New Articles for the Week of January 12th: So Long 2013 Edition

A belated Happy New Years to you, dear reader. Lots to catch up on, what with this being the first update in nearly two months. Probably for the best though, as it’s been a slow start to 2014 on my end, so at least I’ve got a healthy backlog to bring to your reading attention. First, a quick rundown of a few theatrical releases I reviewed, before the big TV list promised so long ago:

Philomena: A nice little movie about a nice little old lady, featuring a nice little supporting performance from Steve Coogan. That I remember almost nothing else from this probably means I should be the one reading the review, if anyone.

Saving Mr. Banks: Ditto for this one, which I’ve only soured on more after reading about the real relationship between Walt Disney and P. L. Travers. Read Genevieve Koski’s review and analysis of “brand deposits” over on The Dissolve to understand the full ickiness I feel about this movie.

Out of the Furnace: I’d be lying if I said review scores don’t matter to me, simply because being well outside the mean distribution of critical math-ery increases your likelihood of being yelled at by people. Writing a downer review for this a full month before its release left me a little nervous to see whether I’d be an outlier, which turned out not to be the case. Part of the fun of seeing movies way before the hype machine kicks in is getting to watch them in a vacuum of buzz, which this one (rightfully) didn’t end up generating. Still love me some Christian Bale though.

American Hustle: Which is also probably a good reason why I continue to like this one a lot more than other critics. Well, reading Rottentomatoes and Metacritic scores would tell you a whole lot of critics liked this one a bunch, but since we now live in a world of Criticism 2.0, the press lifecycle of this film has accelerated faster than I reasonably would have thought.

With major awards season kicking off tonight with the Golden Globes, the widely agreed upon greatness of films in 2013 will now be boiled down to a couple of DVD box tag lines and historical footnotes, so it’s understandable why a lot of critics are upset that American Hustle is going in as a presumed favorite against the likes of 12 Years a Slave, and Inside LlewynDavis. And yeah, I’d be disappointed if American Hustle won any of the major awards (save for any acting award they want to throw at Amy Adams, who’s totally deserving, though that's not to say most deserving), but more so because of the historical backlash it would cause that turns an unworthy, but still very enjoyable film into the worst thing to happen to movies since Crash won Best Picture.

The acceleration of the awards season cycle has caused a dogpile onto American Hustle recently, perhaps in an attempt to sway academy votes. That’s a fair enough goal, but misses the larger issue that awards fever causes the film industry. Why is it that a light, empty, but wickedly fun movie like American Hustle can so easily take gold off the table of more important, timeless pictures? My thinking is that it's because voters are human, and like to be entertained. I’ve likened the film elsewhere to being The Fast & Furious of prestige dramas, in that it’s just a bunch of likeable people having a good time for no real end or purpose. And if you do that well enough, as David O. Russell has, of course voters are going to glom onto it, because there simply aren’t enough films like that, which target adult, film-loving audiences that like to have a good time at the movies.

We need there to be more films like American Hustle, not less. Its success speaks to how badly adult audiences are looking for well-acted, well-crafted entertainment that doesn’t involved superheroes or mass destruction. If there were more movies out there balancing American Hustle's same mix of mature filmmaking and immature, "let's just have some fun" attitude, then critics wouldn’t glom onto it like a life raft. Yes, 12 Years A Slave is a more important, powerful film, just as Her is a more emotionally affecting one, but if you starve awards voters of purely enjoyable film experiences, then they’re going to be absolutely over the moon when one like American Hustle comes along, and gives them the easy satisfaction wider audiences get week after week in the summer blockbuster season.

I think American Hustle is a great good movie, while the other nominees it’ll be facing off against range from good great, to simply great great films. In every case, the great film will be the one remembered by history, but there’s still room for just good, enjoyable prestige films to exist, so long as they don’t make it easier for awards voters to screw up the one thing they have to do: pick the film that best represents the year, either on a qualitative, or idealogical level.

Now, the danger of getting more films like American Hustle is that instead of proving their disposability by satiating the baser urges of voters, the nominee lists will instead be overrun by films that spectacularly clear an insanely low bar. This would be a fine result too, in my opinion, because it would offer us the last hair fiber of proof to show that, for fuck's sake guys, awards are almost never right. To quote the immortal words of TheWire'sSnoop Pearson (or Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven, if you wanna be anal about it): deserve got nothing to do with it. As far as I’m concerned, the year’s best films were decided last month, when critics I love and respect made their cases for what they thought were the best movies. Look no further than Film Crit Hulk’s amazing take on the Top 10 list to see how completely arbitrary picking “bests” is, especially coming off a year as amazing as 2013.

