Hot Fuzz
Showing posts with label british. Show all posts
Showing posts with label british. Show all posts
Monday, February 3, 2014
Movie Review: Hot Fuzz
Back during the summer I became a bit curious about seeing the film The World's End and realized that while I'd seen Shaun of the Dead I hadn't actually seen Hot Fuzz, writer-director Edgar Wright's other really well known film (my mother has no idea how she let that happen). To be clear, yes I know that these films have nothing to do with each other and you can enjoy one without having seen the others, however I knew it was going to be a while before I had a chance to see The World's End so why not watch this one first? I know this would all make a lot more sense if I had gotten to it a few months earlier but I honestly did forget until I caught sight of the DVD at one of the local libraries, probably why I hadn't thought to watch it earlier in the first place.
Hot Fuzz
Hot Fuzz
Wednesday, July 31, 2013
TV Series Review: Ashes to Ashes (season one)
Some people might remember that I used to alternate between British and American tv shows fairly regularly and might have noticed that the only British television on this blog as of late is Doctor Who related so what happened? A few things actually, one is that I did try out Being Human (the UK version) in early January and after a couple of episodes realized that I had no motivation to continue watching and that this was probably a good reason to drop the show. Right after that my semester became so busy that I didn't have time to add anything else to my watching roster so even though I've wanted to check out this show ever since I finished Life on Mars I just didn't really have the time too. What's this connection to Life on Mars (again, British version) you might ask? Well, it's a campion series basically, some of the cast, same premise, although it does have a different setting and a different main character. You don't need to have seen LoM to enjoy Ashes to Ashes, although the first five minutes here spoil what eventually happened there, for the moment anyway, I'm told that the third season of AtA finally explains all of the details for these shows and that's what I'm here for so let's get started!
Ashes to Ashes (season one)
Summary: Alex Drake was the psychiatrist who treated Sam Tyler and when she's shot on the job she's pretty sure he left an even larger impression on her than she thought since she's ended up in a situation much like he described. She's in 1981, still working as a police officer and has no clue how to get home just like Sam but something doesn't seem right. Even if she is basing this world she's in off of what he told her how would she know all the characters Sam knew down to their last personality quirks?
The Good: While I wasn't sure how well I was going to like Alex as the main character (it turns out that watching a character embarrass themselves over and over no matter the situation just feels awkward to me) but I did end up liking the relationship she and Gene had more than the relationship he and Sam had had, after two seasons of watching him slug the main character it was nice to see him thrown off his game and have to take a bit of a different approach. And, while like I said it was awkward to watch Alex go "hey I'm in a dream, I'm going to do something that I would never do in real life because it doesn't matter!" it was fun to see her genre-savyiness come through and say things like "this is important!" "why?" "because it's in my dream and therefore it must be!"
The Bad: Much like Life on Mars I did find my mind wandering a bit during the episodes and since I still don't know any contemporary British history I was a bit lost at the beginning of some of the crimes since I simply didn't have a frame of reference. I fear that's probably the series biggest barrier to entry, for an older viewer (someone whose in their late twenties or older) this probably wouldn't be a problem, they would at least realize that the creepy clown following Alex around is from the David Bowie's music video for the song "Ashes to Ashes" which I didn't find out about until I was almost done with the first season.
The Production Values: Before I watched this show I thought that I knew a little more about the 1980s than the 1970s but it turns out I know nothing so once again I'm useless if you want to know how screen accurate this show is*. Everything seemed technically sound both setting/prop wise and sound wise but honestly it shouldn't be an accomplishment if a show manages to achieve just that much.
In the end I don't have a lot to say about the show so far, I like some parts of it more than LoM and some less, overall I think I like LoM a bit better at this point but there are still two more seasons for me to watch so that could easily change. For the moment I give this a 3 out of 5 and probably won't buy it since, well, it was actually never released on DVD in the US (as far as I can tell it was broadcast once on BBCAmerica and that was it) so I would have to import it from Australia or Great Britain and I'm only going to go through that hassle for something I really adore.
*although I may have embarrassed my mother by showing her Alex Drake's perm and going "did yours look like this?" Although I only thought that since I remembered a few perms from the early 90s...
Ashes to Ashes (season one)
Summary: Alex Drake was the psychiatrist who treated Sam Tyler and when she's shot on the job she's pretty sure he left an even larger impression on her than she thought since she's ended up in a situation much like he described. She's in 1981, still working as a police officer and has no clue how to get home just like Sam but something doesn't seem right. Even if she is basing this world she's in off of what he told her how would she know all the characters Sam knew down to their last personality quirks?
The Good: While I wasn't sure how well I was going to like Alex as the main character (it turns out that watching a character embarrass themselves over and over no matter the situation just feels awkward to me) but I did end up liking the relationship she and Gene had more than the relationship he and Sam had had, after two seasons of watching him slug the main character it was nice to see him thrown off his game and have to take a bit of a different approach. And, while like I said it was awkward to watch Alex go "hey I'm in a dream, I'm going to do something that I would never do in real life because it doesn't matter!" it was fun to see her genre-savyiness come through and say things like "this is important!" "why?" "because it's in my dream and therefore it must be!"
The Bad: Much like Life on Mars I did find my mind wandering a bit during the episodes and since I still don't know any contemporary British history I was a bit lost at the beginning of some of the crimes since I simply didn't have a frame of reference. I fear that's probably the series biggest barrier to entry, for an older viewer (someone whose in their late twenties or older) this probably wouldn't be a problem, they would at least realize that the creepy clown following Alex around is from the David Bowie's music video for the song "Ashes to Ashes" which I didn't find out about until I was almost done with the first season.
The Production Values: Before I watched this show I thought that I knew a little more about the 1980s than the 1970s but it turns out I know nothing so once again I'm useless if you want to know how screen accurate this show is*. Everything seemed technically sound both setting/prop wise and sound wise but honestly it shouldn't be an accomplishment if a show manages to achieve just that much.
In the end I don't have a lot to say about the show so far, I like some parts of it more than LoM and some less, overall I think I like LoM a bit better at this point but there are still two more seasons for me to watch so that could easily change. For the moment I give this a 3 out of 5 and probably won't buy it since, well, it was actually never released on DVD in the US (as far as I can tell it was broadcast once on BBCAmerica and that was it) so I would have to import it from Australia or Great Britain and I'm only going to go through that hassle for something I really adore.
*although I may have embarrassed my mother by showing her Alex Drake's perm and going "did yours look like this?" Although I only thought that since I remembered a few perms from the early 90s...
Sunday, October 7, 2012
TV Series Review: Doctor Who 7A
Geeze, is it just me or are they making anime shorter these days? ....wait this is a regular tv show not anime, whaddya mean they're making these seasons shorter too? It feels like season seven had barely began before it was over and there's a two month gap until the Christmas special and I don't know when the second half of the season starts after that. So after two years of this kind of pacing I can say quite certainly, no I don't like this half season nonsense and sadly there was a bunch of other stuff in this season I didn't like either.
Doctor Who
Summary: The Doctor continues to travel around all of time and space in his little blue box and companions Amy and Rory return. As the years go on however they're starting to get a little tired of being thrown into adventures at the drop of a hat with no prior warning. But they don't want to completely cut the Doctor out of their lives and finding a balance between these two lives is proving hard.
The Good: My favorite parts of this season (and the parts I thought were the best) were the ones that really looked at the relationship Amy/Rory/the Doctor have now since, someone correct me if I'm wrong, this is the first time the series has had companions to the Doctor who don't always travel around with him and I loved how they explored that (yes there have been reoccurring characters like that, such as the Brigadier, but that's slightly different). There was also a particular line of the Doctor's from the fourth episode that I liked, where he says that he's tired of giving people second chances, they take advantage of it, and then he has to go and lay down the smack anyway. His change in attitude, from being a "coward" who gives people second chances to someone who is becoming much harder is something that's been happening since the series restarted with the ninth doctor and, given what the 12th Doctor is supposed to be like (as was established in the original series) I think this is on purpose and I really like where it's going. Given how this half season ended I foresee this trend continuing and I really do want to see how the Doctor changes next.
The Bad: For me there was something off in nearly every episode and, well, they bugged me. In the first episode sure it's a cool idea to see all the damaged daleks from wars and such, there's just the teensy-weeny problem that Skaro is supposed to be time locked so that episode shouldn't have happened at all (plus Amy's line, I've known some people with a similar problem say it killed a relationship but Amy just wasn't in a relationship where that should've mattered). The second episode was tons of fun and, while I can see the Doctor galloping through the universe with Nekfertiti as a companion, why grab everyone else as well? (Hell, why did the daleks grab Amy and Rory before that? This all feels much too convenient) I didn't like the third episode at all, aside from the Doctor's aforementioned lines, it felt like someone said "hey you know what's cool? WESTERNS" "yeah let's do one!" , they tried too hard to play with gray and grey mortality (I was feeling pretty unsympathetic to both sides by the end) and I also felt like the framing was pointless. While I had no problems with the fourth episode (which shared a writer with the second episode funny enough) the fifth episode, ehhhhhhh. Doctor Who is not a serious science fiction show but it uses time-travel a lot anyway, that's okay. But it's not okay when it says "okay, here are the mechanics the show operates by" (in this specific instance, time paradoxes) and then disregards them when the plot calls for it, it really felt like Moffat was fighting the plot to get the story to go where he wanted it and that's not very encouraging.
