Scratching the Surface of the New Season

This is just a taste, not intensive reviews, of my impressions of some of what the new television season has to offer.

"Selfie" - Against all my better judgment, I kinda dig this one. The premise, a modern updating of "Pygmalion," only holds so much water and can only last as long as the story does, is just not the usual fodder for a sitcom. Sitcoms like status quo, and by its nature, this is not. Fan fave Karen Gillan ("Doctor Who," Guardians of the Galaxy) is a social media obsessed woman whose straight laced co-worker, the criminally underused John Cho (Star Trek, the Harold & Kumar movies), tries to help her to better herself. This was fun, I don't know how long it will, or can, last, but it was fun.

"Scorpion" - While some folks have laid into this series for its casting, I think I will stick with other critics and trash the series as a whole. I could not stand this thing. Its good points are that it is as manipulative and predictable as a 1980s popcorn flick. Its bad points are that anyone with common sense or has been on the internet at all will be bleeding from the eyes ten minutes in. CBS, what used to be called the old people network, is trying to get its title back. Because, 'inspired by true events' or not, the only people who believe this 'high tech' hokum are folks who think a pager is cutting edge and are still living in the 1990s where hacking is magic. This made my head hurt.

"Castle" - The more I think about this one, the more I think this series has outstayed its welcome. I loved it so much when it first appeared. What was not to like? An old school TV mystery series with a writer at its center? I'm sold. I loved the poker games with real writers from the first season, too bad they vanished. Last season, the stories seemed to suffer from faulty logic that wasn't there the first few seasons. I loved the characters so I hung in there. Then, as a cliffhanger, they had the main character kidnapped just before the wedding. Yeah, a bit cliché, but I remained a loyal viewer. With the new season premiere, we have entered bad soap opera territory with amnesia. I am sure that this show has worn out its welcome and should have ending with a happy ending wedding last season.

"American Horror Story: Freak Show" - I tried this anthology series in its first season, was bored to tears, and fell away rather quickly. Since then it's gotten a lot of hype. When this season's 'freak show' theme was announced, being a fan of Tod Browning's Freaks and HBO's "Carnivale," I had to give it another chance. I was pleasantly surprised. This hot mess is a campy concoction of many genres thrown into a bloody food processor, including "True Blood," "Dark Shadows," Stephen King, John Waters, and Brian DePalma. Love it, so far at least. You can check out my friend and fellow writer Marie Gilbert's reviews of the series here at Biff Bam Pop!.

Speaking of Biff Bam Pop!, you can read my review of the pilot episode of "The Flash" here, my ongoing reviews of "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." here, my review of "Gotham" here at Welcome to Hell, and my thoughts on the new season of "Arrow" begin right here on this blog starting tomorrow.

Guardians of the Galaxy

Guardians of the Galaxy ~ First things first, there will be spoilers for the movie, so if you're looking for a spoiler-free review of Guardians of the Galaxy, that review can be found at Biff Bam Pop! right here, and really, what are you waiting for already? See the movie!

I should confess that these aren't my Guardians of the Galaxy in the movie. I first encountered the Guardians of the Galaxy back in the 1970s at the Berlin Auction, or the Berlin Farmers Market for the folks from Cherry Hill, at one of those newsstands where they would tear the tops of the covers off of comics and sell them three for a quarter. Sometimes the pickings would be sparse, and instead of a Flash or Justice League, you would end up getting something different that you didn't necessarily want. This is how stuff like Lois Lane or Tarzan Family or Daredevil would end up in your collection, ready to be traded at school for something you thought was better.

One of those books that I actually enjoyed and didn't trade was Marvel Presents #3, featuring the original Guardians of the Galaxy. I loved this book. Here the original and somewhat redesigned members of the team - Charlie-27 of Jupiter, Martinex of Pluto, Yondu of Alpha Centauri, and Vance Astro of Earth - were teamed with the cosmic-powered Starhawk to finish off the alien invaders, the Badoon, who had enslaved mankind. This was in the 30th century, and I was well aware of Marvel trying to parallel DC Comics' Legion of Super-Heroes, but I didn't care, this was cool. These heroes bounced around different titles throughout the 1970s before scoring their own series in the 1980s, before disappearing.

