Category: Feature

Direct Beam Comms #14

CategoriesDirect Beam Comms, Feature, Movies, Toys, TVPosted on

TV

The Carmichael Show

The Carmichael Show
The Carmichael Show

This first season of this hilarious comedy that’s a modern version of the classic series All in the Family aired last summer and now a second season begins tonight at 10PM(EST) on NBC after a preview last Wednesday. I liked the first season of The Carmichael Show a lot, but my only worry here is its timeslot; 10PM Sunday night?

It seems weird that NBC’s programming a comedy in a space almost always reserved for dramas and reality TV. So either NBC doesn’t really have faith in The Carmichael Show and is sticking it wherever they have a hole no matter if it fits or not, or they have A LOT of faith in the show and figure they can put it wherever and people will still watch it.

The Americans

One of the best series on TV, The Americans, returns for its fourth season this Wednesday on FX. Both a spy-drama and a family drama, The Americans focuses on the Jennings’ family with mom played by Keri Russell and dad Matthew Rhys who seem like normal yuppies but are really Soviet agents living and operating in early 1980s Washington DC which itself is interesting enough. But it’s when the added element of what the Jennings’ secrets are doing to their kids, more specifically their daughter played by Holly Taylor who learned of her parent’s double lives at the end of last season, is where The Amercians excels. Secrets and lies are a cancer for families. And while the Jennings might be brilliant agents, what they do for a living is slowly tearing their family to pieces.

What I find most interesting with The Americans is that with the benefit of knowing how history plays out between the USA and USSR, the Jennings are playing for the losing team. And no matter how brilliant they are in penetrating various governmental agencies and stealing secrets, at the end of the day nothing they do will have mattered. The CCCP won’t see the 1990s and all the the Jennings will have done is poisoned any hope that they or even their kids will have any happiness in the future.

Daredevil

All episodes of the second season of Daredevil on Netflix debut next Friday, March 18. How excited am I for the return of this show? Very! How excited am I with the Punisher being a character in this show? So frickin’ much my face is starting to hurt from all the smiling.

Movies

Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War – Trailer 2

“Underroos!”

10 Cloverfield Land

He is the law!
He is the law!

I wonder if the original Cloverfield had been more successful at the box office if the 10 Cloverfield Land sequel that’s not really a sequel would be more about giant monsters tearing apart major cities and less about people trapped in underground bunkers?

Toys

This Judge Dredd 1:4 Statue looks amazing. The design feels like it’s taken right from the 2012 Dredd movie. But it’s the price that’s not that amazing — a whopping $430!

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This week in pop-culture history

  • Kurt Russell aka Snake Plissken aka R.J. MacReady turns 65 and officially becomes a senior citizen on St. Patrick’s Day.
  • Forbiddon Planet opened in theaters 60 years ago this week in 1956.
  • Evil Dead II premiered in theaters in 1987.

Direct Beam Comms #13

CategoriesDirect Beam Comms, Feature, Movies, TVPosted on

TV

Hap and Leonard

For being a six-episode series, Hap and Leonard on Sundance Channel sure moves slow. Starring James Purefoy (John Carter), Michael K. Williams (Boardwalk Empire) and Christina Hendricks (Firefly), Hap and Leonard takes place in a deep south 1988 where Hap and Leonard prodded by Hap’s old girlfriend go looking for one million dollars supposedly at the bottom of a river lost after an accident from a 20 year old bank robbery.

The story is interesting enough and comes off as Elmore Leonard-lite. But it’s the pace that seems slow and off in the first episode. I mean, the story is about these people trying to find this lost money, yet all that really happens in the first episode are the introduction of this diverse and unique set of characters and that’s about it.

It’s like the story is primed and ready to go, only you’ll wait until the next episode to see how the story starts. B-

Movies

The Martian

Matt Damon in The Martian
Matt Damon in The Martian

The Martian is a good movie, maybe even a great sci-fi film. It’s essentially an update of the classic Robinson Crusoe story of a man marooned all alone on a hostile environment. But the twist here is that the man Mark Watney (Matt Damon) isn’t just marooned on an island, he’s marooned and is alone on the planet Mars and must use all his skills and whatever’s at hand to survive.

