Knee-jerk review: "The Batman"

1. It's three hours long, people.  That's important to know up front.
2. Does it feel like three hours?  Not really.  Does it need to be three hours?  Not really.
3. It's well made.  And at times, there is a definite artfulness to it.  The fist fight illuminated solely by the intermittent flash of machine guns is haunting.  This is no surprise.  Director Matt Reeves knows what he's doing - Cloverfield is fantastic and his two Planet of the Apes reboot films are top notch.
4. The movie has the same sort of vibe as Christopher Nolan's overrated The Dark Knight (2008).  It's all very serious and important.  And mostly humorless.  These are sad, rather hopeless characters.
5. It may feel like The Dark Knight, but the closer cousin is David Fincher's masterpiece Seven (1995) what with following a serial killer's trail of creepy clues amid the dark and rainy streets of an amoral urban nightmare.  The Riddler is John Doe, you see.
6. Robert Pattinson's pasty, ghoulish appearance makes for the strongest onscreen suggestion yet that Batman is perhaps a little too similar to the unhinged criminals he pursues.
7. At least we didn't have to again watch Bruce Wayne's parents die in an alley. 
8. This is one dark, dark movie.  It's like someone didn't pay the electricity bill.  Even a hospital ward suffers from moody, dim lighting.  The Little Fry whispered to us at one point "Why is everything so dark?"
9. Can we agree that Jeffrey Wright elevates any movie he's in?
10. The plot is pretty complicated and doubles back on itself, connecting the leaders and gangsters of Gotham City in unexpected ways.  We weren't expecting that.
11. Cool contact lens camera.
12. Colin Farrell is unrecognizable as the Penguin, but one thing is clear: he's doing an Al Pacino impression.  And it's pretty good.
13. The ending is nice and big, but the water business seemed a bit too much to us, like someone somewhere thought the ending needed to be, you know, just a little bit bigger.
14. There is a fairly satisfying arc to Batman involving his "I'm vengeance" catchphrase.
15. Yes, Batman does spend a lot of time acting like a cop chasing down leads and examining evidence.  It's a got a solid police procedural feel.  But several of his successes come from happenstance and coincidence, like the random cop in the right place at the right time who has an uncle that installs carpets.  Okaaaay.
16. They just couldn't do a Batman movie without including the Joker, could they?
17. Did we mention it's three hours long?
18. The car chase is pretty exciting, at least what we can see of it in the dim lighting and pouring rain.
19. We suppose the biggest problem with the movie is just the question of... why?  At what point do audiences grow weary of watching yet another incarnation of the same characters exploring the same sorts of stories?  Given that The Batman has made $500 million in less than two weeks, the answer would seem to be "not anytime soon."
20. Can the next Batman be more fun possibly?  Turn on a light, Bruce.

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Knee-jerk review: "Uncharted"

1. A lot of fun. In fact, it's so good-hearted and earnest that any criticism feels like a cruel nitpick.  It know what it is and totally delivers.
2. Whether you call it a shameless rip-off or a clever homage, it's most definitely in the vein of Indiana Jones-style globe-hopping action-adventure treasure hunts.  See also: The DaVinci Code, Tomb Raider, and National Treasure.
3. Apparently it's based on a video game, but the film never feels convoluted like so many game adaptations.  The only clue to us was the Playstation logo that appeared during the producer logos at the start of the movie.
4. Tom Holland looks like he might be able to leverage his aw-shucks Spiderman success into genuine movie stardom.
5. It's the kind of movie that relies on some pretty crazy plot points, like the plausibility of working-class thieves and pickpockets figuring out a 500-year-old mystery.  While at the same time a billionaire with every resource available can't do it without their help.
6. If you can put your heroes in tuxedoes at a swanky auction heist, we're pretty much already on board.
7. Mark Walhberg is just playing himself at this point, right?
8. Everyone's after plundered treasure from hundreds of years ago: gold crosses and coins and ingots.  That's cool, but we couldn't help but wonder what you do with that once you have it?  How do you convert that into cash?  Sell it to a museum?  Melt it down into bars?  You make bars, okay, then what?  Take those to the local Wells Fargo teller?  You really would need a specialized underground precious metal fence to help you... and then we wonder, will how do you trust that person not to double-cross you?  We eventually had to stop that train of thought and focus back on the movie.
9. Yes, there are "plot twists" that do what the story needs them to do and sends the action in a new direction, but you likely won't be surprised by any of them.
10. Okay, not quite true: we were sort of shocked by one unexpected character elimination.
11. One of the little Fries was quite annoyed that the "You're a little young to be a bartender" and "You're a little old to be going to prom" exchange featured in the trailer didn't make it into the movie.  We had to explain movie editing and marketing to her.
12. It's been said that memorable set pieces are what makes a good film great.  Uncharted has three - maybe four - knockout action scenes.  The ending is particularly over the top in the best way possible.
13. It's a dumb pet peeve, but we hate when movies just begin without a title.  What's the impulse in filmmakers to play the movie and then only after the final fade out (and right before the credits roll) will we finally see in big letters... Uncharted.  What's the deal?  This is becoming more and more common and we do not approve.
14. See it.

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Ten Disappointing Things About "The Book of Boba Fett"

1. A formidable, genuinely scary antagonist - Cad Bane, what a name! - gets a truly fantastic introduction only to get immediately killed off in the next episode.
2. Temuera Morrison is 61 years old.  Maybe that age works out within the timeline of the Star Wars universe and the whole crazy complicated history of the Boba Fett character, but he just seemed old and slow.  And it's not like the show played up an Unforgiven sort of "I'm too old for this" angle, which might have helped.  Then again, the old guy did spend much of the first half of the series sleeping in an antibiotic tank.
3. It's enough of Tatooine already.  Between "The Mandalorian" and now this series, we've spent hours and hours in the desert.  Coming up next on Disney+, a spinoff with Obi-Wan Kenobi presumably set mostly on... wait for it... Tatooine.  And this is supposedly the armpit planet of the galaxy, remember.  Let's mix it up, Disney.  A conspiracy thriller on Hoth, an action comedy on the Death Star, a political drama in Cloud City.
4. All of this work was supposedly about fighting the Pike (by contrast to Cad Bane, the Pike as an alien species is most definitely not formidable nor scary) keeping the spice trade off Tatooine, but the series spends zero time explaining just what the big deal is.  What are the stakes exactly?  Why does Boba Fett care?  How is the spice trade hurting residents of Tatooine?
5. The series seemed at first to want to spin a Godfather-style web of underworld gangster intrigue with black markets and protection rackets and warring families, but it only half-heartedly committed to that plot.  Then the last couple of episodes sort of leaned into a spaghetti Western-slash-Magnificent Seven vibe with a motley band of misfits outnumbered and outgunned.  But it didn't really develop that thread either.
6. Obviously, it was deeply weird to take that big narrative detour into what was essentially a third season of "The Mandalorian."  That those episodes provided some welcome zing and zip - aside from our ongoing "huh?" when it comes to the Mandalorian religion - just underscored how "The Book of Boba Fett" paled in comparison.
7. Why cast Jennifer Beals if she's only going to get about three or four lines?  Ditto the incomparable Stephen Root.
8. What seemed like ten minutes of screen time in the finale was spent with the characters futilely blasting away at giant attack droids even though the droid shields were clearly impossible to breach.  It was more tedious than exciting, a statement also works as an overall criticism of the entire series.
9. The show tried to milk a big twist out of Boba Fett learning the Pike were behind the Tusken massacre, but shouldn't a battle-hardened bounty hunter have already figured that out?  Boba Fett too often seemed like your confused old uncle trying to keep up with the kids, when the whole reason his character is so popular is that he's this shrewd bad-ass who managed to capture Han Solo.
10. Another big selling point for Boba Fett: his armor and his helmet, yet he spent almost the entire series walking around with his helmet stuck under his arm.

We stipulate that some of these issues may have been caused by production problems related to COVID protocols.  That may explain, for example, the strangely empty streets of the big finale or the way the Beals and Root characters vanished from the action after a big introduction.  But all we can do is watch the show that gets made, not the show the producers wanted to make.

