Fargo S5 E3

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“The Paradox of Intermediate Transactions”

This episode of Fargo was okay, but it felt like a step back from the two episode debut of the new season.

This episode had several moments, such as Roy Tillman, thinking about the missing Dorothy. Dorothy heading to the gun shop to try and pick up some home defenses, while her husband Wayne looked on shockingly. Gator having a spirited confrontation with Deputy Farr.

It felt like it was setting up the next big thing, which feels like it is coming next issue as Gator and his team are using Halloween to take another crack at Dorothy.

It did feel a little lacking this episode, but some of the character development was good in this episode.

There was a weird flashback 500 years before too. Not sure what that was for.

Family Switch

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I regretted starting this movie on Netflix ten minutes in…maybe sooner.

It is Freaky Friday, but with a whole family.

The cast was pretty good featuring Ed Helms, Jennifer Garner, Emma Myers, Brady Noon as the family members and Rita Moreno appeared as Angelica. Sadly, the cast looked to be struggling through the material of this film.

The story was the same as any of these body swap movies. Nothing original here (with the exception of the baby and the dog switching bodies too- but that is just a few scenes).

Some of the situations were just ridiculous. How about a lactose intolerance fart joke? There are just so many instances of this that I can’t even begin to go into the stupid moments.

It is so predictable and I really wanted it to be over.

1.2 stars

The X-Files S2 E1

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“Little Green Men”

The second season of The X-Files started with a solid episode involving the mythology of the series. The X-Files has been shut down at the FBI and Mulder and Scully have been reassigned. Mulder is doing brain-numbing stake-out, listening to tapes.

Mulder is starting to doubt what he had seen. Mulder losing his faith is a theme that has happened a couple of times over the series’ run.

Mulder gets pointed to a outpost where contact has been made from space. There is a frightened Puerto Rican man, Jorge. Jorge runs out during a storm and is killed.

Scully has to try and find where Mulder is, while avoiding the people watching his apartment.

There is a tense scene where we get a glimpse at the first extraterrestrial on the series.

Mulder showed off some awesome combat driving too as he and Scully tried escaping from a military outfit arriving to get rid of the evidence at the site.

It was a cool episode but I want the X-Files at the FBI back.

Moonlighting S2 E15

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“Witness for the Execution”

I remember not being that big of a fan of this episode when it first aired back in the 1980s. It lacked all the bombastic chases scenes and comedy that I had come to expect from an episode of Moonlighting. I was much younger then and, after watching it this morning, I have a much different opinion on “Witness for the Execution.”

A ninety-year old man arrived at the Blue Moon Detective Agency to hire someone to come and witness his own murder. He told Dave and Maddie that he had set up a man to come and shut off his oxygen and he needed an observer to tell the police that it was a murder.

Dave and Maddie argued over the case, of course. Dave said he understood what the man wanted and Maddie said that the company would not take the case and if David wanted to do this, he was on his own.

When David showed up to tell the man that he had changed his mind, he discovered that the man was already dead. David tried to turn the machines back on, thus making it look as if he had been the person who had killed him.

This led to a tense meeting in the parking garage between David and Maddie where David told her that he was leaving, going underground. They shared an unexpected kiss. making the situation even more awkward.

Maddie was able to figure out the truth of the murder in the best piece of observation that she had ever had during the series.

The scene where David told Maddie about the events of what happened was some of the best acting that we have gotten out of Bruce Willis during the series’ run.

Admittedly, there were a few questions I had about the plot that had to happen in order to set this meeting up, especially why David took off in the first place. He believed that he had accidentally killed the man, but that seemed an odd thought considering the situation. However, everything with the case was really secondary and used as a trigger to get to the kiss. Moonlighting was, once again, the relationship between David and Maddie above everything else.

Always, Lola

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I have been a fan of Roxy Striar for years, since she was the host of TV Fights. So when I heard she had such a significant role in a movie, I wanted to see it. It was very much an independent feature and with it finally available on Prime, I rented it.

This was a very fascinating movie. These actors are all new faces except for Striar and Andrew Ghai, who I knew from the Movie Trivia Schmoedown. I think you can see the inexperience from these actors, but they did a decent job.

