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Fringe: The Arrival (2008)
As the series suddenly gets interesting...
I was lukewarm toward this series until this episode. I'd watched the first few, found it reasonably enjoyable but not great, not really grabbing me, and figured I'd give it one more shot before giving up (since I'm not a big TV watcher, and require a series to be more than just reasonably entertaining for me to spend time watching it).
Well, I'm very glad I did stick it out, because with this episode, it just got a whole lot more interesting. I'm trying to avoid spoilers, but there were a couple of seriously jaw-dropping moments - the encounter between Peter and his father's friend was one of them, and the other was at the very end.
And now, rather than being on the point of giving up on the series, my only indecision is "Do I have time for just one more episode tonight? I know I've got to do work, but just one more...?" So yes, I think I'm hooked.
If you've watched the first couple of episodes and been undecided on whether it was worth continuing, do yourself a favour and don't decide until after you've seen this one. Things are taking a major turn into mind-bending WTFery, and that's always a good thing in my books.
Tees Maar Khan (2010)
Fun as long as you don't take it at all seriously
I'm kind of astonished by all the harsh reviews of this one... I found it pretty entertaining, albeit in a very silly way.
I think the only way to approach a movie like this one is to realize right from the beginning that ordinary rules of logic are not going to apply, and stop expecting things to be remotely realistic or plausible, because they're not going to be. It's a deliberately ridiculous, over-the-top, screwball comedy, and if you expect any sort of realism or logic from it, then yes, you're going to be disappointed. It seems like some of the other reviewers were expecting something a little more serious and sensible, and I could certainly see how this film could be jarring if that's what you're after.
But if you're just looking for something campy and fun, and are prepared to completely suspend disbelief, then it's definitely worth watching!
Supernatural: Let It Bleed (2011)
A powerful episode, marred by a senseless ending
For the most part this episode was intense, suspenseful and quite well done - up until the very last few minutes.
Dean's final act with regard to Lisa and Ben makes no sense at all. Removing their memory of him is not going to protect them in any way - quite the reverse! The reason Crowley targeted them is because Dean cared about them - which he still does. Their feelings for him had nothing to do with it. So they're still just as likely to attacked by Crowley or other supernaturals as before - more so, if anything, since Dean's probably angered Crowley considerably, and there's no reason he'd hesitate to make good on his threat to them. The only difference is that now they have no idea what's out there or who to call on for help if something does come after them - so they're actually much more likely to get hurt or killed than they would have been otherwise. They just won't have any idea why it's happening. How, exactly, is this an improvement?
Of course, all that only applies if you assume that the world of Supernatural operates on actual logic. But many past events have shown that logic takes a back seat to drama, emotional impact, and sometimes even mere convenience, so this may have simply been a way of writing them out of the show in a suitably angst-producing way, while leaving open the option of bringing them back at some point if the plot requires it. But in actual story terms, it makes no sense at all, and weakens what would otherwise have been an excellent episode.
Dollhouse: Man on the Street (2009)
Wow!
OK, I was lukewarm about this series up until this point. I'd finally started watching it on Netflix because I'd enjoyed a lot of Joss Whedon's other work, but Dollhouse really seemed to be kind of sub-par for him... until now.
This episode is orders of magnitude better than anything that came before it. Breathtakingly intense, and full of alarming twists, turns and shocks that easily rival some of the best of his work on other shows, not to mention hints of much more interesting plot elements than anything seen in the series thus far. He even took what appeared to be a setup for a classic Whedon trope (terrible things always happen to happy people) and twisted it in an entirely unexpected direction.
I don't know if the rest of the series will be able to maintain this standard, but as of now, I'm completely hooked.
Chandni Chowk to China (2009)
Awesome cheesy fun!
I can't believe the low ratings this movie has gotten! My girlfriend and I just watched it and we loved it. Sure, it's incredibly cheesy and silly and over-the-top, but you can pretty much tell that from the cover and the entire basic premise of it, so anyone who isn't looking for something completely ridiculous should have known better than to watch it in the first place. I mean, come on. Bollywood martial arts movie! Was anyone really expecting high art? For what it was - a completely silly, campy, somewhat insane piece of fluff - it was really pretty awesome. Tremendously entertaining, with some great comedy, cool fight scenes (though it took a while to get to them - my only real complaint is that it was longer than it really needed to be), enjoyable music and dance scenes, and even something resembling an actual plot. Maybe you have to be in the right frame of mind to enjoy it, but if you are, it's a ton of fun and I'd highly recommend it.
