Video Game Review: Batman: Arkham Origins

 

This is the third game in the Arkham series of Batman games. It is actually a prequel to Arkham asylum set eight years before that game when Batman was still early on in his career. The gameplay and graphics are awesome and keep getting better as more games are released. It is much more challenging than the first two games, which in a way makes sense. If Batman is in his second-year things are going to be harder for him than when he has been fighting crime for eight or nine years. The one nitpicky point is that Batman can do things in this game that he did not do in the other games, set after this one. I get that they want to keep updating the games to make them more exciting and fun, but really at this point in the timeline, Batman should be working with less advanced gadgets and have less ability than he does later on. The only disappointing thing about the game is that Kevin Conroy did not return to voice Bruce/Batman, but Roger Smith did a good job with the voice work. So, if you are a fan of the Arkham games, this is a must-play.

Study Aid Review: The Laplace Transform Tutor

 

Laplace Transforms are mainly used as a technique for solving some types of differential equations. If you are a math major and have to take differential equations as a semester-long class you will definitely see it there, and if you are an engineering major that has to take the intro to differential equations class (either as a separate class from intro to linear algebra or in a class that combines the two) you will usually have a couple of lectures on Laplace transforms. If you get good instruction on how to do problems involving Laplace Transforms they are not all that hard. If however, your instructor just glosses over them, they can be very tricky.

In this set, Jason introduces the concept of Laplace Transforms, how to derive the basic transforms, then provides a table of transforms (which is generally what you will be allowed to use in class if you need the more advanced transforms). Then he solves a bunch of problems using the Laplace Transforms, including solving several differential equations. As he does in his other math and science sets, Jason goes through everything step-by-step. He does assume that you have the math skills needed to be at this point (so having taken algebra, pre-calc, and calculus I and II). He does not do a recap of the math, but since he rarely skips steps in solving problems (and never does in the first couple of examples he shows on a topic) you do get a bit of a refresher anyway.

Laplace Transforms is a topic that will come up at least a few times depending on what branch of science or engineering you go into. I was an electrical engineering major and I definitely had to use it extensively in one of my higher-level classes and a bit lighter in a couple of other classes. Unfortunately, I did not have a good grasp on the topic after my Calc 4 class (which is where I was introduced to the topic), so I got this to really figure it out. So, if you are a visual learner who learns best by watching sample problems being worked out, this is a great study aid.

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

 

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

The 18-episode sixth and final season of Lost aired during the winter and spring of 2010. The first episode of the season starts 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.

The Blu-Ray set is a five-disc set. 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+++

The 17-episode fifth season of Lost aired in winter and spring of 2009. It was the show's second to last season, and, 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, some are 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 requiring someone to 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.

The Blu-Ray set is a five-disc 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 series recap of seasons 1-4, and a gag reel. So, there's 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.

DVD/TV Series Review: Married...With Children: The Complete Series

 

Married With Children was the often controversial series that aired on Fox from 1987 to 1997, starring Ed O'Neil as Al Bundy, Katey Segal as his wife Peg, Christina Applegate as their daughter Kelly, and David Faustino as their son Bud. It was basically marketed as the "anti-Cosby" show centered around Al Bundy as the stereotypical loser whose life peaked in high school where he was a star quarterback. Reality smacks him, however, and he ends up with a job he hates (as a shoe salesman), and a family he does his best to avoid. Peg is a housewife who never does anything around the house, Bud is a loser who cannot get any dates, and Kelly can get any date she wants. They are a typical trashy suburban, non-politically correct family whose neighbors Marcy (played by Amanda Bearse) and Steve (played by David Garrison) and later Jefferson (played by Ted McGinley) are total politically correct snobs who take great pleasure and looking down on (and yet sometimes getting in the mud with) the Bundys.

The complete series set is a 32-disc set that repackages the discs from the individual season DVD releases. All of the discs are stacked together on large spindles that are accessible after the case is unfolded. Of course, you want to watch the discs pretty quickly to see if any are scratched as there are better ways to store them than the stacking of the discs. Everything that was included on the single-season releases (even the replacement of the "Love and Marriage" theme song after the second season) carries over. This means that all of the extras (or lack thereof in the later seasons) are included, but there are no extras specific to the complete series release.

