Arroo!

This series has made it to a second season. The first season was decent enough, they struck out and did their own thing with Green Arrow, and although they did bring in various lesser known other DC characters (mainly villains), although no-one really got that excited because they were lesser known.

Then the second season has kicked off and we actually get more well known heroes. One in particular, we've been waiting for, is Black Canary... and there she is! But who is she? I just want to step in here and say: I called it! I knew who it would be, because the series was going that silly, and boom, there she is! And we're also getting Barry Allen shoehorned in. Not the Flash yet... but definitely 'yet'.

But the over arching enemy just isn't that interesting. They want to do something big and spectacular and tie it into their evolving back story, but ... this is one of the biggest problems of this series. Oliver's backstory involves him being trapped on an island (with others) over five years and learning all sorts of crazy skills. And they keep flashing back to the island to show yet more bits about what happened to him. The problem is: it's really boring. Like, I'm fast forwarding through it, it's so boring.

I'm still watching... for now. (Unlike, say, Psych, which I've totally given up on), but it could be better. Maybe if they bring in Green Arrow's usual other partner to trade off, Green Lantern...

[END]

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Super-natural

I wasn't much for the first season of this series. It's one of those things where it hadn't really found its feet yet, and so each 'monster of the week' episode felt disconnected from everything else.

Season two did kick it up. They started going for fuller arcs and bringing on the connected stories. Still time for some one-offs, but also building up their own continuity. And later seasons continued. Ranging from aspects of Christian mythology to... other parts of Christian mythology, the show has gone on some big topics. Even talking about 'where is god?' (and deciding that god is a bit of a dick). They've gone through demons, angels, pre-demons...

And the characters are developed well. Even the non-two-main-leads. Who doesn't look forward to an episode featuring Castiel? (Played wonderfully by Misha Collins.) Not to mention Mark "Badger" Sheppard's role as the Devil. Then there are reoccuring human characters, including one Nerd Queen Felicia Day.

And they aren't afraid to kill off characters either. Even the two leads, but, of course, they then find some way around that. That can get a little cheesy at times, but they do try to earn it each time.

The series has come a long way, and this seems like a good deal for Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles. We're mid season nine, and I'm still looking forward to each new episode (and I hope there's a season ten... although let's not push things indefinitely, eh, guys?).

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DW: Love and Monsters

Love and Monsters is a book about Doctor Who, in that is it is a book about Doctor Who fandom, and how it interacts with the main program.

It starts mainly in the 1970s as fandom, in the form of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society, was getting together. We see, though the eyes of author Miles Booy, a potted history of both fanzine creation, the proper magazine creation, and the production of Doctor Who, as it intersects with them. While not claiming to be a definitive work, we do get the rise of DWM, of how John Nathan-Turner changed things, how Target novels were the way Doctor Who was remembered, the launching of the in-between years books, and then the explosion (and some might say collapse) of New Doctor Who and the focus not on the fans but on the children.

It did take me a while to get into it. The essay nature of it doesn't lend to immediately jumping into it, although it definitely sounds better than The Unfolding Text (which I haven't read, and now probably never will). Oh, and endnotes... please, authors, make them footnotes, rather than have me flick through pages for them!

This is very much a British perspective, and while I know of the things he's talking about, it doesn't mean that much to me other than as an interesting historical document. (Yeah, I'm biased by certain New Zealand fanzines take on these events.)

Not bad reading, but I wouldn't say it's vital reading.

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Majority Report

A lot of people point to this movie as having a proper display of how to use motion controls to control displays.

He's a cop, Wrongly accused of a crime he didn't commit! (Or rather, wouldn't commit.) On the run from the law, he has to find out what's really going on. Along the way, he has to make shady deals with the dark parts of society, and comes up against his own team. Finally, he must get back together with his estranged wife to prove himself ultimate innocent and bring down the corrupt.

You know, said like that, this sounds like a rather generic movie. And in many ways, it is. What distinguishes it from other movies is the setting. All the technology gives spectacle to watch and absorb. It's an interesting version of the future, with non-driving cars, and ads targeting people, and we are still on track for a lot of that.

But to fit with the generic plot, we get generic acting no-one is really giving anything new, Tom Cruise is just standing around intense, Max Von Sydow is quietly menacing, and the only one looking like she is doing something is Samantha Morton. And there's a lot of crazy characters, Lois Smith and Peter Stormare just go nuts.

It's a decent enough movie to watch, but it's more because of the vision in blue (and there's a lot of blue!) than anything else.

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Imaginaerium

Okay, a weird movie I only saw screen shots of and thought I might check it out. It's based on a concept album by Nightwish, whom I've never heard of, so that music really resonated with me. I'm not sure if they were trying more for The Wall, but I was more reminded of Pan's Labyrinth.

In this, an old man is dying in a coma, and has regressed back to his childhood memories. In the real world, his daughter cannot sign his "do not resuscitate" order quickly enough, and goes back to the house to find some memories... and at the same time, in the coma, in his kid form, the man also finds similar memories with fantastical overtones (hence Pan). We uncover childhood traumas for both of them, and...

There are a few set pieces where, I'm guessing, the band gets on screen to rock on. I assume they did all the music, which is mostly sweet melodic tunes, odd for a symphonic power metal band. The pieces are somewhat associated with what is going on, but most of them feel like "let's insert this music video moment!".

The acting is decent, even the kids. The production values are also up there, and the evil snowman is well created (and those stitches for a mouth can't help but make him evil!). And, hey, despite being a Finnish production, it's in English, so that's good for us ignant non-English spaeking moroons.

It feels like a concept movie to fit the concept album. Nice imagery, although a thin story.

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I want to want to see this...

I like me some horror movies. And I find mirrors to be a fascinating source for horror, the basic idea being 'what if the image isn't a reflection but a gateway to something else?' And so I see the trailer for the upcoming Oculus movie....

Oh, it's got things I want to like about it. Mirrors and creepiness, check. Karen Gillan, check. What look to be strange movements in the mirrors, double check.

And yet... it's from the people who made Paranormal Activity and Insidious, so... it's going to be a long slow build with an unsatisfying pay off? And it's going to be set up to be an ongoing franchise? (And the poem sucks too.)

And if all they are going to do is "something creepy comes out of the mirror to stalk and kill them all", colour me bored.

You can do great things with mirrors and horror... but I doubt they know how to.

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Face Off'd

I'm a big fan of Face Off... or maybe I should say I was.

This is now up to its sixth season, and has been coming up with lots of different design ideas to inspire people. And there's hints that it's going really big (one episode is set in Japan!). But... it's been six seasons! Just how far do they have to go to not replicate earlier stuff? Would they ever have considered giving these ideas to the season one peoples? Are they just drawing "wacky ideas from a hat" and going with that?

And they've also got a new round of personalities. None of them are really sticking out. I have to admit I haven't been drawn to watching with rapt attention, but I don't know who any of these people are. There's a guy... and a woman... and someone with a hair do... but they just seem interchangeable.

In season five they had 'veterans vs newcomers', in which they were already mining their own shows to help produce new ideas. And now they are starting all over with a fresh batch of people.

Now, I know reality tv shows are easy to produce, and this was good... but I think it's time is done. It had a good run, let's just let it fade into memory than drag it into death...

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