characters revert to their original state (check out how many women romance the Cartwright brothers in Bonanza only to either leave at episode’s end or die tragically and be completely forgotten by the next episode of the show).  Boys will be boys and having a “woman” attached to one of the characters can be viewed as problematic to storytelling.

However, the manner in which they kill Mary is so damn stupid.  I mean, is that the best they could come up with?  Have this mousy elder woman completely surrounded by (one has to assume) well armed officers yet she manages to fire off a shot?  In the time it takes her to get the gun out of her purse she could -and should!- have been taken out by either the brainy Sherlock Holmes or the deadly assassin for hire Mary, both of which stood only feet away from her.

Further, Mary “jumping” in front of the bullet also feels dumb.  The way its presented in the episode, she fires and then Mary jumps in front of the bullet.  Sorry, but it just don’t work that way.  The bullet would hit Sherlock well before Mary could react, much less jump in front of him.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

They say familiarity breeds contempt and, granted, we now have several episodes of Sherlock and, perhaps, as a viewer I’m a little more discerning and less forgiving for perceived failures.  Perhaps.

Still, this is the first time an episode ending left me so disappointed.  I’m not giving up on the show, of course.  Even with the terrible (IMHO!) ending, the rest of the episode was delightful.  Let’s just hope the remaining two episodes to come redeem this horrible ending.

TV

The Expanse Season 1 (2015) a (mildly) belated TV review

When I heard someone had described The Expanse books (to date there are 5 in the series and a few novellas) as a “science fiction version of Game of Thrones“, I knew the authors of the books must have done somersaults of sheer joy.  (The novels are listed as being written by James S. A. Corey which is the pen name for Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) .

It wasn’t all that long ago that some critic stated the then first appearing Twilight books were the next “Harry Potter”-type must-read series and you know where that went.

I haven’t read the books but I have, finally, seen the entire first season of the Sy-Fy Network produced The Expanse series and…

…I’m torn.

On the one hand, the series features many elements I really admire in good sci-fi programming: A sober handling of the material.  A complex (but not complicated) plot.  Good special effects.  Appealing -for the most part- characters.

And yet…

Having seen the ten episode season, I’m left liking it enough to justify giving a second season of the show a try while also being curiously unfulfilled.

The Expanse imagines a future society some two hundred years from now wherein humanity is divided between three solar system locations:  Earth, Mars, and the Asteroid Belt.  The relations between those on either settings is very strained and it appears war is almost certain to come.

We start the series with an intriguing mystery: A woman we soon find named Julie Mao (Florence Faivre), is trapped within a spaceship and manages to break her way out of it, only to find the crew within all dead and a very strange crystalline structure growing within the ship.

From there we are presented the three main leads/groups:

On Earth we follow the political machinations of Chrisjen Avasarala (Shohreh Aghdashloo) who works for the U.N. and worries recent events have pushed Earth and Mars on a course of war.  However, she’s suspicious and careful…she doesn’t want to advocate war without first investigating what is causing the perceived Martian aggression and whether it is real or not.  Mrs. Avasarala is also a political animal who is not above betraying her dearest friends in the search for the truth.

In the Asteroid Belt space station Ceres, Detective Joe Miller (Thomas Jane) is tasked with finding Julie Mao.  We follow the cynical Miller around the station and while doing his work and find there is plenty of corruption and general human wear and tear to be found out in space.  Ultimately, Detective Miller finds himself more involved in this case than he thought he would be.

Finally, we follow the crew of the ice trawler Canterbury as they pick up their latest load of ice and are heading back to port when they receive a distress call.  The Captain and most of the officers fear the call is a fake and that Space Pirates (or worse) await them and therefore chose to ignore the signal.  However, James Holden (Steven Strait), the just promoted Executive Officer of the ship, forces the Captain’s hand (without anyone else knowing) and the Canterbury sends a small rescue ship with Holden within it to check the distressed ship out.

It turns out the distress signal was a ruse and a mysterious vessel appears.  It fires upon the Canterbury and destroys it.  Because of the Canterbury’s debris field, Holden and the other four officers within the rescue vessel manage to evade the attackers but are left stranded in a nearly destroyed rescue vessel.  They believe the Martians were to blame for this provocative act and, when they are eventually picked up by a Martian Battleship, they fear the worst.

However, it turns out the Martians didn’t destroy the Canterbury.  It soon becomes very clear someone out there wants Earth to think they did.

Can war be averted?  What is Julie Mao’s role in this mystery?  And what is that strange crystalline material that took over her ship?