These new Guardians of the Galaxy were born in the fires of the Marvel Comics crossover event called Annihilation and its spin-offs and sequels. This event brainstormed by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning took almost all of Marvel's space and cosmic heroes and wove all of their mythologies into one coherent continuity. And that is really what is so amazing about the movie. All of these characters have such continuity-heavy backgrounds in the comics, but in the film are presented with just what you need to know to enjoy the flick. It's magic, and serious props should go to James Gunn and Nicole Perlman.

Star-Lord and Rocket Raccoon were pretty much, to my knowledge at least, one-shot characters from the late 1970s. Thanos, Drax the Destroyer, Lady Gamora, Nebula and that bunch were all part of that weird 1970s cosmic epic involving Captain Mar-Vell and Adam Warlock by Jim Starlin before that. And Groot, well, Groot predates Marvel, going waaay back to Atlas Comics when Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were doing giant monster and alien invasion stories in the 1950s. Annihilation brought them together as a team before they came to the big screen. That's that, but as I said, everything you need to know about these characters is on the screen.

There are Easter eggs and tidbits from earlier Marvel movies in here, and it's a major bonus if you know about them, but you don't need to know anything to see and enjoy Guardians of the Galaxy. This could very well be the first Marvel movie for all the background needed. In other words, the fanboy and the fangirl can bring their significant others to this flick and they will enjoy it just as much as their partner.

You'll meet Star-Lord, played by Chris Pratt, playing his charm and charisma for all its worth. He's a funny leading man who will make you blow raspberries at that Robert Downey Jr. guy. He is the default leader of the rogues who become the Guardians. Zoe Saldana plays living weapon Gamora, with wrestler Dave Bautista (or is it Batista?  I've seen it spelled both ways) as the literal-minded Drax the Destroyer. The personality quirks of these two characters mixed with Star-Lord are part of what makes this flick so much fun.

The real fun with characters and interaction come from the two CGI entries Rocket and Groot. Rocket is a genetically engineered raccoon (but don't call him that) who's as handy with tech as he is with big guns. Voiced by Oscar-nominated actor Bradley Cooper, Rocket and his bodyguard/partner Groot are the breakout characters here. Groot, whose vocabulary consists of three words, "I am Groot" (voiced by Vin Diesel), is a huge tree creature of many different abilities. Both of them are lots of fun.

These characters go from hating each other to making a Great Escape break out to eventually saving the galaxy - I'm sure that's not a spoiler or surprise, but their bonding is at the core of the flick. Real plot details involve big bads everywhere, including James Brolin's Thanos, Benicio del Toro as The Collector, former "Doctor Who"companion Karen Gillan as Nebula, Michael Rooker of "The Walking Dead" as Yondu, and the wonderfully designed Ronan the Accuser as played by Lee Pace.

As far as cameos go there is of course Stan Lee, but also look for Glenn Close, John C. Reilly, Troma's Lloyd Kaufman, and the voices of Nathan Fillion, Rob Zombie, and in the after-credits sequence, Seth Green as Howard the Duck. Yeah, that's right, Howard the Duck. Perhaps this more character-correct (although it's only one line) version can help erase the George Lucas abomination from 1986, and of course now that Disney owns Marvel, Howard can go pantless. Also, as this movie proves that Rocket Raccoon can be done believably, maybe we can get a real Howard film in the future…

One of the best parts of Guardians of the Galaxy is the soundtrack, not the terrific score by Tyler Bates, but the songs featured throughout. Star-Lord has a cassette tape of 1970s hits that play throughout the film, and it is almost as important as the characters to the film, because the movie wouldn't be the same without it. The 1970s vibe rocks the movie and makes it special.

