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Sweet Tooth: Out of the Deep Woods (2021)
has potential, but also has concerning flaws
The premise of this series gets sketched out pretty quickly. Deadly virus, mysterious hybrid births, chaos, a man and his hybrid son. It's a solid premise filmed in an engagine manner.
BUT ... this first episode has an intrusive and completely unnecessary narrator. He basically describes things you're seeing. He rarely tells you anything you can't figure out on your own, and never tells you anything a better script couldn't have show instead of told.
A small example: The narrator says the source of the hybrids, is a mystery everyone will obsess over. 1 minute later we hear a collage of TV broadcasters, one of whom says, everyone is puzzling over the source of the hybrid. He uses almost the exact same words as the narrator. So what was the point?
Even when not using the narrator, the episode leans very heavily on exposition.
To me, this suggests that the series' makers either aren't confident in their ability to show instead of tell or they aren't confident in their audience's ability to understand what they're watching.
Still, the kid star is likable, as is Nonso Anozie, the episode looks good, and the premise has a lot of promise.
So I'm going to watch a few more episodes and see how they are. But I don't know if this series will ultimately be one I stick with or not.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024)
unpleasant and unengaging prequel to a much better movie
Mad Max: Fury Road was easily the best of the Mad Max Movies, with amazing action and just enough moments of genuine feeling to keep it from feeling like a hollow exercise in mayhem.
Furiousa, on the other hand, a prequel about the title character, is for the most part a hallow exercise in mayhem.
Some exciting early action soon devolves into an unendingly sadistic portrayl of Furiousa's horrific childhood. Furiousa is tossed here and there, her only goal to just survive. There is a lot of action, but there's no reason to care about any of it, because both sides are terrible and Furiousa is just trying not to die.
The movie is over halfway done before Furiousa takes agency, and at this point the movie improves, since there is some reason to root for some people over others. But even though one cheers for Furiousa because of her terrible life, you don't really cheer for her because you care specifically about her. He's spent most of the movie not talking, her face often hidden (and later covered in war paint that masks her expression), making her little more than a generic victim of war.
Still, for most of the last hour, the movie is fairly entertaining. But then there's the final confrontation, and my god that goes on forever. What should have been a couple of minutes is dragged out to 15.
The movie ends more of less where Mad Max begins, so the two movies together do give a pretty detailed bio of Furiousa if you want it. But we didn't learn anything necessary, or insightful, or that wasn't suggested in some way in the economical story moments of Fury Road.
If you want sadism and empty spectacle, you might like this. But for me this is the weakest of all the Mad Max films, and I regret wasting 2 1/2 hours on it.
Words and Music (1948)
Mickey Rooney and a few good numbers can't save this mess
At first glance, Words and Music looks like it will be terrible, as the remarkably bland Tom Drake talks to the camera as Richard Rodgers.
At second glance, the film looks like it will be lots of fun, as Mickey Rooney barrels into it as the chaotic and brusquely charming Lorenz Hart.
The pair's early songwriting struggles and success play out well, and the first big musical number gets a lot of fun out of a song I've never heard of, Mountain Greenery.
Unfortunately, the movie decides to be more showcase for songs than actual story. The actual bio takes a backseat to a mixed bag of musical numbers. And even when they're good, like Thou Swell or the brilliantly danced (by Gene Kelly and Vera-Ellen) but silly Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, they just come across as a bunch of random songs that make one wonder why they bothered with a story at all.
As for the dram, well, Drake's guy-narrating-a-school-film-on-the-constitution delivery drags the narrative down with every appearance and Rooney finds himself trapped in a fictionalized version of Hart's life that he can't find a way out of. Rooney does his best (it's the only time I've been that impressed with him) but is let down by a skeletal script and lackluster direction.
Even by the standards of Hollywood songwriter biopics, this is bad. In spite of Rooney's performance, I don't recommend it.
The Changeling (2023)
Fascinating start, completely goes off the rails by the end
It's hard to even know what this series is, exactly, for quite a few episodes. Is it supernatural? Is it about mental instability? What exactly is it? It's halfway through before that's clear.
But even while it keeps you guess, it keeps you interested, because it's such a wild ride and the performances are great.
