Ian Thomas Malone

Pop Culture Archive

Tuesday

27

June 2023

1

COMMENTS

The Flash is an embarrassing mess fitting for the current state of the DCEU

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The Flash’s tumultuous production history and the rampant legal issues surrounding its star can make it easy to forget that there was a point in time when this film was supposed to spearhead the revival of the DCEU. The restructuring of DC Studios under James Gunn and Peter Safran signaled a different course, one that Barry Allen’s 2011 comic book storyline Flashpoint could be useful to implement. Flashpoint itself originally served as the conduit for DC Comics’ “The New 52” reboot, which reset the publisher’s continuity in the most significant fashion since its launch in the 1930s.

Comic books have relied on plot devices known as “canon events” to keep their mythologies accessible to casual fans who aren’t necessarily engaged with every single storyline. Batman and The Flash are both fundamentally defined by the tragic events that took their parents from their lives, just as Superman can’t be the Last Son of Krypton if Krypton doesn’t blow up in the first place. The Flash centers its narrative around the reality that Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) does have the ability to change his past, an awkward marriage of comic book necessity thrust into the center of a blockbuster movie.

The film kicks off with an awkward action sequence giving the DCEU Batman (Ben Affleck) another moment to shine, nearly five years after the Batfleck experiment was first aborted. Barry’s time travel efforts produce a second, younger version of himself from 2013. Efforts to restore the timeline put him in touch with the Tim Burton Batman (Michael Keaton) as the two essentially relive the events of Man of Steel, complete with General Zod (Michael Shannon), who was last seen having his neck snapped in a disgusting break from canon norm with respect to a certain Kal-El.

Miller’s Allen was one of the highlights of Justice League, a much-needed dose of levity amidst the abounding seriousness of Bruce, Diana, and Clark. The Flash has some isolated humor here and there, but director Andy Muschietti undercuts his whole narrative by forcing Miller to play double duty. Between the depressing nature of the storyline and the two Barrys, Miller is stretched too thin to adequately execute the delightful persona he’d refined over cameo appearances in the television version of The Flash, as well as last year’s Peacemaker. Neither of these Barry’s in The Flash are much fun to be around.

Screenwriter Christina Hodson repeats a key mistake from her work on Birds of Prey, which similarly spends much of its first half as a solo effort before gradually opening up into an ensemble piece. Keaton’s return to the cowl offers little other than nostalgia. Kara Zor-El (Sasha Calle) slides into the narrative in place of her cousin, but Supergirl is given such little screen time that it’s hard to even call her much of a character. Calle delivers a fantastic take on Supergirl that exudes nodes of her Earth-2 counterpart, Power Girl, but her scenes are swallowed up by a third act with far too many other things on its mind.

The special effects range from spectacular to horrendous, an awkward dynamic for the only frontline DC character with their own CW show, the film’s effects often comparing unfavorably to imagery crafted for broadcast television. The action sequences often feel completely obligatory, a lot of explosions and frantic energy without any foreplay. The whole experience perpetually comes across like a first draft that nobody cared to revise, exuding the same sloppy mediocrity that’s defined the canon-level disgrace known as the DCEU.

There is some fan service for comic book diehards here and there, including some delectable cameos for those of us who still have a soft spot for DC’s 90s output. The whole experience feels a bit like dessert without a proper main course, a rush of sugar in the absence of substantive calories. For a movie with a narrative so concerned with comic book semantics, Muschetti never seems to demonstrate that he understands why anyone cares about this stuff in the first place.

The Flash has pieces of a great movie that never flow together in any cohesive fashion. Flashpoint itself is a tricky concept to adapt, especially for Barry’s first solo outing on the big screen. It’s fair to wonder if such a grief-heavy story was the best fit, but there’s also the reality that the narrative serves as an excellent way to bring the DCEU behind the barn for its much-needed demise. We might not have been given The Flash we wanted, but maybe this is The Flash we deserve.

Friday

9

June 2023

0

COMMENTS

Classic Film: Cold Water

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There’s a certain timeless angst to the toils of youth. Puberty floods the body with a sea of hormones few individuals are equipped to handle. An enhanced sense of freedom shields the broader panopticon from view, a lot of ideas for the future without many means to execute them. Set in the 1970s, the 1994 French film Cold Water (original title L’eau froide) captures teenage angst through a series of seemingly inconsequential yet powerful moments in its characters’ lives.