Overall, the show was good but is definitely not everyone's cup of tea. The humor was meant to be offensive and there are definitely things that got aired that would never be aired today. It was not politically correct by any stretch of the imagination, and it made fun of pretty much every topic under the sun. The final couple of seasons were definitely not as good, and the series never did get a proper ending. The final episode most definitely did not have a series finale feel...it was just another episode that not all of the characters even appeared in. If you are easily offended then this is not a show that will appeal to you, but if you like more offbeat sitcoms, it holds up fairly well even thirty-plus years later.

Book Review: Star Wars: Brotherhood

 

Brotherhood is a novel set shortly after the events of Episode II, with Anakin married to Padme and the two trying to hide their relationship, Anakin being promoted to full Jedi Knight, and both Anakin and Obi-Wan trying to find their way into a post-Master-Apprentice relationship. The main storyline is set on the planet Cato Neimoidia, which has been neutral in the new war between the Republic and the Separatists despite the trade federation throwing in with Dooku. The plot involves a bombing of one of the planet's cities, which kills and injures hundreds of Neimodians. The Separatists blame the Republic, and demand Chancellor Palpatine come to the planet in a show of goodwill. Sensing a trap, the Jedi convince Palpatine to send a Jedi emissary (Kenobi) to investigate the bombing, which leads to that "business" that was a throwaway line in Episode III.

This novel also establishes quite a bit of the storyline that we see throughout the animated Clone Wars series and Episode III, including introducing the character of Assaj Ventress, establishing Obi-Wan as "The Negotiator," and using the holonet to spread Republic propaganda. It also reveals that Obi-Wan knows much more about Anakin and Padme's relationship than he ever let on. Anakin also shows he has mentoring skills (despite insisting he will not ever take on a Padawan) when he helps (and is helped) by a youngling named Mill Alibeth, and has many parallels to his relationship with Ahsoka.

The book is paced very well, with a mix of action and suspense. It definitely has a lot of the political tone that all of the prequel movies did, establishing Obi-Wan's distrust of politicians, and it also fleshes out a bit more of Palpatine and Anakin's relationship, which helps to explain why Anakin turns in Episode III (and makes him look less like a mark than he does if you just watch the movies). Palpatine, Dooku, Yoda, Padme, and Mace Windu are all ancillary characters in the book, with the focus being on Anakin, Obi-Wan, Mill, Ventress, and a Neimodian named Rugg Quarnom, who leads the bombing investigation on behalf of the Neimodians.

The book is not overly long, about 330 pages, and is a fairly quick read. How quickly you get through it depends on how fast a reader you are and how much time you can devote to reading at one time. It can easily be read in a day or two if you have a lot of time to read or over the course of a few days if you read for half an hour to an hour before bed. It is definitely one of the better canon novels that have been released since the Disney takeover of Lucasfilm. So, if you are someone who reads some, but not all, of the novels, this is definitely worth your time.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost Season 4

 

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

The 14-episode fourth season of Lost aired during the winter and spring of 2009. The season was shortened 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. It ended up being a bit more streamlined with tighter storylines because of the reduced number of episodes. 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.

The Blu-Ray set is a six-disc set with, 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.

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 53

Day 53 was the final Burn Intervals workout. I felt that I had more stamina during this workout than I did last week.  In this one, I actually altered the weight I was using. On most of them, I used five-pound dumbbells, on the shoulder exercises I used three-pound dumbbells, and on the squats at the end I used eight-pound dumbbells. That worked better for me than using five-pounds the entire time.

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 52

Day 52 was the last Push Circuit 2 workout for this round. In this workout, I was able to hit the 8-rep max for one of the exercises, the single-leg lunges (which are not really done on one leg, just with most of your weight on one leg). My right shoulder has been giving me trouble for a couple of weeks so I had to back off on some of the shoulder exercises in this workout to keep from hurting it. Other than that, however, the workout went well. 

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 51

Day 51 was Burn it Off. Again it went about the same as it had the last time. I did again swap out a couple of the exercises that had a bit lower impact (but as good of a cardio effect) as the ones in the workout. That helped with my back and knees. 

