The Walking Dead Season 4, Episode 1: 30 Days Without An Accident

Huzzah! The Walking Dead's back after a seven month absence. That's better than the SIXTEEN month gap between Season 7 and 8 of Doctor Who, but I still think it's too long.

Thoughts (SPOILERS AHEAD!)

• 16 million viewers watched this episode! Wow! That's a new record for cable TV. It even beat the Breaking Bad series finale! Not bad for our little zombie show.

I'm betting the ratings would be even higher if they counted people who watched it online, as I did.

• Another season, another new show runner. Scott Gimple takes over for Glen Mazzara, who took over for Frank Darabont. Geez guys, get a revolving door, wouldja? 

Gimple wrote this premiere episode and did a pretty darned good job of it. If he can keep up the quality of the premiere then the show's in good hands.

• Looks like there's been another time jump since the end of Season 3. I think that's a good idea. It makes the show feel like it's happening in real time (it's been seven months since we've seen our friends at the prison) and it helps explain Carl's rapid growth, neatly avoiding the "Walt Problem" that plagued LOST.

Other changes during the jump: Herschel's got a brand new homemade bionic leg, Michonne's hunting for the Governor and there's now some kind of ruling council making decisions. Hopefully they'll do a better job of running things than our government, amirite? Eh? Eh? Is this thing on?

Oh, and Daryl and Carol may be a couple. Or maybe not. It's tough to tell.

• Rick wears earbuds and listens to music as he tends to his garden. You know, his garden that's a mere twenty feet away from a mob of hungry walkers on the other side of the fence. Does that seem like a good idea? I can't speak for Rick, but I know I'd want to be able to hear anytime I was outside in this world.

• So Team Prison is raising pigs for food now. Seems odd to see animals on the show. That's something we've not seen much in the series so far. Daryl's killed a few animals now and then, but for the most part we've seen very little evidence that animals even exist after The Fall. Maybe the walkers eat them when they can't find human food?

• Earlier this summer the promos ominously hinted that there'd be a "new evil attacking from within." When I heard that my first thought was that it had to be some kind of disease. What else could it be? Looks like I was right. Not sure how a disease can be "evil" though, but there you go.

I'm guessing since pigs played such an inexplicably prominent role in this episode that the disease is some kind of mutated swine flu? And if you get the flu and then die, you come back as some kind of new, souped-up walker? Like the weird-eyed one that Rick kept seeing through the fence?

• At one point Rick and Carl observe the pigs in the pen. Carl worries that his pig Violet looks sick. Rick admits he doesn't know what's wrong with her and says it might be nothing.

Whoops! I guess the writers forgot that Herschel was a veterinarian and ran a farm before the apocalypse. Apparently no one thought to have him take a look at Violet and maybe even treat her. 

• Foreshadowing 101: Among the newcomers to the prison is Nerd Boy, a young and overeager teen who reminds me a lot of Harold Lauder from The Stand. He's seen cooking breakfast for everyone and even shakes Daryl's hand. 

Unfortunately he's infected with the mystery disease. And he just unknowlingly infected the entire prison as well.

By the way, we see Daryl lick his fingers right before he shakes Nerd Boy's hand. Does that mean Daryl's the flu carrier?

• At the end of last season, Carl had seemingly become a tween psychopath who callously killed a Woodbury resident just for looking at him funny. This harsh new world had robbed him of his childhood and threatened to turn him into a soulless killing machine. Herschel ominously warned Rick that his son was becoming dangerous.

Then suddenly in this episode Carl seems to be his old self again. He's got a pet pig, he's getting along with his dad and he even checks out story time with the other kids!

So what the hell happened? The "innocent kid who's turned into a killer by his brutal world" plot thread was interesting and one I don't think I've ever seen on TV before. I was looking forward to seeing how it would play out, but I guess it was none of our business. Carl's psychological problems were seemingly resolved offscreen. Boo! Way to take the easy way out, writers. That must have been one hell of a lecture Rick gave him!

• Newcomer Bob Stoovey goes on a supply run with Daryl, Tyreese, Sasha and a few redshirts. Inside a warehouse store, Bob sees a wine display and takes a bottle off the shelf, looking at it longingly. He then summons up his strength and puts it back (just before all hell breaks loose).

It's a very well done scene. With nary a word spoken we instantly know that Bob has a bit of a drinking problem and is doing his best to overcome it (and it'll no doubt come up again later to bite everyone in the ass). Well done, writers!

• It's raining men! Hallelujah! Well, it's raining zombies anyway.