The Audio: While there must have been some new pieces of background music in this season it was music from previous seasons that I noticed the most (also, I hadn't realized it before but a lot of the character's themes are rather similar to each other which I like, it helps give the music some continuity). Honestly I didn't notice the music most of the time, only when things were quite for a moment and then the music picked up as if to say "nope, the worst is yet to come!" but I think during the break I'll make an effort to look up the soundtrack since I do like what I remember.
The Visuals: While various bits of CGI weren't movie quality, nothing this season looked terrible. The dinosaurs on the spaceship looked fine, I've heard that they used a lot of real daleks from collections and such for some of the scenes in Asylum of the Daleks yet I couldn't tell the real daleks apart from the CGI ones. I feel like Doctor Who is becoming a bit smarter with their budget, or maybe the second half of the show is going to look absolutely terrible in comparison.
So in short, this season had a lot of weak spots and some good spots and I'm very confused about how I feel about it. By now I would like someone else to replace Moffat as the showrunner, the way he writes just feels a bit awkward and yes, I'm one of those people who isn't too impressed by how he writes women (I wanted to say some stuff about River Song here but I was afraid that might make the review too long, I'll probably put something on my tumblr in the next month or so when I have a chance). But I'll be back for the second half, fingers crossed that it has more strong episodes than this part did however.
Doctor Who
Summary: The Doctor continues to travel around all of time and space in his little blue box and companions Amy and Rory return. As the years go on however they're starting to get a little tired of being thrown into adventures at the drop of a hat with no prior warning. But they don't want to completely cut the Doctor out of their lives and finding a balance between these two lives is proving hard.
The Good: My favorite parts of this season (and the parts I thought were the best) were the ones that really looked at the relationship Amy/Rory/the Doctor have now since, someone correct me if I'm wrong, this is the first time the series has had companions to the Doctor who don't always travel around with him and I loved how they explored that (yes there have been reoccurring characters like that, such as the Brigadier, but that's slightly different). There was also a particular line of the Doctor's from the fourth episode that I liked, where he says that he's tired of giving people second chances, they take advantage of it, and then he has to go and lay down the smack anyway. His change in attitude, from being a "coward" who gives people second chances to someone who is becoming much harder is something that's been happening since the series restarted with the ninth doctor and, given what the 12th Doctor is supposed to be like (as was established in the original series) I think this is on purpose and I really like where it's going. Given how this half season ended I foresee this trend continuing and I really do want to see how the Doctor changes next.
The Bad: For me there was something off in nearly every episode and, well, they bugged me. In the first episode sure it's a cool idea to see all the damaged daleks from wars and such, there's just the teensy-weeny problem that Skaro is supposed to be time locked so that episode shouldn't have happened at all (plus Amy's line, I've known some people with a similar problem say it killed a relationship but Amy just wasn't in a relationship where that should've mattered). The second episode was tons of fun and, while I can see the Doctor galloping through the universe with Nekfertiti as a companion, why grab everyone else as well? (Hell, why did the daleks grab Amy and Rory before that? This all feels much too convenient) I didn't like the third episode at all, aside from the Doctor's aforementioned lines, it felt like someone said "hey you know what's cool? WESTERNS" "yeah let's do one!" , they tried too hard to play with gray and grey mortality (I was feeling pretty unsympathetic to both sides by the end) and I also felt like the framing was pointless. While I had no problems with the fourth episode (which shared a writer with the second episode funny enough) the fifth episode, ehhhhhhh. Doctor Who is not a serious science fiction show but it uses time-travel a lot anyway, that's okay. But it's not okay when it says "okay, here are the mechanics the show operates by" (in this specific instance, time paradoxes) and then disregards them when the plot calls for it, it really felt like Moffat was fighting the plot to get the story to go where he wanted it and that's not very encouraging.
The Audio: While there must have been some new pieces of background music in this season it was music from previous seasons that I noticed the most (also, I hadn't realized it before but a lot of the character's themes are rather similar to each other which I like, it helps give the music some continuity). Honestly I didn't notice the music most of the time, only when things were quite for a moment and then the music picked up as if to say "nope, the worst is yet to come!" but I think during the break I'll make an effort to look up the soundtrack since I do like what I remember.
The Visuals: While various bits of CGI weren't movie quality, nothing this season looked terrible. The dinosaurs on the spaceship looked fine, I've heard that they used a lot of real daleks from collections and such for some of the scenes in Asylum of the Daleks yet I couldn't tell the real daleks apart from the CGI ones. I feel like Doctor Who is becoming a bit smarter with their budget, or maybe the second half of the show is going to look absolutely terrible in comparison.
So in short, this season had a lot of weak spots and some good spots and I'm very confused about how I feel about it. By now I would like someone else to replace Moffat as the showrunner, the way he writes just feels a bit awkward and yes, I'm one of those people who isn't too impressed by how he writes women (I wanted to say some stuff about River Song here but I was afraid that might make the review too long, I'll probably put something on my tumblr in the next month or so when I have a chance). But I'll be back for the second half, fingers crossed that it has more strong episodes than this part did however.
Sunday, August 5, 2012
TV Series Review: Downton Abbey (season two)
This time around I caught my British-class-based-social-drama show on Hulu+ (they have a one week free trial offer which is *just* long enough to watch almost nine hours of episodes, plus it looked great on our new HD tv) and I was able to clear up something about the first season via Hulu as well. Previously I had been worried that the episodes on Netflix (from the first season) might have been cut/edited in some way, because they had such odd runtimes, but they all matched up with the episode lengths listed on Hulu so it appears I was being overly worried that time. But enough about what I've already covered on this blog, onto the second season!
Downton Abbey (season two)
Summary: World War I has began and all of Europe is effected by it. Even Downton Abbey has gone through changes because of the far off war, they are losing their young men to the front lines and seeing others come back to the local hospital lucky to be alive. The war isn't their only problem though, in a house this large there will always be more than a few secrets and there are some people who have large secrets to hide and friends who are bad at keeping them.
The Good: Once again the show manages to balance about a dozen different subplots and gives resolution, or at least the promise of continuation in a few cases, to all of them. They even give a bit more resolution to one or two subplots from the previous season, and Mr. Bates' woes continue as one of the most prominent subplots, and I was never bored by any of the characters. I was also surprised at how much some of the characters grew on me this season, especially the Dowager Countess who, while not exactly a nice person and certainly not a forward thinking one, always had an interesting opinion and did care about more things than I expected.
The Bad: The show certainly upped the melodrama this season and, while some melodrama is okay (especially with a shorter show like this), the fact that a lot of this was accomplished by either the characters being absolutely incapable of keeping secrets or via Mrs. Bates (who didn't even feel like a character, she honestly felt like a plot device that got away from the writers) was frustrating. I hope that the melodrama is toned down again next season (although I'm not betting on it) since after a while I was starting to roll my eyes when another complication arose in some of the subplots which I had hoped the show was done with. Oh and I would like Thomas to have some actual character development this time, he keeps having all these scenes and problems that seem to give him development but then by the next episode he's back to his old self without even a hint of anything having changed and it's really starting to bug me.
The Audio: The show used the exact same themes for the opening and closing credits (the same visuals for the opening as well) and I didn't notice any other changes to the music either which means there's not much for me to talk about. I do hope there's more variety in the music the next season (especially since the show is in the 1920s now and, in the US anyway, that was the era of all kinds of amazing music) but for the moment everything continues as it has before.
The Visuals: As with the first season the clothes all look fantastic (well, perhaps not the servants clothes but even the military uniforms look rather dashing) and the setting looks quite nice as well. One nitpick I do have however is how, by the end of the season, it has been five years in story since the beginning of the first season and yet none of the characters seem to have aged. I worked out that the youngest sister would have been 16 when the show started and 21 by this point and frankly she never looked that young in the first season and by that logic the oldest sister must be at least 23 yet again the actress looks just a bit too old for this. Most people do age noticeably in that time period and I do wish they had shown at least a bit of aging for the characters, it might've made the timeskips a bit easier to keep track of as well.
