Category: Movies

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!

The Reading List

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.