Book Review: Star Wars The Skywalker Saga

 

The Skywalker Saga is an illustrated storybook published in 2019 before the theatrical release of The Rise of Skywalker. You need to be aware that this is not a novel. It is more of a coffee table book that summarizes the "Skywalker saga." There are pictures and illustrations of scenes from every "main storyline" movie (the prequels, original trilogy, The Force Awakens, and The Last Jedi), along with a narrative summary of the key moments from each film written by Delilah S. Dawson. 

The hardcover version of the book is about 400 pages long. It is not a retelling of the Skywalker storyline from any character's point of view or anything like that. It does not have anything from the ancillary movies like Solo or Rogue One, nor does it give hints or details about The Rise of Skywalker. Because it is an illustrated book, it is very easy to read. It can easily be finished in a day or two. It is not one of the must-read books, but it is worth checking out as long as you do not expect it to be a novel that fleshes out the storylines or provides details that are not known from the movies. 

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Chernobyl

 

Chernobyl is a five-part mini-series that aired on HBO in 2019. It is a docudrama telling the story of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster in the Soviet Union (now Ukraine) in 1986. It is told mainly through the stories of two real-life people, Valery Legasov, a chemist tasked to lead a commission investigating the disaster (played by Jared Harris), Boris Shcherbina, a Soviet deputy minister (played by Stellan Skarsgård), and the fictional character Ulana Khomyuk (played by Emily Watson) who was a composite of all the scientists who worked with Legasov Shcherbina.

Each episode told a portion of the overall story, from the response to the disaster in episode one, focusing mainly on the firefighters and the scientists and engineers working at the plant who were the first to respond to the disaster and tried to contain it. Episodes 2-4 were all about trying to contain and mitigate the results of the disaster. The series does a great job of showing not only how bad it was but how bad it could have been had steps not been taken to prevent a second explosion, which would have killed millions and contaminated most of Europe with radiation fallout. The final episode focused on the trial of those who ran the plant and laid out in great layman's terms exactly why the reactor core exploded.

The acting and writing of the series were top-notch. It accurately told the story yet kept the details understandable. I actually researched the disaster for a class in my engineering program, and I was impressed that while some aspects were embellished and dramatized for TV, they got all the important stuff correct, including how the plant was not maintained correctly and how the cheap materials played a pivotal role in what happened.

The Blu-Ray set is a two-disc set. The A/V quality is excellent, as the show looks and sounds great in the format. The extras include short inside-the-episode segments for each episode, then a handful of behind-the-scenes and making-of clips that run anywhere from a minute and a half to about 10 minutes. It's not a ton, but it's good for what is there. It is a pricey set for a two-disc, five-episode series, but it is worth it for those who want to support the physical media and keep it around as long as possible.

Book Review: Fire & Blood: The Targaryen Dynasty: The House of the Dragon

 

Fire and Blood is a prequel to the Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire series. It was written by George R.R. Martin and published in 2018. It serves not only as the backstory to the "main" Game of Thrones novels but also as the source material for the series House of the Dragon. Specifically, the book details (sometimes in painstaking detail) the rule of the Targaryen line over the seven kingdoms. It begins with the rule of Ageon I and ends at the beginning of the rule of Ageon III, or about 100 years before the rule of Aerys II, "The Mad King" (and Dani's father). Of course, Aerys II's rule was ended by Robert Baratheon, who was king at the beginning of the Song of Ice and Fire novels and the Game of Thrones TV Series.

The hardcover version of the book is just over 700 pages. It is not the easiest or quickest read. Not only is it long, but it goes into great detail about the reigns of the various Targaryen kings, queens, princesses, etc., as told from the notes of the maesters of the time. There are many characters in the book, and Martin reuses the first names of the various members of the Targaryen family, so it is sometimes hard to tell exactly who he is talking about. Plus, the fact that the story is not told linearly can make it hard to follow when Martin keeps jumping around and referring to past events and characters. While I am not one who is pissed that Martin worked on this (and other) novels before finishing the next book in the "main" series, I think it would have been better to focus on one or two characters and break this into two or three books. That said, it provides a very informative history and provides details that will probably be omitted from the TV series. So, it is worth the time to read.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: The Post

 

The Post is a 2017 drama directed by Stephen Spielberg. It features an ensemble cast, including Tom Hanks, Meryl Streep, Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Paulson, Alison Brie, Carrie Coon., Jesse Plemmons, and Matthey Rhys.  At its core, The Post is a movie about the publication of The Pentagon Papers, which was a multi-volume retrospective on the Vietnam War that was put together during the Johnson and Nixon administrations. The papers were leaked by Daniel Ellsberg (played by Matthew Rhys, best known for his role in The Americans), who helped work on the documents and ultimately leaked them to the press after trying to get Congress to act on the information within them. The papers outlined the fact that all the past administrations, Democrat and Republican alike (From Eisenhower to Nixon), knew that the Vietnam War was not something the United States could ever win, and the government only stayed in it not to help South Vietnam or halt the spread of Communism, but to keep America from looking weak in losing a war. The release of the papers ultimately led to the public at large turning against the war, which eventually led to the war's end. It also told a larger story of how the Washington Post rose to prominence from a small, privately-owned local newspaper to a national newspaper that would ultimately do a lot to bring down what is now the second most corrupt Presidential administration in history.