I can seen now why some people said the show went down a bit in the second season (there really is a lot of melodrama) but overall I still found the show rather enjoyable. The third season airs in the UK this fall but not in the US until winter (on, who else has a gap for something like this, PBS) so it's going to be quite a while until I talk about this show again. Guess I'd better find another British tv show or two to watch in the meantime....
Downton Abbey (season two)
Summary: World War I has began and all of Europe is effected by it. Even Downton Abbey has gone through changes because of the far off war, they are losing their young men to the front lines and seeing others come back to the local hospital lucky to be alive. The war isn't their only problem though, in a house this large there will always be more than a few secrets and there are some people who have large secrets to hide and friends who are bad at keeping them.
The Good: Once again the show manages to balance about a dozen different subplots and gives resolution, or at least the promise of continuation in a few cases, to all of them. They even give a bit more resolution to one or two subplots from the previous season, and Mr. Bates' woes continue as one of the most prominent subplots, and I was never bored by any of the characters. I was also surprised at how much some of the characters grew on me this season, especially the Dowager Countess who, while not exactly a nice person and certainly not a forward thinking one, always had an interesting opinion and did care about more things than I expected.
The Bad: The show certainly upped the melodrama this season and, while some melodrama is okay (especially with a shorter show like this), the fact that a lot of this was accomplished by either the characters being absolutely incapable of keeping secrets or via Mrs. Bates (who didn't even feel like a character, she honestly felt like a plot device that got away from the writers) was frustrating. I hope that the melodrama is toned down again next season (although I'm not betting on it) since after a while I was starting to roll my eyes when another complication arose in some of the subplots which I had hoped the show was done with. Oh and I would like Thomas to have some actual character development this time, he keeps having all these scenes and problems that seem to give him development but then by the next episode he's back to his old self without even a hint of anything having changed and it's really starting to bug me.
The Audio: The show used the exact same themes for the opening and closing credits (the same visuals for the opening as well) and I didn't notice any other changes to the music either which means there's not much for me to talk about. I do hope there's more variety in the music the next season (especially since the show is in the 1920s now and, in the US anyway, that was the era of all kinds of amazing music) but for the moment everything continues as it has before.
The Visuals: As with the first season the clothes all look fantastic (well, perhaps not the servants clothes but even the military uniforms look rather dashing) and the setting looks quite nice as well. One nitpick I do have however is how, by the end of the season, it has been five years in story since the beginning of the first season and yet none of the characters seem to have aged. I worked out that the youngest sister would have been 16 when the show started and 21 by this point and frankly she never looked that young in the first season and by that logic the oldest sister must be at least 23 yet again the actress looks just a bit too old for this. Most people do age noticeably in that time period and I do wish they had shown at least a bit of aging for the characters, it might've made the timeskips a bit easier to keep track of as well.
I can seen now why some people said the show went down a bit in the second season (there really is a lot of melodrama) but overall I still found the show rather enjoyable. The third season airs in the UK this fall but not in the US until winter (on, who else has a gap for something like this, PBS) so it's going to be quite a while until I talk about this show again. Guess I'd better find another British tv show or two to watch in the meantime....
Sunday, July 1, 2012
TV Series Review: Downton Abbey (season one)
Whew, I'm cutting it close this time. I always get behind in my viewing schedule when I travel and, even if this season was only 7 episodes long, this was actually a bit longer than your standard, 13 episode anime series. Actually, I watched this on Netflix which had the first and the last episodes listed as 66 minutes long but the other five only 48 minutes long, is that how long the show was in Great Britian or did PBS cut the episodes down again? I remember they made cuts to Sherlock, even the online streaming version (which I still think is silly) and I wouldn't put it past them to have done that here as well with such an odd set-up. In any case, thankfully I didn't feel like anything was missing here (like I felt might have been the case with Sherlock), well, except for the fact that Netflix doesn't have the second season streaming yet.
Downton Abbey
Summary: The show begins in April 1912 with the news of the sinking of the Titantic and the news that the heir to Downton Abbey, a cousin since the estate is entailed and none of the three daughters can inherit, has perished. And thus life at Downton is going through a state of upheaval as the family decides what to do next and new people filter into all parts of their lives.
The Good: The season may be a short one but wow does it pack a lot in. Spanning about two years in-universe, there are at least a dozen subplots and nearly every one of them is neatly and satisfying wrapped up (and those which aren't still come to a satisfying stop and I would have been annoyed if they had instead been rushed). The show makes great use of the time-period (I especially the liked the subplot involving the youngest daughter starting to become interested in suffrage and politics) and they characters all felt like they came from the time period (as opposed to the writer coming up with characters that inadvertently reflect more modern views and trying to squeeze them in anyway). All of the characters, likeable or not, were interesting and almost all of them grew and progressed as well, my hat is off to the writers for being able to do that with so many characters.
The Bad: This show should be watched without long gaps between episodes (you don't have to marathon it but don't wait weeks and weeks between episodes) since with nearly every named character having their own subplot that's well over a dozen plots to keep in mind. The show does a good job balancing them but it does dictate that the viewer should either planning on taking a few days to watch the whole show or taking some notes so they don't forget. I am a bit incredulous that some characters in the service stuck around as long as they did with their personalities, although that certainly happens in real life as well, and it does seem a bit strange that the family knows so many of the servants by name and does truly seem to care for all of them. There are some subplots that I would like to see continued in the next season, and I'm a bit worried they won't be given where this season ended, but I found this to be a rather strong show with few flaws to speak of overall.
The Audio: The show has one main theme that is played over the opening and ending credits that I quite liked, it managed to convey both the more relaxed life of countryside gentry and the more frantic life of their servants, and the music in the rest of the show worked well also. No other pieces really stood out to me but they worked well within their scenes.
The Visuals: This is one of the cases where I really prefer a live action show to a cartoon, the amount of detail in the setting and the costuming simply can't be replicated with anything but a huge budget in the animation world. The setting looks authentic and the costuming was gorgeous, normally I'm not a fan of Edwardian(ish) Era clothing but I'll have to give the period another look.
Fully intend to continue the show, although Netflix does not have it for streaming which does put a damper on my plans. However, it appears that Hulu will have it on Hulu+ soon and they offer one week free trials for it, I might be able to make that work out.....
Downton Abbey
Summary: The show begins in April 1912 with the news of the sinking of the Titantic and the news that the heir to Downton Abbey, a cousin since the estate is entailed and none of the three daughters can inherit, has perished. And thus life at Downton is going through a state of upheaval as the family decides what to do next and new people filter into all parts of their lives.
The Good: The season may be a short one but wow does it pack a lot in. Spanning about two years in-universe, there are at least a dozen subplots and nearly every one of them is neatly and satisfying wrapped up (and those which aren't still come to a satisfying stop and I would have been annoyed if they had instead been rushed). The show makes great use of the time-period (I especially the liked the subplot involving the youngest daughter starting to become interested in suffrage and politics) and they characters all felt like they came from the time period (as opposed to the writer coming up with characters that inadvertently reflect more modern views and trying to squeeze them in anyway). All of the characters, likeable or not, were interesting and almost all of them grew and progressed as well, my hat is off to the writers for being able to do that with so many characters.
The Bad: This show should be watched without long gaps between episodes (you don't have to marathon it but don't wait weeks and weeks between episodes) since with nearly every named character having their own subplot that's well over a dozen plots to keep in mind. The show does a good job balancing them but it does dictate that the viewer should either planning on taking a few days to watch the whole show or taking some notes so they don't forget. I am a bit incredulous that some characters in the service stuck around as long as they did with their personalities, although that certainly happens in real life as well, and it does seem a bit strange that the family knows so many of the servants by name and does truly seem to care for all of them. There are some subplots that I would like to see continued in the next season, and I'm a bit worried they won't be given where this season ended, but I found this to be a rather strong show with few flaws to speak of overall.
The Audio: The show has one main theme that is played over the opening and ending credits that I quite liked, it managed to convey both the more relaxed life of countryside gentry and the more frantic life of their servants, and the music in the rest of the show worked well also. No other pieces really stood out to me but they worked well within their scenes.
The Visuals: This is one of the cases where I really prefer a live action show to a cartoon, the amount of detail in the setting and the costuming simply can't be replicated with anything but a huge budget in the animation world. The setting looks authentic and the costuming was gorgeous, normally I'm not a fan of Edwardian(ish) Era clothing but I'll have to give the period another look.
Fully intend to continue the show, although Netflix does not have it for streaming which does put a damper on my plans. However, it appears that Hulu will have it on Hulu+ soon and they offer one week free trials for it, I might be able to make that work out.....
