Life on Mars: The Complete Series (2009, ABC Studios/Buena Vista)
purchase from Amazon: DVD
Being a fan of the original BBC version of Life on Mars, I was leery of the ABC version when it premiered last fall. I loved the original show, an intriguing amalgam of science fiction and ’70s era cop shows. With great stories and a fantastic cast, I was worried — very, very worried — that once ABC got their hands on it they would fuck it up.
However, show producers Josh Appelbaum, Andre Nemec and Scott Rosenberg were big fans of the BBC show, as well, and set out to maintain the mystery, tragedy and fun of the original. Looking back on the entire series contained in this box set, I’m happy to say that they met the challenge.
Jason O’Mara stars as Sam Tyler, a New York detective in 2008 who gets hit by a car and knocked unconscious. When he comes to, Tyler is blown away to discover that he’s awoken in the year 1973. Has he been shot back in time? Is he in a coma? The only way he can get to the bottom of his predicament is to explore his surroundings and look for clues on how he can get back to 2008, where he belongs. Tyler finds his way to the 125 precinct and is immediately met by Lt. Gene Hunt (Harvey Keitel), a ball-busting, whiskey-drinking commander who plays by his own rules. Tyler is amazed that he’s been expected as the new detective arriving to work in the 125. His presence causes a stir in the squad room. Detective Ray Carling (a long-haired, mustached Michael Imperioli) hates him; junior detective Chris Skelton (Jonathan Murphy) looks up to him, and uniformed policewoman Annie Norris (Gretchen Moll) is attracted to him. Tyler could give a shit about any of their feelings because he just wants to get home. Yet as the series progresses and he gets to know these people, figments of his mind or not, he begins to care for them. (more…)
I can understand why fans of the character Wolverine and his band of misunderstood mutants, the X-Men, were disappointed with this film. Sure, the movie has some kick-ass action sequences, but the story is just hodgepodge of scenes thrown together to get to the next big fight. I still can’t say that it’s is a complete waste of time, though, because I find Hugh Jackman (who portrays the titular character, also known as Logan) to be one of the most charismatic actors working today. However, I’m glad that I didn’t lay down eleven bucks to go see this in the theater because, like the rest of those fans I mentioned, I would have been disappointed and pissed off.
There were so many times during the film I almost shut it off out of frustration, but then director Gavin Hood and his team of technical wizards would throw another amazing sequence at me (Wolverine sailing through the air toward a helicopter, a battle atop a nuclear tower) that I would have to push my jaw closed. With an assortment of characters from the comic books showing up throughout the movie, it felt like Fox was trying to cram as many new characters into the movie to see which ones might stick and possibly branch them off into their own spin-off movies.
The film opens with a prologue showing Logan as a boy in 1800s Canada being raised by a nobleman. A tragic turn of events leads Logan to discover that he is a mutant, with bone claws that extend out of his hands and the ability to heal at an accelerated pace. He also learns that his strange friend, Victor, who has the same healing ability and nasty razor sharp nails, is actually his brother. The two of them run away with a mob chasing them and the credits roll over a montage of great battles that take place during the Civil War, World Wars I and II and the Vietnam War. We watch as the adult Victor (Liev Schreiber) and Logan (Jackman), both soldiers, fight in each of these conflicts and never age. With their mutant power of incredible healing, they can’t die, even when bullets go through them. (more…)
Matt and I had a plan. Fed up with the director of our high school fall play, we decided to play a practical joke on her. We were seniors; we thought we ruled the school. Even though we still had to worry about grades and the prospect of getting into college, we carried with us an air of invincibility. We thought we were kings.
October, 1987. The air was cooler; the days were shorter and the leaves dangled for life in shades of red and gold. When we weren’t studying for AP English, running cross country or out on the practice field with the marching band, we were rehearsing in the junior high auditorium on its sturdy old stage and hundreds of empty seats in front of us. Matt and I would typically carpool to rehearsals, generally in the Whomobile. To psyche ourselves up we’d blast the car stereo and sing at the top of our lungs. We’d listen to U2’s The Joshua Tree and Sting’s …Nothing Like the Sun. The latter album, with its chilly demeanor, intricate music and thoughtful lyrics, felt better suited for the autumn. My favorite song was “Straight to My Heart”; Matt liked Sting’s collaboration with Gil Evans, the cover of Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing.” We both loved “Englishman in New York.” Sting’s tribute to his friend, writer Quentin Crisp, has a whimsical tone, tinged with Sting’s typical melancholy and Branford Marsalis’s weeping saxophone. It will always remind me of my friendship with Matt and the evening we rewrote Agatha Christie. (more…)
Castle: The Complete First Season (2009, ABC Studios/Buena Vista)
purchase from Amazon: DVD
Castle, the ABC mystery series, proves one thing: Nathan Fillion is a star. He has charm, comic timing, and enough charisma to make him a wonderful leading man. The first season on the show is out on DVD (13 episodes in all) and the second season has just begun airing on the network. I hope Castle manages to hold its own against CSI: Miami and Jay Leno, because it’s a slick, fun show that deserves to be a big hit.