Most of the questions are answered in the first season of The Expanse but just because they’re answered doesn’t mean they’re resolved.

In fact, this is part of the reason the first season of this show left me so unsatisfied.  We’re given this weird and interesting mystery and in the end we kinda/sorta know all the players but we’re still left wondering why all these elements are put into place.

There are also a host of little things that, for me, didn’t work as well as the show’s creators thought they would.  For example, I never felt the fevered need for Detective Miller to push push push in resolving the mystery of Julie Mao.  His character is probably the most cliched one in the show, your “cynical” detective who suddenly finds he cannot let something bad just go by.  Perhaps because of the fractured nature of the storytelling Detective Miller’s change never felt natural.

Further, when another character tells him he pursues the mystery of Mao so feverishly because he’s “fallen in love” with her, I shook my head.  By the show’s climax it felt like the show’s creators were indeed trying to prove this was the case but to me I never felt that to be the case.  The storytelling here, in the end, was rather weak.

As for U.N. envoy Chrisjen Avasarala, her story never quite ties in as directly as that of Miller and Holden, who actually join forces together at the show’s climax.  While it is true she is seeking information that relates to the behind the scenes elements that caused Mao’s disappearance, I felt her scenes were never as clever or engaging as those of Miller or Holden.

Finally, with regard to Holden and his motley crew, they proved to be the most interesting characters in the story but even their story line had some issues.  I can buy they head to the derelict and witness the Canterbury’s destruction and narrowly escape the same fate but what follows proves harder and harder to swallow.  I don’t want to get into too many SPOILERS here, but suffice to say mega-destruction follows in Holden and his group’s wake and after a while one couldn’t help but admire their incredible luck in avoiding annihilation so many times.

Finally, and as mentioned above, we really aren’t given much of a story resolution here.  The first season of The Expanse feels like a prolonged introduction to events and people but ends without us knowing all that much as to what the heck is going on.  Sure, we find out what Mao was up to.  We find out what happened to her.  But we don’t know any of the “whys” here and that’s frustrating.  What’s up with the crystals?  Why do certain people want there to be war between Mars and Earth?  Why did they do what they did on Eros station?

It’s frustrating to spend nearly ten hours on a show and still have no idea about so many things.

Despite the negatives enumerated above, there was still enough intriguing material to warrant my catching a second season.  I just hope we’re given more answers than were provided in the first ten episode arc.  Otherwise, I might just give up.

TV

Sherlock: The Abominable Bride (2016) a (very mildly) belated review

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If you haven’t watched any of the Benedict Cumberpatch/Martin Freeman Sherlock movies, you’ve missed out on something truly special and should check them out.

Go ahead, I’m waiting.

Seriously, with perhaps a single exception, Sherlock could well be one of the greatest things to make their way to television in these past couple of years.  The idea behind the series is to make adaptations of Sir Conan Arthur Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories but set them in modern times.

Benedict Cumberpatch rocketed to superstardom as Sherlock Holmes but equally effective is Martin Freeman as the sardonic Dr. Watson.  The two play off each other magnificently and the movies presented are alternatively hilarious, incredibly clever, and eminently watchable.

(I mentioned above that there was one exception.  That would be the adaptation of perhaps the most famous of the Sherlock Holmes stories, The Hound of the Baskervilles.  Sadly, of all the Sherlock episodes made, this proved to be the most confusing one, to me)

On New Year’s Day, the BBC released The Abonimable Bride, a special “one-off” Sherlock film that had our intrepid characters going back in time to the era Sherlock Holmes is most associated, the late 1800’s.

I’m so tempted to get into details regarding the episode but all that would do is spoil things so I won’t.  I will say this, however: This might well be one of the absolute best of the Sherlock episodes/movies ever made.  It is clever, engaging, hilarious (some of the dialogue!  I would kill to write such clever dialogue!), and incredibly surprising.

When it was over I was absolutely blown away by what I had just seen.

The story, in short: In late 19th Century London, a woman in a wedding dress appears to go crazy on the balcony of her apartment and fires at people down below.  Ultimately, she puts the barrel of one of her revolvers in her mouth and blows her brains out.

She’s dead, it would appear, yet her husband, who is about to head out to identify her corpse, is confronted by his wife in her wedding dress.  He sees her and positively identifies her before witnesses…before she kills him with a shotgun.  She then vanishes but her corpse is still in the morgue!

How could a dead woman kill her husband?