The film dove deep into the concept of depression and mental illness, dealing with grief and guilt that comes with it. I did like the way they told the story, through flashbacks to when Lola, Roxy Striar’s character, was still alive.

The film had a well written interactions between these characters. There was a weird transition about half way through, but I did like the way the film ended up.

I am very happy for Roxy, getting a role like this and doing such a solid job. There was a lot of emotion and sadness, as well as hope and rebirth. An independent film that gives a clear message.

3.7 stars

Doctor Who Special 2: Wild Blue Yonder

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I am not a long time viewer or fan of Doctor Who. My knowledge of the character and the shows are limited. Last week’s special was fun. This week’s second special, Wild Blue Yonder, was unbelievably awesome.

The Doctor (David Tennant) and Donna (Catherine Tate) crash landed the out-of-control Tardis on a seemingly deserted spaceship at the end of time. The Tardis then dematerialized, sensing a danger, stranding The Doctor and Donna on the ship to face the mystery of what had happened.

I do not want to spoil anything here. Let me just say that this was one of the best science fiction stories I have seen in ages. The cleverness of this episode and the creativity of the situation that The Doctor and Donna found themselves in is steeped in sci-fi history yet provided some much originality and pay off for those who have watched the franchise.

The only thing that I would criticize about this special would be that someone like me who has just come to the franchise now, with a very limited amount of Who knowledge, would not understand as much as those who have watched them all. That is not a bad thing and I do not think it is required viewing to watch this special. I just think that it would have made this a richer experience.

However, I thought the last 25 minutes of this special was just spectacular and I was completely thrilled with the story. The cliffhanger made me ready to see the thrid sepcial next week.

4.6 stars

Candy Cane Lane

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It is Christmastime and that means it is time for some movies that are targeted toward the family and may be sugary sweet and silly.

That is a very good description of the new film on Amazon Prime, Candy Cane Lane, starring Eddie Murphy.

According to IMDB, “A man (Eddie Murphy) is determined to win the neighborhood’s annual Christmas decorating contest. He makes a pact with an elf (Jillian Bell) to help him win–and the elf casts a spell that brings the 12 days of Christmas to life, which brings unexpected chaos to town.”

There is a lot of dumb, holiday fun in this hokey family film. Eddie Murphy is always great and he is in full Christmas mode here. There are actually several moments through this film where the movie avoids those pesky family film clichés. There are tropes that you expect, but he film does not go down the same path.

Jillian Bell is funny as the villainous Pepper. The mini figurines of the others who failed the task was clever. Nick Offerman, Chris Redd, and Robin Thede was fun as these little characters.

There was a lot of dumb in the story too, but I found it inoffensive and cute at times. I think if a family’s looking for a funny film to watch for Christmas, you could do worse than this.

3 stars

Dream Scenario

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We got a new Nic Cage movie released this weekend focusing on celebrity and the potential toxicity that comes along with that. It was called Dream Scenario.

Nic Cage played a college professor named Paul Matthews, a hapless man who is just going through an unremarkable life. Then, one day, he discovered that people were all dreaming about him, people that he did not know. Paul would just walk through the dream like an observer, doing nothing to help the person. It got to the point where real life Paul was feeling guilt over not helping despite the fact that he had zero control over it.

As this phenomenon went viral, Paul started to become well known and in demand. This is, until the dreams he was appearing in began to turn dark and nightmarish. The people who were fascinated by Paul before turned on him quickly, forcing Paul into trying to get through his life.

Nicolas Cage was sensational as Paul, playing completely against his typical character. Paul was frumpy and depressed, unable to understand why things were happening and why people were turning on him considering he had done nothing wrong. You can’t help be feel sorry for Paul considering things were happening that were totally out of his own control.

I really enjoyed this film, but I will say that the ending did not strike as well as I would have liked it. Unfortunately, I can’t talk about that without diving into spoilers. Suffice it to say that I did not love the way the film concluded.

There were some funny scenes of the film, which is listed by A24 as a comedy/horror film. I’m not sure that is an accurate classification, but there are several funny moments. Nicolas Cage does great job bringing this schulb to life, and seeing what happens to him is a warning about the fickleness of pop culture as well as a commentary on cancel culture.