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost: Season 3

 

The 23-episode third season of  Lost aired during the 2006/2007 TV season. Season three starts out a bit slow but definitely picks up steam toward the end of the season. The first handful of episodes deal with the capture of Jack, Sawyer, and Kate by The Others and reveal Henry's backstory. As we go through the season, we learn who The Others are and why they are on the island. The show continues to tell the story in flashbacks and in the present and answers some questions (e.g., who are The Others, how did Locke end up in a wheelchair, etc.), but also raises new questions to keep the mystery going. As has been the case in the first two seasons, there is a lot of cast turnover (both with new cast members coming on and old cast members leaving). The season ends with a two-part episode with yet another huge cliffhanger, involving a flash forward this time.

The Blu-Ray set is a six-disc set that again has a ton of extras. Those include commentary tracks on a few episodes, about six making-of featurettes that range from a couple of minutes to just under an hour, just under twenty minutes of deleted scenes, and a gag reel that runs just over six minutes. Then there are some featurettes that involve promotional items like toys and a video game, and then a featurette on the books that inspire some of the themes in the show. So, if you like watching the extras, there is a lot there. And, of course, the A/V quality is very good as the seasons 1 and 2 releases were.

Overall, the season is good and rebounds from what many saw as a weaker second season. I know when the show was on the air many people got mad that it took so long to reveal the various mysteries. I do think the ability to watch the show on DVD (or streaming) so you can see it all play out without having to wait between seasons makes it easier to watch. There are definitely some logical leaps in the story that do not make a ton of sense, and not all of the twists work to perfection. But, it was unique for its time, not derivative of anything else, and even after all these years, there has not really been a show that caught fire as Lost did in terms of its instant popularity. It is definitely worth checking out if you are a fan of sci-fi/fantasy thrillers.

DVD/TV Series Review: Northern Exposure: Season 2

 

The seven-episode second season of Northern Exposure aired during the spring of 1991, with all of the main cast members returning. The second season continues the fish-out-of-water storyline of Joel (Rob Morrow), who is slowly adapting to life in the small, quirky town of Cicely, Alaska, all while trying to get out of his contract so he can return to New York. The season also does a good job developing more of the characters and the town's history, which itself ended up almost being a character throughout the rest of the show's run. This season also really started the "will they or won't they" aspect of the relationship between Joel and Maggie (Janine Turner), introducing even more sexual tension between them while finding ways to keep them from getting together.

There are a couple of different versions of season two out there. The original 2004 release, which is the one I have, does have the original music on it (at least most of it). Any subsequent US releases, including in the full-season set, do have some replacement music. As most are aware, music was a huge part of the show, especially the scenes in the radio station, and because the show aired long before DVD was even a thing, getting the rights to use the show in the DVD releases was very expensive. Universal started replacing some of the original music with canned instrumental music. The problem was that the instrumental music was often horrible (think Elevator Muzak but without any recognizable songs), and in the instances where specific songs were used as a part of the storyline, not just to have something playing in the background, the replacement music did not have the same effect at all. If the original songs were replaced I do not believe they were replaced with the instrumental tracks on the original DVD release, they just picked different songs. I am not sure about what was done on the re-releases. I can tell you that the Etta James song, At Last, is included in the season finale on at least some of the sets. Of course, for die-hard fans of the show, there is a Blu-Ray set that was released in the UK that does have the original episodes with all the original music, but it is expensive and harder to find.

The 2004 release of season 2 is a two-disc set. The originally released set does have the horrible double-sided discs again. The extras include deleted and extended scenes for every episode and blooper reels for each episode. Overall, the season was good, but you are basically paying for a full season set and only getting a handful of episodes. Personally, if you can find it and afford it, I would get the import Blu-Ray set (but you will also have to get a Region 2 player to play it on, which adds to the cost). That will get you the best version of the show in terms of picture quality, get you all the seasons in one set, and have all the original music. The show is well written and very well acted, and for those of us who were fans of the show during its original run on TV, it is worth coming back to because even though it is a bit dated, it holds up well.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost: Season 2

 

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

The 24-episode second season of Lost aired during the 2005/2006 TV season. There was some cast turnover as a result of events that occurred during season 1, but most of the main cast returned. Several additions to the cast, both in main and recurring roles, were made. Some of the new cast members included Michelle Rodriguez, Cynthia Watros, Michael Emmerson, Sam Anderson, Henry Ian Cusick, M.C. Gainey, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Katey Segal.

