Batman: The Doom of the Rising Sun

"I assure you I'm no footpad!"

The finale starts off with a fascinating, and rather good, cliffhangerresolution. Last episode we saw Batman bundled into coffin and said coffin fed to the crocs. This resolution isn't the first to resolve the cliffhanger by editing in some extra footage- but it really owns what it's doing, and I admire that. There's quite a lengthy sequence of Batman using Morse Code and Robin coming to his aid, revealing that it's not the Batman in the box but Wallace, one of Daka's anonymous and expendable henchmen.

I suppose it's a cheat, if you see re-editing as that. But I really admire the fact that it takes the episode six and a half minutes to get to the point where the coffin is fed to the crocs. For a movie serial cliffhanger resolution, this is positively avant-garde.

The rest is as one would expect, I suppose; Batman and Robin infiltrate Daka's hideout, there'sa fight, there's the obvious racial slur, Daka is fed to the crocs, the zombies are cured and Martin exonerated. But it's all very nicely done, and I love the scene where Captain Arnold finally meets his unofficial best officer. There's some nice comedy stuff with Alfred, too.

Overall... well, it's a movie serial. We know what we're getting. But this is rather better than most. It's just unfortunate that the blatact racism, even taking full account of historical context, is just so very far beyond the pale.

Echo: Chafa

 "You have greatness in you..."

Bear with me; Robin of Sherwood will follow in this blogging "slot", then more Twin Peaks, but first I need to catch up with the MCU; I'm well behind.

Already this is different, with a warning about "mature content" and the Marvel Spotlight logo. I'm avoiding online spoilers as far as I can, but Bob Iger's changes at Marvel Studios are clearly under way, with this the first truly street level series under the Disney Plus imprint. Hawkeye came close, but we haven't really seen anything like this since the Netflix shows.

And this opening episode is, basically, superb, Indeed, all the more so for much of the first half being a recap of Maya's backstory that we've already seen in Hawkeye. There's greater depth, though. We see more of Maya's family, her childhood in Oklahoma, her identity as Choctaw. I love the riffing on what I assume to be Choctaw mythology.

All of the backstory is in greater depth, though. This time it is Maya Lopez, not Clint Barton, who is the star. It may look like a recap, but it works. Plus we get a nice little Daredevil cameo.

It's all extraordinarily shot, too. The many fight scenes are truly cinematic. I'm one of those people who are easily bored by fight scenes, and I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. And then we learn (well, we suspected, but...) that Wilson Fisk, just as Maya determines to take over his empire, is alive. I'm hooked.

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeouisie (1972)

 "Unbelievable what they smoke in the army..."

It's about time I watched and blogged another of Luis Bunuel's extraordinary late run of films, made in his sixties and seventies, and this one in particular is as good as its reputation, irinically winning an Oscar while satirising the lifestyle it represents.

The direction is, as one would expect, both superb and multifaceterd. It's all very surreal, of course, but the surrealism is not quite meaningless here, and I suspect it would reward multiple viewings very well. The surrealism is constant, but it never crosses the line into something which could never happen in real life, just skirting that line between the unlikely and the impossible. An exception is in dream sequences, which abound here, revealed to be so at the end of the scene and dreams nested within dreams. The dream sequences at their modst absurd- the sergeant's night walk in the street, the lieutenant's childhood trauma, the dinner party suddenly revealed to be on stage before an audience- are truly dreamlike in how they feel, an extraordinary achievement.

Yet this is not simply surrealism for its own sake. The central conceit is of six wealthy individuals, one of them the ambassador of a fictional South American dictatorship, are repeatedly thwarted in their desire to have a dinner party. Snobbery is a constant theme, with constant commentary on how food should be cooked or carved, or how a spirit should be prepared or consumed- at one stage a chauffeur is mocked for not sipping his drink properly. These concerns are meaningless, existing only to add artificial meaning to the lives of the privileged who are apart from the cares of the world in their aloof world of affairs and dinner parties.

The film is a visual treat, but it is certainly no "difficult" arthouse film. It is darkly funny throughout and the perferct combination of art and enjoyment. Truly one of the greats of cinema.

Twin Peaks: The Last Evening

 "One can never answer questiions at the wrong moment..."

And so the first season is over, rather satifyingly. Of course, not all threads are tied up, but we have a certain amount of closure. And that's quite the cliffhanger at the end, foreshadowed by the Log Lady's introduction at the very beginning.

It's a superb episode full of shocks. James and Donna finding the necklace initially seems important, but Dy Jacoby getting attacked and killed by a masked man. Then again, Leo is eventually killed by Hank before he can kill Bobby; Jacques Renault is smothered to death by Leland, presumably as revenge for Laura, and then there's that final shooting of Cooper himself.

I've no idea what's going on. After all Catherine and Pete have plotted, it's Leo who sets fire to the mill. Why? Ironically, Catherine and Pete may die as a result. Did Leo have the missing ledger too? And poor Shelley.

So much else, though. Agent Cooper is superb in One Eyed Jacks, showing us what a subtle performance Kyle MacLachlan is actually giving. Cooper is at once folksy, steely and badass, a unique combination.

Then there's Hank's trying to win back Norma, and his "arrangement" with Josie. There's Nadine's attempted suicide. There's Laura's "mystery man", who she fancies despite him possibly trying to kill her, a rather intense kind of kinky.

This is all, of course, just plot. But it's more than that. It's mood. It's carefully cultivated weirdness. Yet it's character too. Twin Peaks is truly unique.

Wow. I'll switch now to the second season of Robin of Sherwood, but after that I'll be back to Twin Peaks.

Batman: The Executioner Strikes

"Looks like a trap..."

"'Course it is. But we won't get caught in it."

Of course you won't, Bruce. Although I suspect you fell for it far too easily and there's something afoot. Were you really in that coffin that got fed to the alligators in their little pit at the end, you know, that pit of alligators that is getting suddenly emphasised in this penultimate episode, almost as though it may have a role to play in Dr Daka's fate in next episode's finale?

But I get ahead of myself. The opening cliffhanger, I have to say, was superb, and the resolution to the spike trap is pretty damn good. Linda actually does get zombified, and used as bait in a trap for Bruce Wayne who, of course, Daka and his hoodlums seem to know is Batman when the plot requires but not when it doesn't, such as when they see Robin in the back of the car but are thrown off the scent by the sight of Bruce Wayne. But let us not be churlish about these things.

Things are actiually pretty exciting at this point. No more random fights and set pieces... well, a few... asit seems that things are actually happening.

Better Call Saul: Wiedersehen

 "We should only use our powers for good..."

This is a fascinating penultimate episode. An awful lot happens, and there's so much character development... but it's still not clear how the finale is going to shape up. Well, aside from Werner escaping and trying to go home because he misses his wife. This is nicely done, and logically follows on from subtle hints that have been recently dropped. The lab is progressing, and starting to look like the lab we know from Breaking Bad.  Morale with the other Germans is high. There's a cool sequence with the demolition.

But then there's new guy, Lalo Salamanca, who we (and Nacho) first saw last episode. Suddenly he's in charge, using a clearly annoyed Nacho as an underling and throwing his weight around. He visits his "Uncle Hector, now disabled as we knew him in Breaking Bad... and, in a bizarre little mini-origin story, gives him the bell. This is a symbolic changing of the guard from one Salamanca to another. He's smarter than Hector, confident, and I love his comment that his uncle is  "Same old Hector... just wants to kill everybody".

He's going to annoy a lot of people, of course. His confrontation with Gus, two intelligent alpha males sizing each other up, is fascinating. But I rather fancy Gus' chances. Lalo isn't long, I suspect, for this world.

We start the episode with Kim and Jimmy on another scam, Kim by now absolutely a natural at the lying and all that comes with it. The two of them are on exactly the same page. Jimmy confidently expects to be reinstated as a lawyer... and he now has a new potential clientele, who know him as Saul Goodman. It looks like the future is being set up...

But he fails his reinstatement hearing.

And Jimmy doesn't take it well. The mask slips. Jimmy, a selfish, malevolent, entitled *** behind the surface charm, lashes out at Kim, who in turn tells him some home truths: she always comes running to him.

They seem to reconcile, but... what now? I don't know, but this is extraotrdinary television.

Morbius (2022)

 "I'm going to get hungry. And you don't want to see me when I'm hungry."

I'm not too familiar with the Morbius character; he tended to not really be around when I was reading Marvel comics in the '80s and very early '90s, when I stopped due to shiny covers, too many crossovers and too much indulging of arrogant star artists. Anyway, here we are, and I believe (although there may be one or two TV movies and the like) that this is as of now the last Marvel film of any kind that I hadn't seen...

Oh. I still have to see Madame Web. Gulp.

I'm well aware of this film's... mixed reception, shall we say, but I rather enjoyed this rather straight riff on Michael Morbius' origin story, despite the modern directorial techniques as seen in the overly CGI'd action bits and the literal darkness pervading everything. I mean, can't they turn the lighting up a bit, just occasionally? But the script is solid and, while I wouldn't use a stronger word, so is Jared Leto. The character of Morbius is nice and nuanced, despite Martine, Nicholas and even Milo being a bit one-note.