Holmes is tasked to solve the mystery but is unable to.  A year later, he is presented with a new mystery…and the ghostly bride appears to have returned from the grave to seek out another victim.

Great, great stuff.

I’m once again tempted to go into SPOILERS but I won’t.

Suffice to say, this “old fashioned setting” episode plays an intricate role in the Sherlock series though, on the surface, it would appear not to.

For those who haven’t seen the series, you simply must try to catch it.  For those who have, The Abominable Bride might well be one of the very best episodes of the series ever created.

I’m not kidding here: Sherlock, and The Abominable Bride in particular, is television at its very best.

TV

Ash Vs. Evil Dead, Season One (2015): A (mildly) belated review

I’m going to come right out and say it: I loved the first season of Ash Vs. Evil Dead, for the most part, but really –really- hated the ending.  (A quick counterpoint from i09: How Ash Vs. Evil Dead Took Everything We Loved From The Movies And Made It Better).

If you know anything at all about the Evil Dead films (the original Evil Dead, Evil Dead II, and Army of Darkness) and actor/God Bruce Campbell, there’s nothing I can add to the myth/legend that is Ashley “Ash” J. Williams, the “hero” of these three films and the new Starz! series Ash Vs. Evil Dead.

Good ol’ Ash (Bruce Campbell, of course), like all of us is a little older but -hopefully unlike all of us- not at all wiser than he was in the original series of films.  He’s still full of those delightful, often vulgar wisecracks and smart ass comments that endeared him to legions of fans, of which I’m one.

The Ash Vs. Evil Dead series started out incredibly strong with a premiere episode directed by Sam Raimi, who was the director of the previous three original Evil Dead movies (the less said about the modern remake, the better).  One of the biggest problems subsequent episodes of the series had was that Mr. Raimi didn’t direct any of the other 9 episodes and, while the other directors didn’t do a bad job by any stretch, that premiere episode looked and flowed, to my mind, much better than what followed.  Please note this was not a critical problem with the bulk of the series but became more noticeable when we reached the the last two to three episodes of the season.  It was in the climactic moments I wished Mr. Raimi was there, directing us through the greatest mayhem.

I’ll get back to the first season’s climax in a moment.

So the plot of the show goes like this: Ash screws up yet again and while stoned and with his latest “girlfriend” reads from the cursed Book of the Dead, the Lovecraftian Necronomicon.  Of course, this releases a new wave of deadly demons/deadites.

Ash comes to this realization and while in his dull Superstore job he reluctantly gathers his coworkers Pablo Simon Bolivar (Ray Santiago) and Kelly Maxwell (Dana DeLorenzo) and off they go together to try to end the deadite menace once and for all.

Meanwhile FBI agent Amanda Fisher (Jill Marie Jones) also has an encounter with the strange and this leads her to believe Ash is behind the menace.  We’re concurrently introduced to the mysterious Ruby Knowby (Lucy Lawless who, for most of the ten episodes is but a cameo player), who eventually joins forces with Agent Fisher in her pursuit of Ash.

The episodes that follow are filled with gory, bloody effects mixed with hilarious dialogue that further proves Ash is a blowhard fool.  The show, however, shows us that deep beneath the swagger lies a man who genuinely wants to do the right thing even with his mental handicap(s).

Again, this is played to great effect and I absolutely loved -and relished!- every moment Bruce Campbell’s Ash opened his mouth, so eager was I to hear the latest silliness he was about to utter.  My favorite line of the series came early and is found at the 50 second mark of the series’ trailer and concerns…churros?

So the series proceeded and characters got together and eventually made their way -it was logical- to the cabin in the woods that birthed the whole mess in Evil Dead and Evil Dead II.

Repeating once again: While the direction in these concluding episodes wasn’t terrible by any stretch of the imagination, one can’t help but compare the cabin scenes in Ash Vs. Evil Dead with those of the movies, particularly Evil Dead II.  And when one does this, one can’t help but feel that the Sam Raimi directed movie had a greater manic energy and humor and, once again (redux), one comes away wishing Mr. Raimi was again at the helm during these episodes.

Moving away from the direction, the crux of my critique lies in the way the series “ended”.  Or, rather, didn’t.

Evil Dead II, the movie that most resembles Ash Vs. Evil Dead, gave us a great story which had a definite ending.  It was then followed by a coda meant to get us interested in more Evil Dead material.  This coda was the jumping off point into Army of Darkness.