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A Few Words on Freeform's "Cruel Summer"

What seems at first glance to be a standard teen-in-peril Lifetime potboiler is elevated by a knockout cast, a complex plot spanning multiple timelines, and a nuanced exploration of some pretty heavy themes.  The Freeform "Cruel Summer" limited series (available on Hulu) tells the story of what happens to a group of suburban teenagers in the mid-1990s when a local girl is kidnapped and then later claims a classmate knew where she was being held but chose not to alert authorities.  That crazy, convoluted sentence doesn't do the series justice.  This is a layered look at teen girl angst and jealousy, media bloodlust, sexual predation, post-traumatic stress, and dark family secrets.  There's a whole lot going on here.  As the narrative slowly peels back the mystery of what happened to who and why, audience perceptions of the characters are constantly shifting.  More than once, a hero is revealed to have a mean streak, while the person who seems to be the bad guy shows an unexpectedly benevolent side.

The true genius of the show, however, is its structure.  "Cruel Summer" tells its story across three years.  Each episode covers the same calendar date, but in different time periods.  Clever editing allows for some pretty powerful dramatic contrasts.  An upscale neighborhood July 4 party, a birthday celebration, a family outing, all have very different vibes and subtexts when we see them take place during each of the three time periods: before the girl went missing, right after she was rescued, and during a very ugly year when girl she claimed didn't rescue her is now suing for defamation.  It's surprisingly easily to keep all of this straight - incredibly, the time jumps sometimes happen within in a single scene in a single location - thanks to smart cinematography and the physical appearance of the two leads.  Indeed, while the cast is uniformly strong, it's the two powerhouse performances of Olivia Holt and Chiara Aurelia that really kick things into high gear.  Their work is the sort of thing that would undoubtedly get a lot more buzz had this run on a higher-profile platform like HBO or Netflix.

But here's the problem.  This story - as rich and complex as it may be - simply cannot sustain itself across ten 45-minute episodes.  This is, of course, not an uncommon complaint.  You've probably experienced similar frustration watching one of these limited series that seem to have an episode-count mandate whether the story warrants it or not.  And so "Cruel Summer" starts with a bang for those first few episodes, droops into a mushy middle run of episodes where nothing really happens (it can't start solving all of the mysteries just yet, you see, it's still too soon), and then suddenly makes a mad dash for a satisfying conclusion in the last two episodes.  Had this been converted into a leaner set of five or six episodes, it would have been much more engaging and effective.  

(Case in point: we submit to you Netflix's "Fear Street" a similarly complex story - albeit one that is more straight horror than thriller - told across different timelines, but clocking in at only six hours it feels much leaner and more focused.  It may not be as culturally relevant as "Cruel Summer," but it's ultimately more satisfying.)

"Cruel Summer" also sort of falls into the trap of cramming as many final act plot twists and reversals as possible.  Those turns can be entertaining, but too often they have the potential to undermine everything that came before.  There's a whopper of a twist here in the final few moments that we won't spoil, but the giddy visceral "OMG!" kick it provides sort of sours once you realize how it sort of undercuts the rest of the story.  It's tricky to lead an audience on a satisfying journey with so many characters - for ten episodes, remember - only to pull the rug out at the very end just because pulling the rug out is what these shows do.

"Cruel Summer" trailer

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The "Dad Thriller"

Max Read offers a fascinating and amusing analysis of a 1990s genre he calls the "Dad Thriller."  It's definitely worth a read.  We wish we'd thought of it.

For example, here are some key questions to consider when deciding if a movie is a "Dad Thriller."

* Is Harrison Ford in the movie?
* Is the director Philip Noyce?
* Is there a satellite uplink?
* Is a key plot point a guy trying to get on the phone with the right guy to give him the correct information?
* Is there a shadowy cabal of lawyers and/or corporate executives?
* Is an American or English actor playing a current or former Irish Republican terrorist and attempting an unconvincing Irish accent?
* Is the main bad guy motivated by money? If he is motivated by ideology, are his politics incomprehensible and unrecognizable?
* Is the advice or warning of the movie's hero going unheeded by feckless bureaucrats?
* Is the main bad guy a former Soviet military commander?
* Is there a tense but ultimately productive exchange about race between a black guy and a white guy who are forced by circumstance to work together?
* Is the movie's hero obligated to go undertake a dangerous mission despite being an analyst, not field personnel?

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Trailer Check

Here are the seven trailers we sat through before seeing Spiderman No Way Home this past week. If each trailer runs two minutes, that's almost 20 minutes of coming attractions before the feature starts. It didn't used to be this many, did it? 

The Batman - As Mrs. Cheese Fry asked, "Why is Batman always so grim?" It's fairly amazing that Warner Bros. continues to make Batman movies. But if the audience keeps paying to see them, why stop? After a successful run with Christian Bale, we cycled to Ben Affleck and now to Robert Pattinson. We have to admit, as completely familiar and repetitive as this one seems to be, we find ourselves fairly intrigued as it seems to push the gritty, grim darkness to new depths, dialing all of that even past Chris Nolan levels. Lots of rain, fire, loud creepy music, and Bruce Wayne barking "I don't care what happens to me!" Very cool. Sigh. We're part of the problem, aren't we? 

Ambulance - The action-movie premise seems solid: desperate military veteran agrees to help a buddy pull a heist, then everything goes sideways, a cop is shot, hostages are taken, he's in over his head, yadda yadda yadda. Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II are always magnetic. So far, so good. But then you'll start to notice the movie's style - it's all swooping cameras, quick cuts, artfully photographed destruction - and realize that it's directed by Michael Bay. A few of his movies are fun, like The Rock, so you're trying to maintain optimism. But then comes the title. Ambulance. Presumably titled after the getaway vehicle in the movie. It's laughably obvious and unimaginative in a way that calls to mind a fake trailer on "Saturday Night Live." Imagine Speed if it were called City Bus. 

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Nope. We missed the first one and surely will be unable to follow this second chapter. We hope James Marsden was well paid. 

Death on the Nile - A sequel of sorts to Kenneth Branagh's Murder on the Orient Express (which was pretty good), it doesn't seem to be a particularly exciting movie. The marketing department won't like hearing that. But the A-list cast is stacked, the Agatha Christie name carries the promise of a sophisticated plot, the setting seems exotic and luxurious, and no one will be shooting lasers. 

Crypto.com - So Matt Damon (we hope he was well paid) is telling us with a straight face that the bravery of mountain climbers, astronauts, and - get this - the Wright Brothers is very much the same sort of bravery needed to invest in the volatile emerging market of cryptocurrency, which is mostly for now a way for rich people to get richer. Got it. 

Uncharted - We're just happy to see a big budget thriller that isn't an adaptation of a Marvel comic book or 1990s video game.**  It certainly looks it's trying to emulate the treasure-hunting heroics of the Indiana Jones movies, but who knows? We're told that Mark Wahlberg can be polarizing, but we certainly like him. The trailer ends with an amazing "how will he get out of that?" cliffhanger moment that makes a huge impression. 

**Update: we have since learned that this movie is indeed based on a series of video games.  But of course it is.  So then, our only non-adapted film from this group is... Ambulance?

Morbius - At the risk of sounding like an old man hunched in a lawn chair yelling at tween skateboarders, this is what's wrong with Hollywood (or, to be fair, what's wrong with moviegoers). Another obscure Marvel character, another tedious origin story, another superpower action movie with a too-big CGI effects budget. Further demerits because it looks like the hero (antihero, whatever) is a vampire. Please, no one go see this. And yes, we certainly see the irony of our endorsement of the new Batman reboot all the while trashing this one. We're not proud of that.

To further explore this question of audiences only responded to movies based on existing IP, we looked at domestic box office for 2019 - we won't look at 2020 or 2021 since the pandemic disrupted everything.   And yes, we know Hollywood now turns on worldwide box office, but for the sake of argument, let's only consider American audiences.  As the great film journalist Scott Mendelson likes to say, audiences who complain about comic book movies need to actually, like, pay to see non-comic book movies when they get made.  Hollywood responds to what audiences pay to see.  Be sure to go see the movies you want to see more of.

So in 2019 you'd have to go all the way down to Jordan Peele's Us (#12 at the box office, earning $175 million) to find a movie not based on either a comic book or a previous movie.  After that, it's Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood (#18, $141 million).  So out of the top 20 movies, only two were original, though one could argue that Peele and Tarantino are sort of a brand of their own.  In which case, there's Knives Out at #21 earning $115 million.