The highlight of the film is, of course, Matt Smith making the very wise acting choice to chew as much scenery as possible while having fun as the baddie, as without him the film was threatening to be far too po-faced. There's not a lot of humour in the rather straightforward, competent yet workmanlike script, so this redresses the balance a bit.

The film, then, is quite good. No more than that: it's an unusually expensive looking B movie. It's fine. It's fun but doesn't pretend to have any depth.

That post-credits, mind... the Vulture is in the Venomverse (are we saying that?) and... he's doing a Nick Fury and assembling a super team of Spider-Man adversaries. Er, that's bonkers. Which is excellent. Bring it on.

The Amazing Digital Circus: Pilot

 "Do you like adventure, activity, wonder, danger, horror, pain, suffering, agony? Death, disease, angel food cake?"

I don't usually watch online animations made by younger creatiions, to put it mildly, but this one is splendidly disturbing and crammed with brilliant ideas... and it was introduded to me by Little Miss Llamastrangler. Who is nine.

Yes, Exactly. 

Circuses are, of course, nightmare fuel, so this pilot episode to what I  hope will be a series quite rightly leans into that. The existential horror is exquisite. Our POV character, Ponmi, puts on some headphones and finds herself stuck, seemingly forever, like her predecessors, in this circus-themes digital hell. Her predecessors are various degrees of insane, having slowly and painfully come to terms, of sorts, with their terrible fate, although some better than others. The cynical Jax, the meek Ragatha, the unconfident Kinger, the utterly broken Zoobie. 

The perfect touch, though, is that their captor and ringmaster, Caine, is not even malevolent or evil, but has no conception of the pain he's suffering, always maintaining the air of the cheerful and, indeed, family-friendly compere. This is far more effective than having a malevcolent antagonist would have been. Cruelly, the idea of an "exit" is dangled in fromt of our poor Ponmi, only to be cruelly taken away. She, like all of them, has forgotten who she was in her "real" existence... but, of course, as with The Matrix and Roger Zelazny's Amber series... what is "real" existence anyway?

If, like me, this isn't normally your thing but you like the sound of it, check it out for free on YouTube. It's only twenty-five minutes long, and it's brilliant.

Batman: Eight Steps Down

 "Stop at the first police box you come to."

That line was, to put it mildly, unexpected for this serial made in 1943 and set, I believe, in Los Angeles (Gotham City? What's that then?) but, well, diddy-dum. Although said police box is just really a payphone-like contraption for Batman to ring up the police captain and scold him for being "not very clever!.

Anyway, our heroes naturally escape the latest of several burning buildings as cool-looking 1940s US fire engines congregate. But Linda Page has been kidnapped! She meets Daka... yeah, that racial slur happens, of course it does, but Linda is stoic, refusing to betray Bruce even if it means being zombified- does she actually fancy Bruce, whom she naturally sees as a lazy cowards, rather than wanting his money? She's actually rather admirable here, social attitudes aside, especially after seeing what was done to her Uncle Martin.

Daka, meanwhile, is no fool. On being told, yet again, by an overconfident underling that no one could have survived that fire, he gives us a wry "another Batman killed, eh?". And his plan to use Linda as bait make it clear that he's worked out that Bruce is Batman. It is, after all, rather obvious.

Incidentally, the new radium gun is nearly ready...

Batman and Robin are cool here, efficiently investigating the baddies' known haunts, finding secret passages and getting close to Daka's hideaway. Alas, they're caught, and we end with the most splendidly movie serial double cliffhanger ever. Will Batman, having fallen down a trap door into an unecessarily elaborate deathtrap, be crushed by the spikes? Will Linda be turned into another zombie? I'm loving this.

Twin Peaks: Realisation Time

 "Once a day, give yourself a present!"

Oh, whetre to start? There's just so much going on in this penultimate episode. I can't keep up with you, neither can you or anybody else, but it's all so compelling and immersive. The direction, the cinematograpjy, the weirdness... the characters.

We begin with Agent Dale Cooper finding Audrey in his bed... and acting the perfect gentleman, refusing to take advantage, making it clear that he does like her but has principles, getting her something nice to eat and drink, and makes time to listen to her. Unsurprisingly, she fancies him even more.

Cooper is a nuanced character- strait-laced, moral, weird, eccentric, trustworthy, competent, several contradictory things, but he fees coherent, a testament to the writing and acting. He's the still point around which all revolves, disliked by no one. 

But so much else happens! Leo survives his shooting, and has Shelley terrified. Bobby is determined to kill him (and James!), yet Leo manages to shoot the mynah bird... but not before a recording of its voice suggests Leo hurt Laura. Leo, Laura, Ronette and Jacques Renault were all in that room from last episode? This calls for an incognito visit to One Eyed Jack's... yet Cooper is in his element even playing blackjack.

So much else. Audrey scheming to get into One Eyed Jack's. The plot to burn down the mill. The Icelanders. The plot to get the tape from Dr Jacoby. I have no idea what's going on. But damn, this is good.

Batman: Embers of Evil

 "That's the way with me- always late..."

Yes, I know: the cliffhanger resolution isrubbish, re-editing things so Batman and Robin can nip down a conveniently-placed trap door, emerging next to a conveniently placed Alfred in his conveniently placed car. Not only that, but the ending cliffhanger is also Batman and Robin in a building about to face a fiery doom.

And yet... this episode is actually pretty good. And you know what? I know it;s a movie serial, but this episode is genuinely all actual plot advancement. Yes, I know, unheard of.

It's amusing how Daka is getting increasingly exasperated by his underlings' failures, but his thinking is sound here- hearing of Marshall talking to Chuck White and arranging his murder by the splendidly outre means of a poisoned cigarette. Marshall is discovered dead just as Bruce happens to be at the station to identify Marshall, hearing the Captain ruefully describe Batman as his "best detective". Hilariously, Bruce steals some evidence, test it in his lab and then, as Batman, rings up the Captain to tell him. I like this Captain much more than Jim Gordon.

We even get Daka using Linda as bait for Batmam, ad Martin as bait for the, er, bait, actually developing existing plot threads. This is a rather striking upswing in quality, and the racism is, well, no worse than the usual baseline. Can they keep this up?

Better Call Saul: Coushatta

 "Yes, well, I got my crawdads in my pants."

Another subtle little character episode here, setting things up for the final two episodes, in which, Ive no doubt, a lot of dramatic stuff is going to happen. As is often the case, though, the episode essentially being set-up doesn't make it any less gripping.

We haven't seen Macho in a while, but here he is, taking Hector's place at the back as each dealer comes in with the money. It's fascinating seeing him violently assert himself- he's clearly playing a part, effectively, yes, but with such visible discomfort that he has to be reassured. Nacho is a man trapped in a life and a role he does not want. He has too much self-awareness, too much decency, to tolerate this existence.

Yet at least he seems to have stability... until the end, where another mewmber of the Salamanca clan, Eduardo, introduces himself.

Mike, meanwhile, is supervising Werner and his underlings at a rather unpleasant little strip club. They are, inevitably, indiscreet, including Werner. Mike realises the implications, and so does Werner by the end. A brief but chilling pefrformance by the estimable Giancarlo Esposito makes it very clear that Gus does. Given Werner's little speech to Mike on his love for his wife... I don't see him getting out alive.

And there's the fun little Slippin' Jimmy trick to get Huell off that gradually unfolds throughout the episode, from the bus-based letter writing montage to the exasperated judge. Jimmy's plan is brilliant, underhanded, discraceful, inspired... and very, very Jimmy. He may start the episode on very thin ice with Kim, but the scheme ends with her spontaneously kissing him... until, in the cold night of day, it becomes clear just how unethical it all was. Poor Kim. Helplessly ensnared in the web of a self-centred man who destroys every life he touches. But then, aren't we all, watching this exquisite little character study of a show?

Generation X (1996 TV Pilot)

 "No one's touching my butt!"

So this is a very, very obscure '90s TV pilot for a vaguely X-Men-themed series that never led to anything, mainly because the pilot is so awful. But it's fascinatingly awful.

I stopped reading Marvel comins around '93-94- I was sixteen, turning to other things, plus in hindsight I wasn't quite as enamouredwith how things were going, the shiny covers, gimmicks, endless first issues, the lack of respect shown to writers as opposed to big name artists who promptly sodded off to Image Comics anyway. But apparently this is based on a title from after my time, where a bunch of new mutants (no, not those ones) are taught at a secong, spin-off mansion by Banshee and Emma Frost, who is apparently a goodie now.

Apparently some of the characters are based on equivalents from the comics, although only those whose powers are easier to do on television. The only characters I know are Emma, Banshee and Jubilee... who, incidentally, is played by a white actress. Yeah.

What's frustrating here is that this is a concept that could have worked. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with the format or characters. There's some nice world-building, with the Mutant Registration Act, the lack of civil rights for mutants, and the sheer injusticeof it all, although it's not entirely clear to me whether or not Emma's "Xavier school" is known and sort of tolerated by the authorities.

No, it's basically just a really bad script for this pilot that makes it fail. The baddie, Russell- played by Max Headroom himself- is not related to mutants at all but just wants to control people through their dreams. Oh, and dreams exist in a "dream dimension" which is a real, physical place. And mutants have a particular sensitivity to said dimension for reasons of plot convenience.