The movie is directed by Steven Spielberg and is centered around the characters of Ben Bradlee (played by Tom Hanks), who was the paper's managing editor, and Kay Graham (played by Meryl Streep), who was the paper's publisher. Overall, it focuses on the events of how the Washington Post came into possession of the papers and the decision about whether to publish them after the Nixon administration sued the New York Times (which was the first paper to get ahold of some of the material in the papers) to stop publication of the documents. It was a tricky situation for the Washington Post, which was transitioning from being privately owned to being taken public, and the publication of the papers could spook potential investors and tank the public offering.

The story is an excellent historical drama, with some fictionalized elements blended in. It benefited from having many of the people involved in the events (including Ellsburg) who were still alive or the children and grandchildren of the actual people acting as consultants. So, it was able to stay historically accurate. It also blended in the audio from the Nixon tapes, which were released as a part of the Watergate investigation years later, of Nixon discussing the release of the papers with his cronies and displaying his hatred of the press. Specifically, the Washington Post. It is not an action movie, so if you are like some of the one-star reviewers complaining that it is boring, know what you are getting.

The 4k set is a two-disc set with a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The UHD disc has just the movie itself. On the regular Blu-ray disc, there are well over an hour's worth of making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes that range from 25 minutes in length to less than ten minutes. The A/V quality of the UHD disc is outstanding. Given that it is not a CGI-heavy action or sci-fi movie, you may not find it necessary to get it on 4k, but if you do, the film looks excellent, especially the location shots.

Overall, the movie was very well-written and acted. Despite idiots reviewing the film on Amazon saying it is just liberal propaganda, it is actually (aside from a couple of lines from the characters discussing political corruption, which were clear shots at the current political climate) a primarily accurate retelling of the historical events. While not everything in the movie was 100% historically accurate, which, given that it is not a documentary, is to be expected, much of what is in the film, including the text of the Supreme Court's decision about the role of the press in our democracy, is accurate. Of course, those events occurred before the modern-day hyper-partisanship in which fealty to a dear leader, regardless of who that leader is, trumps all, including corruption. And they happened at a time when freedom of the press and holding the government accountable was important not only to more than just some members of the government but all members of the media, the courts, and the populace as a whole. It was not a time when salivating, bootlicking toadies stood by the leaders of their party, no matter what. My guess is that many people complaining about the movie being "overly political", even though it made both Democrat and Republican administrations look bad (but yes, moreso Nixon's administration), are doing so because it puts a spotlight on what was happening in the orange genital wart's administration. But, given that the movie's events are absolutely true, it falls more into the category of "those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it" than it does a "political hit job" and is worth watching and learning something from.

Book Review: Paul of Dune (Dune #15)

 

Paul of Dune, published in 2008, is a novel by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. It is the 15th book in the Dune saga if you read the novels chronologically. It is set mainly during the time jump between the first two books of Frank Herbert's original Dune trilogy, Dune, and Dune Messiah. In it, we see how Paul's forces take control of the planets in the Imperium and how Paul ultimately becomes the Emperor. We also learn more about his relationship with Irulan and how she becomes Paul's biographer. The book also details the attempts made to stop his rise to power. 

The hardcover version of the book is just over 500 pages long. Part of the book is told in the present (meaning after the events of the original Dune novel), and part is told in the past, detailing events that occurred when Paul was young. The story flows pretty smoothly since the time period switching occurs in sections, so there will be a section with 5-10 chapters set in the past, and the next section will have 5-10 chapters set in the present. The only thing that makes the storyline set in the present a bit hard to follow is that you have to remember where that story left off after you get through one of the flashback sections. The book is well-written and has a good blend of action, intrigue, and drama. We see that Paul is conflicted about what is being done in his name, and a huge theme of the book is the danger of cult-like devotion to a leader, which is absolutely applicable to the times we currently live in (as of 2024 when this was written). It is an excellent addition to the saga and is worth reading. 

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Heartbreakers

 

Heartbreakers is a 2001 romantic comedy starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sigourney Weaver, Gene Hackman, Ray Liotta, Jason Lee, and Anne Bancroft. Sarah Silverman and Zach Galifianakis also appear in supporting roles. It is about a mother-daughter pair of con women (played by Sigourney Weaver and Jennifer Love Hewitt) who con wealthy men in a marriage/cheating scam that leaves them with half his money. Ray Liotta plays the mark at the beginning of the movie, a wannabe mobster who runs a chop shop in New Jersey, and Gene Hackman plays the mark for the majority of the movie, the owner of a tobacco company in FL, who is the mark for "one last score" for Weaver and Love Hewitt's characters. The rest of the cast is rounded out by Jason Lee, who plays a love interest for JLH's character, along with minor roles for Carrie Fisher, Anne Bancroft, Sarah Silverman, and Zach Galifianakis.

The movie is meant to be a silly comedy with a bit of romantic comedy mixed. The story is very absurd, especially because Jason Lee's character would want to live happily ever after with Jennifer Love Hewitt's character just because she is hot, given how awful she is for most of the movie. But, it is not exactly meant to be anything but an unbelievable story. All the main actors involved were very good sports, as their characters were very over the top in a bad way. Gene Hackman as the chain-smoking, smoke-spewing, lung-hacking-up cigarette company executive was awesome, and they never missed an opportunity to put Jennifer Love Hewitt into a skin-tight, cleavage-baring outfit.