Supernatural: Clap Your Hands If You Believe (2010)
Could have been better, could have been worse
It was interesting to see Supernatural tackle fairy lore, which actually has a lot more horror potential than most people realize. If you look at old-school, traditional fairy lore, it's actually pretty dark, and includes some pretty nightmarish creatures. It was the Victorians who began to romanticize them, and then Disney made the cutesy image of the little sprite with wings universally known to the point where that's the only image of fairies that most people have these days. But if you read some of the older tales, or listen to still-current ones in rural Ireland or Scotland, fairies are anything but cute and harmless.
I liked that they touched on a little of that, with the presence of the Redcap who was stalking Dean (Redcaps are a particularly nasty sort of fairy from Scottish folklore, who are known for eating lost travellers, and dye their caps red with human blood), but I was a bit disappointed that they couldn't resist throwing in the Disney version of fairies as well - though I have to admit the fight scene with that one was hilarious, as was the way it was resolved.
The parallels between UFO and fairy abductions have actually been pointed out by quite a lot of people before this - I've seen that topic dealt with by everyone from folklorists to science fiction authors.
Overall, a pretty entertaining episode, though not one with a lot of substance. But someday I'd love to see a show that took full advantage of the horror-potential of traditional fairy lore, without feeling the need to include the stereotypical Disney image.
Supernatural: The Curious Case of Dean Winchester (2009)
A really interesting, thought-provoking episode
I really liked this one, and more so the more I think about it. It had a perfect blend of serious character development and humour, poking fun at Dean's metamorphosis into a Grumpy Old Man, but also delving seriously into Bobby's frustration with his disability, and the dark side of immortality.
I think a lot of my favourite Supernatural episodes have been the ones with the most moral complexity, that don't have clear-cut heroes and villains, and operate more in shades of grey than black and white. And this one is a good example of that. Patrick is a really fascinating character - a villain who's not altogether villainous, and despite being 900 years old, remains very human in some ways. He had no qualms about taking years of people's lives in his magical game, but didn't want to play anyone he knew he couldn't beat without killing them, deliberately folded despite having a better hand when playing the old man who wanted a few more years to see his granddaughter's Bat Mitzvah, and tried to talk Sam out of betting all his years because it was basically suicide.
And it was his humanity that made the ending so heartbreaking - he gave in to Lia's wishes because he knew she didn't want to go on and didn't want to see her suffer, but you could tell it was tearing him apart to do it. Her soft "Thank you" as her years caught up with her, and his head in his hands afterwards, made me tearier than any Supernatural episode since Heart.
I also really liked the handling of Bobby's situation. So often we're subjected to the stereotypes that disability is somehow worse than death, with the implication that disabled people are automatically useless and can't possibly find any meaning or purpose in their lives - and that's very much the view Bobby starts out with. I was initially worried that the episode was going to play into that, with Bobby somehow nobly sacrificing himself to get Dean's years back, on the basis that oh, he's disabled, it's not like he's got anything to live for anyway. But instead we get Dean - having had a taste of being physically less capable than he's used to - telling Bobby that he's not useless and that he doesn't want to hear any more suicide talk.
And he's right - from what we've seen over the span of the whole series, hunting isn't only, or even predominantly, physical. That's certainly a part of it, but there's also a ton of knowledge, research, intuition and investigation that goes into it, and with Bobby's level of knowledge, he's anything but useless. The mental side of hunting is just as important as the physical.
All in all, a really excellent, well-balanced episode, that leaves the viewer with a lot to think about.
Supernatural: Heart (2007)
Brilliant but flawed
There were many things I really loved about this episode, but also a few things I found frustrating about it.
Like Roadkill - in fact, more so, if anything - this one hits peaks of emotional intensity the series rarely has to date. At risk of making an unintentional pun, it was really heart-wrenching. Most of the twists in it weren't really quite as surprising as the writers might have hoped - I guessed the identities of both werewolves well ahead of when they were revealed, although I certainly didn't guess the eventual ending - but that really didn't lessen the impact.
And the acting, from both the main characters and the guest star, was really impressive - probably Jared Padalecki's best performance to date. Also - very, very hot sex scene. Very. As in, it's going to take a cold shower for me to stop replaying it in my head.
So what didn't I like about it? The ending - and no, not just because it was a tearjerker. I have no problem with difficult choices and epic angst levels, or killing off likable characters, IF it makes dramatic sense within the story. But the problem here is that - it DIDN'T.
