Ian Thomas Malone, Author at Ian Thomas Malone

Saturday

7

January 2017

0

COMMENTS

Pokemon Go Must Introduce a Moveset Variation

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture

Pokemon Go has been an embarrassing hobby of mine for months now. The question, “why are you still playing that?” is pretty indefensible when you consider how flawed the game is. Gym defenses are practically impossible while taking them depends largely on how much time you have to spend standing outside a church or post office rather than any actual skill. Despite my annoyance with the the limitations of the game, I have enjoyed its ability to mask the real world from its bland outer shell, decorating the landscape with an array of pidgeys that remind us of mankind’s unique ability to choose its own reality. It also gets me to the library to stock up on pokeballs…

I recently caught a Gyrados. This should be cause for celebration. Collecting 400 Magikarp candies is no easy feat, though one that tests endurance more than anything else. I should be celebrating, basking in the glory of having the prize that many of my friends desired, if only they could tough it out.

Unfortunately, my Gyrados is terrible. It has the worst charge attack: twister, making it a white elephant unworthy of its CP and the time spent acquiring it.

Twister is one of three charge attacks that Gyrados can learn. It does so little damage that one is essentially better off using the standard attack. The other two charge attacks, Hydro Pump and Dragon Pulse both inflict over double the damage that an individual Twister would. This chance occurrence reflects bad luck on my part, but also the biggest flaw of Pokemon Go as a game.

The inability to choose one’s charge move is a slap in the face to dedicated fans. The biggest problem facing Pokemon Go, and practically every other game for that matter, is retention rate. The overabundance of pidgeys and rattatas and the inconsistent spawns in rural areas play big parts in why people abandon the game, but the battling problems hit those who have presumably weathered the repetitive storm.

Pokemon Go is not a game of skill. You can use strategy in battling to get a leg up, but there’s really not much to it. The game’s bread and butter comes from the desire to power up one’s pokemon to take gyms, with that actual battling process serving as more of an afterthought.

Problem is that Pokemon Go is poorly structured in its rewards system for acquiring battle dominant pokemon. My Gyrados is my third strongest by CP, yet it’s nearly worthless from a battling standpoint. There is nothing anyone can do to change that. I’d run the exact same risk if I went out and caught 400 more Magikarp candies.

Pokemon Go has been slow to address its flaws. The buddy system is the only significant change to the gameplay itself, allowing players a sliver of control as to the pokemon they’re able to power up. A move set variation option could be added without need to overhaul the structure of the game. Users could select which charge attack to assign their pokemon and perhaps even work toward the stronger moves through battling or a TM/HM type system.

A modification like that would also address the game’s biggest flaw. Pokemon Go has little to offer anyone who with strong preferences toward specific pokemon. A Butterfree isn’t likely to beat a Charizard in the Game Boy versions, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t train it to. Even with the recent adjustment, CP still heavily favors a narrow and baffling group of Pokemon. If your favorite pokemon is a Wigglytuff, there really isn’t much you can do with it besides gush over its cuteness.

Like the buddy system, a moveset variation gives players something to work toward using resources already present in the game. We don’t know what causes pokemon to learn certain moves in Pokemon Go, only that we have no control over it. The way the current system stands, there aren’t really 158 pokemon in the game. A Gyrados that knows Dragon Pulse is for intents and purposes a different pokemon from one who knows Hydro Pump. That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

Pokemon Go has many flaws to address, but adding a moveset modification would go a long way toward giving fans something to work toward that actually fits in line with the spirit of the franchise. Training Pokemon to learn better moves feels a lot more like Pokemon than farming candies in the hopes that chance will reward one’s effort. No person should have to suffer the indignity of owning a Gyrados with twister.

Saturday

31

December 2016

0

COMMENTS

Mad Max: Fury Road: Black & Chrome Reaffirms the Value of Special Edition Releases

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture

The idea that a fourth Mad Max film would be any good, let alone nominated for Best Picture, still seems ridiculous a year and a half after its release in a world overpopulated with forgettable sequels and reboots. Fury Road succeeds on every level, providing a substantive action-packed two hours free of the obligations to larger franchise ambitions. With no obvious area to improve upon, director George Miller’s statement that an even better cut of the film existed read like a perfectionist auteur never to be satisfied with his craft. That is, until Black & Chrome was released.

Miller cites a sound editing cut of The Road Warrior as the inspiration for Black & Chrome in the introduction to the Blu-ray release. Given the scarcity of black & white films over the past fifty years, it’s not hard to see why a studio balked at removing color from a big budget release, but its absence makes perfect sense from a narrative perspective. In a post-apocalyptic world where the characters are on a mission to find the “Green Place,” what color is there?

