4k-UHD/Movie Review: Resident Evil: The Final Chapter

 

This is the final entry in the six-movie action-horror zombie apocalypse film franchise adapted from the Resident Evil video games, starring Milla Jovovich, which spanned 14 years from 2002 to 2016. This one was directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, Jovovich's husband who has produced and/or directed pretty much every movie in the franchise. 

This movie is set a few weeks after the events of Retribution and sees Shawn Roberts, Ian Glen, and Ali Larter return to reprise their various characters. Alice (Jovovich) is told by the Red Queen (played by her daughter Ever) that she must return to Racoon City to release an airborne Anti-Virus that will kill everyone infected with the T-Virus (so all the zombies). She learns the origins of the T-Virus and what it was originally intended to do and tries to take out the rest of the Umbrella Corporation.  The big addition to the cast in this movie is Ruby Rose, who plays one of the characters who joins in the attack on The Hive in Racoon City.

The 4k set is a two-disc set with one UHD disc, which just contains the movie and one regular blu-ray which has all of the extras. The extras include an option to play the movie in "Retaliation Mode" which basically has cutaways to Anderson and Jovovich providing commentary on specific scenes, then there are three featurettes, one on the stunts in the movie, one on the female characters, and one on The Hive. Then there are trailers for other movies. What was included is good, but there is not an extensive amount of behind-the-scenes material. Jovovich is always good on commentary tracks and she is again entertaining in the Retribution Mode clips. 

By now, anyone interested in this knows what the movies are and what they are not. They are very good action/suspense/horror movies, and they definitely stay in that lane. Jovovich does a great job playing the lead, and she definitely walks a fine line between taking the role seriously without taking herself or the story too seriously. So, if you liked the other movies then this one is worth watching. If you have not been a fan of the other movies, then this one will probably not do much for you.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Get Out

 

Get Out is a 2017 suspense-thriller with a little bit of horror movie mixed in that was written and directed by Jordan Peele (in his directorial debut). It stars Daniel Kaluuya as Chris Washington, a photographer from New York who is in an interracial relationship with Allison William's character, Rose Armitage. Rose convinces Chris to travel to upstate NY to meet her parents, played by Bradley Whitford and Catherine Kenner. While surrounded by many wealthy white people, Chris notices the strange behavior of the handful of black people in town, which becomes more and more bizarre. Chris suspects something strange is going on and enlists the help of his best friend, Rod, played by Lil Rel Howery, to figure out the possible conspiracy.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is very good. Although there is not a ton of CGI in the movie, what is there looks seamless with the practical sets, and the cinematography looks wonderful. The bonus features include a very good commentary track on the movie by Peele, who offers a lot of insight into the process of making the movie. Then there are 23 minutes of deleted and extended scenes, an alternate ending, a nine-minute making-of featurette, and a four-minute Q&A session with Peele. 

Overall, the movie is very good and very original. It definitely borrows from some horror movie themes, but it is not derivative of anything else that has been made lately. Basically, it is a horror movie in which racism and oppression are the monster. Of course, there will be some nut-jobs out there (basically the MAGATs of the world and their snowflake ilk) that will claim the movie is saying that all white people are bad, which is not at all the case, and some will automatically hate it because of the thought of a white woman dating a black man. The movie is basically a metaphor for the very real history of race relations throughout the course of history, and for the passive-aggressive racism that exists to this day. It is well-written and very well-acted and is definitely worth checking out.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Inferno

 

Inferno is the third movie in the adaptations of Dan Brown's novels based on the character of Robert Langdon (played in the movies by Tom Hanks). The movies are a bit interconnected, but mostly stand-alone stories, so this is somewhat of a sequel to the movies The Davinci Code and Angels and Demons, but you do not have to have seen those movies to follow most of what is going on in this one. The big thing you will miss if you have not seen the other movies is the development of the Langdon character because this movie pretty much just jumps into the story.

The main plot of this movie involves a plot by a billionaire scientist named Bertrand Zobrist (played by Ben Foster) to solve the world's overpopulation issue. Langdon wakes up in a hospital with no memory of the past few days and is immediately targeted by an assassin. With the help of his doctor, Sienna Brooks, played by Felicity Jones (probably best known for her role in Rogue One), he escapes and discovers he has clues to the plot, which points to some mass murder event and is based on Dante's Inferno (hence the title of the book). From there, as in the first two movies, the plot involves Langdon solving clues that point to even more clues, with a lot of twists and turns along the way.

For those who get the Blu-Ray, the movie looks and sounds great in the HD format (with a lot of great location shots from where the movie was filmed), and has a decent amount of extras. Those include over 27 minutes of deleted and extended scenes, short featurettes on each of the main characters, a featurette on the filming locations, and a director journal, which is basically 10 minutes of behind-the-scenes footage following Ron Howard around and interspersing his comments. Then there is a featurette on the darker imagery from the movie and some trailers for other movies.