For those who get the Blu-Ray, it is a decent, but not great, video transfer. You will not get a big difference in quality from a DVD version, but you do the Blu-Ray anti-scratch coating, which is the only reason to upgrade. There are no subtitles, and the audio seems to dip in volume level, so I had to keep turning the volume on my TV up and down to hear some of the dialogue and then keep it from blasting during other scenes. There is about an hour's worth of extras, including a making-of documentary, a gag reel that also incorporates some making-of interviews, deleted scenes, and the trailer.

Overall, the movie is fun if you do not expect an award-winning movie. It is a silly comedy that does not try to be anything more than that. The Blu-Ray quality could be better, but it is not all that surprising that the movie, which came out well before the Blu-Rays were created, and was not popular enough to get a high-quality transfer. If you are looking for a comedy to kill a couple of hours watching, this is a good option.

DVD/TV Movie Review: Baywatch: Hawaiian Wedding

 

Hawaiian Wedding is the 2003 TV movie that (finally) put a nail in the coffin of the Baywatch franchise.  It mostly brought back cast members from the parent series, including David Hasselhoff, Pamela Anderson, Yasmine Bleeth, Angelica Bridges, Nicole Eggert, Carmen Electra, Jeremy Jackson, John Allen Nelson, Gena Lee Nolan, and Billy Warlock however, Jason Mamoa, Brandie Roderick, and Stacy Kamano from Baywatch Hawaii did appear, as did Michael Bergin, who starred in the final couple of seasons of the parent series and the two seasons of Baywatch Hawaii. They also found a clever way to bring back Alexandra Paul, whose character was killed off toward the end of the run of the original series. Notable absences included Donna D'Errico, Erika Elaniak, Angie Harmon, Greg Allen Williams, Brooke Burns, David Charvet, David Chokachi, Parker Stevens, Jason Brooks, and Kelly Slater. 

The movie is just over an hour and a half long. It did not get a major restoration like the Blu-Ray releases of the original series and Baywatch Hawaii, so the A/V quality is nowhere near as good as those. The DVD does not have any extras specific to the show or movie but does have promo reels for two series, The Sheild and the Baywatch spoof, Son of the Beach. Like most of the episodes of the various shows (Baywatch, Baywatch Nights, and Baywatch Hawaii), the storyline is terrible, and the acting is not much better. Still, it does provide a proper series finale for the original series and Baywatch Hawaii (it ignores that Baywatch Nights ever existed), which neither series received. It has horrible plot holes, including handwaving away how Mitch survived the blast that ended season 1 of Baywatch Hawaii and a lame explanation for why Court can still see. It brings back a bad guy from season two, Mason Soto (played by Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa), who is bent on revenge against Mitch and everyone Mitch cares about because Mitch helped put him in jail. There is also a stupid plotline involving the characters of Jason, Kekoa, Leigh, and J.D. that makes no sense and essentially invents something that never happened in the show to develop a love rectangle. But, then again, Baywatch was never big on sticking with storylines or providing continuity. There are a couple of musical interludes/montages that show clips of the various characters from their time on the show (and one showing Anderson rolling around in a bikini), and there are some callbacks to things that occurred over the run of the franchise. I would not call it a must-watch, but it provides some nostalgia for people stuck with the show from the beginning.

Book Review: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker: Expanded Edition

 

+++ Warning: This will contain spoilers from the movie and some of the clarifying points from the book. If you have not yet seen the film, then read it at your own risk +++

This is a relatively straightforward novelization of the final film in the Star Wars sequel trilogy, The Rise of Skywalker. It was written by Rae Carson and published in 2020. Like most of the novelizations that have been put out since the prequel trilogy novels to date, there are additional elements that flesh out the plot points and make the overall story better. The big one is an explanation of how exactly Palpatine returned (he did not survive being thrown down the reactor shaft in Return of the Jedi) and the message he sent out announcing his return to the galaxy. It also gives additional insight into what Finn tried to tell Rey throughout the movie but never did. It also gives more context to "The Kiss" and makes it seem much less forced and creepy than it came off in the movie.

The hardcover version of the book is around 370 pages. How much you enjoy the book will be closely tied to how you feel about the movie. I liked but did not love the film, mostly because I think they had to spend too much time retconning elements from The Last Jedi and resurrecting plot points that were set up in TFA and tossed aside in TLJ. That made it even more evident that there should have been one writer for the entire trilogy. If you hated the movie, then there is nothing in the book that is likely to change your mind. If, however, you liked the film, then the novelization will make you like the story even more.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Pride and Prejudice

 

Pride & Prejudice is an adaptation of the novel by Jane Austen (who also wrote Little Women), made in 2005. It stars Keira Knightley, Matthew Macfadyen, Carey Mulligan, Rosamund Pike, Jena Malone, Rupert Friend, Tom Hollander, Judi Dench, Brenda Blethyn, and Donald Sutherland. Knightley stars as Elizabeth Bennet, the second to eldest daughter in a lower-class English household consisting of all daughters trying to be married off by their mother (Blethyn). Elizabeth has a love-hate relationship with Mr. Darcy (Macfadyen), a wealthy bachelor whose Aunt (Dench) disapproves of Elizabeth and her family.

The Blu-Ray's A/V quality is excellent, and the movie looks and sounds great in HD. The disc includes several behind-the-scenes and making-of features and a commentary track. I will not go into much detail about the plot, as it is a well-known book, and the movie has been out for almost 20 years (as of this writing).  Ultimately, it is a well-written adaptation of the book and very well-acted. It does a good job showing (without going into too much detail) the class system that existed in England at the time and how marriages were arranged within that system, which definitely had (at times) little to do with love, attraction, or the like. It is definitely worth the time to watch, and it is worth picking up the physical disc if you like going through bonus material.

