Reviews

Out of all the Star Trek shows I can understand why some people would say that Deep Space Nine was the best series of them all. The characters and storylines were more complex maintaining the idealistic society established by Gene Roddenberry but showing just how far that ideology could be bent when confronted by the prospects of war. Gul Dukat in particular was one of the best parts of the show in that he truly believed himself to be a good man and that his cruel methods were actually for the betterment of society as a whole, a true sociopath. And Sisko's long arc about being the emissary to the Prophets who were worshipped as Gods by Bajor but were really just aliens on another level of existence within the wormhole was an intriguing idea that you could only hope had a payoff after lots of buildup. But these two characters Sisko and Dukat are what got totally butchered in the final 20 minutes of the series finale and I can't believe more people aren't calling out just how bad this was.

First what worked in the finale? The Dominion War came to a very satisfying conclusion that was appropriate for the ideology of Star Trek. Odo linking with the Changelings, curing them of the disease they had been intentionally infected with and getting them to peacefully surrender was a true Trek solution. Sacrificing his love for Kira for the betterment of all species, very nice stuff. Even Damar who was really just a side character, getting the rest of Cardassia to rise up and rebel against the Dominion, his death was actually heartfelt with what he was willing to do for his people. And getting the goodbye scenes from every DS9 regular was something that effectively hit you in the feels, except for Worf remembering how he hooked up with Ezri as that was completely inappropriate for his character as he should have remembered Jadzia. But I understand the showrunners were limited because the actress playing Jadzia would not agree for her image to be used in the finale without proper compensation. So all things considered these were all the things that worked.

But after all this it's like the showrunners suddenly remembered that they needed to wrap up the Sisko and Dukat Prophets/Pa Wraith storyline that they had been building up since the very first episode of season 1 and they tried to do this in no less than the last 20 minutes. All the build up of Sisko being meant for something grand and Dukat researching and scheming to release the Pa Wraiths, all just amounted to the two getting in a fist fight and Sisko throwing Dukat off a cliff into a pit of fire. No exaggeration that's all that happened. After this the show intentionally ends vague that Sisko still has more work to do for the Prophets and is living in their form of existence now. He may be able to return to his family one day but does not know when that will be and no further explanation on this the show is just over. More insulting is that he does not make any attempt to talk to his son Jake who was with him since the beginning of Season 1, unbelievable.

This finale honestly felt like such a waste of time committing to this show. It was a good end to the Dominion War but this was not what the show was about this was really something that just happened in the last couple of seasons. As a final end to DS9 I could not have been more disappointed and it seems pretty clear to me that the showrunners didn't actually know they weren't getting another season and had to scramble to try to make an ending. I don't care what any of the crew says about this as there are some significant inconsistencies about what they say the plan for the show was. Most telling is the behind the scene drama of how they fired the actress playing Jadzia, who only said she wanted a part time role after Season 6 because she was never told Season 7 would be the last one and didn't want to commit full time for a few more years.

There might be individual episodes I go back to on DS9 because of how strong they were but I'll never watch the show start to finish again because of how bad the writers dropped the ball right at the finish line.

I had my doubts that Disney could re-capture the magic of the 90's X-Men Animated Series. The original series expertly captured the experience that any type of minority group faces when encountering discrimination and oppression by the majority group that is in power. It was smart and didn't pander to audiences like a lot of other content does, particularly modern Disney products.

I am pleased to say that X-Men 97 not only does the 90's show justice but at least so far exceeds it in some areas. The episodes being longer is a huge plus allowing for more complex storytelling. The show isn't any more violent than the original but the discrimination and oppression of mutants is somehow ramped up where it is a bit more directed towards adults rather than children watching on Saturday morning, which for me is a plus. With the exception of Rogue, Gambit and Jubilee I find the voice cast is just as good as the original cast which adds to the nostalgia. And the redone opening sequence and song is just a shot of happy memories.

My only criticism is with some of the storylines. As far as I know it hasn't been established why Bishop is with the X-Men as the last time he saw them to defeat Apocalypse he went back to his timeline. Is he living with them now? What about his sister Shard did he leave her behind?

Also I realize that these stories seem to follow the comics, but Rogue having a relationship with Magneto is totally news to me and it is kind of gross given the wide age gap, Gambit deserved a lot better. But finding out that Jean Grey may not be Jean at all and actually a clone that Cyclops was tricked into having a child with is the most disturbing storyline. Again it's following the comics but to me this is a step too far for a show that was originally directed towards kids. I could be wrong about this part and we'll have to see how this story develops.

For me the biggest surprise in the story so far was indicated in the trailer with Xavier leaving Magneto all his property rights with the expectation that he'd lead the X-Men. And as ridiculous as this might have been prior to seeing it, not only do the writers have this make sense but it is incredibly satisfying in how it plays out.

Overall this was an excellent return and I will be eagerly anticipating the release of all subsequent episodes.

Writing a review because it needs to be said that Night Country is truly awful and should not have been included under the True Detective brand. It's pretty clear that this was never written to be part of the anthology and HBO made the decision to call it True Detective because it had the similarities of detectives solving a brutal murder and that the leads are tortured souls. The problems with this show have absolutely nothing to do with the female led cast and the actors are making the most out of this material they are given. And it's possible that the show might be regarded differently if it was just called Night Country and it stood completely on its own.