The film largely deploys a stream-of-consciousness approach centered on its two leads, Christine (Virginie Ledoyen) and Giles (Cyprien Fouquet). The two have an easy sense of chemistry, united by a common love of mischief. When Christine takes the fall for a shoplifting exercise gone wrong, her parents send her to a mental institute, her newfound sense of freedom promptly snatched away.

Director/writer Olivier Assayas centers the emotional anchor of his narrative at an abandoned rural chateau, which becomes the site of a small teenage rave. Utilizing a soundtrack powered by Janis Joplin, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Nico, and Alice Cooper, the film captures the relatable essence of being a teenage free spirit, alongside its shortcomings that would be lost of the youth, but not necessarily the audience. It’s easy to feel free when the drugs are flowing and the music’s blasting. Possessing actual agency is a far different story.

Ledoyen and Fouquet are fun to watch together, each carrying their fair share of the film’s emotional weight in an otherwise sparse narrative. Assayas keeps things tight with a 92-minute runtime that doesn’t overstay its welcome or allow the audience’s sympathies to shift to the more reasonable adults in the room. As its title suggests, most grand ideas of youth could do with a bit of cold water splashed to buff them out.

Assayas delivers a timeless slice of youth, powered by two emotionally raw performances from his young actors, as well as a killer score. Cold Water doesn’t necessarily reinvent the genre, but it’s a compelling narrative to spend time with. Many adults can relate to the passions exhibited in the film, even if we might cringe a bit from seeing too much of ourselves on the screen.

Thursday

8

June 2023

0

COMMENTS

Pride Film: Weekend

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LGBTQ people often have a tendency to develop extremely close bonds with intimate partners in short periods of time. For a community that knows ostracization and stigmatization all too well, the high of a new crush can supersede any concerns for the longevity of such passion, a mandate to live in the present without worrying about a tomorrow that brings almost certain doom. “No day but today” is less a mantra than a steadfast rule for survival.

The film Weekend follows one of those casual, curiously intense encounters between two homosexuals on very different life trajectories. Russell (Tom Cullen) is a lifeguard with many reservations about his sexuality, preferring the anonymity of a gay club to more flamboyant, public settings. He meets Glen (Chris New), an artistic free-spirit, who keeps a collection of audio recordings of all of his hookups in an effort to unpack the difference between the people they are, and the individuals they aspire to be within the world of hookup culture. Glen’s imminent emigration to America puts a speedy timetable on their courtship, the two spending most of the weekend together partaking in the expedited bonding ritual that LGBTQ people know all too well.

Director/writer Andrew Haigh crafts an intimate portrait of Nottingham queer life that already feels like a bit of a time capsule barely a decade down the road from its 2011 release. The script’s stream-of-consciousness execution carries a degree of authenticity that any LGBTQ person would recognize. Cullen and New possess a keen sense of chemistry that works well for the film’s intentions, two people who don’t need to be perfect for each other in the long haul when the next 48 hours will suffice.

The narrative does spend quite a bit of time on the nature of the closet, often at the expense of a much more interesting examination of gay hookups as a whole. Haigh produces one of the best defenses of the fleeting temporality that often defines gay relations, a film that captures the joys of hookup culture alongside its many real tropes. People who live existences defined by repression naturally find euphoria through the release of the pressure valve. Gay relationships are often way too intense right from the start, but that’s also part of the magic of finding someone who sees you, for you.

The real crowning achievement of Weekend is that it genuinely feels like a gay movie made for gay people. Despite its fascination with LGBTQ-101 mainstays like the closet, the film also earnestly unpacks the natural baggage that comes with trying to find yourself amidst a world that constantly encourages queer people to partition off parts of ourselves for the comfort of the world around us. Haigh doesn’t look away from the vibrancy of that reality within his narrative, but he works without the constraints of straight comfort oozing from the finished product either.

Weekend is some of the most effective lived-in LGBTQ storytelling presented on film. You may not want to emulate the courtship of Russell and Glen to see the appeal in these fleeting encounters that often mean the world to gay folk. You don’t have to spend forever with someone to feel the weight of their presence in your life. Sometimes, a weekend is more than enough.