Unfortunately with Ash Vs. Evil Dead, we get a great story but even with the 10 episodes of approximately half an hour each for a total run-time of five or so hours, when all is said and done what we were given was nothing more than an introduction to a story.

Ash Vs. Evil Dead’s conclusion wasn’t much of one at all.  Through the series we move from place to place and reach that cursed cabin in the woods but instead of getting a conclusion to the story we’re effectively told the story is about to happen (hello, season 2!) and this disappointed me tremendously.

We still don’t know who/what exactly Ruby Knowby is.  Sure we were given some big hints but she remains an enigma that will obviously be dealt with in greater detail in the future.  Worse was the fate of another of the main characters (I won’t get into spoilers here) who wound up being nothing more than an overglorified victim.

As for the remaining characters, including Ash, its obvious his fight against the deadites has just begun.

In sum, I loved loved loved Ash Vs. Evil Dead…up to the conclusion which I felt wasn’t much of one.

Given the amount of joy the series offered versus that disappointing final five or so minutes, I suppose Ash would likely say, “quit your bitchin’, there’s a second season on the way”.

Of course that’s true.  And you know what?  I’ll be right there to see it.

Alright, I’ll quit my bitchin’.  Despite my reservations regarding the conclusion, I HIGHLY recommend the first season of Ash Vs. Evil Dead to anyone who likes their gory horror mixed with some hilarious -and vulgar- comedy.

Just go into this realizing that the full story will take at least two seasons to tell…I hope!

Movies, TV

Ash vs Evil Dead: “El Jefe” (2015) episode review

He’s back and I couldn’t be happier.

Count me among those who loves Bruce Campbell’s Ashley “Ash” J. Williams character featured in the films The Evil Dead (1981), Evil Dead II (1987) and Army of Darkness (1992).

Which means that with this past Halloween weekend premiere of “El Jefe”, the first episode of Starz! Ash vs Evil Dead, it has been a mind boggling twenty three years since we’ve seen a healthy dose of our anti-hero/screwup in action.  Sure, Mr. Campbell made a cameo appearance as Ash at the very end (after the credits) of the disappointing 2013 remake/reimaging of Evil Dead, but that’s all it was, a few seconds’ long cameo…

Here we finally, finally get what we asked for: Ash front and center doing what he does best: Kick demonic ass while simultaneously making an ass out of himself.

For that’s what the crew behind the original Evil Dead films discovered: That graphic, splatter horror could be merged with comedy to create something unique for these times.  While this wasn’t an entirely new idea (years before Abbott and Costello meet up with, among others, Frankenstein, the Wolfman, Dracula etc), the character of Ash, a knucklehead with a penchant for spouting some of the strangest/hilarious lines…

…was.  He’s a clod, a dim bulb.  An arrogant, selfish fool who nonetheless has one very unique ability: To effectively fight evil.  Though the first Evil Dead movie was more of a straight up horror film, it was in the second Evil Dead this unique comic-Ash character really flowered.  The clip above, from Army of Darkness, continued and expanded on that interpretation.  Ash was the dufus character from a comedy that just happened to find himself in a full fledged horror feature.

Happily, Ash vs Evil Dead follows that path beautifully.  Though older, Ash is certainly no wiser.  In fact, other than dentures and a bigger belly, he’s the exact same fool fans have come to know and love.

The first episode of this 10 episode series (with a second season already approved!  Yay!) succinctly re-establishes Ash while introducing us to his modern world, a place where he’s still a low level worker at the “Value Stop” chain (alas, the S-Smart found in Army of Darkness -and indeed all the elements present in that movie- could not be used in this show as that film is owned by another studio.  No big deal: Strong continuity isn’t an important element in the Evil Dead universe).  Ash also remains a lothario, readying himself in comical fashion in the opening scenes to cruise down to a seedy looking bar and pick up the only woman in the establishment…by lying and boasting about how he lost his hand (one can imagine how many times before he’s used this pick up line).

But all is (of course) not well and Ash realizes the evil he faced all those years before may be back.  And the person responsible for its return could be…Ash himself.

I won’t go into all the details of this episode but we are introduced to a larger cast of characters who will accompany Ash on this new adventure.  Some, like Lucy Lawless‘ Lucy appear only for a few seconds in this episode while three other regulars are given more time.  Whether there are more characters to join in this journey, I’m not sure.

Yet.

If you’re at all into Evil Dead and, more specifically, the legend that is Ash, you’ll have a blast with this new series’ first episode.  Let’s hope what follows is up to this highly entertaining premiere.