Grimm: Trust Me Knot

"Whatever happens to Nick is gonna happen to you!"

Wow. Firstly, that was awesome. Secondly, it was clever, with a last minute twist that upends everything. Thirdly, as I suspected, this final short season is blowing apart the tradition of epic stuff for a season's first two episodes and then the arc plot taking a back seat to stories of the week; this episode's climax utterly blows apart the status quo.

The "previously on", by emphasising the fact that Rachel Wood's room had Renard's fingerprints all over it, sort of gives away what Hank and Wu are going to do; dramatically arrest Renard for her mirder and use him as a bargaining chip for Nick's seemingly inevitable reinstatement into the police, with all charges dropped. That this doesn't happen, and that Renard ends up free, powerful and with everything he wants, is deeply unexpected. And the question of how Hank and Wu can continue to work under him is suddenly answered; they're fired. It seems that Grimm is no longer a police procedural.

There's some interesting stuff about the stick, too, and hints at some unholy origins, whether from the symbols hidden on the cloth or the fact that Nick seemed reluctant, Gollum-like, to part with it. More is clearly set to be revealed about the season's MacGuffin. Diana is scary, too; she may be a sweet little girl but she's powerful, and it's only a matter of time until she surely ends up as the season Big Bad. Oh, and Rosalie ends up publicly announcing her pregnancy, in typical TV fashion, at a moment of high danger.

There's a long way to go, though; Nick is still on the run, Hank and Wu are no longer cops, Trubel has buggered off, and the city's establishment is right behind Renard and Black Claw...

Grimm: Fugitive

"You chose the wrong side, Sean."

Things keep on moving fast with no sign of a new status quo emerging; normally we can expect things to settle down after the first couple of episodes of a new season, but this season is both much shorter than usual and the final season. Anything can happen.

Nick is a fugitive with Sean using the full weight of the Portland police force to "shoot to kill". Things don't look good for Nick, especially after the cliffhanger, and a big question mark hangs over both Hank and Wu; how can they carry on as cold when their boss is such a blatant baddie? And yet... there are signs that Sean isn't really sure that he's on the right side. One thing is sure; Adalind is definitely still with Nick.

There are other curiosities; Eve is still Eve but is losing her powers and seems to be getting more and more Juliette-like. And why did Renard shoot Bonaparte instead of Nick at the end of the finale? Could it have been Diana controlled by her own father? That little girl is getting creepier and creepier. And this is a compelling start to the season.

Although apparently the artist formerly known as Bitsie Tillich is now going by "Elizabeth". That's buggered up all my tagging...

Friend Request (2016)

"Why did you accept my friend request?"

I wasn't expecting much of this film; it's part of what seems to be establishing itself as a new genre of horror film based on something evil in social media. It seems to be evolving it's own tropes- dead people maintaining an active online presence, not being able to turn things off onscreen and, of course, rather blatant social commentary. All this is predictable. What's less predictable is how good and genuinely scary this film is.

Our protagonist, Laura, begins the film normal, popular and happy until she befriends the awkward loner Maria, fatefully accepting a friend request yet not treating this very odd girl as her friend. Maria, unfortunately for her, is descended from a long line of witches who use "black mirrors" (no Charlie Brooker connection other than an interesting search engine result onscreen) to wreak terrible revenge on those that wrong them. This makes for a surprisingly good film.

Let's start with the cinematography and the direction; nearly all modern horror films are overly glossy, which robs them of atmosphere. This isn't. And, just as rarely, it relies on suspense rather than gore, finding new ways to do this with the social media conceit and managing to be genuinely scary in a way few modern films are. If I was twelve this film would have scared the pants off me. There's a clever ending too; I can honestly recommend this as one of the best recent horror films out there.

The Dark Knight (2008)

"Let me get this straight, you think that your client, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the world, is secretly a vigilante, who spends his nights beating criminals to a pulp with his bare hands, and your plan is to blackmail this person?"

I may have changed my mind about this film a bit. I first saw it about eight years ago (in Los Angeles!) and my impressions were that it worked well as a film but not so well as a part of the Batman myth is, being more interested in pursuing the then-contemporary themes of terrorism, civil liberties (which are, don't get me wrong, important) and surveillance, hence the rather. crowbarred-in scene with Batman and Lucius Fox monitoring the people of Gotham on a bunch of monitors.

That's still, I think, a concern. But eight years on it seems not to loom so large, and the film seems a much better experience. Heath Ledger is a magnificent Joker, intelligent in his madness and articulate in his pursuit of chaos. It's perhaps a very idiosyncratic take on the character, but just about close enough to the original. Again it's a complex plot, weaving the tragedy of Harvey Dent into a tale of how the Joker grows from minor sideshow beside the important work of going after the mob to existential threat to Gotham itself. All this and we find time for a trip to Hong Kong just to find a mob boss. A lot gets packed into these Christopher Nolan Batman films.

It's odd to see Maggie Gyllenhaal as the recast Rachel, but she does a splendid job. Christian Bale is adequate as always and Gary Oldman was still born to play Jim Gordon. Aaron Eckhart and Michael Caine are superb but, yeah, the film belongs to Ledger. It would even if he hadn't died so shortly afterwards. He's the James Dean of our generation, but it would be much better if instead of that he was still around.

I enjoyed the film this time around, and felt as though it respected the characters rather better than I previously thought. Behind all the spectacle there's some real depth to a film that really seems to have divided the fan from the general viewer..

Batman Begins (2005)

"What chance does Gotham have when the good people do nothing?"

Yes, it's odd to see Ra's al-Ghul used in this way, conflated with Henri Ducard from the Blind Justice arc back in '89 and bearing absolutely no relation to the character we know and love to the point that he doesn't even seem to be an Arab; Ken Watanabe's decoy character seems to hail from much farther east. Still, there are hints as to the Lazarus Pit, perhaps. And, more to the point, this is a brilliant film tacking Batman's origins and a triumph for both the fan and the general audience.

Essentially this is because of both David Goyer's perfectly judged script and the always impressive direction of Christopher Nolan; Christian Bale is a perfectly good Batman, although no more than that, and the film is very well cast indeed, with Michael Caine being a particular master stroke. Still, were I an American I'd probably raise an eyebrow at the suspiciously high number of Brits in this film based on an iconic American character and directed by a Brit; I'm surprised this isn't more often commented on. It would be a reasonable objection in my British eyes. Still, Gary Oldman is the perfect Jim Gordon.

I can't fault the film though. Cillian Murphy's Scarecrow is chilling and brilliant, with that mask and some splendidly trippy direction making a hugely effective villain. And the time and thought given to Batman's origins is clear; it is both faithful and innovative, with a focus on Bruce's relationship with his philanthropist father and his childhood sweetheart Rachel Dawes, a new character. This, as well as the more jovially sarcastic edge to Alfred, works very well indeed. The theme of fear is developed throughout, with the figures of Ra's, the Scarecrow and Batman reflecting different uses of it, for good or ill. And I like the way Batman's moral scruples against killing are contrasted against the gang 'em flog 'em stupidity of Ra's and his gang, the Daily Express of terrorist organisations.

Yes, there's also a fair bit from Batman: Year One, but that's no bad thing; it's nice to see Colin McFarlane as Commissioner Loeb. And, on the subject of actors, we even get an appearance by the great Shane Rimmer! This is a long film, yes, but a dense one, with a lot going on from the evolving relationship between Bruce and Rachel to Bruce's takeover of Wayne Enterprises. It's one of the finest superhero film ever and almost (but not quite) makes me rethink my opinion that superhero films should eschew origin stories.

The Walking Dead- Season 2, Episode 9: Triggerfinger

"Rick? I keep you safe!"

These last episodes are a contrast between Rick and Shane as rival alpha males; Shane as the volatile and guilt-ridden disturbed individual who would do well as an analogue for Trump, and Rick as the decent man burdened by a conscience, honest enough to try and reason with a bunch of hostile gunmen having killed their friends in self-defence, sympathetic to Herschel and willing to save the life of an injured man whose friends had tried to kill him. It's a straight choice between them in a world where other humans can be as deadly as zombies. So far Dale is definitely for Rick but Andrea, horrifyingly, is under Shane's spell. Lori is coming to see through him very easily by now, but he wants her and is convinced the baby is his. I have a good idea where the season is going.

Meanwhile Glenn continues to be horribly immature about Maggie declaring her love for him, and Herschel is beginning to return to his old self, although he's certainly no friend of Shane's.

This is an episode of foreboding-laden set-up for Shane doing something bad; it's clear that he's the big bad of the season. This is the best episode in a while.

Class: The Lost

"I would quite like to kiss you now."

Here we go then: the season finale. Hope it's not the last ever episode. I came to Class with middling expectations but have been pleasantly surprised by just how good it is. And the season (series?) ends on a high.

The gang are all dysfunctional with each other after the last episodes' argy-bargy, and this is naturally the time that Corakinus decides to come back and get revenge on April on all her mates. And then there's the tension about what the newly freed Quill will do when she wakes up. Oh, and she appears to be pregnant. And Quill young eat their mothers. Lovely.

Things get very serious when Tanya's mother is shockingly killed, followed by Ram's dad; these events will have consequences. And the pressure keeps growing on Charlie to use the Cabinet. Cue much arguing. It's all well written, though, and catharsis brings the gang together a bit. But good old April saves the day. Phew. But not all is well; it's too late and Charlie has used the Cabinet of Souls.

Dorothea has therefore failed. And we see through that mysterious door to where the school governors dwell. In an entertaining scene they do that super villain thing of killing Dorothea for failure. And the big boss is revealed to be played by Cyril Nri in a moment that leaves you wanting more. This was a brilliant bit of kids' telly.