As fans of the show know, the first season ended on a few different cliffhangers that set up the storylines of season two. The big one is what is in the hatch (which opened in the season finale). What is in the hatch is revealed and explained (at least partly) in the first few episodes. The second one is the attack on the raft and the kidnapping of Walt, which sets up the story arc of "The Others," who are a group of inhabitants of the islands who attack the crash survivors. We also learn that another group of crash survivors from the plane's tail are on the island, and we see that their experience was much different from the "main" characters of season one. The show continues to reveal portions of the story (sometimes at a snail's pace) through flashbacks, showing who the characters were before crashing on the island and revealing secrets of the island itself. The season again ends on a major cliffhanger, leaving the fates of many characters in limbo.

The Blu-Ray set is a seven-disc set. As with the season 1 release, the A/V quality is great, and the Blu-Rays have a ton of extras. Those include commentary tracks on five episodes, a bunch of behind-the-scenes footage, about twenty minutes of deleted scenes, a gag reel, and a "Lost Connections" chart, which shows how all of the characters on the island are interconnected with each other (which sometimes stretches all logic in order to be clever).

Overall, the series continues to be very strong. It is well-written and very well-acted. The show has to balance a ton of characters (although the amount of characters is definitely in flux) and juggle a lot of storylines. New additions to the cast include Michelle Rodriguez, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Cynthia Watros, Michael Emerson, Henry Ian Cusick, and M. C. Gainey. Yunjin Kim and Danel Dae Kim are given a lot to work with this season with the development of their characters and really knock it out of the park. The show definitely leaves more questions open than it answers, which definitely irked many fans when it was on the air. But, I definitely think the pacing of the story was very well done and enough was revealed to keep viewers hooked and kept mysterious to keep people coming back.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Lost: Season 1

 

Lost is a series created by J.J. Abrams and produced by Damon Lindelof that aired for six seasons on ABC from 2004 to 2010. The 25-episode first season aired during the 2004/2005 TV season. The series had an ensemble cast made up of relative newcomers and recognizable actors, including Matthew Fox, Josh Holloway, Evangeline Lilly, Jorge Garcia, Daniel Dae Kim, Ian Somerhalder, Harold Perrineau, Maggie Grace, Dominic Monaghan, Emilie de Ravin, and Naveen Andrews. The basic premise is a plane flying from Sydney to Los Angeles that hits turbulence, breaks apart in mid-air, and crashes on a deserted tropical island in the South Pacific more than a thousand miles off course. 

The series opens with Matthew Fox's character, Jack Shephard, waking up on an island. As he slowly regains consciousness, he sees the wreckage of the plane and tries to help the other survivors, including Locke (Terry O'Quinn, in an exceptional performance), Kate (Evangeline Lilly), Sayid (Naveen Andrews), Hurley (Jorge Garcia), Charlie (Dominic Monaghan, of "Lord of the Rings"), Sawyer (Josh Holloway) and Shannon (Maggie Grace). Over the course of the season, they find out that the island is not as deserted as it seems and contains a bunch of mysteries, including a smoke monster and a mysterious hatch in the middle of the woods. They also discover a distress call, in French, that has been sent from the island for years. Throughout the season, multiple storylines are set up, and the season ends on more than one cliffhanger, with really none of the mysteries being solved.

The Blu-Ray set is a seven-disc set. The A/V quality is outstanding, as the show, which has a lot of CGI graphics, looks and sounds great in the HD format. There are a ton of extras, including commentary tracks on multiple episodes, several behind-the-scenes and making-of featurettes, a featurette on the cast members, deleted scenes, and bloopers. So, there is a lot there for those who like going through the bonus material.

Ultimately, The first season is very strong. While Fox, Lilly, and Holloway are the main characters (and the budding love triangle between them is a large part of the series), the show does a good job balancing the very large ensemble cast. Along with those I mentioned earlier, the series also included Yunjin Kim, Daniel Dae Kim (who, along with Garcia, has probably had the largest post-lost career on TV of all the actors), Harold Perrineau, and Emilie de Ravin. There are a lot of twists and turns, and the show does a good job of not revealing too much too soon. It is definitely a unique show that was not derivative of anything else when it aired and remains pretty unique nearly twenty years later. It did air on regular network television, so it was tamer in terms of sexual content (although there was some) and violence, as you would see on a cable show. So, if you are looking for a show that is a good blend of mystery and drama, this is a good option.