Matt Frewer chews the scenery with aplomb as Russell, and is the best thing in this, at least being entertaining. But the tone is all over the place, as is Banshee's accent. None of the other characters are remotely likeable. There's a scene where a whole board of directors have a simultaneous fart and... yeah, it says a lot that this is probably the best scene.

Still, bad though this is, it's fun to watch, in a car crash sort of way.

The Unknown (1927)

Up until yesterday, I'd never heard of this wonderful late Hollywood film, directed by Tod Browning and starring Lon Chaney Sr and Joan Crawford, together at last. And it is a thing of dark beauty.

Sadly, ten minutes or so of the film are apparently missing; given the poor survival rate of films from this era, I suppose we're lucky to have it at all. Because this isa deliciously dark bit of black humour that's recognisably Tod Browning and certainly has DNA in common with the great Freaks. Set in a circus in "old Madrid", at first it seems to concern a love triangle between Alonzo, a man with no arms who uses his feet to shoot bulletsand throw knives at his beloved Nanon, who is also loved by Malabar, the kind strongman. At first it seems as though this is to be a straightyforward love triangle... but all is not what it seems.

Slowly, we learn of Alonzo's secret, and his true nature. We learn the extremes he will go to in order to win his lady's love, with body horror and cruel irony played on that very edge between tragedy and comedy.

The three main performances are superb. Lon Chaney is, of course, magnificent, but so too is the very young Joan Crawford. I particularly love how Alonzo is seen doing all sorts of things with his feet- smoking a cigarette, drinking a glass of wine, playing the guitar. 

This is, in short, superb. I have perhaps neglected silent cinema a bit lately. This sort of film is the reason why I shouldn't.

Twin Peaks: Cooper's Dreams

 "My log does not judge."

Wow. Where to start with this one? There's so much going on.

So let's see... the Norwegian investors sent packing by Audrey have been replaced, much to the chagrin of Agent Cooper, by a load of boisterous Icelanders. And Cooper and his police posse explore two log cabins, the second of which offers lots of tantalising clues (I'm not following the facts around Laura Palmert's death very well at this point, of course, but that makes me no different from all the other viewers), but the first of which is the highlight of the epidsode.

It's the Log Lasy, for a sustained period of time, and the Sheriff and his deputies clearly respect her, gloriously and magnificently weird though she is. She gets all the episode's best lines, all within this one scene.This scene alone makes the episode a triumph, and is wonderfully David Lynch.

Yet there are so many other plot points. Audrey blackmailing her way on to the perfume counter. Hank coming home to Norma from prison, being nice... but still secretly involved in crime. The Log Lady revealing a third man besides Jacques Renault ad Leo. Bob's weird confession to Dr Jacoby that "Laura wanted death", and her bleak phiolosophy that people only end up doing evil despite trying to do good. Hell, that's dark.

But what en ending, with Shelley, scared, shooting Leo. And a certain lady in Cooper's bed. This is sizzling stuff indeed. I can't wait to devour the rest.

Batman: A Nipponese Trap

 "I got out at the last minute..."

Eleven episodes in, and I really must praise the music. The opening music is pretty good, and I love the "sting" when the title is shown. I also have to praise the attention to detail with the "ghost train" into Daka's lair, with glimpses of exhibits showing Imperial Japanese troops up to various nefarious things. I say "praise", of course, but perhaps it's fortunate that said displays are not clearly lit, as the chances of them doing a racism are quite high, I'd say.

We don't start well: Batman escapes from the car by jumping out of the car, unseen, at the last minute. Not only this, but Bruce disguises himself as "Chuck White" again to trick Marshall, in jail, into revealing the location of another safe house... and also escapes being crashed into by a lorry at, you guesses it, the last minute. The concluding fight is a bit rubbish, too, with some hoods defeating Batman and Robin too easily before the inevitable explosion.

Still, Daka has the radium and we have some actual plot, as he's about to start constructing a mysterious weapon. Could stuff actually be... happening?

The Way: The Wait

 "It affects everyone in a family, doesn't it? When one person is suffering."

Well then. Where do I even start with this materpiece?

Obviously, on the surface at least, this is all about the small boats, the obsession of those of a certain ilk who, you know, don't want to do the obvious solution of just bloody processing refugees properly. And, of course, it's a simple role reversal, that obvious satire trope that we know so well, with Owen wryly asking Anna what the Poles will make of all these Welsh people going over there, taking all their jobs.

And, of course, the episode really runs with this, with a refugee camp on the Kent coast, trying to get to the Continent. It's very well done. And yet... there's far more subtext than this.

Slowly, over the course of the episode, the character arcs resolve. Dee and Geoff reach a mutual understanding and closeness, Geoff finally realises that he has ironically done to his son what his own father did to him. Owen is no longer emotionally numb, and he and Anna are in love. He forgives Thea.

And Geoff, of course, redeems himself in the inevitable way.

Yet even this is part of a deeper subtext. Oh, there's the irony of the Welsh Catcher being himself Welsh- plilosophical, no fool, but disdaining the luxury of principles. There's the worrying idea of AI being used for "predictive policining". But, deeper than this, there's the need for new stories, not the same old tired ones that have the glitching Internet revealing that the human imagination is stuck on nostalgia, stuck in the past. Huimanity cannot keep reliving old stories. It must throw away the weight of history, of old tropes, and live in the present. 

This is inspired... and very, very Adam Curtis. And so the various Arthurian and mythical references are pointedly thrown back in the sea.Wow.

I understand this wasn't a hit. I don't care. It's genius.

Batman: Flying Spies

"A pity Marshall was killed in that mine disaster instead of you!"

Yes, the above quote is how Daka speaks to his main henchman in this episode. In fact, he's pretty rude, uncaring and horrible to literally all his minions. This is, toput it mildly, a very toxic working enviroment. I strongly advise all Daka's minions to speak to their union rep. Bullying, toxic behaviour... and the place is a health and safety nightmare, let me tell you.

Anyway... again, no more racism than the usual, which is nice, relatively speaking. We've been strung along for a while now with Daka's need for radium, so now, suddenly, a plane is coming to deliver it, just like that. We have a blatantly rubbish cliffhanger resolution. Linda is pretty upset with Bruce for standing her up. Oh, and Bruce is pretending to be a hood cxalled "Chuck White" again, as a ruse to discover Daka's hideout.

It's all pretty good, to be fair, considering. The cliffhanger is excellent, although one can't help but remember the rubbish resolution at the top of the episode.

Next time, though, can we expect some slight plot advancement? Or is it too soon...?

The Way: The Walk

 "Am I going mad? Or is it the world?"

After a first episode, highly impressive in itself, setting up this new dystopia, now we get to explore it. The Driscolls (and Anna) are refugees in their own land after Thea, putting family before Fascism, organises an escape for her brother, and the Driscolls are on the run in what is suddenly a bleak exercise in the picaresque, complete with surrealoism and family drama.

And it's brilliant. The Driscolls have been framed by an establishment which uses its client ,media, and deepfakes, to scapegost not just Owen but all of them. And yet, with the conceit of Qwen's withdrawal from drugs, we have surreal moments like the talking teddy bear, tempting him not to go to tomorrow but to come to the safety of yesterday. Again we have Simon, the homeless, riddling savant, getting drunk in a bleakly disused holiday camp- andthe brief footage of the cheery advert is a stroke of real genius.

Equally fairytale is the Welsh Catcher, a villain from the Brothers Grimm. Fitting that the escape into England should be via Hay-On-Wye, town of bookshops. Then there's the motif of the underwater bell, a nod, like last episode with the sword in the stone, to Welsh folklore, the many lands said to have fallen beneath the water.

Yet the realism is superb too. We think, in our first world comfortds, that we will never be refugees, on the run, with nothing. Yet, as Anna says, "It happens. All the time. All over the world". There's the GCHQ helper who helps because "First they came for...".

And there will always be those who not only conform but do so with enthusiasm. The English volunteer border guards are truly chilling. The deep irony of one of them cheerfully and casually uttering racist slurs against the Welsh to a Black man he sees as English is nicely done. But sois the whole thing, the directing and cinematography remaining utterly sublime. This is superb telly..

What If... Strange Supreme Intervened?

 "Right.So you're here to narrate."

"It's my job".

Nice little bit of forth wall breaking in the quote there. It's one of many witty little lines in this perfect, epic season finale starring Peggy from last episode plus a few episodesearlier; Kahhori from a couple of episodes ago; and Strange Supreme from last season. Yep, What If? is doing a tangled web of sequels. It really shouldn't work, but it does.

This is truly epic. Spoilers: there's a bit of misdirection early on, but of course Strange is the baddie. We get action, loads of cameos from the likes of Surtur, Hela, Killmonger, Thanos... and, briefly, the Two Gun Kid. Oh yes. But that's not what this is really about. It'sabout Strange wanting to destroy untold multiverses to bring back Christine, whereas Peggy knows Steve would never want her to do that for him. Both are denied love, but they deal with it very differently. That, as much as anything- and the scene where she resists temptation- is what makes her a hero.

This is an epic,perfect gfinale, with characters- even cameos, like Hela- whom we've really got to know, and that makes all the difference. Roll on next season... but Echo first. One I've finished a certain movie serial from the Distinguished Competition...

Batman: The Sign of the Sphinx

 "It's Batman!"