Sunday, May 27, 2012
TV Series Review: Sherlock (season two)
Compared to the rest of the internet I'm rather late here but, considering the last episode only aired (legally) in the US last Sunday I'm not doing too bad actually. When my mom and I first heard that there was going to be a five month gap between the BBC and American showings (and I'm rather unhappy at their "we have to edit it to fit American format" excuse, the show is on PBS which doesn't even have commercial breaks!) we guessed that we probably wouldn't be able to wait and did watch the first two episodes in March but weren't able to get to all three because of their length (each episode is a long, hour and a half long), thankfully PBS has them legally streaming on their website for now (abet cut down by eight minutes or so for each episode, I really don't understand why they can't at least leave the full episodes online where there are no time restrictions on it AND they make money off of the commercials).
Sherlock (season two)
Sherlock (season two)
Summary:
Following last season’s harrowing cliff-hanger, Sherlock (with John in tow)
tackle three more mysteries, based and expanded upon the original Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle canon, but with Moriarty afoot there might be some things that even
Sherlock cannot work out in time.
The
Good: I'm not fond of villains like Moriarty, I like them to have more of a motive than what boils down to "I was bored" but here he was just so insane underneath it all, although his last scenes of the season felt a bit contrived, like Moffat and Gatniss had been written into a corner and didn't have a really good way to get out. All of the mysteries were interesting and stayed true to the spirit of the original stories and the new elements worked in well (especially in the case of the Baskervilles) and Sherlock's explanations for the cases make enough sense to be plausible. In short, if you liked the first season (and if you haven't you really shouldn't watch this one first) you'll enjoy this one quite well.
The
Bad: While Sherlock
is far from the first mystery series to have this problem it was tiresome after
a while to see just how dumb and incompetent everyone around Sherlock is and
they don’t even seem stupid by comparison, it really seems like the London
police force has exceedingly low standards for general intelligence among it’s
employees*. I had issues with Irene Adler as well, mainly
since she deviated so much from the original canon (where she was a clever and
quick thinking woman who was the one person ever to catch Holmes off guard,
here whatever cleverness she has is buried under UST with Sherlock^) and I’m also tired of the “sexually confident women can wear skimpy
clothes because they’re that happy with themselves!” idea, it just rings like a
hollow excuse for fanservice and that was supposed to be a plot point early on.
The
Audio: This may be just me but whenever I hear one of
the main themes played in Sherlock I
always feel as if it’s drawing inspiration from other Sherlock Holmes
adaptations. I don’t mean that in a bad way at all, and it’s possible that I’ve
seen so many series I’m trying to see connections that aren’t there (by my own
count I’ve seen roughly 60 hours of Sherlock Holmes tv series/movies), but the
music for this series has always seemed like a perfect and seamless fit here.
The
Visuals: The show has created a very distinct looking
style of cinematography with many quick shots, overlaid with text to give the
viewer insight into Sherlock’s methods, often in close-up with a very shallow
depth of focus, combined with some tilt-shift shots of London every now and then
as transition shots, which serves to re-emphasis that Sherlock has a strange
mind that sees the world in odd ways. As I believe I mentioned last time, I’ve
seen a few of these quirks appear in various Doctor Who episodes but never with the frequency that they are seen
here and they do keep the show interesting in a unique manner.
One thing that does puzzle me is that I saw a lot of praise for Molly online once the show finished it's British run and I'm not entirely sure why. People mentioned a speech of hers and I'm wondering if that was part of the 8 minutes that were cut, she did have a speech but it just didn't seem, well, strong enough to merit that much discussion I saw. My mom and I feel like a scene with her was also cut for a few other, spoilery, reasons, if anyone has a list of the cuts made to the US version (for any of the episodes) please share since I would love to know.
*I feel like I’ve had this problem with Moffat’s work before too, he
loves to build up his main characters but doesn’t quite seem how to flesh out
the side characters as well
^funny
enough I don’t have a problem with Sherlock being interested in her, mainly
because being asexual does not mean you can’t have romantic feelings for
someone and Mycroft says point blank in that episode that Sherlock was a
romantic. Holmes originally was certainly both asexual and aromantic but,
possibly this is after seeing the two recent American Sherlock Holmes films and
how they played with Irene Adler I’m willing to give the series a pass on that
point
Sunday, May 13, 2012
TV Series Review: Life on Mars (season two UK version)
Unlike the previous season it was incredibly simple for me to get a copy of Life on Mars season 2 (walking into my school's library, go to the basement, grab the DVDs and go). I love it when it's this simple to watch something legally, then again I have no idea why it's so much harder to find illegal streams of a British tv show from a few years ago versus a subtitled stream of a 10+ year old foreign cartoon. In any case, onto the review!
Life on Mars (season 2, original UK version)
Summary: Following where the first season left off, Sam Tyler is a DC in Manchester 1973 but he's really from 2007 where, as far as he can tell, he's in a coma following a car accident. He continues to obsess over what has happened to his life while solving cases and dealing with his coworkers in 1973 but doesn't seem to be making much progress as his 1973 life gets even more complicated as it goes on.
The Good: It's fun to compare this show to Grimm, which is another cop-show-with-a-twist that I've been following lately, since with Grimm I can play it in the background and still basically follow along, here the show really demands your full attention if you want to really get something out of it and it's interesting enough to hold your attention for a full episode. Each story was interesting, it never felt like the writers were taking the same plot from an earlier episode and just mixing different details in, and while the solutions weren't so simple they could be solved within the first five minutes there were enough hints for the viewer to put together the case and it's solution by the end. The characters were also fun, I was glad to see that Annie had an even more central role in this season, and overall I thoroughly enjoyed this show from beginning to end.
The Bad: I have, mixed, feelings however on the ending of this series, even despite the fact that I had accidentally found out how the show ended before I even started it. The ending wasn't bad and certainly made sense with the themes the show had set up, I just have some mixed feelings on it. Part of the reason for the mixed feelings is that there is a lot left unexplained, Sam Tyler's story does seem well wrapped up by the mechanics of how the setting worked were barely touched upon and I do want to check out Ashes to Ashes to see it explained. That was my main gripe with the show, which is more because I'm a little more obsessed with settings than most people, overall it was a very strong show.
The Audio: I think the show used even more period insert songs this season than the previous and all of the choices seemed to fit in really well. I wasn't familiar with many of the songs but when looking at the lyrics it was very clear why they had been chosen and they usually provided a bit of foreshadowing as well. The rest of the music didn't stand out quite a much but the bits I do recall that it all seemed to flow well.
The Visuals: There's no change in the visual styling from the previous season, everything still has a slight sephia tone and overall the styling seemed spot on. I've seen some comments on wikipedia that there were some background details that appeared in the show that weren't period appropriate but nothing in there ever stuck out so much that it drew me out of the show.
So, not much else to say except that I need to figure out where I can find a copy of Ashes to Ashes to keep on going before I completely forget about the details here!
Life on Mars (season 2, original UK version)
Summary: Following where the first season left off, Sam Tyler is a DC in Manchester 1973 but he's really from 2007 where, as far as he can tell, he's in a coma following a car accident. He continues to obsess over what has happened to his life while solving cases and dealing with his coworkers in 1973 but doesn't seem to be making much progress as his 1973 life gets even more complicated as it goes on.
The Good: It's fun to compare this show to Grimm, which is another cop-show-with-a-twist that I've been following lately, since with Grimm I can play it in the background and still basically follow along, here the show really demands your full attention if you want to really get something out of it and it's interesting enough to hold your attention for a full episode. Each story was interesting, it never felt like the writers were taking the same plot from an earlier episode and just mixing different details in, and while the solutions weren't so simple they could be solved within the first five minutes there were enough hints for the viewer to put together the case and it's solution by the end. The characters were also fun, I was glad to see that Annie had an even more central role in this season, and overall I thoroughly enjoyed this show from beginning to end.
The Bad: I have, mixed, feelings however on the ending of this series, even despite the fact that I had accidentally found out how the show ended before I even started it. The ending wasn't bad and certainly made sense with the themes the show had set up, I just have some mixed feelings on it. Part of the reason for the mixed feelings is that there is a lot left unexplained, Sam Tyler's story does seem well wrapped up by the mechanics of how the setting worked were barely touched upon and I do want to check out Ashes to Ashes to see it explained. That was my main gripe with the show, which is more because I'm a little more obsessed with settings than most people, overall it was a very strong show.
The Audio: I think the show used even more period insert songs this season than the previous and all of the choices seemed to fit in really well. I wasn't familiar with many of the songs but when looking at the lyrics it was very clear why they had been chosen and they usually provided a bit of foreshadowing as well. The rest of the music didn't stand out quite a much but the bits I do recall that it all seemed to flow well.
The Visuals: There's no change in the visual styling from the previous season, everything still has a slight sephia tone and overall the styling seemed spot on. I've seen some comments on wikipedia that there were some background details that appeared in the show that weren't period appropriate but nothing in there ever stuck out so much that it drew me out of the show.