It is not all good however. We get precious little of Thanos, and the Collector's scenes are more than a bit disappointing (although we get to see a Celestial!), although I did dig that his home was inside the dead skull of a Celestial. I would have liked to have seen more use of Nebula, as would most "Doctor Who" fans coming to the flick. I am sure however we will see her again, as well as her father as I believe Thanos plays heavily in Avengers 3, and of course Guardians 2 is a go as well.

If wanting more is my only complaint, how bad could the flick really be? In fact, I think this is one of the best of the marvel movies, right up there with Iron Man, Captain America, and Avengers, and that's high praise indeed. If you want a bit more of my thoughts (and The Bride's), you can check out our special Guardians of the Galaxy episode of The Make Mine Magic Podcast.

Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol

As it has since the beginning of the post-millenium series, "Doctor Who" returns for Christmas with a new special, a teaser of the season to come. This time, it's a Dickensian Christmas-themed trip on a honeymoon spaceliner with returning cast Matt Smith and Karen Gillan as The Doctor and Amy Pond. Arthur Darvill also returns as Amy's newlywed husband, Rory. At least that's what might be expected from the previews, and the episode's title, "A Christmas Carol."

We begin on board a plummeting spaceliner, this being "Doctor Who" all spaceliners are doomed, but we find Amy and Rory arriving from the bridge of the ship, from the honeymoon suite, in meter maid and Roman soldier outfits (!), telling the crew everything is all right because they've called for help. Yeah, you guessed it, The Doctor, cue opening credits.

The spaceliner is careening into a planet whose atmosphere is controlled by an evil old man who refuses to grant entry, dooming the passengers of the ship, unless The Doctor can change his mind. Between the Dickens references, the Victorian steampunk culture of the planet, and the more obvious "A Christmas Carol" parallels, this is not what you think it is, and goes in a completely different direction. And I would expect nothing less from writer/producer Steven Moffet.

Yes, this is Dickens' classic tale of redemption, but not in the way you think. While Amy and Rory are here, they are barely here. The story revolves around Michael Gambon as the Scrooge template, Kazran, whose past is altered helter skelter. Gambon is terrific here, as are his younger self Laurence Belcher and the love of his life Katherine Jenkins.

Steven Moffet spins a wonderful but bittersweet time travel tale that also mirrors last year's season finale. It's almost as if Moffet decided that if "Doctor Who" is a show about time travel, let's make it a show a time travel gosh darn it - and he pulls out all the tricks. The result is delightful, and the Christmas tradition continues. I can't wait for the new season to start.

Doctor Who: The Big Bang

This is it, the finale. Last episode it was truly a 1966 "Batman" cliffhanger – The Doctor was imprisoned in the Pandorica by all of his greatest enemies and Amy had been shot, supposedly killed by the Nestine/Roman/Auton Rory at Stonehenge in 102 AD.

After the scenes from last week we get the caption that says 1894 years later to see Amy as a child praying for someone to come and fix the hole in her bedroom wall. This is significant as it skewers the rumors that the Doctor actually picked up Amy from the 1980s rather than the present day. Do the math.

What we see is very similar to the opening of this season’s first episode "The Eleventh Hour" – except there’s no Doctor, and no stars in the sky. With other things like star cults and Nile penguins, it becomes quickly apparent that this is an altered timeline. Young Amy is led to a museum by a path of Post-It notes Alice-style where she opens the Pandorica and is confronted by her older self. Cue title sequence.

My first reaction is that Steven Moffet was just watching a bit too much Bill and Ted. There is a lot of Bill and Ted time travel buggery going on here. You know, jumping back and forth in time quickly to make sure what you need is where you need it when you need it. It’s fun. Once. Not several times. But I have to say, Moffet covers his bets and makes sure everything is explained regarding these elements.