More of the same here, really, from cliffhanger to cliffhanger, beginning and ending with the perilous aftermath of a fistfight.

The cliffhanger resolution is a bit of a cheat- Batman, Robin and Linda just happen to survive the explosion, but the plot actually progresses a bit. The radium mine is ruined, Colton is dead (aww, I liked him, he was fun) and... Bruce gets Linda to think he and Dick were asleep throughout it all. He seems to go out of hisway to convince his girlfriend that he's utterly lazy and cowardly, safe in the knowldge that she won't dump multimillionaire Bruce Wayne for some reason.

So we move to a new subplot, with Bruce dressing up as a hood to try and find Daka's actual hideout. I suspect this mini-arc will basically be over by next episode, but it's mildly entertaining. And, Daka's presence aside, there's no visible added racism here, which is a bonus. Although once again I'm a,mused with how rubbish the Batcave set is.

To be fair,though, this is episode nine, and I'm not actually bored...

Richard III (1955)

 "Conscience is a word that cowards use..."

Ah, Richard III. Maybe he killed the princes, maybe he didn't. Maybe he was a tyrant, maybe he was a decent bloke and a goodand poular king. Certainly the Tudor propaganda- Shakespeare very much included- doesn't help his reputation.But one thing must be said: Laurence Olivier's mullet here is utterly horrifying. And on the evidence of portraits this is one crime of which Richard III is assuredly very guilty indeed.

This film, though, is as superlative as one might expect, given the director and the cast crammed with first class classical actors, including Claire Bloom, John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and at least one Thorndike. Not that there isn't actor spotting fun to be had, of courdse. We get John Laurie of Dad's Army fame, plus Michael Gough as a murderer gets a line or two.

The sets are, perhaps, rather more dated than the acting. This is a very brightly coloured, Adventures of Robin Hood take on the late Middle Ages. The direction and cinematography are deliberately conventional and unexceptional, despite some creative use of lighting. Yet the performances and, of course, the words overwhelm everything. And Olivier's Richard, caricature though Shakespeare's Richard always is, remains utterly captivating throughout. Throughout all three phases of the play- the disturbing wooing/gaslighting of Anne, Richard's plotting, and his speedy unravelling and downfall to "despair and death"- Olivier';s Richard is superlative and,perhaps, definitive.

The Way: The War

 "What is it that rises up the moment it falls?"

I was made aware of this series the other day at work, I looked it up... and not only is it scripted by James Graham, he of This House and Brexit: The Uncivil War, but it's co-directed by Michael Sheen and the one and only Adam Curtis, whose uniquely philosophica; and visually extraordinary documentaries have made a huge impression on me and my world view. Watching it immediately became imperative, and I care not that I'm juggling so much other stuff on this blog.

The first thing to note is that it's shot beautifully, cinematically, artistically, exquisitely. The acting, from a fairly unknown cast aside from Sheen, is extraordinary. The cinematography is perfect too, reflecting the dull, hopoeless world of those dependent on the ever-moribund steelworks in Port Talbot. In today's world, globalised yet beset by populist nationalism, the industrial working class lives in ignored despair.

We have two viewpoint figures. One is Own, emotionally numbed, mentally ill and seeking human connection in the most literal way possible, sex, yet without meaningful communication with the lady concerned. Connection, and yet not connection. And then we have Geoff, alienated from the militancy of his family and community because he recalls how a strike destroyed his father, the ghost of whom is played by Sheen himself.

The pllot unwinds masterfully, introducing so many characters and allowing things to get out of control as the strike unfolds and draws support from across Wales. I'm not sure the conceit quite works of the national strike ending at Offa's Dyke, and Wales being cut off from the rest of the UK and put under martial law, but at the same time this is a scenario pregnant with so many allegories in our scary modern world, from the nature of power to the right to protest to borders and migration.

Throughout there's this very Adam Curtis sense of hopelessness, that politics has long since lost its power to change things and that fight is mere expression of despair, yet perhaps worthwhile just for that.

We have,of course, some nice little moments that ouncture realism. The red monk, Geoff at the end with the sword from the Port Talbot stone... Arthurian allusion? 

This is spellbinding telly. Superb.

Batman: Lured by Radium

 "Hey, Sitting Bull..."

Yep. The above is how one of the baddies addresses a Native American gentleman in this episode. Racxism again, although in this case iyt's just depicting the attitudes ofthe time. At least Bruce is polite to said man. Although one does wince at the broken English.

Anyway, after Batman is saved by certain death by... Robin, er, flicking a switch, the plot moves onwards. I like how Colton (still a great character) pretends to lead Daka's hoods to his mine, only to give them the slip. I love how Linda continues to be disgusted by Bruce's laziness, but for some reason still refuses to dump multimillionaire Bruce Wayne. Even better, I love the crap special effects as the "countryside" whooshes by the car windows.

The plot here is genuinely cleer, with a nice set of sets connecting Colton's cabin to his mine by an underground passage. And the mine is about to be blown up with Batman, Robin and Linda still inside...

This episode was acrually quite good. For a movie serial, that's high praise.

What If... the Avengers Assembled in 1602?

 "We never get our happy ending..."

I read Neil Gaiman's limited series of 1602 a couple of decades ago, but I fear I remember little. I recall the throwback from the future being the same as here, but the 1602 of the limited series was much more rooted in real history, Old Queen Bess with her old rotting teeth and all that. This is a very different beast, but fun just the same.

We have rifts in time causing this universe to end. We have a very ungrateful King Thor- he's had Wanda Maximoff kidnap Peggy from her own reality (and her own Steve Rgers) to help save their universe... only to exile her when she initially fails, still exiled to a doomed world. Yet Peggy is truly a hero, refusing the Watcher's offer to take her "home."

Indeed, I love the metatextuality with Peggy being very much aware of the Watcher's presence and the two ofvthem interacting. But then, of course, this is an episode which opens with Tom Hiddleston playing Hamlet (a recent play by some lad from Warwickshire) and which is delightfully crammed with deliberately absurd olde worlde insults.

The character stuff is cool too, though. Once again, Happy Hogan becomes the Freak. Yet, at the core of things, behind all the fun, is the deep, tragic heartbreak of Peggy and Steve never getting to be together. Here's hoping that the finale puts a stop to that...

What If... Hela Found the Ten Rings?

"I have not survived a thousand years of war to die at the hand of foliage!"

Once again we have a superb episode of What If?- this season really is proving to be far superior. Hela, portrayed superbly by your actual Cate Blanchett, is hugely charismatic and engaging here in a rare starring role where she gets all the best lines and, best of all, gets to truly grow as a character in an arc that dovetails beautifully with the plot and works perfectly.

The episode impresses from the start, with Odin exiling Hela to Earth, removing her powers and her helm, of which he says, brilliantly, "Whosoever wears this crown, should she know mercy, shall possess the power of Hela".

Yet i't s also wonderful to see characters and concepts from Shang-Chi again, as that's one Marvel film that hasn't been followed up for far too long. Despite the odds, Hela and Wenwu find happiness and wisdom together. But we Ta Lo too, and it's fun seeing the culture clash between Hela's Nordic cynicism and the Eastern philosophy she is taught. It is, at once, profound and hilarious.

This just may be one of the best yet, and two to go...

Batman: The Phoney Doctor

 "I know you're sorry. You're always sorry. You're the sorriest man I ever knew."

We begin with an outrageous cheat of a cliffhanger resolution, and we end, inevitably, with another one, as Batman is about to be crushed. In between we get more of the Tim Colton radium mine plot, with Daka and his goons determined to find the location of the claim.

And... it's actually really fun, mainly because Colton is such a fun character, a walking stereotype of the drawling, gun-titing man of the West, but at a time when such types all voted on mass for FDR and would have very little time for orange con men from New York.

He's pretty gullible, though, falling for that phoney doctor very easily. And that clue with the "Japanese laundry" found by Bruce is mighty convenient. Still, it's great to see Colton after he's taken to Daka's lair, dismayed at what's been done to his friend Martin but not giving up. Here's hoping he sticks around for a while: right now he's the best thing about this movie serial.

No more than the usual underlying racism this time, mercifully.

Better Call Saul: Something Stupid

 "Dude, I don't need to be a lawyer, all right? I'm a magic man."

It's a nice little trick, to allow at least four months to pass between episodes. It gives us the nice little split screen montage at the start with Kim and Jimmy. Both go through their everyday lives, their very different jobs, Kim's arm slowly heals (it's a nice touch later on when we see her nervously driving), and the two of them slowly drift apart, failing to communicate as their relationship deteriorates. In bed, they lie in opposite directions. They don't talk at mrealtimes. (Incidentally, why is it that every single evening meal on an American television show inclides a bottle of wine, even if it's just a random Tuesday?).

We also have the future meth lab develop, albeit problems. And, of course, we have Hector regain consciousness to the point at which we know him in Breaking Bad. And then we get the scene, in Gus' lovely kitchen, where bhe and the doctor discuss Hector... and he makes it clear, with a subtle sadistic grin, that he wants treatment to end here, and we know why: Hector's body is a prison, he's fully conscious, and his life is a living Hell.

It's a dark episode. Jimmy has an unfortuate run-in with a pretty damn reasonable and upstanding cop, with Huell ending up assaulting a police officer. Jimmy is not yet reinstated... although we get to see him picking a location for, surely, the premises we know from Breaking Bad, with an office which Jimmy works out will be smaller than Kim's. Ouch.