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Six Thoughts About Netflix's "The Squid Game"

1. Unless you've been living under a rock, you know the basics of this show.  The premise is an engaging high-concept variation of a familiar plot: for their own amusement, the rich and/or elite get the unwashed masses to fight to the death.  The Hunger Games was played straight, but those movies didn't come close to this kind of exhausted, grim hopelessness.  The marbles episode packs a devastating punch.  It's not a particularly fun experience.
2. We're not familiar with the style and format of Korean television.  Are all K-dramas this overwrought?  The villains are complete one-note caricatures, one all obnoxious bug eyes, the other sneering and scowling through every scene.
3. "Netflix bloat" is a real thing and, frankly, we're tired of it.  This show runs nine episodes (most of them almost an hour long) when the story could have easily been streamlined and told in four.  Just about every twist and turn gets talked to death by the characters, dragging the plot out to absurd lengths.
4. We suggest watching it in the original Korean with English subtitles.  Don't rely on the histrionic English actor voice dub that makes like it play like a bad episode of "Star Blazers."
5. As fascinating as it is to consider an underground death game sponsored by billionaires, the logistics here are utterly implausible.  Over 400 hundred people die in this first season, all of them seemingly with families and friends and living in big cities like Seoul.  They will be missed.  But, okay, this can maybe work.  Oh, but the contestants can vote to end the game, so it's possible that you have hundreds of people out there alive who know about the game and could talk.  Hmm.  Okay, we'll go with it.  But it's a bridge too far when later we learn this contest has been happening for years.  That's thousands of people who just vanish, their bodies disposed of in secret, and no one starts asking questions except for a single police officer?
6. In the end, we're trying to puzzle out the point to it all.  There's some dark themes about the "it's either you or me" evil people will do to survive, of course, and the resilience of the human spirit in the face of death.  There are also some last-minute meditations on wealth and classism that might have resonated better had they been introduced sooner.  And then there's the epilogue, which suggests that despite winning, victory for the surviving character was a hollow one.  The character won, but they're broken.   The end most definitely did not justify the means.  Again, that's an interesting notion but one that could have maybe been clearer.  It's all mushy, which seems inexcusable given the producers had nine hours to make it less mushy.  Then again, as a Cheese Fry colleague suggested to us, this show may have been more about the morality of the game rather than the arcs and journeys of the contestants.

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Knee-jerk review: "Ghostbusters Afterlife"

* Paul Rudd is never not a delight, but the real find here is 15-year-old McKenna Grace.  The whole thing rests on her lead performance and she 100% delivers.
* We highly recommend that you watch the original first.  There's a number of connections to that 1984(!) movie, both subtle winks and big plot points.  You'll want to refresh your memory.  It will help.
* The explanation for the strange earthquakes was quite ingenious.
* On one hand, we certainly appreciate the idea of making a direct sequel to the original and engaging longtime fans.  We saw that movie twice in theaters in the summer of 1984 (most likely at the dearly departed United Artists Walnut Hill 6) and had a movie poster thumbtacked to our bedroom door. The exciting sequences of the kids strapping on proton packs, driving the Ecto-1, and even (gasp) zipping into Ghostbuster jumpsuits are the very definition of "fan fiction."
* On the other hand, remember how The Force Awakens was sort of a narrative re-do of A New Hope? The plot here not only covers similar beats to the original movie, it completely undermines the Ghostbusters' "cross the streams!" Central Park victory all those years ago.
* We don't want to spoil anything, but surely you've heard by now that some original Ghostbusters actors make cameos.  It's an awkward bit of business that borders on embarrassing.  Some of them really don't look like they want to be there.  One in particular.  We wonder who twisted their arm.
* The CGI Stay Puft marshmallow men gag is completely hilarious and charming.  And also completely forced and unnecessary, existing solely to be hilarious and charming.
* The emotional ending makes sense in a lot of ways, and we know the filmmakers got everyone onboard and were completely respectful.  You'll know the moment when you see it. But it's also a little but icky.
* It's fun, yeah, but it's also kind of a slog.  You'll likely be way ahead of the movie and subsequently tapping your foot impatiently waiting for the story to hurry up and just get there.
* Who you gonna call?

Israel Daramola has a great take on the current state of tentpole sequels like Afterlife at The Ringer.

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Knee-jerk review: "Old"

 1. We'd seen some mixed reviews, so weren't sure what to think.  All in all, a pleasant surprise.

2. The camerawork is top-notch, always gliding and roving and swooping.  It gives the action an unsettled, queasy vibe.  Like all good horror movies, what the camera shows is often just as important as what it doesn't.

3. We love Ken Leung.  

4. How are we supposed to post something about this film without revealing all kinds of spoilers?

5. The first half hour or so is something of a master class in incongruously creating a sense of dread out of the lush trappings of a fancy tropical resort.

6. It's a genius premise, the sort that makes one wonder why someone didn't make a movie like this sooner.  Fear of getting old, of mortality, of losing one's youthful vigor - those are universal worries.  The movie strikes a particularly poignant chord as well for parents everywhere dealing with the inevitable march of time as kids get older and older.
  Time is precious, don't wish your life away, carpe diem.  We often spout these pithy aphorisms, but how often do we really grasp what they mean?
7. We could totally believe there could be a well-known hip hop artist named Mid-Sized Sedan.

8. What is it about M. Night Shyamalan always wanting to put himself in his movies?  And a lot of times, it's not some Hitchcock-style character, it's a fairly large supporting role.

9. We think there's something significant or symbolic in the name of the report our characters visit, but we can't figure out what that might be.

10. Not only is it a fairly simple-yet-brilliant premise (if you've seen the TV spots you know all you really to need to know), the movie does a great job exploring it from a number of different angles.
  Aside from one horror movie gross-out scene towards the end, the film plays everything fairly straight.
11. Definitely a "Lost" vibe with creepy supernatural goings-on in a beautiful tropical setting.  Ken Leung's presence underscores that parallel.

12. There's some nice foreshadowing going on in the opening scenes.  It's a bit overt, yes, but it works.  We've heard people complain about M. Night's dialogue, but look at the crazy plots of his movies - these are big stories about very strange things.  Quiet subtlety and sly subtext wouldn't necessarily work.  His movies aren't about gritty realism and high-minded drama.
13. The ending stretches credulity - sometimes weird stories don't need everything tied up in a neat little bow - but it's still satisfying.

14. Wikipedia tells us the movie cost $18 million, which really is the perfect price tag.
15. Yeah, it's "only" PG-13, but it's a dark movie, people.


16. One big takeaway: if your swanky  resort offers to send you to a secret and secluded "no trespassing" beach, politely decline.

Our revised, ranked list of M. Night movies:

1. The Sixth Sense (1999), obviously

2. Unbreakable (2000)

3. The Visit (2015) literally gave us chills in a couple of moments

4. Old (2021)
5. Signs (2002) ridiculous ending and all

6. Split (2016)

7. The Village (2004), like most of his movies, has an ending that you just sort of have to go with

8. The Happening (2008) probably should get begrudging admiration for so audaciously tackling so looney a premise
9. Lady in the Water (2006) is better forgotten

We never saw The Last Airbender (2010), After Earth (2013), or Glass (2019).

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Knee-jerk review: "F9"

1. At this point, it's all fairly ridiculous, isn't it?
2. Two of the characters actually go into orbit, people.  It's totally crazy.
3. No matter the role, Michelle Rodriguez is just always so surly looking, like someone just killed her dog.
4. There's this weird structure where the action grinds to a halt for these gag scenes with Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris trading comic insults.  It sometimes seems like they're in a whole other movie.
5. Vin Diesel gets a crazy sequence where he goes into superhero berserker mode and fights off, like, a whole squadron of soldiers with his bare hands.
6. Bonus points: the movie has a lot of fun with some giant electromagnets during a lengthy set-piece car chase.  This is why we see these movies.
7. John Cena is pretty terrible here, making us wonder if he's better served in parts with a lighter, more comic sensibility.  He can be pretty funny.
8. We do appreciate the effort to expand the story tapestry and go back to Dom's youth to explore the death of his father, which adds a nice Shakespearean vibe to the whole thing.  That said, it's completely ballsy to ask audiences to believe that two auto racer brothers became estranged, followed totally different life paths, yet ended up both becoming James Bond-style super spies.  What?!  (And no, it doesn't work to hand-wave all of this insanity away by suggesting Kurt Russell's Mr. Nobody character engineered the whole thing.)
9. If you only watched the more recent Fast movies, packed full of machine guns and electronic gadgets and world travel and melodramatic villains looking to rule the world, you'd assume this was a franchise about secret agents.  Let us remind you: these characters started out as Los Angeles blue collar street racers.  Did we mention these movies are nuts?
10. To us, the best one is 2011's Fast Five which starts with a prison break and ends with two cars dragging giant stolen banks vaults down a city street.  It's the Goldfinger of Fast movies, just the right mix of realism and wacko.
11. Paul Walker's absence throws everything off kilter (although in the world of the story he's still alive, just off-screen).  He and Diesel's bromance was the heart of the franchise.
12. As over the top as all of this is, we cannot deny the movie's soul.  Over and over, throughout the entire franchise, the characters (most of whom are not related) talk about the importance of family, risking their lives for each other, ending their adventures with communal dinners and cold beer toasts.  Lots of Hollywood movies involve some sort of makeshift family, but few wear that notion on their sleeve like these movies do.

