Tag Archives: reviews

The X-Files S11 E10

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“My Struggle IV”

Today marks the end of a journey that I started here at EYG in September 2023. I had just finished watching the five seasons of Twilight Zone and I needed something new to do as a rewatch. Despite being a little intimidated by eleven seasons of episodes, I decided to watch The X-Files, which was one of my favorite shows when it was on TV. Now with just about two months away from two years since starting, I watched the final episode of the series.

The finale was the fourth piece of an over-arching storyline about the Cigarette Smoking Man trying to release an alien virus and cause a planet-wide pandemic. It was a pandemic that we all lived through in the finale of season 10. We started season 11 with taking the results of that episode and having it be a vision Scully saw of the future and part of the idea was this was a chance to stop it. In order to stop it, they needed to find William.

We met William earlier in the season, setting up his powers. We also learn that William is not Mulder’s son, but was created by CSM in a lab. This was a horrible truth that everyone hated.

We are back to trying to find William in the finale and I wonder why Mulder and Scully spent this whole season ignoring this arc and doing all those individual episodes instead.

This episode was basically Mulder chasing after William, trying to catch up with him. There was a lot of running, some driving and so on. Then, Mulder and Scully was too far apart for most of the movie. I liked this much more when they got back together at the end.

Mulder FINALLY shot the CSM. He did not shoot him in the head though. How much of the pain would have been prevented had Mulder just shot him in the head when he first had a chance? CSM was shot in this manner to allow him to pull another “I’m not dead” moment had the show returned. It was finally CSM’s shooting of William (in the head, btw) that pushed Mulder past the point.

Oh, and… did Skinner die? He got run over by CSM? What a bitch way to go out for one of our longest running characters. Jump up on that hood of the other car, Skinner. Skinner did shoot Monica in the head, which I truly appreciated. I never liked that character.

I did enjoy the final scene with Mulder and Scully where she told him that she was pregnant. However, Scully did not seem to react to William’s death in the way that she would have. I know she learned about William’s origin but would that have affected the way she perceived this boy for all of these years? It is nice to have Mulder and Scully together with a possible happy ending.

William returning to life out of the water was a tag that felt like they wanted to continue, but the series needed to be done.

I feel like this is an accomplishment finishing the series after such a long time. I do love David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson because of these characters and this show.

I want to believe.

The X-Files S11 E5, E6, E7

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I watched three more X-Files from season 11, leaving me with just three left to complete the entire series.

“Ghouli”

Episode 5 was a wild ride with Scully receiving a vision in a dream that led her to a case of two girls who seemingly did not know each other who had stabbed each other viciously.

The girls shared the same dream as Scully did, down to the last detail so Mulder and Scully were involved. Turned out that the only connection between the two girls was that they both were girlfriends for a boy named Jackson Van De Kamp.

When Scully and Mulder tried to find the boy, they arrived too late. They found the boy’s parents dead and the boy in his room, an apparent murder-suicide.

Van De Kamp was a name given to Scully a few episodes ago as a possible name used by William, her son. Scully was afraid that the boy who had killed himself was William and she tearfully spoke to his body before setting up a DNA test.

When the body was left alone, it unzipped the body bag and escaped from the morgue.

Turned out this was indeed William and he had some mental powers, specifically mental illusions that allow him to make people see things he wanted, such as himself dead on the floor.

The DOD was in pursuit of both Mulder and Scully and the boy as well. Mulder and Scully tried to find William, protecting him from a group of men trying to capture him. William used his abilities to escape.

The whole Jackson/William thread here created some strong scenes, but I did wonder why Scully thought this was her son. Maybe it was the connection to the visions that he had. She had talked to Jackson’s therapist and she confirmed that Jackson had seen the whole story from the end of season 10, with the virus and the collapse of the earth. Maybe it is just that mother’s feel.

The episode ended with William getting away, but he had approached Scully at a gas station making her see the form of Dr. Pierre Chang from LOST. Just kidding, the actor who played that role was in the episode.

This was a nice episode that left Mulder and Scully with the knowledge that there son was alive.

“Kitten”

We got an episode featuring Skinner, looking back at a time in his youth as he was in Vietnam.