Overall, the movie is good, but probably not as good as the first two movies. The movie does adapt the book well, but like with the first two installments, there are definitely changes made. It seems more and more likely that this movie will be the last of the novel adaptations with Howard and Hanks at the helm, despite there being two other Langdon novels that could be turned into movies. In general, I would say if you enjoyed the first two movies you will probably enjoy this one, although maybe not as much. On the other hand, if you did not like the first couple of movies, this may not do much for you. That is, of course, unless the only reason you did not like the first two movies was because of the religious tones, but in that case, you are probably not ever going to watch this anyway. 

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Mr. Robot: Season 2

 

Season two of Mr. Robot continues the strange trip that is the story of Elliot and fsociety versus E-Corp (or Evil Corp as the characters refer to it). Season two is set months down the line from the successful hack of E-Corp. Elliot, now knowing that Mr. Robot (played by Christian Slater) is really his dead father that he has been hallucinating is staying with his mother and trying to get rid of Mr. Robot, only to fight a losing battle with him constantly. Darlene (Carly Chaikin) is now in charge of fsociety and continues to try and take down E-Corp from the outside, continuing the hacks, while Angela (Portia Doubleday) is now working her way up the ladder at E-Corp. Tyrell (Martin Wallström) is missing and is mostly absent (at least in person for most of the season), and Joanna (Stephanie Corneliussen) is trying to find him while also having a fling with a new guy who gets more and more suspicious of her.

The show continues the serial story arc from season one, revealing more and more of the backstory and including a lot of twists and turns. Of course, the audience experiencing events from the perspective of a mentally ill character allows for a lot of weirdness, as things are definitely not always what they seem, and includes some crazy moments like a 1980s/1990s sitcom version of a family road trip with that featured the 80s sitcom character, ALF. The new addition to the cast this season is Grace Gummer, who plays Dominique DiPierro, an FBI field agent investigating the E Corp hack, and BD Wong (from Jurassic Park) makes a couple more appearances as White Rose.

For those who get the blu-ray set, the show once again looks and sounds great in HD. The episodes and the extras are spread out over three discs. The extras include deleted scenes for most of the episodes and a couple of behind-the-scenes featurettes. Not a ton, but what was included is good if you like watching the bonus content.

Overall, the show continues to be very entertaining. Like in the first season, there is a lot of violence, swearing, sex, and drug use in the show, so it is not family-friendly and will not appeal to everyone. It is definitely telling a long drawn-out story, so you have to watch from the beginning to have any clue about what is going on. The writing and acting are both top-notch and the show does a good job of revealing small details about the story while not giving away too much. It also blends the storyline into the real world (using clips of the mega-rich and politicians) to establish how the super-rich controls everything and why fsociety wants to take them down. It is definitely a great show and worth the time to watch.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Mr. Robot: Season 1

 

Mr. Robot is a show that aired on the USA Network from 2015 to 2019, and starred Remi Malek as Elliot Alderson, who by day has a job at a reputable cybersecurity company, and by night is a hacker who takes down bad guys. He is approached by a group of hacktivists called society (as in fuck-society), whose goal is to take down a large, own-everything company called E-Corp, which basically uses the old Enron logo and is a metaphorical stand-in for any of the huge companies that basically run everything like Amazon and Walmart. Elliot has numerous mental issues such as social anxiety disorder and clinical depression and breaks the fourth wall by directly addressing the audience. The show has a lot of twists and turns that play out over the course of the ten episodes. By the end of the season, a lot is revealed but a lot is still unanswered. You find out there is a lot more to the storyline than what you necessarily think there will be at the beginning of the season.

For those who get the blu-ray, the show looks and sounds great in HD. There are not a ton of special effects, but the cinematography is very well done, and the show goes from looking dark and gritty to sleek and polished, depending on where particular scenes are being shot. The extras include a few deleted scenes and a short gag reel. The most extensive extra is on the second disc, a twelve-minute making-of featurette that includes interviews with the cast members and showrunner Sam Esmail.

Overall, the season is very good. Malek is great as the series lead, and it has a strong supporting cast including Carly Chaikin, Portia Doubleday, Martin Wallström, Stephanie Corneliussen, Michael Cristofer, and Christian Slater. I cannot say much about the roles of any of the other cast members because to do so would give too much away. While the show does take some creative liberties, it does try to be realistic with the computer coding and the portrayal of hacking. It is really a show that you will know very quickly if you like or hate it. It definitely uses a serial storytelling format in which the episodes build on each other and more of the story is revealed as the season goes along. It does have some swearing, sexual content, drug use, and violence in it, so it is definitely not a family-friendly show. When the show aired on the USA network, the word "fuck" was mostly bleeped out but in the blu-rays (and presumably the DVDs too) it is not.  One interesting aspect of the show is that it is set in the real world as it uses video clips from actual events and utilized deep fake technology to have real-world leaders, specifically President Obama comment on the events in the show. I definitely put it in one of my best series of the 2010s along with series like Breaking Bad and The Americans. If you have not seen the show and are looking for a good dramatic series, this is definitely worth watching.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Constantine: The Complete Series

 

Constantine was a supernatural thriller series that aired on NBC in the 2014-2015 season. It starred Matt Ryan as John Constantine, a demon hunter, and master of dark arts who exorcises demons from humans and sends the demons to hell. He is joined by Angélica Celaya who plays Mary "Zed" Martin: A psychic who helps Constantine find demons and Charles Halford as Francis "Chas" Chandler: Constantine's oldest friend and sidekick. Harold Perrineau (from the series Lost) also stars as Manny, an Angel assigned to watch over Constantine.