Here's why: The whole episode took place over the span of one full moon. Usually that's defined as three days, although in this case I think they stretched it out to more like a week. But still, that's a relatively short time. Plus, they didn't figure out Madison was the werewolf, or that she didn't know she was and thus wasn't at fault, until a couple of nights into that period. So what you have is a span of barely a few days, during which we're supposed to believe that the brothers "looked everywhere" and "tried everything" and are ready to give up on there being any possibility of a cure, despite Sam's feelings for Madison.
Come on! Who the hell would write off the life of a loved one with that little time and effort? Particularly when it looked like they spent much more of the time on stakeouts and guard duty than on doing any actual research.
Even the idea of locking her up for the period of the full moon each month (a la Oz from Buffy) was dismissed on the basis that she'd probably eventually find a way out - but even if it wasn't a permanent solution, doing something like that could have bought them some time to search for a cure.
I could see Dean giving up that easily, since his usual response to anything supernatural is to kill it unless there's an excellent reason not to (and sometimes even if there is), but it just felt incredibly unconvincing to me that Sam would have, when he's not only by far the more compassionate of the two but also apparently in love with Madison. To me, that made the whole ending feel contrived - like the supposed necessity of killing her was really there not so much for any valid reason in the context of the story as because the writers wanted to crank out maximum angst from the episode by any means necessary, regardless of whether it actually made sense for the characters or the storyline.
Basically, it turned what was in every other respect a really outstanding story into a cheap exercise in emotional manipulation - and more so because they've done essentially the same thing before. The whole series started out with a double dose of what's variously been called the "Disposable Woman" or "Women in Refrigerators" trope - female characters who basically exist just to die horribly, thereby generating motivational angst for a male character. So having that device used yet again, and under such unconvincing circumstances, shattered the mood of what had up until that point been a really stellar episode, instead leaving me feeling "Oh hell, not THIS again!"
I'm still giving it a high rating, because of the overall intensity and the quality of the acting, but it could have been perfect if the writers hadn't decided to sacrifice logic and plausibility for a little more "Deus Angst Machina"...
Supernatural: Roadkill (2007)
One of the all-time best episodes
I really, really loved this one. It may begin in standard horror-movie format, but it becomes so much more... Like Bloodlust (another favourite of mine), it nicely challenges the at times simplistic, black-and-white hunter ethos, with Molly's difficult questions about the nature and fate of spirits after she discovers what the vengeful spirit that's stalking her was like as a living man.
There's not much I can say about the ending without spoiling it, except that it was amazing - I think this was the first episode of Supernatural that actually had me in tears, not just because it was sad but ultimately because it was beautiful.
I think this is probably my very favourite episode to date, and an excellent example of the depths this show is capable of when it wants to go there.
Supernatural: Tall Tales (2007)
An entertaining change of pace
Considering the intensity and angst levels of most of season 2, this episode was a refreshing break in the drama. I imagine it must have been a lot of fun for the actors too, being able to basically play parodies of themselves in each other's distorted recollections.
About the only thing I really didn't like about it was the idea that it's supposed to be possible to kill what amounts to a deity with... a pointed stick? Come on, staking vampires at least has some folklore behind it, but I'm not aware of any myth that suggests you can stake gods, or even demigods. That part sounded a bit too contrived - basically just an attempt to force-fit a mythic archetype into the monster-of-the-week mold.
I don't know if the above really counts as a spoiler, but I figure, when in doubt, better to spoiler-tag than not...
Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead (2009)
Not great, but pretty good
I think people are being a little too harsh toward this one. No, it's certainly not a particularly heavy or intense episode - it was more of an entertaining bit of fluff than anything. But it was pretty good as that, and fun to watch.
The characters were interesting and engaging, and I was pleasantly surprised they didn't resort to the usual let-you-start-to-like-them-then-pick-them-off-one-by-one thing. I think this may be the first time the Doctor has promised to save some bunch of innocent people and actually managed it without any of them dying (well, except one very early on, but I think that was before the promise). Usually as soon as he says "I promise!" you expect the body count to start.
I did like Christina, and hope we see her again at some point. And the one thing I really found least convincing in the whole episode was his reason for not taking her with him - that he isn't going to have any more companions because he's lost them all. I haven't watched that much of the classic series, but at least since its revival in 2005, every companion he's had is still alive and well except for the occasional temporary one from a holiday specials. They may not be travelling with him any more, but it's not like he's brought some horrible fate on them that he needs to start sparing people from. It seemed like a contrived excuse based on the actress not being available or something. But hopefully she'll at least turn up as a guest at some point.
The little bit of ominous foreshadowing at the end was nice - a little glimpse of darkness to come, in an otherwise fairly light episode.