Monday

5

June 2023

0

COMMENTS

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is a gorgeous sequel that’s firmly rooted in comic book lore

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Much of the superhero canon relies on throughlines developed decades ago, a lush if not rigid tapestry that’s defined the framework of storytelling that can draw newcomers in without alienating longtime fans. You don’t need to read hundreds of Batman or Spider-Man books to know that both heroes carry on their crusades in service to vows taken in the wake of dead relatives, just as The Man of Steel defines his life’s mission by his family’s creed that “The S stands for hope.” Part of what’s refreshing about newer heroes like Miles Morales is that the younger generation lacks such strict parameters, granting them more freedom to define their own journeys.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse largely succeeded off of its ability to bring a genuine sense of awe and wonder to the most over-saturated genre in the entire film industry, along the way winning the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Nearly five years later, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse finds itself amidst a sea of multiverse-related movies, none quite achieving the visual splendor of its own predecessor. The endless variety that the very concept of a multiverse suggests creates certain lofty standards to deliver material that challenges its audience’s very definition of reality.

Across the Spider-Verse is quite possibly the most beautiful animated film ever made, a powerful testament to the sheer might of blockbuster filmmaking in possession of more than an iota of ambition. The innate appeal of a comic book likes in its ability to illustrate new worlds or fresh perspectives in every passing frame. No more has ever felt more like a comic book than Across the Spider-Verse, a sentiment that certainly applies to its less-than-earth-shattering premise.

The film largely picks up about a year and a half after the events of Into the Spider-Verse. Miles (Shameik Moore) is struggling to balance his scholarly ambitions with his extra-curricular web-slinging endeavors, along with an overbearing mother (Luna Lauren Vélez) who thinks New Jersey is too far away from Brooklyn for college while simultaneously allowing her son to board at a high school across the borough. On Earth-65 Gwen Stacy (Hailee Stenfield) remains at odds with her police officer father (Shea Whigham), joining up with the multiverse-hopping group the Spider Society, led by Miguel O’Hara (Oscar Isaac) and Jessica Drew (Issa Rae).

The bulk of the narrative centers around familiar comic book territory, namely Miles’ place in the larger Spider-canon, as well as the effect of his secret identity on his broader life. Directors Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson juxtapose their fairly straightforward story with a non-stop barrage of breathtaking sequences, the kind of animation that makes you not want to blink for fear that you might miss something. The film pays homage to every single era of Spider-lore without ever coming across like it’s pandering to nostalgia.

Peter Parker’s presence looms large over the film, even if the characters and his many variations largely take a backseat throughout the narrative. Peter B. Parker (Jake Johnson) barely appears, Across the Spider-Verse is firmly caught in the original spider’s gravity, an awkward if not understandable dynamic. The film’s gargantuan 140-minute runtime covers plenty of plot without ever feeling like it’s overstuffed, a feat almost as impressive as its ability to keep a steady barrage of trippy animation that never gets old.

It is hard to shake the contrast between Miles’ desire to carve out his own path and Across the Spider-Verse’s insistence that his movie carries around the full weight of the franchise’s baggage. Can Miles ever truly own his own story when fans wait for a glimpse of 1990s relics such as O’Hara or Ben Reilly? The film firmly focuses on the questions of fate and agency, while never truly selling the idea that Miles could actually ever break free of the world defined on Peter Parker’s terms. A movie that tries to please everyone inevitably loses a bit of its own voice in the process.

Across the Spider-Verse is a singular superhero film, one of the few that tries to be a comic book more than a blockbuster. It’s one of the most beautiful sights to behold on the big screen, a triumph of ingenuity at a time when the genre itself is starting to buckle. For its subversive visuals, the narrative does not try to deconstruct the comic book so much as embody its chaotic power. Its narrative may not break the wheel, but it might leave you with a new appreciation for the way the wheel is designed in the first place.

Thursday

1

June 2023

0

COMMENTS

The Innocent offers a fresh take on the heist genre

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The older you get, the more you realize how little of life follows anything resembling a rubric. Time never waits for you to get your feet comfortable in its waters. You can spend all day licking your wounds inflicted upon various grievances, or you can throw caution to the wind and help your new father-in-law rob a caviar shipment in the parking lot of a truck stop diner, as the French film The Innocent centers its eclectic narrative around.