3.8 stars

Picket Fences S3 E6, E7, E8, E9

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The running storyline of the season has been the struggle of race relations and the first of these three episodes is part of that, but then the next two do not include it. The last two go back to the Brian Latham case.

“Elective Conducts”

The Rome mayoral campaign dominates the episode, and Jill faces more controversy as Zack writes a report that included racial stereotypes. When Zack is confronted by a group of black students in the rest room, Zack peed on them in self-defense. It was shocking.

When it came to the mayor’s race, Carter stepped up and became a true challenger in the election. So much so that, when Jill realized that she had no chance, Jill decided to drop out and support him instead.

Ed Lawson wound up winning the election in a 12 vote difference. Ed Lawson is Donald Trump decades before Donald Trump. It is actually a bizarre correlation.

“Rebels with Causes”

This is the crossover episode with David E. Kelley’s other TV show at the time, Chicago Hope. It guest starred Mandy Patinkin as Dr. Jeffrey Geiger, his character from the show.

Douglas Wambaugh collapses as he prepared for the trip to the Supreme Court. Jill believed he had a heart attack, but wanted to take him to Chicago to see a specialist. She then came into major conflict with Dr. Geiger, whose manner and attitudes rubbed her the wrong way.

Turned out that Doug had M.S. and not a heart attack.

There was also a conflict between Jimmy and Kimberly because Kimberly wanted to date Kenny. Jimmy flipped out over the possibility, and, like all things with Picket Fences, there is much deeper truths behind it. Everything here dated back to Jimmy’s infidelity.

One of my favorite moments was very meta in this episode when Jill commented that more people went to the other hospital (meaning the TV show ER which was also set in Chicago).

“May it Please the Court”

Douglas Wambaugh and John Littleton go to Washington to argue the Latham case.

This was an amazing acting episode from both Fyvush Finkel and Don Cheadle. Their passion showed through the great writing of the episode.

The Supreme Court justices are portrayed wonderfully by the group of the actors cast in these roles.

The second storyline going on in this episode was involving Carter. Carter had made an agreement to have a surrogate give birth to his child. When the surrogate decided she could not go through with it, she wanted to abort the baby. Kelly Connell gives a serious performance from a character that is usually used as a joke.

“For Whom the Wind Blows”

The Brian Latham case comes to a close here.

Maxine, Kenny, and John start to believe that Brian Latham was actually innocent. They convinced Judge Bone that he was innocent and that the father was the killer. Bone took to the court to sentence Latham, except, instead, he threw out the conviction stating that the evidence was not enough to convict. He overturned the conviction and set Latham free.

All of this came from Maxine’s hunch that the father had gone to confession to confess that he actually killed his daughter. Father Barrett would not break the seal of confession, but Max could tell from his expression that there was more to this story. Bone went to Father Barrett and asked him whether or not, in his opinion, Brian Latham was guilty. When Father Barrett said that he thought Latham was not guilty, he was implying to Bone what he knew.

The group went after the father, pushing hard for his wife to testify against him, offering immunity.

Then the mother tells the truth on the stand… she had killed the daughter in a fit of rage and the father had just helped cover it up.

Judge Bone had to, once again, skirt the rules as he said the immunity agreement was gone because the mother had committed fraud. In the end, the police got it done, if not with questionable methods.

Jimmy during this whole time started to have doubts if he could handle the position of sheriff any longer. He saw the fire in the eyes of John, Max and Kenny and Jimmy started to believe that he was in the way.

The Brian Latham storyline came to a close here with another shocking twist that Picket Fences was known for.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters S1 E4

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“Parallels and Interiors”

The week that Godzilla Minus One was released in the theaters, what was, in my opinion, the worst episode of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters was dropped on Apple TV.

The episode focused on the lost crew in Alaska, facing off with an ice Titan that consumes heat/fire. It had a LOST feel with flashbacks back to when Kentaro and May met. It paralleled the dangers that they were facing after May got her legs wet in Alaska as they hid from the Titan.