Fillion stars as Rick Castle, a best selling novelist in the vein of James Patterson (who makes an appearance as himself in the pilot episode). Castle’s latest novel kills off his long-running character, Derek Storm, leading his fans to ask “what next?’ Fate drops that answer in his lap when a killer begins mimicking the murders from Castle’s books. The confident author is brought in by the NYPD as a consultant on the case. Immediately he butts heads with the stunning Detective Bennett (Stana Katic) and bonds with the other homicide detectives in the squad room, Esposito and Ryan (Jon Huertas and Seamus Dever, respectively). As soon as the case is solved, Bennett believes she’s seen the last of him. Not so, say the TV gods. Castle is so well connected that he convinces the police commissioner to let him tag along with Beckett on all of her cases as research for a new novel he’s writing featuring a female detective (in truth he loves the thrill of it all). How long she’s assigned to have him shadow her depends on how soon he completes his book. In other words, indefinitely, which is fine as it allows Castle and Beckett to build enough sexual tension to remind you of the glory days of Moonlighting. (more…)
Friday night, Julie took me aside to tell me the results of Jacob’s latest throat culture. Each time he goes to an appointment with his CF doctor they shove a swab down his throat and test him for harmful bacteria. One bacteria they look for is Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a particularly menacing bug for people with cystic fibrosis that can create havoc on a patient’s lungs. To combat it the antibiotic tobramycin, or TOBI, is added to the daily regiment of inhaled medicines a CF patient must undergo each morning and night. This latest test revealed that Jacob is culturing Pseudomonas aeruginosa and will be starting a daily regiment of TOBI. Although he only showed a small amount of the bacteria, the news is still unsettling, another reminder of how helpless we sometimes feel in combating CF.
Soon after Julie gave me the news, the elephant returned. The elephant is this pressure I feel on my chest that takes my breath away. The elephant is always accompanied with his friend, the snake, who winds its way through my stomach and causes unrest. Joining them this time, for a limited engagement, was the sloth, weighing down on my back, making slouching on the couch in front of the television or curling up in a ball the only things I wanted to do. (more…)
When you’re presented with the opportunity to see a film deemed “too unbearable to release,” you have to check it out, don’t you? That’s how I wound up with a copy of the 2008 horror movie Deadgirl, in my mailbox. I’ve seen my share of slasher movies and torture porn films like Saw and Hostel, so I felt like I was prepared for anything. Deadgirl definitely has its disturbing moments. But I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it’s just as much a story about friendship, young love and loneliness as it a movie about sex with a zombie.
Rickie (Shiloh Fernandez) and JT (Noah Segan) are best friends, a couple of high school outcasts who cut class one afternoon to go pound beers and vandalize the boarded up remains of an abandoned mental hospital. As they explore the halls of the empty hospital, they venture down into the dank basement and make a gruesome discovery: a naked woman chained to a table with a plastic bag over her head. Who is she? Where did she come from? And what happened to her? These questions are never answered, creating a creeping case of ambiguity that lurks in thee dark shadows of the movie.
One of the guys pokes the “dead” girl and she opens her eyes. Holy shit! She’s alive! Rickie immediately wants to go tell the police, but the sicker, hornier JT has other plans for the chained up woman. Now before you start thinking that the film is going to get exploitative, I hate to disappoint. Although there are some glimpses of nudity and a couple of well done blood-splattering scenes, everything disturbing about Dead Girl is what’s implied. The fact that we know that JT is going to screw the chained up woman made me squirm enough that I didn’t have to see it. It’s what happens next that really makes the movie twisted. (more…)
The first is the addition of Kevin McKidd playing Dr. Owen Hunt, a former Army trauma surgeon who joined the staff at the fictional Seattle Grace Hospital and quickly became one of the most compelling characters on Grey’s Anatomy. To be blunt: Owen is fucked up. He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and has recurring nightmares from his service in the war in Iraq. Owen is a wreck of a man whose only means of survival is immersing himself in the job. When he finally begins to connect with someone, Dr. Christina Yang (Sandra Oh), he screws that up by choking her in the middle of the night while suffering from a particularly horrible night terror. McKidd is so remarkable in his role that it’s a crime that he was not nominated for an Emmy this year. Sandra Oh deservedly received a nomination this year, yet a majority of the quality work she gave us in this season was with McKidd. I sometimes question why I stick with Grey’s Anatomy and McKidd is one reason I’ll keep it on my DVR. Owen is, flat out, the most authentic character on this show and it is solely because of McKidd’s work. (more…)
Supernatural: The Complete Fourth Season (2009, Warner Brothers)
purchase from Amazon: DVD
The fourth season of Supernatural kicks ass. Great mythology, plenty of action, some good doses of humor, it makes you think, and yes, it will creep you out. I had never seen an episode of this series before the fourth season DVD box set arrived for me to review but, man, what a good place to jump into the world of Supernatural.