Black & Chrome offers a significantly grittier experience. Each characters’ scars and wrinkles become exposed without a palette to hide behind. The explosions in the sandstorm are claustrophobic in their presentation without the depth of color to serve as a reference point, much like what the characters would have experienced inside it. This comes at the cost of some of the technical marvels of the effects team, providing the kind of intimate experience that is rarely associated with action films.

What’s noticeable throughout the cut is that this isn’t a cheap cash grab designed to lure diehard fans into ponying up more money. Each scene is carefully constructed so that the black & white enhances the experience. Definitely a big step up from the b&w Instagram filter.

The Blu-ray version did not include the rumored silent version of the film. I’m not really sure how that would work in a way that didn’t rob the audience of its connection to the characters, though an enhanced score could give the film more of a Fantasia-like feel. To use a whiskey metaphor, if Fury Road was a single malt, Black & Chrome would be the tiny drop of water that opens it up to enhance the flavor. Silent B&C could very well be the massive ice cube that strips it of its character.

Perhaps Black & Chrome’s greatest achievement is that it’s a superior cut that doesn’t eradicate the value of the original release. Miller may have preferred to have released this version straight from the get-go, but it’s hard to imagine a world where the black & white version could have achieved the same level of mainstream popularity both at the box office and on the awards circuit. Fury Road occupies a special place in the film canon, being the only fourth entry in a franchise to ever be nominated for Best Picture. Miller himself remains a rare figure in cinema, having maintained creative control over his creation since the original came out in 1979. If B&C needed to wait, so be it.

Special edition and director’s cut releases have taken a hit in the streaming era, but B&C proves there’s still value in physical media, giving film aficionados Miller’s best cut without hindering the movie’s earning potential. Hopefully B&C will see a theatrical release as well. Some directors like George Lucas can’t stop tinkering with their masterpieces, cheapening them over the years with unnecessary CGI and blinking Ewoks. Blood & Chrome proved the exception, enhancing the experience through the absence of color.

Wednesday

21

December 2016

1

COMMENTS

Rectify Goes Out On Its Own Terms

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture

The question of Daniel Holden’s innocence has always been Rectify’s low hanging fruit. If Sundance’s first original drama aired on network TV, the ads every week would feature variations of “did he do it?” along with some gripping music and a voiceover, but creator Ray McKinnon never made that the focal point of his masterpiece. In the week leading up to Rectify’s finale, I got the sense that we weren’t going to get any definitive closure. The four seasons we spent with Daniel remind us that life doesn’t work like that. Thankfully, the finale didn’t tell us anything different.

It’s easy to forget that the entirety of the show takes places over a few short months. The circumstances surrounding Daniel’s life barely change over the course of the series. He’s on the road to recovery and probable exoneration, but that’s about it thirty episodes later. Rectify’s pacing is a true marvel, moving at a glacier slow speed but with such precision that it’s easy to forget just how little time has passed, though for a show about a man who spent nineteen yeas in solitary confinement, it feels oddly fitting.

Part of the beauty of Rectify is that we’ll never know if Daniel really did it or not. The show supplied enough details to suggest Chris Nelms killed Hanna Dean, but never fully lets its lead off the hook. Daniel himself claimed to not remember in the season opener, understandable considering he was on mushrooms that night. Most shows would be ripped apart for not definitively revealing the killer, but Rectify managed to frame its narrative so that it almost would have been a cop out to supply the answer.

That’s also really not what Rectify was ever about. As Daniel put it in the finale, an exoneration would be only good for an occasional visit home, plus any future Google searches by artsy companions. He won’t get his years back. Some people in Paulie will always think he did it. Rectify never tried to trick its audience into thinking otherwise.

I didn’t think the season finale was the best episode of the season. I’m glad it didn’t try to be. There were so many deeply moving scenes throughout the season that you almost couldn’t imagine that there were any heartstrings left to tug. Of course Rectify managed to find a few, but the goodbyes offered in the final episode ended on a happier note than what we’ve come to expect from the show over the years.

Rectify’s conclusion had all the makings of a proper TV finale set through the lens of one of the most unique shows ever to air. We got to see familiar faces one last time, without the kind of shock scene that would have felt out of place. The best TV finales are the ones that remind you why you loved the show to begin with. The final dream sequence offered the only kind of conclusion Rectify could offer, bringing the show to an end knowing full well that Daniel Holden’s story is far from over.