And then right at the end, it complete falls apart. The penultimate episode is tedious and has almost zero to do with the series.
Now you would think that was because they didn't have enough to make up the full 8 episodes and were tossing in filler. But apparently not, because the final episode is rushed and short. It's not as bad as the previous episode, but it also doesn't wrap things up - they were hoping for a 2nd season - and at the same time it doesn't really make you want to watch more. It just makes you wish they'd given us a satisfactory ending, which they definitely did not.
It's a shame. Most of this was really engrossing, but the ending has to be considered an unforced error.
Three Little Words (1950)
A serviceable vehicle for some great musical numbers
Kalmer and Ruby wrote songs. They sat in a room, and they wrote songs, and they were hits. Which is great, but not that interesting. And while this film does make some attempt to act like there's some tension, and squabbling, the movie can't really make itself anything more than a song about two guys who made their living hanging out and writing songs.
So as a light-hearted biographical drama, Three Little Words is pretty useless.
But it does offer an excuse to turn some of those songs into musical numbers, and some of them are really incredible. The best is Astaire and Vera-Ellen as domestic dancers - they were two of Hollywood's best dancers and it is always wondrous to see them together. Other top numbers are Vera-Ellen and a bunch of guys, Astaire and a cane, and a very amusing performance of I Wanna Be Loved By You mimed by Debbie Reynolds to the song's originator, Helen Kane.
In between dance numbers, Skelton does some light physical comedy, there are mild jokes, and there are women calmly dealing with idiot men. But the movie keeps getting dumber and dumber in spite of its likable cast, with the laste 15 minutes being genuinely painful to watch.
This isn't atypical of Astaire films - he made a million formulaic moves with great dance numbers but only a few genuinely good movies (The Band Wagon, of course, alongside Easter Parade and Top Hat).
So if you want to see a typical Astaire musical with typically brilliant dancing, you should watch this. Or you could just find the dance numbers online and skip the movie altogether. Your call.
The Bear: Tomorrow (2024)
like watching sauce dry
In the third season of Twin Peaks, there was an episode that begins with an endless slow motion shot of a bomb exploding, then nonsense happens for the rest of the hour. I thought of it while watching the Bear's season 3 opener because, like that TP episode, it was painfully slow, did nothing to further the story, was horribly pretentious, could be removed from the series altogether without losing anything of value, and was rhapsodized over by some people who claimed it was a brilliant work of art.
The episode is simply an hour-long montage of scenes, most wordless, that are a mix of moments from Carmy's life, either scenes from his days in NYC, of moments in the past 2 years, and very occasionally of something happening in the present day, all while a painfully repetitive minimalist score drones on.
And then it ends.
This is what you can get away with if you're popular enough. You can do something that, if it was someone's first experience of a show would also be their last.
The Bear has pushed the envelope before, though more successfully, so for now I'm assuming this is not a sign that the series has lost it but simply a sign that the showrunner feels free to indulge himself. But if I turn out to be wrong I will certainly stop watching the series.
The Nevers: I'll Be Seeing You (2023)
disappointing
The second half of The Nevers only season was, for the most part, still excellent. But there were some issues, with some strange character turns and some rather perplexing sequences. But still, for the most part it was still quite exciting and entertaining.
But the final episode was deeply flawed. It wasn't just that it was so dispiriting, although honestly I wish it weren't even if it *didn't* turn out to be the series ender (not the maker's fault - they thought they were coming back, not knowing HBO was on the verge of massacring a lot of its best shows.
But there were issues beyond that, many coming from some of the odder plot decisions of previous episodes in which some characters seemed to have surprising character alterations and the galanthi seemed to become less explicable as it became visually clearer.
Some of the finale was just dumb, like the unlikely sense of security the touched developed after everything that had happened before. Some of it was frustrating. And some of it was riveting (Amy Manson was in particularly good form).
It wasn't a terrible episode, but it was a bad note to go out on. Bye-bye Nevers.
Doctor Who (2023)
Great "first" season, for the most part
Not everyone liked the way this season started out, but I loved it from the beginning, by which I mean Space Babies.
This is exactly the series I remember from the first reboot season in 2005 - silly and cheesy and imaginative and funny and charming and well acted. Davies has just gone back there, and I LOVE IT.