In his platoon, a soldier nicknamed Kitten was accidentally exposed to a mysterious gas and it caused him to murder civilians.

Other members of Skinner’s troupe were being killed off too and Skinner disappeared. Kersh called for Mulder and Scully, expecting them to know what was going on with Skinner. When they did not, they started to investigate what was going on.

This episode featured Haley Joel Osment as the son of Kitten, Osment ended up being the killer as he had set several traps for the other veterans, including his own father.

People were having their teeth falling out in this town too. It is implied that this was because these people were also exposed to the gas. Perhaps in a small dose than what sent Kitten into a murderous rage.

Mulder and Scully seemed to be back on the trust train with Skinner, but he technically never told them about his current situation with CSM, so can they truly trust him?

“Rm9sbG93ZXJz”

What a bizarre episode this was.

The X-Files has had several episodes where they were involved with technology, such as artificial intelligence and typically those have been some of the worst of the episodes. This one is better than some of the other ones, but it all felt really odd.

The automation of all the technology of the episode made me think I was in a Ray Bradbury sci-fi story. I really pictured “April 2026: There Will Come Soft Rains.”

Everything started to go to hell after Mulder did not tip at a fully automated sushi restaurant. Apparently, the technology took this poorly. When Mulder finally tipped on his phone, all the chaos ended.

This episode was told with the minimal amount of dialogue. Both Mulder and Scully had very few lines and only spoke when absolutely needed. It helped create quite the mood of the episode.

It was an episode that spoke to putting aside one’s phones at times and, I guess, to make sure to tip your waitresses (although Mulder finally only tipped 10%).

The Bear S4 E5, E6, E7

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Season four rolls along…

“Replicants”

I had a feeling that something was happening to Sydney’s father when he gave her that call at the beginning of the episode. A heart attack left Sydney shaken and all of us scared for Sydney.

Natalie bringing the baby to the restaurant brought all kinds of feels for everyone involved and there was nearly no other moment that was as sweet as Carmy holding his baby niece for the first time as Natalie left the room.

Neil trying to get as close to the baby as he could was hilarious, as was protective mother Natalie. When Neil asked to hold the baby, Natalie asked him when he last washed his hands. A couple days ago was probably the answer she was expecting.

It was cool to see Luca again. Will Poulter fit right into the cast perfectly after guest starring a couple of years ago.

Rob Reiner returned again to help with the business plan for Ebraheim.

“Sophie”

We get more on Sydney’s father’s heart attack and the episode is really showing how much everyone at The Bear loved her. Claire finds her at the hospital and comforts her as Sydney was waiting for word. The dialogue between them is one of the strengths of this show as everything is done so well.

Sydney’s father is going to recover and the rest of the episode was basically prep for the wedding with Tiff and Frank.


“Bears”

This was the best episode of the season so far and one of my favorite episodes of the entire series. It was the wedding of Tiff and Frank and the party afterwards where all of the family descended on each other.

All you can expect is yet another Berzattos crash and burn, and yet, this turned out to be a wonderful night with some remarkable scenes without the over-the-top drama that one would expect.

I absolutely loved the interactions between Richie and Frank. The tension was thick between them, but they were able to put anything side to help Eva, who was scared about doing a dance with Frank. All I could think of during this scene was “How big is that friggin’ table?” as more and more members of the Berzattos clan, both related and honorary, found their way underneath the table. It turned into a giant “What are you afraid of?” share time to help Eva feel better. I loved this scene even if it felt like there were enough people under the table.

Other awesome moments/scenes:

  • Donna and Sydney talking. Sydney got stuck with Donna as Carmy got taken off. The scene was both wonderfully caring and deeply sad at the same time. Jamie Lee Curtis is a tremendous actor and she conveyed multiple feelings with single looks.
  • The feud between Natalie and Francie went full boar as they yelled at each other but ended the day hugging as friends. Apparently they were a thing at one time.
  • The scene between Uncle Jimmy and Tiff was sweet and dealt with Tiff’s concerns that the divorce with Richie would lose her the Berzattos family.
  • As Carmy hid in the kitchen, Lee (Bob Odenkirk) showed up and they had a deep discussion over everything. The dialogue played it as if they were on the edge through the whole time, but that they both wanted to clear the air.
  • Sydney and Richie dance at the wedding and he asked her about the other thing she wanted to tell him. She said it was a decision she had to make. Richie asked if she had made it and she said she only really had one choice. Not sure what that meant.
  • Stevie, played by John Mulaney, was hilarious through the entire episode. His line about all of the Berzattos attending the wedding was laugh out loud funny.