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Observations from a Minor League Baseball Game

The Cheese Fry family recently visited a local Double-A baseball park to watch a game.  It's been well over two years - if not more - since our last visit, and while the kids grumbled and whined about going ("Three hours long?!") there were conversations on the way home about where to sit on the next visit.  The consensus seemed to be the outfield grass, which is fine with us - it's half as expensive as the infield seats.

* It's not a baseball game unless you eat a steamed hot dog ($5) wrapped up in that paper foil sheet and slathered in enough room temperature mustard to make your fingers yellow.

* All baseball games require multiple discussions of how long it will take sun to move behind the upper deck and give you the sweet relief of shadow.

* Our row was completely empty, at least 20 seats curving out to the right in our section, but we had one guy sitting right next to us.  Why?  Also: who attends a baseball game all alone?

* We don't what that mascot was supposed to be.  Sort of a giant beaver, but also orange and yellow and shaggy like a Muppet.  Whatever it was, it wore a number 2 jersey.

* There's a low-key ritual involved with baseball field preparations that can be soothing to witness.  Raking the infield, drawing the chalk lines, hosing down the infield dirt, placing the bases.  It's a ballpark reset. What's happened before doesn't matter.  What's important is now.  What happens next.  On the diamond tonight, which is being freshly assembled and cleaned and groomed just for us, anything is possible.  Anything can happen.

* We still don't fully understand the difference between the OBP and the batting average.

* At any sporting event, people-watching of course can be just as engaging at what's happening on the field.  While we secretly judged the bad tattoos, the inappropriately dressed teen girls, and the couples who didn't look like they belonged together, the winner on that evening surely went to the two old timers sitting right behind us who didn't shut up for seven innings.  Their loud running commentary most notably included a discussion of Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle and shooting skill.  They also had comments about a player named Luken.  "Why not just drop the N and go by Luke?"

* Honorable mention to the huge group one section over.  This was the boisterous relatives and friends of one of the visiting team players, all of whom cheered and shouted whenever he was on the field.  (To his credit, he hit a lead off double.)

* An post-game fireworks show allowed us to sit on the outfield grass.  Thick grass, but clipped very short.  Scratchy, not soft.  And yet, not as flawless as it might look from a distance.  We saw some divots and bald spots.

* Another baseball game essential food item: the bag of salted peanuts ($3.50).  Nowhere else can you make that big of a mess on the floor and then just walk away with a shrug.

* Scoreboards have come a long way in our lifetime.  Gone are the crude message boards made up of incandescent light bulb grids.  Now it's all gigantic flatscreen TVs.  We particularly marveled at a real-time update of the opposing pitcher's ERA as he gave up several runs in the middle of the game.

* Not a fan of the row of urinals without privacy barriers, people.

* Whoever ran the sound board was earning their paycheck.  An endless, wall to wall string of audio drops, music cues, and sound effects.  Is that person following a rigid script or just selecting on the fly what to play and when to play it?  Bonus points for the "Price Is Right" loser cue after a strikeout.

* Stadium was maybe half full, so the half-hearted attempt to start the Wave fizzled quickly.

* We often daydream about what sort of song we'd want played for us if we were a player walking up to the plate.  In those 10 seconds, how would you define yourself?  You could go the obvious route and play something hard and heavy like AC/DC.  Or you could go goofy, maybe play "Mmmbop" or "Margaritaville."  Or you could go instrumental and maybe pick the "Game of Thrones" theme or that Alan Parsons Project song "Sirius" that the Chicago Bulls made famous.  We'd probably end up picking some cheesy 80s song like "Your Love" by the Outfield.  The Outfield.  Get it?  Baseball?

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Five bite-sized movie reviews

* Army of the Dead boasts the sort of high concept logline you expect to get pitched over martinis in Hollywood: "a Las Vegas heist thriller with zombies."  The idea probably should have died there.  As much as we love Dave Bautista's wounded weariness in any role, this is a movie ripping off ideas, characters, conflicts - and even entire story beats - from other, better movies.  But the most egregious sin for us is the sinking feeling that the filmmakers are giggling at the audience by arbitrarily killing off characters just because they can.  In the end, it's pointless, grim, and unsatisfying.

* Awake is pretty terrible. It feels cheap, rushed, and totally undercooked. While the idea that a global phenomenon preventing sleep might lead to social chaos and insanity is somewhat intriguing, what should maybe take a couple of weeks to play out here takes about 24 hours: after a single night of no sleep, the world totally falls apart and a church of wild-eyed wackos is ready to sacrifice a young girl who was able to sleep the previous night.  It's that kind of movie, chock full of underdeveloped drama and supporting characters that come and go at random.  Ugh.

* Greenland stars Gerard Butler, which typically signals a cheesy, B-movie aesthetic of big thrills on a low budget.  We were pleasantly surprised that this film delivers genuine edge and grit.  Post-9/11 and post-"Walking Dead,' we've all seen countless iterations of "end of the world" stories, but this one works hard to create a sense of realistic panic and dread.  It's easy to buy that this scary breakdown of law and order and morality is exactly how things would go if the world suddenly realized that a planet-killer comet was only two days away.  It's a Gerard Butler movie, so you get the required eye-rolling moments of happenstance and coincidence, but it packs a punch.

* In the Heights is certainly an exuberant and vivid movie. Recent casting controversy aside, there's a lot of fun to be had soaking up the story's Caribbean Latin culture and spending time with these likable characters, all of them hungering for a better life. The issue is that aside from a dreamy dance on the side of a building and a fantastic showstopper number at a city pool, there's a surprising flatness to the action. It just doesn't hit the mark. None of the songs are particularly earwormy, there's no clear antagonist to create conflict, and the story rambles on for about 45 minutes too long. We wanted to like it more than we did. 

* Tenet, like all Christopher Nolan films, can give you a headache as you try to understand just what exactly is going on.  The idea of an "inversion" machine that makes time run backwards is undeniably clever and unique - especially in those truly weirdo, nonsensical moments when forwards and backwards characters cross paths - but that doesn't mean it makes for a clear story. There are some undeniably memorable moments, but in the end, the movie feels like more of a mental exercise of plot mechanics than an effective drama. That is, it's all head and no heart.

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Remote Control Inventory

When we were growing up, the family television was a big Magnavox cabinet with a little black metal wireless remote control that beeped when you pushed the buttons.  How cool is that blue "power" button?  Around third grade or so, the family updated to Qube cable.  Not only did we suddenly now get dozens more channels, but we also got a fancy wired remote control.  

Our personal little 13-inch color TV - the one that went with us to California in the mid-90s - had no such space-age luxury.  That little TV (which weighed way more than it looked) sported an actual hand-crank channel dial.  When's the last time you saw one of those?  A knob for VHF and a knob for UHF.  Tuning in your channel was always accompanied by that satisfying plastic clack-clack-clack. This was also the age of newspaper TV guides before onscreen lists were ever a thing, but that's for another blog ost.

Flash forward 30 years to a family coffee table wire basket filled with remote controls.  These are not the dusty remotes we all have that go untouched.  The list below, for example, does not include the PlayStation 3 remote that gets dusted off every so often whenever someone wants to play a game or watch a Bluray DVD, nor does the list include the even more dusty remotes that go to unplugged DVD players and VHS decks and even an original Tivo-branded DVR stacked neatly in a back closet.  Those remotes are all stashed away out of sight.