So much of this season is so clever and original and fun. Some episodes are truly brilliant - Dot and Bubble, 73 Yards, Space Babies (I know I'm in the minority here, but I stand by it).
Ncuti Gatwa is a fun Doctor. So far I wouldn't rank him with Eccleston or Tennant but he's as good as any of the rest. And Millie Gibson is terrific as the latest spunky young girl companion - she's not doing anything new, but she's doing the basics as well as anyone.
I don't love everything about the series. Gatwa's mood shifts from "let's party" to "I'm still relieving my trauma" are head spinning and rather annoying, and the season finale was a slight letdown. But overall this is as good as the final (terribly underrated) Whitaker season.
Doctor Who: Rogue (2024)
The DTF Doctor Who
This episode was a fun period piece, mixing Bridgerton and bounty hunters, with a lot of fun gowns and mocking of the upper class. But it's also a very weird episode.
First off, the Doctor's view of romance has really ... evolved. In the Rose years it was all, "no, we mustn't, the most I can give you are longing looks." In the River years it was - "Wait, I'm married? How on earth did that happen? Well, I guess if it's already happened I'll have to accept it." And now it's "hey, you up?" It's not really what I would expect of the doctor. I mean, yes, he's always a little different, but this seems to be a big, surprising push.
And while I don't want to get into spoilers, his reactions at the end also don't jibe with the Doctor we know. The Doctor is "never say die." Tell me the Doctor is throwing orgies in the Tardis and I'll say, "well, that's unexpected, but okay." Tell me the Doctor is like, "well, that's how the cookie crumbles" and I'm like, "whaaaaaaaa?"
Right now the most popular user review here lists 6 or so ways in which the Doctor seems off of Doctor norms. I agree with all of them.
But it was still a fun episode.
Doctor Who: Empire of Death (2024)
good for the most part, but disappointing
The second-half of the season finale begins with all the intensity of the excellent first half. It's chaotic and absorbing and things go from bad to worse to worse to OMG!
There's a solid explanation of Susan Triad, and some really clever ideas. Even the parts that don't make that much sense (that bit on the planet) are engaging.
The series continues with its theme of a guilt-ridden, PTSD Doctor, which I could do with a lot less of, and they punted on a mystery I was hoping they'd answer, but I wouldn't call either of those irredeemable.
But then there's the resolution to the mystery that's been building up all season and it's ... not good. I mean, conceptually I can see and appreciate what they're going for, and I feel that if they elaborated on that concept and gave it more context and history I might say, okay, I get that.
But then I guess they wouldn't have time for the incredibly annoying weepy-heartwarming nonsense that went on forever (by which I mean 10 or 15 minutes) at the end.
I wasn't disappointed enough by the worst of this episode to ignore how of it was genuinely fun , but the last part of the season 1 finale was undeniably a letdown.
The Belle of New York (1952)
A handful of good dance numbers in an abysmal script
Apparently there are Fred Astaire movies I've never seen, and this is one of them, and it's quite bad.
Astaire plays a spoiled louse who has left a series of women at the altar. So when her fervently pursues do-gooder Vera-Ellen, I wasn't really cheering for him to get her. He should not be allowed to date women at all.
Still, Vera-Ellen is believable as the girl everyone loves and a bunch of Hollywood vets keep things light. Astaire's first dance number is forgettable, but the second one, in which love causes him to float to the top of the Washington Square Arch, is lots of fun. And the first two numbers he does with Vera-Ellen are really remarkable - often the choreography asks less of Astaire's partners, because he does some difficult stuff, But Vera-Ellen matches him move for move with remarkable skill and ease.
But the script is just such a mess. For one thing, that floating business isn't just a fanciful moment, like Astaire dancing on the ceiling, but a continual fantasy theme in a script that has absolutely no other fantasy elements in it, which is just so bizarre. Keenan Wynn plays a friend/partner/something of Astaire's but it's never exactly clear what he is or does or has to do with anything.
And after 3 great dance numbers in a row, even the dance goes downhill, with a tedious wedding-photo medley dance followed by a forgettable Vera-Ellen solo that is only notable for the follow-up version of the song and dance by Alice Pierce, who gives a really good comic performance in a really bad movie.