There was so much wonder here and the amount of chaos was limited to a normal wedding, not a Berzattos meeting.

This was such a great episode.

The X-Files S11 E4

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“The Lost Art of Forehead Sweat”

The fourth episode of season eleven of The X-Files brought another excellent, comedic show that loosed its venom on itself.

What I mean is that this is clearly a parody of the X-Files as a TV program, poking fun at a lot of the tropes of the series.

Our new informant was named Reggie and the episode featured the Mandela Effect (or as Reggie would put it, the Mengele Effect). According to Wikipedia, the Mandela Effect is when “specific false memories can sometimes be shared by a large group of people.”

Besides the parody of the show, the episode also had some pointed comments about both the use of disinformation and Donald Trump. One of the conspiratorial characters, Dr. They, told Mulder that the days of hiding the truth were gone because the truth can be told and nobody will believe it.

There was an alien that Mulder, Scully and Reggie (who claimed that he had been their partner on the X-Files for years- which included a theme song for the show including his picture) met at the end. This alien spoke lines directly from Trump, talking about building a beautiful wall (invisible), around the galaxy because earth was not sending its best people into space. The Trump effect was in full swing with this episode.

There were clips from previous episodes of The X-Files with Reggie superimposed in them to illustrate his point. Episodes included “Home,” “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose,” and “Small Potatoes” to name a few.

The whole parallel universe argument that Mulder was making was really funny, as was Mulder’s own frustration on how silly the parallel universe argument was. When Mulder threw his pencil across the room in a fit of frustration, it was just hilarious.

The X-Files could do silly as well as any show and this was a very good example of that.

What We Do in the Shadows Season Two

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I decided that, since the show What We Do in the Shadow had ten episodes each around 24 minutes, it would be a good idea to go ahead and binge these seasons instead of spreading it out. I will be finishing the X-Files soon and my goal is to run through this total series before school starts again.

So I started the season two this morning and went through it. I think the second season was tremendous, and I think I liked it even more than I did season one.

There were some awesome guest stars/cameos during the season. This included an amazing performance from Mark Hammil, plus Benedict Wong, Haley Joel Osment, Craig Robinson, Greta Lee, James Frain, and Lucy Punch.

Some of the fish out of water things that the show threw Laszlo, Nadja and Nandor into some of the oddest situations. They had to attend a “Superb Owl” party at a neighbor’s house which was actually a Super Bowl party. They had to figure out their own laundry after Guillermo left them. The email curse, which everyone knows is BS, caused them massive concern. Colin Robinson’ promotion which led to his great power.

The show brought us a zombie (Haley Joel Osment who is killed by Guillermo accidentally), witches, ghosts (in a very clever episode), Black Peter- a talking goat and, of course, other vampires. There were vampire slayers too, or at least, a group of vampire slayer-wannabees, who get crushed by a house of vampires.

The story of Guillermo being a descendent of Van Helsing is a major driving force of story this year, as is Guillermo’s desire to be appreciated by his master. We see how vital Guillermo is to this group, even if they still do not necessarily see it. Even when Guillermo saved them from the Vampire Council by killing all of them, all Nandor could think of what his laundry.

Mark Hamill’s appearance as Jim the Vampire was so great and led to a solo story for Laszlo, who ran away from Jim the Vampire and hid out in Pennsylvania as a bartender named Jackie Daytona. Laszlo is able to hide his identity by having a toothpick in his mouth. This was a hilarious episode and one of the standout episodes of the season.

This was a great way to watch this season and I will continue to pick days to binge the remainder of the seasons of this show over the next six weeks or so before school. I have seasons 3 – 6 remaining, each season (except 6) have ten episodes.

The X-Files S10 E5, E6 & S11 E1

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I wrapped up season 10 and then I had to start season because of the cliffhanger they left us with.

“Babylon”

Homeland meets Californication.