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Baywatch Hawaii: Season 2

 

The 22-episode second season of Baywatch Hawaii aired during the 2000-2001 TV season. As was the case for the entire run of the Baywatch franchise, there was a lot of turnover in the cast, the biggest being David Hasselhoff leaving the show (he was still listed as an executive producer). The other cast members who left after season one were Simmone Jade Mckinnon, Dawn Masterson, Michael Newman, and Brooke Burns. Burns would, however, make a couple of appearances in season two as a guest star. This season, the additions to the cast were Brandie Roderick (who was at the height of her Playboy modeling fame), Charlie Brumbly, and Alicia Rickter. Krista Allen was promoted to series regular, and Jason Mamoa, Stacy Kamano, Michael Bergin, and Jason Brooks all returned as series regulars. The series did get a couple of recognizable guest stars this season. Daisy Fuentes, still popular from her MTV days, guest starred in one episode, and Pat Morita (from the Karate Kid movies) played a major recurring role. 

The Blu-Ray set is a four-disc German import set. So, if you get this, you will need a Blu-Ray player capable of playing European (Region 2) discs. The menus and episode titles are in German, and the audio track defaults to German, but you can switch to the English language track in the disc menu. There are no captions, but there are some extras on the discs. Those include standard definition versions of each episode, and on the final disc, promotional trailers for many episodes, a promotion reel for the series, and a photo gallery. You can play the remastered episodes in a play-all mode or one at a time. If you stop in the play-all mode and turn off your player, it will not resume where you left off. While the show's first season could conceivably be considered the 10th season of Baywatch, this season was its own thing and was mostly bad. The writers totally ignored the cliffhanger that ended season 10, the storylines were all over the place, the character of Zack was irritating, and some episodes were aired in an order that made no sense. For example, an engagement party occurred two episodes before the proposal. On top of all that, it was given a finale that felt like part 1 of a two-part series finale, but instead of another episode, it just stopped without wrapping up any character arcs. The writers would have been better off resolving the cliffhanger in the Hawaiian Wedding TV movie and skipping this mess of a season. If you want to see how it played out just to finish the show, it is a trainwreck, but you are not missing anything notable if you just skip it. 

Book Review: Star Wars: Secrets of the Jedi

 

Secrets of the Jedi, published in 2019, is another Star Wars coffee table book. Much like the Han Solo coffee table book released earlier (without behind-the-scenes shots from the movies), it is devoted to the Jedi. It is essentially a journal written by Luke Skywalker laying out the history of the Jedi and the Sith and giving character profiles of the "main" individuals of each group. 

The hardcover version of the book is very short, at just over 30 pages. It includes lots of pictures, so it is a very quick read. It can easily be read in less than an hour, even if you are a fairly slow reader. It ends during the events of The Last Jedi, likely just before Luke "force teleports" to Crait during the battle. The most important thing the book does is detail his change of heart about the need for the Jedi order to die. I would not say this is one of the must-read books in the canon, but it is worth the time to check out.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Halloween (2018)

 

This version of Halloween, released in 2018, starred Jamie Lee Curtis, Judy Greer, Andi Matichak, James Jude Courtney, and Nick Castle. It was written by David Gordon Green, Jeff Fradley, and Danny McBride, mostly known for the comedy genre, directed by David Gordon Green. It also brought John Carpenter back into the fold as executive producer and co-composer. This sequel is a complete reboot of the series, acknowledging that only the original movie existed, and is almost a "what if" scenario, presenting the scenario of what if Michael had been caught at the end of the first movie and held in Smith's Grove for 40 years. Curtis reprises her role as Laurie Strode and is also an executive producer. Of course, her character was killed off in Halloween 8, hence the need for a total reboot. In this version, Laurie is a basket-case who is estranged from her daughter ( played by Judy Greer) and granddaughter (played by Andi Matichak). She has been readying herself for 40 years for Michael to return. She lives alone in the woods in what can only be described as a compound with lots of surveillance and guns. Curtis does a great job with this version of the character and does a believable portrayal of what she would be like if she never moved on from the events of that night. 

Any fan of the Halloween franchise knows that the various sequels have ranged from good to decent to absolute garbage. And, of course, there was the sequel that wasn't Halloween 3. I think everyone has slightly different ideas about which sequels fall into what categories, but for me, Halloween 6 and 8 fall into the absolute garbage category (although I think 6 had some potential as a story, it was just executed horribly and suffered massive rewrites and the death of Donald Pleasance), and Halloween 4 and H20 fall within the excellent category. Die-hard Halloween nerds will know that while Carpenter's name was included on many of the other sequels, he never had anything to do with them and was just getting royalty rights. He famously never wanted the movie to go any farther than the first one, and if there was going to be a franchise, he wanted it to be like Season of the Witch, without the Michael Myers character.
  
The 4k set is a two-disc set that includes a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The UHD has both the movie and the extras, so the regular Blu-Ray disc is extraneous. The extras include about 12 minutes of deleted scenes and several short behind-the-scenes and making-of featurettes. The bonus content amounts to around a half hour to 45 minutes worth of material. One thing that was not included as an extra, which would have been nice, is a commentary track on the movie. I would have liked to hear the writers, director, Curtis, and Carpenter provide commentary on the movie. But what was included was very good.  While the movie does pretend that the other sequels and remakes never existed, it does have many easter eggs that pay homage to the original film and some things that were clearly inspired by the other sequels, including the movie's last shot. It could have worked as an end to the franchise, but as most are likely aware, it ended up spawning two additional movies. While I cannot say that everyone, including fans of the franchise, will like or love this version, it is better than most of the other sequels and is worth the time to watch.