Abel (Louis Garrel, who also directed the film and co-wrote the screenplay) is a sad man. He’s upset that his mother Sylvie (Anouk Grinberg), a prison drama teacher, married one of her soon-to-be released students Michel (Roschdy Zem), another addition to a long list of questionable life decisions. His fairly sterile existence as an aquarium educator is occasionally buoyed by updates on the Tinder adventures of his coworker/best friend Clémence (Noémie Merlant), who serves as both an object of jealousy and a painful reminder of his wife, who died in a car accident while he was behind the wheel. One could argue that Abel has a right to be moody about his life’s circumstances, but the people around him are getting a little tired of his sad sack schtick.

Abel grows suspicious of his mother and Abel’s new flower shop, correctly surmising that Michel has acquired the funds through dubious methods. His shoddy efforts to spy on Michel with Clémence lead to both being wrapped up in the heist required to fund the new floral endeavor. Abel and Clémence are required to stage a dramatic confrontation in the diner to engage the driver long enough for the robbery to take place. Through make-believe, Abel finds an unexpected crash course in agency.

The Innocent thoroughly marches to the beat of its own drum, a tender comedy that finds ample meaning within the simple mechanics of narrative. Garrel commits his film wholeheartedly to the structure of the heist genre, a classic of French cinema, but he uses that space for vivid character studies, a moving commentary on grief and resentment. The four principal characters possess vibrant personalities that shine through a kind of interpersonal conflict with each other that doesn’t lend itself well to taking sides. The screenplay never forces the audience to see matters of right and wrong, but to accept the messiness of life.

Both as the director and in the lead role, Garrel has a knack for bringing out the best in his cast. Grinberg and Zem constantly defy expectations of their characters to challenge Abel’s preconceptions, undoubtedly shared by many in the audience. Merlant elevates the role of Clémence beyond the parameters of the manic pixie dream girl trope she certainly orbits. The abundant zaniness feels oddly grounded, a dynamic it sustains through its 100-minute runtime.

The Innocent is a charming narrative that leaves a strong impression, the kind of story your mind will want to chew on for a while. It doesn’t exactly reinvent the wheel of the heist genre, but its offbeat humor and quirky characters are fun to be around. Society is not generally taught to treat criminals with empathy, but Garrel makes a strong case for looking beyond one’s preconceptions.

 

Friday

5

May 2023

0

COMMENTS

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is a satisfying, imperfect sendoff

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The MCU has often struggled to define itself in the post-Endgame, post-Snap, landscape. The only films to truly center themselves in the aftermath of the universe-shattering carnage were 2019’s Spider-Man: Far From Home and 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, with the other cinematic and television offerings either focusing on new characters, or doing their very best to move on as if the very fabric of society hadn’t been fundamentally altered by Thanos’ mission. No single hero was responsible for the Snap quite like Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), whose selfish punching of Thanos on Titan allowed the monster to regain control of the situation and defeat the Avengers/Guardians team up.

The fallout of Quill’s behavior and the death of prime timeline Gamora (Zoe Saldana) seemingly laid out a pretty solid narrative rubric for The Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 to follow, one that might have been at odds with director James Gunn’s vision for the conclusion of his trilogy. The 2018 cancellation/subsequent un-cancellation of Gunn following juvenile tweets put a fair amount of distance between Endgame and Vol. 3 that might have made a direct follow-up a little awkward so many years down the road, squarely in Phase Five of the MCU. Fortunately for Gunn, Marvel found a clever way to put some distance between the Guardians and their last team up, keeping them fresh in the audience’s minds with fluffy appearances in Thor: Love and Thunder and The Guardians of the Galaxy Special.

Vol. 3 picks some peculiar territory to structure its narrative around. The film doesn’t exactly ignore the awkward reality that its Gamora isn’t from the first two Guardians, but rather Endgame’s alternate 2014 timeline. Gamora is both dead and not dead, a dynamic that might have made for an interesting main plot if Gunn hadn’t decided that Rocket (Bradley Cooper) would make a better core instead.

