Category: Reviews (Page 53 of 120)

Heroes 3.15 – In Blood We Trust (All Others Pay Cash)

Tonight’s episode began not with the resolution to the cliffhanger but, rather, with Nathan making a phone call to…who? At first, I thought, “Oh, it’s Mama,” but, no, that would’ve been too obvious. And we knew it wasn’t Tracy, since she was on the plane. Then I had a crazy thought: maybe it’s Papa, already back from the dead. It wasn’t, of course: it actually was Mama. But, hey, a Robert Forster fan can dream, can’t he?

The post-crash sequence quickly showed that last week’s cliffhanger was a big waste of everyone’s time, as every single hero got out alive, but once the gang got on the run, it looked like things were going to get very interesting very quickly, especially when Matt went all white-eyed. But, suddenly, the jets flew over and bombed the shit out of the crashed plane, and I groaned. Really, “Heroes” writers? You think having a couple of big, loud jets flying by and dropping bombs is somehow going to draw attention away from the plane crash that happened a few minutes before…? And my groaning turned into moaning with the funny-for-all-the-wrong-reasons scene of tranced-up Matt busting into a trailer just to hunt down paper and a writing utensil. Fortunately, Ando was there to provide a couple of legitimate laughs, most notably at an airline operator’s lack of knowledge about the whereabouts of the state of Arkansas.

It was a shame to see Daphne get shot down, though I was disappointed that we didn’t get to see a great deal of Matt’s emotional reaction beyond his turning the soldiers against themselves. I’m sure, however, that we’ll see him start to grow darker with his power usage in upcoming weeks as he extracts his revenge.

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Jurassic Fight Club: The Complete Season One

“The following is a graphic depiction of a violent prehistoric battle. Viewer discretion is advised.” That’s the warning presented at the top of each installment of “Jurassic Fight Club,” and a hat must be tipped toward the producers for coming up with a title guaranteed to grab attention. Thankfully, the show very much delivers on the promise of the title. Over the course of 12 episodes, there’s quite the variety of bloody prehistoric smackdowns involving T. Rex, Raptors and Allosaurus recreated via a mixture of CGI and loads of scientific supposition. Based on the remains of various critters – usually located in close proximity to each other – dino experts piece together the circumstances leading up to the demise of many a different creature. Each episode tackles a separate battle, with the dots being connected based on evidence, slowly leading up to the big brawl.

It crossed my mind numerous times, however, what if they’re just plain wrong? Then I came to my senses and realized it was much more fun to just go with it, and bask in the unbridled carnage. There are a couple surprises along the way, too, such as a non-lizard installment pitting the ice age specimens the Giant Short-Faced Bear against the Mega Lion, and an episode that takes place deep beneath the ocean surface. The season ends with a massive finish entitled “Armageddon,” which recreates what it may have been like when the giant asteroid collided with Earth, bringing to an end the species for good. At this point, the warning is accordingly changed to “The following is a graphic depiction of a prehistoric apocalypse.” Good stuff? You bet Jurassic. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

Click to buy “Jurassic Fight Club: The Complete Season One”

Fiona Glenanne of “Burn Notice,” dissected

Look, I like Gabrielle Anwar’s character, the gun-toting Fionia Glenanne, as much as the next red-blooded American male, but I never thought someone (other than maybe a few of the “Burn Notice” writers) could put together 650+ words on what she represents in a post-feminist world. But Ginia Bellafante of the New York Times did just that.

Fiona is a character with no memorable precedent: a genius joke-take on girls with gun lust, the joke being that above all else she is every woman who needs to be sent a copy of “He’s Just Not That Into You,” next-day delivery. In the show’s back story Michael broke up with Fiona years ago, disappearing without explanation. (I imagine this to have been like Berger dumping Carrie with a Post-it note on “Sex and the City,” except it occurred three feet from a terrorist cell.)

Fiona has never been able to get over Michael despite his persistent and explicit reminders that he is not made of the ordinary stuff of human need. Still, she keeps pushing for the dream, dating other people solely to try to make Michael jealous, interrupting stakeouts and shooting sprees and manhunts to ask for a key to his apartment or to tell him that what she would really like for her birthday is a teddy.

While reading the piece, I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop — for Bellafante to criticize Anwar’s character for continuing to pine over her ex-boyfriend even after all these years. But that shoe never dropped. Bellafante genuinely admires Fiona and what she represents. Good stuff.

On a side note, anyone else remember the pilot episode where Fiona spoke with an Irish accent (which made sense because she used to be a member of the Irish Republican Army)? I thought they should have stuck with it, though the creators apparently thought otherwise.

Heroes 3.14: It’s a strange new world we live in…

Welcome back, kids, to one of the most bashed series currently on television…and that’s by people who used to consider themselves fans of the show. Now, clearly, if you’ve been a regular reader of this blog, you know that, although I’ve been here from the very beginning of the “Heroes” saga and plan to hang on ’til the bitter end, I’ve had my problems with the show. Clearly, Tim Kring and the gang can’t please all of the people all of the time, but even I can admit that Season 3 started off looking like it was going to blow the disappointment of Season 2 out of the water and only ended up having its own share of problems. Worst of all, the first half of the third season, “Villains,” came to an end with the death of one of the series’ one interesting new characters: Papa Petrelli, played by the ever-awesome Robert Forster. (The only consolation is that, well, we thought the character of Papa was dead throughout the first two seasons, so there’s every reason to believe that they’ll find a way to bring him back to life yet again.)

Tonight, we were presented with the beginning of the second half of Season 3, which has been given the subtitle of “Fugitives.” How was it, you ask…?

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Killing Hitler: The True Story of the Valkyrie Plot

If you went into Bryan Singer’s “Valkyrie” without knowing anything at all about the many plots to kill Hitler throughout his reign of power, then you probably enjoyed the film a hell of a lot more than those who were already familiar with the history of those events. Indeed, you may have walked out of the theater with an interest in learning more about what really happened…and that’s where “Killing Hitler: The True Story of the Valkyrie Plot” comes in. While it does flesh out the events prior to Claus Von Stauffenberg’s actions in a manner which “Valkyrie” fails to do (kids today don’t know nearly as much about World War II as you think they do), the proceedings are a bit dry. It does indeed serve the purpose of educating viewers in a less dramatized fashion…and, more importantly, without the distraction of having one of Hollywood’s top actors playing the part of a German officer…only WWII buffs will be left breathless. And possibly not even them.

Click to buy “Killing Hitler”

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