Few shows demonstrate such mastery of the craft. Like The Wire before it, Rectify won no major awards and never achieved a sizable following while it was on the air. Both are fairly unwelcoming in their brutally honest deliveries, which rarely spare punches to their characters. Hopefully history will rectify Rectify’s standing in this so-called “golden age of television,” but until then we can rest easy knowing what a fantastic piece of art we got to enjoy.

Monday

19

December 2016

1

COMMENTS

Rogue One Sets A Strong Template for Standalone Star Wars Films

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture, Star Wars

We live in a post-film era for big blockbusters. Being an entertaining, self-contained, couple hours of fun isn’t enough anymore as franchises work their own larger continuities into the mix to keep fans coming to the theatres. While criticized for being a largely derivative film, The Force Awakens was praised for setting up the franchise for future annual offerings. As a standalone film, Rogue One demonstrates what a movie can be without the weight of obligation.

Rogue One takes place during the long eighteen year period between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, enough for General Motti to remark, “your sad devotion to that ancient religion,” in the latter film. There’s a few familiar faces in the supporting cast, but the leads are complete unknowns. The presence of rebels not related to the Skywalker/Solo/Kenobi/Binks clans was rather refreshing as the mind tends to focus on the film itself rather than the potential parentages of the characters. Felicity Jones and Diego Luna captivate in the leading roles, never once suggesting that the two may be related or that one owned a droid built by the other’s father.

The film moves at a rapid pace, taking little time to explain who its characters are. You probably won’t remember most of their names. There is a natural inclination to knock the film for giving the audience little reason to get behind the characters, except the film’s standalone nature and lean 133 minute runtime stand in direct contrast to most action films these days. Rogue One doesn’t have the luxury of spending the entire film setting up future entries for its characters and it’s better off for not trying. I liked the characters enough to care if they survived various explosions. Isn’t that enough?

Which isn’t to say that it’s a perfect film. The cast is a little bloated and the story relies heavily on dramatic clichés to advance the plot. I’d care more, but I was having too much fun watching a movie that wasn’t trying to be a different movie or sell me on the next one.

The idea of standalone Star Wars films has existed since the Caravan of Courage/Battle for Endor duology back in the 80s. The world George Lucas created offers endless storytelling possibilities, which made J.J. Abrams’ decision to remake A New Hope and The Force Awakens incredibly frustrating. Rogue One doesn’t deviate quite as far from the original films as the Ewok movies, but certainly demonstrates what the franchise is capable of when separated from its beloved characters.

Rogue One succeeded for many of the same reasons as the original. It offered satisfying escapism with breathtaking special effects. It pays homage to its predecessors, offering numerous easter eggs for dedicated fans that don’t take away from the enjoyment of those who don’t even know what the Ewok movies even are. It doesn’t shoot for the stars, but one has to wonder if any film is going to in the Disney era. If this is as good as it gets, I’ll take it, as long as there aren’t any post-credit scenes.

Tuesday

29

November 2016

0

COMMENTS

In Defense of No Man’s Sky

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog

As someone who grew up in the era where blowing into your cartridge was the only way to improve video game functionality, the idea that No Man’s Sky could receive such a massive structural overhaul months after its release day is still fairly remarkable. I did a live video defending the game back in August that quickly became the most watched on my page with 18,000 thousand views. There’s no denying the game is polarizing, rightfully so for many reasons. The problem is, many of the knocks against the game have never really been fair.

The two chief complaints I’ve heard since the games release tend to be concerned with its marketing and price point. No Man’s Sky promised big things in its trailer and failed to deliver vividly unique locations filled with interactive critters of all sizes. The game shattered sales expectations both in the U.S. and abroad, explaining the massive outrage that still manages to trend on social media months later.

One question that’s always stuck with me throughout this process is an age old quandary. How much of the blame belongs with the consumer?

No Man’s Sky may have skyrocketed in sales before taking a catastrophic nosedive, but the same can’t be said of the reviews. Those were always bad. Before falling off the grid, Sean Murray even hinted that the game might not be for everyone. The marketing may have been misleading, but this is hardly a groundbreaking revelation. The role of marketing isn’t to provide an objective opinion on a product, but rather to get you to buy it.

The other big issue focused on the game’s sixty-dollar price point. This is also a valid complaint, to a certain extant. It’s also one that’s easily explainable through a basic understanding of society’s relationship with entertainment.

Think about a movie trailer that looks moderately entertaining. You might want to watch said film, but do you want to see it in theatres or do you want to wait until it’s available to rent? Or better yet, do you want to wait until it’s on Netflix or another streaming service that doesn’t require you to shell out money just to watch that particular film? This line of thinking isn’t new.