Class: The Metaphysical Engine, or What Quill Did Next

"Coal Hill provides. It always provides."

So here we have an episode that takes place simultaneously with the last one, give or take some timey-wimey strangeness, as we find out what Quill was doing (the kids hardly appear) to regain her free will at last, albeit painfully. We know from the start that this unlikely occurrence is going to happen as we saw the Arn die last episode; we don't know how.

I'm not entirely sure this episode works; there's an awful lot of padding. It's interesting to get more background on Quill and her species, and even more interesting to get more hints about the mysterious Dorothea, but I never really invested much in the shape shifting alien Ballon, who is far too removed from normal human reality to be at all relatable without a hell of a lot more introduction than he gets in this short episode. The episode drags at times and is the first real misfire for Class.

It's an odd lead-up to the season finale. Still, the first five episodes of the season were superb and I'm confident we will end on a high.

Class: Detained

"Sometimes action isn't pretty, you big Polish giraffe!"

Interesting bottle episode, this one. It's obviously the season cheapie, with a tiny cast, no location filming and limited sets, and Miss Quill is clearly off having her own simultaneous adventure elsewhere- obviously involving the removal of the creature from her head. Isn't detention a wonderful plot device?

Essentially the classroom is moved to nowhere and no time, a bit like The Mind Robber except the nothingness is black. This is a harsh alien prison but, more to the point, it revolves around a MacGuffin which causes people to be both angry and uber-honest, thus getting the gang to say loads of hurtful things to each other which give the episode it's emotional beats and break up the team somewhat. Thus we learn that Matteusz may love Charlie but is also a little bit scared of him, that Tanya fears insecurity from being so much younger than the others, we get a bit of valid criticism of C.S. Lewis for his authorial agenda in the Narnia books, and Ram feels that he loves April more than she loves him back, which is devastating.

As a bottle episode it works, and genuinely advances some character stuff, but bottle episodes always show their working a bit and so does this; it may shake up the format a bit but this is by necessity rather than creativity, and the limitations, well, limit things. This is not one of the greatest episodes. Still, it works well within its limitations while not quite transcending them as the best bottle episodes (Midnight) often do.

Class: Brave-Ish Heart

"How do you have an army?"

Unlike Buffy I don't think we can say this increasingly awesome series uses monsters as specific metaphors for aspects as teenage life, but it's hard not to see April's huge responsibilities here- conquering an entire world of Shadow akin and usurping their king's throne, and she's a teenager-.as being a whopping great metaphor for how being a teenager is hard, especially if the challenges of school, puberty and romantic feelings are made harder by family problems. And April's family problems are enormous.

It's tempting to say that this episode is, to a large extent at least, about April's relationship with her mother and the beginnings of reconciliation with her father, who has truly sinned. Then again, it's also the episode where Ram describes the Lord of the Rings trilogy as "some old movie" so, you know, I feel awfully old watching this.

Meanwhile, our mysterious new headmistress gives Miss Quill a bit more exposition about the equally mysterious board of governors. Oh, and that creature will be removed from her head if she forces Charlie to use the Cabinet of Souls against those nasty otherworldly petals. This leads to the inevitable row between Quill and Charlie, as the petals begin to attack people. Fortunately April is able to return to save the day before the Cabinet has to be used... but Quill has still fulfilled her part of the bargain; it looks as though she will get what she wants...

Yep. This is still far better than I ever expected it to be.

Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016)

"Curiouser and curiouser..."

Alice in Wonderland was a very Tim Burton film, and Tim Burton is a director with a very distinctive individual style. It's extremely odd, then, that this sequel should have gone ahead without being directed by him. It seems somewhat humiliating to ask a director (James Bobin is best known for the recent Muppets films) to adopt the style of someone else. The result is perfectly diverting but not entirely successful.

Like its predecessor, this film is entirely original, with only nods to the source material in scenes involving chessboards, Humpty Dumpty and the love me while essentially telling a tale about Alice travelling back in time to save the Mad shatter, who's feeling a bit down. It's a visually arresting film, as you'd expect, but it tends to drag somewhat. Johnny Depp's relative lack of screen time doesn't help, and nor does it help that in those scenes where he does appear the plot doesn't really allow him to be entertaining. Still, Mia Wasikowska is again superb as a splendidly feminist Alice, and the moral of the film is that women can indeed be sea captains, patriarchy be damned.

Highlights are Sacha Baron Cohen as Father Time, a rare example of his playing a character not created by himself, and Andrew Scott as a sinister Victorian doctor obsessed with locking women away because of "female hysteria", reminding us of the dark realities of the time. But best of all is Helena Bonham Carter as the gloriously mad Red Queen. Her eventual reconciliation with the White Queen may be absurd and corny, but it's supposed to be.

This film is uneven, mildly disappointing and nowhere as good as its predecessor. But in spite of this it remains a glorious visual spectacle with a splendid cast and is worth watching in spite of it all.

Class: Co-Owner of a Lonely Heart

"Have you noticed no-one under the age of 35 is called John?"

Poor April has to share her heart with a bloodthirsty alien shadow king thingy. Being a teenager is certainly complicated. Add some lethal pink flower petals and the return of April's dad (played by Con O'Neill who was the lawyer in Cucumber) and you've got another splendid bit of telly. Mrs Llamastrangler and I are well and truly hooked by this intriguing cross between Buffy and Torchwood.

We also get a replacement head for Coal Hill in the person of Dorothea, who seems to know an awful lot and is working for the school's mysterious governors, adding another nice little intriguing arc thread. We also have Miss Quill overhearing Charlie talking about the Cabinet as a weapon of mass destruction; by the iron law of Raymond Chandler, a gun seen on the table in an early scene is bound to go off. This weapon is going to be used before the series ends, I'm sure.

Anyway, the script keeps shipping April and Ram to the point of April's mum catching them having sex(!), and Ram loves April enough to follow her through the wormhole on an apparent suicide mission at the end. Aww. Meanwhile those innocent little flower petals threaten to wipe out humanity but Miss Quill can apparently help Dorothea to avert this- and have that creature out of her head which is restricting her free will into the bargain. She's understandably both sceptical and tempted.

So, yes; really rather good.

The Walking Dead- Season 2, Episode 8: Nebraska

"Get him off my land!"

It's the morning after the night before, and the shocking events, as the second season recommended in sober mood- although not necessarily with literal sobriety in the case of Herschel. Carol mourns poor Sophia, with Daryl also pretty damn upset. Shane continues to be a dangerously arrogant twat whose presence Herschel cannot tolerate, yet Herschel is desperately needed so that Lori's pregnancy can not be a death sentence. Fortunately Rick connects a little with Herschel in a bar; the formerly teetotal farmer has fallen off the wagon with the realisation that zombies are, in fact, not curable people but monsters, and that there is seemingly no hope.

Interestingly (foreshadowingly, perhaps, if that's an adjective), the main threat here is not from Zombies at all but from two random blokes in a bar and, of course, from Shane. Civilisation has broken down, a terrifying thing in itself.

On a more pleasant note Maggie declares her love for Glenn, but the young man seems not to be mature enough to deal with this. I expect that, after the birth of Lori's baby, she'll choose to leave with the gang. But Fort Benning is gone; where can they possibly go to?

We're clearly leading up to a massive showdown with Shane, who surely cannot survive the season. I fear, though, for Dale. I also wonder, well-written though the characters are, how we can possibly fill another four episodes before this happens.

Class: Nightvisiting

"Do you often see your parents after sex?"

This time the spotlight falls on Tanya as her late father seemingly returns to her, in her bedroom in the night, with a long, long stalk erupting from his back for hundreds of metres. Less foregrounded are others in the same situation- including Miss Finch, all experiencing the dangers of temptation. This is a good 'un.

Obviously we get to know Tanya much better, beginning with a montage of her growing up; now the entire ensemble cast has been well fleshed-out and are good, strong characters. We also learn more of Miss Quill ("Andrearth") and her very non-human species and this is all mixed into a somewhat metaphysical tale of "souls" and what looks awfully like the offer of Faustian pacts. Meanwhile April and Ram get to know each other better, reminding us that this is not exactly a gang of close friends to begin with. April's mum is paralysed because her alcoholic dad crashed the car- and he's coming out of prison soon; April shares some very personal stuff with Ram- and they kiss.

It's a nice touch that the Lan Kin are only on Earth because of the cracks on Amy's wall way back in The Eleventh Hour, connecting things to the parent programme. But Class is shaping up to be an unexpectedly superb bit of telly in its own right.

Class: The Coach with the Dragon Tattoo

"He's from Ofsted. Of course he's evil."

Still no subtitles. Grr. Still, it's the last time I'll be watching the programme by means of Sky catch-up. Murdoch hates deaf people, folks.

Anyway, on the surface this is a fairly ho-hum tale about a PE teacher of little brain who gets a sentient dragon tattoo, thereby annoying its rather big and powerful beloved. But beyond that it lets our newly established team bond a bit and gets us to know Ram, not a focus for the first episode, much better. He's good at football but far from what Il Duce Trump's new subjects call a "jock", being intelligent, sensitive and, indeed, mourning the deaths of both his girlfriend Rachel and his original not-alien leg.

Once again the episode is well-written, shot and acted. But Katherine Kelly is particularly superb with some brilliant material about a sinister Ofsted inspector who turns out to be a robot in the most obvious metaphor ever. I already love Miss Quill.