There's one last good Astaire number (on sand) amidst a hugely irritating and idiotic scene, and an ending that suggests nothing expresses love more than screaming at each other, and yet I've only scratched the surface of how incoherent and downright objectionable this script is.
My advice - skip the movie but see if you can find the Astaire/Vera-Ellen dances on youtube or somewhere.
The Black Cat (1941)
a real mixed bag
In this combination murder-mystery/estate sale comedy, it's unclear that the cast agreed on what kind of movie they were making. Some, like Alan Ladd and Basil Rathbone played it straight. Meanwhile, Hugh Herbert as the "comedy relief" played everything as broadly as possible (it was a very stupid, annoying role).
The best bet seems to have been to split the difference. Broderick Crawford was reasonably successful in a light but not especially funny performance. And Gale Sondergaard was the MVP, playing her part with an overwrought version of her Rebecca character that just shaded into parody.
The script is weak, the performances are mixed, the cinematography is excellent, there's one memorable in-joke, and it's all quite missable.
Dickens of London (1976)
Great for the first half, a bit mixed for the rest
Dickens of London tells Dickens life story, up to a point. Each episode begins with an elderly Dickens doing a speaking tour of America before flashing back to his younger days.
The series starts with his childhood, and it is portrayed as wonderfully Dickensian and full of odd characters, most notably his father, who is excellently played by Roy Dotrice, who also plays elderly Dickens and, later in the show, no-longer-young Dickens (he's less charming in that role).
At the start, the series is very entertaining and engaging. But somewhere along the way, as Dickens turned into a rather vain and obnoxious adult, the charm drained out a bit. The Dickensian quality of England also faded - increasingly, Dickens seemed to just hand out with rather ordinary people.
In the latter half, episodes vary in quality. Some episodes, like Magic, are a real slog, but a few, like the fanciful Nightmare, are quite entertaining. The series final is an oddity that seems a peculiar way to end the series.
I watched this series when it first came out but never saw the end, and used to joke that because of that I had no idea if Dickens ever died. But it turned out the series doesn't follow his life all the way through, almost as though they were hoping there'd be enough interest for a sequel.
I hunted this series down because I always regretted not seeing the last of it, but in retrospect, I'd probably seen most of what was worth seeing.
Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019)
somewhat entertaining, with a 75% good cast
I've seen one F&F movie, Fast Five, which is said to be the best of the lot, and thought it was awful. So I normally wouldn't watch a movie with Fast & Furious in the title. But the movies David Leitch made before and after this one - Deadpool 2, Bullet Train, The Fall Guy - were all terrifically entertaining, so I thought I'd take a look.
The movie begins with a superpowered bad guy stopped from stealing something but a super-determined good guy. Bad guy frames good guy, the world is in danger, and two characters from the F&F franchise are told to work together even though they hate each other but somehow they work together (this part was not well explained - they run around in split screen, there's violence, they yell in unison, and then they're on board?).
Of the four principles, 3 - Idris Elba as unstoppable bad guy, Vanessa Kirby as tough good guy, and Dwayne Johnsons as a franchise spin-off - are terrific.
Then there's the other franchise spin-off guy, the charmless Jason Statham. How is this guy an action star? It's not just that he doesn't have acting ability - lots of action stars can't act. It's that he lacks presence and star power. For me, he was a constant nagging irritation.
Outside of that, well, the movie has some solid action and moves quickly. On the other hand, it never has much momentum. At one point I thought "are we near the end" and checked and it was the midpoint.
Much of this is dumb and unpersuasive, but much of it is also funny and exciting. There are moments, like a fight between Johnson and Kirby (great chemistry between those two), or a wild set piece with a helicopter, that are really pretty entertaining. But other times the movie drags. And while it's mean to keep harping on it, Statham's character has a connection with the characters of Elba and Kirby but because he can't act you don't feel any real sense that he has a history with either of them.
I'm not saying Statham sunk this movie. I'm not honestly sure if replacing him with someone better would raise my rating from a 6 to a 7. But he definitely didn't help matters.
