The fall movie season is a bit of an oddity these days. Ever since the movie studios found out they could make billions off of superheroes and Star Wars, first the spring movie season started filling up with movies that would feel more at home during the summer, then the winter season as well. But the fall season has been relatively untouched with these kinds of movies as that was always the time of year that films were released with higher expectations than making wheelbarrows full of money, these were Oscar hopeful movies. While there are still a lot of movies due out that have Academy Awards on their minds this fall, there’s quite a few as well that feel more like summer blockbusters than award winners.
The Predator – September, 14
The Predator
What was originally due out this summer before being pushed to the fall, the third film in the Predator franchise, unless you count those awful Aliens vs Predator movies of a few years ago and who wants to do that!? The Predator marks the return of Shane Black (Iron Man 3, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang) to the sci-fi genera. Black co-starred as Hawkins and did some on-set rewriting on the first film. The Predator looks to move the action from the jungles of Central America in Predator and Los Angeles in Predator 2 to a rain-soaked little town where the only thing standing between the population and total destruction are a rag-tag team of special forces soldiers being carted off to prison.
Venom – October, 5
Venom
There’s some confusion with this one. Starring Tom Hardy, technically Venom takes place in the same film universe as the fan-favorite Spider-Man: Homecoming movie, except if reports are to be believed out of the San Diego Comic-Con your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man won’t be making an appearance in this one. And it almost seems as if Sony is positioning Venom, who’s been the nemesis of Spider-Man in the comics for 30 years now and even appeared in Spider-Man 3, to be more an anti-hero than a villain. Think Punisher rather than Ultron and that sounds more in-line with this new movie version of the character.
Halloween – October, 19
Halloween (2018)
This latest version of Halloween will be the TENTH sequel to the original film and will bring back Jamie Lee Curtis in the Laurie Strode role she originated in the first film and has reprised on and off the last 40 years. This new Halloween reportedly ignores everything after Halloween II (1981) — though how can anyone ignore that ear-worm of a song “ten more days ’til Halloween” from Halloween III: Season of the Witch?
The Girl in the Spider’s Web – November, 9
The 2011 film The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was supposed to be the first of a series of movies taken from the novels of Stieg Larsson directed by David Fincher and starring Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig. But for whatever reason it was decided to cast aside that creative team and start anew this time with director Fede Alvarez (Don’t Breathe) and co-stars Claire Foy and Sverrir Gudnason in the Mara/Daniel roles respectively.
Maybe Fincher’s vision for the Dragon Tattoo sequels was too intense since the movie did decently enough at the box office for something not starring super-heroes?
Alita: Battle Angel trailer
TV
Freaks and Geeks
Freaks and Geeks
Recently, I caught a documentary about the TV series Freaks and Geeks and had some memories of my own to share of this gem of a show.
I remember when Freaks and Geeks premiered it was difficult to see new episodes. NBC seemed to either air a lot of repeats or they moved the show around a lot to different timeslots.
I remember that the episode “Kim Kelly is My Friend” was controversial for its time and didn’t run in my area during the series original run.
In fact, I didn’t see all of the episodes of Freaks and Geeks until Fox Family reran the series in 2000 as there were a few episodes including “Kim Kelly is My Friend” that never aired on NBC.
When Fox Family began rerunning Freaks and Geeks and premiering unaired episodes I started recording the show on my EyeTV which was a device that allowed you to record a cable signal to your computer and save shows as MPGs. While I’m pretty sure I recorded the entire run this way, I’m also pretty sure I never watched them other than maybe the one time since the files it produced them were small and SD cable grainy too.
In 2003 or 2004 Shout! Factory promoted a DVD set of the entire series, urging people to preorder the set since this might be their only chance to own this, then, forgotten series on home media. Of course I ponied up something like $120 for the set.
I didn’t realize the TV series In Search Of… which was hosted by Leonard Nimoy had such a long life. I only discovered the show which originally ran from 1977 to 1982 in syndication when History Channel began airing old episodes of it in the 1990s alongside things like Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World. But while there were just 13 episodes of the Arthur C Clark series, there were more than 140 of In Search Of….
In Search Of… covered everything in the pseudoscience arena, from UFOs, to ghosts, the Bermuda Triangle, Atlantis… and everything in between. Most of episodes asked a lot of questions but didn’t provide a lot of answers. Hence pseudoscience.
Ironically, where In Search Of… was an oddity on a channel in the 1990s that aired lots of documentaries and series about historical things, nowadays the simply titled History instead aires a lot of reality series like Forged in Fire and Mountain Men along with pseudoscience series of their own like Ancient Aliens. So I suppose it makes a lot of sense to reboot In Search Of… for a new generation.