We get to know Tanya a little more, too, and learn that she's only 14 but three years ahead because she's very bright, and that she sadly lost her dad to a stroke two years ago. Oh, and Mr. Armitage dies; I wonder how the headmaster survival rate in Coal Hill will compare to Sunnydale High? This is already showing distinct signs of being very good telly. Two episodes in and I'm gripped and invested in the characters.

Class: For Tonight We Might Die

"Look at you all. The cream of the crop. High achievers. No wonder this country only exports Downton Abbey."

I must begin this enthusiastic review, I'm afraid, with a condemnation of Sky; their catch-up feature does not include subtitles and this is NOT even remotely acceptable.

More happily, though, this is an effortlessly brilliant first episode, introducing us to April, Tanya, Ram, Charlie and the mysterious Miss Quill while also benefiting from an entertaining and well-judged appearance from Peter Capaldi as the Doctor encourages them to act as a Scooby gang. This is appropriate; the script even references Buffy by referring to the rift at Coal Hill as a "Hellmouth". First impressions are that it is well written, well shot, has a banging title sequence and is centred around a strong cast of characters, with the awkward relationship between Charlie (interesting Jane for a prince) and his pretty-much-slave (and physics teacher) Miss Quill, who is cool. Both, interestingly, are the last of their kind. This episode focuses mainly on Charlie and April, though; I hope that Tanya and Ram get some attention too before long.

This debut episode is a very nice interweaving of exposition and death at the school prom (an American import that was only just starting over here in my day) at the hands of the Shadow Kin. I'm intrigued and want to see more.

Sherlock: The Final Problem

"I wrote my own version of the nativity when I was a child. "The Hungry Donkey". It was a bit gory. But if you're gonna put a baby in a manger, you're asking for trouble."

I've not been quick in blogging this episode so I've not failed to notice the divided reaction which seems, anecdotally, to be more negative than not. And one of the main criticisms I hear- that this is yet another non-whodunit- is a valid one in that Moffat and Gatiss are certainly not writing what their audience wants and expects from Sherlock. But here lies, I suppose, the question: are writers mere hacks hired to give an audience what they want, or are they artists who may transcend such considerations? There is, of course, no easy answer, and I do not claim to be firmly on either side. But I will make the obvious point that giving the audience what that want connects very awkwardly with giving them surprise and unexpected events. I will also note that I enjoyed this episode very much. And that Mrs Llamastrangler was deeply affected, to the point of tears at the end.

This episode is a series of interlocking puzzles and fun little intellectual games, all with a touch of the macabre, but it is of course really about the character stuff, an excuse to explore the psyches of not only the fascinating Eurus but also Sherlock, John and the pleasingly foregrounded Mycroft.

If there's a disappointment it's the relative lack of Moriarty, whose games from beyond the grave do not come close to living up to expectations and whose screen time is painfully limited. But Eurus is a superb creation and Sian Brooke gives an incredible performance. It's so very clever that, after all the misdirection hinting at a third Holmes brother called "Sherrinford", this is simply the name of the prison where Eurus does her Silence of the Lambs stuff.

There are clever nods to The Musgrave Ritual and The Three Garridebs, but here we are quite moving away from a Holmes canon that the series may have outgrown. Certainly, each character- including Mrs Hudson, Molly and Lestrade, gets what would work as a final scene, suggesting that this may have been intended as a possible finale. I suspect no one connected with the show really knows whether or not Sherlock will ever be back, what with everyone being so very busy, but that this was designed as a fitting finale if need be. I hope it isn't, and I'm sure the creators do too. After all, we end with Sherlock and John both back in 221B Baker Street, and The Dancing Men...

And yeah. Mrs Hudson vacuuming to "The Number of the Beast". Awesome.

Sherlock: The Lying Detective

"I'm the widow of a drug dealer, I own property in central London, and for the last bloody time, John, I'm not your housekeeper!"

The character of Culverton Smith is, at one level, the embodiment of an idea explicitly referred to in the script: what if all the serial killers we know about- mentally subnormal, odd and marginalised- are just those who get caught? What if, every so often, there is a rich and powerful serial killer who simply kills with impunity? There's a blatant subtext here: Smith stands for Jimmy Savile, and that obviously informs Toby Jones' (excellent) performance; he even has his "own" hospital. There's a reason why Sherlock Holmes declares Culverton Smith to be the very worst and most despicable adversary he's ever met.

This is a plot by Steven Moffat which is surprisingly straightforward and relatively free of his usual narrative tricks, although the camerawork remains as clever as is usual for Sherlock. It isn't really a whodunit, either; like Columbo, the tension lies in whether or not Sherlock can prove the guilt of the obvious killer.

No; the narrative tricks lie elsewhere, in the interplay between Sherlock and John, and in their interactions and slow reconciliation. And yes, Sherlock is almost... nice, at times here. He certainly reacts sensitively, for him, when John confesses that he is not the man Mary thought he was, and had been flirting by text with another woman. It is here, with the character stuff, where we see the more traditional Sherlock narrative cleverness. And it's good telly. And yet- it's about time we had a proper, clever whodunit, don't you think?

Nice cliffhanger, though,,with Sherlock's sister, whom I assume to be a baddie...

Grimm: The Beginning of the End- Part 2

"Monroe, I'm pregnant!"

We know what Grimm season finales are about by now. Anything goes, the status quo is not safe, some things will be resolved but many won't, there'll be a big cliffhanger and the whole heightened mood will carry over to the first two episodes of the next season n until some kind of status quo is established- although with the much shorter final season to come I suspect we'll be getting a lot of rushed emphasis on the arc stuff, much like the second season of Dollhouse.

Anyway, the quote above gives us what is probably the main bombshell here. But there's so much activity and so many that nag happening; By nap after is desperate to get that book from Prague that Nick has and willing to use his possession of Kelly as leverage, the bastard. There's a big fight between Eve and Bonaparte which leaves Eve seemingly dying, until she's healed by the stick- and, it seems, Juliette again. I can't wait to see how this plays out, with potentially a very awkward love triangle.

The baddies are all coming for the gang at Nick's after finally getting the address from Adalind, but all but Nick manage to escape into the tunnels. And then there's the shock ending- a shootout between Nick and Bonaparte after which Renard shoots Bonaparte to save Nick. Whose side is he on? What's going to happen now? Fortunately, with my inadvertently getting to the second half of the season late (Sky Plus issues back in the Spring), we don't have long to wait...

Grimm: The Beginning of the End- Part 1

"You better get used to it. Because this is a position you can't quit..."

Nearly there now...

I think there's an interesting subtext going on here. Adalind has no choice; she is being forced to undertake the role of trophy wife and mother to show Sean to be a "family values" politician while he carries out whatever policies Black Claw wants him to. This is the episode where the threats get truly explicit; Bonaparte (any relation?) is a very sinister personification of the patriarchy as he makes clear to Adalind that she is to marry Renard and that is that. Men have spoken.

All of this is writ large as Black Claw seek to infiltrate political positions everywhere, a sort of Wesen Militant tendency. And they really are suddenly  everywhere, especially in the previously unseen Portland North Precinct. Much of the episode consists of Hank being framed and set up but this quickly unravels into chaos; none of this is done by the book. The targeting and kidnapping of Hank is done purely to distract Nick, Trubel and especially Eve away from HW so Black Claw can attack and carry out one of their signature massacres, and there are no survivors. Not even Meisner. This is shocking, and clearly means war.

After a clearly miffed Diana has Rachel suffocated to death (what a lovely child!), we end with a furious fight between Nick and Renard which ends up with Nick being arrested. And there are Black Claw marks on his cell...

This is awesome stuff, finally getting to pay off various arcs in a season which has had a particularly good season arc even if some individual episodes have been variable. More please...

Grimm: Bad Night

"You're gonna be the one who's self-winding tonight..."

The end of the season is so close you can almost taste it.

Hank is with Zuri, blissfully unaware that she is working against him. Wu is learning to control his inner beast. Nick is fruitlessly looking for Sean, who is (as usual) in bed with Rachel. But there's a definite feeling that things are moving fast; no more stories of the week now as Nick brings Monroe and Rosalie fully on board. And so we begin a chain of events that I'm certainly not going to try and summarise.

For Hank, of course, it's a trap. And we're back to the old days of tension and mistrust between Nick and Renard; it's fascinating how Renard's character has shifted from sinister to ally to once again being an antagonist. He's complex. I like that.

The stick is interesting, too: the point is made that it's significance is not its healing abilities, not directly, but that it proves (or, as Douglas Adams said with the Babel fish, disproves) the existence of God. That's big. No wonder the crusader Grimms hid it.

As we wait for the election results Adalind won't tell Bonaparte where Nick is; she isn't there of her own free will and still has loyalty. She's in a horrible position but I like her. But Bonaparte holds all the cards as we end with the revelation that Hank was just being used as a distraction so HW could be utterly destroyed and it's people massacred-  including Meisner. A bad night indeed.

And it gets worse. Not only does Renard win in a landslide but he rubs "his" family in Nick's face on television. This episode is awesome and Earth-shaking. On we go to the two part finale...

Cromwell (1970)

"An England without a king is unthinkable!"

I watched this film principally because I wanted to see two great actors- Richard Harris and Alec Guinness- play two iconic roles from history; Oliver Cromwell and Charles I. And they are, indeed, magnificent. Their performances- Harris as a principled sociopath slowly descending into a dictatorial sociopath and Guinness as a politely arrogant congenital liar- are superlative and alone enough to make the film worth watching. The film succeeds brilliantly if seen as a character piece based on its broadly valid idea of Cromwell- a man who can honestly give everything for the supremacy of Parliament and then simply dismiss it when it does not live up to his expectations. For this reason the film succeeds as drama in spite of being so incredibly rush and in spite of its ending so suddenly.