The X-Files had a Muslim terrorist angle that did not put a very positive face on it. It had a definite feel of islamophobia to it as the terrorist organization they were pursuing was Muslim.

It seemed as if the episode was as interested in introducing mirror images of Mulder and Scully. We meet Agent Miller (Robbie Amell) and Agent Einstein (Lauren Ambrose). They were younger examples of Mulder and Scully. Miller was a believer in the paranormal and the weird aspects of the world and Einstein was a scientist who was a skeptic. She was even a red head.

At first it felt like they were just a joke, but they actually turn into characters that would play an important role in the next episode.

The bizarre hallucinations Mulder underwent (thanks to a placebo, apparently) were strange and included the Lone Gunmen (RIP).

“My Struggle II”

Why will they not just shoot him in the head?

I was just screaming at the TV again when Cigarette Smoking Man showed up, not dead again, and plotting to expose the world to a deadly alien virus. Mulder had a gun on him again and just refuses to shoot him in the head. Why won’t he shoot him in the head? Everything can be over if he would just shoot him in the head… several times. Empty the gun.

We get an apocalyptic episode where the world is going to hell and Scully and Einstein race against time to try and find the cure for the virus. Meanwhile, Mulder is confronting CSM and NOT SHOOTING HIM IN THE HEAD!!!!

This episode did feel like a mess and wound up leaving on an insane cliffhanger. It was advertised as “This is the End” and it sure felt like it.

The show did bring back Monica Reyes and put her with CSM, which allowed me to freely hate her instead of trying to like her as I did in season 8 and 9.

“My Struggle III”

Nevermind.

Oh, that ending to season 10…. well, that was just a possible vision that Scully was having. Wink wink.

I wonder how much of the dislike for season 10 episode 6 there was in the world led to this changing of mythology in season 11.

I do not think that the revelation at the end of the episode would change the negative thoughts though as it was revealed that William was not Mulder’s son, but that he was artificially inseminated by CSM and that he was the father of Scully’s baby. Not sure why anyone would think that would be a well received idea.

It was hinted that William was the one sending these visions to Scully, which make little sense, but it definitely kicks off the storyline of finding William for season 11.

Oh, and Skinner won’t shoot CSM in the head either. Why don’t they just SHOOT HIM IN THE HEAD? They have the opportunity to d it. Who would blame them. He is believed to be dead anyway. JUST DO IT!!!!

Oh and Jeffrey Spender is back this episode, but looking a lot better than he did the last time we saw him. Did it cost too much for the make up?

Squid Game Season 3

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Squid Game Season Three dropped on Netflix yesterday and I was able to binge it on Saturday and what an emotionally ragged trip this show took us on over the last six episodes of the acclaimed Korean series.

If we are really being truthful, season three of Squid Game really should be considered the second part of season two, as season two left us with a huge cliffhanger and very little to nothing resolved. Season Two Part 2 or Season Three is really semantics, so who cares that much?

Season two had spent a lot of time building the characters participating in the Squid Game up, so we had connections to them and that we cared about them (or despised them, as the case may be). I guess we should have known that they were building up these characters in order to rip our hearts out in the last season… because that is exactly what happened.

Honestly, there were a few characters that I believed would survive this season because I couldn’t believe that the show would be that cold hearted. Unfortunately, the show could be that cold hearted because practically every character that I thought “no way do they kill them off” got killed off.

Seong Gi-hun (played by Lee Jung-jae) was the one I was sure would survive, but the show had a fate for him planned out. He was truly our hero of the show and he showed what an honorable man he actually was. His efforts to save the baby, as well as others along the way, made him the show’s breakout character.

Geum-ja was another character that I thought for sure the show would not kill off, and then she hanged herself, after stabbing her own son to prevent him from killing Kim Jun-hee moments after she had given birth. That round of hide and seek was just horrific and filled with tension and anguish. Hyun-ju was another who I was sure had a great chance of being safe, but she did not make it out of the hide and seek, despite the fact that she found the exit before anyone else. She returned to get Geum-ja and Kim Jun-hee, whom had been together the whole game, only to get killed from behind by Myung-gi, right in front of Jun-hee and his daughter.

The jump rope section was also just rough and showed the worst in the players of this game. In fact, the worst of them kept making it through and the characters that I cared about kept getting killed off. I felt satisfied by the end with the deaths of those rotten players though.