I wouldn't say this movie was worth my time, but if you're looking for a watchable action time waster, you could do worse (i.e. Fast Five).
Bullet Train (2022)
wild, funny, and ingenious
In Bullet Train, Brad Pitt is a genial criminal who's been working on himself in therapy and needs to steal a briefcase on a train that has an inexplicable number of professional killers on board. This leads to a series of crazy fights and weird plot twists.
Brad Pitt is terrifically funny as Ladybug (almost everyone here has a codename or alias). He's a shambling, charming, everyman who just happens to be terrifically good at fighting. The rest of the cast is also marvelous, including Joey King as an innocent-presenting psychopath and Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Brian Tyree Henry as bantering killers.
One thing I don't see anyone talking about in the user reviews is the ingenious construction. Even though it's true that much of this can be picked apart, from minute to minute the way it unfolds, and the clever throughlines like that water bottle, have a lovely intricacy to it. Everything fits together neatly, at least until you start thinking about it after.
The other thing about this movie is that it is a contemplation of fate. Everyone in the film talks about fate and luck (Ladybug talks about his bad luck, King's character Prince talks about her good luck). I wouldn't say the movie's philosophy of fate is especially consistent, but that may be because the movie is more concerned with how fate is perceived than what it actually is.
(Director David Leitch's follow-up movie, The Fall Guy, talks about wrapping the central thesis of a film in the tasty bacon of action scenes, and this movie appears to be exactly that.)
So come for the action, vibe on the goofy philosophizing, observe the construction, take note of the plot holes, and have a good time.
Highly recommended.
The Fall Guy (2024)
Comedy, romance, and action - in that order
After watching the trailer, I was expecting an action picture with a little romantic comedy thrown in at odd moments. But while it would be an overstatement to say this is a romantic comedy with some action thrown in, it wouldn't be off by all that much.
The movie is about a stuntman whose back, career, and romance, are all broken in one moment. Then he's asked to return to work on his lost love's big sci-fi epic.
For the first half hour the movie is almost entirely a romantic comedy with a background of behind-the-scenes filmmaking, as the two leads, Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, banter in amusing but heartfelt ways. The chemistry of these two is terrific, and you're pulling them from the start.
When we start getting action, it's imaginative (especially that striking fight in the club), funny, and still tied very much to the romance. No matter how much is going on, the movie always makes sure to tie back to its love story.
The second half of the movie is more pure comedy action, with most of the actual story crammed in, although even then it never lets the romance out of its sight.
The movie is very funny and very charming. The action sequences are lively and fun. The cast is terrific. The behind-the-scenes stuff feels authentic (director David Leitch used to do stunts).
I was a little torn between giving this movie an 8 or a 9. I feel like if I take a step back then objectively it's not *really* a 9, but it was just so much freaking fun that I can't help myself.
Highly recommended.
Elsbeth (2024)
lady Columbos everywhere!
When I saw the capsule description of Elsbeth, I thought, well that sounds dumb. Then I realized that this was the goofy-yet-brilliant character I had loved when she appeared on The Good Fight (unbeknownst to me, she had previously been a character on The Good Wife, which I didn't watch much of).
Carrie Preston's Elsbeth is a fascinating character who uses her genuine goofiness and friendliness to make suspects underestimate her prodigious detective skills.
Not that Elsbeth is a detective. Instead, in a rather strained premise, she's a lawyer sent to investigate a police department who just pokes her nose into every murder case that comes her way.
Each episode starts with us watching the murderer committing the crime, then the rest of the episode is Elsbeth, who seems to instantly recognize the killer, pestering them until she finds the clue that reveals all.
If this sounds familiar, well, it's both the formula for the old TV series Columbo and for the current series Poker Face, which also gives us a female version of the deceptively harmless detective.
While Poker Face is a little more original in design and premise, and is arguably a more interesting series, I really like them pretty much equally. Each has an engaging star, an interesting villain, and a satisfying reveal.
I will say that Poker Face has smarter killers. Some of Elsbeth's suspects would probably have been caught by pretty much anyone. But it's always fun to watch everyone realize that Elsbeth is more than meets the eye. The trick of this series is each week there's a new killer and a new police detective who dismisses Elsbeth out of hands, but the show doesn't pretend that there aren't rumors about how smart she is.