Somehow the warehouse store's roof was crawling with walkers (and a crashed helicopter yet!) who came crashing through the rotting ceiling at the worst possible time.

Lots of cool gore and makeup effects on display in this scene, as the walkers splashed to the floor like bags of rotten meat.

• Rick goes into the woods to check the animal traps and meets a cuckoo crazy Irish (!) woman named Clara. She begs him to help her and her unseen husband Eddie. 

Did anyone not think that Eddie was a walker and she just couldn't bear to let him go?

We never actually get a look at what's left of Eddie; all we see is something wriggling inside a burlap bag. Somehow that made it even worse. 

• At the end of the episode Daryl tells Beth that her pal Zach The Redshirt died in their supply run. She calmly and dispassionately walks over to her "It's Been 30 Days Without An Accident" sign and removes the 30, which perfectly illustrates her deadened emotional state as well as explaining the episode's title.

• Nerd Boy is sick enough to die, but not sick enough to walk to the shower room. Got it. I'm betting he'll be infecting even more people next week.

This Week In Odd Halloween Costumes

Fans of Halloween and the films of Bob Clark rejoice! You can now buy an authentic A Christmas Story Sexy Leg Lamp Costume! 

Actually as slutty Halloween costumes go, this one's pretty tame. In fact it's downright chaste. I still wouldn't recommend it though.

First of all it's a hoop skirt, so if you wear it to a party you're going to have to stand up all night. If you sit down the front of the skirt's going to be forced upward and you'll flash your business to everyone in attendance, and nobody needs to see that.

Secondly, you're wearing a Christmas themed outfit to a Halloween party, which is just plain confusing.

Thirdly, this costume is horribly inaccurate. To be really authentic there should only be one leg sticking out from under the shade. Do you have the intestinal fortitude to saw off one of your own limbs just for a party you didn't want to go to in the first place? I thought not.

Alternatively you could try stuffing both legs into a flesh colored stocking to simulate one leg, as shown here. It's not gonna be easy to walk around in such a getup though, so don't forget to bring the hand truck so your date can haul you around the party and prop you up next to the dip. 

I bet you thought I was going to erase the girl's leg and Photoshop a bloody stump, didn't you? Well, maybe you don't know me as well as you thought.

Good News, Everyone!

Good news for Doctor Who fans today: the BBC announced today that several more long lost episodes have been found! Huzzah!

A couple weeks ago rumors began flying across the interwebs that a cache of episodes had been found in Nigeria of all places (no doubt hidden by one of those princes who's always emailing everyone about their fortunes). The BBC refused to comment on the topic "until they were ready to make a statement," which was the absolute worst thing they could have done. This only caused rumor and speculation to spread like wildfire.

Stories started popping up saying that all 106 missing episodes had been found. Most fans knew this was too good to be true though. First of all, finding ALL the episodes in one spot just seemed unlikely. Secondly, there's a Christmas episode titled The Feast Of Steven that was erased shortly after airing that is lost forever, so it's impossible to find all 106.

The BBC finally deigned to clear up the confusion and speculation today and announced that eleven episodes had been found, nine of which hadn't been seen for forty six years!

All six episodes of the story The Enemy Of The World have been found. The story features Patrick Troughton in a dual role as the Second Doctor and his enemy Ramon Salamander.

Also found were five out of six episodes of The Web Of Fear. Sadly episode three of this story is still missing. But hey, it's better than nothing! The Web Of Fear features the Second Doctor's famous foes the Yeti as they crawl around in the London underground. It's also the first ever appearance of fan-favorite character Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (although he's just a colonel here). Cool!

As you can probably tell, the recovered episodes all feature the Second Doctor, which is good news. For some reason poor ol' #2 has the most missing episodes of any Doctor, so any of his that can be recovered is always a good thing.

Supposedly the video restoration team is working to reconstruct the still-missing third episode from still images and the audio soundtrack, which is still available.

This leaves ninety six episodes that are still missing, not counting the one that can never be found (106 missing - 1 that will never be found - 11 that were just found + 2 that we already had = 96). Here's to hoping that somewhere out there is a dry, dusty warehouse containing a box full of the rest of the episodes.

As always it's galling to me that we're still missing ninety six episodes of Doctor Who, while every single miserable second of Two And A Half Men will be forever preserved in stunning 1080p high definition. The universe is a very unfair place.

Don't Delay!

Amazon now has The Walking Dead Season 4 available for preorder. 

That's right, the very same Season 4 that doesn't start until October 13. Order now before it even starts! Supplies are limited!