DVD/TV Series Review: The Good Place: Season 2

 

+++Warning, this has spoilers from season 1, but no major season 2 giveaways+++

The 13-episode second season of The Good Place aired from fall 2017 into winter 2018. It picks up immediately after the reset that ended season 1 when the group finds out they are really in The Bad Place and have been torturing each other. It does not really follow the format of season 1. I will not spoil all the details of season 2; however, the bulk of the season is focused on the group trying to get into the real Good Place.

The show continues to be well-written and acted. All the "core" group returns, and some of the more ancillary season one characters have a more significant role this year. That said, not everyone who made guest appearances last year returns this season. It sticks to the format of primarily being a comedy, which does not take itself very seriously but also ties in some emotional moments. The cast gets along well or can fake great chemistry, which is essential given the show's format. Unlike season one, it does not end on a cliffhanger this year and does leave a lot of leeway going into season three for what direction the show will go in.

The DVD set is a two-disc set that is very bare-bones. The extras include a commentary track on one episode, a seven-minute gag reel, and a special effects reel that lasts less than a minute. What was included was good, but not nearly as much as what season one had, and there are no closed captions. And, of course, it is one of the shows for which no blu-ray set is available.

This is a great option if you are looking for a great comedy that is still under the radar. Despite being about the afterlife, it has no religious overtones. It deals more with philosophy and what it means to be good and bad. That is the serious part of the show. It is mostly really absurd humor and, like I said, does not take itself all that seriously. You definitely want to watch season one because it is not a show that you can easily just jump into and have it make sense. All the episodes are chapters in a long story, and everything connects together. The mediocre DVD release aside, it is worth checking out even if you just stream it.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: The Shawshank Redemption

 

The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 thriller/crime drama starring Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, Clancy Brown, Bob Gunton, and William Sadler. It was adapted from a story by Stephen King and directed by Frank Darabont. The film did not get much acclaim during its initial run in the theater but took off on home video after being nominated for several Academy Awards. It is a fairly basic story. A man named Andy Dufresne (played by Tim Robbins) is convicted of murders he did not commit and sent to prison for life. He ends up at Shawshank prison, run by a corrupt warden and thuggish guards, befriending a fellow inmate named Red (played by Morgan Freeman), who also narrates the movie. Andy hatches an elaborate escape plan that no one, including the viewers, is aware of until the end of the movie.

The Blu-Ray's A/V transfer is good, but the movie did not get an extensive HD restoration. The Blu-Ray features several extras, including a director's commentary track on the movie, a few different behind-the-scenes and making-of features, a roundtable discussion with Robbins, Freeman, and the director of the movie on The Charlie Rose Show, and more. There is a ton of great material for those who like going through the bonus features.

Overall, the movie is well-written and acted. It was cast perfectly, from the leads to many character actors filling out the supporting roles. It is a combination of a prison movie, a period piece, and a buddy movie. There is not a ton of action, but some moments of action are mixed within the drama. It is a movie where the "good" guys are bad and the "bad" guys are good, at least partly. It is definitely worth the 2+ hours of time to watch it.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: A Quiet Place

 

A Quiet Place is a 2018 film with a twist on movies with themes of unseen monsters, alien invasions, etc. The twist is that the monsters in this movie are blind but have super hearing and kill anything that makes noise. The movie stars John Krasinski (who wrote the screenplay and directed the film), his real-life wife Emily Blunt, Noah Jupe, and Millicent Simmonds, playing members of a family in what is essentially a post-apocalyptic world in which many humans and animals have been killed. Those who have survived have to be perfectly quiet, communicate via sign language, and can only talk if they are near something that is making more noise than them.

It is a very different movie, especially as a horror movie, because there is minimal sound. Of course, sound is critical to the thrills in most horror movies, and in this one, it is the absence of sound, including background sounds. Even the soundtrack is very understated. The movie pulls off what most TV shows cannot, namely, having little to no dialog between the actors yet still managing to tell a compelling story.

The 4k set is a two-disc set with a UHD  disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The movie looks great in the UHD format. What the film lacks in sound, it makes up for in visuals and special effects. The UHD disc has just the movie, and then there are about 35 minutes (give or take) of behind-the-scenes and making-of featurettes on the regular Blu-Ray. Overall, the film is well written, very well acted, and tells a unique story on an old theme of a creature-based horror movie. It is definitely worth checking out.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: The Invisible Man

 

The Invisible Man is a 2020 horror/thriller. It is an updated version of the Invisible Man story, which has undergone several different on-screen iterations. It stars Elisabeth Moss (from Mad Men and The Handmaid's Tale), Aldis Hodge, Storm Reid, Harriet Dyer, Michael Dorman, and Oliver Jackson Cohen. It was directed by Leigh Whannell, a writer on some of the movies in the Saw franchise. The story involves a woman leaving her abusive boyfriend while he stalks and terrorizes her. The invisibility part comes in with him being an optics expert who builds a suit that allows him to appear invisible. From there, it is a decent thriller. While it does have some twists and turns, the ending is predictable if you pay attention all the way through. It is violent and bloody in a couple of parts, but it is not anywhere near as gory as the Saw movies, which often went overboard on the gore.