No, the four remotes in the basket see frequent use.  Multiple scrapes and dog-tooth marks are proof.  

1. DirecTV - This is the granddaddy, the big gray plastic beast that controls channel selection and play functions for the built-in DVR.  The biggest frustration with this one - aside from a perpetual need to replace the batteries - is the fact that, even as bulky and colorful as it is, it's easy to mix up the buttons.  Invariably, when watching a DVRd show, we go to push "pause" but instead accidentally push "exit" and get zapped back to the main menu, requiring multiple steps to drill down into the right menu and resume the recording.  Profanity in these situations is unavoidable.

2. Vizio TV - This remote has endless rows of tiny rubber buttons with nooks and crannies that trap filth and grime, but we really only use two buttons - the one that turns the flatscreen on and off and the one that lets us toggle between video inputs.

3. Vizio soundbar - In theory, we were all excited to connect the new fancy soundbar to our iPhones to play music via Bluetooth, turning our living room into a hip, funky hangout with a 21st century digital jukebox.  And yet, we've used that feature... maybe five times in two years.  Note also: whatever you do, please do not attempt to adjust the volume with any remote other than this one.  You'll just mess everything up.

4. Amazon Fire Stick - This is a late addition to the basket, only arriving last fall.  But it's certainly made up for lost time and has very much become a fan favorite.  At this point, the Cheese kids probably consider  streaming platforms like Amazon, Netflix, and Disney+ as "TV" more than traditional outlets like ABC, NBC, or even old school cable stations like TBS.  Our big irritation here is the remote's size.  It's barely bigger than a pack of chewing gum.  It's also one of those remotes trying to be clever with just four or five buttons that do everything.  Even better, it's surprisingly difficult to remember which button is the "pause" button - remember that this is a family that sits still for nothing, so we have to frequently stop the action for popcorn making, for dog wrangling, for bathroom going, for blanket adjusting... the list goes on forever - especially when the Cheese family insists on a pitch black living room to watch anything, which means that we're unable to actually look at the remote to help us remember which tiny recessed plastic nub is the right one. 

This surely sounds familiar to all of the readers out there.  Every viewing experience requires a complex series of inputs and adjustments across multiple remote controls.  Good luck finding them all when you need them.  The sofa is black, the remotes are black, the room is dark.  When we booked a house sitter years ago, the directions we had to create for TV operation looked like technical specs in their flowchart if/then confusion.

You can tell Generation X by our nostalgic affection for those handcrank dials.

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Knee-jerk review: "Wonder Woman 1984"

1. To us, it's not a step down from 2017's original Wonder Woman... but it's not exactly a clear improvement, either. 

2. We have never been fans of the curious insistence of superhero movies to cram multiple villains into a single movie.  That splits the focus of the conflict, limits screen time for the characters, and adds unneeded narrative confusion.  It's a terrible idea.

3. That said, the two villains here get pretty sympathetic, fleshed-out backstories.  Even if it's still one too many.

4. The whole "monkey's paw," careful-what-you-wish-for premise felt fresh.  It's the execution of that idea that didn't always pack a punch.  The basic mechanics of the wish fulfillment, for example, weren't always clear, which seems like a pretty important thing to make clear.

5. While the shopping mall action bit that kicks things off was surprisingly dull, we did love the big truck chase sequence that called to mind Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Honorable mention: the White House fight.  The movie could have used a few more moments like those.

6. We don't see very much of the Wonder Woman costume.  Diana Prince spends most of her screen time in civilian attire.

7. We suppose that's as good a way as any to bring back a character who clearly died in the previous movie.

8. There's some interesting things happening here with female objectification and how pretty women have completely different experiences than "regular" women.  Unwanted male attention is a hassle for supermodel Gal Gadot but something Kristen Wiig's character ("homely" by Hollywood standards) craves.

9. If that was an attempt to put President Ronald Reagan into the movie as a minor character, they could have done a better job.

10. Gal Gadot may have limited range as an actress, but this does seem to be a role she was born to play.

11. Seems like the filmmakers could have done more with the 1980s timeframe.  What was the point exactly?

12. With every comic book movie ending with huge CGI bombast, deafening sound design, laser light shows, and multiple climaxes, we appreciated how different this ending felt.

13. Our biggest complaint involves the villain.  Max Lord gets what he wants pretty early on, but then inexplicably continues to take needless steps that plunge the world deeper and deeper into chaos.  It's not enough to just shrug it off with "I want more power."  His choices are what's creating the conflict, so the motivation needs to be airtight.

14. The prologue set at some kind of Olympics event in Themyscira was fun.

15. Much online has been made about implausibility issues with a plane flight from the U.S. to Africa.  We don't want to spoil anything, but those online complaints are completely valid.

16. Seems like the golden lasso is a bigger deal this time around.  Has Wonder Woman been practicing with it between movies? 

17. As with most big-budget movies like this, it's about 20 minutes too long.

18. A fun movie for sure, but we wish it had been better.

A word about distribution.  As you may know, Warner Bros. chose to release Wonder Woman 1984 simultaneously in theaters and also on the streaming platform HBOMax, which has apparently lagged far behind Disney+ in subscriber numbers.  Warner Bros. has further decided to follow this same pattern for all of its 2021 releases.  Those titles will get a theater release on the same day they also go onto HBOMax for 30 days.  If streaming is indeed the future of Hollywood content, Warner Bros.' choices make business sense as a way to boost HBOMax's profile and get more subscriptions.  The pandemic has inexorably changed society in every possible way: how we work, how we buy groceries, how we eat out, and - the point here - how we consume entertainment.  The theatrical moviegoing experience as we knew it "before times" in 2019 will likely never return.  We understand this fact, but we certainly don't have to like it.

 

Streaming has been growing for years. Way before anyone heard of COVID, Amazon Prime and Netflix (and Disney+ which debuted last fall) were changing the paradigm.  But 2020 accelerated those trends.  Exhibitors like Cinemark have had next to zero business since March.  Many theaters may close for good.  And as people grow more and more comfortable watching movies at home, and with studios like Warner Bros. understandably leaning into that trend (and admittedly, some Hollywood mavericks have long pushed the idea of releasing new movies in theaters and homes on the same day), they may resist going back to the theater once the pandemic ends.  (For the record, Disney's Mulan and Universal's Trolls World Tour led the charge in moving from an intended theatrical release to a streaming launch.)  Habits can be hard to break.  People may buy tickets and popcorn for big movie spectacles, but what about comedies and smaller dramas and thrillers that were already getting squeezed in a world of sequels and remakes and superheroes?  Is Hollywood unwisely cannibalizing itself?  Can a streaming subscriber base paying a reliable $15 a month take the place of a few $500 million-grossing movies each year?  Time will tell, of course, but we lament the possible end of an in-person, theatrical moviegoing culture that has been such an important part of our lives.

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A Few Words About CBS All Access' "Star Trek: Picard"

As a matter of habit, we don’t binge television shows.  This frequently creates conflict in the Cheese Fry screening room (a.k.a. the sectional couch in front of a Vizio flatscreen).  Ms. Fry always wants to watch “just one more” episode, but the more appropriate viewing process, obviously, is to soak afterglow of each episode to carefully mull everything over.  Then, and only then, can one watch the next episode.  What is the root of our peculiar 20th-century preference?  It could be just a lingering preference from days of yore when folks only got a new episode once a week or it could be that we perhaps expend so much mental energy undertaking painstaking, useless analysis of story structure, acting performances, cinematography, plot holes and the like that we’re simply too exhausted after 48 minutes.

And yet... over the recent Fourth of July weekend, we binged all ten episodes of “Picard” in less than three days.  That's a big media bite for us.  We don’t subscribe to CBS All Access, but our father-in-law does.  So we had to avail ourselves of the show while we could.  It was an intense experience, but not altogether unpleasant.

Here are our disjointed musings and comments.

* “Engage.” Be honest.  How often have you said that in your car when you’re about to begin a trip?  Or maybe when the light turns green?  Just us then?