And yet... no film set in the past can be historically accurate in full. I accept this. Events must be compressed into a shorter period of time and simplified to fit the medium of cinema. And yet... here we have Cromwell as one of those MPs whom Charles tries to arrest in January 1642. We have Cromwell present at Edgehill. We have the Earls of Essex and Manchester making speeches in the Commons. We even have arch-republican Henry Ireton (a shockingly young Michael Jayson) trying to persuade Cromwell to take the crown, in spite of having died during the (glossed over) Irish campaign in 1651. All this is a little much to swallow; these are not small things.

I'm also uncertain about the dialogue; a film set in the mid-seventeenth century should either use modern dialogue or contrive to use contemporary speech but contrive to favour those sentence constructions and that vocabulary that would be understood today, preferably the second. Instead we get a bizarre mish-mash of speech which mixes archaisms such as "withal" with modern coinings such as "international". The effect is clumsy and distracting.

Still, it all looks magnificent and, in the final analysis, it's all about the acting. And, judged by this criterion, the film is superb.

Grimm: The Taming of the Wu

"Did I kill him?"

I love Wu episodes; he's probably my favourite character. And now he has superpowers. Not because he's a Wesen, but because he got bitten and now has a superpower disease. Cool. And, if the ending is anything to go by, he's going to learn to control it. Awesome.

Meanwhile, we learn the true sinister scariness of Diana and those CGI eyes; this is the "creepy child" trope in all its glory. Adalind, of course, is now being made to choose between her Black Claw captors and "the Grimm". And she at last manages to tell Nick about her He enbeist powers returning after all this time. And through it all there's a constant background of the mayoral contest as we slowly work out what's happening with Wu.

We end with a cliffhanger as Nick finds both Adalind and Kelly missing from his home and Adalind has left a note. The finale is sooo close. This is really getting good and exciting.

Spider-Man 2 (2004)

"And it rides up in the crotch a little bit too."

Hmm. Still not entirely enamoured with Sam Raimi's take on Spider-Man in spite of having to admit that it has to be considered, objectively, as a very good couple of films so far. It's stylish, well-directed and acted, a faithful recreation of the style of the early comics from Stan Lee and Steve Ditko with a student Peter Parker. And yet... where are Spidey's funny quips?

At least this is the sequel and therefore not another bloody origin story; it's nice how scenes from the first film are used during the opening titles but this is a film which is, yes, about Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina is very good casting), but really about both Peter's roller-coaster relationship with MJ and the increasing disintegration of Harry Osborne- and the fact that Peter may be a hero but he and his Aunt May are struggling with very real poverty, which is brave to show. It's 2004, but Peter must use a pay phone because he has no mobile. We even get a funny cameo from Sam Raimi perennial Bruce Campbell and, of course, a blink-and-you-miss-it appearance from Stan Lee. And, indeed, a minor role for Daniel Dad Kim, who plays Gavin Park in Angel. J. Jonah Jameson is awesome ("Guy names Otto Octavius ends up with eight limbs. What are the odds?") to the point that J.K. Simmons was surely born to play him.

Ok, it's a good film. Very good, in fact. The central romance is brilliant and, yes, it's faithful in many ways to the source material. Not being an origin story allows this film to breathe and grow, and it lacks a lot in without ever feeling too long. But... where are those quips?

Grimm: Good to the Bone

"Then someone took his wallet, phone, keys and bones."

A quote which, rarely, I recognised- from Julius Caesar- starts off a gloriously gruesome episode in which the big bad beaked Wesen sucks out people's bones to feed his parents. It's gloriously weird, CGI-heavy and violent. Lovely. I like it. And the story of the week also intersects nicely with the arc stuff as we find out what's happening to Wu. Meanwhile, Hank is approached in a supermarket after all this time, and it seems she wants them to get back together.

Eve tells Rosalie about Adalind's Hexenbeist powers returning; the secret is spreading. Meanwhile Adalind tells Nick about Sean contacting her and having Diana, and he finally tells her about Renard and Black Claw. But I think this is a bit late for them to start communicating. Indeed, Adalind leaves Rosalie to babysit as she goes off to an appointment with Sean of which Nick would not approve.

The story of the week, meanwhile, concludes with the baddies attacking a transformed Wu instead of the intended bait; something is definitely happening. And a superb episode in terms both of arc and story ends with Adalind effectively having been kidnapped by Sean and a very involved Diana. It's all getting very tense and exciting...

Grimm: Inugami

"He's doing this for us."

A very odd, Japanese-themed story of the week this episode, dripping with such stereotypical themes as honour and obligation. Still, the murders are visually interesting and the killer unexpected. Oh, and there's origami. But the A plot doesn't particularly impress in an episode where we're looking for the arc stuff to provide the main entertainment value.

Arc-wise, Nick finally learns that Adalind is getting her powers back- but only from Rosalie, which isn't good. Rachel sleeps with the real Sean this time, and encourages him to marry someone else (presumably Adalind) as some rather unconventional pillow talk. It's becoming increasingly clear that something is happening to Wu, and Adalind is hired for her new job (weirdly, she's allowed to keep Kelly in the office) precisely because she's a Hexenbeist.

Rosalie and Monroe explore that tunnel leading out of Nick's and find, as well as some delightful skeletons, evidence that it leads out into the open air. But Monroe overhears Eve taking to Adalind, warning her a at from doing anything to hurt Nick. It's almost as if some of Juliette is still in there...

The cliffhanger is Rachel visiting Sean alongside a fast-aging and very striking Diana. This is all very exciting; who cares about the story of the week when so much is happening? I'm loving the arc stuff but I wish they'd do something interesting with the general format of the show.

Grimm: The Believer

"Is this a tent revival?"

A story set in the disturbing world of religious brainwashing this week as an evangelical preacher uses the fact that he's a somewhat devilish-looking Wesen to expand his flock. The old Wesen council would not have approved. The story does a good job of exploring the ethics here, though; is he doing any harm? Most of his "flock" seem to be reformed ex-criminals, after all. But a gang of religious fanatics led by his wife, alas, end up murdering him because he's "possessed". Still, the lack of didacticism is commendable.

Behind the A plot there are constant reminders of Renard's ongoing mayoral campaign, but Eve is determining bed to get to the bottom of his possible connections to Black Claw, going as far as to magically impersonate him and hear what's going on. Little does she realise that she's expected to have sex with Rachel. Oops.

Aside from this, though, and an analysis of the cloth holding the magic stick from a professor friend of Monroe's there's not much arc stuff this week, a situation I don't suspect we are likely to see again this late in the season. But the story of the week is one of the better ones.

A Clockwork Orange (1971)

"You are now a murderer, little Alex."

Anthony Burgess may not be a fashionable author but I'm a huge fan of his. I've read a large amount of his work, from A Dead Man in Deptford to Earthly Powers and while, yes, there's certainly a fair amount of Catholic guilt in there as subtext, you can't reduce him to that as a writer; he has such fun playing with ideas in gloriously erudite prose. A Clockwork Orange is no exception- a treatise not only on sin but also on civil liberties vs. law and order, on free will, on the awkward fact that one can appreciate high culture and still be evil, whatever F.R. Leavis may think.

So how does Stanley Kubrick handle it? Well, with great aplomb. The entire film takes place amongst the brutalist architecture of the third quarter of the twentieth century, even the scenes set outside, with rose horrible associations not yet of decay (as I'm sure the same locations would have evoked a few years later) but of a brutal, soulless totalitarianism of the mind, which fits the totalitarianism of what happens to Alex. Yet law and order truly has broken down and totalitarian mind control is proposed as a solution; there is no role for decent liberals here, whom the script even seems to mock as elitists. It's a chilling echo of modern times. The fashions- while boiler suits, bowler hats, fake eyelashes- are striking and succeed in giving the film a sense of timeless in spite of the inevitable 1971-ness of various things, not least the police brutality.

The film would not be the triumph it is without a stellar central performance by a young Malcolm McDowell, who is not only convincing but successfully manages to imbue the psychopath Alex with sufficient charm to leaven the darkness of the film. McDowell is ably assisted by a strong cast including a startlingly young Warren Clarke. The directorial style is just as awesome as we might expect.

After a couple of crappy films it's such a relief to be blogging a true masterpiece like this. A truly seminal film.

Grimm: Skin Deep

"You may have the face, but I have the boobies!"

A metaphor for plastic surgery and other dodgy quackery in the beauty industry this episode as we get a story-of-the-week about an elixir of youth with bad side effects which is acquired through killing people. It's a ice idea, even if the execution is a bit ho-hum.

In more arc-related news Nick learns from Eve what's been happening with Sean and all the dodginess surrounding his rather sudden mayoral campaign. And then Sean himself announces to Nick and Hank that he's running, and asks for their support. How very awkward.

Also interesting is that Eve seems to be dreaming of being Juliette. But the end is particularly arresting as Eve manages to assume the appearance of Sean...

As a cog in the machine that is this fascinating season, the episode does its job. But this isn't one of the episodes we will be remembering after the finale, I suspect.

Krampus (2015)

"Because that's what family is. We have to get along with them, even if we don't have much in common."

This film was suggested for me by Mrs Llamastrangler in a particularly evil moment as the Christmas film to blog this year. Next time I'm doing bloody Die Hard.

The German legend of the Krampus seems not to have travelled to this country with Prince Albert alongside Christmas cards and Christmas trees, but it seems to be impinging more and more on popular culture, particularly in the United States; I first heard of the legend from an episode of Grimm a couple of years ago. I suppose it's calling out for a good horror film but, well, this is not it.