I don't get why they do this. If the pattern holds, this DVD set won't come out until August 2014. Does anyone out there really order their DVDs ten months in advance? Why not order Season 10 while you're at it?

By the way, the previews for Season 4 keep hinting at a new menace to threaten our favorite survivors of the zombie apocalypse. What could it be? A new type of zombie? A band of bloodthirsty cannibals? A rogue group of popcorn-selling band members who won't take no for an answer?

Nope. It's none of those. Look at that cover above. Look closely at the background. Geese. It had to be geese. Filthy, disgusting, miserable geese.

It Came From The Cineplex: Gravity

Gravity was written and directed by Alfonso Cuaron (Children Of Men) and co-written by his son Jonas Cuaron.

Cuaron reportedly spent four years trying to bring the film to the screen. At one point Angelina Jolie was attached to the role of astronaut Ryan Stone, but dropped out when Warner Bros. balked at her $20 million asking price (!). Scarlett Johansson, Blake Lively, Marion Cotillard and Natalie Portman were all considered as well before they settled on Sandra Bullock. I think they made the right choice. Bullock has a vulnerability that the brittle and icy Jolie lacks.

Robert Downey Jr. was set to play astronaut Matt Kowalski, but ultimately dropped out and was replaced by George Clooney.

So far it seems like half the viewers are praising the film for its realism while the rest are blasting it for lack of same.

Personally I thought it looked (and seemed) pretty darned realistic. Yes, I know that the Hubble and the International Space Station are in different orbits and that somehow makes it impossible to get from one to another. I know that you can't see the International and Chinese space stations in the sky at the same time. I definitely know that Ryan wouldn't be wearing just her skivvies (like Ripley in ALIEN) under her space suit. You can find even more mistakes with just a few seconds of googling.

And you know what? For once these little inaccuracies don't bother me. So what if it's not 100% scientifically accurate? Does it say anywhere on the poster that it's the most realistic space movie ever made? No. No it does not. So why's everyone so upset about it? Because it has the space shuttle in it? Does Star Wars get a pass because it has make-believe ships in it, but Gravity has to tow the accuracy line because it's got a real one?

It's a fictional story about astronauts in trouble, trying to survive the harsh environment of space. It's not a documentary. I'm willing to forgive them the occasional lapse in logic and realism (well, almost).

Besides, if they had made the movie completely accurate, the aforementioned scene in which Ryan strips off her spacesuit would have lasted about an hour, as that's how long it takes to get out of one of those things. Does anyone want to see Sandra Bullock struggling to get her boots off for sixty minutes? She'd also have been wearing a large adult diaper instead of her skimpy little underwear. I definitely don't need to see that!

OK, so you guys demand realism in your space movies? Here's some for you. Did you know that many astronauts who go on extended space walks experience something called "fingernail delamitation?" Due to the design of the pressurized space suit gloves, their fingernails sometimes peel right off. 

As you can imagine, this is quite painful. In order to avoid it, some astronauts have actually had their fingernails surgically removed before a mission so they don't peel off inside their gloves. Oy gevalt!

So… are you sure you want absolute realism in your space films?

I think I might have picked up on some subtle symbolism in the film. When Ryan finally makes it into the ISS, she sheds her space suit and then curls up into the fetal position, floating in the womb-like airlock for a few minutes.

Then at the end of the film after her escape pod splashes down in a lake, she literally crawls out of the water and onto the land and gasps for breath, like a fish that just evolved legs. Hmm. Now what could those images mean...

WEIGHTLESS SPOILERS AHEAD, INCLUDING THE DEATH OF A MAJOR CHARACTER! YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

The Plot:
Mission Specialist Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) is on her first space shuttle mission, along with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), who's about to retire. Disaster strikes when debris from a Russian satellite destroys the shuttle and sends Ryan spinning helplessly into the void. Kowalski, who's wearing a self-contained jetpack, rescues Ryan, but the two of them are now stranded in outer space without a ride home.

Their only hope for survival is to try and make it to the International Space Station before the orbiting debris comes back for another pass at them. Oh, and also before they run out of oxygen.

Pros:
• Spectacular visuals! I didn't watch the film in 3D because I loathe it with the white-hot passion of a thousand suns. Now that I've seen it though I'm kind of wishing I'd coughed up an extra three bucks and seen the 3D version.

• The film's full of Cuaron's patented super-long takes, for which he's famous (see Children Of Men). The opening scene lasts around fifteen minutes and appears to be one incredibly long, unbroken take. Impressive!