Awkwardly, it falls to Kim, in denial about the fact she's channeling her inner Jimmy, who needs to wheel and deal and help Huell. We end on an intriguing bit of uncertainty. This is a fascinating dark episode. But not a happy one.

Visitor Q (2001)

 "What do you think of such wonderful bullying?"

Oh my. I knew this film would be weird, and I knew it would be disturbing. But I didn't expect... this. So many things I can't even directly allude to. Let's just say there's incest, violence, drug abuse, rape, murder, and milk. Lots of milk. In quantities requiring an umbrella...

The film is very interestingly shot, with a hand-held camera, deliberately given a grainy, low budget look. It's a very deadpan dark comedy, amusing us at times while making us uncomfortable about our amusement. It belongs, I suppose, to a genre where a dysfunctional family is visited by a stranger who patiently "fixes" their problems sothat, as the film ends, the family are happy and united in their extremely twisted way.

The father, mother, son and daughter all do morally repugnant things, but it is the neglect of the salaryman father that is clearly the root cause, filming life instead of living it and accepting his responsibilities. His sexual problems are a metaphor for this. He ignores his son's abuse of his wife, and passively films his own son's bullying. Only a renewed bonding with his wife, in the most twisted circumstances possible, leads to the moment of catharsis as the couple briefly pause their dismemberment of a woman's body to chop the bullies to pieces. Ah,it warms your heart, doesn't it?

There's clearly a subtext here, and a view is being expressed about the percieved woes of Japan. Perhaps one theme is about what it means to be a man- to have integrity, to be a decent husband and father. Twisted though the film is, it makes one think. A worthwhile film, then... but watch it at your peril.

Antony and Cleopatra (1972)

 "I must from this enchanting queen break off..."

I've read Antony and Cleopatra, but this is my first time seeing a production on either stage or screen. The play is, of course, magnificent, as are all of Shakespeare's later tragedies. It is at once a love story and a tale of politics at its most raw and brutal, with legendary characters including the young Octavian Ceasar, played superbly by John Castle as an upright, disciplined young man, exemplifying all that Rome stands for and who very much feels like a younger version of the future Augustus.

This is also a play about two worlds- masculine, martial, relatively puritan Rome versus the feminine weakness and decadence of Egypt and the east... yes, that dodgy trope is old indeed. But one can't deny it's handled well here by the Warwickshire lad.

The film is nicely shot, by Charlton Heston himself, on location in Spain. Half the cast are Spaniards, yet to their credit you wouldn't notice. This may not be right up there with the greats of cinematic Shakespeare, but there's little to criticise... although, superb though Roger Delgado may be as the soothsayer (sadly, one of his last roles), one has to wince at the obvious brownface.

Hildegard Neil is very good as Cleopatra, but Heston is magnificent as Antony, a difficult role. Yet he handles the duality of the character with aplomb, believable both as the great Roman general and the besotted lover of Cleopatra. This is a truly excellent film, one of surprisingly few screen versions of the play.

Batman: Poison Peril

 "Oh Bruce... you're impossible!"

The cliffhanger is soon resolved by, er, simply having the plane crash into the ground but with Batman and Robin both surviving. Ok then. This is how they're playing it.

The plot thread with the Japanese submarine and plane plans is abruptly and hliariously dropped at this point as we move towards a radium mine and prospector, one Ken Colton, introduced in some exposition as Linda visits. I can't for the life of me see why this working girl should be interested in the apparently flaky, lazy, unreliable Bruce Wayne... oh, yes. The money.

There's an obligatory seqyence in which a henchman suggests that Bruce and the Batman must be "one and the same". a phrase which only ever comes up in the context of superhero secret identities, but Daka says that "That simpering idiot could never be the Batman".

We then have some bugging of Bruce's front room, some exposition, and Daka now knows that Colton has a claim to a, er, radium mine, the most 1940s movie serial concept ever. So Alfred, ever the comic foil, is made to dress up as Colton as a decoy only for Batman and Robin to spiring into action when he starts to be roughed up. Hmmm... surely the baddies would realise that the only way they could have found out about their plan was from finding the bug, which makes their secret identities rather obvious.

Never mind. Nice explosive cliffhanger here...

What If... Kahhori Reshaped the World?

 "Welcome to the New World..."

This, motre than any other episode, has only the most tangential relationship to the rest of the MCU. The conceit is that Surtur destroyed Asgard long ago, and the Tesseract ended up in Mohawk lands, roughly northern New York State and southern Ontario to us. Yet this is a superb piece of television.,

There's a forbidden lake, and a hidden world, a place of paradise, plenty, immortality and, perhaps, a little too much ease. Meanwhile, in "our" world, there are Conquistadors, as terrifying as any monster. I've just looked up the history, and Isabella of Castile died in 1504, a little early for contact with the Mohawk, who presumably lie quite far inland for a time when Columbus had only just found the West Indies... but no matter. This is wonderful stuff. 

There's a deep subtext here. Colonialism, obviously. The greed of the Spaniards versus the wiser attitudes of the Mohawk, with Kahhori's confrontation of Isabella being deeply satisfying. The amazing land beyond the lake, reduced by the Spaniards to a mere "Fountain of Youth". The fruit hunt. We have wonder side by side with real darkness. This episode is a thing of beauty.

Assignment to Kill (1968)

 "I'm just calling to say I loathe and despise you and everything you stand for, and what time are you taking me to dinner tonight?"

At first this little film seems to be ripping off James Bond, what with its vague spy theme, its protagonist's great chemistry with the female lead and love interest, and the time it was made, I suppose. But instead it's something very different and, despite the at times pedestrian direction and the low wattage of its stars- although Herbert Lom and John Gielgud, both excellent, provide some heft- very good indeed.

Patrick O'Neal plays Cutter, an investigator of fraudulent insurance claims who finds himself in Zurich and a web of rather deadly intrigue. There he meets Dominique, with whom he establishes a rather delightful little romantic rapport with lots of Steed-and-Mrs-Peel type wit between the two of them. O'Neal is fine, but Joan Hackett is utterly superb.

Great though the characters are, though, this is a clever, complex thriller which has a highly satisfying ending, fully paying off all the intricate twists and turns. And yet, despite the film being essentially a puzzle box, at no point is it difficult to follow and the characters, wthin the limits of the genre, feel like real people.

And it's a real revelation seeing John Gielgud as a crime lord.

This is an odd little film with B list actors for its stars, but the script and most of the performances are superb, and the location of Zurich and the Swiss Alps is perfect. Highly recommended.

Foundation and Earth by Isaac Asimov

 Like Robots and Empire, this novel can very much be seen as continuity-driven, tying up loose ends in what Asimov has decided to make a single universe of Foundation, Robot and Empire novels and stories. In a sense, it's a kind of self-fanwank. It just so happens to simultaneously be a bloody superb novel. You'll noticed I read it rather quickly after my last Asimov despite working full time and having rather a lot going on. This novel is a Class A substance. It's dangerously addictive. You have been warned.

Part of the reason it's so damn satisfying, of course, is the fanwank. Everything is resooved- where the Solarians went; what happened to Earth; why Galaxia is necessary; why women seem to find the rather annoying Golan Trevise so damn irresistible. You can tell that Asimov, in his sixties, is rather enjoying being able to reflect in his writing some rather more relaxed sexual mores than he would have known in his youth.

The ideas are not so central as earlier novels, perhaps, but they are there. The society of Solaria reaches its logical extreme.And there are thrilling moments- Comporellon is Baleyworld! Aurora has literally gone to the dogs! And on the Moon is... ah yes.

This ties everything up rather neatly. I'll get round to the other Asimov novels eventually but for now, I think, I'll diversify my diet. But this novel, while obviously not self-contained and with a lot of required pre-reading, is a real joy.

What if... Captain Carter fought the Hydra Stomper

 "I don't do sequels... normally."

And I thought last episode was good.

This one is simply outstanding. It helps, of course, that it's a sequel to one of last season's standout episodes and benefits from the powerfully tragic love story where Peggy and Steve, although deeply in love, can never be together on account of the small problem of him being the Hydra Stomper, never helpful to true love.

This gives the episode a nice bit of depth and character, but the whole thing oozes class, with excellent characterisation. The close friendshop between Peggy and Natasha Romanov feels real and nuanced. It's great seeing Peggy as out-of-time in the present day, just like the Steve of "our" world. It's nice to see a Bucky Barnes who has remained living and grown old. And, yeah, that ersatz American town in Sokovia is magnificent nightmare fuel.

Also, what an ending. Is this a version of Neil Gaiman's 1602 graphic novel? I look forward to it. The finale, I assume?

Batman: The Living Corpse

 "Stop! Behind you! The Batman!"

This being a movie serial, with fifteen likely interminable episodes of set pieces and probable further racism, this instalment sees the plot, such as it is, suddenly changed without warning. Both Batman and Daka are given new missions.