However, the VIPs arrived to watch the games and they all had zero accountability at all. Man, I really wanted those VIPs to pay some kind of price for their cavalier attitude toward the games and their downright cruelty and wickedness. Nope, they see the ending of the games when Seong Gi-hun threw himself off the large pillar to save the baby and the VIPs are just never seen again. I really wanted someone to burst into the room and blast them all with some automatic weapon.

Who would guess that Cate Blanchett would be involved in the recruiting for more Squid Games in the world? She made a cameo as an American recruiter playing ddakji with some guy in an alleyway.

The last ten-fifteen minutes was spent wrapping stories up, giving us some ideas on what the few surviving characters were doing, specifically those secondary characters, such as Seong Gi-hun’s daughter.

This was a rough final season as so many of the characters that we had bonded with are killed rapidly. As I said, I really wanted more of a final ending that does not make me think that the Squid Games could be brought back or continue on as the show outright implied. The VIPs needed some kind of comeuppance for me to feel completely satisfied. The sacrifice made by Seong Gi-hun was beautiful and packed an emotional wallop.

A powerhouse of a series.

Until Dawn

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June 26

I have been waiting for this movie to drop price on Fandango at Home before I purchased it. Then, just before the June Swoon is getting read to conclude (four days remaining) Until Dawn went on sale.

After watching it, Until Dawn was not on sale enough.

Based on a 2015 video game, Until Dawn is a survival horror film with a million jump scares and a bunch of horror tropes and cliches.

According to IMDB, “One year after her sister Melanie mysteriously disappeared, Clover and her friends head into the remote valley where she vanished in search of answers. Exploring an abandoned visitor center, they find themselves stalked by a masked killer and horrifically murdered one by one…only to wake up and find themselves back at the beginning of the same evening. Trapped in the valley, they’re forced to relive the night again and again – only each time the killer threat is different, each more terrifying than the last. Hope dwindling, the group soon realizes they have a limited number of deaths left, and the only way to escape is to survive until dawn.“

I couldn’t care any less about these characters. Because I couldn’t care less about them, I was bored as the jeopardy surrounded them. The film was chocked full of jump scares but none of them were anything but your typical jump scare. There as little thought behind them.

The concept itself had some possibility, but it also removed most of the drama, since we knew they would basically return at the end of the night. How did this work? No idea.

And the biggest crime here is that the killings were so dull, I am having trouble remembering any of them. Maybe the film just never grabbed my attention.

I did not like this one and I am glad I did not go to the theater to see it.

2 stars

Ironheart E1, E2, E3

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Riri Williams returned from her appearance in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever to her own Disney + series. Six episodes total, three debuting this week and then concluding next week.

I find that a strange release schedule. After watching the first three episodes, I think this was interesting enough to spread the release out more than two weeks.

Riri winds up in a heist crew to make money after she was expelled from MIT. The crew was led by Parker Robbins, aka The Hood (Anthony Ramos). The Hood has a magical cape that gives him a variety of powers. Anthony Ramos is awesome and brought some serious chops to the show. He was especially great in episode three.

Where did he get this magical cape/hood? In the comics, this is tied to Mephisto, but will he actually make his long awaited appearance in the MCU? It seemed for sure that Mephisto was involved in WandaVision, but never arrived. There have been rumors that Mephisto would be showing up in this series, but, again with all the rumors during WandaVision, I’ll need to see Mephisto before I believe it. Mephisto was named dropped in Agatha All Along so I guess we’ll see.

Dominique Thorne is really great as Riri. The show is giving us an intriguing relationship between Riri and her AI N.A.T.A.L.I.E., based on her best friend who died in a violent shootout along with Riri’s step dad, Gary. There are questions about the AI but I really enjoyed this dynamic between these actresses. Lyric Ross played Natalie.

Alden Ehrenreich was great too as Joe McGillicuddy, who is revealed in episode three as being the son of Obadiah Stane, aka Iron Monger from the first MCU movie, Iron Man. I liked this little twist (and it was funny to have Stane’s ashes in a Ziplock bag in Joe’s kitchen).