Hosted by Zachary Quinto — who ironically like Nimoy also played Spock in Star Trek — this new 21st century version is essentially the old series all over again. The first episode covered UFOs and had the ubiquitous interview with three people who claim to have been abducted; one failed a polygraph test about his experiences, the other had an “implant” in a toe that turned out to be a rock while a third built a contraption so non-abductees can feel what it’s like to have that experience. There were also interviews with scientists too who were searching for extraterrestrial intelligence. Spoiler alert, nothing found… yet.
There’s nothing new in this overly long and drawn-out at an hour 2018 version of *In Search Of…” that hadn’t already been done before 40 years ago in the old. Since we’re living in 2018 and not 1977 the questions I would’ve liked answered are — if we live in a world that’s increasingly being constantly recorded from security cameras outside businesses to cameras within people’s doors and if essentially everyone on the planet are carrying around cameras in their mobile phones 24/7, then why aren’t we recording evidence of UFOs and abductions on a regular basis rather than less than before? To me that would’ve made an interesting episode, not the same thing that’s been done over and over and over again for decades now.
So far the new In Search Of… is just that, a lot of looking but not a lot of finding.
Doctor Who “Shada” animated special
I don’t think people are ever going to uncover a “lost” episode of Star Trek. All of the episodes of that show that were ever shot have aired, are available in many home media formats and it’s not like there were any episodes that were aired once and never seen again. Sure, maybe they’ll find clips of episode or reels of henceforth unknown behind the scenes footage of DeForest Kelley eating a hamburger on the bridge of the Enterprise, but not a whole episode people haven’t seen in years. However, that’s not the case for classic Doctor Who series. That show has nearly 100 episodes that are considered lost that aired a few times but the original archival tapes either went missing, were destroyed or taped over.
Shada
But just because those episodes are lost today doesn’t mean that they won’t be found tomorrow. In fact just a few years ago a batch of episodes were uncovered in Africa. However, not all episodes like this can be found, case in point “Shada” which originally was set to air during the 1979–1980 season. That episode, written by Douglas Adams, yes, that Douglas Adams, was partially shot but never finished due to a work strike. So with “Shada” it’s the case of BBC having some completed footage but not enough for a whole episode. What they’ve done is to put together an episode that’s partially composed of these already filmed live-action elements as well as portions of the episode that were created via animation like “The Power of the Daleks from a few years ago to fill in these gaps.
“Shada” is interesting if a bit difficult to watch for a non-Doctor Who fan. In fact, I think even fans of the modern Doctor Who series probably wouldn’t dig “Shada” — Matt Smith obsessives probably need not apply here. “Shada” is difficult to watch partially because the classic stories were always a bit slow — there’s a part of the episode that features the Doctor and his companion taking a long, leisurely boat ride down a river — and also because the switch from live-action to animation can be quite jarring. Because TV shows aren’t filmed in order means that a character can be outside one second in a live-action scene and walk through door into an animated scene.
“Shada” is for die-hard Doctor Who fans only, and luckily since I’m a die-hard Doctor Who fan it means “Shada” is for me.
Killing Eve
Can I talk about Killing Eve for a moment? This series has won loads of critical acclaim and an Emmy nomination and was a show I was excited to see before it premiered. That was before BBC America advertised it into the ground for me. Before the first episode aired BBC America began promoting the show like most networks do for new and upcoming series. But they didn’t just promote it, they promoted it several times each commercial break. Which meant that every time I watched an episode of The X-Files or Star Trek I’d see ten commercials for Killing Eve every hour. Watch a few episodes of anything on BBC America and you can see why I quickly grew tired of Killing Eve before it ever aired. I can still hear that, “I have to kill you, I’m really sorry,” song echoing around in my head from hearing it so much on the commercials.
So I never watched an episode of Killing Eve. And again, it’s getting great reviews so it’s my loss, but I figured that once the first season ended in May BBC America would be done with it until next year. Except they weren’t/aren’t. They’re still airing promos for the show only this time telling views to “binge” Killing Eve this summer and ones congratulating Sandra Oh for her Emmy nomination.
I give up, BBC America, you win. If I publicly say that Killing Eve is the best show on the planet even though I’ve never seen an episode will you please stop airing commercials for this show?
Here’s everything I’ve seen this year that’s new, or that I missed seeing in 2017.
The kids of It
It: I liked this one a lot and was very happy to see a Stephen King movie that’s horror-related finally get some love. See this one if you love Stranger Things but want more scares with your side of 1980s nostalgia.