So, not much else to say except that I need to figure out where I can find a copy of Ashes to Ashes to keep on going before I completely forget about the details here!
Sunday, April 8, 2012
TV Series Review: Life on Mars season 1 (British version)
Well I had a fun time getting a hold of this series and I'm still not even sure how it happened. Back in early January I was browsing the school library's catalog and found that both seasons of the British version of the show were listed but that the first season was lost. So I thought, I'm able to find cartoons from other countries online and subtitled so how hard can it be to find a show that doesn't even need subtitles? Really hard it turns out, I found around the first five episodes before giving up and deciding I would just have to wait for spring break and check out the DVDs from my local home library (I had put in an interlibrary loan request but it had fallen through). But then I got an email saying it was on hold for me at the library, after I had gotten an email saying the interlibrary loan had fallen through, and I went to pick up a copy of the series with my library's sticker on it. I'm wondering if my request triggered something in the system so they ordered a new copy or what but decided not to complain and simply enjoy the show.
*and that’s not because I’m bad at faces since he looks identical in both shows, although it has been a while since I saw John Simm in Doctor Who.
Life
on Mars Season One:
Summary:
DCI Sam Tyler (roughly a Chief of Detectives in the US) is on the case one day when he’s
hit by a car and wakes up in Manchester (a city in England) in 1973 as the new DC
transfer to the local police department. Police work is conducted rather
differently in 1973, no version of the Miranda Rights, the Gene HuntInterrogation technique, and all the coopers carry guns and will shoot if provoke. So Sam must learn how to maneuver in this alien, new world all the while
he keeps hearing snippets from 2006 where his body apparently lies in an
unresponsive coma.
The
Good: One of the big draws to the show is that Sam
Tyler has a vague idea of what is going on around him in 2006 and I liked those
bits (which doesn't mean the rest of the show was bad, I just really liked that detail). As the audience you already know that he’s telling the truth, he really
isn’t from 1973, but it’s also very easy to see why he appears crazy to
everyone around him, especially Annie (who is part of the women's department which makes her a little bit of an outcast as well). I also liked how Sam Tyler’s own past
was worked into the plot and thought it was a clever move, he knows that some
odd things happened in his past right around this time so why not investigate?
All of the crimes seemed relevant to the time as well and none of them were
obviously easy to figure out and were interesting to watch. Also, props to John
Simm for some really good acting, the only show I had seen him in before was as
The Master in Doctor Who and in there I was
seriously doubting he could actually act since he was so hammy. Here however he
did a completely different character and it actually took me some time to
realize it was the same actor*.
The
Bad: My main complaint is that this season doesn’t
stand on it’s own very well since the ending just doesn’t do much. Sam does
have character growth but has only partially accepted his fate and it’s clear
that this show is going to have/really needs its second season. Since there is a second season this is a bit less of a problem and it was easily my biggest problem with the show but writing a multi-part show where the individual parts can't stand on their own does mean that the writing went wrong at one point or another.
The
Audio: The show has several period pieces of music
playing in the background and a few of them reference themes in the show (such
as the titular “Life on Mars” song by David Bowie, part of the song seems to
literally describe the show and the idea is that 1973 is so alien to Sam Tyler
that he might as well be on Mars). Normally I wouldn’t have been a fan of a lot
of the songs used in the show, they’re simply not my style, but I really liked
how the music was integrated and found myself enjoying the music and that’s
probably the ultimate sign that the music was used well.
The
Visuals: The show is set in 1973 and does a nice job
recreating the setting with the clothes, color schemes, and cars used. One
touch I liked was how the 1973 police station is always filled with cigarette
smoke, something absent from the shots of it in the 2000s. I’m not that fond of
1970s style but I thought that the designers managed to make it all look
natural on the characters, not like people from the current day at a costume
party.
Thankfully I have not had nearly as hard a time getting a hold of the second season of Life on Mars, my school library already had a copy of that, so I'm making my way through that right now and enjoying it as well. I know there was a deliberate decision to stop the show after two seasons (with Ashes to Ashes being made a bit later as a spiritual successor of sorts) so hopefully that resolves my problems with the show.
*and that’s not because I’m bad at faces since he looks identical in both shows, although it has been a while since I saw John Simm in Doctor Who.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
TV Series Review: Tinker, Tailor Soldier, Spy
I haven't had a chance to see the new movie adaption of John le Carré's book, which I've also never read, but I did find time to watch the 1979 BBC tv mini-series adaptation of the book since my dad actually had a copy of it. The American version, which I had, is six, one hour long episodes (apparently the original version was seven episodes long and some shortening/altering happened for the US version, no idea why they went to that trouble) which I watched over the course of a few days and has made me more curious than ever for how a two hour movie could hope to adapt this huge, detail heavy story.
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Summary: The Cold War is on and the head (Control) of the upper division of British Intelligence (the Circus) believes that there is a mole in their midst. When a mission to collect more information about the hypothetical mole goes disastrously wrong this all but confirms it but nothing else is done to the case until George Smiley, who was forced into retirement after Control's death and remains bitter about that, is given the task to pick up where the investigation left off and figure out if it is the tinker, the tailor, the soldier, or the poorman who has turned turncoat.
The Good: This is a very meticulously plotted series without a wasted minute and yes, it is possible to figure out the mole before the reveal (I actually did although I wasn't completely positive until the last minute). You don't need to know much about the Cold War to understand the movie, really just the basics, to understand the intrigue going on which is good since it's one less thing the viewer needs to keep track of. The series is well paced, there is always enough going on in each episode to keep it interesting and I always wanted to see the next one afterwords, but that doesn't mean that this series always made sense, see below.
The Bad: This may be due to the cuts but glancing through the Wikipedia article before I started writing I was surprised to see that some parts of the show were flashbacks since I hadn't picked up on that at all. Actually, this is a very plot dense story and if you don't have some kind of crib sheet with you (wikipedia, handy list of characters and terms that came with the DVD) then you're going to get lost fast, marathoning is not recommended for this series since that will only make it worse. That isn't a bad thing per say but you do need to be prepared to give your whole attention to this series and give yourself some time to watch it.
The Audio: Surprisingly enough this series does have distinct opening and ending themes (not 30 second clips of songs as they frantically scroll credits but proper little songs) and both of them grew on me, the image is actually a shot from the opening sequence. Other than that, the show was a bit quiet so I kept having to turn up the volume but that could've been a problem with the transfer to the DVD.
The Visuals: This series was shot in the 70s and it looks like it was (which isn't a good or bad thing, just a thing). There's not much to say about the visuals either, while they are necessary to this story it's also easy to see that this was originally a book and how this story could work in a text only environment as well.
Did I like this story? Well, honestly I'm not sure. It was well done and interesting, and I do wonder now if some of the problems I had were because of the US cut, but it just didn't grab me in the way that my favorite shows do. It didn't give me a burning desire to read the book or see this series again, although I am curious how a two hour movie version of this would work, but I still think it was a pretty good work.
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Summary: The Cold War is on and the head (Control) of the upper division of British Intelligence (the Circus) believes that there is a mole in their midst. When a mission to collect more information about the hypothetical mole goes disastrously wrong this all but confirms it but nothing else is done to the case until George Smiley, who was forced into retirement after Control's death and remains bitter about that, is given the task to pick up where the investigation left off and figure out if it is the tinker, the tailor, the soldier, or the poorman who has turned turncoat.
The Good: This is a very meticulously plotted series without a wasted minute and yes, it is possible to figure out the mole before the reveal (I actually did although I wasn't completely positive until the last minute). You don't need to know much about the Cold War to understand the movie, really just the basics, to understand the intrigue going on which is good since it's one less thing the viewer needs to keep track of. The series is well paced, there is always enough going on in each episode to keep it interesting and I always wanted to see the next one afterwords, but that doesn't mean that this series always made sense, see below.
The Bad: This may be due to the cuts but glancing through the Wikipedia article before I started writing I was surprised to see that some parts of the show were flashbacks since I hadn't picked up on that at all. Actually, this is a very plot dense story and if you don't have some kind of crib sheet with you (wikipedia, handy list of characters and terms that came with the DVD) then you're going to get lost fast, marathoning is not recommended for this series since that will only make it worse. That isn't a bad thing per say but you do need to be prepared to give your whole attention to this series and give yourself some time to watch it.
The Audio: Surprisingly enough this series does have distinct opening and ending themes (not 30 second clips of songs as they frantically scroll credits but proper little songs) and both of them grew on me, the image is actually a shot from the opening sequence. Other than that, the show was a bit quiet so I kept having to turn up the volume but that could've been a problem with the transfer to the DVD.
The Visuals: This series was shot in the 70s and it looks like it was (which isn't a good or bad thing, just a thing). There's not much to say about the visuals either, while they are necessary to this story it's also easy to see that this was originally a book and how this story could work in a text only environment as well.