Let me tell you the plot, shall I? A family squabble a lot. A kid wishes for it to stop. The Krampus arrives and offs them all. The kid regrets it and the adults all come back, except for those who really don't deserve it. And that's it. No stars, no wit, no fun. You don't care about any of the characters and it's boring, boring, boring.

Yep. Definitely Die Hard next year.

Sherlock: The Six Thatchers

"Don't you dare! You made a vow!"

Oh my. Well, spoilers abound, obviously. You have been warned.

The episode starts out so light-heartedly. There's a nifty cover-up for Sherlock so he can not go to prison, and he's all happy and stimulated in the knowledge that Moriarty is back. Sherlock even seems to be channelling Matt Smith's Doctor for much of the first part of the episode ("Are those ginger nuts?"), and there's much fun to be had throughout. Hence the shock at the end. But let's look st the whole episode as Mark Gatiss has utterly outdone himself with a superb bit of telly.

It's fun seeing Holmes rush through a fun series of cases in what has become typical Sherlock style, with John's blog superimposed on screen, all the wit and fun of the birth of little Rosalind and the addition of a baby to the dynamic, and especially the way that John and Lestrade manage to bond by taking the piss out of Sherlock. And then, almost in the background, we're introduced to the busts of the Evil One that give us our modern version of The Six Napoleons. At first this isn't foregrounded but, after a bit of fun with Toby the uncooperative bloodhound (never work with children or animals) we discover that there are six of them, made in Tblisi. And I for one knew, having read the short story, that the significance was likely to be the contents of one of the statues. But that isn't the twist; the twist is that this isn't to do with Moriarty at all, or the magnificent red herring that is the Black Pearl of the Borgias. It's about Mary's past.

We get a flashback to an embassy hostage rescue gone wrong, with one of the four agents being Mary and another being our antagonist whose name, we learn, is Ajay. And Ajay seems to think that Mary is a traitor and wants her dead. That's awkward. Yet Mary denies this to Sherlock and, after a fun few scenes in which she tries to leave for exotic shores to sort it out herself, she ends up explaining herself both to Sherlock and an understandably peeved John. Poor Ajay ends up dead but it seems that Mary is not the "Englishwoman" who betrayed them all. So who was it?

What is awful, and will of course become even more awful, is that John has been exchanging sexy texts with another woman, and it's even left ambiguous whether he's had an affair. All this while Mary thinks he's perfect. So the final scene arrives and the baddie turns out to be Vivian Norbert, the secretary- and we have, obligingly, been provided with a few clues to that effect. The crime is solved, the case is over- but Sherlock can't resist gloating over his adversary and, horribly, Mary ends up taking a bullet for him, and John's whole world with it. And the guilt must make it even worse.

So we end up with John cutting Sherlock out of his life utterly even as Mary implores Sherlock from beyond the grave to "save John Watson". The gloom is leavened only by a neat little reference to The Yellow Face and Mycroft making a call to "Sherrinford"....

That was good. Sherlock is back.

Grimm: Lycanthropia

"Yeah... but who attacked whom?"

It's a neat and elegant, if simple, story of the week this episode as we inevitable get the Grimm take on werewolves: they're the result of an incurable disease for Blutbaden. All this plays through as the A plot for the episode,  it a nice little twist at the end raises this from the unremarkable to the rather good.

In more arc-related news Sean meets with Adalind but doesn't have a lot to tell her about what happened to Diana. They part awkwardly, but at least the series is acknowledging that this is a dangling plot thread that will have to be dealt with at some point.  What's more intet sting is how Sean noticed how Adalind's Hexenbeist powers seem to be returning. How will he use this knowledge?

We also have Eve telling Nick and Hank about Sean being made to run as new candidate for mayor by Rachel Wood, and how all this has to have been planned before Andrew Dixon's assassination. All this stuff is fascinating, and that's the point; the stories of the week on Grimm right now are perfectly decent but the arc stuff is what we're really interested in and it just isn't foregrounded enough.

Wanted (2008)

"This is me. Taking back control."

Grr. Don't talk to me about "taking back control". I'll be glad to see the back of 2016.

I watched this film at the suggestion of Mrs Llamastrangler as she hates it and wanted me to administer a good spanking in my blog. The things we do for love, eh? This is the most awful film I've seen since The Black Knight, and that's saying something.

Actually I suspect that the original comic book (which I haven't read) is likely to have been quite good; there's nothing wrong with the intrinsic concept of a beaten down, cuckolded office drone finding out that he's connected to a rather cool secret society of assassins and at last gets to be cool. The twist is pretty effective, too, and, in fact, I don't think the script is the problem at all here.

No; it's the awful direction from the enfant terrible of Central Asia, a man who comes with a certain reputation and from whom I expected better. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with an ever-moving camera or even with the things that happen with bullets in this film, but here it's just style over substance. The curved trajectories of the bullets (er, yes) and the  over-use of the same CGI tricks give an impression of style over substance, of a strongly emphasised visual style which doesn't actually mean anything and gets in the way of both the characters and the story. The visual style isn't just annoying; it's actually a barrier.

Also, it's noticeable that Angelina Jolie's character, Fox, is there only to look cool and spout exposition rather than have a character as such or, indeed, a first name, which is a shame. Still, at least we get Nine Inch Nails on the soundtrack and the performances are good. It's just st that the direction has to spoil everything and turn a film that could have been something into... this.

For Fans of 1960s Doctor Who...

MrVortexofDOOM has been busy with his recon of The Smugglers. Here are Episode 1 and Episode 2 with more coming soon...

https://youtu.be/cj8jG1_YpT0

https://youtu.be/FvJsmpi9eF4

Grimm: Silence of the Slams

"There's a ceremony for everything..."

We're back to a regular story of the week, albeit with arc elements, about a masked Mexican wrestler who tries to make it big by getting a magic mask (Wesen-related), for which innocents died and which will give him glory for a price- if he follows instructions and only uses the mask in the ring. Predictably, he doesn't. Take away the particular context and it's a typical fairytale, one that works well, particularly where the protagonist, as here, is well written and acted and imbued with proper tragic flaws. I won't pretend I enjoy these one-off episodes as much as those which are more arc-based, but this is a good one. And I have absolutely no interest in Mexican wrestling.

It's still interesting how both Nick and Adalind are keeping secrets from each other- the magic stick and the return of her Hexenbeist powers respectively. This isn't at all healthy for their budding relationship and is bound to explode at the worst possible moment, probably in the finale. And now we have Eve watching the footage of Andrew Dixon's assassination and noticing Rachel Wood's odd behaviour; her confrontation with Sean hardly lessens her suspicions.

We end with Sean ringing up Adalind and claiming to have news about Adalind. The arc stuff is still there and still developing, and for an episode of the week this is a good one but, well, can we foreground the arc stuff a bit more please?

Grimm: Into the Schwarzwald

"There's something we're not seeing..."

It's a dark, dank catacomb and we get an entertaining opening few minutes as Nick and Monroe work out where the treasure is hidden. Soon they find the treasure- which conveniently can't be opened until they're back in Portland- and, after a spot of bother with the locals, off they go out of an Indiana Jones film and back into an episode of Grimm.

Meanwhile Rosalie gets an unpleasant visit from Tony, a nasty figure from her dodgy, forgotten past whose letters she has been avoiding and who wants money off her. Fortunately, Adeline is there to help her- with some unexpected Hexenbeist powers. Are her old powers returning? If so then not only would Nick not like it but her personality will turn nasty again. This could be a problem.

Meanwhile, Eve has managed to bug the assassin's phone but Sean rather inconveniently kills him.  This causes some annoyance. But when Rachel later visits Sean for a post-assassination shag, as you do, he confronts her. Not only is she some kind of Wesen, but the assassination of Andrew Dixon was all planned in order for Sean to take over. He is to be the new pawn. But whose...?

We conclude with the gang opening the treasure chest. It's... an old and gnarled wooden stick. That's it. But it just turns out that, conveniently, Monroe has a really bad wound that it heals so we can find out what it does. It's an exciting ending to an exciting episode that shows just how much is going on this season. Grimm may not be great drama at the moment but it's as entertaining as anything.

Doctor Who: The Return of Doctor Mysterio

"Brains with minds of their own? No one will believe that. This is America."

From the very beginning- a joyful pastiche of the comic strip intros to the Marvel Cinematic Universe Movies- to the equally joyful ending, this was one of the very best Christmas specials and perfectly pitched for early evening on Christmas Day when everyone is a bit sozzled. Ironically, though, the fact that this was my best Christmas Day ever (I have a 22 month old little girl, and every moment was truly magical) means I didn't open the bottle of wine I have just consumed until she had gone to bed. So this review comes early.

At last Doctor Who does superheroes. What took it so long? Much of this film riffs on the romance between Superman and Lois Lane in the first Superman film, and the referencing of superhero life is joyful; I love the Doctor's deconstruction of Spider-Man's origin, and the joke about Clark Kent being Superman. We even get a reference to "Miss Siegel and Miss Schuster". It's amazing, in retrospect, that Doctor Who has taken so long to do the genre. Here it truly embraces it, and Steven Moffat's background in romantic comedy serves him well in handling the beautiful love story between Grant and Lucy.

The unnamed baddies are the same ones from The Husbands of River Song but still unnamed; curious. I suspect we will see them again. The Doctor, it seems, resurrected Nardole (Matt Lucas works surprisingly well as a companion) because of his upset over losing River; the 24 year date is explicitly paralleled with the 24 years of Grant having his powers. Grant and Lucy are brilliant characters, incidentally. Asa father I love the message that real men look after children, and of course Lucy's usage of Mr. Huffle is beyond cool.