The series is basically a case-of-the-week procedural, with the team having to find and then get rid of a particular demon. There is also a serial arc that is tied to Constantine's past that we get a few hints about, but the series was canceled before it could be fleshed out. Of course, most fans of the show know that the character was brought into the Arrowverse when the character appeared on the series Arrow and then became a regular on Legends of Tomorrow. I think the series would have been a lot better off being on The CW as it could have crossed over with the other Arrowverse shows from the get-go, but it was probably too close to the series Supernatural which was, at that time, The CW's longest running show. But, the series was just too dark to get enough of a fan base on a regular broadcast network and was never going to get the kind of ratings it needed to be renewed.

For those who get the blu-ray set, the series looks and sounds great in HD. The one benefit of being on a major network is that it got a huge budget so the special effects looked movie quality. As far as extras go, there are a couple of very short behind-the-scenes featurettes, a trailer for the series, and two Comic-Con features. One is a portion of the Constantine panel (that runs about 11 minutes) and the other is the DC Comics Night at Comic-Con 2014 Presenting Gotham, The Flash, Constantine, and Arrow, which runs just under a half hour.

Overall, the series is good, but was probably doomed from the start. The showrunners made the curious choice to abandon a major character from the pilot who was clearly going to be a series regular and basically swapped her out with the character of Zed. As I said above, it was probably too dark a show to get traction on any of the major networks as it was only going to appeal to comic book fans and they alone cannot generate the kind of ratings needed to keep a series on a major broadcast network. And, given the themes of demons and the occult that occurred in every episode, there was no chance that casual viewers were going to stick with the show. So, if you watch the show, just know that the series has a pretty unsatisfying end and while the character of Constantine lived on in the Arrowverse, the plot lines (and other characters) from the series did not.

DVD/TV Series Review: The Americans: The Complete Fourth Season

 

+++Warning, this contains spoilers from the prior season, but no major season 4 spoilers+++

The fourth season of The Americans continues some of the storylines from prior seasons (tying some of them up completely and shifting others) and introduces new storylines. The big new storyline involves bioweapons and brings in the great character actor Dylan Baker as another soviet living in the US and working as a biochemical scientist. The storyline with Martha, after Phillip revealed his real identity to her in the prior season, takes a prominent role this season and both he and Martha are in constant danger of being discovered by the FBI. Phillip and Elizabeth also have to deal with the fallout of Paige telling Pastor Tim about her parents, trying to figure out whether to kill him and risk alienating Paige further.

For those who get the DVD set, the A/V quality is definitely not as good as it could be, and one of those where the streaming quality (in HD) is better than what you get on the physical discs. The extras are very bare bones, just some deleted and extended scenes. There are no behind-the-scenes features or commentary tracks as there have been in prior seasons. So, this basically amounts to little more than an MOD set, and one of those series that Fox (which has heavily preferred steaming) only puts out a bare-bones set. So really, the only reason to get the DVDs is that you want to keep your collection current.

Overall, the season is very good. There are definitely twists and turns throughout the season, and the series ratches up the tension as Phillip and Elizabeth are always in danger of being caught. The cast is top-notch, not only the main cast but the supporting characters as well. Margo Martindale and Frank Langella are great as Philip and Elizabeth's handlers, and Julia Garner does a great job as Kimmy in her limited role. Matthew Rhys gives a standout performance this season playing Phillip as very conflicted and torn between being a good Soviet and an American becoming more and more disillusioned with his real job. There is a lot of violence and some sexual content as there has been in every season, although I would say that the sex is a bit toned down in this season. If you have been a fan of the series up to this point, it is definitely still worth watching. If you are looking for a new series to watch, start this at season one and enjoy.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Manhattan Night

 

Manhattan Night is a crime drama/thriller starring Adrien Brody, Yvonne Strahovski, Jennifer Beals, and Campbell Scott. The overall story is that Brody plays a journalist named Porter Wren, who is approached at a work party by a socialite Caroline Crowley (Strahovski), who wants Porter's help to investigate the death of her husband (played by Scott) whose body was discovered in the rubble of a demolished building. What follows is a combination of a murder mystery with some twists (some predictable, some not) and an erotic thriller. The movie marked the first time that Strahovski who had previously starred in the series Chuck and then in the later seasons of Dexter, had done nude scenes (where you could see anything), which was the allure of the movie for many people. And yes, for those who have loved her since Chuck, they are as spectacular as you would have guessed.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is okay, but not great. Given that the movie was made sometime in 2014 and released in 2015, even a basic transfer to blu-ray looks pretty good. But, you can also tell that it did not get as good a blu-ray transfer that bigger-budget movies get. The extras include a commentary track on the movie with Director/Producer/Screenwriter Brian DeCubellis, Actor/Co-Producer Campbell Scott, and Cinematographer David Tumblety, a couple of short behind-the-scenes featurettes, about 18 minutes of deleted scenes, a director's notebook and storyboard feature, and the trailer.