It also isn’t fair to No Man’s Sky. Hello Games charged what they could get for it. A thirty-dollar price point would have alleviated some of the outrage (though there’s still the misleading trailer), but who’s responsibility is it to make that call? There isn’t a litmus test for what qualifies to be labeled full price. As we saw with the subsequent price drop, the idea that No Man’s Sky was in fact overpriced isn’t really contested.

Anyone who truly cared about that would have waited for the reviews, which never masked the game’s imperfections. The disappointment over No Man’s Sky was unavoidable. Choosing to wait to make a decision until all the facts were on the table wasn’t. Waiting a single day after the game’s release would have told you everything you needed to know.

No Man’s Sky is a deeply flawed game, but I never felt ripped off. I’ve played it for hours, mining crap and collecting Atlas Stones without really caring what the end goal is. As someone who doesn’t have a ton of time to really get invested in Fallout 4 or Skyrim (as majestic as they are), there’s something comforting about No Man’s Sky’s simplicity.

That reasoning isn’t going to fly for everyone, especially those who wanted another Skyrim or Fallout. Therein lies the age old debate of taking in something for what it is as opposed to what you want it to be. I don’t begrudge anyone who hates No Man’s Sky. It could have been better and it should have been better.

But we can’t pretend like there’s some concrete hours to dollars ratio for video games. The phrase “you get what you pay for” rings true here, but there’s also the idea that you have the ability to research that which you choose to pay for. I can’t help but feel like many of the people who hate No Man’s Sky are angry because they didn’t do that.

Friday

25

November 2016

0

COMMENTS

Why Does Gilmore Girls Have a Monopoly on WB Nostalgia?

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture

Netflix offered millions of people a sanctuary from the Black Friday madness with the return of Gilmore Girls. The four episode limited revival has captured the interest of the pop culture world, bringing back the nostalgia of late 90s/early 00s WB programming. In an age with endless televisions offerings, both past and present, available to the consumer, it can be easy to forget that there once was a time when channels themselves were relevant at all, let alone ones that catered to a younger demographic.

With remakes and reboots popping up all over TV, it shouldn’t be surprising that Netflix wanted to book a return ticket to Stars Hollow. Gilmore Girls’ arrival to Netflix, relatively late to the streaming game in October 2014, garnered the kind of media attention that most current shows would kill for. What is perhaps surprising, is that Gilmore Girls is the only WB program to receive a revival in a world where Dynasty, Magnum P.I., and Prison Break are all being brought back to life. For a brief four month period, NBC wanted to capture the nostalgia of Coach before realizing that no one else did. So why is Gilmore Girls the only one of Michigan J. Frog’s offerings to return to millennial laptops, cell phones, and Apple TVs?

Gilmore Girls began its run right at the heart of WB’s love affair with the American youth. The show premiered in 2000, when Dawson’s Creek, 7th Heaven, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Felicity were plastered all over the covers of teen magazines and the insides of high school lockers. As far as ratings success goes, Gilmore Girls maintained a comfortable viewership relative to the rest of the network, but consistently lagged behind 7^th Heaven and Smallville with ratings comparable to Buffy and Everwood.

When you think about one sentence that fully encapsulates all the feels of The WB, is there any better the the opening lines, “I don’t want to wait, for our lives to be over,” bringing images of a quaint North Carolinian town to mind? I don’t think so. I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for a Dawson’s Creek revival either. Poor Grams.

While ratings are nearly irrelevant in the year 2016 and shouldn’t be used as a barometer for the quality of a show, they do remind us that Gilmore Girls wasn’t even close to being the flagship program on the WB. It ended unremarkably in 2006 after a one season run on The CW without creator and writer extraordinaire Amy Sherman-Palladino. The unsatisfying ending serves as a potential explanation for the desire to seek additional episodes, but no such treatment has been given to Charmed, which fell victim to massive budget cuts in its ninth and final season. Joss Whedon directed two of the highest grossing movies of all time, yet there’s been almost no talk of any Buffy or Angel continuation.

Gilmore Girls remains on an island, or perhaps in a diner of its own in WB lore. With podcasts like “Gilmore Guys” breathing new life into the fandom years after its demise, there’s no doubt that the show maintains a cult status with its viewers that most shows would kill for. There’s little question that the show’s writing was among the best on TV even if the Emmys refused to acknowledge it. The show’s fast paced dialogue, filled with pop culture references, practically forces repeat viewing. It could be that Gilmore Girls is the only WB show to get a revival because it was the best show on the network. Problem is that doesn’t really explain the legions of revivals while plenty of other popular and beloved programs remain dormant. Is anyone really angling for another season of The Wire?