* There’s a pretty complicated backstory here about a failed species-wide Romulan evacuation linked somehow to a massive android sabotage of the Starfleet shipyards on Mars.  It all feels unique and appropriately big, but the scope grows so vast that the story sometimes felt overwhelming.  This may be an unpopular take, but not every science fiction story has to grapple with fate-of-the-universe stakes.

* “Star Trek: The Next Generation” (1987-1994) played a big part of our high school and college years (1986-1994), both the first-run episodes that ran on weekend evenings on KTXA 21 and the reruns that played every weekday evening in the 90s.  We came of age right alongside the show, which – like us – started with some rather clumsy and awkward moments before soaring with some classic masterpieces later in its run.

* Honestly, we’d probably prefer to watch a domestic drama on CBS All Access about the Riker family living on a farm on Nepenthe raising their precocious daughter.

* Name-dropping sidebar – we once sat behind Jonathan Frakes at a Beverly Hills Sunday morning church service.

* We read somewhere a suggestion that the entire Borg subplot of “Picard” could have been completely removed without ever being missed.  As crazy as that sounds given the huge amount of screen-time spent on the machinations inside the reclaimed Borg cube, that person is absolutely correct.  It’s a cool idea that really doesn’t go anywhere.

* We never liked the “Next Generaton” Klingon or Romulan “culture episodes” where the Enterprise crew had to navigate ridiculously intricate customs and complicated alien political intrigue and subtitles and dark lighting and dozens of extras in latex face makeup.  Worse, those episodes always seemed to be two-parters.

* As expected, the best part of this show was watching Picard assemble his ragtag crew of mercenary malcontents. (Echoes of Star Trek III: The Search for Spock in which Kirk asked Starfleet for help with a mission, was turned down, but Kirk went anyway.)

* The two Romulan heroes who work on Picard’s vineyard are charming and complicated, while the two Romulan villains are complete one-dimensional duds.  Further demerits for the show by insisting that the scruffy-looking Romulan spy was somehow alluring.  Having female characters call him “hot” as a way to somehow convince the audience this was so was particularly hilarious.

* The best episode of the season was the stand-alone Freecloud (how well will that name age?) episode in which our heroes had to pull off an underworld Mission: Impossible sort of con on what seemed to be a Las Vegas planet.

* That we enjoyed that episode so much perhaps points to our overall fatigue with serialized television, where a single story is dragged out, er, told over multiple episodes.  That sort of thing certainly has its place for deep dives into complex characters and byzinatine plots.  But sometimes don't you just want a self-contained story without a contrived cliffhanger?  There's a reason "Law & Order: SVU" has been running 20 years.  We hope season 2 is more episodic.

* Although Data is an ageless android, the 71-year-old actor Brent Spiner most decidedly is not.

* Name-dropping sidebar – Ms. Fry by chance ran into Brent Spiner one evening on the Paramount lot and engaged in a lengthy verbal joust with him regarding both what she was doing there and what he was doing there.

* Honestly, this thing probably should have been six episodes.

* The four-letter cursing feels completely out of place on a “Star Trek” show.  It’s so glaring and strange, in fact, it totally took us out of the story and reminded us that this is a new, edgy, streaming-service version of “Star Trek.”

* Patrick Stewart is one of those actors that can probably find a way to make anything cool and interesting.

* Interesting stuff layered in here about the myth of Jean-Luc Picard, Starfleet hero, and how he must cope with all that baggage, whether it’s trying to not believe his own hype, subtly using it for leverage to get what he wants, or swallowing his disappointment when someone doesn’t show him the expected respect based on reputation.  We wished the show had dug a little more into that mythbusting angle.  

* We haven’t watched many episodes of “Deep Space Nine,” “Voyager,” or “Enterprise.”  We’ve missed all of the “Discovery” series.  Yet we call ourselves rabid “Star Trek” fans.  Is that right or wrong? Discuss.

* Surprising parallels to the overrated The DaVinci Code, what with the secret society protecting a crazy conspiracy theory for thousands(!) of years.  Dan Brown should get a "story by" credit.

* If you’re going to kill someone off and wring big emotion and catharsis out of that moment, then you really need to let that person stay dead.  Otherwise, the moment is cheapened and the drama totally undermined.  Better idea: just don’t kill them off.

* You can grumble about the plotting, but you certainly cannot criticize the strong work of the cast (especially Allison Pill).  

* We did sometimes have hard time getting a handle on Picard.  He didn’t always ring true.  For example, no matter how pained and lost he may have felt after leaving Starfleet, it’s hard to believe in fourteen years Picard never once checked on the last executive officer he served with.

* This is the kind of show that inspires interweb commenters to point out after Seven of Nine and Picard share a warm reunion that the two characters never had a single previous onscreen scene together.

* The show ended pretty strong, but the middle was more mushy than we would have preferred.

Top ten “Star Trek: The Next Generation” episodes: 

1. "Yesterday's Enterprise" - the one where a time rift allows Tasha Yar to die a noble death

2. "Best of Both Worlds, Part 1" - the one with the gut-punch OMG cliffhanger where Picard is a Borg and Riker opens fire on him

3. "Lower Decks" - the one told from the point-of-view of the low-level Enterprise officers

4. "Starship Mine" - the one that's Die Hard on the Enterprise

5. "Tapestry" - the one were Q gives Picard a chance to make different choices as a young officer

6. "The Inner Light" - the one where Picard lives a whole other life via an alien probe

7. "Timescape" - the one where time is frozen just as the Enterprise is about to be destroyed

8. "Q Who?" - the one where we first meet the Borg

9. "All Good Things" - the series finale with Picard bouncing between three timelines

10. "The Measure of a Man" - the one with the trial to determine if Data is sentient

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What We've Been Watching (in 50 Words or Less)

In the grip of COVID-19 lockdown, days run together, bored children drive you to drink evening cocktails, weeks are measured solely by the Wednesday mornings when the lawnmower man visits, you find the elementary school online learning platform more confusing to operate than the recording timer on a 1985 VCR, and the kitchen table becomes the place where you eat and also the place where you work.  

The Cheese Fry has recently ramped up television consumption and we've been musing about how long the list might be if we looked back at the shows we've been regularly watching (or fully binged) since the fall season started back in 2019, all of them full of people touching and hugging and standing very close to each other.

Here's a rundown.  Each title gets only fifty words.

American Housewife (ABC) is a funny family comedy about classism in spite of the grating lead character - the titular "American housewife" - played by Katy Mixon.  We can't tell if she's insufferable because of the way she's written or the way Mixon plays her.  She's the worst part of the show.

Black-ish (ABC) is very much a descendant of the great Norman Lear sitcoms of the 1970s. So determined to use humor to explore complex issues of race, the show can be preachy, but there's a fun absurdist bent that leavens any heavy hand. Essential viewing.

The Conners (ABC) finds black humor amid financial hardship. It's shocking to see this kind of gritty realism on network television when most shows feature ruggedly perfect hero cops, paramedics, and doctors.  But more people in America are like the Conners than the folks on the endless Chicago shows. 

Ellen's Game of Games (NBC) is a good one for the kids, a series of elaborate games that treat the contestants - most hysterically, inexplicably in love with host Ellen DeGeneres - pretty badly, dunking them in goo or yanking them up into the rafters or dropping them through trap doors.

Emergence (ABC) is one we almost gave up on. We worried it was making it up as it went along and we're still recovering from the trauma of mistakenly believing Lost knew what it was doing. This show ended strong. Bonus points for quirky lead Allison Tolman.

Evil (CBS) is a 21st century spin on The X-Files, pitting a believer (theology student Mike Holter) and a skeptic (psychologist Katja Herbers) together to investigate mysteries for the Catholic Church. Like the producers' previous show, The Good Wife, this ingenious series is too good for CBS.

Jack Ryan (Amazon) is like an eight-hour Jason Bourne movie, all exotic locations,  sweaty foot chases, and shocking shoot-outs. We can't stop thinking about the production budget.  It may seem impossible to think of The Office's schlub Jim Halpert as a spy, but John Krasinski pulls it off.

Lego Masters (Fox) is awesome, a reality show contest that pits Lego builder teams against each other in increasingly complex "builds." The show is nudged along by the strangest TV co-hosts we've ever seen: two geeky Lego masters who are hilariously self-serious and often seem impossible to please.

Lost in Space (Netflix) may share flavors of the dystopian Battlestar: Galactica reboot, but it's most definitely a family show: it regularly showcases the power of teamwork and resourcefulness to solve any problem. Is it just us or is Parker Posey's villainess Dr. Smith just a little too much?