The Martian is kind’a sort’a a “last man” story except instead of being the last man on Earth, he’s The Last Man on Mars.

The Martian is an exciting flick from start to finish. From an opening storm that forces an astronaut explorer evacuation of Mars for everyone else, and looks a lot like the storm from the movie Prometheus which was also directed by Ridley Scott, to Watney’s eventual escape from the red planet are all work very well. If there’s one thing in the movie that I didn’t really buy it’s that in all the action of The Martian from engineers on Earth rushing a Mars bound supply launch to the crew that abandoned Mark flying to the Earth then back to Mars to attempt a rescue to Mark being stuck on Mars for over a year, stabbed once and blown up twice — that (huge spoiler alert) everyone lives to the end and no one dies even after taking all these gigantic risks is a bit of a stretch. A-

This week in pop-culture history

  • 1971 THX 1138 & The Andromeda Strain premiers in theaters
  • 1978 The TV series The Incredible Hulk debuts.

What did Doc Brown know?

CategoriesFeature, MoviesPosted on

I found myself wondering the other day after watching a marathon of Back to the Future movies; what exactly did Doc Brown know about what’s about to happen to Marty McFly when we first meet Brown at the beginning of Back to the Future? I suppose there are a few ways to look at this; first, that there’s one timeline in Back to the Future and the other that’s there’s at least two.

Back to the Future
Back to the Future

Let’s assume that there’s only one timeline. If this is the case then at the very least ’85 Doc Brown knew when he first met Marty McFly sometime in the early ‘80s that he was destined to send Marty back in time to ’55 where Brown would help him return to ’85 since all this had already happened to Brown. He’d also know that after he sent Marty home to ’85 another Marty, this one from slightly farther in the future from Marty #1, would have to be sent to the Old West to rescue the ’85 version of himself (Doc Brown) from death at the hands of Mad Dog Tannen.

I suppose the one thing this Doc Brown wouldn’t know is if McFly was successful or not at that rescue. In fact, for all ’55 Doc Brown knows, both McFly and the older Doc Brown were stuck in 1885 for good.

So for much of Doc Brown’s life he’s known what’s going to happen next to himself big-picture-wise. That he’s going to invent the time circuit, since his future self has already sent McFly back in time and he’s seen this creation in ’55, and that he’s going to meet this McFly kid at some point in the ‘80s too.

All of which is true unless there’s more than one timeline in Back to the Future.

Back to the Future Part II
Back to the Future Part II

Let’s assume here that the minute that Marty McFly goes back in time to ’55 from ’85 that another timeline was created. The first timeline would be a past McFly doesn’t go back in time and while Marty’s parents do get together, they and the McFly family don’t have the best of lives.

But when Marty goes back to ’55 in Back to the Future he creates an alternate timeline where he changes things. He meets Doc Brown and gives his father George the confidence to knock Biff Tannen out and woo Elaine. And by doing this Marty effectively changes the time stream to where George McFly grows up with more confidence and becomes a successful novelist and the McFly’s have a nice house and things.

There’s also the fact that when McFly leaves ’85 for the first time he leaves from “Twin Pines Mall” but when he arrives back from ’55 towards the end of the movie it’s “Lone Pine Mall.” Which to me really points towards the idea of there being two timelines in Back to the Future.

There’s also the idea that I read years ago that says there’s more than one Marty jumping around in time. This theory said that there’s the Marty we follow who goes back in time and changes things for the better. That he doesn’t as much CHANGE things as he switches places with the Marty McFly who’s always lived in the good timeline. That this Marty also went back in time. But instead of giving his father extra confidence to knock Biff out, he instead sets into motion the events of Elaine’s father hitting George with the car, and her falling for the meek George that way.

Back to the Future Part III
Back to the Future Part III

So when this alternate Marty McFly gets home to ’85 he finds that the home he’s always known, the father who’s always been confident and the family of up and coming business people are all gone. Instead they’re replaced with lower-middle class duplicates of people he thinks he knows but really doesn’t.

I’ve always wondered if this was the case if this Marty, the one who grew up in the good time and had it replaced with the “blah” one, if he wanted to go back in time to set things right for him? Or even if he could since I suppose in his timeline Doc Brown was probably killed by terrorists and any knowledge that he had with him about time travel died with him.