Justice League: I still don’t understand the online vitriol against this movie. I liked Justice League. I didn’t think it was the best movie ever but I certainly didn’t think it was bad. See this one if you dig superhero movies and have an open mind.
Movies I’ve seen so far in 2018.
The Cloverfield Paradox: This surprise movie that was announced during the Super Bowl and premiered right after on Netflix is a fun, well-crafted sci-fi yarn about astronauts stuck on a space station fighting the unknown. See this one if you don’t demand that every movie you see be groundbreaking.
Avengers: Infinity War
Mute: Another Netflix sci-fi flick, Mute takes place in a near-future that’s depressingly a lot like out own. More importantly, it’s a kind’a sort’a sequel to the movie Moon. See this one if you’re ever jonesing for a sci-fi fix.
Black Panther: I liked Black Panther if I thought at times it was a little cluttered in the story department. See this one if… who am I kidding, based on the box office returns you’ve already seen this one.
Avengers: Infinity War: Infinity War is the Marvel team-up movie to top all Marvel team-up movies with all the heroes together to fight a big baddie. See this one if you don’t necessarily always need to know what’s happening on-screen, but like watching things go “boom.”
Deadpool 2
Deadpool 2: The hilarious sequel to Deadpool both manages to differentiate itself from the original while being just as funny as that first film. See this one if you like to have a good time while watching movies.
Solo: A Star Wars Story: Another movie that was ravaged by online reviews, I quite liked Solo and thought it was a very strong Star Wars movie. See this one because this might be your last chance to see the character of Han Solo on-screen for a while.
Annihilation: Finally a movie this year I didn’t like. I loved the novel this one’s based on and couldn’t wait to check it out but found Annihilation slow and dull. Honestly, I couldn’t make it through this one and shut it off with about 20 minutes left. See this one if you’re looking for an all-natural sleep aid.
Go Team Venture! The Art and Making of the Venture Bros.
Out nearly a year after it was originally scheduled to be released — though series creators Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer have a habit of turning in things late — comes Go Team Venture! The Art and Making of the Venture Bros.
Ken Plume sits down with series creators Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer to have a conversation about the creation of every single episode through season 6 and much more. From the earliest sketches of Hank and Dean scribbled in a notebook to pitching the series to Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, learning the ins and outs of animation, character designs for each season, storyboards, painted backgrounds, and behind-the-scenes recollections of how the show came together–it’s all here.
This week a brand new edition of the collected RONIN story by Frank Miller is set to be released. Though I’ve read the RONIN story before and own an issue or two of the original comic series, I don’t actually own the collected edition so I might pick this one up.
Frank Miller’s six-issue miniseries RONIN returns in a new trade paperback! It’s the tale of a 13th century samurai who is reborn in a futuristic 21st century New York City with one last chance to regain his honor: he must defeat the reincarnation of his master’s killer, an ancient demon called Agat. This new edition includes promotional art, fold-out pages and more special features.
There’s nothing on TV to watch these days. Of course I jest, mostly. But whereas a few months ago I was watching loads of shows, and even a few weeks ago my DVR was still recording several things to watch each week, these days it’s mostly barren. I mean, when all you’re recording in a week are old episodes of This Old House and NOVA you know you’re in trouble.
It doesn’t help matters that the start of July is a sort’a dead-zone for TV here in the US. Most of the series that debuted last fall are done and those that weren’t cancelled are in hibernation. And while there are a few new things here and there premiering on streaming services — for the most part the new shows that will premiere on cable and network next fall TV have just gone into production and won’t start airing episodes for months.
Whereas before I’d spend the week looking forward to checking out new shows, for the most part in the heat of summer I’ve been watching reruns of things like The X-Files and Doctor Who.
One interesting thing about The X-Files… When the series originally ran I was all about the episodes that dealt with the series spanning conspiracy story that ran through the show. And while I also dug the stand-alone “monster of the week” episodes, back then they were second best to Mulder and Scully finding out who was really behind all those UFO abductions. Nowadays that’s flipped. Whenever there’s a conspiracy episode on I usually change the channel, but adore the “monster of the week” ones. I’m not sure if it was because at the time The X-Files originally aired those conspiracy episodes felt timely and I was dying to learn the truth that the truth really was out there or if in the intervening years after having watched hundreds of hours of the show and two films I realized there wasn’t anything to the conspiracy story. It was a bust, so why watch them all again today?
Which makes me wonder. If part of the reason shows like The X-Files are still airing in syndication today is because of the stand-alone “monster of the week episodes,” where does that leave most modern series today that have no stand-alone episodes and are all series spanning stories?