The Mandalorian (Disney+) has the zip and zing that The Rise of Skywalker could never truly muster.  Characters you care about, high stakes, smart plotting, and a phenomenal score.  Best of all, it leans way into the Western outlaw vibe that partially inspired George Lucas in the first place.

Modern Family (ABC) stopped being genuinely funny years ago; now it's just coasting on reputation. Expect a couple of smiles each episode, but they've exaggerated the characters now to the degree that they're no longer real people. This was their last season.  It was time.

The Outsider (HBO) is adapted from a recent Stephen King novel.  We stopped reading King 20 years ago, but this is all very familiar to us: small town besieged by a supernatural evil that commits unspeakable violence. The great cast and the stylish cinematography elevate everything.

Stumptown (ABC) is fun mostly because of rough charms of stars Cobie Smulders, Jake Johnson, and Michael Ealy. The seedy world of private eyes, ex cons, dive bars, and blue-collar cops recalls the work of our favorite novelist Elmore Leonard, which is sometimes all you need.

Superstore (NBC) has been accurately described as The Office at Walmart what with the oddball characters and the workplace setting. But there's more meat to this show in the way it explores the struggling working class.  It's not as funny as it used to be, but it feels kind of important.

Survivor (CBS) maintains a special place in our heart.  Since debuting in 2000, we have only missed a single cycle. This season features past winners and the show has changed so drastically over the years that there is a noticeable difference in game play between "old school" and "new school."

The Unicorn (CBS) feels genuine, filled with real people who happen to be funny rather than zany "characters." It's strange to see the usually villainous Walton Goggins - playing a widower dad - as a comedic family man, but his dramatic chops add edge. We hereby confess our crush on Michaela Watkins.

Watchmen (HBO) is a masterpiece of television. We were skeptical of the producers' intent to extend the mythology of the landmark 1986 graphic novel, but they delivered. A layered, rich tapestry of characters grappling with race and power, boosted by genius plotting and slick style. Not a single misstep.

Will and Grace (NBC) is a throwback sitcom driven more by sharp one-liners than characters that resemble real people, especially when it comes to the absurdity of Jack and Karen. They almost seem to belong in another, totally nuts show.  Even so, we find it hilarious.

Young Sheldon (CBS) is far more nuanced than The Big Bang Theory, the overrated set-up/joke, set-up/joke show that spawned it.  It would work if it didn't feature the Sheldon character, though it probably wouldn't be as popular. Bonus points: Annie Potts and Wallace Shawn.

We sampled 911: Lone Star, All Rise, Carol's Second Act, The Masked Singer, and Single Parents. One episode was enough.

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On the Enduring Mediocrity of the Dallas Cowboys

On January 28, 1996, your Dallas Cowboys beat the Pittsburgh Steelers 27-17 in Super Bowl XXX.  Since that day, this so-called "America's Team" of missed opportunities, lost seasons, and unearned hype has never advanced past the Divisional round of the NFL playoffs.  Not once.

There are 31 other teams in the NFL, many of whom since January 1996 have experienced considerable (and consistent) post-season success while all the while the Cowboys shuffled along on reputation alone, often entering seasons with high Super Bowl expectations - often pushed by the snake-oil salesmanship of Jerry Jones, the only General Manager in the NFL who will never be fired by his Owner boss no matter how crappy his team performs - that fans foolishly fell for time and time again. We're like Charlie Brown goaded by Jerry-as-Lucy into kicking that ball just one more time, hearing assurances that this time it's going to be different, only to have it yanked away yet again.  The Dallas Cowboys have languished under a variety of head coach misfires: no-name, clueless folks like Chan Gailey and Dave Campo; supposed geniuses who consistently showed a lack of necessary fire and grit like Jason Garrett and Wade Phillips; and one Hall of Fame coach in Bill Parcells who did the best with what he had but (understandably) finally just gave up.  Some of those seasons were disasters, a few were surprisingly successful, but all ended with playoff flameouts and ultimately squandered the talents of Pro Bowl players like Tony Romo, DeMarco Murray, Jason Witten, Dez Bryant, and Demarcus Ware.

On the eve of what we hope will be the unceremonious ejection of Jason Garrett, who should have been fired years ago, let's look at the other teams that have found ways since 1996 to string together wins and devise game plans good enough to beat other good teams consistently enough to advance in the playoffs and contend for Super Bowl titles.

Let's first remember the teams who have won the Super Bowl and hoisted the shiny Lombardi Trophy. Since January 1996...

The Baltimore Ravens have won two Super Bowls*
The Denver Broncos have won three (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Green Bay Packers have won two Super Bowls*
The Indianapolis Colts have won one (and lost one) Super Bowl
The Los Angeles Rams have won one (and lost two) Super Bowls
The New Orleans Saints have won one Super Bowl*
The New England Patriots - as we all know - have won six (and lost three) Super Bowls*
The New York Giants have won two (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Philadelphia Eagles have won one (and lost one) Super Bowls*
The Pittsburgh Steelers have won two (and lost one) Super Bowls
The Seattle Seahawks have won one (and lost two) Super Bowls*
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have won one Super Bowl

Wow.  That's a long list (parity!) with zero mention of Dallas.  These twelve teams out of 32 represents 38% of all NFL teams.

Now let's look at the teams that made it to the Super Bowl (which means they won their conference) since 1996 but didn't win...

The Arizona Cardinals lost one Super Bowl
The Atlanta Falcons lost two Super Bowls
The Carolina Panthers lost two Super Bowls
The Chicago Bears lost one Super Bowl
The Oakland Raiders lost one Super Bowl
The San Francisco 49ers lost one Super Bowl*
The Tennessee Titans lost one Super Bowl*

Now if you add the 12 winners with these 7 losers, you end up with 19 NFL teams that got all the way through the playoffs to appear in a Super Bowl.  Nineteen teams that each had a chance at football glory.  Now we're up to 60% of all of the 32 teams.  

Still no Dallas Cowboys.

Okay, so let's look at the teams that - since 1996 - got to their conference title game but lost.  These are the franchises that were just one win away (or, even worse, one play away) from the Super Bowl.

The Jacksonville Jaguars lost the 2017 AFC title game
The Kansas City Chiefs lost the 2018 AFC title game*
The Minnesota Vikings lost the 2017 NFC title game*
The New York Jets lost the 2010 AFC title game

At this point we are up to 23 NFL teams that - since 1996 - have all advanced to at least their conference title game, if not the Super Bowl.  That's 72% of the NFL.  Still no Cowboys.  At this point, the law of averages should give the Cowboys help, but chance has nothing on poor decision-making of the Cowboy front office.

In fact, at this point in this study all we're left with is a collection of consistently going-nowhere NFL franchises that since 1996 either lost in the Wild Card round or in the Divisional round.  These teams never got close to the conference title games, much less the Super Bowl.  It is amid these dead-end teams that we finally find the supposedly proud, legendary, fierce Dallas Cowboys.

Below is a rundown of when these teams most recently made a playoff appearances.

The Buffalo Bills lost a Wild Card game in 2017*
The Cincinnati Bengals lost a Wild Card game in 2015
The Cleveland Browns lost a Wild Card game in 2002
The Dallas Cowboys lost a Divisional game in 2018
The Detroit Lions lost a Wild Card game in 2016
The Houston Texans lost a Wild Card game in 2018*
The Los Angeles Chargers lost a Divisional game in 2018
The Miami Dolphins lost a Wild Card game in 2016
The Washington Redskins lost a Wild Card game in 2015

What unwelcome company.  But this is where Cowboys fans find themselves.

Do we think a new coach will help change the fortunes of the Dallas Cowboys?  We hope so, but we doubt it.  It's more than just the curious game day intransigence of Garrett - it's the culture of the organization, which means it's the culture of Jones and the way he makes decisions based on PR rather than Xs and Os (he pushed hard to draft Johnny Manziel in the first round!), the way he undermines his coaches at every turn (always with the postgame interviews! why?) thereby spoiling discipline, the way he spends more time on big picture NFL and Cowboy strategies that he can't possibly focus on the day-to-day needs of the club, the way he so hypes and spins the Cowboys that players can't help but develop big egos and baseless entitlement, the way he stubbornly clings to bad ideas and decisions at the risk of admitting his own errors.  Anyone who tunes into Dallas sports radio can see the problems.  Until Jerry is gone, the Cowboys will not succeed.