All in all, no, it wasn't a standout, but it was still fun and fairly well done for what it was. And really, if all the episodes were as intense as some of the best ones have been, it'd be a little overwhelming - like season three of Torchwood, which I think is going to leave a lot of viewers needing therapy. Having a few lightweight episodes to balance the heavier ones is not a bad thing.
Torchwood: Children of Earth: Day Five (2009)
Torchwood, squared
This review is of Children of Earth as a whole than Day Five in particular, because the mini-season was basically one continuous story, so it's hard to judge the individual episodes separately.
Having just finished watching it, I'm feeling really shell-shocked - it's easily on a par with some of the most harrowing and emotionally intense episodes Torchwood's ever had, and probably some of the most intense and gripping television ever made. Many of the performances, both from Torchwood regulars and from newcomers, were brilliant, and it never shied away from dealing with disturbing issues and impossible moral quandaries.
If this ends up being the final season of Torchwood, it will certainly have gone out with a bang. Though the latest news pieces I've seen have said that a season four is in the works, so who knows...
And yet, while in many respects it epitomized some of the best things about Torchwood, it also really showcased some of the series's flaws. As much as I dearly love Torchwood, it's not perfect, and Children of Earth is, in many ways, like Torchwood squared: both the good and bad aspects of the series are magnified.
The biggest weakness, on the whole, is that logic too often takes a back seat to emotion. Maybe this is to be expected in a science fiction series that's fundamentally more character-driven than science-driven, but it would be really nice if things made a LITTLE bit more sense sometimes... SF always requires some suspension of disbelief, but in Torchwood's case the plot holes and fractured logic require more of it than the alien technology.
Listing everything that made me think "Wait... WHAT?" would be too long, and would also detract from the fact that otherwise I thought it was extremely well done (which is why I can put up with Torchwood's flaws in general). But a few of the standouts: Jack's actions in episode 4 - saying no to aliens who have already shown that they can concoct viruses deadly to humans, without no backup plan and apparently no expectation of consequences - was completely insane. What exactly did he think was going to happen? And the government's means of implementing their plan was equally nonsensical: convince people it's a perfectly safe inoculation program, and then send truckloads of heavily armed soldiers into the schools? Yeah, that's going to go over well...
Another problem is that, while I understand that Torchwood's been positioned as darker than Doctor Who, it seems like they've painted themselves into a corner by setting such a high level of intensity that they have to constantly find new horrible things to do to central characters just to keep up the standard. Killing two main characters at the end of season two was a hard act to follow, and killing yet another in the SECOND-last episode of this season made me wonder just how they were going to manage to top that in the finale, short of actually wiping out earth or something. Well, they managed it - but it came across as almost gratuitous. You could almost hear the writers in the background going "Oh god, now what? We can't kill ALL the main characters... Oh, I know! How about a kid? THAT'll do it!" I've got nothing against emotional intensity or disturbing subject matter - far from it! I thought Frobisher's final actions were perfect. Horrifically disturbing and tragic, yes, but completely real and believable for that character. Jack's "sacrifice", not so much. Yes, it was framed as the only way of saving millions of children, and maybe if it had been handled differently it would have worked better. If he'd had to talk to Steven and tell him what was going to have to happen, and Steven actually said yes, it would have if anything been MORE emotional, and it would have fit the characters better. As it was, he didn't even seem to think about it very hard, and the whole thing just felt contrived.
Maybe that's also partly John Barrowman's limitations as an actor. He's very good at playing a particular sort of role - the original Doctor Who Jack epitomized that. But the character has grown beyond Barrowman's strengths, because he really doesn't do intense emotion very well. In some ways that almost works, because Torchwood's Jack is 250 years older than Doctor Who's Jack was, and has seen enough loved ones die that it's understandable he'd be a bit emotionally hardened, but it really lessens the impact of scenes like that one, and even Ianto's death, although that was handled better than Steven's.
However, overall I'd still give the season a 9 out of 10, and there were many elements to it that I absolutely loved. Eve Myles and Gareth David-Lloyd were both phenomenal, as were many of the actors who only came in for this season, such as Peter Capaldi, Lucy Cohu, and, in the final episode, Liz May Brice and Susan Brown, who both showed their characters to be much more complex and interesting than they first appeared. And one of the things I most loved was that it showed ordinary people as capable of doing heroic things: Lois, Rhys, Alice, Ianto's family, PC Andy and others showed themselves capable of unexpected courage and conscience. That's one of the things that most distinguishes Torchwood from Doctor Who - that it's mostly about relatively ordinary people. Not a 900-year-old alien swooping in to save humanity, but about ordinary people coping with the extraordinary. That's part of what makes it so inspiring.