The film’s plot is near-incoherent, mostly centering around the team’s efforts to save Rocket after he was gravely injured in the opening sequence, an embedded kill switch interfering with his treatment. Rocket’s starring role is mostly conveyed through flashback sequences, a peculiar dynamic for the final film in the trilogy, even after putting aside the fact that Rocket and Nebula (Karen Gillan) were the only two Guardians to feature prominently in Endgame.

After the friction of the team in Vol. 2, which carried over into Infinity War, it’s a little weird that Gunn didn’t want to have most of the team intact throughout the narrative here. With Gamora off the team, there’s a lot of strain on Nebula, Mantis (Pom Klementieff), and Drax (Dave Bautista), all previously comic relief characters, to carry the narrative. All three actors do admirable jobs pushing against the confines of their comedic tropes, though never quite succeeding in breaking the mold completely. The fact that Mantis and Drax are both coming off one-note starring roles in the Holiday Special doesn’t help their performances here either. Gunn’s comedy is largely childish and pedantic, though occasionally supplying some earned laughs through his script.

Pratt gets off to an extremely wooden start, demonstrating next to no dramatic range in an early scene with Mantis, unpacking his feelings. He does course-correct later in the film, having some touching moments with Saldana that do earnestly engage with the fallout of Infinity War. Gillan and Cooper provide most of the emotionally satisfying moments in the film, displaying both characters’ immense growth throughout the franchise. Groot (Vin Diesel) is largely a non-entity, though Gunn does deserve credit for deploying the fan-favorite tree-humanoid sparingly.

Similarly, newcomer Adam Warlock (Will Poulter), perhaps the best cult character in Bronze Age Marvel Comics lore, is introduced with restraint. Poulter gives Gillan and Bautista a run for their money for the mantle of best comedic timing, but Gunn never loses sight of the reality that Vol. 3 is not really Adam’s movie. That cast is way too big, even with a 150-minute runtime, but Gunn has a way of making things feel grounded amidst all the chaos.

The special effects are among the best in MCU history, gorgeous practical sets that are ripe for Gunn’s style of filmmaking. The cinematography isn’t limited by Disney’s clownish love affair with its hideous StageCraft technology. For the first time in ages, watching a Marvel movie on the big screen actually feels like a big deal.

There’s a certain endearing quality to Vol. 3’s inherent messiness, an imperfect sendoff fitting for a team of misfits. The timing frequently feels off. The fact the film is easy to follow doesn’t excuse the incoherence of its narrative. Each Guardians film has been worse than the one that came before, but there’s no denying that this team is fundamentally fun to spend time with.

The first two Guardians had the luxury of existing with a broad degree of independence from the broader MCU. Years removed from their last solo outing, the pacing clearly bristles at the idea that there are any factors to consider beyond those within Gunn’s immediate control, a man overly concerned with reigning supreme inside his own sandbox. Vol. 3 is not a stellar sendoff by any means, but Gunn delivers some of the most ambitious filmmaking of the MCU’s post-Endgame era. Maybe, considering how bad things have been for Marvel lately, that’s enough.

Tuesday

25

April 2023

0

COMMENTS

Classic Film: All I Desire

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The allure of the American dream has never been super compatible with the realities of agency. The charm of 1950s suburbia, with its white picket fences and heteronormativity, pushed women into their preordained roles, with little concern for any desires contrary to the picturesque image of a happy life. For many, their only true choice was conformity or exile.

The 1953 film All I Desire centers its narrative on a woman stifled by her lack of agency over the course of her life. Naomi Murdoch (Barbara Stanwyck) is a vaudeville actress barely scrapping by in her career. Having abandoned her husband and three kids for a life in the theatre, Naomi faces her dwindling prospects with an understandable disdain for the cards she’s been dealt. A letter from her middle child Lilly (Lori Nelson) requesting her presence at a high school play gives Naomi the chance to go back home, to see all that she left behind for a chance at fame that never panned out.

Based on the 1951 novel Stopover, director Douglas Sirk crafts a subversive family drama that challenges the idealism of suburbia. Naomi’s abandonment of her family put a great strain on her husband Henry (Richard Carlson) and eldest child Joyce (Marcia Henderson) to keep their household together. The close-knit town of Riverdale, Wisconsin is too small for secrets, the ramifications of Naomi’s old affair with Dutch Heinemann (Lyle Bettger) resurfacing a decade later like no time had passed at all.