Then again this Marty would still have the Delorean. And the only thing he’d need to travel wherever he wanted in time would be finding enough power to get him there.

Direct Beam Comms #12

CategoriesDirect Beam Comms, Feature, Movies, TVPosted on

TV

The X-Files

The X-Files mini-series ended its run last week and I’d rank this first season of new shows or 10th season of the classic ones, however you define it, as being more successful than not. What seemed to not work this time around were connected episodes related to The X-Files conspiracy while what did work were all of the other “monster of the week” episodes that were somewhat interconnected but all had self-contained stories. I’m not sure why the two conspiracy episodes didn’t connect with me this time around? Perhaps what scared us so much back in the ‘90s and early ‘00s like governmental programs to create alien viruses and media control seem quaint in a time of wars and real government media control and overall uncertainty.

That being said, with the new “monster of the week” episodes The X-Files operates like the old Twilight Zone used to where ideas that would be too controversial to be tackled head on instead were approached in the guise of sci-fi and horror slightly hiding the theme in the gauss of reptile scales or mutant telekinetic kids.

Historical Series

I’ve noticed that a lot of shows that take place at some point in the past have debuted. I kind’a wonder if this is because of the old adage that in uncertain times we tend to look to the past for comfort or if it’s simply because with bigger TV budgets and computer effects that can believably turn, say, 2016 Los Angeles into 1940s New York.

Here’s a listing of current TV series that take place sometime in the past, and this does’t take into account time travel shows like Legends of Tomorrow or 12 Monkeys that take place in the past and future too:

  • 11.22.63 (HULU): Early 1960s US but mostly Texas.
  • Agent Carter (ABC): Late 1940s New York and Los Angeles.
  • American Crime Story (FX): 1994 & ’95 Los Angeles.
  • The Americans (FX): Early 1980s Washington DC & northeast US.
  • Fargo (FX): Most recently the late 1970s northern US.
  • Better Call Saul (AMC): 2002 New Mexico.
  • Fresh Off the Boat (ABC): 1995 Orlando.
  • The Goldbergs (ABC): 1980s Philadelphia.
  • Halt and Catch Fire (AMC): Early 1980s Texas.
  • The Knick (Cinemax): Early 1900s New York.
  • Manhattan (WGN): 1944 & ’45 New Mexico.
  • The Man in the High Castle (Amazon): Alternate Reality early 1960s US.
  • Salem (WGN): 1600s Massachusetts.
  • Vinyl (HBO): 1973 New York.

Deadpool

Deadpool
Deadpool

It took me a while to see this one, and really the only reason I went was because a friend and his son were going and I got an invite, but I was pleasantly surprised as to just how much I liked Deadpool. It’s not like I hadn’t heard it was good; most of the reviews I read were glowing and all of my friends who’d already saw it loved it. But I’ve never been a big fan of star Ryan Reynolds or co-star T. J. Miller so I really wasn’t too excited about spending $10 to see Deadpool.

That being said, Wade Wilson/Deadpool was the role that Reynolds was born to play. All his acting tendencies that can make him so annoying and hard to watch in other roles actually work for the Deadpool character here. It’s like all the training he got playing the annoying guy in Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place and annoying Hal Jordan in Green Lantern … really the annoying guy in just about everything he’s ever played actually works well here in a movie about a superhero that’s supposed to be annoying.

I was surprised too just how strong the supporting characters in Deadpool were. Special mention goes to B or C list X-Men at best Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand) and Colossus. While Colossus has gotten a bit of screen time in the past he’s never been as integral, or as on-screen as long, as he is here as a character realized through CGI. And Negasonic, a character who I had only been dimly aware of before, shows that there’s really no need to call on the same roster of X-Men over and over again — Cyclops, Jean Grey, Wolverine… — when there’s literally hundreds of other interesting characters in the X-Men universe to choose from in future stories.