For Batman, it's a letter from Uncle Sam, in invisible ink, sending him on a secret mission to protect a plane against dastardly agents of Imperial Japan. It's a nice little spy scene with a bit of comic relief for Alfred. But the minions of Tojo in Tokyo get their message to Dr Daka by more... unusual means. A coffin is delivered to a beach, with a corpse inside, dressed as a Japanese soldier. Said soldier is briefly brought to life in a scene literally ripping off James Whale's Frankenstein, and the revived corpse proceeds to deliver his verbal message and promptly snuff it again. Dialogue makes it clear that, being the oriental type, he's only too happy to die for the Emperor in place of, you know, just using invisible ink or many other methods...

Racism aside, and to be fair we've seen much worse in this serial, the episode ends with a nice little action set piece on a place, with our heroes engaging in fisticuffs as their plane is shot down by friendly fire. On and on we go...

What If... Iron Man Crashed into the Grandmaster?

 "Take that, vile asparagus woman."

This is, quite simply, one of the best episodes of What If I've seen thus far, perhaps the best. Given the design of one of the "chariots", I think we're supposed to notice an allusion to the pod race in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. I prefer to see this as a particularly good episodfe of Wacky Races.

It's not just the simple but awesome ploty, it's the incredibly witty script. It's Jeff Goldblum's absoluteky splendid scenery chewing as the Grandmaster, a tyrant who gets a kinky thrill, after trying to cheart at the end, from the sensation of being melted. It's the fact that both Valkyrie and Gamora get some good character development that riffs on what happens in the actual films. It's the sheer horror of a grand prix that's an actual health and safety nightmare. Plus, Iron Man and Korg are one of those double acts that absolutely had to happen in some way or other.

Oh, and Mick Wingert almost convinces as Robert Downey Jr. I'm impressed. This episode will be rather hard to top.

Fool Me Once: Episode 8

 "Oh noooo!"

And so it ends, as any good melodrama should, with a proper full-on confrontation between Maya and the Burketts, in which- of course- she is shot and killed. As we established last episode, protagonist she may be, but she's a war criminal. Karma demands she die. But she dies for a purpose, with the livestream and killing livestreamed by Corey. It's a neat way to end.

There's a lot of non-linear filling in of gaps, as we flash back to Joe's mudder of Claire, Maya's killing of Joe, the revelations that Joe murdered... well, everybody else who has died during the course of the series.And Kierce, no longer a cop, gets his own revenge, of sorts, by letting Maya go and confront the Burketts.

I'm not sure what purpose the coda accomplishes, other than to establish that Kierce in fact goes on to survive for many years. There's the full circle thing of Lily's baby being called Maya but, well, that's a bit superficial. Still, all in all, this is a highly satisfactory end to a highly satisfactory melodrama.

Robots and Empire by Isaac Asimov

I've said before that I used to see Isaac Asimov's 1980s novels as being, while highly enjoyable, essentially as a kind of self-fanfiction in relation to his novels of decades before, with Asimov focusing more on continuity than concepts. That was my original impression, back when I first read these novels thirty (ouch!) years ago. With Second Foundation and The Robots of Dawn, however, in this rereading at least, I haven't found this to be the case at all.

Well... perhaps third time is the charm. Spoler alert: you have been warned... but I find this novel seems to exist in order to fill a continuity gap. It serves to explain how the Settlers would ultimately come to eclipse the Spacers without being destroyed by them. It explains how Earth becomes radioactive, in order to fit the continuity of (if I recall correctly) The Currents of Space. So, for once, Isaac Asimov would appear to be guilty as charged, convicted of self-fanfiction.

And yet... does this make any difference to the actual quality of the book? Well... no. It's full of engaging and original ideas. The philosophical conversations between Daneel and Giskard, in which they come up with the concept of the "Zeroth Law" are fascinating. And the ending, while I predicted it slightly in advance, is clever: the Aurorans' plot to make Earth radioactive, and thus uninhabitable over time, serves not to undermine the Settlers but to spur them on, removing the umbilical cord that was holding them back.

It must also be said that, despite the fact that no one reads the novels of Asimov, all of which are novels of ideas, for his characters, the development of Gladia as a character is highly satisfying here. Beginning the novel as a decadent, long-lived Spacer who is just waiting for death, she finds renewed purpose, meaning and, indeed, love amongst the Settlers.

I'm running out of Asimov novels. That's a truly scary thought.

Fool Me Once: Episode 7

 "You're not fit for work, Kierce."

"No, I'n not."

Wow, That final bombshell in thedying seconds of the episode has left me reeling.

It's not the only bombshell to explode in this deeply satisfying penultimate episode, of course. We realise the cause of Kierce's blackouts... and it's the Birketts' fault. We learn what really happened to get Maya dismissed from the army. We learn how Maya came to see Joe on the "nannycam". Oh, and we learn what happened to Theo and Andrew all those years ago... teenage Joe murdered them both. Lovely.

Most mind-blowing of all, last few seconds excepted, is that the person we thought was Kierce's AA cult counsellor (less dodgy addiction treatment is available) was always a hallucination of his late wife, in a devilishly clever bit of misdirection.

It is, as ever, all about the revelations: this is a melodrama and doesn't pretend to be more. But there's nothing wrong with that, and this is a melodrama of the first rank. Both Michelle Keegan and Adeel Akhtar are deeply impressive. They even say "lift" and use the proper British version where Kierce reads Corey his rights. Shame about "Get in the trunk"...

The Alphabet Murders (1965)

 "A A, eh?"

This is, I believe, by the creative team behind the Miss Marple films starring Margaret Rutherford who, indeed, gets an odd little cameo here. I'm told they're very good films, if apparently not particularly faithful to the novels. I intend to give them a chance. That is, despite the fact that this film is utterly unwatchable.

I'm not at all surprised that Agatha Christie herself loathed this film. It is rather difficult not to. I can't remember the novel (The ABC Murders)- it's been at least thirty years or more since the one and only time I read it. I read many, many of Mrs Christie's works in early puberty but rather went off her by my mid-teens. Still, I've no doubt that this is a far from faithful adaptation, not least because it scarcely pretends to be a whodunit. It is, rather, an embarrassingly unfunny attempt at "comedy".

It's trying to be a farce. A good farce is, of course, a very clever thing indeed. This is not. The cast, from the awful Tony Randall, surely the worst ever Hercule Poirot, with his ever-shifting accent, in one of the most cringeworthy leading roles ever, to a shockingly awful Robert Morley as an unrecognisable Captain Hastings, is either bloody awful or quite sensibly phoning it in for the money as there's no point doing otherwise for a script like this.

We get unfunny "comedy" setvpieces, one after another, and soooo much smoking.We get Anita Ekberg playing, well, the kind of tall blonde unattainable woman she invariably plays. We get a bit of psychological mumbo-jumbo. And we have a very unfunny conclusion in a train. And at no point is any of it remotely entertaining.

Be warned: ninety minutes of your one and only life are far too precious to waste on this drivel.

Fool Me Once: Episode 6

 "You keep sytumbling over dead bodies, don't you, Maya?"

A grumble, before the praise begins. I know I've whinged a lot about Kierce getting called "Detective Kierce" rather than "Detective Inspector", but this time his boss gets called "Captain Proctor" rather than Detective Chief Inspector Proctor". I don't mind a bit of adaptation to a largely American audience- this is Netflix- but things like that really take away the realism.

That aside, this episode is superb. The plot twists and turns like a twisty-turny thing yet again, and in a hugely entertaining manner. There are shocks and bombshells all the time, not least at the very end- did Joe really kill Andrew? But that's not all. What's Corey really after? Did he kill Tommy Dark? Is Judith, as I now suspect, a red herring?  Is Joe alive after all? There's a lot to uncover, I have no idea whats happening, yet we're really quite close to the end.

Yet, despite all this, this is all about Sami Kierce and his coming to terms with things, along with the help of his loving, lovely fiancee. Adeel Akhtar is once again sublime in a role that really showcases his talents. This is all about the shocks and the plot equivalent of jump scares, it's got no deeper subtext I can discern, but I'm loving the ride... and the characters feel very real.

Better Call Saul: Pinata

 "Get rich quick schemes never work."

The saddest scene, and also the most revealing, is where Jimmy visits HHM to pick up his $5,000. The firm, and Howard, are struggling... and it is all, of course, the fault of Jimmy, who destroys all he touches. Worse, HE tells HOWARD that hes a "****** lawyer" and much better at being a salesman. Pot, kettle...

Jimmy's only talent is the gift of the gab. The episode begins with a fadscinating flashback to Jimmy's mailroom days. We see a brilliant, triumphant Chuck and intern Kim, clearly going places. No one sees Jimmy as important. Cut to today... and Kim is still awesome, clearly held back by Jimmy, going places as he sells phones to the dodgy.

Jimmy has a brutal side, too, as we discover when he deals with the three ne-er-do-wells who attacked him last episode. But nowhere near as brutal as Gus. Giancarlo Esposito has a truly chilling, sublime monologue, making it clear he wants Hector alive and conscious just so he can suffer. Brr.

Gus trusts Mike increasingly, though, his fixer and reliable lieutenant already. Mike is fascinating, working for some dodgy people while also being a good family man, making amends with his daughter-in-law, with whom he has a genuinely sweet relationship. These characters, all of them, are very, very real people. This is, as ever, close to televisual perfection.

The Red Beret (1953)

 "There are two kinds of men who jump- those who are crazy and those who are stupid."