Stanwyck largely carries the narrative through its brisk 80-minute runtime, bringing a much-needed natural degree of sympathy to the complex protagonist. Naomi is not a very likable person, but Stanwyck never tries to endear her to the audience, instead focusing on the carnage that ensues when people are forced to grapple with pre-programmed existences. You don’t need to like Naomi to understand why she did what she did or feel the pain of someone forced to retrace their steps through hostile territory.

The narrative itself leaves a lot to be desired. Henry and Joyce are both fascinating characters who don’t get much of a chance to shine. Henry’s relationship with Sara (Maureen O’Sullivan), Lily’s drama teacher, plays second fiddle to a more predictable pairing, refusing to muddy the waters of interpersonal conflict. All I Desire could have been a damning indictment on the forced idealism of suburbia, instead conforming to a 1950s audience who weren’t ready to see the dream of the middle class crushed before their eyes.

The film’s overwhelming desire to play it safe undercut what could have been a masterpiece. Instead, All I Desire rests comfortably as a lesser entry in Sirk and Stanwyck’s storied canon. There is some staying power in the themes presented, a contemporaneous indictment against the idealism that is still hoisted up nostalgically as peak Americana. Everyone would be well to remember that the 1950s had plenty of problems too.

Tuesday

18

April 2023

2

COMMENTS

Star Trek: Picard’s third season is one of the franchise’s finest achievements

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Star Trek: Picard was built on the noble premise of exploring arguably the franchise’s most beloved figure against a backdrop that wasn’t just a reboot of The Next Generation. The execution of its first two seasons ran into some regrettable issues. A series that was simultaneously trying to establish a new cast, redeem the Romulan and Borg races, build on synth lore, and examine its titular figure’s complex relationships with franchise titans such as Q and Data, alongside tertiary TNG characters like Hugh the Borg and Bruce Maddox was always going to be a heavy lift. The first two seasons were often defined by sluggish pacing that didn’t see the urgency in all the complex storytelling the show ostensibly strove toward.

Many might point to the acclaim of season three as indicative of the show giving into nostalgia. The real triumph of Star Trek: Picard’s final season is its cohesive, determined storytelling. Retaining only Jean-Luc (Patrick Stewart), franchise stalwart Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), and Raffi (Michelle Hurd), the single original Picard character to retain a starring role across all three seasons, the show balanced out its roster with a compelling mix of fresh faces and legacy characters, including the entire core TNG cast. Three seasons in, Picard finally figured out how to balance its affection for the past alongside the franchise mandate to “boldly go where no man has gone before.”

For a season that riffed most of its core premise off storylines already thoroughly explored in Deep Space Nine with the changeling infiltration of Starfleet, as well as the not-so-original secret child trope in Jack Crusher (Ed Speleers) the real X-factor has been the USS Titan. Picard is the first new Trek series to take place in the timeline established by TNG, DS9, and Voyager since the opening sequence of the 2009 Star Trek reboot. The Titan actually feels like the Starfleet many of us grew up with, not the bleak deconstruction favored by prestige television.

Picard found itself an unlikely sleeper gem in Captain Liam Shaw (Todd Stashwick). The curmudgeonly foil to Picard and Riker (Jonathan Frakes) could have been an easy person to hate, but Stashwick quickly sold audiences on one unassailable truth. For as fun as it’s been for the audience to watch the crew of the Enterprise save the universe all these years, rank and file Starfleet has to be pretty sick of their nonstop drama. Shaw provided audiences with a sympathetic conduit unwittingly roped into their shenanigans.

The Titan serves as a place where the legacy characters can meaningfully interact with newer characters. The show took great care to establish figures like Sidney La Forge (Ashleigh Sharpe Chestnut) independent of her famous father (LeVar Burton), who everyone knew was bound to show up. Raffi and Worf (Michael Dorn) provided meaningful plot progression independent of the Titan, while Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) navigated the complexity of her place on their ship with ample grace, a triumph for fans who always wished for more for her character. Frakes delivered similar career-best work as Riker, the grief of a father channeled through his interactions with Picard and Troi (Marina Sirtis).