DVD/TV Series Review: Northern Exposure: Season 1

 

Northern Exposure is the "Fish out of Water" series that ran from 1990 to 1995. The eight-episode first season aired during the summer of 1990. It was created by Joshua Brand and John Falsey and starred Rob Morrow, Janine Turner, John Corbett, Cynthia Geary, Darren E. Burrows, Barry Corbin, John Cullum, Peg Phillps, and Elane Miles.  The show's premise is that a young doctor from New York named Joel Fleischman (played by Rob Morrow), whose medical school loans were underwritten by the state of Alaska. As a result, Joel is under contract to work in Alaska for four years. He expected to work in Anchorage, but when he gets to Alaska he finds out that he will be working in the very remote town of Cicely, full of quirky residents. What follows is a pretty fun fish-out-of-water dramedy. 

The show co-starred Janine Turner as Maggie O'Connell, a bush pilot and Joel's landlord with whom he has a love-hate relationship. Barry Corbin co-stars as Maurice Minnifield, a multi-millionaire businessman who is a former fighter pilot and astronaut who moved to the area after retiring and owns most everything in the area. John Cullum plays Holling Vincoeur, who owns the local bar and is Maurice's ex-best friend and current rival due to winning the affection of Shelly Tambo (played by Cynthia Geary), a former Miss Northwest Passage brought to Cicely by Maurice, who had hoped to marry her but chose Holling instead.  Darren E. Burrows plays Ed Chigliak, a young Native American teenager who is a movie fanatic.  Peg Phillips plays Ruth-Anne Miller, who owns the local convenience store and runs the local post office. John Corbett plays Chris Stevens, an ex-con with little direction in life who is the morning DJ at the local radio station owned by Maurice. Finally, Elane Miles plays Marilyn Whirlwind, Joel's unwanted assistant at his office.

The 2004 DVD release is a two-disc set. It comes in a case that is covered with a parka, and the episodes are on two double-sided discs. The first two sets I purchased had scratched discs, which is what knocks the set down a star for me. The extras include deleted and extended scenes, which include several minutes worth of deleted scenes from each episode; video documentary footage, that is the footage filmed for the documentary that was made during the third episode; mock movie footage that was filmed for Ed's daydreaming fantasies in the sixth episode, and unexposed footage which is a blooper reel with bloopers from each episode (generally 4-6 minutes of bloopers per episode). So, there is a lot if you like extras.

It is worth noting that this release does include the original music that was used when the show aired on TV. As most fans of the show are aware, the show used a lot of copyrighted music. When the first season was initially released on DVD in the US, it was very expensive because of how much Universal had to pay for the rights to the music. Some of the second-season sets also had the original music, but from the third season forward, the DVDs used replacement music, which was basically canned instrumental music. If you get one of the later US releases some of the songs in the first season are replaced. Given how important the music is to the series, most people want the original songs, so keep that in mind.

Overall, the season is very good. The acting and writing are excellent, but the episodes are much more stand-alone in this season than they are in later seasons. Basically, after you watch the pilot, the episodes can be watched in almost any order, as there is not a ton of flow from one to another. The show does a fun nod to Twin Peaks, the other popular show of 1990, and the season finale introduces the character Adam, played by Adam Arkin, who is basically the Cicely version of Bigfoot (someone everyone has heard of but has never seen), who would be a major recurring character throughout the series. The first season basically sets up the premise and the characters but is not as good as it would become in the subsequent seasons.

DVD/TV Series Review: Community: Season 4

 

The fourth season of Community was a mess behind the scenes with series creator Dan Harmon being fired and Chevy Chase mostly (and then finally) leaving the show over the creative direction of his character Pierce. That craziness definitely bled onto what would make it to air and the show just did not feel the same. By this point, the show has pretty much dropped all pretense about the classes the group is taking being the focus and is basically about the quirkiness of the characters and the situations they find themselves in. That is not to say that there are not funny moments, but it is a different show in season four than it was in season one.