This is, I suppose, a fairly standard British war film, despite the fact that it happens to have an American star in the person of a notably getting-on-a-bit Alan Ladd. And it's a good, exciting bit of adventure with a nice bit of characterisation- McKendrick is an American pretending to be Ameriucan who has joined the parachute regiment here in Blighty.

Now, I'm a bit scared of heights. Not to extremes- I'll travel by plane (well, maybe, these days I'd have to think about the fossil fuels), but I'll go a bit quiet at takeoff and landing. But there's absolutely no way you'll ever get me in a parachute. I could never, ever, jump off a plane, even with a modern, much safer parachute. But back then... the early scene where the poor instructor "Roman candles" and plummets to his doom is existentially horrifying. The fear of that happening, much more likely then than it would be now, is unimaginable. But these men would do that and then go straight into combat.

There's nothing particularly outstanding about this film, it's no all-time classic, but it impresses simply by being very good and getting the basics right. The cast isn't that stellar but it does the job. The story, characterisation and script are impressive without necessaily being up there with the best. The tyrannical Scottish sergeant major is a nicely done little knowing stereotype. It's short, entertaining and worth a watch.

Batman: Slaves of the Rising Sun

"You and all your Axis cronies... you're through!"

A lot happens in this episode between the two cliffhangers of the railway bridge and the van going off a cliff. One of Daka's hoods, having failred in his mission and turned agaimnst Daka, is foolish enough to stand right on top of the trap door and ends up fed to Daka's aligators in that spendid supervillain trope. Some sake is drunk. There's a fortune teller and a switcheroo, a car chase, Batman firing the radium gun.

But... well, again it's the staggering levels of racism, even taking full account of the context, that stands out here. I know we had one staggeringly racist line in the first episode, but this time we get "That's the kind of answer that fits the colour of your skin."

Yes. Really. That line is literally in this episode. Wow.

I'm lefdt wondering just how much more we'll see that's at this level. Jingoism, anti-Japanese sentiment, even a bit of mild xenophobia could be largely explained by the context. But this? Wow.

Fool Me Once: Episode 5

 "The rich protect each other..."

The plot continues to be splendidly convoluted. Corey knows the Burketts are mixed up in some seriously bad criminal stuff, possibly involving Joe. The plot thickens, too, around his late brother Andrew andthat sinister public school. Another kid, a working class outsider turned popular achiever, dies of "alcohol poisoning" shortly before Andrew's apparent suicide. And yeah, the headmaster is definitely hiding something. 

In support of the "evil Burketts" theory is Judith's continued creepiness. She's a psychiatrist, making veiled threats to institutionalise Maya, having altready renfdered her daiughter Caroline a madwoman in the attic. Brr. Meanwhile, Eddie continues to be decent and his daughter has her own fascinating plot thread.

Oh, and there's a storage place. With at least one frozen body in it. Literal Brr.

But the real emotional core here, of course, is with Inspector Kierce and the sublime performance of Adeel Akhtar who, cruelly, as he's about to become a husband and father, faces a truly horrible fate. 

Again, this is perhaps not exactly oozing with subtext. It's a whodunit-cum-melodrama.But it's bloody good melodrama.

What If... Happy Hogan Saved Christmas?

 "'Twas only two hours prior, and the Tower was not yet on fire..."

I know, it's late January, and I'm doing the Christmas episode of What If?. I still have Echo to go, plus all the non-MCU stuff I'm doing. This may not quite be the furthest behind I've ever been but, well, I'm juggling all this with Twin Peaks, Fool Me Once, Better Call Saul, Batman and really need to get back to Robin of Sherwood soon. Aaargh.

Anyway, this is a nice little comedy episode with lots of witty lines, lots of fun and allusions to just how many years Darcy has been at uni, just how many intern placements she's had, and how little Happy (or "Hulk Hogan", as jhe's nicknamed by a very naughty Justin Hammer) is probably being paid for all he's going through.

This is all a bit of a subtle allusion to the not-so-good old days before David Michelinie's first run on the Iron Man title, when Happy would regularly turn into a bizarre creature called, yes indeed, "the Freak". But the episode manages to get away with it, mainly by just being very funny indeed.

Good stuff. Although not necessary the standard programming...

Better Call Saul: Quite a Ride

 "You can't play chicken with me. I invented chicken."

It's a fascinating choice that this episode, filled with notably creative directorial choices even by the standards of Better Call Saul, begins with a flash forward to the very end of Breaking Bad, showing us the offices of Saul Goodman for the first time,or the last time, depending on your perspective. Saul's... Jimmy's last goodbye to Francesca is as awkward as it was always going to be. It's the end of Jimmy's life as anuything other than monochrome mediocrity and paranoia, reminding us that yes, he may seem to get away with his morally dodgy choices while others suffer, but karma will be back to punish him in the end.

Jimmy's behaviour here is typically cynical. Instead of honestly selling phones in the shop, he goes out at night to sell to the mildly criminal, grey market semi-undrrworld, only to be mugged for his pains: on this one occasion, karma is more immrediate, and he seems to learn his lesson and go back to orthodoxy. At his typically hmilating meeting with his parole officer, he seems resigned to biding his time until he can hopefully get his law licence back. And... we've seen where that ultimately leads.

Meanwhile, he continues to slowly ruin the lives of others around him. Kim really damages her reputation with her Mese Verde clients because she's having to take on other work to support Jimmy. And Howard, being a decent sort, seems to be falling apart with all the guilt. Guilt that rightly belongs to Jimmy.

And yet, while elsewhere we see Jimmy with his dodgy ways, and how he damages the lives and careers of thosearound him, we end the episode with a German structural emngineer bimpressing Gus with his consummate professionalism. Professionalism with not a Jimmy in sight.

Superb telly, obviously.

Dogma (1999)

 "Bethany, bless the sink!"

I watched, and enjoyed this film, many years ago but, as often happens as the decades pass- and I am not, you understand, in any way confessing to being middle aged- I remembered very litttle. Last night was pretty much a second first viewing.

And it's superb. As a comedy, it's bloody good, with a constant stream of laughs. Linda Fiorentino is perfect as the star. Chris Rock and Alan Rickman are both brilliant. George Carlin is perfect casting as a down-with-the-kids cardinal. Some dodgy angel wing CGI aside- and we can be forgiving, because it's 1999- there's not much wrong with this.

It is, of course, a very different beast from the very '90s slacker romantic comedies for which Kevin Smith had previously been known, although there's a fair bit of that sort of thing here. But the religious stuff is obviously going to come across as provocative, not least with Bethany working at an abortion clinic and (spoilers!) the plot requiring God's life support machine to be switched off. Casting Alanis Morissette as God is, of course, entirely uncontroversial.

And yet... I don't get this film to be mocking faith, or religion itself, in any way, but rather the reactionary and socially conservative structure that eventually inserts itself around every religion. I've never had any religious faith myself, I wasn't brought up with it and am simply unable to believe in something without empirical proof, but even I was moved by Bethany's drunken nostalgia for a time when she had a childlike, simple faith. But perhaps this film also hints at a deeper truth. Divine or not, this Jesus person seems to have been anything but conservative.

What If... Peter Quill Attacked Earth's Mightiest Heroes?

 "Bummer. I thought you were the dude from Van Halen."

Yes, I know. I'm doing so much telly at the moment, and it's a struggle to keep up. I blame all the new telly. There's this, there's Fool Me Once, there's Echo after this. I fear that Twin Peaks and the Batman movie serial may have to take a very temporary back seat, but they're very much ongoing. Same with Robin of Sherwood.

Anyway, I enjoyed this. There's character stuff with PeterQuill as a kid with Ego as the main threat. There is, perhaps, an overly neat resolution. But it's fun seeing an Avengers team form in 1988. We get a young Hank Pym, Bill Foster, and the fortysomethings are represented by T'Chaka... and both Peggy and Howard must be nearing retirement age. Peggy isn't aging bad. The Winter Soldier is well handled, though, and Thor is fun. 

One complaint, though: the United States has many fine ales and a proud brewing traditiob. But its bottled "light beers" are unfit for human consumption. Thor and T'Chaka endorsing "light beer" is the most unrealistic thing in this episode.

Fool Me Once: Episode 4

 "Boom!"

Grr. I know I've spent half these reviews moanimg about Kierce being referred to as "Detective" rather than "Inspector" and saying that this is not America... but this time we get "DUI", goddammit.

That aside, though, this is bloody good telly. It twists and turns, in the words of the great Lord Melchett, like a twisty-turny thing. I won't recount said twists and turns of the plot... but damn, there are some superb character moments here, triumphs of writing and acting.

Joanna Lumley is wonderful as the evil mother-in-law from Hell, pretty much threatening to put Maya in a psychiatric ward as she claims to have done with her daughter Caroline. And that shot of Caroline in the upstairs window... brr! Then there's the sweet, mutually respectful reconciliation between Maya and Eddie. And then we have Kierce and his underling being open with one another, about blackouts and sexual orientation resprectively. 

Perhaps even more interesting, though, is the thoughtful little chat between Maya and her erstwhile nemesis, Corey the Whistle. There's a kind of mutual regard there, too, and it feels plausible.

Halfway through. Lots of twisting and turning to go. It'sa fun ride.

Fool Me Once: Episode 3

 "Life-ruining rat!"