The 4k set is a two-disc set with a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The movie looks and sounds great in the UHD format. There are some beautiful views of Australia (where the film was shot), which doubled for San Francisco (where it was set). The extras are all included on the UHD disc, including deleted scenes, a few behind-the-scenes features, and a director's commentary. Outside the commentary track, the bonus features amount to about a half hour's worth of material. What was included was good, but it was not extensive. Overall, the movie is good but not great. It is well-acted, and the writing is good, even if a bit predictable. It is not an award-winner by any means (not that it tries to be), but it is worth checking out if you are looking for a suspense movie to watch to kill a couple of hours.

Star Wars: Shadow Fall An Alphabet Squadron Novel

 

Shadow Fall, published in 2020, is the middle book of the Alphabet Squadron trilogy of novels written by Alexander Freed that follows a "B-team" group of characters in the aftermath of the Rebel's victory at the Battle of Endor. Much like the Rebels TV series, it mentions some of the "main" Star Wars characters but is set around a group of outcasts who form a fighter squadron tasked with trying to mop up the remaining Imperial threat. Specifically, an elite squad of Imperials called Shadow Wing. The story is set in a new system whose central star has collapsed into a black hole. It focuses on a few of the main characters established in the first novel, expands some on their backstory, and mixes in a decent amount of action, both set on the ground and in fighter battles.

Like the first one, this book suffers a bit from not including any of the main characters from the original trilogy. Even an appearance by Leia, Han, or Luke would have made the story a bit better. I know the author was telling a story about how the war affected those other than the Skywalkers and other main characters, but I think that could still be accomplished by including them in limited roles. Given that there really has not been (as of the original writing of this review) a novel that really details what Leia and Luke were doing in the immediate aftermath of their victory at Endor, using the ancillary novels as a setup for those stories (kind of like what the Aftermath Trilogy did), would have been good.

The hardcover version of the book is just under 400 pages. It is a similar length and has a similar tone to the first novel. If you enjoyed the first novel, you will probably enjoy this one as well. Along the same lines, if you did not like the first novel or were lukewarm to it, you will probably feel the same way about this one. I would probably not ever re-read this one unless I just wanted to read all the canon material over again. Nor would I say it is a must-read for those who pick and choose which novels they read. That said, it is a good ancillary story set in the Star Wars universe and is enjoyable if you accept that you will not get anything about what Han, Leia, Luke, Lando, etc., were doing during the events in the book.

DVD/Movie Collection Review: The Star Wars Trilogy

 

This one is one of the original DVD sets of the original Star Wars trilogy. It was a good set and had a lot of good bonus material, including the great Empire of Dreams documentary, that outlines the making of the entire original trilogy, with a ton of archived material. The only real drawback, and the reason that I got rid of the set when the blu-ray set came out, was that it does NOT include the original releases of the movies as they were shown in the theaters. You just get the special edition releases with all the edits and additions that Lucas did to the movies for the 20th anniversary of the original movie and leading up to the release of the prequel trilogy. Of course, Lucas famously hated the movies as they were originally released because they did not have the look he was going for because of the limitations of special effects when they were made. And, once the movies were released with all the digital effects that were available for him to use in 1997, he vowed that the original movies would not be released again. Now that was not quite true because there was a very horrible DVD release of the original movies that you can find online for an exorbitant price, but long ago went out of print. But, it was basically a transfer from the laserdisc release of the movies, that looked horrible, and a lot of people never bothered getting them. So, the only "easy" way to see the original versions of the original trilogy movies remains to this day on VHS for those old enough to have purchased the old VHS tapes and kept them all these years (and who still have a working VHS player). And, it does not seem that Disney is ever going to release the original versions of the movies as well, even though it easily could given that it owns the rights to everything Star Wars. So, assuming you have upgraded to blu-ray, 4k blu-ray, or switched to streaming, there is no reason to get this set anymore.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Short Circuit

 

Short Circuit is a comedy from 1986 starring Ally Sheedy, Steve Guttenberg, Fisher Stevens, Tim Blaney, Austin Pendleton, and G.W. Bailey. Chances are, if you were a kid in the 1980s, you loved this movie. For those who have not seen it, yet somehow stumbled on the page for the DVD or Blu-Ray, it is about a robot called Number 5 that was designed to be a military weapon, programmed with artificial intelligence which, after being hit by lightning, becomes "alive". As I mentioned above, it stars 1980s staples Steve Guttenburg and G.W. Bailey from the Police Academy movies and Brat Pack member Ally Sheedy. Fisher Stevens played the comic relief sidekick as an assistant to Guttenburg's engineer/programmer character, who built and programmed the robots.

The movie definitely toes the line between adult and kid movies. The robot definitely appeals to kids, but there is a lot of swearing and off-color humor, mostly sexual jokes made by Stevens' character. So, it is probably not something you would want a really young kid to watch, but I think it is acceptable for kids who are 10, 11, or 12 years old and up. While rated PG, it could have easily been hit with a PG-13 rating. There is no nudity or sex in the movie; however, the closest is Sheedy in a bubble bath with everything covered.