In closing, I do hope Torchwood continues for another season (though if so I really hope they can break the "OK, what can we do that's even more horrifying than everything we did last time?" pattern), but if it doesn't, this season will have been a very fitting end to it, epitomizing all that's both good and bad about Torchwood.
Heroes: Chapter Twelve 'An Invisible Thread' (2009)
Good, but not great
Well, I wasn't sure how the season finale could possibly top the episode immediately before it, which contained some of the best psychological horror the series has ever portrayed, and the quick answer is: it didn't.
It's not that this wasn't a dramatic, intense, well-paced episode. It was. But compared to "I Am Sylar", or "Cold Snap" for that matter (the two highlights of volume 4 for me), it just seemed like a bit of a letdown.
I did really enjoy the uncertainty created by the shapeshifting, especially with two characters now being capable of it, and never knowing for certain exactly who was who. I thought that element was used very well.
I think the biggest disappointment was the ending -- I just found the whole Sylar-as-Nathan thing somewhat unconvincing. I could see the political side of it making sense -- the idea that if it was known that a US senator had been murdered by someone with powers, there'd be no stopping the persecution. But Angela Petrelli's reason for going along with it -- sorry, NO. I'm a mother myself, and if my son was murdered, the LAST thing I would ever want was his murderer taking his place because "otherwise he's gone forever". Are you kidding me? He's already gone forever -- how on EARTH is having his killer, even a brainwashed version thereof, replacing him going to make that any better? That just completely rang false to me, and I'm betting whatever writer came up with it was not actually a parent.
Plus there's the inconsistency someone else already noted -- Claire's blood can bring people back from the dead. They even had an empty syringe handy from injecting Sylar with anaesthetic. Why not just give Nathan some of Claire's blood? It seems like they went with the option that seemed more twisted and dramatic at the expense of logic.
However, apart from that, it was a very well-done episode. I didn't mind a few loose ends being left untied -- that's part of what keeps a show going from one season to the next.
Speaking of which, the little taste of volume 5 at the end was interesting, and I was not surprised to see the third triplet make an appearance (no, not "the return of Tracy Strauss" -- did people forget that she and Niki were two of three triplets?). I had been reasonably sure she would ever since Tracy's death -- the only question was whether it would be this season or next. It should be interesting to see -- Tracy and Niki were such different characters, plus with Niki having multiple personalities in the first place, that it's fascinating to see the range of different characters played by the same actress in the same series.
All in all, I thought volume 4 was pretty impressive overall -- definitely much better than 2 or 3, and parts of it rivaled volume 1. I'll be looking forward to seeing where it goes from here.
Heroes: Chapter Eleven 'I Am Sylar' (2009)
Creepiest episode ever
Oh my god, this episode had me completely in shock... And I'm going to have to spoiler-tag it, because there is no way I can convey why without spoilers, though I'll try and keep it at least slightly non-specific.
It's not like Sylar's parental issues didn't occasionally seem a bit Norman Bates-ish even before this, but this episode, which basically centres on him gradually losing his sanity (such as it was), took that to its ultimately conclusion. At first I thought his conversations with his dead mother were just hallucinations... But when what was really happening became clear I just about screamed out loud -- while at the same time being in awe at just how well they played it.
Heroes has always been at its most interesting when it delves into the psychology of the characters, and Sylar has a more twisted psychology than most to delve into. But this really took it to new heights... or depths, maybe. It's like a walking tour through a particularly fascinating and disturbing madhouse, and the result is both incredibly creepy, and really amazing.
This episode is easily tied with Cold Snap for most impressive of volume 4, which I already found to be overall the best since the original season. Anyone who stopped watching Heroes due to volumes 2 and 3 being a little lackluster really, really needs to get back into it. Now.
The only flaw in this episode is that there was no way the season finale could top it... and it didn't. Otherwise, this was an absolute triumph, and an excellent reminder of why this is pretty much the only series on North American television that I'm really, truly addicted to.
Heroes: Chapter Seven 'Cold Snap' (2009)
Completely blew me away
This isn't just the standout episode thus far of this volume -- it's one of the standouts of the whole series. Not one but two really stunning, emotionally hard-hitting climaxes to two different story threads, both of which nearly had me in tears.
I'm trying to avoid spoilers here, so I can't get too specific, but there's a major act of heroism from a really unexpected source, and really moving, if ultimately futile, romantic gesture, and both were incredibly well done.