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By the way, here’s my Top 10 list of TV shows for 2013! So as to save myself from a very severe case of hypocrite-lash, let me be upfront by saying I would have chosen to not even rank these if I had my druthers. I was wishy-washy about all the numbering from conception to posting, and don’t considered myself held to the ordering in any way. You can check out my big 10 on the link, but I also just want to take a minute to highlight another 10 series from the year that didn't make the cut, roughly in ascending order of my enjoyment of them:

Homeland: Oh, Homeland. I’d say you broke my heart, but you never really had it to begin with. You had my attention all through season one, as Carrie Matheson elbowed her way into the anti-hero pantheon, and Damien Lewis put on an acting clinic every week. And for the first half of season two, you had me by the shorthairs, what with your inspired and insane willingness to barrel the plot forward at an alarming pace.

But then the rest of season 2 happened, and like a lot of other viewers, I got nervous about what would emerge from the rubble of the show’s late 2012 implosion. What we got in 2013 wasn’t an embarrassment, but it does prove the sneaking suspicion early critics had about Homeland’s success being intrinsically tied to momentum. It still looks great, and the performances are strong, but I’m not sure I’m getting much else out of it each week.

Broadchurch: Check my mega-blog from a few months back for the full scoop, but I found a lot to like in this morbid little seaside murder mystery. Here’s to hoping the American remake, and another series of the original don’t completely throw this show’s legacy off a cliff.

New Girl: I was late to the New Girl party on both ends, as I wasn’t in time to praise the strong back end of its second season we got in 2013, and have only now caught up, when the show is seriously struggling to maintain its momentum. Jake Johnson is practically carrying the show on his shoulders at this point, so this might be the only time New Girl makes a best of list for me. But, hey, at least they’ve cut down on a lot of the ironic racism humour that plagued the first couple seasons! That’s something, right?

Archer: The fuel gauge is visibly starting to dip on one of my favorite animated comedies, though word is the quickly approaching fifth season makes for a revitalizing gamechanger. This is a show I usually like watching more the second or third time than the first, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Season 4 is a whole lot better than I give it credit for. If for nothing else though, the show gets points for collapsing the H. Jon Benjamin voiceover universe into a singularity during its Bob's Burgers crossover in the premiere, which was just fantastic.

Parks & Recreation: My love of Parks still runs deep, but it’s deep enough to know that I'm about ready to say goodbye. I still love the characters and world of P&R, but as with all comedies, what made them identifiable and relatable continues to get stretched by the increasingly cartoonish lengths needed to land a joke. I’m a Legacy-ist in a lot of ways: it’s better for a show to live fast and die young than to risk overstaying its welcome. Parks isn’t nearly at that point yet (I laughed my ass off at the touching 100th episode they just had), but the show’s 3 season golden age might be forgotten by history the longer it’s followed by diminishing returns.

Scandal: Jumping off of Parks, the best way I can describe Scandal is to say that if Leslie Knope is TV’s Superman, Olivia Pope is its Batman. Scandal is a cynical soap opera thrill ride that’s only recently shown signs of flagging. It’s a show I love for a number of reasons, chief among them being how aggressively, at times embarrassingly, progressive it is. It’s almost certainly run out of juice at this point, but considering the levels it was operating at through all of 2012 and most of 2013, can you blame it? Not since Spartacus has a surface layer of trash hidden some of the most effective and thought-provoking writing on TV.

Game of Thrones: I think I ruined Game of Thrones for myself right after episode 9 of the first season (yeah, that episode), when I decided I couldn’t wait a whole week for the finale, like some sort of impulse-control-having sucker. I burned through the first book before the first season’s finale, but felt much less excitement and enjoyment when watching HBO recreating something I had already read. The same muted feeling has persisted since reading all the books, and seeing the show adapt them. It's still so incredibly well made, and so well acted that it’s almost impossible to comprehend that something like Game of Thrones not only exists, but is one of the biggest things in TV. Still, I can’t help but feel like I love Game of Thrones more in book form, and simply appreciate and respect the TV version more than feverishly devour it like a lot of other people do.

Hannibal: God bless Bryan Fuller for not only proving that serial killer television doesn’t have to be bad, but for also showing that a remake of a known property doesn’t have to be the worst thing ever. Coupled with the best cliffhanger ending of 2013, Hannibal’s first season will give you ample reason to be unbearably excited for the quickly approaching second.

Orphan Black: I’m running out of word fuel so I’ll keep it brief: watch this show. Maureen Ryan sums up best why little shows like this are some of the most important out there, but even as pure entertainment, Orphan Black is a smashing success. If Tatiana Maslany wins the Best Actress Golden Globe, it will be deserved, and make up for any and all future snubs by the HFPA.

The Returned: The third of Sundance Channel's trio of esoteric shows to premiere in 2013, this late 2012 French series was even more frightening than Hannibal, despite very rarely giving in to horror/thriller cliché and tropes. It’s a disturbing little show in a lot of ways, capable of making very simple images incredibly unnerving, but it’s all in service of a thoughtful, emotionally balanced look at loss and grief. Don’t let subtitles be a barrier to entry, or you’ll be missing out on one of the most haunting and beautiful shows 2013 had to offer.

That’s all for now, I’ll be back with more updates, once I’ve got some stuff to update you with! Play me off into 2014, mysterious and ethereal Mogwai soundtrack!