There are lots of cool bits in this episode. It felt sooo good when Rory punches the Doctor in the mouth. It’s even cooler when River Song makes a Dalek beg for mercy. And Rory seals his image with the ladies with perhaps the most romantic artist’s rendering ever. There were scary moments of premature realization when I thought maybe Amy was an Auton or perhaps DoctorDonna. There’s also the fez that the Doctor wears for a short time, "It's a fez. I wear a fez now. Fezzes are cool."

There’s also an overlong backwards rewind through this whole season by the Doctor. In this we learn that not everything we have seen was the Doctor in his present time, at that time. It also serves to explain what I at first thought was an editing glitch in the Angels two-parter. When the Doctor is sans jacket, then with jacket and then sans jacket again – the jacketed Doctor was the Doctor from the future rewinding backwards.

"The Big Bang" was a somber and less special effects dependent finale than its first part, but it worked for me. It does suffer somewhat from Lord of the Rings-it is, in that it has far too many endings. The bad news is we don’t find out who River Song is, yet, so I cannot collect bets or pay folks off. I still think she could be the Rani...

So until Christmas... remember, in the words of Professor River Song, "the Doctor lies."

Doctor Who: The Pandorica Opens

I can’t believe it’s almost over. Here we are at the final story of the fifth season (series for you Brits) of "Doctor Who." As the title "The Pandorica Opens" implies, we’re going to get some answers finally, and man, are they something! Beware, there be spoilers ahead...

The Steven Moffet scripted episode opens with various characters from throughout the series – Vincent van Gogh, Winston Churchill, Prof. Riversong and Queen Liz all working to get a message routed through time via a painting and the TARDIS. The painting, by van Gogh is called "The Pandorica Opens" and depicts the TARDIS exploding.

Somehow we end up back two thousands years in the past with the Roman legions of Julius Caesar, with Riversong as Cleopatra. Don’t worry, it comes together. The Doctor, Amy and Riversong track the Pandorica to Stonehenge, and I half-expected an appearance of the Ogri from "The Stones of Blood," one of my favorite old school stories. No luck, but there is a very cool Raiders going on when they discover the Pandorica, which appears to be some sort of prison cell.

This is when things get very bad. The Pandorica is sending out a signal, and apparently calling various alien races to Earth, and not good ones – all ones with a hatred for the Doctor. First the Daleks, then the Cybermen, and as if that’s not enough, it seems they are all converging on Earth – the Sontarans, the Judoon, the Silurians, the Sycorax, the Slitheen, the Atraxi, and the Autons among others.

Yeah, it’s the final battle with all the baddies with fanboy giddiness. You can almost feel Steven Moffet grinning as he wrote this.

Just as I was starting to like Karen Gillan as Amy unhindered by Rory, the old boy makes a reappearance, believe it or not as one of the Romans. And she still doesn’t remember him. And just when you might think it just can’t can’t get any worse ... it does. Rory is an Auton.

Meanwhile Matt Smith’s arrogant promise-breaking Doctor has problems of his own with almost every one of his worst enemies in the skies. He momentarily holds off the warring alien races with smack talk, which would have been much cooler had it not been the same smack talk and the same trick he pulled at the end of "The Eleventh Hour." It definitely seems like arrogance is going to bite Matt in the ass just like it did David Tennant last season.

And then the Pandorica opens. Wow. Once all of the elements of this season come together, it makes sense, and man, is it nasty...

So until next time... "Hello sweetie" ... or should that be "Goodbye sweetie?"

Doctor Who: Vincent and the Doctor

“Vincent and the Doctor” is one of those history episodes of “Doctor Who.” They used to do these all the time way way back in the old days of the show. We’ve had a few in the new series. The recent Dalek adventure in World War II springs to mind, as does the older “Daleks in Manhattan” two-parter, and then there were the episodes with Agatha Christie, Queen Victoria and Shakespeare. This one falls more in line with the historical personage than just standard period piece. The personage in this case is Vincent van Gogh.