The main difference between this and Columbo is, Columbo was from a time when no one expected a story arc. Now that such things are required, there is this whole story involving a police captain that just distracts from the fun of the investigations. But it doesn't suck up a lot of time, so it doesn't do any real harm.
The acting by the sidekick cop and the villains (who Elsbeth seems to genuinely enjoy talking to) are very good, but still, this is Carrie's show all the way, and Carrie carries it beautifully. You should watch it.
Doctor Who: Space Babies (2024)
I freaking loved this episode
Doctor Who is a silly show. It's always been a silly show. Yes, it can get dark, and it can get scary, and it can get into elaborate mythology, but even when it's doing all that, it is still silly and cheesy and weird.
So I'm not sure why so many people seem to really dislike Space Babies, which is exactly the kind of silly one-off episode that we've seen over and over again. Is it ridiculous? Yes, it is goofy and comical and cute and people run around and there are jokes and babies, and it's clearly not going to be part of whatever elaborate story arc will be introduced this year, but how is any of that a bad thing?
This episode has a lower rating than the very worst episodes of the Capaldi era (like The Zygon Invasion) and I find that just so weird.
Anyway, great episode.
Hazbin Hotel (2019)
unique and full of good ideas, and yet ...
Hazbin Hotel has a lot going for it. The premise of a pollyanna trying to save Hell's sinners is unexpected, the Broadway-ish songs are tuneful and well sung, the animation is quirky and ornate, and it's just fascinating to see Heaven as kinda evil.
But after watching three episodes, I just couldn't get past that I was never that drawn in. First off, while much of the approach is comical, it's not actually very funny. There are also a lot of characters in it and I found myself losing track of who was who. And even when I knew who was who, I didn't feel that interested in them.
Ultimately, Habin Hotel is a show I wanted to enjoy more than I ever actually enjoyed it. Still, it's worth taking a look at.
30 Monedas: Telarañas (2020)
quite the crazy thrill ride
30 Coins started off with a real bang with this crazy episode, which is awash with a very Italian, Catholic-horror sensibility, as a cow gives birth to a human baby and things just get weirder from their.
The outline of the series is neatly sketched out - muscly priest with secrets, young veterinarian with gumption, well-meaning but rather bland mayor and his shrewish wife who is I assume getting the short end of the narrative stick so the show can do something with the vet and the mayor.
The supernatural bad guys are after something the priest has - one of the dumb parts of the episode is everytime he says "what do you want" they say "YOU KNOW WHAT WE WANT" and yet it turns out he doesn't. But that's par for a series that based on what I've seen has a lot of stupidity on both sides.
I've seen the next few episodes and they're quite enjoyable, but not nearly as weird or action-packed as this one. But *this* episode is really pretty amazing.
Magic in the Moonlight (2014)
Woody Allen's gonna Woody Allen
In Magic in the Moonlight, a famous magician (Collin Firth) is asked to debunk an unusually convincing psychic (Emma Stone). The movie revolves around the twin questions of "is she or isn't she" and "does the world contain mystery and magic."
This period piece is attractive and pleasant, with a nice jazz score. It's got typical Woody Allen touches, like short bridge scenes that rather bluntly further the plot and people discussing philosophy and spirituality to great length. Firth is solid as the magician and Emma Stone is likable as the psychic, although you wouldn't guess from this movie that she was about to unleash Emma-Stone-the-brilliant-actress in Birdman later the same year.
Firth's cynicism is often unnecessarily obnoxious and Stone is rather unrealistically tolerant and even achieved by his boorish behavior. And the unlikely connection the two make is what caused my girlfriend to say, "well, Woody Allen's gonna Woody Allen." Because of course the young, fresh woman will be drawn to the old, brilliant cynic. Allen has his world view, after all.
The actors are good, the movie looks good, and the premise is intriguing. But the script and direction or just ... okay. It's a mildly funny comedy with little tension or surprise - I wasn't positive I knew how things would turn out but my guess did turn out to be on the money. And it would be refreshing if Woody Allen could have kept his worst Woody-tendencies at bay. But you know, Woody's Allen's gonna...