• For decades now filmmakers have been adding sound to space scenes and interstellar battles, saying they're too boring without it. Gravity features spectacular scenes of destruction with nary a peep out of the soundtrack, and you know what? It was just as exciting without sound. Seeing debris shred the space shuttle in absolute silence gave the scene an eerie, dreamlike quality that would have been missing if there'd been booming explosions batting the audience about the head.

• The film does a great job (for the most part) at simulating the weightlessness and physics of outer space. I especially liked the part where Ryan uses a fire extinguisher and is thrown backward across the room and into a bulkhead by the force of the spray.

Some are complaining that Sandra Bullock's hair doesn't behave the way it should in zero gravity, but that's probably for the best. Do you really want to watch her seemingly wearing a fright wig for two hours?

• Nice cameo by Ed Harris as the voice of Mission Control. Harris played a very similar role way back in Apollo 13.

• It was a nice touch at the end when Ryan has difficulty standing and walking on Earth after spending forty-some days in space.

Cons:
• At the very beginning of the film there's a title card describing the conditions of outer space in very basic terms. Things like the lack of oxygen, the wild fluctuations in temperature, etc. It ends with the line, "Life in space is impossible."

Is there anyone watching who doesn't already know this? Because if modern filmgoers need to be told that there's no air in space then we need to throw in the towel as a species. Well done, American education system!

• As I said above, I'm willing to forgive the film its occasional lapses in realism, except for one major blunder. I'm talking about the scene in which Matt Kowalski sacrifices himself because his momentum is pulling Ryan free of the ISS. That whole scene is just full of wrong.

Yes, Kowalski was shooting away at great speed, but he was tethered to Ryan, who was attached to the station. As soon as she stopped moving, he should have been jerked to a stop as well. His momentum would have been broken and Ryan could have pulled him back toward her with a light tug of his safety line.

And even if he did somehow break free, he still could have possibly saved himself. That jetpack he was wearing was empty so it was useless, right? Surely it wasn't welded to his suit. What if he unbuckled it and pushed himself away from it? Equal and opposite reaction and all that. If he pushed against the jetpack he'd be forced the opposite direction at the same velocity. He definitely wouldn't have been going very fast, but it might have given him another shot at grabbing onto the station.

I'm assuming they wanted Matt to die in order put doubt in the audiences' mind as to Ryan's survival. But if they absolutely had to kill him off they should have come up with a less boneheaded way for him to go.

• At one point in the film Ryan breaks down and sobs uncontrollably in the Russian escape craft. Her tears inexplicably detach from her face and float around the cabin.

I'm sure they were going for poetic rather than realistic here, but it just looked wrong. Generally when a person cries the tears stream down their face. Surface tension keeps the tears firmly stuck to your cheek. Does that not work in space? 

It seems like the only way this could work is if she cries with such force that her tears spray from her eyes like water from a garden hose. Who is she, Cathy?

• Twice during the film Ryan opens a space station airlock from the outside and is violently blown backward by the escaping air. Both times she barely manages to hold on to the hatch with one hand.

Does that really happen every time an astronaut wants to get back inside? Or did she just not have enough time to depressurize the airlock before opening it? Hopefully the latter.

Gravity is a tense and exciting outer space thrill ride that's full of incredible visuals and is reasonably realistic. I give it a B-.

Marvel's Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 1, Episode 3: The Asset

I don't have a whole lot to say about this episode. I hate to admit it by my enthusiasm for the series is starting to wane. 

Thoughts:

• I liked the reveal that the stereotypical trucker was actually a capable S.H.I.E.L.D. operative in disguise.

• The truck driver was driving a S.H.I.E.L.D. vehicle disguised as an ordinary semi truck. I noticed the "Rocky Mountain Office Supply" logo on the side looked suspiciously like the one for Office Max.

• So this episode is basically the origin story of how Dr. Franklin Hall becomes Graviton (who's pretty much the same as Magneto, but with gravity). Hooray! A real live super villain from the Marvel Universe! But we don't actually get to see him become Graviton until the last five seconds of the episode. Boo!

Why the hell didn't he turn into Graviton in the first five minutes of the episode, so we might actually see something super happen? 

Yes, battles with super-powered bad guys are expensive to film, but Smallville did it every week for ten seasons (!) and Fringe did it quite often as well. So why not here? Why didn't we get to see Graviton tearing open bank vaults with a wave of his hand until Coulson brought him down with some high-tech S.H.I.E.L.D. weapon?