Deep breath. Lots of rabbit holes here. So...

The red car belongs to Corey the Whistle, who had dodgy arrangements with both Claire and Joe, feeding him info to protect Maya... infor for whi they both deied. Info about the Burketts? They're certainly paying off a lot of person. And that Neil (the third Burkett brother?) certainly seems dodgy. Which probably, of course, makes him the red herring.

Of course, I'm sure there's a lot to be revealed about what truly happened with Maya's apparent war crime- we're certainly being teased a lot. Then there's Claire's kids investigating a tech bro ex of their mother's, whose firm has a weird, QR code-flashing robot thingy.  Oh, and one of the motorbiokes from Joe's murder is linked to that unpleasant football coach. and the cliffhanger... wow.

And yet... what really impresses is the characters. Michelle Keegan is great, of course. But Adeel Akhtar also impresses as the able but world-weary DI Kierce (again, stop calling him "Detective Kierce!: this is not America!), a very well-rounded character. I'm still not sure this is about anything beyond the thrills... but does it have to be?

Fool Me Once: Episode 2

 "Lying's never good policing."

No, DI Kierce. And nor is lying by omission to your fiancee about your blackouts while being open to them to yoiur dodgy Alcoholics Anonymous counsellor. You need to stay away from that semi-cult for a start, but at least on this occasion she gives good advice. Get tested. And bloody tell your fiancee, who miraculously failed to spot anything dodgy after your very well-shot breakfast blackout.

Meanwhjile, in some ways, the plot advances quietly. In other ways it doesn's, as Maya finds a lead to ploice don't suspect- Claire had a secret phone which she used only for talking to someone at a retro gaming arcade. Was she having an affair with Joe, as the police (and Eddie) suspdct? I don't think so. I think it was a very different secret, and connected to all the dodgy cult stuff.

Then there's the photos of a young Claire, developed by her kids- and, incidentally, her son doesn't understand why the camera doesn't have a screen. I feel old- in which shre's pregnant with another child from before she met their dad. We see the reading of Joe's willpostponed by the lack of a death certificate, and we meet KJoe's likeable sister, Caroline, who has her own suspicions that not only Joe but his brother Andrew may not be dead.

Oh, and one final bombshell: Joe's family are paying Kierce a load of money every month. Conflict of interest much? But I suspect eve this is not what it seems. Nothing is. This is quite the most twisty-turny bit of telly I can remember ever seeing. I'm not sure if it's all that deep behind all these whodunit equivalent of jump scares, but my God I'm loving the ride.

Twin Peaks: Zen, or the Skill to Catch a Killer

"Fire, walk with me..."

This, if you'll recall, is the third episode, and the one I inadvertentle skipped, having watched and blogged Episode Five. Now, thankfully, linear chronology is restored. And gosh... it would have been damned useful to have watched this episode in its proper place.

It is, perhaps, my favourite thus far, dreamlike from the very first scene in which Ben's brother Jerry (ha!) returns from Paris to interrupt an awkward, silent dinner where the wine is served from a decanter and a Native American bloke in full headdress just happens to be sitting at table, saying and doing nothing. We then proceed to learn of One Eyed Jack's.

We learn much more, too. How increasingly suspicious Leo is becoming. Jocelyn's discovery of the two sets of accounts.We meet Albert, FBI forensic genius and the rudestv man in America. And Agent Cooper's bizarre thing with the bottle, arising from dreams and Tibet, which both functions as a rather nice bit of exposition and actually gets Sheriff Truman to think more highly of him.

But then we get to the drewam itself and... oh my.This is peak David Lynch. It is a thing of beauty. I'm sure it all means something, if not necessarily in a linear way, which, i Suppose, makres it rather appropriate that I've inadvertently made a non-linear mishap. I shall endeavour not to do it again.

Fool Me Once: Episode 1

 "Duran Duran came on the radio and he's never even heard of them...!"

Aboiut time I got round to this new-ish thriller on Netflix which everyone is talking about: my very lovely partner has convinced me and now I see to be quite hopelessly addicted. And yeah, I know I'm blogging loads of different things and this is one more... but it was ever thus with this blog. It’s what I do.

So on the surface the conceit is simple. Maya, a former soldier (she loved combat and was addicted to it, an interesting character trait!) sees her husband Joe, from a much posher family than her, gunned down by apparent motorcylist muggers. Some time later, by means of a "nanny cam" (don't ask), she appears to see her late husband with her young daughter. Did this really happen? Or is this one of the many visions she's been having?

Also... is she the killer? Yeah, I know, she's the protagonist and there are unwritten rules of TV drama, so she probably isn't. But Detective Inspector Sami Kierce (not "Detective Kierce", please: this is not America) hasn't ruled her out. After all, her sister was recently killed, and her widower wants Maya to stay away from his daughters because "death follows you". Ouch. Indeed, we learn that both murders were done using the same gun.

There's dodginess in her past, too. Her old army mates seem to like her, but was she really dishonourably discharged for killing innocent civilians? Is there a connectioin with her murky past? I think we know there is.

But then we end with a bombshell. Maya's posh mother-in-law, Judith, is somewhat overbearing- I've had worse, mind- and there's a real subtext of snobbery. Except... we begin with a flashback to 1996, a private school, and some sort of Dennis Wheatley-style Satanic ritual. Then,  in the final scene, we realise this all pertains to Joe's younger brother, who died that year at seventeen. Does all this creepy aristcratic weirdness link to all this? We know it does.

Aaaargh. The tension is all coiled up like a spring. But I'll be good. Another episode tomorrow. And I'm not promising just the onre...

They Came from Beyond Space (1967)

 "I will not have sentiment interfering with our vital work!”

I knew, before watching, only that Amicus made this film at the same time as Daleks: Invasion Earth: 2150 AD, and reused some sets, costumes or whatnot.

Having seen it last night, though, I strongly suspect another Doctor Who connection. Yes, this is basically a cheeky rip-off of Quatermass II, both in terms of the plot and in terms of having an American star amongst an otherwise all-British cast. If you’ll forgive a brief Doctor Who fanboy diversion, though, I strongly suspect Robert Holmes saw this film, at the pictures, a couple of years before writing Spearhead from Space. I suspect said story’s debt to Nigel Kneale comes at least partly via this film, which not only has the plot based on alien meteorites leading to mysterious alien doings, but has as its hero an endearingly rude scientist with a vintage car. Yes, quite.

Rip-off it is, but the film is rather good. The cast may be fairly low-wattage, but they do a good job. The visuals are nicely trippy in a 1967 way, making this rather old-fashioned sort of film look relatively contemporary. It does, admittedly, run out of both ideas and budget once the story leaves Earth, but the rather sudden conclusion is brilliantly hilarious in a way which must surely have been intended. Let us just say that the cameo by Michael Gough is… unique.

This film is utterly bonkers. I can’t call it a classic, but I can say it’s thoroughly enjoyable.

The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey

This is a compelling, addictive, novel, one which I've found it very difficuklt to put aside every now and again for, you know, eating, seeping, that sort of thing. But it's odd. It's one of six detective novels by Josephine Tey featuring a Detective Inspector Alan Grant, the last of them before Tey sadly died. However, the other fice in the series are not widely read today. This particular novel is very unusual for an award winning whodunit.

Simply put, our inspector is laid up in hospital with a broken leg, he's bored out of his skull, and he ends up looking into the deaths of the Princes in the Tower and pondering whether the murderer was Richard III, as popularly supposed, or someone else.

It sounds simple. But what makes this novel compelling is the how. This is an investigation where we're really shown the working. All of the primary evidence, all the facts, are lain before us an analysed, and a modern (well, 1951) police approach is taken. The reasoning, and the conclusions, feel pretty damn rigorous, although other views of the case are available. 

I suppose, like the Jack the Ripper TV series from the '70s I recently blogged where the conceit was two fictional detectives investigating the murders in a documentary in the form of a drama, this may be seen as factual history dressed up as fiction. Yet the prose, the plotting, the characterisation, all are superb. 

This novel is a veritable Class A substance.

Twin Peaks: The One-Armed Man

 "In real life, there is no algebra..."

Bums. Just belatedly realised that, because of how the episodes are displayed on the DVD, I inadvertently missed the third episode, so the last one I blogged was ion fact the fourth. Aaaargh. That's incredibly annoying. I'll blog the third one next, then onwards.

Anyway...

I think, given how damned complicated things are getting- although, I'll note, it's not that hard to follow, which is a triumph of storytelling- I'm not going to be too thorough about discussing plot developments in these blog posts. So many characters, so many connections between them, so many secrets... and the point is not so much the endless mystery as the mood, in any case. And plenty of it.

Leland's chat with Leo is a surprise, though. And it's interesting how multiple characters are now having seemingly precognitive dreams. There's feeling here, too: Shelly's domestic abuse by Leo isn't treated lightly. We meet Hank, unexpectedly successful in his parole hearing, which is going to cause problems.. 

But mostly this is where the weirdness creeps in a little more. The goings-on are becoming more and more absurd. I'm minded of how the investigation takes a turn towards parrots and mynah birds. The absurdity, of course, is by no means a bad thing. This is the world of David Lynch. So much weirdness, so many symbols. Does any of it mean anything? Does it matter? I'm engrossed.