Melissa McCarthy’s recent A-list success is obviously part of the equation, but I hesitate to give it too much credit. Sookie may have been Lorelai’s best friend, but was still a supporting character on a similar level as Lane or Paris. McCarthy’s cameo is important to recapturing the magic of the show, but hardly a driving force in A Year in the Life.

The varying success of other WB stars fail to shed any consistent light on the lack of appeal for other shows either. Michelle Williams, Katie Holmes, Jessica Biel, Keri Russell, David Boreanaz, Alyson Hannigan and Emily VanCamp have all either been in big budget movies or hit series, but James van der Beek has, so far, been the only former WB star to try to cash in on his old nostalgic value. Putting aside 7^th Heaven’s soiled reputation in the wake of Stephen Collins’ transformation from beloved father to pedophile, it does seem odd that no network or streaming service hasn’t tried to tap into the former magic of the WB besides Gilmore Girls.

We’ve seen plenty of articles and studies on pop culture’s recent obsession with nostalgia. South Park captured it best with its “member berries” that use nostalgic references to give characters warm feelings of security. The past itself is less important than the idea of returning to a simpler time.

The world of Stars Hollow gave Gilmore Girls a unique leg up in this regard. Every episode takes you to a special place filled with all the warm feelings of community and beloved culture. The WB gave teens a sense that someone out there was on their side. Gilmore Girls possessed a degree of separation with its emphasis on family and the town itself.

An image of Joey Potter climbing through Dawson Leery’s bedroom window might look a little creepy in the year 2016. The idea of Felicity as a grad student or college professor seems a bit odd, regardless of hairstyle. What would the Camdens have to lecture their kids about in a world with legalized pot? Stars Hollow survives because the idea is timeless in a world where the doors opened by technology often lead to divisiveness and isolation. The best revivals are the ones that don’t just recapture the magic, but bring something new to the table as well. For much of The WB’s roster, nostalgia is probably best left in the past.

Tuesday

4

October 2016

0

COMMENTS

Suicide Squad and the DCU’s Failed Opportunities

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog

It’s hard to separate the hype surrounding Jared Leto’s “method acting” stunts as well as the failure of Batman v. Superman to build hype for the still blossoming DCU from Suicide Squad as a movie. Such is the current state of big franchises, which concern themselves with their part in the bigger universe often to the detriment of the job at hand, to be entertaining. While it’s hard to figure out how much blame Suicide Squad deserves for not being the desired platform to launch the DCU or for barely including Leto, it almost doesn’t matter. The movie plays like it couldn’t care less what people think.

Director David Ayers keeps his audience at a distance with the endless music video like montages introducing the ensemble cast, most of whom end up being wasted, which is a shame since Margot Robbie, Will Smith, and Viola Davis particularly stand out as making the most of the worthless material they were given. The only true stinker of the cast is Leto, whose Joker plays like someone doing a Heath Ledger impersonation at 2 in the morning after a night consuming Four Loko. It’s truly astonishing to see a film as bad as Suicide Squad that contained its weakest link in a short, almost cameo like role.

The problem is the movie never gives its audience anything to latch onto. The “squad” never blossoms into anything more than a couple of superficially interesting people walking around reminding the audience that they’re the bad guys. This is especially astonishing given Deadpool’s rise as an oft kilter antihero earlier this year. While I don’t think Deadpool/Suicide Squad comparisons are entirely fair, I was surprised to see Deadpool’s only weak link, its unoriginal plot, amplified ten times worse in SS. I’m still not entirely sure what the plot even was.

Moving forward, this issue appears to be a significant problem with the DC Extended Universe as a whole. It goes even beyond the question of who cares, but rather who are we supposed to care about? Man of Steel, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Suicide Squad all made hundreds of millions at the box office, it’s hard to argue that the DCU isn’t exactly off to the kind of start that Warner Bros. would liked to have had. The billion dollar threshold, which both Avengers movies, Iron Man 3, and Captain America: Civil War passed, was looked to as a way to gauge the true success of Batman v. Superman, which missed by around $125 million. Calling it a failure is a bit extreme, but this movie was something that fans waited decades to see and should have been a powerful asset in launching the DCU rather than a liability.

The DCU finds itself in a terrible position with only one film to go before the release of the Justice League. Is it fair to put the whole weight of the franchise on Wonder Woman? Kind of.