For those who get the DVD set, for extras, there are commentary tracks on each episode which usually include the writer of the episode and one or two cast members. Donald Glover and Chevy Chase were the only members of the cast to not participate in at least one commentary track. Then there are deleted scenes, a gag reel, and some episode-specific making-of featurettes. So, if you like extras there is a lot there.

Overall, the season was okay but not as good as it had been in prior years. I think the acting was very good, but the writing was definitely not as strong as it had been, which definitely affected what made it to air. There was a strong recurring and guest cast this season including Malcolm McDowell, Jason Alexander, Sara Bareilles, Jack Black, Adam Devine, Giancarlo Esposito, Brie Larson, Tricia Helfer, Luke Perry, and Jeannie Garth, among others. I do think the season is worth watching, and thankfully the show does bounce back after this season, but just be aware that it is definitely the weak point of the series.

Study Aid Review: AC Circuit Analysis Tutor -- Volume 1

 

This set in Jason's engineering circuits video will cover the material that either comes toward the end of the first semester or early in the second semester of circuits analysis. It starts out with a discussion of alternating current, and sinusoidal sources and a review of the math (complex numbers and phasors) needed to solve the circuits. Then the lessons get into the concepts of the impedance of inductors and capacitors, and Kirchhoff's Laws in the Phasor Domain. Then it ends with several examples of solving circuits that have resistors, inductors, and capacitors. It is basically the material that forms the basis for solving the more complex RCL circuits.

As with Jason's other math, science, and engineering DVD sets, Jason explains all the concepts in an understandable way and works through many examples, providing clear, step-by-step instructions for how to solve the problems. He does not cover every single concept you will see in class, but he covers the main concepts that you need to know. So, this is a compliment to class lectures and doing homework, not a replacement for either. Jason explains the material a lot better than many textbooks do, and better than some teachers. So, if you are looking for a good circuits study aid, and you are a visual learner, this is a great option for you.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: We're the Millers

 

We're the Millers is a fun, raunchy comedy from 2013 starring Jason Sudeikis, Jennifer Aniston, Emma Roberts, and Will Poulter in the leading roles and Ed Helms, Nick Offerman, Katherine Hahn, and Moly Quinn in supporting roles. Sudeikis plays David Clark, a low-level pot dealer who gets into debt to a drug kingpin, played hilariously by Ed Helms. To settle his debt Clark agrees to make a "small" pot delivery from Mexico and enlists the help of a stripper who lives in his building (Aniston), his nerdy neighbor Poulter, and a street kid (Roberts) to travel with him as his fake family to make getting across the border easier. Of course, things do not go smoothly and hilarity ensues. Nick Offerman and Kathryn Hahn play a hilarious pair of fellow travelers that make life even more complicated for The Millers and steal pretty much every scene they are in.

The Blu-Ray includes both the theatrical and extended editions of the movie. The extended edition is not much longer than the theatrical version. It basically just adds to some of the scenes. Then there are about 16 minutes of deleted scenes, about 7 minutes of outtakes, and several making-of featurettes that range in time from 1 to 3 minutes, give or take, and total about 20 minutes in all. So, if you like watching the extras, you get a decent amount. Overall, the movie is a fun, but very adult comedy. It is akin to the other comedies like Horrible Bosses, that Aniston has done recently. Of course, she plays one of the only strippers ever who only strips down to her underwear, but looks very good doing it. Of course, she really never shows anything other than cleavage and her very toned abs and legs. You can tell she enjoys shedding the "good girl" image she had from friends when she can. Sudeikis is hilarious with the smarmy comedy that he was known for on SNL, but it is really the interactions with (and especially between) Roberts and Poulter that generate most of the laughs. It is a movie that definitely is very tongue in cheek the entire time, and does not take itself too seriously. So, if you are a fan of the more raunchy comedies, this one is a good one to check out, but just be aware that it is definitely not something that will appeal to everyone.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: The Americans: Season 1

 

The Americans was a drama that aired on FX for six seasons from 2013-2018. It was created by former CIA officer Joe Weisberg and starred Kerri Russel, Matthew Rhys, Holly Taylor, and Noah Emmerich in the leading roles. The rest of the cast varied from season to season, with some of the actor's roles changing over time. Some included Annet Mahendru, Susan Misner, Alison Wright, Lev Gorn, Costa Ronin, Richard Thomas, Dylan Baker, Frank Langella, Julia Garner, and Margo Martindale.