Also, it was cool to see that my guess as to a particular mystery individual's identity turned out to be right.
Honestly, the only flaw in this entire episode is that the opening scene involving Danko and (indirectly) Sylar was a little unconvincing. I can't quite accept that a highly trained special-ops military sociopath walks into his apartment and finds something there that he didn't put there (at the end of last episode) -- and and his response is to go in the washroom and start shaving? Unless there was a time lapse between the two during which he actually searched the place thoroughly... One can only hope.
But really, a slightly weak beginning was more than made up for by the rest of this amazing episode. If they manage to keep up this pace for the rest of the volume, it may even surpass season 1.
Heroes: Chapter Two 'Trust and Blood' (2009)
Wow!
Well, this was a hell of a hard-hitting episode, with some interesting character development thrown in as well.
The way it was framed, with Nathan's phone call alternating with flashbacks to the events he's discussing, was very effective and at times made for some excellent creepy foreshadowing.
Nathan is so difficult to figure out -- at times he really seems sincere about everything he's doing, and at other times he just seems like a cynical manipulator, and it's impossible to tell when he's actually being real -- or even if "real" has any meaning any more where he's concerned. Sometimes it seems like he may not even be sure himself what his real motivations are. In a way, he's creepier when he does seem sincere. It's kind of reminiscent of that quote that "Human beings are perhaps never more frightening than when they are convinced beyond doubt that they are right." Tracy remains an fascinating, if not entirely likable, character -- it was interesting watching her loyalties and judgment wavering back and forth -- I just wish she'd actually manage to do the right thing once in a while. And Matt showed a harsher side of himself this time around than we've seen before.
And I really like the way Sylar's being handled in this volume, but I'll write more about that in my comment on episode 16, since he really stands out in that one.
All in all, a very intense, and at times gut-wrenching, episode - if volume 4 can keep up this pace, I'll be seriously hooked.
Heroes: Chapter Three 'Building 26' (2009)
Sylar really does steal the show
I really like the way they're handling Sylar this time around -- he's showing the perfect balance of just enough humanity to to be keep him interesting and avoid making him a stereotypical villain, and just enough really monstrous behaviour that we never forget what he is. He's definitely one of the most intriguingly complex villains TV has seen in a long time.
And the fact that they're also able to insert the odd bit of humour into his scenes despite the disturbing elements is great -- I laughed out loud at the "*Technically* I'm a serial killer" bit, and the song that came on the radio in the last car scene.
I do like many of the other characters too, but in this episode it didn't really feel like most of them were being used to their full potential. I particular, Hiro and Ando's subplot was kind of lackluster -- they're usually a delight, but this time around, not so much. But I suppose one of the down sides of having a cast as large as Heroes does is that they can't all shine at once...
Heroes: Chapter One 'A Clear and Present Danger' (2009)
A very intense beginning to the new storyline
Well, the new "volume" is certainly starting off with a bang... This storyline feels bleaker and scarier than any of the previous ones, because the enemy isn't just one shadowy corporation, or even two competing ones, but the US government. And given the atmosphere of paranoia in the US since 9/11, that makes it feel disturbingly realistic. The atmosphere is much less comic book this time around and much more dystopian political SF.
It's lost none of its ability to keep me on the edge of my seat, either... the three episodes I've seen so far of the new volume have all been tense, suspenseful and effective. It's hard to see how this all could possibly end well, but it's very gripping seeing just how scary things are going to get before they maybe, somehow get better. And in the meantime, it's almost as effective as political commentary as it is as entertainment.
Heroes: Chapter Eight 'Villains' (2008)
Very intense, and answers a lot of questions
Wow - this episode easily rivaled the intensity of "Angels and Monsters", and dealt with some of the same themes: the extremes of good and bad that people are capable of.
But it's not, with the exception of the very beginning and the very end, a continuation of the current story line - rather, it jumps back in time and fills in the answers to many of the questions that may have been on viewers mind by showing us some more of the characters' backstory.
In particular, it adds a lot of depth to the portrayals of both Petrelli parents, Sylar, Elle and Meredith. The Sylar and Elle arc is particularly wrenching to watch, and Mr. Bennet's role in it is chilling. But the Petrelli story comes very close on the scale of disturbing yet compelling.
I don't want to give away any further details, so as not to have to spoiler-tag it, but overall this episode was both very useful for character development and filling in gaps in the story, and very effective dramatically. Definitely one of the high points of the season thus far.