I was willing to give this show a chance, but they're gonna have to ramp up the comic book angle if they want to keep me tuning in. Right now it's more like watching CSI or Criminal Minds or shows of that ilk than something from the Marvel Universe. Name-dropping the Avengers each week just ain't cutting it.

I know I keep bringing up Fringe, but they had the perfect tone that this show needs to emulate. Interesting characters trying to deal with the weird and bizarre things they're confronted with each week.

• When Coulson says he's going on the rescue mission, May balks and says that's not a good idea. Coulson reminds her that he saw "plenty of action" with the Avengers. Really? Because it seemed to me like he was too busy being killed by Loki to see much action with them.

• Again with Skye and her "is she or isn't she" a mole schtick. It's only the third episode and I'm already tired of that storyline.

• Where did Ian Quinn get his cool disintegration fence and where can I buy one to put around my yard?

• Gravitonium? Cheezus, I thought "Dalekanium" from Doctor Who topped the list of ridiculous fictional element names. Apparently any word can become the name of an element as long as you add "ium" to the end.

• Nice Inception-style crazy gravity effect, I guess. Now that I think about it I don't think I've ever seen that attempted on TV.

We Have Christmas Creep, Can Hanukkah Creep Be Far Behind?

Hey, look! Craft superstore Hobby Lobby's in the news! Good for them. They can use the publi-OH SWEET JESUS THEY'RE BADMOUTHING JEWS!

It all started last week when a customer visited a New Jersey Hobby Lobby and asked an employee if they carried bar mitzvah cards. Why she'd go to Hobby Lobby for such a thing, I have no idea. Has she never been there before? They might as well call the place Goy Warehouse, amirite?

Anyhoo, instead of saying something like, "I'm very sorry ma'am, but we don't carry that item," the helpful Hobby Lobby employee was all, "Beat it, Jew!"

OK, so it wasn't quite that bad. The helpful employee went all Star Wars Bartender on the woman and said, "We don't cater to you people." Now that I see it written out like that, I think "Beat it, Jew" wasn't so bad after all.

You know, Hobby Lobby, you're well within your rights to decide what you will and will not sell in your stores. If you don't want to sell Jewish trinkets, well then that's your call and it doesn't infringe on anyone's inalienable rights in the least. But maybe tone down all the "you people" talk, OK?

Of course the story spread like wildfire across the interwebs, as stories of appalled outrage over minor incidents always do. Why can't people get fired up like this about things that matter? Like, oh I don't know, the nimrods in Washington shutting down the country? But I digest.

The story spread all the way to Hobby Lobby's home office in the imaginatively named Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, where the head of public relations fell all over himself, saying: 

Due to overwhelming demand in the Northeast, we are pleased to announce that we will begin offering Jewish holiday items in a number of stores to test the market in New York and New Jersey.

Translation: "Jews are the ones with all the money, right? Money they could be spending in our stores if we stocked their fancy Jew candle holders, Arks of the Convenants, beads and incense or whatever the hell they use."

So for all of you residents of New York and New Jersey, soon you'll be able to buy your Passover and Hanukkah decorations at your local Hobby Lobby.

Personally I can't wait. I want to see 'em start putting up their menorah and dreidel displays in May and Passover decorations in January. Hanukkah Creep, anyone?

Sneak Peek!

You may have noticed I haven't posted any actual artwork here on my blog for a while. There's a good reason for that. No, I haven't given up illustrating. No, I'm not a lazy schlub who lies on the couch all day seeing how much weight I can gain in a week. Stop guessing and let me tell you!

I haven't posted any art because for the past month or so I've been hard at work on this year's annual Christmas Card Slash Book. This year I had the novel idea to start on it before the last week in November like I usually do. I actually began working on it sometime in August! Can you imagine such a thing?

Of course starting four plus months before Xmas won't make any difference. It's a fundamental law of the universe and of graphic design that the work will always expand the fill the time available. If you have a week to work on a project it'll take you a week. But if you have a year to work on the exact same project, then you'll be working on it for a year. I have no doubt I'll be plugging away on it right up to the wire as usual.

Anyhow, here's a sneak peek at this year's Xmas Card Slash Book. As you can see, it features Dr. Killdeath, a character I first drew way back in 2009. I've always thought the character had potential and finally figured out something to do with him.

The Doctor is just one of the stars of the card slash book. So who's the other one (or ones)? Ah, you'll have to wait until December to find out.

Nipple Threat

I've been re-watching Season One of Community all this week. If you've never seen it I highly recommend it. Stop reading right now and go watch it on your favorite video transmitting device.