Anyway, there’s not a lot on TV these days to watch. In addition to watching episodes of old sci-fi and horror series I’ve already seen before I’ve been watching films too. Well, “films” might be too fancy a word — I’ve been watching “movies” like Total Recall and Bright Lights Big City that I’ve just happened to catch on TV, recorded and watched later. I do that quite a bit.
Looking out the next few weeks TV-wise it doesn’t look like there’s much relief in sight. I’m still working my way through GLOW and should probably go back and finish up The Santa Clarita Diet and Lost in Space, but as for new shows in the month of July there’s really only the reboot of In Search Of on History that I’m looking forward to and perhaps Castle Rock on HULU. I mean, Castle Rock is a show based on the works of Stephen King that’s being executive produced by J. J. Abrams which sure sounds interesting to me. The big drawback is that it’s on HULU. Which I don’t get. And I’ve made a commitment to myself not to subscribe to any other streaming services just to checkout a show or two.
Even if this summer when there’s really nothing on TV and Star Trek: Discovery is practically calling to me on CBS All Access saying, “There are new episodes here!” makes it really hard to not pull out my credit card and subscribe for a month or two and binge watch some Starfleet action.
Who would have ever guessed that a series about the 1980s female TV wrestling program GLOW: Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling would be so good? The second season of the drama GLOW on Netflix debuted Friday and picked up right where the first season left off. If the first season was about the girls of GLOW lead by Alison Brie and Betty Gilpin banding together to make something out of nothing — even if it’s a women’s wrestling program that airs on local TV — then the second is about what happens when these same girls realize that if they’re all not looking out for themselves, no one will.
The cast of GLOW
The story of GLOW is complex. On the one hand it’s about these wild, over-the-top comic book-esque characters doing all these nutty and crazy things in a wrestling ring. They’ve got names like “Zoya the Destroya,” “Liberty Bell” and “The Welfare Queen” with over-the-top personalities to match. On the other hand these characters are played by “real” people like Ruth Wilder (Brie) an actress who hasn’t quite figured out how to make it in Hollywood and accidentally finds herself at a GLOW audition and realizes this might be her only chance at fame, Debbie Eagan (Gilpin) another actress who did make it in Hollywood for a time before having a baby derailed her career and Tammé Dawson (Kia Stevens) who plays the “Welfare Queen” in the ring but in “real life” has a son who’s attending Stanford and is willing to do anything, even play the “Welfare Queen” on TV, to keep him there.
And these are just a few of the deep and interesting characters of GLOW.
I kind’a sort’a wonder if the second season of GLOW will mark the beginning of the end of the fictional show within-the-show of the same name? While the real GLOW: Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling turned out to be very influential, it only ran for four seasons and then only in syndication. I wonder if that’s where the fictional GLOW is headed too? The first episode is kind’a setting things up that way with director Sam Sylvia (Marc Maron) firing one of the girls for insubordination, Eagan renegotiating her contract for more money and a producer credit on the show and Wilder finding out that her spirit of “all for one, one for all” might be wasted on GLOW.
The fictional GLOW looks like a fun place to visit but it’s a facade, the “real life” place the actors of GLOW live in is just as unforgiving as our own.
Westworld
Westerns and sci-fi usually don’t go very well together. Whenever these genera meet it’s usually not very pretty — Cowboys vs Aliens immediately pops to mind. However, the exception to that rule is the marvelous Westworld series on HBO that mixes both genres together into something both new and familiar that wrapped up its second season last week.
Ed Harris and Evan Rachel Wood
In Westworld, it’s the future at the park of the same name guests can come and interact with the robotic “hosts” in a place that looks and feels like the real wild west. But the guests aren’t interested in playing nice with the hosts, many of them are there play out every dark fantasy they’ve ever had in a consequence-free environment during their stay. Much of the first season of Westworld had a distinctly Philip K. Dick vibe going on and dealt with a software glitch that caused many of the hosts to realize the true nature of the reality they’re trapped in and want to rebel.
The focus of the second season of Westworld is on the rebellion and its aftermath, told in two separate timelines. Here, once meek and mild host Dolores (Rachel Evan Wood) now leads a band of robots doing to whatever guests they find along the way that had been done to them over the years. But they’re not just out for blood, they’re also trying to find the fabled “valley beyond” and escape from the park. In a parallel story another group lead by ex-madam Maeve (Thandie Newton) who can control and reprogram other hosts on the fly searches the park for her daughter while guest William (Ed Harris) is trying to find the real meaning of Westworld hidden somewhere inside its borders. And that’s not even mentioning Bernard’s (Jeffrey Wright) story of, shall we say, “self discovery” in the second season of the show too.