The first episode of the 22 on this box set opens with a man buried in a coffin. He’s Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles), who, we find out, was sent to hell. As he slowly digs his way out of the grave to the surface, he wonders who pulled him from Hell and what it all means. Bursting through the ground, Dean finds that his grave is in the middle of nowhere and trees fallen around the headstone. If this were a horror movie, it would be the perfect opening. No ridiculous voiceover, no exposition in the dialogue, just mysterious visuals and plenty of eeriness. Dean comes upon a deserted town, breaks into a gas station and steals a car. Oh and there’s an ear piercing scream that occurs midway through the break-in. More intrigue. I was hooked. Dean finds his way back to his brother, Sam (Jared Padalecki) and their mentor, Bobby Singer (Jim Beaver). The three of them are hunters, responsible for tracking down supernatural creatures and killing them.
Sam has psychic powers given to him by a demon called Azazel. As we learn throughout the season, Sam has been hanging out with a demon named Ruby, using his special gift to send evil beings back where they belong. The two of them hooked up during the four months Dean was in Hell. Like a good novel, we don’t learn what happened to Sam during those long months until later — specifically episode nine, “I Know What You Did Last Summer.” Likewise, we don’t fully understand what Dean went through while banished to Hell until the following episode, “Heaven and Hell.” In the meantime, the fourth season sets in motion a huge arc in the Supernatural mythology. (more…)
Two years ago, when I was working on this column’s debut, I wrote about Bruce Springsteen’s “Book of Dreams” and what the song means to Julie and me. During the first month of our courtship I created my first mixtape for her, entitled HEY, HEY, JULIE! On that tape was the Springsteen song, one that’s grown to have profound meaning in our relationship.
We began dating in August of 1992, and soon thereafter, I threw this tape together in a flurry of inspiration, wanting to give Julie something that came from my heart. I don’t recall the actual minutes spent in my parents’ basement picking the songs or laying them down on a Maxell cassette (my brand of choice), but looking back on the list of songs, I’m happy to see they still add up to 90 quailty minutes of music.
Before Nick Hornby wonderfully wrote about what makes a good mixtape in High Fidelity, I assembled exactly the right combination of hip, well known and somewhat obscure songs from my small music collection. Combining big hits like “Learning to Fly,” “What I Am,” and “All This Time” with lesser-known songs by popular artists such as “Until the End of the World,” “Shining Star,” and “Getting to Know You,” while tossing in some hard to find (at the time) songs like “Baby Mine” and “Wild Night” made this tape eclectic, but still enjoyable to listen to and quite accessible. (more…)
There’s a killer on the loose in Melrose Place! Beware! The ’90s hit soap is back, this time on the CW, which seems to be mining the previous decade for new programming (or is it reprogramming?). While I wait for some exec at the CW to remake Fox’s series, Wolf, I’m stuck with the new Melrose Place, an update of the sex and sleaze-filled show that gave us Josie Bissett, Courtney Thorne Smith and that dude who’s Elizabeth Shue’s brother. A new group of twentysomethings have moved into the place, but there’s still the same intrigue and drama we’ve come to expect. As is custom in fantasyland, every neighbor knows one another and they form a tight knot family, for now. Soon enough I’m sure the characters will be swapping beds and blackmailing one another. We can only hope.
You know, I was once twenty and living in the Los Angeles area and I wonder where these apartment complexes exist that twentysomethings get along so wonderfully that they meet up in the courtyard when someone dies or someone gets engaged. Then again, I lived on Moorpark Place, so maybe the vibe is different in Hollywood than in the Valley. Still, this is the land of make believe, so the fantasy of a group of people becoming family in a Melrose apartment complex is passed off as reality.
The new version of Melrose Place, which the CW airs on Tuesday nights (and online at their infinitely confusing website), is just as sleazy, corny and full of sex as the original. I watched the pilot thinking I’d be getting a healthy does of mindless, guilty entertainment — and, for the most part, I got what I expected. (more…)
Life on Mars: The Complete Series (2009, ABC Studios/Buena Vista)
I can understand why fans of the character Wolverine and his band of misunderstood mutants, the X-Men, were disappointed with this film. Sure, the movie has some kick-ass action sequences, but the story is just hodgepodge of scenes thrown together to get to the next big fight. I still can’t say that it’s is a complete waste of time, though, because I find Hugh Jackman (who portrays the titular character, also known as Logan) to be one of the most charismatic actors working today. However, I’m glad that I didn’t lay down eleven bucks to go see this in the theater because, like the rest of those fans I mentioned, I would have been disappointed and pissed off.
Matt and I had a plan. Fed up with the director of our high school fall play, we decided to play a practical joke on her. We were seniors; we thought we ruled the school. Even though we still had to worry about grades and the prospect of getting into college, we carried with us an air of invincibility. We thought we were kings.
Castle: The Complete First Season (2009, ABC Studios/Buena Vista)
an appointment with his CF doctor they shove a swab down his throat and test him for harmful bacteria. One bacteria they look for is 
When you’re presented with the opportunity to see a film deemed “too unbearable to release,” you have to check it out, don’t you? That’s how I wound up with a copy of the 2008 horror movie 
Grey’s Anatomy: The Complete Fifth Season (2009, ABC Studios/Buena Vista)
Supernatural: The Complete Fourth Season (2009, Warner Brothers)
Two years ago, when I was working on this column’s debut, I wrote about Bruce Springsteen’s 