Overall, the movie is good, but not what I would call a must-see. It definitely has a lower-budget independent movie feel to it, which some people may like and others may not. It has a relatively small, but good cast that, besides Strahovski and Brody include Jennifer Beals and Steven Berkoff. Fans of Strahovski will definitely like her scenes and she does a good job with sort of dark and mysterious characters (as she showed during her time on Dexter, and even to some extent in Chuck). So, if you are a fan of crime suspense/thrillers and don't mind lower-budget movies, this is a good one to check out.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: 11.22.63

 

11/22/1963 is a miniseries that aired on Hulu and was an adaptation of Stephen King's novel by the same name. The premise is that an English teacher living in Maine (of course) in 2016 named Jake Epping, played by James Franco, learns from a dying friend, named Al Templeton, played by Chris Cooper, of a portal that will take him back in time. Specifically, the portal can take him back to October 21, 1960, and Templeton tells Jake that he has been trying to prevent the assassination of JFK. He tells Jake that the past does not like to be interfered with and will try to prevent him from doing anything to change the past. The bigger the event you try to interfere with the harder the past pushes back. Jake takes up the mantle and goes back to the past to surveil Lee Harvey Oswald and try to stop the assassination.

For those who have read the book, you know that it is very long, and therefore, even in an eight-episode mini-series, it had to be pared down a lot. So, there are definitely changes from the book, some big, some smaller. For example, in the book, the portal takes people back to 1958 and Jake comes back through the portal to 2016 once before going back to 1958 again, and the storyline involving the young Harry Dunning is a lot more extended in the book.

For those who get the blu-ray, the series looks and sounds great. The scenes shot in the 1960s have a very distinctive look to them, both by copying the 1960s style, but the colors of the scenes are different from those set in 2016 which gives the scenes set in the past a distinctive feel. The only extra is a 15-minute making-of documentary titled "When the Future Fights Back".

Overall, the series is good, but as is usually the case with movie or tv adaptations of novels, is not as good as the book. Franco does a good job playing Epping and the supporting cast was very good. It definitely hit all of the high points from the book and stayed pretty faithful to the book, but I do think that it suffered from skipping some of the fine details that made the book so good. Ultimately, I do think it is worth watching, regardless of whether you want to pay $20 for an eight-episode blu-ray set.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Blindspot Season 1

 

Blindspot was a combination serial and procedural drama from 2015 starring Jamie Alexander (best known for her role as Lady Sif in the MCU) and Sullivan Stapleton (best known for the series Strike Back). The show opens with a mysterious bag in the middle of Times Square that suddenly stops moving. A naked, heavily tattooed woman (Alexander) emerges from the bag with no memory of who she is but has the name of FBI agent Kurt Weller (Stapleton) tattooed on her back. She is dubbed "Jane Doe" and brought to the NY FBI field office where it is discovered that the tattoos contain a clue leading them to a terrorist, and subsequently discover that other tattoos contain clues to active plots, old cases, etc. The series then launches into a blend of a case-of-the-week procedural in which the team tries to solve a new tattoo and several serial arcs. One of the serial arcs involves Jane's memories slowly coming back through flashbacks and the other involves a childhood friend of Weller's who went missing as a kid.

The show has a very strong supporting cast including Rob Brown as Edgar Reade, an FBI special agent and member of Weller's team, Audrey Esparza as Natasha "Tasha" Zapata, an FBI special agent and member of Weller's team, who used to be an NYPD officer, Ashley Johnson as Patterson, an FBI special agent and head of the FBI Forensic Science Unit, Ukweli Roach as Robert Borden, an FBI psychiatrist who helps Jane to retrieve and understand her memories, and Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Bethany Mayfair, assistant director in charge of the FBI's New York Field Office.

For those who get the blu-ray set, the A/V quality is very good, and what special effects there are, look great in HD. The extras include featurettes on the tattoo clues, several deleted scenes, a portion of the Comic-Con panel, a gag reel, a commentary track on the pilot episode with the series creator Martin Gero and the director Mark Pellingham, and then there are several making-of featurettes that range in length from a few minutes to just under ten. So, if you like watching the bonus material, there is a good amount there for you.

Overall, the season is very good. It has a good blend of action, suspense, and drama, with some humor mixed in. The humor is mostly dry humor from the overly stuffy (with the exception of Patterson) FBI agents, and the non-dry humor comes in large part from the character of Rich Dotcom, played by Ennis Esmer, who is in just one episode in season one but would become more involved in subsequent seasons. It is definitely a show that you have to watch from the beginning to know what is going on because, even though some of the main storylines of particular episodes are self-contained one-off storylines, there is always a secondary storyline about one of the larger serial arcs that will make little sense if you just jump into it. But, if you are a fan of crime dramas that have a lot of action, then this is definitely a good one to check out.

