Feature – Page 14 – Dangerous Universe

Rewatchability

Feature, MoviesAugust 3, 2018August 3, 2018

How important is being about to watch a movie over and over again, something I call “rewatchability,” to you? It’s pretty important to me. I tend to rank movies I can watch over and over again higher against ones I can’t/don’t. And that’s not a knock against those movies I can’t watch over and over again, I quiet liked some of them when I originally saw them. It’s just that I’ve never gone back to them like I do with other movies.

I loved movies like Juno and Hot Fuzz in the theater, I even bought them on DVD when they were released, but so far I’ve never gone back and watched them again. I don’t know if it’s the tough subject matter that keeps me away from them or what? But so far with movies like those they are “one-view-wonders” for me.

And it’s not just movies like those two that I’ve only seen once. I think I’ve seen the movie Armageddon one and a half times and so far have only watched Doctor Strange once too even though I own them on home media. Though I think the “home media” version I own of Armageddon is VHS!

With a movie like Armageddon, I found that after you’ve seen it the first time, and admittedly the first time I saw it I was on the literal “edge of my seat,” the magic is gone. There’s not a lot of story holding the big action set pieces of Armageddon together and once you’ve been through the twists and turns of Armageddon once watching it again is a bit dull.

And with Doctor Strange, I saw the movie on home media after it came out and thought it was good. I didn’t think it was spectacular or anything, but I didn’t dislike it either. But as I sit here and write this a) I honestly can’t remember what the movie was about other than it had Dr. Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) becoming the master of the mystical arts and b) I honestly have no desire to watch the movie again to see what I’ve forgotten.

And to be quite honest — I feel the same way about Avengers: Infinity War too. I liked the movie when I saw it in the theater but honestly don’t have any plans to go back and check it out again when it comes out on home media.

Again, that’s not to say that Armageddon, Doctor Strange or Avengers: Infinity War are bad movies, just that watching them once is probably enough for me.

But then there are other movies I obsess over and watch again and again. These are movies I’ve watched so many times I can quote them practically line for line, I own them and also will watch whenever they’re on TV too. Movies like the original Star Wars trilogy I’ve seen more times than I can count and still end up watching them whenever they pop-up on cable. Even a movie like the 1989 Batman I remember watching over and over again on VHS is a film I own on Blu-ray and will still watch whenever it’s on TV.

Newer films like The Martian, Dredd and Mad Max: Fury Road too are ones I end up watching a lot. In fact, with these movies I have to force myself not to watch them when I see that they’re on, since I find that sometimes if I watch things too much I start disliking them.

I suppose in the end movie rewatchability doesn’t matter too much to the movie studios. All they’re concerned about is me paying for the movie at least once, either by buying a ticket or paying for the movie on home media — no matter what that is be it VHS, DVD, Blu-ray or digital download. After that it’s all “icing on the cake” for them.

But to me it is important. I love going through some movies again and again to see what I’ve missed and to view them in a new light as I grow older. Nothing makes me happier than to watch a movie I’ve seen a dozen times before again and catch something new that I’ve never noticed until that moment.

Direct Beam Comms #138

Direct Beam Comms, Feature, Movies, TVJuly 29, 2018July 28, 2018

Fall Movie Preview

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

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

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

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

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.

The Reading & Watch List

Cool Movie & TV Posters of the Week

Direct Beam Comms #137

Direct Beam Comms, Feature, Movies, TVJuly 22, 2018July 21, 2018

TV

In Search Of…

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.

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?

If this works for you contact me via this website. I am not joking.