Suicide Squad failed miserably in two regards. It was a terrible movie and it didn’t just fail to give people a single nice thing to say about the DCU, it made matters worse. It isn’t fair to expect Wonder Woman to clean up the damage, but it needs to at least start the process if people are supposed to care about this franchise. The MCU has shown us the benefits of a shared continuity. Movies like Guardians of the Galaxy and Ant-Man flourished in an environment that gave them the kind of exposure they likely wouldn’t have had a decade ago.

We haven’t really seen what a failure on this magnitude really looks like. The three DCU films have shown us that profitability isn’t tethered to quality, but if long running franchises have shown us anything, it’s that there does come a time where people just plain tune out. Suicide Squad wasted a chance to build hype for its broader canon and Warner Bros. should be very concerned about the direction of its franchise.

Tuesday

6

September 2016

0

COMMENTS

Halt and Catch Fire and the Art of Adaptation

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog

Halt and Catch Fire should have been, at least in theory, a Joe McMillan problem. He started off as the show’s unquestionable lead, and now finds himself often competing with John Bosworth for relevance in the main plotline, acting as little more than an occasional thorn in Mutiny’s side. This really shouldn’t work, especially with a talent like Lee Pace, who dominates every scene he’s in whether he’s trying to or not.

But it does.

Halt has mastered the art of the slow burn. It redefines what pacing means to a cable length season, delivering payoffs when they’re ready rather than when the viewer may normally expect them. I’d say it shouldn’t be too surprising that the show struggles to maintain acceptable ratings, except the popularity of Mr. Robot, another show that frequently challenges the viewer to keep up with its narrative, shows that the world might in fact be ready to embrace television that truly pushes the envelope.

Season two’s refocusing on Cameron and Donna could be seen as a way to keep the show fresh. Mackenzie Davis and Kerry Bishé have a natural chemistry, but who would expect the show to commit to it over keeping Pace at the forefront of the narrative? Who would expect the show to keep John Bosworth around as a character after his incarceration in season one? Television is littered with actors who make their marks and move on to other shows.

Halt has the special ability to actually comprehend its own strengths. No one would have been surprised if Toby Huss hadn’t returned. No one would have been surprised if season two hadn’t reunited the Joe, Gordon, and Cameron brain trust. People may have even wanted that. Halt knows that it doesn’t have a weak link in the cast and employs them in a manner that actually serves to benefit the plot.

We saw this immediately into season three, which chose not to put too much focus on its change in location. Instead, it got right down to the plot. I thought about holding off on doing a Halt article until the season ended, as I am with Mr. Robot. The difference between the two is that Mr. Robot’s chaotic approach is integral to the plot. Halt isn’t trying to play mind games with its viewers, but it still manages to redefine the way we think about how television is supposed to work. Most shows outside of CBS’ procedural lineup have three dimensional characters. Halt excels not only in utilizing its entire cast, but also in constantly redefining its characters’ relations to each other.

I don’t know how Zen MacMillian Utility Joe is going to compare to Cardiff Joe or Westgroup Joe. I don’t know how Mutiny is going to function outside of that decrepit frat house. Part of TV’s fundamental appeal is the familiarity it offers. We tune in week after week to see people we know and care about, even though they’re not real. Halt succeeds in its ability to constantly challenge the notion of familiarity. We, the viewer, have no idea what’s going to happen or even who it’s going to happen to. If the past two seasons have taught us anything, it’s that Halt knows how to pull off the payoff. I don’t need to see the rest of the season to say that with confidence.

Wednesday

3

August 2016

0

COMMENTS

Star Trek Beyond Is As Entertaining As Skeptics Feared It Would Be

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture

The fans who raised concerns over Star Trek Beyond’s action packed, Beastie Boys fueled trailer had a point. The comparisons to the Fast and the Furious franchise were warranted even before considering that director Justin Lin helmed four installments, overseeing the series’ shift away from car racing into buddy action films. Vin Diesel would have look more appropriate in Beyond than Patrick Stewart or Kate Mulgrew. The problem for those critical of the trailer is that while they weren’t wrong to point out the franchise’s shift in direction, the result is the single best thing to happen to Trek since Seven of Nine’s introduction to Voyager back in 1997.

Funny thing is, I can’t really find a spot where the fast pacing, sharp writing, and overall strong performance from the cast would have been improved by longwinded technobabble exchanges or impassioned debates on the Prime Directive. Lin took Trek and made it his own, but it’s still Trek. Giving Simon Pegg control of the script proved genius as he brought his comic wit and fan’s perspective, giving Leonard Nimoy one of the most heartfelt tributes I’ve seen in fiction, giving me great optimism for how Anton Yelchin’s unfortunate death will be handled.