Geek that I am, my first exposure to van Gogh was in the Peanuts comic strip – Snoopy had one of his paintings in his doghouse. Later, I learned what a genius the man truly was, even if he was a mad genius. As one of the greatest post-impressionist painters of all time, his work still resonates and affects the art world even today. And yeah, he’s a perfect choice for a character in a Doctor Who episode. Of course his presence in this episode begs one question, is his name pronounced ‘van goff’ or ‘van goh’?

Notable this time out is that “Vincent and the Doctor” is written by Richard Curtis, more famous for Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill and one of my favorite films Love Actually. He even brought along one of his favorite actors, Bill Nighy, for a pleasant cameo as a present day van Gogh expert. Good stuff.

Despite the ending of the last episode “Cold Blood,” Amy Pond seems pretty upbeat in this one, but of course she doesn’t remember she lost, or even had, a fiancée. It is a good upbeat though, and there is good chemistry between Amy and the Doctor this time. She is big and flamboyant. I like Amy here. Did Rory really make that much of a difference in her life? There’s a great moment when the panicked Doctor calls Vincent “Rory.” He’s taking Rory’s death harder than the clueless Amy.

The episode is highlighted by many beautiful visual references as well as several bad puns to van Gogh, his life and his work. Amy taunting the artist with sunflowers comes off just as well as Rose trying to get Queen Victoria to say “I am not amused” back in “Tooth and Claw.” The performance of Tony Curran as van Gogh plus the music of Murray Gold produce a perfect shattered portrait of the tortured genius. The music has been notably stunning this season.

The story has the artist, along with our TARDIS crew fighting off a stranded monster, the Krafayis, a miracle of the non-special effects of the invisible – almost a homage to Forbidden Planet at times. Look for inky cameos of the first and second Doctors, along with some frightening moments, and a powerful powerful ending that I won’t spoil.

So until next time, remember... “Sonic never fails.”

Doctor Who: Amy’s Choice

This is a very intriguing episode. In “Amy’s Choice,” the Doctor and his friends are trapped in two parallel dreams – one of now in a doomed TARDIS, and one five years from now with a pregnant Amy married to Rory in ‘the village that time forgot.’ The challenge – figure out which dream is real before they die.

The nemesis that places the Doctor in this trap is the mysterious and self-proclaimed Dream Lord, played by Toby Jones. He’s one of my favorite character actors. I loved him as Truman Capote in Infamous and he recently was verified to play the villainous freak Arnim Zola in the upcoming Captain America feature film. Here he plays a foe the Doctor apparently knows as the only person in the universe who hates him as much as he does.

Toby Jones gets all the good lines in the form of insults against the Doctor, similar to the Valeyard. He calls upon all of his names like the oncoming storm, etc., but while I prefer my ‘Kid Who’ for the ‘Junior Doctor,’ I certainly do have a fondness for ‘him in the bowtie’ as well. And it’s not just Jones, Matt Smith and Karen Gillan as well as Rory played by Arthur Darvill, all have excellent dialogue in this Simon Nye script.

Rory this time out kinda falls into Mickey territory a bit in this episode, but I still like him. He has presence, which puts him above Mickey’s comic relief in my book. He only has that whiny quality when confronted by the Doctor as a romantic rival. It’s refreshing as it sort of reminds me of how the Christopher Eccleston Doctor reacted when Captain Jack Harkness was hitting on Rose.

“Amy’s Choice” has terrific performances by all, a rough ending and then a soft ending, and of course more monsters worthy of making us all hide behind the couch. The same danger as usual but with a lighter touch than usual – I wouldn’t mind having Simon Nye return as a writer. His “Men Behaving Badly” vibe fits “Doctor Who” better than I thought it would.

We also get to see a bit more of the multi-level multi-color Soul Train set of the new TARDIS control room. Fun.

So until next time, “under the circumstances, I’d suggest... run!”