Jeffrey Wright and Tessa Thompson
If the first season was Philip K. Dick then the second was a bit of that along with Solaris with Terminator thrown in for good measure.
I really enjoyed the second season of Westworld if I was a bit confused at finale episode. There were a few too many twists and turns and “is this taking place in the past or future?” in the finale for me to keep them all straight. There were a lot of stories all going on in the second season, probably too many to be neatly wrapped up in one episode which Is what I felt happened in the last one. In addition to wrapping things up and clipping dangling storylines, there was also a bit of new story, getting things ready for the third season of the show due out sometime next year in the finale.
I think it would have made more sense to rather than try and wrap everything up in the finale, to instead only finish some of the storylines and continue others next season.
The Expanse
There once was a time when The Sci-Fi Channel was the destination for quality science fiction programming. In addition to airing lots of classic sci-fi shows, they also aired series like Farscape, Stargate SG–1 and the Battlestar Galactica reboot in addition to doing things like creating mini-series like Dune. But over the years things changed and as The Sci-Fi Channel chased the bottom line into the ground airing things like professional wrestling and cheap-o movies like the Sharknado series while also changing their name to SYFY, fans of the genera slowly began abandoning the channel for other venues. However, a few years back new management seeing how well sci-fi was doing on other venues decided to once again air more original sci-fi programming on SYFY, one of the first shows of this new slate was The Expanse.
The cast of The Expanse
Great from the very beginning, The Expanse is set in the near-future where mankind is living on the Earth, Mars and throughout the solar system and is still struggling with all the things we struggle with today. But when a mysterious alien artifact is discovered that threatens the entire human race, humanity must band together or face extinction. The Expanse was the first show in a long while to return to the genera of “people in big ships zooming around in outer space” and is a show that seemed like it was made for me. Over the three seasons of The Expanse I only loved it more as the story of the series changed and shifted from what started out in the first season to the current third season.
If the first season and second seasons were about the lead-up to war because of this artifact, then the third was about this war breaking out. Which I figured was going to take up the bulk of the third season of the The Expanse. But that’s not what happened. Rather than focus on this war, the creators of The Expanse instead stopped the conflict in its tracks and then jumped ahead many months into the future. Going from conflict to a weird sort of inter-solar system alliance to figure out what happened when the artifact changed into a … something.
The ships of The Expanse
And that’s where the second half of the third season of The Expanse spent its time, trying to figure out what this artifact had become while at the same time trying to keep the conflict that had just been capped from boiling back over into war.
Honestly, the third season of The Expanse was the best season of the show so far, and I was dying to see where the series was going to go from here.
Except that even before it ended SYFY announced that they were going to cancel The Expanse after its third season. Their reasoning was the ratings of the show were never what they wanted and that since the series had convoluted streaming deals in place that didn’t benefit SYFY they weren’t going to commission any more seasons of the show.
Which was a major bummer, but luckily the cancellation was short-lived as Amazon quickly stepped up and picked up the show for their Prime service.
Still, it burns me to no end how much SYFY has fallen from once being the home to sci-fi to the thing it is now. When I want to watch sci-fi I almost never turn to SYFY, I turn to places like BBC America that shows things like Star Trek and The X-Files, pay cable like HBO with Westworld and Fahrenheit 451 and online streaming services like Netflix with Stranger Things and Lost in Space. SYFY? I usually avoid it at all costs — even morso now that they dumped The Expanse.
Ironically, the big new “thing” that Syfy has been promoting as of late is them being the new home of the Harry Potter film franchise. The film franchise that at this point is a whopping 17 years old. The film franchise that has been playing on all sorts of other channels for those 17 years already.
The Expanse is new and fresh and I’m extremely excited that I’ll be able to watch new episodes of it on Prime (hopefully) next year. As for Harry Potter on Syfy? Give me a break.
A new edition of the critically acclaimed and highly influential Lone Wolf and Cub manga series is due out this week. This volume costs a whopping $100 but has reproduced the artwork at its original size and in original Japanese.
Kazuo Koikes samurai epic is a tour-de-force of graphic fiction, and the Lone Wolf and Cub Gallery Edition features selections of the late Goseki Kojima’s spectacular illustration reproduced at original size on heavy-stock art paper to preserve the work in detail as it exists today, as close as one can come to owning these rarest of artworks. Including in its entirety the final titanic clash between ogami Itto and Yagyu Retsudo. This deluxe volume is a must-have for collectors and enthusiasts of the finest comic art ever created.
