Falling Skies is okay. Not great science fiction, but good. The special effects are convincing, but there isn’t much of it. Most of the action takes place on a post-apocalyptic Earth. I haven’t watch much of The Walking Dead, but it’s along that line. The good guys are fighting the monsters in addition to a few bad guys. The best thing about it is the series runs to completion, wrapping up the story.
It’s tricky recommending Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but that’s a shame, because it’s a great TV show.
BrainDead is the TV show to watch right now.
This show aired in 2016, just as Trump was locking down the Republican presidential primary in 2016. It is political satire done as horror science fiction. It’s all played as a light comedy.
The horror/science fiction premise is that alien bugs come to Earth in a meteorite, and infect people by climbing into their skulls. The bugs eat part of the brain and can control the person. Nothing is very graphic, and even when someone’s head explodes, it is in a cartoonish way. When a person is in thrall to the bugs, they act pretty similar, but with different objectives. The alien bugs have strengths and weaknesses, so the horror/sci fi works well.
The political satire comes in because this occurs in Washington, D.C. as politicians are infected. The show doesn’t have a Left/Right agenda. The message is that politicians are unprincipled cynics more interested in winning power without an obvious ideology. A governmental shutdown occurs, with both sides trying to get funding for their interests in order to come to an agreement.
Interestingly, the action all takes place amongst the House and Senate, along with federal agencies. No president is explicitly revealed, but background visuals suggest it’s Trump even though it was produced while the presidential primaries were underway.
BrainDead has a great cast, with Mary Elizabeth Winstead portraying an assistant to her senator brother who is investigating the alien bug infection. It’s a light, fun TV show for a time when everyone is all serious and hyper-engaged with the recent presidential election. I’d give it a 8/10. It’s currently showing on Amazon Prime.
Looking for analysis and commentary on the recent election, I stumbled on Megyn Kelly on Youtube. When she was a journalist for ABC or Fox, she was attractive and engaging, but not that different than anyone else. She was managed by the network, like everyone else.
Now that she is running her own show, she has become one of my favorites. Megyn is smart and well-connected, and has the freedom to cover what interests her. She is much more animated, making casual. At 54 years-old, she looks great. Megyn brings to mind the Audrey Hepburn quote, “I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls.”
There is something wrong with Disney that will be difficult to fix. The Acolyte was in trouble before it even aired. Snow White opens next year, and will fail.
My brother got me watching The Chosen. After a few episodes, Sparky wanted to dress up as a pharisee. Being a godless heathen, Sparky doesn’t know that most of the pharisees are jerks. We compromised by letting him cosplay as Sparkidemus as an homage to Nicodemus.
Like everybody else, I loved Star Wars: A New Hope. By The Last Jedi, I lost faith in the franchise. After that, there had to be good buzz to bother watching. The first two seasons of The Mandalorian and Andor were well done.
The Acolyte is interesting because it is getting extraordinarily bad reviews. Following The Acolyte is more rewarding than watching. Two topics I haven’t seen discussed.
I haven’t watched The Acolyte because hate-watching a show isn’t appealing. It may not seem fair to judge a show without watching it, but the show creator, Leslye Headland, has made it clear in interviews that the show should be categorized as lesbian fantasy. Using the logic of the lead actress, Amandla Stenberg, none of the actors are like me. Representation is so important.
I could be watching The Acolyte, or some other queer new show, but instead, I’m working my way through Xena: The Warrior Princess. It can be campy and ridiculous, but the women are attractive and dress to distract.
TV shows targeting modern audiences prioritize degenerate representation, but Xena is for normal people. I don’t know what to make of this episode. The centaur got his human girlfriend pregnant. This proud couple raises some uncomfortably porny questions. The idea keep pushing it’s way into my brain.
Xena and Gabrielle are professionals, so they act like this relationship is entirely conventional. We need Joxer or Autolycus to ask the awkward questions.
NYT: Will the Force be with The Acolyte
NYT: Will the Force be with The Acolyte
In two days, a Star Wars spin-off TV show, The Acolyte, will premier on Disney+. The eight episode season will cost $180 million. It’s hard to believe anyone thinks this show will be successful.
This is how Leslye Headland, the show creator, pitched her idea for the show to Kathleen Kennedy, the president of Lucas Films.
Headland described her concept in the meeting as “‘Frozen’ meets ‘Kill Bill.’” Kennedy bought it on the spot.
That’s why the Star Wars IP is trashed. Kennedy couldn’t resist a sister drama crossed with a woman’s revenge fantasy.
Stenberg, the show’s star, said “Leslye really is driven by emotion and heart and relationships. So even though our show is within the ‘Star Wars’ universe and set in outer space, in a galaxy far, far away, it’s really a family drama.”
Star Wars fans don’t want that, and everyone else knows that Star Wars is a deteriorating IP, so aren’t going to get on board now.
There was a way that the Star Wars universe could have thrived if the people in charge were competent and didn’t despise the original fan base. Instead, they tried a bait-and-switch.
Make the three pre-quels and sequels for the original fans. Tell those masculine stories by staying true to the original trilogy. Knock out a few TV shows in the same manner, like Mandalorian .
With a well-developed universe, be honest about a TV series that is going to be less action-oriented. Say you are making a family drama, love story or children’s adventure in that universe. The original movie, Star Wars: A New Hope was described as a Western in space. There are plenty of family-oriented Westerns like The Big Valley or Bonanza. Make sure that original fans know that you don’t hate them and aren’t going to destroy legacy characters. Emphasize quality, not diversity.
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