Did I like this story? Well, honestly I'm not sure. It was well done and interesting, and I do wonder now if some of the problems I had were because of the US cut, but it just didn't grab me in the way that my favorite shows do. It didn't give me a burning desire to read the book or see this series again, although I am curious how a two hour movie version of this would work, but I still think it was a pretty good work.
Monday, September 5, 2011
TV Series Review: Doctor Who (Remembrance of the Daleks)
The final Classic Doctor Who serial I was able to get through this summer, this time featuring the Seventh Doctor and fan favorite companion Ace (for reasons that become clear in this episode, it involves daleks and baseball bats). This is one of the later serials in the shows initial run (1988, the show was "put on hiatus" in 89) and the last time the daleks would appear until the 2005 episode Dalek (funny enough, the daleks in this episode can already float to get up stairs, I thought that had been an invention of NuWho) and it's a good episode for their last appearance, especially when I started reading about some of the other, not so great dalek episodes.
Doctor Who: Remembrance of the Daleks
Summary: Set soon after the First Doctor left Earth in An Unearthly Child, the Doctor and Ace go to Earth where they become entangled in a dalek civil war who are fighting over a Time Lord weapon that the Doctor left on Earth when he was first there.
The Good: Even thought Ace comes across as a bit of a dated character she's yet another cool and proactive companion who certainly keeps the story interesting when the Doctor is planning something in the background. Speaking of planning in the background, this serial was the first hint that the Seventh Doctor was a bit darker, more of a schemer, than his previous incarnations and it's a nice twist on the Doctor's previous character*, instead of just getting caught up in the action he now actively tries to manipulate it from the start. Finally, one nice detail about this story was how the dalek's civil war (which revolved around how one group was a tiny bit genetically different than the other) was also reflected in the 1960s setting with a "No Coloureds" sign in a window and a black man in a cafe musing with the Doctor that, if it wasn't for sugar cane, he wouldn't even be in Britain. It was a nice detail to throw in especially since it is un-politically correct history and I'm happy that the show was true to it's setting^.
The Bad: At times it's a little hard to keep track of what the side characters are doing (there seems to have been a Nazi sympathizer plotline that I completely missed) and they are fairly important to the story. Another complaint I had was, as interesting as it is to see a darker Doctor, why is it that he didn't tell anyone about his plans until they were well under way? I would hope that he trusts Ace enough at this point and normally it's easier to have a plan work correctly if other people don't screw it up (because they understand the plan and know what to do/not to do).
The Audio: The theme music has changed slightly once again and, like the logo, manages to sound more dated than any of the other changes so far. Some of the sound effects also sound dated but that would be the case for any sci-fi show produced in the late 80s, especially one with a lower budget. So what was there worked, sorta, but is going to date the series for modern viewers.
The Visuals: The logo for Doctor Who has changed some over the years but the logo for this time period looks especially strange (and screams "hey guys, we can do some computer art now!"), some parts of the show look really dated. Wasn't able to tell how period accurate the costumes were but the daleks all looked fine and like, well, daleks. There were a few special effects that looked like early CGI in the episode but nothing really special happened visually.
Sorry for the delay here, I had almost all of that written up last night but I have a head cold which is making me feel out of it. Review should go up tomorrow but I'm not sure when, I have double club meetings and a bit of homework that I didn't get to this weekend because of said cold (and you know, school in general). Later in the school year I might get around to seeing more Classic Doctor Who since it turns out that one of my friends has a lot of the DVDs but currently I don't have any plans to, there are more than enough movie showings at the school to keep me entertained for the moment.
*especially since some people have pointed out that the current Doctor is starting to act more and more like a schemer who keeps others in the dark about his plans until they actually go off (although I'd argue that Seven seems much better at planning things that work than Eleven, Eleven makes his a bit too over the top which is a genuine character weakness). I always find this kind of continuity between Doctors cool and also feel like it makes the story stronger, even though I'm sure some people don't like it.
^also since the serial after this one is the infamous, critical of Margaret Thatcher (the then-current PM of Great Britian) serial which, having seen Nash's review of it, was pretty bad, makes me appreciate how this one was done even more.
Doctor Who: Remembrance of the Daleks
Summary: Set soon after the First Doctor left Earth in An Unearthly Child, the Doctor and Ace go to Earth where they become entangled in a dalek civil war who are fighting over a Time Lord weapon that the Doctor left on Earth when he was first there.
The Good: Even thought Ace comes across as a bit of a dated character she's yet another cool and proactive companion who certainly keeps the story interesting when the Doctor is planning something in the background. Speaking of planning in the background, this serial was the first hint that the Seventh Doctor was a bit darker, more of a schemer, than his previous incarnations and it's a nice twist on the Doctor's previous character*, instead of just getting caught up in the action he now actively tries to manipulate it from the start. Finally, one nice detail about this story was how the dalek's civil war (which revolved around how one group was a tiny bit genetically different than the other) was also reflected in the 1960s setting with a "No Coloureds" sign in a window and a black man in a cafe musing with the Doctor that, if it wasn't for sugar cane, he wouldn't even be in Britain. It was a nice detail to throw in especially since it is un-politically correct history and I'm happy that the show was true to it's setting^.
The Bad: At times it's a little hard to keep track of what the side characters are doing (there seems to have been a Nazi sympathizer plotline that I completely missed) and they are fairly important to the story. Another complaint I had was, as interesting as it is to see a darker Doctor, why is it that he didn't tell anyone about his plans until they were well under way? I would hope that he trusts Ace enough at this point and normally it's easier to have a plan work correctly if other people don't screw it up (because they understand the plan and know what to do/not to do).
The Audio: The theme music has changed slightly once again and, like the logo, manages to sound more dated than any of the other changes so far. Some of the sound effects also sound dated but that would be the case for any sci-fi show produced in the late 80s, especially one with a lower budget. So what was there worked, sorta, but is going to date the series for modern viewers.
The Visuals: The logo for Doctor Who has changed some over the years but the logo for this time period looks especially strange (and screams "hey guys, we can do some computer art now!"), some parts of the show look really dated. Wasn't able to tell how period accurate the costumes were but the daleks all looked fine and like, well, daleks. There were a few special effects that looked like early CGI in the episode but nothing really special happened visually.
Sorry for the delay here, I had almost all of that written up last night but I have a head cold which is making me feel out of it. Review should go up tomorrow but I'm not sure when, I have double club meetings and a bit of homework that I didn't get to this weekend because of said cold (and you know, school in general). Later in the school year I might get around to seeing more Classic Doctor Who since it turns out that one of my friends has a lot of the DVDs but currently I don't have any plans to, there are more than enough movie showings at the school to keep me entertained for the moment.
*especially since some people have pointed out that the current Doctor is starting to act more and more like a schemer who keeps others in the dark about his plans until they actually go off (although I'd argue that Seven seems much better at planning things that work than Eleven, Eleven makes his a bit too over the top which is a genuine character weakness). I always find this kind of continuity between Doctors cool and also feel like it makes the story stronger, even though I'm sure some people don't like it.
^also since the serial after this one is the infamous, critical of Margaret Thatcher (the then-current PM of Great Britian) serial which, having seen Nash's review of it, was pretty bad, makes me appreciate how this one was done even more.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (part two)
No Doctor Who this week (don't worry about that though, I have pleeeeenty for the next few weeks) but I do have another British property to review, Harry Potter! No I didn't plan for the review to fall on Harry's birthday, although that is a nice coincidence, and unlike many other people, I didn't go back and reread all the Harry Potter books before this final movie came out or rewatch part one (I did just see that movie a few months ago and had too much to read). So I would say that this isn't going to be a review where I nitpick over the changed details but there were actually a few scenes that either didn't make sense in the movie (showing that something had been cut, even if I didn't recall what) and I do remember a few important scenes being different so I guess this will be a bit of a nitpicky review after all!
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two
Summary: Continuing directly where the first part left off, Harry, Ron and Hermione finally have a lead on how to kill Voldermort and destroy him for good. This goal will need even more allies than they already have and will bring the story to a conclusion where everything really began, Hogwarts.
The Good: Just about every character who made an apperance in the last book showed up in this movie which is rather impressive (not all of them got speaking time but Harry Potter still has a huge cast). For the characters who did have a chance to speak it was really amazing to see just how far all of the younger characters (and many of their actors) have come and even the adult characters feel so much more fleshed out and different from their earlier appearances. The central plot in Harry Potter is a simple one, the classic good vs evil scenario, so it's the characters that have made this story so memorable. Rowling did write a very interesting plot withe plenty of twists and turns but in the end she'll be better remembered for creating such a fantastic setting and her characters more than anything else.