This episode rules. We get proper use of the superhero genre. We get evil brains in jars, even if they're more The Keys of Marinus than The Brain of Morbius. We get an episode of truly entertaining fun for all the family rather than the more intricate episodes that, much as I may love them, don't appeal to the kids. It's a appropriate tale for Christmas and it's right that the seasonal references are perfunctory.

This is Moffat's best Christmas special, easily. And the teaser for the upcoming Season 36- for inc narrated, by the already engaging Bill) looks fantastic. As far as I'm concerned 2016 can just go away (Brexit and Trump can both just do one) but this is at least a positive ending to a horrible year.

Grimm: Key Move

"This is really good. For something completely illegal...!"

At last Watch are showing the episodes I wasn't able to see earlier this year because of Sky Plus issues. Hallelujah. And we jump straight into the first episode after the half-season break where Nick and co have found a map to the mysterious treasure in the Black Forest that was buried by those seven mythical Grimms after the Sack of Constantinople. We get a rather fun sequence where everyone works out the puzzle and decides the treasure must be buried somewhere under an old church. So Nick and Monroe are grabbing a flight to Stuttgart while everyone else has further adventures in Portland.

Meanwhile, Sean loyally and unethically drips on a rival mayoral candidate to his mate Andrew Dixon, and Adalind ends up declaring her love for Nick, they have sex while both knowing whom the other actually is, and it feels right! But the main plan to in Portland is an assassin in Portland,hunted by both HW and the police. Who is his target? From a very early stage it looks to be either Dixon or Sean.

In Baden-Wurttemberg Nick discusses his burgeoning relationship with Adalind but can't answer Monroe's question of whether he loves her. But soon they're deep into their investigation as Wesen priests and churchwardens get wind that there's a Grimm About and whip up a little mob. And in Portland our assassin's bullet finds Dixon. Is he dying?

An eventful and hugely exciting episode ends as Nick and Monroe fall into some ancient catacombs. Is this the treasure? This is a hugely promising start.

Commando (1985)

"I can't believe this macho bullshit!"

My wife and daughter are away and I'm alone in the house this evening; I'll watch a totally boy film with lots of guns and killing in. Preferably from the '80s, and something Mrs Llamastrangler doesn't like. Preferably something with Arnie in. I'm in a none-too-serious mood but I want something I can laugh at rather than laugh with. So what's available on Netflix tonight? Ah.

This film is increeeeedibly '80s, from the music to the plot to the very, very slight knowing winks that haven't quite developed into irony. You can switch off your brain for the duration of the film, which consists solely of Arnie (the character is Colonel John Matrix, but let's just call him Arnie) being macho and going after the thugs who have kidnapped his daughter while the plot does elaborate somersaults to stop them knowing what he's doing so they don't just kill her. Still, it must be said: Arnie's acting range may be limited but he has charisma, and that charisma carries the film. Along with, obviously, all the guns and killing.

You know the best bit? It's the cliched moment at the end where Arnie tells the General that no, he's not going back into special forces because he's retired, dammit. An entertaining and splendidly brainless ninety minute film that doesn't outstay it's welcome.

Humans: Season 2, Episode 8

"You're not going to lose me, Niska. You've got me."

It's the end, then, and inevitably we will end with all synths everywhere being conscious. A truly historic event; the Singularity. And that leaves rich potential themes for next series. Never mind how society is ever going to cope; surely this means the end, violently or just as much otherwise, of humanity as a biological species?

But let us not get ahead of ourselves. We start with reconciliation between Max and Leo, while Laura and Joe are divided again between her social conscience and desire to do the right things for people or who happen to be synths, while he just wants to retreat and defend his family. There are a lot of Joes in the world, sadly.

Athena has to admit to Karen that it simply isn't now possible to give her a human body, thereby destroying all her hopes and dreams. And there's a heartbreaking scene as V explains to her "mother" that's she's far more than just Ginny and is leaving the network to explore, and that mother and "daughter" will never meet again.

Laura is in trouble as Hester sneakily lies her way into the house and they have a philosophical chat about the role of violence in resolving social injustice. It isn't long before a hostage situation develops and it's Leo and Mia to the rescue. Its interesting to see just how protective towards him Mia is. Meanwhile, Toby's relationship with Renie is finally going well and Sophie, whose story is left unresolved,is taken by Joe to a kids' party with a synth clown. Brr.

The real action, though, is between Hester and Laura,who strikes a nerve in telling Hester that she is what she is because of abuse, reacting just as a human would. This doesn't go down well with Hester, who proudly announces that she has killed four humans and their lives mean nothing to her. This is chilling. And the lack of regret means, of course, that she isn't going to survive the episode.

Hester and Leo have an emotional reunion, but she suddenly stabs him just after he has declared his love, which is nice. In the end it's Mia who kills Hester, along with herself as an heroic sacrifice. Only the arrival of Niska, just in time, saves them both, and it's right that it should be Niska who sort of redeems herself by killing Hester.

We end with Leo seemingly comatose and all synths worldwide becoming conscious, including Sam who seems to avert Karen's attempted suicide. It's a truly magnificent individual episode of television and elevates a series that had started out without as much promise as the last one into something truly special.

The Walking Dead- Season 2, Episode 7: Pretty Much Dead Already

"Enough risking our lives for a little girl who's gone!"

This is the half-season finale. Knowing this tells us it's going to be heavy and dramatic. And it is; from the moment at the start where Glenn cracks and tells the whole gang that there's a "barn full of walkers" it's inevitable that the two groups are going to be sundered apart and it isn't going to be nice.  But the final moments are not predictable at all.

Things are downbeat. Rick has to beg Herschel to let them all stay; childbirth on the run without medical supplies would be a death sentence. But with Shane around and the inevitable upcoming conflict it's all hopeless. And even Carol is losing hope in finding Sophia, much to Daryl's discuss. Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.

Yes, Maggie argues with her dad to let them all stay and yes, she sort of reconciles with Glenn, but these are slim pickings in a gloriously doom-laden episode. Shane is increasingly unhinged and,hearing about the baby, is sure that it is his. That's bound to cause friction later. There are signs of John st how far gone he is as he hands out guns in open defiance of the principled Herschell's wishes, and there's an atmosphere of deep foreboding until Shane starts to shoot and kill all the zombies in the arm. The most horrible thing is saved till last, though- one of them is Sophia, and Carol has to watch as Rick shoots down the thing that she has become...

This half-season has gone on far too long. But this episode, at least, is magnificent.

Humans: Season 2, Episode 7

"It's time for them to fear us..."

We start with Mattie being interrogated about her code to make all synths conscious, but fortunately she's able to stonewall and leave because Mia and Leo are essentially nice. Hester isn't, but for now she's just the new girl. It's Mia who now takes charge.

The media are beginning to notice "bizarre synth malfunctions"; we're entering the endgame. Synths are becoming conscious more and more. But Odi, tragically, is not among them as a devastated Mattie reads what is in effect a suicide note from Odi, who is rebooting himself because he hates being conscious.

A direct contrast is Karen, who outs herself as a synth to Athena and asks for her consciousness to be uploaded into ahuman body so she can have the one thing she's always dreamed of.

Laura and Pete meet and compare notes as Mia's plan to rescue the synths at Qualia proceeds. The raid is magnificent, bold and a tragic failure, leading to the casual deaths of many conscious synths which is devastating for everyone but especially Leo. This leads to Max reconciling with the others, but that is small comfort. These are powerful scenes.

This is yet another emotionally powerful episode as Revie, hearing whatSophie has to say about being a synth, emotionally abandons her lifestyle: "It was fun, but you can get lost in it." At least there's happy news that Niska is back with Astrid- if she survives. The ending is devastating, though, as a rogue Hester tries to kill Athena and manages to kill Pete in the process. Poor Karen is inconsolable. Finally, in the penultimate episode, this season is really coming together to be magnificent. It may have taken a long time to get going but a good finale would elevate the season to magnificent.

Humans: Season 2, Episode 6

"I had sex with him."

So, as both Athena and Pete know, Khoury is trying to create conscious synth children for bereaved parents as a cynical moneyspinner. And Athena will do as she's told because Khoury "owns" V, what with her being company property. Ouch.

Meanwhile Mattie finds Leo at his hideout and tries to talk some sense into him as Laura sets about trying to restore Anita into being Mia again, one of the few sequences that feel like padding and, once she manages to do this, poor betrayed Mia is heartbroken. In a moving scene, Odi confesses to a priest; his life no longer has purpose or meaning now he is free. All he wants is the life of service he remembers. This is troubling, but there will always be individuals like this.

Karen falls in love with the seraphim Pete brings her, and bonds herself to him, very clearly showing how she identifies as a human. Mattie receives little gratitude after saving Mattie's life; they are both sort of rivals for Leo and, anyway, we know that Hester hates humans. It's unknowingly cruel of her to tell Mattie she's had sex with him and then blindly ask her if she's ever been with anyone.

Poor Sophie, though; even Joe's egg fight fun can't get rid of her desire to act like a synth. It's an event-filled episode of a season that's finally hotting up, ending with Mia revealing to Leo and Hester that Mattie has the code to make all synths sentient...

Christmas Pubcast

Nick and I have a special Yuletide edition of the Doctor Who Pubcast, sure to appeal to all Peter Cushing fans...

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/dwpubcast/episodes/2016-12-20T10_53_44-08_00

Humans: Season 2, Episode 5

"I believe the man has ejaculated."