Anyhoo, there's a story arc in which the Britta character is casually dating a guy named Vaughn. He's a hacky-sack playing hippy type who rarely wears a shirt and there's a running joke on the show about how he has extremely tiny nipples.

Here's a shot of Vaughn sans shirt from the episode The Politics Of Human Sexuality. As you can see, his nipples are pretty darned small.

Naturally I assumed that this is just the way the actor was born, and once they saw the size of his nipples they wrote that fact into the show.

But take a look at another take of the same scene from the blooper reel. Suddenly Vaughn has normal, human-sized nipples. Ones that fall well within the normal bell curve for adult man-teat sizes. What the heck's going on here?

The only answer I can come up with is that Vaughn really has normal sized nipples and some poor schlub at a CGI effects house in LA had to sit at his computer and shrink them in every frame in which they appeared. Hey man, good gig!

"Hey Joe, did you hear? I just got hired by ILM to work on the new Star Wars movies!"

"That's awesome!"

"So what are you working on these days?

"Um... I'm working on some TV show."

"Oh yeah? Which one? Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.? Under The Dome? The Walking Dead? 

"Uh, no. It's Community."

"Community? Huh. That's a good show, but I wouldn't think they'd need any CGI. Whaddya do over there?"

"Uh... I um... shrinkaguysnipples."

"What's that?"

"shrinkaguysnipples."

"Dude, I can't hear what you're saying."

"I SAID I SHRINK A GUY'S NIPPLES, OK? ARE YOU HAPPY NOW? YEAH, I SIT THERE ALL GODDAMNED DAY AND SHRINK HIS NIPPLES IN EVERY. SINGLE. SCENE. I've got nipples com in' out of my butt, man! I've seen so many nipples I'm startin' to dream about 'em!"

"Yeahhhh. OK, so I'm gonna go over here now and pretend I'm looking at my phone."

Our Long National Nightmare Is Finally Over!

At last, our long National Nightmare is finally over! Huzzah!

Oh... you thought I meant this National Nightmare, didn't you? Goodness, no, that one's still dragging on with no end in sight. Shutting down the government, making America the laughing stock of the world and all that? Those clowns over in Washington, amirite? 

No, I was referring to the end of our more important National Nightmare: the end of the feud between hip-hopping rap singing entertainers Chris Brown and Drake!*

The two have been firing shots over each other's bows for a year now, arguing over who's sampled the greater number of other artists in their songs or who's spelled their name the most in their rapping compositions or something like that. Maybe it was over a chick, who knows?

Whatever the reason, the feud's over. Your favorite rapping musical singing entertainers have finally reconciled their differences. Sleep easy once again, citizens of America! 

* Truth be told I have no idea who either of these people are. I think Chris Brown wrote a Doublemint Gum commercial maybe?

It Came From The Cineplex: Prisoners

Prisoners was written by Aaron Guzikowski and directed by Denis Villeneuve. Mark Wahlberg was the executive producer (!). Yeah, that Mark Wahlberg. Who knew the star of The Happening produced movies?

I don't have a lot to say about this film, mainly because it's not the type of movie I usually see. I prefer sci-fi, fantasy and horror stuff. The only reason I saw it is because the summer blockbuster season is over and this was the only thing playing at the cineplex. Hearty recommendation, eh?

That said, Prisoners surprised me. It's disturbing, with a feeling of dread that seeps into you as you watch. It's similar in tone to films like The Silence Of The Lambs (but without all the cannibalism).

Huge Ackman's Keller Dover character is interesting. Someone abducts his daughter so he goes out and does the same thing to the suspect. In essence he becomes the thing he hates. Worse even, since he adds torture to the mix. There's probably a message there somewhere.

PRISON-Y SPOILERS AHEAD!

The Plot:
Keller Dover (Huge Ackman) and his family spend Thanksgiving Day at the home of their neighbors the Birches. Keller's daughter Anna and the Birch's daughter Joy go outside to play and end up missing. The families suspect the girls' disappearance has something to do with a suspicious dilapidated RV seen parked in the neighborhood.

Detective Loki (!) tracks down the RV and finds it belongs to an Alex Jones and arrests him when he tries to flee. Loki questions him extensively but can find no evidence to link him to the girls' disappearance and releases him.

Keller is convinced Jones is lying, so he abducts him and ties him up in an abandoned apartment building he owns. He begins torturing Jones for information as to the girls' whereabouts. He somehow convinces the Birches to help with the whole torture thing. They're righty horrified, but do nothing to stop him. 

Meanwhile Loki tracks down several suspects who are seemingly dead ends. However they eventually point to the real abductor.