And I really have to wonder if the people who insist Heroes is going downhill are watching the same series I am - I would agree with the popular view that season 2 was a little lackluster (though in part I think that may have been due to the main storyline being derailed by the writers' strike - when I saw what they had planned in a special feature on the DVD, it looked like it would have really picked up steam after the virus outbreak). But I think it's really rebounded in season 3, at least so far - I know it's early yet. But I'm really looking forward to seeing what the rest of the season has to offer.
Heroes: Chapter Nine 'It's Coming' (2008)
Not as good as some, but not bad
This episode felt like a bit of a letdown after the intensity of its predecessor, "Villains", but still had some fairly compelling parts to it. Actually, it probably wouldn't have felt disappointing at all if the one before it hadn't been so powerful.
Probably the best part of this one is the encounter between Sylar and Elle, which makes a very effective conclusion, or at least continuation, to the arc that began in the past in Villains.
The storyline concerning Matt and Daphne seems like it should have been able to hit the same level, but never quite does - I think because the actress playing Daphne isn't that convincing when it comes to showing extremes of emotion. She'd been effective in the part up to now, but I think some of this episode's events demanded more emotional intensity than she was capable of, and came off as a bit flat as a result.
Still, an enjoyable episode overall, even if not really on the level of some of this season's others.
Heroes: Chapter Seven 'Eris Quod Sum' (2008)
A bit lackluster compared to earlier episodes this season
This one didn't quite live up to the level of intensity set by earlier episodes this season (notably #5), but I guess it wouldn't really be possible to keep things that intense all the way through. It does at least allow the various story lines to continue unfolding, has a few interesting developments, and raises a few questions.
I have to say that some of the things people are complaining about seem to me to imply they either weren't really paying attention or didn't think too much about possibilities. Heroes isn't a show that spoon-feeds you explanations and makes everything obvious - it's a show that keeps you on your toes, throwing things at you that require you to pay careful attention, and constantly think and question. That's what I *like* about it. I don't mean to imply that there are never any missteps, because there are, but I don't think there are as many as some viewers seem to think.
Example: Peter's fall. How he survived is hardly a mystery - they practically announce it as it happens! Mr. Petrelli's pointed comment to Sylar about the unlikeliness of him surviving it coupled with Sylar's not-very-convincing look of innocence couldn't have been more clear if they'd added a little subtitle saying "Look! Sylar broke his fall with telekinesis!" Why he did it is another question - did he just have qualms about killing him even though he's apparently switched sides, or does it mean that the switch wasn't real and he's just trying to make Mr. Petrelli think he's on his side? Who knows? Presumably, that's something we'll find out further on in the season.
Why doesn't Mr. Petrelli immediately know all Peter's abilities and how to use them? Well, why would you expect him to? Everyone we've seen him drain powers from so far had only one, and in each case he already knew what it was. Chances are he knows that a few of Peter's powers are from spying on him, but it's highly unlikely he'd know all of them, much less be able to use them effectively immediately. Every time Peter's absorbed an ability, it's taken him a little while to figure out how to use it. Why wouldn't it with his dad as well? Why is Elle losing control of her powers (as is Claire, possibly)? That one was openly discussed, for heaven's sake! She doesn't *know*, and she wants to find out - that's why she goes looking for Mr. Bennet, and ends up going to Pinehearst. The suspicion she and Claire have is that there's something happening to both of them that's causing their powers to escalate out of their control. What that is could be any number of things, and there's no reason why viewers should expect to have it all explained ahead of time while the characters themselves are still trying to sort it out.
It just seems strange to me that some people get upset when everything isn't clearly laid out and explained in advance (or even when it is but they somehow missed it). Half of the fun of a series like this is trying to unravel the mysteries and figure out what's happening, and perhaps people who don't enjoy that should be watching something less challenging.
Heroes: Chapter Five 'Angels and Monsters' (2008)
Intense and Disturbing
A lot of people seem to want to slag the current season of Heroes, but as far as I'm concerned, while it's not perfect, it certainly hasn't lost any of its ability to keep you on the edge of your seat. This whole season started off very intense and has only gotten more so, with this episode by far the hardest-hitting so far.
I don't want to include any spoilers here, but there are so many revelations and genuinely shocking and upsetting developments in this episode that it's hard to know what to say without giving anything away.
I will just say that some of the things other people seem to dislike about Heroes, and particularly the way it's evolved over season 2 and this one, are exactly the things I do like about it: incredibly complex plot lines full of weird twists and turns, and characters who can't be pinned down as simply good or evil. The latter is especially evident in this episode - while the previous episodes of this season were already escalating the sense of moral greyness that was already present, this episode takes it new heights, or depths, with several previously likable characters doing horrific things, as well as characters thought to be villains showing unexpected redeeming qualities.