Some of the scenes out in the snow were laughable. When Kentaro went off in his own direction and started to hallucinate, the show just felt as if it went off the rails.

I did like how Shaw, Kentaro, May and Cate were brought to Monarch at the very end of the episode, so I am hoping that next week’s episode picks things up.

The series’ Titans do look great, as did this undefined one.

2023 The Don’t Feed the Trolls: Insane Rage Scandal of the Year

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The internet can be an ugly place. Yes, it has its awesome moments, but it allows some individuals (or groups) rage against things that they do not like. Hence, this award came into being three years ago.

The term “Trolls” has been given to those on the Internet that go out of their way to speak down to something. Previous winners of this award include:

The Don’t Feed the Trolls: Insane Internet Rage Scandal of the Year

Previous Winner:  Baby Yoda eats frog’s eggs (2020), Masters of the Universe: Revelations part one (2021), She-Hulk: Attorney at Law (2022)

Twitter purchased by Elon Musk, becomes X

There are few ends of the internet with as many Trolls than we saw with Twitter. Only billionaire Elon Musk chose to purchase the social media site and immediately made some changes that created an even more toxic environment, enabling the trolls to run wild.

The issues occurring on Twitter even drove millions of people, temporarily, to Threads, a new online community. It was huge for a minute but it could not sustain the momentum.

Then Musk decided that he wanted to put his own stamp on Twitter, so he changed the name to X.

X? Yes, X.

Twitter… errr, I mean… X can still have its moments. Unfortunately, the hate is free as well.

Picket Fences S3 E5

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“Cold Spell”

The final day of the November Picket Fences DailyView Rewatch arrived. I watched today’s episode early this morning before I went to school and now I am doing the final write-up of November. I will continue watching Picket Fences episodes as I am currently in the third season, but it may not necessarily be every day. For the rest of the watch, if I have a day where I have a lot of things scheduled, I will not compel myself to watch an episode. I will absolutely continue to finish up season three and then go through season four of this series. I do love Picket Fences.

This was a tough episode because it started a trend. Ginny was found in her home, dead and inside a freezer. She had been dead for three weeks, according to Carter. It was a shocking death when I first saw the episode back in the 1990s and it was a reminder of how sad it was when one of the original cast was sent off in this manner.

Paul Williams came to Rome playing Ginny’s brother, who was struggling to understand why it took the people of Rome three weeks to realize that Ginny was missing. He never got a good answer to that question but, as Jill said, “Rome does well with funerals” and Ginny’s service was fully attended. Paul Williams sang a version of his classic song, Rainbow Connection in honor of Ginny.

Ed Lawson continued campaigning for mayor as an election was coming up. Carter declared his own candidacy for mayor, to a series of giggles from the crowd. Jill had decided to run last episode to become a duly elected mayor and not just the temporary mayor that she had been.

The other main story featured a Wiccan family whose daughter painted a pentagram on the school walls to protect herself from the fear of the black kids. Littleton was front and center for this, leading the way in trying to get the young girl removed from her mother’s care.

I find it fascinating that Rome, Wisconsin has Wiccan, Christian Scientists, Jews, Mormons and many other religions floating around, but they are shaken by the African Americans coming into the school. If there was any place that should fit in, Rome seems to be it.

Godzilla Minus One

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I love Godzilla. So I was very excited when I saw the trailer for this new Japanese film. Godzilla Minus One is potentially the best Godzilla movie that I have seen.

Godzilla comes from the oceans and attack as a force of nature. This Godzilla is not the “protector” Godzilla as we have been used to over the last few years. This Godzilla is out there as a motiveless devastation.

One of the reasons why this is one of the best Godzilla movies ever is because this film was able to do something that very few (if any) Godzilla films have been able to do: create human characters that are compelling and who I wanted to see.

Fact is many times when the human characters are on the screen in a Godzilla movie, my thought has been, “Get them off the screen, bring up Godzilla.” However, in Godzilla Minus One, the human character are just fantastic. These are characters that I loved and found engaged with every second they were on. Koichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) is amazing and he fills the screen of this film.

Godzilla looked tremendous. The beast looked like a true monster and he was frightening. Watching Godzilla walk his way through the Japanese cities was unbelievable. It also had the feel of old school Godzilla films.