Pros:
• The movie's densely plotted and demands your attention, which is in stark contrast to most films which barely have a plot at all. It took its old sweet time telling the story too, but in a good way, letting it unfold at a natural pace.

• Good performances, especially from Jake Gyllenhaal (really, spellcheck? That name's in your database?).

Cons:
• Detective Loki? What the hell?

Note to screenwriters: when you're writing an realistic and intense psychological drama, don't give your characters the names of Avengers villains.

• Most parents would do anything in their power to protect their children. However, I think torturing their child's suspected abductor is a line most people would be unwilling to cross. 

Keller's actions are where the film kind of jumps the rails for me. Up to that point it was very realistic and plausible, but the idea of a normal everyday person beating someone senseless, then sealing them up inside a wall and dousing them with scalding water steered the story firmly into movie land. I just don't think a real person would do something like that. At least I hope not.

• Speaking of that, Keller tortures Jones in a run-down building his father left him. When we first see the building it seems like it's in a remote location, but later it's shown to be right next door to a liquor store! Did no one going in and out of the store notice the screams coming from the supposedly empty building?

• At one point Loki discovers a dead body wearing a necklace shaped like a round maze (like the one in the "O" on the poster above). Later he enters a suspect's home he sees the walls are covered with the same maze design. He then stares at a photo of the maze necklace and slowly connects the dots. He stops just short of turning to the camera and saying, "Did you get that, audience?"

Jesus, movie! I ain't a goddamned goldfish! I can remember something for more than two minutes. I saw the necklace and the walls and figured it out. It really bugs me when movies assume I'm a drooling idiot like this.

• After Anna is rescued, Keller's wife Grace asks Detective Loki if her husband will go to jail when found. Loki says, "Probably." 

I get that he's most likely trying to be diplomatic and sensitive here in her time of crisis, but the answer would most likely be, "Absolutely, positively and without a doubt." The law kind of frowns on abduction and torture.

• Similarly, the Birches should be in hot water as well. They witnessed firsthand Keller's abduction and torture of Alex Jones. They didn't participate, but they didn't move to stop him or alert the authorities either. In the eyes of the law that makes them accomplices and just as guilty as Keller.

A complex, long and disturbing psychological thriller. I give it a B-.

Overhead At Work: Handfishin'

I work in a typical office, surrounded by many other workers in cubicles. Although I'm grateful to have a job I like, sometimes the vocal din from the surrounding coworkers is a bit overwhelming. Not to mention odd. Thank the gods old and new for headphones and Pandora.

The following is a 100% true actual conversation I Overheard At Work:

Woman #1: Did you watch Hillbilly Handfishin' last night?

Woman #2: No I wasn't home, so don't spoil it for me!

So apparently not only is there a TV show called Hillbilly Handfishin', but it's possible to spoil its plot. Got it. Wow, look at all the quality programming I'm missing out on after getting rid of cable.

By the way, while Hillbilly Handfishin' is about catfish hunters, it should not be confused with the late Major League Baseball pitcher Catfish Hunter.

Marvel's Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 1, Episode 2: 0-8-4

This week the team travels to Peru and finds a box with blinking lights that turns out to be a weapon that everyone wants. A woman who may or may not be Coulson's ex betrays him in an effort to steal said box. The various team members argue to pad out the run time, they get captured, they blow a hole in side of the plane to defeat the bad guys, and they shoot the blinking box into the sun.

I'm very happy that we have a TV series set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and I really, really want to like this show, but… so far it's not wowing me. It's just kind of meh.

Take the 0-8-4 in this episode, for example. Supposedly that's S.H.I.E.L.D. code for an unknown, potentially dangerous object. The last time they used that code was when they found Thor's hammer in a crater in the desert at the end of Iron Man 2. So what does the 0-8-4 mean here? Ehh, just a blue box with lights on it, that might have been built by Hydra (the villains in the Captain America movie). Yawn.

They're going to need to step things up if they want this show to survive. I'm afraid that viewers are going to be expecting to see Iron Man and The Avengers level plot lines each week, but when they see stories about blinking boxes they're gonna start tuning out.

The characters aren't helping either. So far Coulson and Melinda May are the only interesting members of the team, and even then they're not exactly crackling with excitement. So far Grant's been a bland cypher, Fitz and Simmons are becoming annoying and Skye seems to serve no function whatsoever. If they can't make these characters more compelling, and soon, they need to torpedo them pronto and bring in someone more exciting.