But adding in the supernatural to the True Detective brand which was always previously grounded in reality is completely off putting. The occult that was hinted at previously was always made to have the believers appear insane rather than give their beliefs any credence. Now people see the dead everywhere and these apparitions can be used to help them. But even more insulting are these superficial connections to Season 1 which was clearly done to generate buzz. We see the occult symbol and it is strongly implied that one of the characters is Cohle's survivalist father that he talked about. Instead of being cool that it's connected to Season 1 it comes across as cheap, lazy and totally meaningless. I kept hoping the show would stick the landing and make sense but it's clear now that this was just a con job to make us all watch a supernatural detective show that HBO did not have confidence would succeed on its own merits.

3 stars for the visuals. But be ready for some of the most god-awful dialogue that you've ever seen committed to screen for such a big project. Never have I seen such a heavy handed attempt at writing poetic and meaningful dialogue, only for it to fall so completely on its face that it becomes pretentious and unintentionally hilarious. If you make it to the line "one cannot satisfy thirst by drinking seawater," you will have made it to the part where I laughed in disbelief about how ridiculous this line was in the context of the action that preceded it. Yes I understand Galadriel was trying to say something meaningful to Halbrand about how revenge will not dissipate the anger within a person. But do the writers not understand that this line is a complete joke coming from her? The whole show she is driven to annihilate Sauron, at any cost and at anyone else's expense. Moreover, we only just learned in that moment that Halbrand even knew Adar and there was no prior indication he was driven by vengeance. And not more than 5 minutes later Halbrand pulls Galadriel back from killing Adar herself. Again, the writing is so inconsistent that it becomes ridiculous and unintentionally funny.

There are many other instances of terrible dialogue such as "there is a tempest in me..." But the seawater line was what broke my will to finish this show and I turned it off with no intention of finishing it. This show is not fun to watch and instead is a challenge of enduring boredom.

First of all, like many others I have to say that I am a huge fan of John Carpenter's The Thing. I was looking forward to the Norwegian prequel as I love Ronald D Moore's version of Battlestar Galactica and thought he would really nail this as well if he wrote the screenplay. I first saw The Thing on VHS at the age of 16 over 20 years after it originally was released in theatres. What I loved about the film was the tension created based on the characters' paranoia of not knowing who to really trust to be a human. It was this quality that I believe made the film as compelling as it was. The monster effects were very impressive for their time, but for me they came secondary to the paranoia aspect of the film.

So if this is to be an actual faithful prequel, any fan of The Thing should accept Kurt Russell's monologue that the alien has tendencies to strike only when it is alone with another person and will try to take the whole group over slowly by hiding amongst them. The problem with this so-called prequel is that the alien does anything but that. We are treated with plenty of gross out monster revealing effects where the alien straight up attacks the humans, sometimes taking out three humans at a time. This action completely undermines the original where the idea was that the Thing was vulnerable when it was out in the open. All this prequel provides is gross images of a monster that attacks humans who then fight back with whatever weapons they have on hand. This aspect got boring really fast, whereas the paranoia aspect of the original played a very minimal role in this film. When a character was revealed to be a Thing, it really had no impact at all as there was not enough character development to really care about it. I realize Carpenter didn't have much more character development, but he still had enough for the audience to be blown away when the creature chose to reveal itself.

Yet the most flawed trait of this film could be pointed out by a young Stephen Spielberg or Ridley Scott 30 years before this film was even made. Much like Spielberg's shark in Jaws or Scott's original Alien, the alien in Carpenter's The Thing was hardly ever shown. The tension that was created from all these films was built off of what was not seen. The audience knows that the monster is a real threat to the characters and we also feel the tension of how the characters treat each other because of this threat. It was this aspect of these films that worked so well, not the violent gross out special effects of monsters attacking humans.

To summarize, I was highly disappointed with this film and would rank it with The X-Files: I Want to Believe as the worst movie I have ever gone to see in theatres. Fans of Carpenter's The Thing will not benefit in the slightest from seeing this film and the so-called tie-ins are so shallow that it is better to preserve the mystery of the Norwegians that the original film created.

I would have to strongly disagree with these negative comments. I started to lose interest after Escape Velocity, that was by and far the most filler episode. The one's with the Demetrius somewhat picked up more but still annoyed me, not as much now that I've seen them again. Then Guess Whats Coming to Dinner completely flipped my lid and I was back on board the fan train.

But this one I honestly think was the best so far. You learned so much about the characters that I felt was intense. Adama finally admits that he can't live without Roslin, well holy cow, he's just committed himself all the way in a relationship that didn't even involve sex. And the pregnancy of Six by Tigh, it might not make sense right now but come on!! The most bad ass guy on the crew is now going to be responsible for a child, it totally threw me off guard. And with Lee, you start to see how conniving he really is. You can tell from this that he always secretly planned on making it to the top. Now it's clear that he has some sort of ulterior motives for his actions, who knows where that is going to end up.

Obviously this review sounds adolescent, I honestly can't say why I liked this so much.