Blu-Ray/Movie Set Review: Riddick: The Complete Collection

 

This set contains all of the Riddick movies (Pitch Black, The Chronicles of Riddick, and Riddick) that starred Vin Diesel in his other, less well-known franchise, as well as the short animated film, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury, that bridges the time between Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. The first movie involves a space freighter carrying both cargo and passengers (including a dangerous criminal on his way to a high-security prison, Diesel's Riddick), encounters difficulty en route, and crashes on a deserted, seemingly lifeless planet with three suns. It then turns into a horror movie as the suns set and the true nature of the plant is revealed. The second movie has some ties to the first movie but is a very different story pitting Riddick against a race of planet invaders called Necromongers. The third movie, is a bit derivative of the first, seeing Riddick stranded on an Alien planet, this time hunted by mercenaries when he activates a beacon on an abandoned ship. Then he has to deal with the mercs and the planet's original inhabitants.

Each of the movies looks very good in HD, with, as you would expect, the A/V quality getting better with each movie. There are extras for each of the movies, including commentary tracks on all three movies, deleted scenes for every movie, featurettes on the effects, making of documentaries for each movie, an extended edition of Riddick, and more. So, if you like watching bonus material, there is a lot there for you.

Overall, the movies are a good blend of action and, with the first and third, horror/suspense. The acting is okay to good. Diesel is what he is, but each movie has a good supporting cast that makes up for his shortcomings. Between the three movies, they include Cole Hauser, Keith David, Alexa Davalos, Karl Urban, Tandie Newton, Judi Dench, Colm Feore, Katee Sackhoff, Keri Hilson, and Dave Bautista. As long as you do not go into them expecting academy-award-winning material, they are enjoyable. The dialogue can get clunky and/or downright dumb sometimes, but the action sequences generally make up for those moments. So, if you like action movies these are good ones to check out.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Jurassic World

 

Jurassic World is the 2015 reboot of the Jurrasic Park franchise starring Bryce Dallas Howard, Chris Pratt, Nick Robinson, Ty Simpkins, Katie McGrath, Irrfan Khan, Judy Greer, and BD Wong (reprising his role from the original movie).  In an era of reboots for both movies and TV shows, it was really only a matter of time before it happened to Jurassic Park. In this movie, the site of the original park on the island of Isla Nubar is rebuilt and opened as Jurassic World. Apparently, nobody learned at InGen a lesson from the events of the first three movies and are hell-bent on creating a dinosaur zoo, which goes about as well as you expect it to. The only legacy character that appears in the movie is BD Wong's Henry Wu, who is still making new breeds of dinosaurs, which again, goes about as well as you would expect. 

The crux of the story is that Park Operations Manager Claire (played by Bryce Dallas Howard) needs to "reinvigorate the public's interest" in the park. Her nephews Gray (Ty Simpkins) and Zach (Nick Robinson), fly over to visit her and get a tour of the park, but she is too busy and passes them off to her assistant (played by Supergirl and Merlin's Katie McGrath) and, of course, they get in mortal danger when things hit the fan. Chris Pratt plays the male lead, Owen, who is a velociraptor trainer, who butts heads with everyone in charge at the park, including Claire. None of the other legacy characters like Alan Grant, Ian Malcolm, or Ellie Sattler appear, although one of Ian's books is on display in one of the early scenes. The movie does have some nice tie-ins that pay homage to the original movie, some that are very obvious, and others you have to be kind of sharp-eyed to spot.

For those who get the blu-ray set, the movie looks and sounds great, as you would expect. The A/V quality is wonderful. The extras include deleted scenes, a featurette titled "Chris and Colin Take on the World" is an in-studio conversation with actor Chris Pratt and director Colin Trevorrow, a featurette titled "Dinosaurs Roam Once Again" about the updated special effects used here, a thirty-minute making-of documentary titled "Welcome to Jurassic World" that includes interviews with executive producer Steven Spielberg and producer Frank Marshall, a featurette titled "Jurassic World All-Access Pass" takes a closer look at the design of the park itself, Chris Pratt gives a brief tour of the park's visitors' center, and finally a featurette titled "Jurassic's Closest Shaves" that include attack scenes from all of the movies in the franchise.

Overall, the movie is good. It is not as good as the original 1994 movie, but I think it is somewhere between Jurassic Park II and the original movie in terms of quality. The characters make a lot of bad decisions, as they always seem to do, and there is the really goofy scene of Bryce Dallas Howard running from a dinosaur in heels. Even though you have to give her credit for being able to sprint in heels, it is pretty cheesy. And, of course, the movie continues to play into the myth that a T-Rex (yes, the T-Rex makes an appearance) cannot see you if you stand perfectly still. But there are a lot of good action scenes, Howard and Pratt have really good chemistry, and if you do not nitpick it to death and just enjoy it, it is well worth watching.

DVD/TV Series Review: Castle: Season 7

 

+++Warning, this contains minor spoilers from season six, but no major spoilers from season seven+++

The seventh season of Castle opens with Beckett and the team discovering the Castle had been abducted in the aftermath of the car accident that ended season six. Then it jumps ahead a couple of months when Castle resurfaces, found abandoned at sea with no memory of what happened to him or where he has been. That pretty much sets up the serial storyline of the season in which the team tries to figure out what happened to Castle, and it gets mixed in with the procedural case-of-the-week stories. The stand-alone episodes usually involve some murder mystery, but there is one in which Castle imagines that he is transported to an alternate universe in which he and Beckett never fell in love that was kind of an It's a Wonderful Life spoof. There are also a couple of episodes that call back to an earlier season storyline. So, while the show is a procedural crime drama, it is best to watch it from the beginning as opposed to jumping right into it at some random point.