The Bad: As mentioned earlier, there are a few times in the story where some of the side characters end up in strange places with no explanation given (such as, how did Luna get back to Hogwarts?) and it's annoying to see that little, establishing explanations like that got cut for even more action scenes. That's another problem, there was a good bit of action in the later part of the book but the movie adds much more to it for no real reason. There already was enough in the book, the movie was certainly long enough and it would have saved them money if even a third of those scenes had been cut. In the end, this movie and part one really need to be watched back to back (or at least within a day or two) in order to balance the talking and the fighting since neither of them fully stands on their own.
The Audio: It's amazing that the scores for all eight movies that each movie has had some new music yet everything feels so cohesive. Nothing in particular stood out to me in the movie (except when they used the main Harry Potter them, I believe it's "Hedwig's Theme", from the first movie in the credit music) because it all felt like Harry Potter music, music I've now grown up hearing. That's a good sign, that the music is so recognizable that the audience doesn't even notice it in the movie anymore, and my hat is off to the composers for all their work.
The Visuals: The CGI in these movies have come so far since they started and, back when the Philosopher's Stone came out, the CGI has always looked good in these movies. The only part where the effects looked a little off was when the group was riding a dragon and you could see the characters and the CGI in the same shot, it didn't quite mesh. Other than that, the film was dark but still well lit enough to see everything and my only other complaint is that, while it looked like a few years had passed in the epilogue, the characters didn't look nearly 20 years older. The visuals were great and this probably would have been an interesting film to see in 3D.
In one of the final scenes of the movie, there was a significant detail changed that I didn't like as much and I think that's when it hit me, I just didn't like this movie as much and for me it wasn't that satisfying an ending. So perhaps I will reread the book again soon, especially since I didn't have any trouble with the end of that story, guess it's a good thing I didn't stay up for the midnight showing after all.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two
Summary: Continuing directly where the first part left off, Harry, Ron and Hermione finally have a lead on how to kill Voldermort and destroy him for good. This goal will need even more allies than they already have and will bring the story to a conclusion where everything really began, Hogwarts.
The Good: Just about every character who made an apperance in the last book showed up in this movie which is rather impressive (not all of them got speaking time but Harry Potter still has a huge cast). For the characters who did have a chance to speak it was really amazing to see just how far all of the younger characters (and many of their actors) have come and even the adult characters feel so much more fleshed out and different from their earlier appearances. The central plot in Harry Potter is a simple one, the classic good vs evil scenario, so it's the characters that have made this story so memorable. Rowling did write a very interesting plot withe plenty of twists and turns but in the end she'll be better remembered for creating such a fantastic setting and her characters more than anything else.
The Bad: As mentioned earlier, there are a few times in the story where some of the side characters end up in strange places with no explanation given (such as, how did Luna get back to Hogwarts?) and it's annoying to see that little, establishing explanations like that got cut for even more action scenes. That's another problem, there was a good bit of action in the later part of the book but the movie adds much more to it for no real reason. There already was enough in the book, the movie was certainly long enough and it would have saved them money if even a third of those scenes had been cut. In the end, this movie and part one really need to be watched back to back (or at least within a day or two) in order to balance the talking and the fighting since neither of them fully stands on their own.
The Audio: It's amazing that the scores for all eight movies that each movie has had some new music yet everything feels so cohesive. Nothing in particular stood out to me in the movie (except when they used the main Harry Potter them, I believe it's "Hedwig's Theme", from the first movie in the credit music) because it all felt like Harry Potter music, music I've now grown up hearing. That's a good sign, that the music is so recognizable that the audience doesn't even notice it in the movie anymore, and my hat is off to the composers for all their work.
The Visuals: The CGI in these movies have come so far since they started and, back when the Philosopher's Stone came out, the CGI has always looked good in these movies. The only part where the effects looked a little off was when the group was riding a dragon and you could see the characters and the CGI in the same shot, it didn't quite mesh. Other than that, the film was dark but still well lit enough to see everything and my only other complaint is that, while it looked like a few years had passed in the epilogue, the characters didn't look nearly 20 years older. The visuals were great and this probably would have been an interesting film to see in 3D.
In one of the final scenes of the movie, there was a significant detail changed that I didn't like as much and I think that's when it hit me, I just didn't like this movie as much and for me it wasn't that satisfying an ending. So perhaps I will reread the book again soon, especially since I didn't have any trouble with the end of that story, guess it's a good thing I didn't stay up for the midnight showing after all.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
TV Series Review: Doctor Who (The War Games)
And now for something a little different, I've reviewed NuWho and seen all of it but this was my first time seeing any of the Classic Doctor Who. I've been curious about it for a while and found this video by Nash of TGWTG recommending which episodes would be interesting to someone whose familiar with NuWho but not Classic Who. So, after discovering that my library apparently has every Doctor Who DVD ever, I went with the earliest in the bunch which is actually a fairly significant one. It's the longest serial (back in the day, each story took multiple episodes and were called serials) consisting of 10 episodes and clocking in at nearly four hours, it was the 50th serial, the last one shot in black and white, the first time that the Doctor's race is named (the Time Lords, I believe they had already mentioned they were from the planet Gallifrey) and the final one starring the Second Doctor, Patrick Troughton. So, without knowing anything about this particular Doctor or the companions I charged right in and enjoyed this much more than I expected.
Doctor Who: The War Games
Summary: The Tardis has once again deposited the Doctor and his companions (Zoe from the 21st century and Jamie from the 18th) where they didn't expect to be and it seems that they are in 1917 in the trenches of World War I. However, even the people from this time period aren't entirely sure where they are or how long they've been fighting, the general has everyone under his absolute control and people from other times and places start showing up. If the Doctor and company want to get out of being executed as deserters/spies then they'll need to figure out just whats going on and who is pulling all the strings.
The Good: Now THAT is a plot heavy episode, one that is much bigger and more complex than it originally seems yet makes perfect sense in the end, there was some very strong writing here. The main characters are also interesting, the Tardis crew has great chemistry with each other, and not one sided (with the added bonus that Jamie and Zoe's backgrounds are alluded to, very nice for a new watcher), although the overall motivations of the villains is a little fuzzy, and they're great fun to watch. At times Zoe and Jamie (especially Zoe) seem more capable than many modern day companions, even if everyone gets kidnapped more times in one episode than most companions do in an entire season, and the Doctor seems to be having an awful lot of fun with all the trouble he gets into. It was really easy to get sucked into this serial and sympathize with the characters, despite knowing almost nothing about them, and that seems like the mark of really good writing and acting.
The Bad: The episodes are well paced but there are some scene changes where it's a bit difficult to tell what just happened, usually when they change between a dimly lit set to another dimly lit set with different characters (if this was in color the scene change would have been more obvious and this probably wouldn't have been a problem). One character does vanish completely around the middle of the serial (the DVD commentary clears that up a bit) and the ending is a bit rushed since it has to send off so many different characters, some with better explanations than others.
The Audio: The audio, as well as the visuals, have been very well preserved and there are very few instances when someone is miked too low to hear. It does feel a bit strange to hear another Doctor Who intro theme* but most fans have probably heard a compilation of the themes over the years anyway. Some of the sound effects (the special effects in general honestly) were cheesy and dated but that's to be expected from a 42 year old video. Could they have done better? Possibly, I'm not that familiar with video editing techniques from shows twice my age, but Doctor Who has never been a high budget show and the crew doing their best to work with what they have.
The Visuals: The film quality does vary a bit but by and large the video looks fine (some of the darker scenes might even look a little better than the darker scenes in Buffy). The video seemed to look the worst when the Doctor and company kept running into the Romans (so that was probably all shot at the same time under similar conditions, maybe the lighting that day was strange?) and there is one point where Jamie describes an object as being large and green which seems a bit strange to hear from a character in a black and white show. The frame rate looks normal^ so if someone is holding off watching this serial because they aren't a big fan of black and white really has nothing to worry about, it looks just fine and probably better than you'd expect.
In short, I went into this expecting the episode to be hokey but okay and absolutely fell in love with it (which does make sense, I mean, this was recommended as one of the best Classic episodes). After this I'm really pumped to try more of the episodes on the list and will have to poke around the various Doctor Who communities to see what other Second Doctor stories are worth watching.
*although I was more weirded out by the Classic Doctor Who practice of having a floating head of the Doctor appear in the credits instead of the Tardis. The ending to the serial is even tripper however....
^there was a period in time when British television used a higher frame rate than American television does (I believe it was 60 frames per second instead of 30 frames per second) which made the movements look more realistic but also made the video look like it was being shot by a cheap camcorder/on the set of a Spanish soap-opera.