The Blu-Ray release was very bare-bones. There are no bonus materials or extras. The AV transfer is of minimal quality, with the original aspect ratio of the movie presented, so if you have a large screen, it will play basically in a box in the middle of your screen. Not exactly widescreen, but not fullscreen either. Overall, it is a good comedy, that also blends some drama along with a bit of ethics and morality thrown in there. The writing and acting are okay for what it is, but neither are award-winning by any means. It flows around an hour and a half in length. For those who grew up in the 80s and probably watched it at least once on VHS, it is a good nostalgia trip down memory lane.

DVD/TV Series Review: 24: Legacy

 

24: Legacy was a limited event series that aired in early 2017 and starred Corey Hawkins, Miranda Otto, Jimmy Smits, Teddy Sears, and Gerald McRaney. Carlos Bernard was the only cast member from the original series to appear in Legacy. In the age of seemingly every canceled show getting a reboot, this is definitely not needed. At least not in the way it was done. It was actually the second shot at a 24 reboot, this time without Kiefer Sutherland reprising his role as Jack Bauer (he was credited as an executive producer), so while it had the same kind of exaggerated "real-time" format (at least for 11 hrs and 58 minutes or so, then did a 12 hr time jump and finished off the last couple minutes) and crazy twists that the old show was known for, it just did not work as well without the character that made the series iconic in the first place.

This series follows up on the aftermath of a raid that was clearly a take-off on the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden, but this time with the remaining terrorists planning retaliatory strikes in the United States. It centers around the character of Eric Carter (played by Corey Hawkins ), who was a member of a group of army rangers on a mission to kill the terrorist leader. The supporting cast includes Miranda Otto, who is the outgoing director of CTU and wife to Jimmy Smit's character who is a senator with Presidential aspirations, Gerald McRainey who plays the father of the senator, and Teddy Sears as the new director of CTU. There are also some character tiebacks to the original series. Chances are, most people who get this have already seen the series, but I will not spoil anything for those who have not.

The set is only available on DVD. After the series ended, Amazon had a page for a blu-ray release. Still, as is the case with the vast majority of Fox's shows, if it gets a disc release at all, it is only a DVD (although it looks like it was released on blu-ray overseas, so if you have a region-free blu-ray player and want to pay for an import, that is an option. The extras are all on the last disc, just deleted scenes and an 11-minute making-of featurette. Okay, for what is there, but definitely bare bones.

While the series was billed as a first season, it was canceled shortly after the final episode aired. Had the original series not existed, this would have been fine for a 12-episode show. But given what had come before and the fact that it was so centered around the Jack Bauer character, having an event series so far outside the parent show's storylines just did not work well. Plus, the fact that the new characters were not established in any way for a handful of episodes, so there was no way to really get fans to care about them, did not work. What the writers with the story was fine, and the acting was fine, but the series just felt like a square peg being forced into a round hole. I think it would have worked far better if they were at least to incorporate the character of Jack Bauer into the story (say, a mission to try and free him from whatever hole he was likely dropped into at the end of the Live Another Day series), even if Kiefer did not appear, appeared for just one scene at the end, or only appeared in flashbacks would have had fans of the original series more invested in this one. Ultimately, while it was not a horrible series, it was nowhere near as good as the original series was at its best. While it is worth watching but is not a must-watch series.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Red Sparrow

 

Red Sparrow is a 2018 film adaptation of the first book in a trilogy of spy novels. The movie stars Jennifer Lawrence, Joel Edgerton, Charlotte Rampling, Jeremy Irons, Mary-Louise Parker, and Joely Richardson. It centers around a Russian ballerina named Dominika (played by Jennifer Lawrence), who, after suffering a career-ending injury, is forced into a spy training program called the Red Sparrows, which trains young Russian women in spycraft.

An easy comparison for the film would be "The Americans" TV series. However, while there are some character parallels between Keri Russell's character on the show and Lawrence's character in the movie since it is set entirely overseas, the better comparison would be to Atomic Blonde, with less over-the-top fight scenes. The movie is a spy thriller with a KGB vs. CIA kind of plotline, with the loyalties of almost every character called into question at some point. While it is set in the modern-day (there are cell phones and laptops), because the spycraft in the novels was deliberately kept old so that the author did not reveal any modern-day secrets, the movie has a very cold-war 1970s-1980s feel to it. As a result, some of the technology in the film is very old-school. Those old enough to remember 3.5" discs will find it hilarious that they are being used to copy files off a modern-day laptop computer. If any laptop had a 3.5" disc drive, they have not been around in a long time.

The 4K set is a two-disc set with a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc.  The UHD disc has just the movie and the director's commentary. The movie looks and sounds great in the ultra-high-definition format.  The regular Blu-Ray has all the other extras, including previews, deleted scenes, and over an hour's worth of making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes. So, there is a decent amount of bonus material for those who like to watch the extras. Overall, the movie is very good. It is well-written and acted, and Lawrence takes on a different role than those she had played up to that point. The movie is very violent, and there is some nudity with a lot of sexual tones and themes. The movie is a bit different from the book it was adapted from, but it generally stays true to the story in the book.

Book Review: Star Wars: Queen's Peril

 

Queen's Peril is a 2020 novel written by E.K. Johnston. It is one of the young-adult novels that is ancillary to the main storyline novels, TV series, and, of course, the movies, but it is still a part of the overall canon material. It serves as an origin story for Padme and the various handmaidens, starting when Padme is elected Queen of Naboo. The first 2/3 or so of the book details how Padme and Captain Panaka devised a bodyguard system for the Queen, his finding and recruiting the various girls that would become handmaidens, and how the girls came up with the decoy system. The final 1/3 of the book overlaps with the events of The Phantom Menace, mainly glossing over what was actually seen in the movie, although occasionally showing things in the film from the perspective of different characters or filling in some of the gaps of events that occurred concurrently with what we saw in the movie (e.g., what was happing on Naboo while the others were on Tatooine). There are also appearances by Palpatine, Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, Darth Maul, and some of the other characters from TPM in the book, but all have relatively minor roles.