Yes, this is in Japanese, but, as with all really great foreign films, you forget that you are reading the captions and it just becomes part of the story. The score is utterly exceptional and works to enhance the scenes, especially with Godzilla.

The finale of the film is tense and anxious. It has an extremely emotional ending that had some tears forming in my eyes. The story was more than just Godzilla on a rampage and I loved it.

4.8 stars

Year in Review: 2022 movies in 2023

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Every year there are movies that I missed from the previous year or that I watched once the calendar switched from December to January. Those movies I do not consider for the 2023 year end lists even though I watched it in 2023.

This number has increased since I started doing the June Swoon, this year the second annual June Swoon included 30 unseen films from 2022.

Here are the top 12 films that I watched during 2023 that were actually listed as films from 2022.

#12. Good Luck to You, Leo Grande. A fun, sexy romp with Emma Thompson working through some sexual satisfactions with a sex worker. Thompson is always fun and she is great here.

#11. The Pale Blue Eyes. I love Edgar Allan Poe and seeing this film provide one of the best versions of the author ever on screen. Plus, Christian Bale.

#10. Honor Society. One of the biggest surprises of the year. A film that I never thought I would enjoy turned out to be really funny and a bit of an unexpected shock at the end. Featured Angourie Rice and Gaten Matarazzo.

#9. On the Count of Three. Two friends decide that life is not worth living and they agreed to kill each other after a last day taking care of loose ends. Dark comedy at its best.

#8. Brian & Charles. Brian invents a robot named Charles out of a washing machine. This is a top notch British (Wales actually) comedy and it very funny.

#7. Decision to Leave. Epic Korean film where a detective investigating a man’s death ends up developing feelings for the man’s widow. Story is very smart and well designed.

#6. The Duke. Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren are an old couple whose marriage was strained by life. Broadbent ends up stealing a valuable painting, holding it for ransom.

#5. A Man Called Otto. Tom Hanks is a grumpy man who is preparing to commit suicide but a new neighbor throws a wrench into his plans and his life.

#4. Breaking. John Boyega is a Marine Corps veteran who holds a bank hostage. Based on a true story, Boyega does an amazing job in this portrayal.

#3. Women Talking. A film about women talking does not sound that compelling. It absolutely is. A religious community is shocked to find out the secret being kept by the men.

#2. To Leslie. Andrea Riseborough received an Oscar nomination out of nowhere for this role and, after watching the movie, I can see why. She was amazing and Marc Maron was very good too.

#1. Living. Bill Nighy is unbelievable in this movie as a man who receives some bad news and it changes his life and the lives of many people around him because of his choices. This was such a great film with an Oscar-worthy performance from Nighy.

Picket Fences S3 E4

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“Enemy Lines”

After trying to stop the bused Green Bay kids from coming to Rome, Wisconsin, Jill Brock, as one of the co-mayors, had to face the consequences of her actions as Judge Nance, played by Paul Winfield, marched into her office and placed her under arrest for contempt of a federal order.

He placed Jill in a jail cell and made noise that she was going to be the one that he made an example out of.

Nance took the time to come and see Jill and the pair of them spent most of the episode engaging verbally with each other. Both gave some great performances in the small jail cell. We learned about the motive of Nance, who had clearly had something driving him to be as desperate as he had been.

Meanwhile, John was struggling with the new normal of Rome, a town that suddenly felt less welcoming than it had before for the D.A. He even tried to get taken off the case heading to the Supreme Court, but Judge Bone would not recuse him.

Kimberly and one of the new black girls from Green Bay got into it as well. I remember these two becoming friends, but their start was extremely shaky. Kimberly was nervous and the other girl, named Aisha, picked up on it immediately, which led to a fight between them.

This was a decent episode, but honestly, some of the discussion between Nance and Jill felt forced. It was the typical Picket Fences fight that had its origins in other traumas. Here it turned out that Nance was dying of liver cancer and he was trying to fix race relations before he died. I’m also not certain that the inclusion of the story about his son made sense when they were including it. Winfield delivered it well, but I’m not sure it worked.