The success of season three’s story reflects the essential nature of its cast to the conflict. Unlike previous seasons, you actually get the sense that these people need to be a part of this particular adventure, a pivotal time in these figures’ lives. The show does a serviceable job looping in the previous two seasons, while also undoing plenty of their resolutions in less satisfactory manners, particularly with regard to Data (Brent Spiner) and certain antagonists vital to Picard’s entire arc. We the audience know that Picard exists because Paramount needs subscribers for its streaming service, but the show finally stopped feeling like it was reverse engineering ideas in search of a purpose.

The other big triumph of the season is the way the show managed to present satisfying episodic storytelling alongside its broader narrative. Early episodes such as “Seventeen Seconds” or “No Win Scenario” could have easily belonged to the 90s Trek canon while serving as pivotal setup for the rest of the season. The mandate for this season might have been to say goodbye to Picard, but the show also managed to lay out a compelling rubric for how future series, including a much-anticipated spinoff, might handle this beloved era of Trek lore.

It would be an oversimplification to lay the blame for Picard’s earlier failures on the show’s original, far less compelling cast that have almost all been sent packing. Season three sells the idea that the magic wouldn’t have been there if the show hadn’t tried other things first, even if they didn’t work very well. The TNG crew also aren’t all necessarily there to make up for the sins of Picard either, but earlier crimes in the form of the lackluster swan songs provided by Insurrection and Nemesis.

Season three is one of Star Trek’s crowning achievements, the gold standard for how franchises can blend in legacy characters while maintaining vitally present plotlines that don’t completely rely on nostalgia. There are so many obvious throwbacks here, the motherlode of which was dropped in the season’s penultimate episode. The passion burns brighter because we the audience have finally been given ample reasons to care.

Tuesday

18

April 2023

0

COMMENTS

Classic Film: Criss Cross

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Storytelling favors cohesion for obvious practical purposes. Audiences are not exactly wrong to crave narratives that fit neatly within the confines of the medium’s natural parameters. Noir as a genre prefers to bask in the messiness of the human experience. Adapted from the novel of the same name, the 1949 film Criss Cross explores the nature of a man forced to confront how detached his fantasies are from reality.

Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) returns to his old Los Angeles stomping ground hoping to rekindle a romance with his ex-wife Anna (Yvonne De Carlo). Steve’s storybook reunion with Anna at their old bar is quickly dashed by the reality of Anna’s present life, entwined with mobster Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Working as a driver for an armored truck company, Steve decides that the easiest way to win Anna back would naturally be to involve Slim and his goons in a robbery heist in order to double cross them, armored-trucks typically considered too dangerous to loot.

Director Robert Siodmak has a knack for building easy suspense. Lancaster is an easy muse for the noir genre, an expressive actor with a fantastic range for Steve’s uneasy pain, bringing to life the cluelessness of many attractive men to see their own responsibility in their life’s trajectory. Life hasn’t given Steve what he wants. He’s mostly to blame for that, a reality that noir illustrates with such bleak beauty.

The film at times does fall into the comfortable mechanics of heist plotting at the expense of its own characters that lie at the heart of the story. Siodmak keeps things interesting through his brisk 88-minute runtime, albeit making a bit of a mess with a third act that needs to cover too much ground. Noir is a forgiving genre for such dynamics, chaos finding an appropriate outlet in Steve’s delusions of grandeur.

Criss Cross basks in noir’s proclivity to deconstruct the flawed nature of man, powered by Lancaster’s innate charm finally that’s confronted with its own limitations. Plenty of men think they can do anything. Film likes to sell the idea that we can. Who likes to be told that we don’t have in our individual power the ability to change the course of not only our fates, but the entire orbit around us?

Noir can often be a bit of a downer, humanity’s grittiness exposed through the often-idealistic Hollywood lens. Criss Cross puts enough distance between its egomaniacal lead and the audience to provide some interesting glimmers of hope. The film possesses some truly inspired twists that cut against the grain of typical Hollywood fare, a reminder that some stories can hold power not through their reliability, but through the potent reality that we as individuals need not fall into the same traps. You can always change your fate, but it to have some humility along the journey.