These episodes were quite long, in comparison to some other MCU Disney + shows. Episode three was 50+ minutes long. I like that a lot more than those short 30-35 minute shows.

I liked what I saw so far. I expect next week to bring the goods even more as each episode got a little bit better this week. Episode three was definitely the strongest so far.

The Friend

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June 21

The second film of the June Swoon today was one I rented off Fandango at Home and I rented it because they had Bill Murray on the cover and had a decent Rotten Tomatoes score. We are under ten days now left in the June Swoon and the 2025 movies have been tough to find to watch.

According to IMDB, “Novelist and creative writing teacher Iris (Naomi Watts) finds her comfortable, solitary New York life thrown into disarray after her closest friend and mentor (Bill Murray) commits suicide and bequeaths his beloved Great Dane to her. The regal yet intractable beast, named Apollo, immediately creates problems for Iris, from furniture destruction to eviction notices, as well as more existential ones, his looming presence constantly reminding her of her friend’s choice to take his own life. Yet as Iris finds herself unexpectedly bonding to the animal, she begins to come to terms with her past, her lost friend, and her own creative inner life.“

I had no idea what this movie was about. I did not know that this was going to be a story about a girl and her dog. I’ve never been a big fan of dog movies that try to tug on the heartstrings. However, this added more to the story than just the dog. The story of Walter (Bill Murray) having committed suicide and how that affected the people around him was very interesting for me.

Naomi Watts is always great. There could have been more Bill Murray for my tastes, but I understand why that is the case with the story.

I am not a dog person, but this was a nice film. I liked the balance between the guilt and sadness of one aspect of the story and the bonding between a very charismatic dog and a human.

3 stars

The Surrender

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June 20

So I did a second Shudder movie this morning for the June Swoon. It seemed like a good double feature with In a Violent Nature, and the fact that I am going to 28 Years Later this afternoon. The Surrender fit nicely into the schedule.

According to IMDB, “When the family patriarch dies, a grieving mother and daughter risk their lives to perform a brutal resurrection ritual and bring him back from the dead.“

Colby Minifie (who plays Ashley on The Boys) starred as Megan, whose mother Barbara (Kate Burton) was helping her ailing husband Robert (Vaughn Armstrong). Robert was stricken with cancer and was in terrible shape, in pain and agony.

Colby Minifie and Kate Burton did a tremendous job together in this film, which was, at times, very difficult to watch. Their performances stood out among the best parts of the film.

In fact, I would say the first two acts of this movie were excellent. There was deep issues between the mother and daughter and the grief over what was happening to Robert, as well as his ultimate fate, were creating high levels of stress and anxiety.

However, the third act of this movie really went off the rails. The first two acts dealt with the difficulty of caring for a loved one who was desperately sick and dying and another act handled the relationship between the family members. However, it is when the supernatural things start to happen that the film ceases to work. The character development that was alive in the first two acts of the film really take a back seat to the body horror or scary circumstances that are nowhere near as intense.

With the arrival of The Man (Neil Sandilands), the film still is working because of the uncertainty and the mysterious nature of everything that he is doing with the grieving wife and daughter. After that, things just get weird and there are no explanations for what happened or why things went as they did.

This started strong but ended with a very disappointing result. I still was impressed with Colby Minifie and Kate Burton and their work in their roles. I just wish they would have been given something better to wrap the story up with.

2.6 stars

The X-Files: I Want to Believe (2008)

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I have started season 10 of The X-Files, with just 15 more episodes to complete my rewatch of the whole series. I have been working on this on and off since late 2023. With the end in sight, I thought it would be a good choice to go ahead an rewatch the second of the X-Files movies that came out in 2008, The X-Files: I Want to Believe.

According to IMDB, “Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) worked at the F.B.I. as partners, a bond between them that led to them becoming lovers. But now they’re out of the F.B.I. and have begun new careers. Scully works as a staff physician at a Catholic hospital. Her focus these days is on a young boy with an incurable brain disease. Administration wants to give up on him. Scully, who feels a special bond with the boy, does not. Meanwhile, Mulder’s focus is on clipping newspaper articles, throwing pencils into his ceiling and writing about the paranormal. Scully and Mulder are brought together as partners again when a special case requires Mulder’s expertise, and Scully is prevailed upon to convince him to help. The case involves a pedophile priest who claims he is having psychic visions regarding the whereabouts of a missing F.B.I. Agent.”