For those who get the DVD set, the extras include commentary tracks on two episodes, the season premiere that includes director Rob Bowman, actors Jon Huertas and Seamus Dever, and writer David Amann, and on the 15th episode which includes actors Nathan Fillion and Michael Mosley, director Rob Bowman, and writer Andrew Marlowe. Then there are deleted scenes, a gag reel, and a commercial for Castle's book.

Overall, the season is good, but it seems that the alleged tension between Nathan Fillion and Stana Katic does start to bleed through into the show. They definitely act professional on screen, but it does seem like they are starting to have fewer scenes together as the season went on. The show does have a good blend of drama and comedy and the acting is always great. So, if you are a fan of police procedurals and like shows that fall more into the dramedy category than a straight-up drama, this is definitely still worth watching.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Mad Max: Fury Road

 

Mad Max: Fury Road is a 2015 reboot of the Mad Max/Road Warrior franchise. The movie was written and directed by George Miller and stars Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, and Zoe Kravitz. Of course, the role of Max launched Mel Gibson's career, but after a string of controversies in his personal life and failed attempts to get another movie made, George Miller decided to reboot the series with Tom Hardy (from Inception and Dark Knight Rises) in the role of Max. The basic story is that Max is captured by a group known as the "War Boys" and is taken to warlord Immortan Joe's Citadel, imprisoned, and used as a "blood bag" for a sick War Boy called Nux. Meanwhile, Imperator Furiosa (played by Charlize Theron), one of Joe's lieutenants, is sent in her armored "War Rig" to trade produce for gasoline and ammunition with two of Joe's warlord allies. She leaves and secretly takes Joe's wives, played by Zoe Kravitz, Rose Huntington Whitely, Riley Keough, Abbey Lee, and Courtney Eaton, with her to help them escape. The War Boys are sent to chase Furiosa and the wives down, and Max tries to use the opportunity to escape.

Ultimately, the movie is much more about Furiosa than it is about Max. It is basically a big chase movie with a lot of action scenes spaced throughout. Max was much more of an ancillary character, with Furiosa calling the shots. And Theron, once again, shows off her very mighty acting chops, really devoting herself to a very gritty role. Obviously, she has supermodel looks, but this was definitely not a role to show off how pretty she is. Furiosa was a very complex and hard-edged character, and Theron played her very well.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is off-the-charts good, especially if you have a big-screen TV and a great sound system. The extras include several making-of featurettes, including Maximum Fury: Filming Fury Road, which runs just under half an hour and contains behind-the-scenes footage and interviews on set in Africa. Then there is a feature that is titled Mad Max: Fury on Four Wheels about the design of the various vehicles as an extension of wardrobe. An eleven-minute feature on the characters Max and Furiosa and the transition from Mel to Tom. Then there is a featurette titled Tools of the Wasteland, which is a fourteen-minute feature on the props, an eleven-minute feature on the wives, including interviews with each of the actresses, and a four-minute combination of pre-production tests and raw footage. Then, there are a few deleted scenes.

Overall, the movie is very good. The movie is a bit weird but very much in the same vein as the prior movies from the 1980s. Realistically, the Mad Max films had always been a bit weird, set in a dystopian future with almost nothing in the way of law, order, or security. While Charlize Theron really dominates and takes over the movie, all of the actors, regardless of how large or small the role they play, do a great job. So, if you are looking for a good action movie and you like the dystopian nightmare kinds of storylines, this is definitely worth watching.

DVD/TV Series Review: The Killing: The Complete Third Season

 

The third season of The Killing essentially resets the series after the closing of the Rosie Larsen case. It is set one year after the events of season two. Linden (Mireille Enos) did not actually move to California and is working as a Transit Authority cop on a ferry. Holder (Joel Kinnaman) is still a homicide detective with a new partner played by the very recognizable character actor Gregg Henry, named Carl Reddick. Holder and Reddick investigate the disappearance of a young runaway that ties into an old case of Linden, which was briefly mentioned during season two. This ultimately leads Linden and Holder to once again partnering with each other to try and track down a serial killer. The season also stars Elias Koteas (probably best known from the series Chicago PD) as James Skinner, Linden's former partner and current leader of the Seattle Police Department's Special Investigations Unit, Bex Taylor-Klaus (who has had character roles on Arrow, The Librarians, and iZombie and a leading role in the Scream TV series), and Peter Sarsgaard as Ray Seward, an inmate on death row for the murder of his wife. Sci-Fi nerds will also recognize Aaron Douglas (from the Battlestar reboot) as a prison guard and Jewel Staite (from Firefly) as Holder's girlfriend.

For those who get the DVD set, it is just an MOD set without any extras. Just the twelve episodes across three discs. Like many other TV series that were not massively popular and/or highly rated, even though the first season got a decent blu-ray release, seasons 2-4 only received DVD releases, with seasons 3 and 4 just getting MOD releases.