 

Wednesday

12

April 2023

0

COMMENTS

The Mandalorian Season 3 Review: Chapter 23

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Much has been written about season three’s seeming ambivalence toward addressing the emotional ramifications of Mando and Grogu’s reunion that happened on someone else’s show. It seems likely that Grogu was not originally supposed to be in this season, at least not by Mando’s side. The season has barely featured Star Wars’ only current cultural sensation, perhaps the single most valuable character across Disney’s vast empire, for any purposes that don’t involve cute memeable moments for the internet. His only substantive character moment came in episode four, itself a handcrafted viral moment featuring the return of millennial icon Ahmed Best.

The baby that singlehandedly redeemed the launch of Disney+ has been sidelined in favor of a character who made her debut in the eightieth episode of a children’s cartoon which The Mandalorian heavily leans on to fill out its own lore. Convolution may be one of this show’s predominant issues, but the bigger problem is a simpler matter. This show is absolutely horrible at basic plot progression.

“Chapter 23: The Spies” essentially starts off by abandoning the accomplished objective of the entire pro-helmet Mandalorian sect two episodes prior, to fight off space pirates so they can build a settlement on Nevarro. After putting up a few tents, the arrival of Bo-Katan’s anti-helmet buddies and their repurposed Imperial light cruiser apparently has them ready to pivot completely toward the imminent, impromptu reconquering of Mandalore. What’s the rush? This show has endless time for side quest antics but can’t even bother to explain anything resembling a plan, something each of the three original Star Wars films made time for.

The sight of the Mandalorian fleet was a bit jarring when juxtaposed against the handful of helmet people we’re used to seeing. The idea that Bo-Katan would continue to fly her ship The Gauntlet with Mando, Grogu, and R5-D4 just after reclaiming her leadership spot was beyond clownish. Who exactly is flying all these ships? What was the point of Greef welcoming them all if they’re just going to leave two episodes later?

This show has never featured more than two dozen or so Mandalorians on screen at the same time, obvious limits of the StageCraft technology. This dynamic is unnecessarily complicated by the show’s refusal to engage in any sort of meaningful exposition. If you don’t show more than twenty people ever, and you don’t say there’s more than twenty people ever, how is anyone supposed to take this whole war seriously? These people have supposedly survived for thousands of years yet there’s barely enough to field a football team, let alone garrison several massive ships.

The return of Moff Gideon is a bit of a mixed bag. Giancarlo Esposito is always fun to watch, especially when he’s setting up Grand Admiral Thrawn, the crown jewel of the no-longer-canon expanded universe. The obvious strides toward the sequel trilogy serve as an unwelcome reminder of how little has happened since Gideon was captured just a handful of episodes ago. This show apparently has nothing else to do but reuse its own villains.

Baby Yoda gets to ride inside IG-11’s (IG-12**, because there are fewer droids in the galaxy than helmet people) corpse, for some reason. Mando left Grogu behind to hang out with complete strangers last episode, but now he feels comfortable bringing a baby to war instead of leaving him with Greef, despite claiming that he’s not able to pilot the droid. This would all feel more like nitpicking if it wasn’t all so stupid.

The Mando-chess fight between Paz Vizsla and Axes Woves served as a microcosm for everything wrong with this episode. Bo-Katan claims it was a matter of time before the two cultures clashed after a minor board game dispute. Maybe if they spent more than five minutes together as a people before going off to war, they might not get so easily pissed off at each other. There are barely ten Mandalorians on the ship and they’re ready to kill each other over the Star Wars equivalent of the designated hitter.

The action sequence was fairly silly. The jet troopers had the high ground, Star Wars 101, while many Mandalorians, including Din himself, didn’t even have rifles. The sets looked repetitive, sequences that were eerily similar to those from Chapter 12 of last season, as well as Part V of Obi-Wan Kenobi. The return of the Praetorian guard was certainly fun, but the uninspired fight choreography kind of sucked the air out of the room.

Mando’s capture and evil Gideon speech aside, the Mandalorian could have easily killed the troopers in their convenient bottleneck. Paz Vizsla took out most of them himself, only succumbing to foes that Bo-Katan didn’t know about when she ordered the retreat. This whole sequence was a pointless mess that couldn’t be redeemed by Esposito’s charismatic acting or the emotional ramifications of Mando’s capture.

Chapter 23 packs no narrative punch, the production of the season’s ambivalence toward cohesive plot progression. This show’s creative braintrust is as lazy as its CGI. The cute puppet is finally not enough to save this lazy experience masquerading as prestige television.

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