First off, I love the characters of Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. They are some of my all-time favorite TV characters. They are a major selling point for this movie, especially since I am right in continuity of the TV rewatch to where this film would take place. Seeing David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson together once again would improve any movie.

It just does seem that this movie does need that improving. The story in this film is fairly ugly and has moments where it is just not easy to follow. It is convoluted and turns into the weirdest “Frankenstein” type film, seemingly from out of nowhere. The secondary plot of the boy with the disease that Dr. Scully is trying to help despite the administration at the hospital that she works is too medical TV show for a movie like this.

Father Joe (Billy Connolly) is a bizarre choice in many ways, but I do enjoy the conflict that he throws into the mix. As a possible psychic seeing flashes of the kidnapping, that is questionable enough, but when it was revealed that he was a pedophile as well, it was a rough choice. The character is still kind of set up to be the heroic one, which did not go well for Scully and, I would guess, most of the audience. Billy Connolly is an awesome actor though and this was a solid performance.

I do wish this story had a little more construction to it, because what they gave us seemed too strung together without enough connective tissue. Still, I did enjoy seeing my two favorites back together in a movie that would be basically a “monster-of-the-week” structure from the show.

Ultraman: Rising

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June 17

The June Swoon film today sees us head back to animation for a fun tryst into the world of the classic superhero character of Ultraman. Ultraman: Rising brings the character back into the present world of Kaiju fighting and worldwide threats.

The original series of Ultraman debuted in 1966 and there have been many versions of the hero over the decades. This co-production between Tsuburaya Productions, who owns the franchise, and Netflix Animation looks to reintroduce the hero to the world. And with this film, they have done a wonderful job of it.

According to IMDB, “Ken Sato, a superstar baseball player who returns to Japan to become the latest hero to carry the mantle of Ultraman. His plans go awry, however, when he is compelled to raise a newborn kaiju monster the offspring of his greatest enemy as his own child. Sato will also have to contend with his relationship with his estranged father and the schemes of the Kaiju Defense Force.“

Tying this new hero Ken Sato to Japanese baseball is a excellent idea. Shohei Ohtani is a huge draw among the MLB baseball stars worldwide and having Ken Sato in that vein should help connect this to other fans around the globe.

The designs of the characters are great, as they are all awesome to look at and engage the creativity of the viewers’ imaginations.

The CGI/animation works very well too. There is the feel of old school Japanese monster flicks as well as the current day look of a big budget animated movie. The colors are flashy and entertaining.

The story does more than the typical fighting Kaiju story as it wraps itself around the idea of fatherhood and the relationship between father and sibling, both with Ken and his father, but also Ken and Emmy, the baby Kaiju that Ultraman rescues. This is a universal theme to which everyone could relate.

The villains of the KDF are a little underdeveloped. There are some interesting things going on with the KDF, but it is really basic and surface level. There are some deeper ideas available had the film chose to develop them.

Overall, I thought Ultraman: Rising was really solid. I enjoyed the superhero action and they developed the character of Ken Sato very well. This is a fun film on Netflix.

The X-Files S9 E17, E18, E19, E20

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Spoilers

The final season of The X-Files in its original run was season nine. The show returned for two shortened seasons after that, but this was the final four episodes of The X-Files

“Release”

The show is clearly beginning to wrap things up for the original run and one of the dangling mysteries of the last few years was what had actually happened to Agent Doggett’s son. Well, this episode provided some closure to that story as we get the man who had killed him and the reason why the boy was killed. The only piece of the story that was left dangling was the fate of Brad Follmer, as played by Cary Elwes. We learn that Brad has been taking money from the mob and he wound up shooting the actual killer at the end. We never see Elwes again in the series so it is unclear what exactly happened to him.

“Sunshine Days”

Here’s the story, of a lovely lady, who was bringing up three very lovely girls…..

Yeah, this was a weird episode. Of course, Ben Linus was here. That always throws me off somewhat. Michael Emerson is an awesome actor, but he will always be Ben Linus to me. Then, the fascination with the Brady Bunch was a strange choice, right down to naming Emerson’s character Oliver Martin, in reference to Cousin Oliver.