Beyond succeeds because it knows where to concentrate its phaser fire. The plot is about as forgettable as The Final Frontier or Insurrection, certainly no whales, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The film wastes none of its two hour run time, knowing when enough is enough. My only real complaint is that Idris Elba is largely wasted in the role of Krall. Having been highly underwhelmed by Benedict Cumberbatch’s go as Khan in Into Darkness, I’m not sure more Krall would have been a good thing, but it’s always at least a bit of a shame to see a talent like Elba underutilized.

It’s rare to see a blockbuster film, let alone one that’s part of a franchise, to not suffer under the weight of its perceived obligations to its universe. My main criticism of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Batman V. Superman, various films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is that they spend too much time worrying about the bigger picture of the franchise that they don’t put enough focus on being entertaining films. A cameo from an older cast member or from the upcoming Discovery series would have been fun, but I’d rather not have either than suffer an unnecessary subplot designed to “connect” individual works together. Beyond is a pleasant throwback to the days where movies dedicated themselves to satisfying the audience sitting right in front of them rather than those who complain in coffee shops, comic book stores, or the internet.

The film is fun. That’s about all there is that needs saying. Those who were bothered by the trailer probably won’t like the film, but the trailer was inaccurate in at least one regard. Beyond has a lot of heart for a movie that’s mostly focused on explosions.

The new Star Trek films have different obligations than the earlier films, which were continuations of television series featuring characters the audience had ample opportunity to get to know. We’ll never know Pine’s Kirk as well as Shatner’s. Every few years we get to have a couple hours of fun with these characters. For Trek fans who haven’t had the luxury of a Trek series on TV in over a decade (at least until January), resistance to Lin’s different style is, well, logical. As an ardent Deep Space Nine fanatic and a fan of the other series, I welcomed Trek’s decision to boldly go where no captain had gone before, even if it that involves going into the Fast and the Furious’ quadrant.

Monday

4

July 2016

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COMMENTS

Occasionally Casting Logic Aside, Season Six of Game of Thrones Succeeds at Being Good Television

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Game of Thrones

My thoughts on the events of the season finale line up pretty well with my feelings on season six as a whole, both good and bad. A lot of exciting stuff happened and quite a bit of it didn’t make sense. Characters died and others were crowned with very questionable claims to the thrones. Above everything else, season six had an obligation to set up the rest of the show, which only has two shortened seasons remaining. With that in mind, it carried out its duties quite well.

This season did often feel untethered by logic. The high body count seemed driven more by a desire to cut ties with unnecessary characters rather than what made sense for the story. With limited time left, it’s hard to argue against scrapping plotlines like Dorne, even if the execution made zero sense whatsoever. Avenge Oberyn Martell by killing off the rest of his house? As preposterous as it was to see the Sand Snakes seize control of one of the major regions in Westeros without any opposition from any of the legitimate houses, wasting more time on Dorne would have been worse.

It’s hard to believe how much hype was given to Jon Snow’s death prior to the start of the season considering the way the show handled it. His death only served as an out from The Night’s Watch, and even then, it’s hard to fathom why no one in the North besides Ramsey seemed concerned that he was a deserter. Also, I’ll say it again one last time. Jon’s decision to execute Ser Alliser, Olly, and the rest of the mutineers completely undercuts his “release” from his vows. If his death freed him from his duty, he shouldn’t have carried out one final order.

The decision to elect him King in the North is just as baffling as Sansa’s lack of explanation for why she kept the Vale army secret. Why does Jon need to be king? It doesn’t inherently change anything about R + L = J or even the Azor Ahai prophecy, which the show has played down.

By and large, the Northern plotline was pretty good, aided by latecomer Lyanna Mormont, who became this season’s breakout star. The Battle of the Bastards was one of the most visually impressive achievements of the series. My only problem was the unanswered questions. It’s frustrating because none of these gaffes are related to the bigger picture, unless the show wants to do a War of the Three Kings with what little time it has left. Just lazy writing.

Even after being snubbed, Sansa still had her best season. Her storyline was one of the most compelling and she helped guide the Northern plotline in the right direction after Jon spent a few episodes moping around Castle Black. Her final scene with Ramsey was perhaps her best of the show. While it was time for Ramsey to get what he deserved, he was easily the show’s best villain.