Now that I think of it, this series reminds me a lot of Torchwood. Just like the BBC said, "Hey, let's do a Doctor Who show without the Doctor!," ABCs doing an Avengers show without the Avengers.

Peppering the script with shout-outs to Tony Stark and Thor ain't enough to keep people tuning in, guys. Plus it's never a good idea to remind people of something better they could be watching.

I hope this show succeeds, I really do. But they're gonna have to make some significant changes in order to make that happen.

Thoughts:
• So last week Coulson assembles a team, but this week we find that only two of the five have been trained for or even seen combat. Does that seem like a good idea?

• Last week we got to see the team being assembled, so of course this week we get the obligatory "Team can't get along and bickers endlessly until there's a common threat and then they all pull together at the last minute" plot.

• I get that Melinda May is a crack pilot, but can she really fly what appears to be some kind of modified C4 plane all by herself? No copilot or navigator needed?

I suppose you could say S.H.I.E.L.D. installed some kind of souped-up autopilot in the plane so one person can fly it alone. I suppose you could say that, but I remain unconvinced.

• The explosive decompression scene was very, very similar to the one in Iron Man 3. Anything that reminds me that that awful film exists is double plus ungood in my book.

• Speaking of explosive decompression, how long do you suppose it lasts in the real world? Ten seconds, tops? All that's happening is the pressurized air inside the cabin is equalizing with the thin air outside. It shouldn't take very long for that to happen.

Here it went on for a good five minutes of screen time. Long after the explosion happened the Peruvian soldiers were somehow still being sucked out of the plane. There must have been a lot of pressure in that cabin!

• Likewise, once Skye tossed the rubber raft at the hole, it too was immediately sucked up against the inner hull, keeping the pressure in. Nope!  The decompression should have ended well before then. When she tossed it, it should have just plopped to the floor. 

But let's give them this one. Let's say the decompression is still somehow going on after five minutes. If the suction is powerful enough to pull a full grown man out through the hole, why wouldn't a rubber raft be pulled through as well?

I get that this is a comic book world full of people who can fly and turn into green monsters, but everything can't be exaggerated like this. You've got to ground some of it in reality if you want us to be amazed when the super stuff happens.

• At the end of the episode the team puts the blinking box into "The Slingshot," a rocket which will carry it into the sun and destroy it. They do this because the box is too powerful a weapon for any one person or nation to possess.

Fitz mentions that it'll take eight months for the rocket to reach the sun. That seems like a awfully long time. How much do you want to bet that a few episodes from now someone's going to intercept that rocket and snatch the blinking box out of it?

• So Skye's really some kind of spy who's infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D., eh? I honestly don't understand why she's on the team in the first place. Coulson and everyone else already knows she was the head of some kind of anarchist group. Why in the name of Aunt May's hair bun would you invite someone like that into your super spy organization?

• Holee. Crap! Samuel L. Jackson made a cameo appearance! That's amazing! And it almost made up for the meh-ness of the rest of the episode.

Has SLJ ever been on a TV series before? He's done a lot of voice work for various animated series (Afro Samurai, The Boondocks), but as far as I know this is the first time he's ever appeared in a live action show.

It was fun seeing Coulson reduced to the position of underling in the presence of his boss. Nice touch, whoever wrote that scene. See? You guys can write interesting stuff when you want to.

The most amazing thing about the whole deal is that ABC managed to keep it a secret, especially these days when people have to post photos of what they're eating for lunch. I'm honestly surprised, nay astonished, that ABC didn't run those annoying promos that take up the bottom third of the screen announcing the cameo for an entire week before it aired. The most I saw was a little spot telling viewers to stay tuned for a special appearance at the end of the episode. Whoever managed to keep the cameo on the down low, thank you for your superhuman restraint!

On the down side, I can't believe Nick Fury showed up so soon. It's only the second episode. Where are they gonna go from here? A cameo from Robert Downey Jr.?

This Week In Irony

If you head over to Google you'll see this is their Doodle for today: a graphic celebrating the 123rd anniversary of Yosemite National Park.

Thinking about heading out there to visit the park on its birthday? Not so fast, Bub! Due to the government shutdown all 401 National Parks* are closed until further notice. Nice timing there, Google (cue Sad Trombone)!

Also affected by the shutdown: NASA's Near Earth Object Office. You know, the people who monitor asteroids and other near-earth objects that may pose a threat to the planet. Come on, extinction-level meteor! Now's your chance to finally bash into Earth and wipe out our whole sorry civilization!

*The actual number of parks varies wildly depending on who you ask. Wouldn't think that would be such a mystery, but there you go.