Doctor Who season 11 commercial

Stranger Things season 3 teaser

Titans commercial

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5dIwGAYcWk

Nightflyers series promo

Better Call Saul season 4 teaser

Young Justice: Outsiders promo

Star Trek: Discovery season 2 promo

The Orville season 2 promo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiDvo-n2j38

Movies

Patient Zero trailer

Overlord trailer

Glass trailer — aka Spilt 2 or Unbreakable 2

Godzilla: King of the Monsters trailer

Aquaman trailer

Shazam! trailer

The Reading & Watch List

Astronomers discover 12 new moons orbiting Jupiter – one on collision course with the others

Cool Movie & TV Posters of the Week

Your Mission: Impossible, should you choose to accept…

Feature, MoviesJuly 20, 2018July 7, 2018

At this point, the Mission: Impossible movie franchise is more than 20 years old. While there are older film franchises out there, Star Wars and the Planet of the Apes spring to mind, what’s different with Mission: Impossible is that over the decades while some actors have come and gone the lead is still played by the same actor — Tom Cruise.

Released in 1996 and directed by Brian DePalma, Mission: Impossible was one of the early movies to bring classic TV series to the big screen. In the mid to late 1990s there were a spate of TV series to films like The Brady Bunch Movie and Lost in Space, some of which were successful and some of which were forgettable, but the one film series that’s still going today is Mission: Impossible.

That first movie featured Cruise as Ethan Hunt, a member of the “IMF” (Impossible Missions Force) that acts as a covert spy agency who, if they’re ever caught, their bosses will, famously, “deny all knowledge of (their) actions.” And, of course, things go wrong and Hunt, along with what’s left of his team and a few ex-IMF members have to figure out why their cover was blown and colleagues killed.

Most of the first movie deals with Hunt trying to get a list of all the active IMF agents and sell it to the bad guys, but not let the bad guys get full access to the list, to get to the bottom of this mystery.

I liked most of the Mission: Impossible sequels that followed but as I went back to do some research for writing this article was surprised to see just how different the newer movies are from the first few.

In Mission: Impossible there’s a few big action scenes. The first is when the mission goes bad at an embassy in Europe. The second is Hunt and his new team breaking into the CIA headquarters in Washington, DC to steal the list that features a stunt with Cruise suspended from the ceiling via wires since the room the list is in is so secure simply touching the ground will set off an alarm. And finally, there’s an action scene with Hunt on and on top of a high speed train inside the Chunnel as he fights the person who murdered most of his team while at the same time battling a helicopter that’s also flying inside the tunnel.

Honestly, the first Mission: Impossible is more of a 1990s techno-thriller in line with The Hunt for Red October than a pure action film like the series has become. The newer films, like most action movies these days, seem to instead be built around a four or five BIG action scenes that connected together with a bit of story.

For example, Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation (2015) starts with Hunt hanging onto the side of a plane for dear-life as it takes off, him chasing some bad guys on a mountain road via in a motorcycle chase as well as an underwater scene with Hunt trapped inside a piece of machinery as he has to do something or other.

The craziest thing is that the most intense stunts in the film with the airplane and motorcycles were actually performed by Cruise himself and not a double.

But as for the story of Rogue Nation? I really couldn’t tell you that. I know there was an evil Mission: Impossible force but other than the amazing action scenes that’s about all I can remember — and I own the movie and have seen it a few times.

Now comes the latest Mission: Impossible Fallout out July 27. This time too the movie features Cruise (now nearly as old as Jon Voight was when he played the senior “I stay back at the hotel while the young whipper-snappers go out and do all the dangerous things” Jim Phelps) really piloting a helicopter treacherously close to the side of a mountain and halo parachute jumping where he jumps from a great height but waits until he’s almost to the ground to open his ‘chute.

My question is will the story of Fallout be as interesting or as memorable as the original? Probably not. Will I be seeing Fallout? You bet’cha.

Direct Beam Comms #136

Direct Beam Comms, Feature, MoviesJuly 15, 2018July 14, 2018

Movies

Here’s everything I’ve seen this year that’s new, or that I missed seeing in 2017.

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.

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: 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.

Extinction movie trailer

Books & Comics

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.

From Dark Horse:

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.

Frank Miller’s RONIN

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.

From DC:

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.