Max makes a friend: a newly conscious synth who has been looking after some rather unpleasant children. She is given hope, and a possible future. Contrast that with Mia, who has been sold by Ed to cover his mother's care home costs. It seems MIA meant very little to him after all, and that's horrible.

Odi, too, is conscious, but with no desires of his own; he just wants to serve and be useful. This time, though, it's his actual personality. That's interesting. And a direct contrast with Leo and Hester who have definite plans for the liberation of all synths.

Athena hears that her daughter is dead and, distraught as she is, she isn't going home for the funeral. That seems to prove beyond doubt that V is Ginny and, sure enough, we get this confirmed. Things stay emotional as Mia foils Ed's plan by pretending to the prospective purchasers that she is just Anita again. But she ends up as Just Anita again. Will she ever again be herself?

Toby's wannabe synth wannabe girlfriend is called Renie and, in another heartbreaking scene, offers him sex while in role as a synth- but he wants to get to know her as a person, not just to get inside her pants. This, of course, makes her feel that her chosen persona is being rejected and she sends him away. It's an episode full of emotional rejections and heartbreak. At least we get the contrast of Hester coming on to Leo, whom she likes and wants to protect. But Hester represents the violently revolutionary Left, and he the more middle class progressive- and she's swaying him.

Probably the biggest thing in plot terms, though, is that Mattie has worked out the full code for making ALL synths conscious. Oh, and Niska realised at the climax of her consciousness test that the odds have been stacked against her... and escapes, awesomely. Again. And then we end with the big reveal of what seraphim are... little synth children!

Now the season is really getting good. I hope this level of intensity gets maintained.

Humans: Season 2, Episode 4

"It's Qualia!"

We begin with an ideological schism as the moral Max leaves in disgust after Leo agrees to Hester's cynical plan to allow humans to kidnap a consciousness synth and follow them to their base. It works and, yes, it's Qualia. But Leo is going down a slippery slope, even condoning torture on Hester's part as long as he doesn't have to watch. The moral issues at play in this programme are fascinating.

There's an interesting post-coital scene between Mia and are; she seems about as blissful as she can get, but did she enjoy the sex? We simply don't know. More developments happen with Sophie,who has a syndrome where she starts behaving like a synth, which causes Laura and Joe to have their signature moment of angst about being Bad Parents. Fortunately this is all interrupted by a menacing synth trying to force Laura to drop Niska's case; it seems someone really doesn't like what she's doing.

Laura's secret weapon in proving Niska's consciousness is,of course, Astrid, who is lovely. It doesn't matter that Niska abandoned her, or even that she's a synth; Astrid still loves her. Astrid is wonderful, and I'm very apprehensive at how it's all inevitably going to end in tears.

The plot thickens further as a bit of hacking from Mattie shows Joe to have been fired by synths, with no human involvement; there's more than a whiff of conspiracy here. And Khoury wines and dines Athens into a full confession of what she's up to- full transfer of human consciousness into an artificial body. He decides to support rather than fire her, but her work requires the, well, vivisection of any conscious synths held by Qualia.

Odi now seems to be conscious- he misses George- while Mia suddenly collapses to give us our cliffhanger. We still aren't hitting the heights of last season but the last couple of episodes have been better.

Humans: Season 2, Episode 3

"Apricot!"

This is still a good season, but something is still missing compared to last season. Perhaps we're still in the set-up stage?

Athena has a daughter, Gin who's in a coma; the obvious inference here is that V, her artificial intelligence, is somehow linked to her daughter. I'm sure we'll find out; Athena is finally off to Blighty to join the rest of the plot. Meanwhile Laura is continuing to try and prove Niska's consciousness so she can stand trial, and Joe, humiliatingly, goes back to work as a temp for his old employer on the shop floor. Laura has a rather dramatically effective three days, and much of the episode consists of her frustratingly failed attempts. These scenes are entertaining.

Leo and co all abandon their hidey-hole, unaware that Hester killed their prisoner rather than letting him escape. Meanwhile Toby tries to get to know the girl at school who wants to be a synth, and Mia gets back together with Ed and they start a rather heartwarming relationship. The season is starting to come together, I think; a lot more is happening and I enjoyed this episode a lot.

So many plot threads, all good; Odi is now up and working, while Pete and Karen are on the trail of the mysterious "seraphim". And Athena manages to blackmail a forcibly retired Hobbs into helping her. What is she after...?

The Odessa File (1974)

"You are not even worth a bullet..."

Frederick Forsyth is one of those guilty pleasures; hardly a literary writer, prose that makes no pretensions to be anything more than functional, and (especially late on) somewhat right-wing, Biafra aside. But he's a quick, undemanding writer and, dammit, exciting, so it's no surprise that, after the previous year had brought The Day of the Jackal to the big screen, 1974 should see a second adaptation in the shape of this Anglo-German production, with Hollywood star Jon Voight parachuted in to join the largely Anglo-German cast in a film which manages to impress in spite of all the English- speaking actors putting on comedy German accents. It's odd seeing a young Derek Jacobi in such a small role, but great to see the wonderful Mary Tamm, four years before Doctor Who, playing the leading lady.

It's an interesting artifact from the year of the Watergate scandal, and I think that's a valid thing to say even if the novel was published in the year of said burglary itself, starting with a moment of nostalgia for the very recent past of Kennedy. Except the West Germany of 1963 had some very dark shadows lurks by beneath the prosperity, the flawless constitutional democracy and the Beatles in the Reeperbahn; not all of them were SS, but many Nazis had quietly integrated into society and there was a quiet determination to cover things up, to be in denial: even the head of the police War Crimes Unit attends a deeply disturbing regimental reunion. And that kind of sinister doublethink is what the film is about. Peter Miller may represent a younger, less tainted generation who is horrified by the Holocaust (at last re-emerging as an event in its full enormity into the wider culture in the 1970s) but ultimately motivated by personal reasons.

This is an entertaining and exciting political thriller, even if the characterisation is close to non-existent. But the Holocaust flashbacks- filled in monochrome- certainly stay with you.

Daredevil: Daredevil

"...Or you'd kill him. Which would probably have the same effect on someone as Catholic as you are."

The finale finds time to begin with the funeral of Ben Urich, a good man in a bad world, and it's lovely to see the widowed Doris Urich flat out refusing to blame Karen for his death. It's not lovely for Matt, though; a good man has died, as he see it, because he failed. Fisk has to be stopped now. And so the rest of the episode shows us how the house of cards can fall down very, very quickly.

 It all unravels because of a piece of hubris from an angry Fisk. And that, it seems is a weakness; he angrily kills the traitorous Leland even though said turncoat has an insurance policy in the person of Detective Hoffman. Remember him? That probably wasn't a clever thing to do. Now all Matt has to do is find Hoffman, keep him safe and get him to make a statement to the police.

He and Foggy are making a serious effort to reconcile, but Matt very quickly sets out to find Hoffman and use him to bring Fisk down. And then Fisk falls, very suddenly, to the strains of Nessun Dorma. It's a glorious sequence. And Fisk, heartbreakingly, tries to propose to Vanessa during his arrest but isn't given time. And Matt, Foggy and Karen get to celebrate.

It doesn't last. Fisk is extracted by his underlings and is soon on the run.But Matt has paid a visit to his friend Melvin Potter and we see- after soooo long- the red costume and billy club we've been waiting for. It's not Matt Murdock in a simple black outfit; this is Daredevil. Where has he been?

Daredevil gets his bloody, one-on-one showdown with a desperate Fisk. At last Fisk is finally brought down. We see a bereft Vanessa, a jailbird Fisk, and Daredevil surveys his city from a rooftop. What an episode. What a season. What a programme. After the much-mocked 2003 film at last we have a screen Daredevil to be proud of, with writing and acting of the first rank. Roll on Season Two.

Daredevil: The Ones We Leave Behind

"It's a difficult thing, isn't it, taking a life?"

It's the penultimate episode plus, you know, that title: we can expect some deaths. And it's interesting to see how we're going to advance towards the finale because, frankly, Fisk seems as impregnable as ever at this point. Especially with Matt and Foggy so far apart, and Karen despairing. Not to mention poor Ben Zurich being fired for flying too close to the Sun.

In an episode all about killing we begin with Karen feeling guilt for killing, albeit in self defence. That is an emotion Fisk will never feel about killing those who get between him and his goals, and he's out for revenge for both Vanessa's poisoning and Wesley's slaying. It now becomes just about feasible that they might be able to wrap up the season in one more episode, but it still feels sudden.

And we also have the shock ending; Ben, about to start a blog exposing Fisk for what he is, is killed in cold blood by Fisk himself in what is a superbly written and acted scene. It's an excellent episode as an individual piece of television, as have so many this season, but surely they've left it a bit late to start wrapping up the season now?

Daredevil: The Path of the Righteous

"We're going through a rough patch."

"I found the Nelson and Murdock sign in the trash."

"A very rough patch."

Fisk shows rare vulnerability as he struggles to save the poisoned Vanessa, while both Matt and Foggy spend much of the episode lying to Karen and not saying why they've fallen out. There's a lead- Karen and Ben know that Fisk killed his dad- but the evidence is weak and it's doubtful they can use it. The situation seems to have hit rock bottom.

Meanwhile, Claire gives Matt the idea of body armour. She'll always be there to patch him up, but her heart is closed to him. He's too dangerous. And Matt's priest then mentions, as part of a philosophical conversation, the Devil as a figure to encourage sinners to find the path of righteousness. We can see where these two things are going. And so he visits Melvin Potter (the Gladiator himself!) to commission a certain set of red-hued items. Daredevil is coming.