This seems to be frustrating to people who expect that because of the series comic-book inspiration, it's going to follow a typically simplistic comic-book moral code where heroes and villains are clearly defined, with the good guys being always good and the bad guys always bad. But if anything the series has become the antithesis of that - in retrospect, Mohinder's anguished cry from last season of "I don't know who's right or wrong any more!" seems like foreshadowing - in this season, not only is it increasingly hard to know who's right and who's wrong, but it seems increasingly evident that there *is* no clearly defined right and wrong, and that the difference between a hero and villain is sometimes only a matter of perspective.
The people complaining that "But (character) wouldn't do (good/bad thing)!" are missing the point - the central idea here is that there's an angel and a monster inside of everyone. And that idea has rarely been as clearly and disturbingly shown anywhere as it has in this episode.
Encounters at the End of the World (2007)
Not your average science documentary
Encounters at the End of the World is a quirky and interesting film, definitely a departure from your average dry science documentary or eye-candy nature film, though it has elements of both.
It focuses predominantly on the odd collection of people drawn to live in an Antarctic research station, and to a slightly lesser degree on the oddness of the region itself, and the bizarre bits of scientific trivia that can be found there. Then there the bonus meanderings about the ultimate doom of humanity and whether we originally emerged from the sea onto land to escape the "horror" of marine ecosystems.
Many of its parts are fascinating, but for me, it didn't quite come together as a whole. It drifted in a lot of different directions, but seemed overall to be lacking in focus a bit. There were also a couple of elements that disturbed me a little - one was the inconsistency of talking about how humanity is destroying itself one moment, and then bashing "tree huggers and whale huggers" the next. I guess it's OK to notice that we're damaging the world, but not to try and do something about it? The other was that in some cases he seemed to be going out of his way to depict the people he interviewed in embarrassing ways, with things like leaving the camera lingering on them after the interview appeared to be finished, as they stood nervously, apparently trying to figure out if it was over or not.
But on the whole I would recommend it -- the flaws are offset by some impressive visuals (especially the underwater footage), dry humour, interesting ideas to ponder, and a really great soundtrack by Henry Kaiser and David Lindley, which work very well with the oddness of the content.
Doctor Who: Midnight (2008)
A definite change of pace, but very effective
It would be hard to top the Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead duology with anything remotely similar, so it's probably a good thing that this episode went in an entirely different direction.
As opposed to vast, unearthly (CGI-generated) settings, almost the entire episode takes place in one small confined place, a tourist shuttle craft. This gives it almost the feeling of a stage play, and also a sense of claustrophobia that's very effective in enhancing the feeling of being trapped.
And as with a stage play, when you don't have elaborate sets and props to depend on for effect, it all comes down to acting, and the human factor - both of which are truly excellent in this episode. It's a very strongly character-driven story, and while the basic premise of small group of people trapped in a dangerous situation gradually turning against each other may have been done before (from Lord of the Flies on down through the movie Cube and many others), that doesn't lessen its impact, or change the fact that this is an extremely well-done rendition of that theme.
No, it's not standard Doctor Who fare - technology and aliens are decidedly second to human psychology here, and the Doctor for a change does not come across as all-knowing and able to handle anything. But that just makes it all the more effective.
All in all, a strong if atypical episode, and a nice break between Silence/Forest and the concluding three-episode story arc of the season.
Doctor Who: Silence in the Library (2008)
Frighteningly good
I suppose comparisons between this episode (and its follow up, Forest of the Dead - it's hard to review them separately, so most of my comments here apply to the two as a combined story) and Blink are inevitable given that they're both written by Steven Moffatt, both excellent, and both scary as hell. Even the beginning fragmentary warning "If you want to live, count the shadows" is a bit reminiscent of Blink's "Don't blink, or you're dead".
However, given that Blink tends to be pretty widely regarded as the best Doctor Who episode ever, there are far less promising ways to start a new one than evoking it. And overall, Silence/Forest doesn't come across as derivative at all. Both of them are very fast-paced and alternately terrifying, tragic, touching and funny, but beyond that the themes are very different. This story is a lot more complex and thought-provoking, packing in enough really interesting ideas and twists that even spread across two episodes, it keeps you constantly on the edge of your seat and never drags at all. It also includes some really top-notch performances from some of the cast, particularly in Forest of the Dead.
All in all, one of the best episodes (or pairs thereof) yet, and good reason to look forward to Moffatt taking over the series in 2010.