The hardcover version of the book is just under 300 pages. It gives a decent backstory for Amadala and the handmaidens. It is not an essential read or must-read, especially if you are just a casual fan and only get some of the novels. However, it is a fun and sometimes funny story (mainly the parts where Panaka has to learn how to deal with a bunch of teenage girls), as well as a nice blend of action and political intrigue from TPM (without getting as bogged down with the politics as TPM did), While it is in the young adult category, I think it is enjoyable enough to be enjoyed by those of all ages. It does contain one S-bomb that was dropped during the Trade Federation invasion. Yes, it also has details like the girls getting their period and getting the Queen's makeup right that will certainly not appeal to everyone, but those are, to me, relatively minor points. And, the parts that detailed the emotional toll on what amounts to a bunch of teenage girls when it came to having to become adults when they were still kids and be responsible for an entire planet were well done. It is also a fairly quick read, depending, of course, on how fast you read. But, if you are a quick reader, you can easily get through this in less than a week (at most). While it is not a must-read, it is worth the time to read.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Leaving Las Vegas

 

Leaving Las Vegas is a very dark 1995 drama starring Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue. It tells the story of an alcoholic named Ben, played by Nicholas Cage, who has managed to throw his entire life away. He uses his severance check after getting fired to go to Vegas and drink himself to death. There he finds a hooker named Sera, played by Elisabeth Shue, who is in an abusive relationship with her pimp, and basically jumps from one bad situation to another. They end up falling in love while he is slowly dying. There is also an excellent supporting cast with recognizable actors and actresses, although none of the supporting cast members have extensive roles. The largest is probably Laurie Metcalf, who plays the landlord of Elisabeth Shue's character. The supporting cast also includes Julian Sands, Richard Lewis, and Emily Proctor. 

The Blu-Ray release is fairly bare-bones. The HD transfer is okay but not excellent, and there are really no bonus materials. The theatrical trailer. So, if you only get physical discs when there are a lot of extras, then you may just want to stream this. The story is very dark and unhappy, but Cage and Shue's acting is excellent. Cage's overacting is kept to a minimum and actually works in this movie when he does it. Given that he plays a character who does not care about his life anymore, it is not as ridiculous as in other movies. The movie has some violence, sexual content, and nudity and obviously deals with the subject of substance abuse, so it earns its R-rating. It is definitely worth checking out if you are in the mood for a darker, gritty drama.

4k-UHD/Movie Collection Review: The Matrix Trilogy

 

I will only review the 4k set, not the movies themselves. The movies have been out long enough that people know what they are and how they feel about them. I personally like all of them almost equally, but anyone who has been around since the first movie came out, who was a fan of the first movie when it came out, knows the opinions on the quality of the second and third movies that are out there.

If you already own the ultimate edition trilogy on Blu-Ray, the only reason to get this is for the video and audio upgrade in the UHD format. But, be warned, not all the extras from that version carried over, such as the Animatrix episodes. You probably want to hang onto that set if you are a bonus material buff. This still gets you a lot of the behind-the-scenes and making-of features from the original Blu-Ray releases, and you have multiple commentary tracks on the UHD discs (if you want to watch the movies multiple times to get multiple perspectives on them). The audio and video upgrade on the UHD discs are substantial and make the double (or triple) dipping worth it (depending on how many versions you have purchased over the years). While some of the CGI limitations that existed at the time the movies were made still exist in the UHD version (such as making Neo and Smith look like animated characters in the fight scene in the courtyard in the second movie), the overall detail and sound are significantly better than the DVD release and even a big step up from the initial Blu-Ray release. If however, you do not have a 4K TV or projector and a 4K UHD Blu-Ray player, then it is not worth investing in this as you will essentially get the same A/V quality from the existing discs which are less expensive to pick up than this one.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Requiem For a Dream

 

Requiem For a Dream is a 2000 drama directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Jennifer Connelly, Jared Leto, Ellen Burstyn, Marlon Wayans, and Christopher McDonald. It is a movie about the power of addiction and the hold that varying addictions (drugs for most of the characters and TV and looking perfect for another) have over people. While all the actors turn in great performances, Burstyn, Leto, and Connelly give powerhouse performances, especially Connelly, whose character basically does anything for her next fix. All the characters end up in a downward spiral that ruins their lives by the movie's end. It is very over the top and similar in style and tone to other films by Darren Aronofsky, such as Black Swan, Mother, and The Fountain.

The 4k set is a two-disc set with a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The movie looks and sounds excellent in the UHD format. The restoration of the 20-year-old film was done very well, and it looks as good as many of the physical media releases of newer movies. The extras are partly carried over from the original Blu-Ray and DVD release. A few new extras (such as an interview with Ellen Burstyn) were made for the 20th-anniversary release.  Overall, it is not a film that will appeal to everyone. That, however, is par for the course with Aronofsky's films, especially the really out-there ones. That said, if you are a fan of his movies like Black Swan and The Fountain, I think this one is worth checking out.