And Deadpool is funny in all the right/wrong ways too. It’s almost as much a comedy as it is a superhero action movie. My question with superhero movies moving forward is if all the other traditional superhero movies that come after Deadpool will look old and stodgy in comparison? B+

Direct Beam Comms #11

CategoriesDirect Beam Comms, Feature, TVPosted on

TV

Vinyl

I thought Vinyl on HBO was pretty good. I have a little knowledge of music in the 1970s, but not a lot — does Almost Famous count? And I liked how the story of a record exec in the ’70s who’s life is slowly unravelling from a few bad business deals and cancerous acquaintances unfolds.

That being said, my big fear for Vinyl is that what worked so well in the first episode — namely a crazy pace that went from 0 to 100 and back to 0 again over and over and the drug fueled mania of the times will be discarded moving forward for a more traditional structure. Not that this will doom the show, just that it might.

The Americans season 4 poster
The Americans season 4 poster

The creators of Vinyl, Terence Winter and Martin Scorsese, also did this interesting thing with the story by jumping around in time. We get an opening scene of insanity, then a cut to “five days earlier” like a lot of shows do these days but the creators of Vinyl also do a fair amount of jumping far back to, what I’m assuming is, the early ‘60s when the main character Richie (Bobby Cannavale) was just getting into the business and was learning the ropes on how to rip off the musicians and make loads of money himself. And this isn’t just once, it was over and over again and was an integral part of the show.

I can’t imagine how much the music rights for the songs used in Vinyl cost. There’s a lot of original music from the ‘60s and ‘70s played throughout. And though there is a scene with Jimmy Page and Led Zeppelin’s manager backstage at some show, Zep songs must’ve cost too much since that’s the one scene I noticed they used sound-alike music for.

Now that I think about it, Vinyl is Almost Famous via Martin Scorsese but from the business side “ruining” music. B

The X-Files

As we approach the end of The X-Files mini-series I decided to look back on episodes of the show that I especially liked, new and classic included. I noticed one thing about many of the ones I liked the best; they were all written by the same guy, Darin Morgan:

  • “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose”
  • “Jose Chung’s ’From Outer Space’”
  • “Quagmire”
  • “Mulder & Scully Meet the Were-Monster”

It’s weird since all of Morgan’s episodes break the typical The X-Files mold, but I think that by breaking that mold he took the series places it might never have gone otherwise.

As I was researching Morgan I noticed another thing, he wrote my favorite episode of The X-Files spin-off series Millennium too. Now I can’t say I was a fan of Millennium since I only ever watched a handful of episodes at best. But one episode I did watch was entitled, “Somehow, Satan Got Behind Me.” In it, a group of demons, who look like regular people to regular people but demons to each other, sit around a diner and talk about all the mean things they’ve done to humanity since they’ve seen each other last.

It’s the way that Morgan treats these demons, as regular Joes with problems of their own who see what they do as a job, that makes the episode so interesting and more memorable than other episode of the series.

Better Call Saul

The second season of the fabulous Better Call Saul started back up on AMC last week and picked up right where the first season ended with Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) having to decide whether to do the right or wrong thing after events conspired against him in the first season. A

11.22.63

The novel 11/22/63 is one of my favorite, if not my favorite, books by Stephen King. It’s about a time traveler Jake Epping from our time who goes back to try and stop the Kennedy assassination in order to change the present. But what he’s not prepared for is a past that actively tries to stop anything that might change history and Jake finding his place and love in 1960s Texas which he’d have to leave behind to return to our time if he’s successful in stopping Lee Harvey Oswald.

And now comes the Hulu series 11.22.63 with James Franco in the role of Epping. From the first episode the creators of the show have done their best in condensing King’s 800+ book down into a more manageable story. It’s tough to say what’s been removed from the story after only seeing one, but it seems like all of the major story beats from the novel, from the way time travel works to Jake going back in time and trying to see if he can make small changes to time pushing back against those changes are all still present in 11.22.63. What seems to be gone are some of the little details. Which is probably for the best with an eight episode series like 11.22.63 that only has a limited time in order to tell the story.

My only concern is that what I loved about the novel so much were those little details and I’d hate to see too many of them go.

One thing I was surprised by the first episode was that it had something that I don’t remember being present in the book; the idea that when Jake’s in 1960s Texas and he notices the past starting to push back he might be onto something major that’s going to happen in history even if he’s not aware of what’s about to happen. I thought this was a great idea. B+

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