* These teams - unlike the Dallas Cowboys - made the 2019-20 playoffs so their place in this list could change.

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Knee-jerk review: "Knives Out"

1. Really, really good.
2. If you want to know what it looks like when an actor truly relishes a role and can't hide how much fun he's having, take a look at Daniel Craig here playing Southern-fried Detective Benoit Blanc.  (What a name!)
3. Memorable characters, clever pretzel plotting, hilarious moments.  Writer-director Rian Johnson, so unfairly attacked for The Last Jedi, proves without a doubt that he has chops.  (If you haven't seen it, take a look also at his time travel thriller Looper.)
4. We don't claim to be Agatha Christie experts, but this movie is steeped in Christie-an tropes (wealthy patriarch - played by Christopher Plummer - dies unexpectedly; all of his upper-crust relatives have a motive; the suspects all gathered for questioning in a drawing room by a quirky detective; a death that isn't nearly as simple as it first seems).
5. But Johnson wisely turns some of those Agatha Christie expectations on their head, such as suggesting Blanc maybe isn't as brilliant as his New Yorker profile makes it look or by delivering a death that is inexplicably equal parts premeditated murder and tragic mistake.
6. "What is this, CSI KFC?"
7. It's a standout cast, but Toni Collette is particularly entertaining as Plummer's greedy daughter-in-law, a passive-aggressive lifestyle influencer.  We think she's doing a Gwyneth Paltrow impression.
8. The central location - Plummer's sprawling Gothic mansion - is practically a character unto itself.  As a bestselling Christie-like author, Plummer's character has filled his house with all kinds of strange knick-knacks, not the least of which is a giant wall decoration of knives in all shapes and sizes.
9. Captain America himself, Chris Evans, does a fun heel turn.
10. It's a donut inside a donut, you see.  Hilarious.
11. Ana de Armas carries the movie as the kind nurse to Plummer's patriarch, but we had a hard time zeroing in how this whole experience was affecting her.  Typically, the events of the movie somehow change the hero, teach a lesson, and correct some character flaw.  There is a nice moment early on when Ana's meek Marta seems to steel herself to embrace the fight ahead, but that's pretty subtle.  This may just be one of those movies that's more about plot than some big transformation of character; the good characters prove they're incorruptible, the evil characters prove they're irredeemable.
12. Don't miss it.

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Knee-jerk review: "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker"

1. As hard as we tried to go in with zero preconceptions, we did see a few early reviews.  Most of them were negative, so we bought our ticket with pretty low expectations.  It's easy to Google any number of "Why The Rise of Skywalker sucks" articles.

2. Let the record reflect that we were pleasantly surprised.

3. The first half is indeed a jumble, packed too full of plot and fun-but-needless set pieces.  The final hour, however, is mostly satisfying so long as you can swallow some of the movie's bigger twists without getting too hung up on plausibility.

4. The biggest one involves this giant secret fleet of enemy ships hidden in some extra-hidden pocket of the universe, all of them led by the return of the Emperor - last seen plummeting to his apparent death down an energy shaft on the second Death Star at the end of the Return of the Jedi.

5. On one hand, with this big of a turn, it would have been nice (as many have pointed out online) if the last two movies - The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi - had planted the seeds of the Emperor's return so it wasn't such a completely random, out-of-left-field twist.  This new trilogy famously - or infamously - didn't develop a master story plan upfront so they were sort of making it up as they went.

6. That said, let us remind you that George Lucas was also sort of making it up as he went along back in the 1970s.  As Obi-Wan told Luke in his Tatooine hut, Darth Vader was unambiguously not the same person as Luke's dead hero father in A New Hope and that Hoth Base kiss demonstrated that Luke and Leia were clearly not envisioned as secret siblings in The Empire Strikes Back.  Like it or not, this is a thing for Star Wars movies: offering up twists-for-twists' sakes that come of nowhere.

7. The fan backlash to the subversive The Last Jedi was equal parts pathetic and amusing, especially given how everyone complained (rightfully so) that The Force Awakens offered nothing new.

8. J.J. Abrams is not on our short list of great directors, but he usually delivers a few great moments (like that kick-ass lightsaber fight among the crashing waves) and this may be his most satisfying movie overall.  He still can't help his obsession with puzzles (a "Sith Wayfinder" gizmo? seriously?) but at least he mostly sticks the landing.

9. The final scene - as you may have heard - is a strong one. They always say end with a big moment that audiences will walk out of the theater talking about.

10.  This whole bit where the Emperor insists that if you kill him, he wins always seemed like an impossible scenario.  How are the heroes supposed to defeat the villain if righteous, vengeful murder won't work and only somehow gives him more power?  The solution here worked for us.

11. A great surprise guest appearance. We had something dusty in our eye.

12. The chemistry between Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver remains a central reason this new trilogy works as well as it does.

13. While we don't necessarily agree that this movie wholly rejects and undoes the events of The Last Jedi to appease those vocal fans who hated that movie so much, we also can't help but notice this movie doesn't exactly build on The Last Jedi either.

UPDATE: Upon further review, we foolishly overlooked the central tenet of The Last Jedi - that anyone can wield the Force, not just a few special families, which is why the kid with the broom at the end of The Last Jedi was so unusual.  The reveal about Rey's family in The Rise of Skywalker completely undermines that notion - it's a fun twist and it works well for her character, but it ignores the whole point of the kid with the broom.  Also, The Last Jedi worked hard to suggest that the myth of Luke Skywalker could be more powerful than Luke himself in inspiring hope and sparking a larger rebellion across the galaxy.  Cut to The Rise of Skywalker and the realization that our ragtag Resistance is still just as ragtag as when we last saw them.  Seems like the myth of Luke didn't really pan out the way The Last Jedi suggested - no one's stepped up to join the fight.  The more we think about it, the more irritating these choices are.  Did Abrams and Disney really bend to the demands of the vocal minority that whined and pouted about The Last Jedi?  Pathetic.

14. Sidelining the Rose character and leaving her completely out of the action seems particularly cruel.  Especially since she was set up as a possible romantic interest for Finn and in The Last Jedi and now in this movie Finn gets another, new girlfriend.

15. Funny how in this universe data transfer requires big bulky cables.  Apparently there is no wireless networking in a galaxy far, far away.

16. It's good to see Billy Dee Williams, of course, but Lando is completely superfluous.  That he's hanging out on some random planet our heroes happen to visit is pretty silly.  Also weird that the movie suggests Lando is the long-lost father to some random new character.

17. Also completely contrived and forced: the identity of the rebel mole inside the First Order.  This may be the one moment where we rolled our eyes.  We didn't buy it. 

18. Loved the twist with the forbidden Sith language and C3P0, but the cheesy inscribed Sith dagger business belongs in an Indiana Jones movie.  It's a ripoff of the Staff of Ra.

19. We've read online that a good number of plot points and backstory for this movie can only be found in comic books and other supplemental material.  If that's true, then we call foul.  Movies need to stand on their own without audiences needing to go to other media to fill in narrative gaps.

20. Dig Rey's new yellow lightsaber.

21. Is there anyone who sees this movie that might not know about the tragic death of Carrie Fisher?  The Leia scenes work as well as they can, we suppose, but we completely agree with the online comment we saw that said her scenes feel like the Steve Martin movie Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid where Martin was spliced into old movies and his dialogue awkwardly written to work with whatever old footage they were using. It looks like a conversation between him and the older footage, but it never feels exactly natural.

22. Weird that we never get to hear the broadcast that the Emperor sends out to the galaxy announcing his return. UPDATE: we have since learned the message was available to hear on Fortnite. Pardon us while we puke.

23. We mostly didn't mind the frequent last-minute rescues and reversals.  Remember, this is all based in part on those cheesy old Flash Gordon serials of Lucas' youth where the hero was snatched from the jaws of certain death by some pretty cheesy plot contrivances.

24. If you're looking to nitpick and watch the movie with your arms crossed, you're not going to like it.  This is a movie made by committee to maximize box office dollars, rather than the product of a singular creative vision in search of a truly meaningful narrative.
25. Even so, if you go in with an open mind, you'll have a good time.

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