Overall, the season is very good. The acting is great, and the writing is mostly very good. The writers do try to throw a lot of twists and misdirection as they did for the Rosie Larsen storyline. As was the case in the first couple of seasons, some of the twists worked and some were pretty silly. Peter Sarsgaard absolutely stole the show this season and had the best character arc of any of the characters. The season ends on a pretty big cliffhanger, which was a risky way to go given that the show was not a shoo-in to be picked up for a fourth season. Thankfully, Netflix revived the show after AMC canceled it so the storyline does get resolved. While it was not a highly rated blockbuster show with A-list stars, it was a smart show that had a very gritty and real feeling to it that many police serials and procedurals do not. While you do not need to have watched the first season to understand what is going on (for the most part) in this season, it is a good idea to watch the first two seasons before you watch this to get the introduction and development of the two main characters. It is definitely worth the time to watch.

DVD/TV Series Review: The Americans: Season 3

 

+++Warning, this contains prior season spoilers, but no major giveaways from season three ++++

Season three of The Americans picks up sometime down the line from the end of season two. Most of the characters continue as they had, aside from Nina, who is now in a Russian gulag having been arrested for treason after Stan failed to save her from being arrested by the Soviets at the end of season two. As has been the case for the first two seasons, this season is a mix of a case-of-the-week procedural while having a running theme that goes throughout the season. This time, it involves the Soviet-Afghan war, and the Jennings trying to obtain information from the CIA's Afghan group. That storyline brings in Julia Garner to play the high-school-aged daughter of the head of the CIA's Afghan group that Phillip has to get close to in order to bug her father's home office, which presents a moral quandary for Phillip as she clearly has a crush on him. Phillip's relationship with Martha gets even more complicated as the bug he convinced her to plant in agent Gaad's office is discovered, and Paige continues to become more suspicious of her parents as time goes by.

For those who get the DVD, it is very bare bones. It does have a couple of bonus features, basically deleted scenes and a feature on the character of Paige. Of course, the first season was released on Blu-Ray, but from season two forward only got DVD releases. While the show does not really use special effects, the show does not look as good on DVD as it did on DVD.

Overall, the show continues to be great. The writers do a good job balancing the large cast and making nearly everything suspenseful. The writing and acting are still great, with the standouts this season being Holly Taylor, whose storyline gets more prevalent, and Annet Mahendru whose character is in a much different position this season from the first two. This season also sees Lev Gorn, Costa Ronin, and Richard Thomas promoted to series regulars. Again, the series is definitely not family-friendly as it has as much swearing, sex, and nudity as can be shown on basic cable. But, the stories are compelling and if you are old enough to remember the early to mid-1980s it will definitely give you a flash of nostalgia. So, if you like the first two season, this is definitely worth watching.

DVD/TV-Series Review: The Americans: Season 2

 

+++Warning, this contains minor spoilers from season one, but no major season two giveaways+++

Season two of The Americans is set a few months down the line from the events that ended Season one, with Elizabeth being shot. She and Phillip concoct a story about having to visit an ailing aunt to explain her absence while she recovered from Paige and Henry (and to a large extent Stan). Paige begins to become more and more suspicious of her parents as the season goes along, with a very strong, will he figure it out vibe. As was the case in season one, the series has a blend of procedural and serial elements. There are self-contained missions and several story arcs that thread throughout the season. One of those involves the murder of another pair of illegals whose lives are fairly similar to the Jennings. Then there are several missions that involve the Jennings trying to steal stealth technology and the precursor to the internet called the ARPNET. There are several additions to the cast this year with Susan Misner (who plays Sandra Beeman), Annet Mahendru (who plays Nina), and Alison Wright (who plays Martha) being promoted to series regulars, and the addition of Costa Ronin as Oleg Igorevich Burov, a new KGB officer working out of the Soviet Embassy.

For those who get the DVD set, there are a handful of extras including a featurette on the real "Directorate S", a featurette on the morality (or lack thereof) of the series, deleted scenes, and a gag reel. The show was not released on Blu-Ray, which sucks for those of us who prefer that format and purchased season one on Blu-Ray. But, Fox has a strong preference for just streaming shows and is putting fewer and fewer shows out on Blu-Ray and only putting some out on DVD. So, the fact that this one got a physical release at all, given that it never had a huge fanbase, is kind of surprising.

Overall, the series continues to be great. The acting and writing are both top-notch, and the show is definitely a blast from the past for those of us who actually grew up in the 1980s. The early seasons of the show were set in 1983 when I was still pretty young, but I do remember some things about that time and I think they recreate it pretty well. There is still a lot of violence and sexual content (and as much nudity as they could get away with on basic cable) so it is not family-friendly, but if you watched and enjoyed season one, you already know that. To me, the show is, along with Breaking Bad, one of the best dramas of the 2010s, and is definitely worth watching, especially if you are into crime and spy dramas.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost: Season 6

 

+++Warning, this contains minor spoilers from the prior season, but no major season six giveaways+++

The final season of Lost starts out back on the (seemingly) doomed flight that started the entire series. But, we find out that as a result of the hydrogen bomb that was detonated at the end of the fifth season, there are now two realities, one in which the plane never crashed and one in which it did. So, after doing flashbacks and flashforwards, this season does a "flash sideways" going between the alternate realities and seeing how the characters come out in each one. The season pays off the reveal of the smoke monster and basically reveals all about the supernatural aspect of the island. The end of the series works out to be a bit of a thought experiment (or at least a good discussion point) when it reveals what we are seeing in the flash sideways, and the last shot of the series is a nice bookend to the opening shot in the first season.