The overall story of this episode was flat and I did not find it very compelling. I did like seeing Ben Linus again.

“The Truth Part 1 and Part 2”

This was the two part series finale, again of the original run of X-Files episodes and saw the return of David Duchovny as Fox Mulder. Duchovny had been gone the entire season and had agreed to return for this final wrap up.

The military had decided to put Mulder on trial for the murder of Knowle Rohrer, the “super soldier” who had been running around, surviving death several times over the last few seasons of the show. Of course, this was all part of the government conspiracy that the show had been investigating for the last nine seasons.

The military trial of Mulder was a sham, of course, as one of the men who sat in judgment was one of the aliens, The Toothpick Man (Alan Dale, also a LOST alum, playing Charles Widmore). These two episodes featured the return of multiple characters from the nine years, including  Marita Covarrubias (Laurie Holden), Gibson Praise (Jeff Gulka) and Jeffrey Spender (Chris Owens), all of whom testified in the trial. We also had a group of ghosts appear to Mulder in visions such as Alex Krycek (Nicholas Lea) and X (Steven Williams) as well as the Lone Gunmen.

Of course, the final return was that of the “Wise Man” who Mulder and Scully go to for answers at the end, and it turned out to be the Cigarette Smoking Man (William B. Davis) himself. Seeing that rotten bastard again did not make things great and neither did seeing him burned to death as I know he returned in the later seasons of the show. I have no idea how he survived this time, but seeing him alive really was a smack to the face.

They dropped a date: December 22, 2012, which is supposedly the date of the alien invasion.

I do not know what was to become of Doggett and Reyes as they drove off into the distance. Reyes has never won my favor in this series, but her final repose after testifying just about won me over. Another plot line that was never dealt with was the supposed feelings that Doggett had for Reyes. A few episodes again, there was a huge deal about how much they loved each other, but it was never mentioned again.

Deputy Director Alvin Kersh was also a bizarre character, as he seemed to be leading the trial against Mulder, going as far as suppressing evidence that proved Mulder innocent. Kersh looked to be fully opposed t Mulder, though he does help Mulder and Scully escape from captivity when Skinner and Doggett break him out. This is yet another character that is unclear of his motives and weakens the story.

Mulder and Scully end up together, snuggling on a bed somewhere, still holding out hope.

I am not sure how I feel about the conclusion of the show. This finale did not really wrap anything up and only served to leave plenty of things dangling or unanswered. Every question does not have to be answered in a finale for me, but it felt as if they brought up a major storyline in the last episode. I know it is dealt with in the future episodes, but we did not know that at the time.

Season ten only has six episodes to it and it will be next.

Magazine Dreams

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June 16

Magazine Dreams was intended to be released originally in 2023, but it was pushed back, and not released until 2025. Part of the reason was said to be because of the writer’s strike, but a big reason was because of the trouble that the movie’s star, Jonathan Majors found himself in.

Jonathan Majors was in a scandal involving his girlfriend at the time who claimed that he physically assaulted her. It led to Majors losing several major projects and jobs in Hollywood, most notably the main villain role in a future Marvel Studios Avengers film.

Pushing this film back makes real sense because it has Majors playing the role of a mentally ill bodybuilder, who while on steroids, was showing violent tendencies and was involved in several scenes featuring assault.

After watching this uncomfortable movie, it makes me all the more sad that Jonathan Majors derailed his career the way he did, because he is spectacular in this role. He was so believable as a man on the very edge of losing it that it felt like he wasn’t just acting. It is so sad that it is going to be difficult to separate real life from this performance in Majors’ situation.

Without any spoilers, I am not sure that the ending worked. I am not sure that the ending was earned, meaning, I don’t think the character’s choice fit with what the film had given us. Still, the fall of this character is developed extremely well.

There felt as if there were too many storylines in the film, none of which truly pays off. I think it could have benefited from a story rewrite, focusing down some of the events that occur. However, Jonathan Majors really does step up his game.

I don’t know what Jonathan Majors’ career holds for him, but he is undeniably a brilliant actor. His performance in Magazine Dreams is top line, but my guess is that a deserved Oscar nomination will not come.

3.6 stars