The series is about a pair of "illegals" from the Soviet Union, played by Kerri Russell (best known for the series Felicity) and Matthew Rhys, who live in the United States in the 1980s and spy for Russia. The 13-episode first season aired during the winter and spring of 2013. The plot is loosely based on the spy ring that the US uncovered in 2010 and Russian Spies in Canada. Rusell and Rhys play Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings, who came to the US as young adults after learning to speak perfect English and blend into American culture. On the outside, they seem like the typical 1980s nuclear family with two kids, Paige, played by Holly Taylor, and Henry, played by Keidrich Sellati, running a travel agency. They are really deep-cover agents who carry out missions that range from everything from bugging or sabotage to abduction and murder. Life gets even more complicated for them when an FBI agent named Stan Beeman (played by Noah Emmerich) moves in next door. He gets suspicious of the Jennings' comings and goings but mostly accepts that they are ordinary neighbors. It incorporates actual events (like the assassination attempt of Ronald Regan) that occurred during the 1980s into the storylines and uses archival footage to blend in with the story. It also has a great 1980s soundtrack with songs that anyone around back then would recognize.

The first season's supporting cast included Annet Mahendru as Nina Sergeevna, Agent Beeman's Soviet mole working in the Soviet Embassy in DC, Margo Martindale as Claudia, the Jennings' KGB supervisor, Susan Misner as Sandra Beeman, Stan's wife, Alison Wright as Martha Hanson, Agent Gaad's secretary and Philip's informant, and Lev Gorn as Arkady Ivanovich, the KGB's second Rezident.

The Blu-Ray set is a three-disc set with a modest amount of extras. Those include deleted scenes, a commentary track on the season finale, a gag reel, and a couple of making-of featurettes. The Blu-Ray's A/V quality is good. Even though the show does not have many special effects, the colors really pop, and what effects there are (usually incorporating historical footage) do look great.

Overall, the series is outstanding. I like that it was set during the Cold War (probably not at the height, but not far removed from the height), which really ramped up the tension in the show. The show does a great job with character development and shows that Elizabeth and Phillip have very different feelings about what they are doing and how they would handle their kids finding out about what they do. The show does push the boundaries of what can be shown on basic cable. There is as much swearing and nudity that they can get away with and a lot of sexual content. The show does definitely hone in on the "honeypot" aspect of spy work, in which spies use sex to get close to and manipulate people in positions to be helpful to them. It is well-written and very well-acted, and the shorter (thirteen-episode) season makes viewers want more. So, if you are looking for a good drama, this is definitely one to check out.

DVD/TV Series Review: American Dad! Volume Eight

 

American Dad! volume 8 actually contains the season seven episodes. This is because, like with the releases of the early seasons of Family Guy, Fox released partial seasons in the volumes, and then after a ton of harsh feedback from fans and the showrunners, started releasing full seasons. So, just be aware of that if you are looking to purchase the DVD sets. Anyone who is looking at getting this likely knows what the show is by now, a story (or stories) of the week show, usually involving some shenanigans of Roger (playing a character) or one of the other characters. Roger tends to get the heavy focus throughout any particular season, but the show does kind of rotate storylines in which the other characters get featured. By this time the show had started to move away from the CIA story arcs that focused mostly on Stan and started intertwining more off-the-wall episodes, like one involving a killer Hot Tub.

The DVD extras include audio commentaries on a few episodes, deleted scenes, and Stan's dance from one of the episodes. So, it is not quite a MOD disc when it comes to little or no extras, but this is really the season where the DVD releases started trending that way. Of course, the show (as of this writing in 2022) is still on the air but no longer being released on DVD in either a "regular" release or a MOD release. So, it is kind of a take-what-you-can-get scenario if you want the physical discs. The DVD releases do contain uncensored jokes that do get bleeped out in the streaming version, which is part of the appeal for some fans. While I generally do not think that the show is as good in this season as it was in the first couple of seasons, I do think it is still entertaining and the stories are not stale (as they have become in later seasons). So, if you are a fan of the show, this is a good pickup.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Red Dragon

 