Doctor Who: The War Games
Summary: The Tardis has once again deposited the Doctor and his companions (Zoe from the 21st century and Jamie from the 18th) where they didn't expect to be and it seems that they are in 1917 in the trenches of World War I. However, even the people from this time period aren't entirely sure where they are or how long they've been fighting, the general has everyone under his absolute control and people from other times and places start showing up. If the Doctor and company want to get out of being executed as deserters/spies then they'll need to figure out just whats going on and who is pulling all the strings.
The Good: Now THAT is a plot heavy episode, one that is much bigger and more complex than it originally seems yet makes perfect sense in the end, there was some very strong writing here. The main characters are also interesting, the Tardis crew has great chemistry with each other, and not one sided (with the added bonus that Jamie and Zoe's backgrounds are alluded to, very nice for a new watcher), although the overall motivations of the villains is a little fuzzy, and they're great fun to watch. At times Zoe and Jamie (especially Zoe) seem more capable than many modern day companions, even if everyone gets kidnapped more times in one episode than most companions do in an entire season, and the Doctor seems to be having an awful lot of fun with all the trouble he gets into. It was really easy to get sucked into this serial and sympathize with the characters, despite knowing almost nothing about them, and that seems like the mark of really good writing and acting.
The Bad: The episodes are well paced but there are some scene changes where it's a bit difficult to tell what just happened, usually when they change between a dimly lit set to another dimly lit set with different characters (if this was in color the scene change would have been more obvious and this probably wouldn't have been a problem). One character does vanish completely around the middle of the serial (the DVD commentary clears that up a bit) and the ending is a bit rushed since it has to send off so many different characters, some with better explanations than others.
The Audio: The audio, as well as the visuals, have been very well preserved and there are very few instances when someone is miked too low to hear. It does feel a bit strange to hear another Doctor Who intro theme* but most fans have probably heard a compilation of the themes over the years anyway. Some of the sound effects (the special effects in general honestly) were cheesy and dated but that's to be expected from a 42 year old video. Could they have done better? Possibly, I'm not that familiar with video editing techniques from shows twice my age, but Doctor Who has never been a high budget show and the crew doing their best to work with what they have.
The Visuals: The film quality does vary a bit but by and large the video looks fine (some of the darker scenes might even look a little better than the darker scenes in Buffy). The video seemed to look the worst when the Doctor and company kept running into the Romans (so that was probably all shot at the same time under similar conditions, maybe the lighting that day was strange?) and there is one point where Jamie describes an object as being large and green which seems a bit strange to hear from a character in a black and white show. The frame rate looks normal^ so if someone is holding off watching this serial because they aren't a big fan of black and white really has nothing to worry about, it looks just fine and probably better than you'd expect.
In short, I went into this expecting the episode to be hokey but okay and absolutely fell in love with it (which does make sense, I mean, this was recommended as one of the best Classic episodes). After this I'm really pumped to try more of the episodes on the list and will have to poke around the various Doctor Who communities to see what other Second Doctor stories are worth watching.
*although I was more weirded out by the Classic Doctor Who practice of having a floating head of the Doctor appear in the credits instead of the Tardis. The ending to the serial is even tripper however....
^there was a period in time when British television used a higher frame rate than American television does (I believe it was 60 frames per second instead of 30 frames per second) which made the movements look more realistic but also made the video look like it was being shot by a cheap camcorder/on the set of a Spanish soap-opera.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Movie Review: The King's Speech
When I initially heard about The King's Speech (back in December or so) it sounded like a movie that might interest me but I just wasn't interested at the time. I was busy and I was also pretty sure that my school would be showing it later on. So lo and behold they did show it and I managed to get a friend to come along so I wouldn't be lonely (side note, I have no idea how I keep getting friends to come see movies they know nothing about with me, guess they should be glad by now I have good taste).
The King’s Speech
Summary: The Duke of York, second in line to the throne of England in the 1930s, has a terrible stutter and, as a result, a phobia of speaking. He wishes to get over this, to an extent anyway (he doesn’t seem to want to do much though so he comes off as rather spoiled), and events going on in the background of the story suggest that it more important than ever that he be able to rally the nation with a good speech.
The Good: Huzzah for historical dramas! A friend commented that this movie was made just to win an Oscar (I disagree that that was the intention in making the movie, but we both agreed that if that is the reason we get some good movies each year we’re perfectly okay with it) and it was a nice change of pace from what I normally see. Even without the dates the visuals of the movie clearly and quickly set up the time period and manages to show the passage of time through the years, from the late 1920s to Britain's entrance into World War II. Despite covering so many years the movie is well paced
The Bad: As a quick note, there seems to be a PG-13 version of the movie airing in the US as well as the original R rated version and, since the R rating would be only because of language, people should really see the R rated version (also, the one scene with the most cursing is hysterical). As for the movie, Albert can be very hard to relate to throughout the entire film, even knowing all the stress and pressure he's under. At times he comes off as a spoiled prince who hates to be told to do things and takes a long time to come around and trust Lionel's help. It also appears that this movie is a bit historically inaccurate which, while a given in most historical movies anyway, does make me question how much of it was accurate then.
The Music: I liked how all the music played over the radio or all the speeches had a slightly scratchy noise to them, just a little detail that I thought gave the movie a little more authenticity. Other than that, nothing about the music really stood out to me in the film and since I don’t remember having any complaints about it it certainly wasn’t bad either.
The Visuals: Over the past couple of years I’ve noticed a couple of differences between British and American cinematography now and just from the video I was able to tell this was a British film. Specifically, it was all the close up shots of people’s faces as they are listening to someone/thinking so you see their face and then get the reaction a second or two later, I just don’t notice that in American films as much. I liked that and it really worked here since the whole movie was about Bertie and Lionel so it makes sense to have that much visual focus on a character driven movie.
Whew, glad I didn't try to post yesterday after all, I might have just been at a mini-con but it wiped me out. I thought about trying to write up another post for my buffer but was too tired to even do that. Anyway, thing should be normal around here for the next two weeks or so and then my exams start and summer vacation starts so the updates may get a little wonky, I'll be sure to post and say if I'm not going to be able to post some days.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
TV Series Review: Torchwood (season one)
Sorry this is late guys, I had about half of this written up yesterday and then my evening was way more busy than I expected and was nodding off when I tried to write the rest. So just as a heads up, I might have to switch to an every other day update schedule but I'm going to try to keep the reviews daily as long as I can.
So, Torchwood! Appropriately enough I watched this with the same friends who introduced me to Doctor Who last year (TW is a spin-off from DW). Also a bit funny since RTD was the show runner for both series and his style of writing/directing is really distinctive. Although, like the first few seasons of the new DW series, this season was a bit rocky.
Torchwood
Summary: With the number of aliens coming to Earth each year, and the trouble of keeping them hidden from the general public, it's no surprise that many countries have created their own response teams. Torchwood 3 is located by a giant space-time rift in Cardiff Wales and are soon joined by the plucky Gwen Cooper in their quest to keep the city alien free.
The Good: Some of the episodes were pretty interesting, ie, ended up being quite different than I expected. The fairy episode and the one with the monster in the middle of nowhere had some interesting twists at the end and the time travel one turned out a bit different than I expected. Really liked the 1940s episode for the setting and the characters were actually clever in this one. Yes there was still angst but they seemed more focused on solving the problem this time around, might look it up to see if that one had a different episode writer or such.
The Bad: Like I said above, some episodes were hits and some were misses. Torchwood was created to carter to the older Doctor Who audience so it's also "edgier" which, as far as I can tell, means that everyone angsts more and tries to solve every problem using sex (spoiler alert, usually doesn't help). So the characters by and large are rather annoying (maybe I would talk with them at a party but I really wouldn't want to deal with them more than once or twice), the season didn't have an overarching theme/villain/motif (which is what I liked about RTD era DW) and the ending was abrupt. Yes I know it crosses over at that point but frankly, if I wasn't interested in seeing DW and saw that season ending I would've been really annoyed.
The Music: I heard the opening theme plenty of times while watching this (mainly because the DVD player was being finicky and it took forever to get the DVDs to play) so it's a good thing that I actually like it. Just a short bit of music with a fast tempo that isn't used as prominently in the series as it does on the DVD menu but it would probably make a cool ringtone. Other than that, music really is something I notice more on the re-watch of a series than the first time but I like the period music in the WWII episode.
The Visuals: The CGI is a bit worse than DW (so that is to say, lower end of average) and, as the image above suggests, visually it's pretty dark in a lot of places, I think my friends had the tv brightness turned way up to see it. The settings worked however, some very nice clothing for the 1940s episode and none of the sets looked overused to me. So, it's not the most visually interesting show out there but it works, rather average I suppose.
So, this was kinda a week season actually. There were some things I liked but if I hadn't been watching with friends I might've actually dropped the show. As it stands, still planning to watch season two with them, since both of them had the same problems with the season I did and said they liked the second one better, and if that goes well I'll watch Children of Earth and wait for season four, Immortality Day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)