Fisk angrily swears revenge on Vanessa's poisoners. He's a fascinating villain portrayed brilliantly by Vincent D'Onofrio. Interestingly, he isn't a psychopath. He has morals, of a kind. What he does he does from a genuine love of his city. It's just the means by which he does it that he's damned himself.

We end with Karen captured by the resourceful Wesley going rogue. She is, it seems, in very deep trouble. And yet, she's resourceful. I don't know about the state of New York, but I think English law would certainly acquit her for what she manages to do in shooting him. Go Karen...

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

"I'm staying. And I'm not buying a gun either."

I don't know too much about Westerns; unless you count the ones by Akira Kurosawa I've only seen The Magnificent Seven, A Fistful of Dollars and Back to the Future Part III, and the first two of those were many years ago. But The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance has made a huge impression on me. It's the most profound experience I've had watching a film in recent months. I'm only vaguely aware of the tropes and themes of serious Westerns, but this film has so much subtext I hardly know where to begin. Plus it taught me the etymology of the word "dude", which apparently predates Bill and Ted by a century and a half. Who'd have thunk it?

Much of the film takes place in flashback and structurally would doubtlessly reward repeat viewings. Rance (a likeable and charismatic James Stewart), now a senator, returns with his wife Hallie to a town much changed by the advent of rail travel and the amenities it brings. They are there for the funeral of Tom Doniphon, a fascinating character; cue extended flashback.

A young Rance, travelling by the inevitable stagecoach, is moving west straight from law school. Immediately we have a character representing law and order moving towards an area synonymous with lawlessness, and this thematic tension informs the whole film; justice versus revenge. It's not the kind of cultural reference one usually associates with Westerns, I assume, but I'm reminded of Aeschylus' Oresteia, albeit with a much more ambiguous conclusion. But for now we simply observe Rance trying and failing to apply the rules he knows to his new environment. Liberty Valance will not, as we will see, be tried, convicted and imprisoned.

Rance's antithesis- and love rival- is Tom Doniphon, a hugely watchable and charismatic John Wayne- oh, and did his catchphrase "pilgrim", must beloved of Preacher, come just from this film? Tom is none too intellectual, very old-fashioned with the ladies to put it mildly, and at ease with the rough justice of the west. He's also obviously the alpha male, something which it seems at this point that Rance will never be.

Nevertheless, stubbornly law-abiding Rance begins to have an effect on the town, teaching literacy and generally acting as a mild civilising influence, even rousing the whole (male) town to exercise their franchise and vote in favour of statehood, which is clearly not so much a metaphor of a state of law and civilisation than, well, quite literally that. Men like Rance (and they are men at this time) have power in a state that they do not in a mere territory, and those like Valance, who thrive from lawlessness, are naturally prepared to use violence to prevent the end of their natural habitat.

Rance is slowly gaining in stature and confidence, though. It's precisely his civilising tendencies that lead Hallie to abandon alpha male Tom for him, a sure sign of the way the wind is blowing. But he inevitably ends up in a shootout with Valance... and inexplicably winning, seemingly abandoning all his principles. And yet, as we eventually discover in the film's big reveal, the shooter was in fact a hidden Tom. The character personifying rough justice eventually, despite misgivings, paves the coming of law and order. But he's yesterday's man, and all he can do is provide a future for others, not himself. He's a tragic yet compelling figure.

The flashback ends, we return to the present, and eberyone decides to ignore the inconvenient fact that Rance, who owes his popularity to having killed Valance and now feels quite firmly as though he belongs in a town which has now firmly adapted to his values, did no such thing. Everyone decides to ignore the truth and print the legend. But then, don't we all when it comes to the Old West?

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

"This isn't freedom.This is fear."

HERE BE SPOILERS

This was an extraordinary film when I first saw it at the cinema on my honeymoon and, even with the main twist spoiled, it's an extraordinary film today. The Russo brothers have done a superb job with what is effectively the spy genre of the Marvel superhero films, but Chris Evans is extraordinary too as a World War II Roosevelt New Dealer out of time, struggling to adapt to a time where nobody cares about civil liberties and the military-industrial complex has grown to monstrous proportions.

We begin as Cap bonds with Sam Wilson, another military veteran with similarly invisible scars, and we get a glimpse of Cap's notepad filled with things he needs to catch up on such phenomena as Star Wars, Nirvana (yay!) and the Berlin Wall, "up and down". It isn't long until his first exciting mission, a hostage crisis perpetrated by Cap's old for from the comics, - moustache-free George Batroc. But cracks begin to show between our SHIELD comrades as Cap and Black Widow are given markedly different mission objectives. Cap's complaint to Nick Fury leads to his being shown Operation Insight-a massive and, in Cap's view, disproportionate armoury. How can this be synonymous with freedom?

It can't, or so it seems, as there is a cancer within SHIELD, one that disdains Cap as much as it disdains liberty: HYDRA. And the revelation of this, and that Cap is suddenly hunted prey, is the most shocking and exciting part of the film.

There's so much more, though; Cap's heartbreaking meeting with the elderly Peggy, the nice bit of exposition in the bunker as Arnim Zola spends his last moments as an uploaded AI life form expositing on how HYDRA's takeover of SHIELD came to be, Natasha's general awesomeness, capped by a kick-ass session at a Senate hearing, the whole sequence with Nick Fury under pursuit in the car that leads him to fake his death. But the film is ultimately about the Winter Soldier; Bucky, Cap's oldest friend. Behind the explosions and the awesomeness the film always has a heart.

There's a lot of Marvel life here- HYDRA's targets include "Bruce Banner, Stephen Strange"- but the film is about two things: civil liberties vs. security and friendship. Hence Cap's new yet strong friendship with the Falcon. Hence Bucky being unable, when the moment comes, to kill Cap. It's an incredible film, but it ends with Bucky still at large...

Swamp Thing (1982)

"Some of the men say it was one of those abdominal snowmen or something."

I came to this film, in spite of Wes Craven helming it, expecting a so-bad-it's-good B movie. Instead I find a film that's genuinely brilliant- pacy, stylishly shot and very well acted.  I really wasn't expecting that.

The South Carolina location looks amazing; it may not be Louisiana, but the swampy landscape certainly looks like it and fills the production with a great deal of atmosphere throughout. At the start it feels like an early '80s horror film, but it isn't; it's very much its own beast. We're introduced to Alice, the genius Alec Holland and the rest of the crew who will shortly die. We quickly get to know the witty, driven, flirty Holland and his invention, a plant/animal hybrid formula. And then, suddenly, they are all shockingly killed, aside from the captured Alice, by the thugs of the sinister Arcane. Already the characterisation, dialogue and direction are far above B movie standard.

There are little oddities- why is the bloke in charge of Alec and his mates a Yorkshireman? And yes, the Swamp Thing costume indeed looks very obviously latex, as such costumes always do and as is always priced in. I'm also inevitably reminded of The Creature from the Black Lagoon. None of this is a problem.Nor is Arcane's delightful moustache-twirling evil. Sometimes it's fun for a baddie just to be bad for the sake of it, and Louis Jourdan is brilliant; fun but stopping short of being hammy.

I think the moment I fell in love with this film was the slow-motion boat attack, which felt completely A-Team. It's a genuine classic that rises far above B movie status.

Thor (2011)

"We don't have horses. Just dogs, cats, birds."

"Then give me one of those large enough to ride!"

So far I haven't seen a bad Marvel Cinematic Universe film and this, while not one of the very best, is no exception. It may be an odd film for Kenneth Branagh to direct but he does a fantastic job, giving us Asgard in all it's spectacular glory exactly as we dreamed of. Chris Hemsworth is a splendid Thor, Anthony Hopkins a brilliant Odin, and Idris Elba an implacably magnificent Heimdall. All this and we get Sif and the Warriors Three. Most of all, we get the extraordinary Tom Hiddleston as the villainous Loki. Natalie Portman also impresses as poor Jane Foster, with her doomed love for a god.

The film strikes exactly the right balance between the fantastical and the ordinary, giving us plenty of spectacle but grounding it in just enough reality to avoid alienation. It also subtly continues the ongoing plot thread with Clark Gregg's Phil Coulson and a post-credits sequence setting up what is to come. There's an obvious basic plot, yes, as the arrogant god learns humility and becomes better, but this is a hugely entertaining couple of hours. But then, Marvel films always are.

Only one thing, though... why didn't they incorporate the theme tune for the 1966 cartoon with the closing titles?

Ghostbusters (1984)

"Do you have any hobbies?"

"I collect spores, moulds and fungus."

It's quite an instructive experience seeing a film you saw at the old Cannon Cinema in Hinckley back in '84, watched tens of times while still in primary school, but haven't actually seen since Thatcher was prime minister. You remember very little until you see it happens, and then the memories flood back. You even find yourself unexpectedly remembering dialogue from the next scene. It's quite surreal.

This is the first time I've seen the film as an adult, and so finally realise what Hittites, Sumerians and Babylonians are, and what a cad and a charlatan Peter Venkman is, and what a creep he is with Dana. But I can also appreciate what may not be laugh-out-loud funny but is a justifiably popular fun classic with a top notch cast. In hindsight it's clear how much this film owes to the then-recent Poltergeist, with lots of that kind of ghost activity, but it never attempts to be a scary film and keeps the tone light and fun.

Rick Moranis s great as the possessed Louis, but William Atherton deserves special praise for his Walter Peck, the perfect pantomime villain. But the whole damn thing justly deserves its status as a true classic.