“Red Dragon” is a 2002 horror/crime-thriller starring Anthony Hopkins, Edward Norton, Ralph Fiennes, Harvey Keitel, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Emily Watson, Mary Louise Parker, Anthony Heald, and Frankie Faison. The latter two reprising their roles from Silence of the Lambs. This movie rounds out what ended up being a trilogy of Hannibal Lecter movies starring Anthony Hopkins in the starring role. It was directed by Brett Ratner and is a prequel to the iconic 1991 movie Silence of the Lambs, but it was made after the direct sequel to Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal, which was made in 2001. This is also a remake of the 1986 movie Manhunter with the same storyline which starred Brian Cox as Lecter. This one co-stars Edward Norton as Will Graham, the FBI agent who originally captured Lecter. We see how Lecter was caught at the beginning of the movie, and then for the rest of the film, he is in the familiar dungeon-like cell that we see him in Silence of the Lambs. This movie centers around a serial killer that is nicknamed The Tooth Fairy. Graham comes out of retirement to work the case and enlists Lecter's help to catch the Tooth Fairy. Lecter serves in much the same role as he does in Silence of the Lambs, but has a much different dynamic with Graham than he did with Clarice. 

The Blu-Ray's A/V quality is very good, with many great cinematographic shots, and it includes a substantial amount of bonus content. The extras include several deleted, extended, and alternate scenes, over an hour's worth of making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes (that range from a minute or two to about forty minutes), an FBI profiling feature, and two commentary tracks on the film, one by the director and writer and one by the composer. Overall, the movie is good, but not as good as Silence of the Lambs. I would say it is on par with, or a bit better, than Hannibal. I think having Lecter in the advising role especially given Anthony Hopkins' age, works better. All of the actors did a great job with their characters with Fiennes and Philip Seymour Hoffman really standing out. So, even though it is not as good as Silence, it is still worth checking out.

Book Review: It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald T***p

 

It Was All a Like is a book by former Republican operative Stuart Stevens, published in 2020. It provides a behind-the-scenes look at the inner workings of the Republican party spanning decades (from the 1980s to the orange genital wart's election) from someone who helped craft much of the conservative narrative and helped get Republicans elected. Stevens draws a straight line from what was being done and said in the 1980s and 1990s to the culture that embraced the shitgibbon. 

Stevens does a bit of a mea culpa admitting his role in things but also indicts himself a bit by implying (and sometimes outright saying) that many of the policies and talking points were trash, half-truths, or just total bullshit when they were things that he helped foster and willingly pushed. He absolutely backs up what he says in the book by bringing receipts in the form of hundreds of endnotes. Yes, some of what is in the book are his opinion, but he backs it up with citations to many sources. Personally, I think he should have used footnotes instead of endnotes to make it easier to see what he was citing, but the book is not just full of his unsubstantiated opinions. 

The hardcover version of the book is about 250 pages long and reads quickly. It can easily be read in a couple days or less. The book is a very revealing look at the difference between what was being said by Republicans versus what was actually meant when they used buzz words and phrases such as "family values", "welfare state", and the like, by someone who was in a position to know. He also calls out some of the biggest bullshit artists by name (e.g., Newt Gingrich who went after Bill Clinton for an affair with a White House intern while Newt was cheating on his dying wife with a congressional intern). He also goes into detail about how the idea of "small government" which is what many Republicans still try to cling to even if they can't stand t***p to justify their party loyalty, was complete and utter crap, and not anything that the Republicans really ever cared about (unless a Democrat was president, in which case they were all about fiscal responsibility and small government).

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 50

Day 50 was the final Push Circuit 1 workout for this phase. I was able to hit the 8 rep max on just a couple of exercises, but for the most part, I was in the 6-7 rep range for almost all of the 9 exercises. Next week will be the switch back to the Power-90 workouts, doing the 3-4 workouts, which are, for the most part, just longer and a more intense version of the 1-2 workout. 

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 49

Day 49 was the Recharge workout. My flexibility is still improving (very slowly). I can get deeper into the crouches near the beginning, getting as low as I could about a decade ago when I was in the best shape of my life. I am definitely not anywhere near that shape right now, but I am getting better incrementally.

Workout Update: Power-90/Chalean Extreme Hybrid: Day 48

Day 48 was the second Burn it Off workout of the week. It went pretty well again. I still modified a couple of the exercises, but I was able to get through them without pausing or stopping, which is always the goal at this point.