M3GAN (2022)
Amazing movie equals/surpasses director's Housebound
Every once in a while there is a movie so good that I peridically check to see if its creator has made something else. Imagine my joy when I discovered Gerard Johnstone, the director of the brilliant Housebound, had finally made his second movie, M3GAN.
In M3GAN, a young girl, mourning her parents, is given a robotic AI prototype doll by an inventor who hopes she can fix tragedy with technology.
Like Housebound, M3GAN is wonderful at mixing comedy and scares. The story is, as some have said, predictable, but that's part of the fun. We *know* where this story is going, and that makes every weird look or movement of the doll kinda hilarious. This is a knowing movie that plays to people who know the tropes, but if you go in expecting some original story with an amazing twist well, that's not this movie.
The movie flows seemlessly from family drama to sci-fi to comedy to suspense to horror, and like Housebound can hope from humor to scares and back without being jarring.
I was pretty shocked to see this movie only has a 6.3 on IMDB, but then, Housebound only has a 6.7 so perhaps a lot of people just don't know a good movie if they see one? I was torn between giving this movie an 8 or a 9 but when I saw so many middling scores I decided I *had* to go with 9 just to balance things out a tiny bit.
Anyway, if you liked Housebound, watch this. If you liked M3GAN, watch Housebound. And if you like good comedy/horror/thriller/dramas, watch both.
Not Dead Yet (2023)
is this an unfunny comedy or an overly broad dramedy?
Another review here said Not Dead Yet doesn't know what it wants to be, and that's exactly how I responded.
In Not Dead Yet, a reporter on the obituary beat discovers she gets haunted by whoever she's writing on. A series about someone who can talk to dead people is nothing new (people comparing it with Ghosts have a limited historical knowledge of the genre), and this series does nothing new with it. She meets a ghost, she learns about the ghost and herself as well. Standard stuff.
The series kind of feels like it should be an hour drama. That's how it's filmed, and that's what ghost-of-the-week series generally do. But it's only a half hour. The acting has an exaggerated quality, although the actors themselves are an appealing bunch.
I watched one episode, with Martin Mull as the ghost. It was very dumb, it wasn't funny (although maybe it was trying to be?) and it did have a genuinely touching moment at the end. It didn't seem like something I'd want to re-experience.
The likeable lead, Gina Rodriquez, is known for Jane the Virgin, which was also broad and dumb, so this is in her wheelhouse. But Jane was a little funnier and a little stronger story-wise.
I can totally see this as something people would like. I did think it looked very promising from the trailer. I did like the way Gina kept shouting NO! It seems well-intentioned. But I wouldn't recommend it to someone like me.
Peter Gunn: The Kill (1958)
I guess this was good at the time?
I heard this was an old noir-ish tv series so I thought I'd take a look. It's an oddly paced show. It's only a half hour long, and in the user reviews someone said that was a problem because they didn't have the time to develop a story, but the show spends an endless amount of time on a rather dull conversation with Gunn's hot girlfriend so in a way it seems they had more time than they knew what to do with.
The half hour was a weird mix of overlong scenes, short scenes that didn't really go anywhere, and continuity skips that just hopped to the next place in the story. The story itself barely qualified as a story.
The acting is decent, it's got a couple of good lines, and it does have a noir-ish look. For 1958 television it might have been great. Watching it in 2024 for the first time though, it doesn't come off that well.
Pantheon (2022)
Brilliant from the first minute to the grand finale
I watched this compelling, wildly imaginative series in spite of a very unimpressive trailer, because there were so many raves, and it's one of the best decisions I made. The very human moment in the first scene was more compelling than anything in the trailer, and the series did a great job throughout of combining deep felt humanity with high-concept sci-fi and philosophizing about the nature of existence.
The first season was brilliant, and if season 2 had been more of the same I would have been fine with it, but instead, it all grew in imagination and narrative daring, culminating in a final episode that is so sweeping and vast that it's just so wild to think back to that first scene and realize this was where it would wind up.
According to wikipedia, this series was cancelled after one season even though the second season was already finished, but we got both seasons in the end and it's a very satisfying wrap up (I would say there was no place left to go but the writers have proven that their imagination far eclipses mine).
Watch this.