One element of the Northern plotline really bugged me as the season came to a close. The Brienne/Davos/Mel dynamic was pretty bizarre, but what was even weirder was the show’s decision to wait until the finale to discuss the burning of Shireen. The passing of time was an often discussed topic throughout the season, with characters traveling all over the map at unfathomable speeds. The idea that it took a full season and the chance discovery of a wooden stag leftover in a snow-covered old battlecamp for Davos to question what really happened to Shireen was a little preposterous.

That said, Davos was simply excellent this season. Best character on the show by far.

The audience’s knowledge of Dany’s impending arrival to Westeros presented a unique challenge for the King’s Landing plot, which needed to present itself as a high stakes storyline given all the key players involved. It all looked like it was headed somewhere… and then everybody died. No Mountain trial by combat. No Margaery planning. Just Cersei as Queen even though she blew up the most sacred religious building in the city, perhaps even in Westeros.

Could there have been more to King’s Landing? Of course. We didn’t need multiple High Sparrow lectures. We didn’t need all that buildup to a Tyrell/Faith Militant spat, only to have a stand down that didn’t go anywhere. Tommen could have had a personality. I really wanted to like the KL storyline, but there really wasn’t much to like here besides some quality acting from Lena Headley, Diana Rigg, Natalie Dormer, and Jonathan Pryce.

Meereen suffered from many of the same problems. Everyone sat around waiting for Dany to come back. Even the characters knew how boring their plotline was. The many Tyrion/Grey Worm/Missandei conversations weren’t aided by Tyrion’s admission that his companions were lame. Tyrion is perhaps the best character on the show, but had nothing to work with this year. I’ve said this in a few recaps and on my live show, but this season really highlighted the mistake of killing off Ser Barristan last year. He could have singlehandedly improved Meereen and it’s not as if his death really served some great purpose.

I was however, a big fan of Dany’s storyline this season. Outside of her two big moments in winning over the Dothraki and sailing to Westeros, she didn’t have much to do, but made the most of every scene she had. Furthermore, limiting her onscreen time allowed much of the other plotlines to breath. It can be hard to care about Westeros when you know that Dany is about to arrive with her massive army and three dragons. The ending of episode four was perhaps the best executed scene of the season and the fact that it came midseason just makes it even more impressive.

My only problem with Dany’s storyline was Ser Jorah. It’s baffling that he’s still alive after this season killed off nearly every expendable secondary character on the show. Telling him to go out and find a cure for his incurable and unnecessary disease was a little ridiculous. I love Iain Glen, but Ser Jorah is nothing but a deterrent at this point. The show handled Dany’s breakup with Daario as well as it could. I wish Ser Jorah had been mercifully allowed to become one with the many rocks in the Dothraki sea.

Arya’s story is a bit hard to judge without instantly thinking about the absurd Terminator 2 style chase through Braavos. Like Dany, Arya had to spend much of the season waiting for other events to unfold before she could return to Westeros. I mostly enjoyed this and don’t want to let the ridiculous fatal stabbing detract too much, but that image comes to mind just about every time I think of Arya. That said, her storyline for next season should be on the most interesting.

Oh Bran. I can’t really say I hated his story, aside from that horrible moment where Hodor valiantly dies saving him as a result of some weird time stuff that the show probably didn’t need to cover, but his absence from season five highlights how little I care about him in general. The three-eyed raven was a bit underwhelming, as were the revelations of Benjen as Showhands and the Tower of Joy. He wasn’t really in this season that much though and that’s probably for the best.

Perhaps it’s fitting since he had the worst storyline of last season by far, but Jaime likely had the best arc of season five, unless you want to count The Hound’s fun couple of scenes as a major storyline. The Riverlands were excellent on all accounts. Jaime’s scene with Edmure in the tent was one of my favorites. Jaime also had a great moment with Brienne which showed the depth of his character, with his deeply conflicted feelings. The show also provided some good moments for Bronn, who hasn’t had much to do since leaving Tyrion’s service.

The Ironborn could have been a great storyline. Book fans rejoiced at the prospect of a kingsmoot. It was all pretty lame, including Reek’s bizarre journey from the middle of the North to the Iron Islands, as a highly sought after captive with no money for a ship. Yara had some good moments, but Euron was a big fail. Hopefully he gets some good scenes with Dany next year.

Sam gets some points for not being in this season much. He loses points for everything else he did. Why did he take his father’s sword? Why didn’t he leave Gilly and baby Sam at Hornhill, the safest place possible? Why didn’t the Citadel know about Joer Mormont’s death? While this season had its fair share of eye-rolling moments, it was quite effective in setting up the rest of the show. Perhaps more important, it made for very entertaining television.

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