For those who get the Blu-Ray, the A/V quality is again stellar, with the show looking and sounding as good as pretty much any movie. For extras, there are commentary tracks on four episodes, a 40-minute making-of documentary for the final season, an 8-minute recap of the series up to season six, and a few short (under 10 minutes in length) behind-the-scenes featurettes. There is also a series epilogue which ties up a couple of things that the series finale did not. So, all in all, a good amount of bonus material if you like watching the extras.

Overall, the final season was very good. The show ran hot and cold for a lot of people, with many fans disappointed (or downright mad) at how slowly everything played out. I do think being able to binge-watch the series (whether on disc or via streaming) does help with that and makes things easier to follow and, as a result, the series makes more sense. While the ending surely did not and will not appeal to everyone, I do think it was well done, even if not every character got a happily ever after ending. It goes without saying that you definitely cannot jump right into the final season and hope to understand what is going on. The show definitely has a serial storyline that has to be watched from beginning to end. It is, in my opinion, one of the best sci-fi/supernatural thrillers to be on TV in recent memory, and is definitely worth the time to watch.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost: Season 5

 

+++Warning, this contains minor season four spoilers, but no major giveaways about season five+++

Season five is the second to last season of the widely popular serial show, Lost. As such, it finally begins to unravel some of the mysteries that have been set up throughout the first four seasons. This season also sees the survivors split not only in location but in time, since moving the island at the end of season four to protect it from the "freighter folk" resulted in time rips so that some characters are back in the 1950s, then in the 1970s while others remain in the present day. The show does finally start to explore the island's history, explain what the Dharma Initiative really is, reveals the 'incident' that led to having someone press a button inside a hatch every 108 minutes, explains the time travel, explains why the castaways crashed on the island in the first place, and reveals more about Jacob. Some of the reveals are ham-handed and/or eye-roll-inducing, but some of them really pay off well for the die-hard fans of the show. This season, while again a bit shorter (17 overall episodes) does contain the milestone 100th episode of the series and does again end on a cliffhanger setting up the final season.

For those who get the Blu-Ray set, as with the prior season releases, you get a good amount of bonus material including commentary tracks on a few episodes, about seven making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes, including one on the 100th episode, a starter kit which is basically a series recap of seasons 1-4, and a gag reel. So, a lot there if you like watching the bonus features.

Overall, the season is very good. It continues to be well acted and mostly (with some exceptions) well written. The writing does get a bit too clever for itself sometimes, but it does seem like the writers had almost everything planned out and were not just making stuff up on the fly. A big complaint by many fans really from the end of season two onward is that the show was not resolving the mysteries and introducing four or five new questions for every question it answered. I would not say that was the case this season. Major plot elements were explained this season, and while not everything gets wrapped up, you can definitely tell the series is winding down. You definitely need to watch the prior seasons for this one to make any sense as this show is truly a serial story that builds on itself, so if you just jump in randomly, you may enjoy it, but you will not have any idea what is really going on.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost Season 4

 

+++Warning, this contains spoilers from the prior season, but no major season four giveaways+++

The fourth season of Lost is a short one because of the writer's strike that occurred in the middle. Therefore, the season ends up being 14 episodes as opposed to the 24 from prior seasons. So, it was a bit more streamlined. Instead of using the flashback as a plot crutch, this season utilizes what was teased in the season finale of season three, the flashforward, showing that indeed some of the survivors made it off the island and that leaving the island was not necessarily the good thing they thought it would be. The flashforwards were one main storyline and the other was the presence of the "freighter folk", those being the people on the freighter that appeared at the end of season three, and whether they are trustworthy rescuers. The season ends on a bit of a cliffhanger this season (yet again) but it is not as big a cliffhanger as we have seen in the prior seasons.

For those who get the Blu-Ray set, there are yet again a lot of extras. There are commentary tracks on four episodes, an eight-minute series recap, a handful of making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes, a featurette that has all of the flashforward scenes in chronological order, deleted scenes, a blooper reel, and some easter eggs accessible off the menus. Even excluding the commentaries, well over two hours of bonus material. And, of course, the A/V quality continues to be great.

Overall, the season is very good. It ties up some of the threads from the prior seasons while exposing new mysteries. Again, I think it is good to be able to watch the series without interruption because you get to see how it all plays out without month-long breaks, which makes everything easier to follow. The acting and writing this season continue to be very strong, and the show does a good job balancing the very large ensemble cast. Michael Emmerson was really the standout this season with his portrayal of Ben, leader of The Others. While I still think that season one was the best season of the show, this one was very good and definitely worth watching.