New Articles for the Week of July 15th: Emmy Edition

It's July. It's hot. TV stuff continues to happen, despite my protestation months ago. Maybe it's about time this whole Golden Age of TV thing silvered up a bit; we're only halfway through the year, and I'm already starting to get a kid-in-a-candy-store-that's-closing-in-five-minutes panic over the sheer volume of television that's come out this year that I hear is amazing, and I haven't seen a single frame of. The dumbest thing I'll ever write (an award that changes ownership with exciting frequency) might turn out to be that doom 'n gloom forecasting for 2013 in did in my Best of 2012 list. I've done a rough draft of this year's version, and it's already got more than 25 nominees. It's not even fall pilot season yet, people!

The best evidence showing the critical mass of quality small screen entertainment being dumped on us is the Emmy nominations that came out today. Most of the major categories could have doubled their nominee list, and still realistically had people moaning on twitter about snubs and/or flubs. I love me some Oscars, but the Emmys have never held huge appeal to me, what with a voting record that makes the HFPA look like Deep Thought, and much larger commitment there is to fully viewing the possible contenders. Besides, in the words of a still Emmy-less performance that proves their inadequacy, awards are stupid...

...but they'd be less stupid if they went to the right people. Like Tatiana Maslany, for example. Any one of the roles she plays on Orphan Black wouldn't be enough to make much hay out of, but when four or five of those performances form up in the Voltron-like acting decathlon that the show is for Maslany, her exclusion becomes a real shame. As does the near dearth of nods for Justified and The Americans, though acknowledging how great the opening titles and Margo Martindale were on the latter helps make the lack of dues given to Keri Russell and Timothy Olyphant more tolerable. And while I'm complaining, hey Emmy voters: where's the love for Key & Peele? Variety or otherwise, this was a strong contender for funniest show of the year, no ifs, ands, or buts (give or take an ampersand in the title).

Whatever, there were still plenty of smart choices, and a couple of surprise nominations worth celebrating (Yay Top of the Lake! Yay Enlightened!). And who am I kidding, if Jonathan Banks wins for Best Supporting Actor, all will be forgiven.

But their will be plenty more time for bitching about the Emmys once they've actually happened, so let's focus on some more(ish) immediate distractions.

Under the Dome: This is the closest thing to a screener-review I've ever gotten to do, as most critics get to watch a couple episodes of a new show before giving their early verdict. Now four episodes in, here is a rough approximation of how my thoughts on the Stephen King-adapted miniseries have developed thus far:

Week 1: Hey, this is pretty good! The effects are alright, the premise is interesting, and Dean Norris is getting paid. Let's see where this goes!

Week 2: Well...that was unfortunate. But hey, sophomore slumps are commonplace in TV. They'll learn valuable lessons from the mistakes this week.

Week 3: Nope, school's out, there has been no learning. Oh god, and the ratings are still holding, so they'll probably pick this up from miniseries to a full series! Abort, ABORT!

Week 4: Has the plane finally levelled out, or was there just nowhere left to go but up? I guess you can feel pretty okay about a bland, tolerable cup of coffee as a palette cleanser when it followed a three course meal that cratered in quality from appetizers onward.

I'll be reviewing the remaining 9 episodes over the next couple months, but really hope this thing makes up its mind about how good it's going to be. Writing about TV that's exceptional, or exceptionally awful is easy; it's everything in between that gets difficult.

The Last of Us: As expected, I spent the better part of a week writing about how this one video game is, like, really good you guys. No really it, is! It's got a great story, well-realized characters, an incredible atmosph- and everyone's gone.

I don't have a ton of time for games anymore, but I like it when one like this comes along, and gives me an excuse to release more of the "Video Game Storytelling Sucks, and Here's Why" manifesto that's been rattling around in my brain for awhile now. The Last of Us is definitely the sort of game I feel no regrets in spending more time writing about than actually playing; that's probably as good an indicator as any that it's doing something right. Seriously, if you have a PS3, this is probably the best game you'll have the chance to play all year.

White House Kegger: Sadly, this is neither a show, nor a game (though has probably been the theme to numerous college parties). With the roommate out of town all week, I dedicated myself to beating the heat in three-pronged fashion: wearing as little clothing as possible, staying refreshed with minikeg of awful Canadian pale ale, and plowing through a pair of Washington-based series that will be up for "Best of" Consideration later in the year.

The first of which, House of Cards, definitely saw its "It" status confirmed by the Emmy nominations, welcoming Netflix to the big kids table with representation in Best Drama, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Direction categories (yet none for best effects, despite convincingly CG-ing Foghorn Leghorn to look like Kevin Spacey). While it's nice to see a new challenger to the old guard throwing their hat into the ring, I wish it was because of a better series than HoC. While it looks the part of a top-tier drama (David Fincher's "everything and everyone looks slightly sick" style does marvels in a political setting), it's a series in search of a reason for existing, beyond theoretically drawing in Netflix subscribers. It goes down easy, but is often lacking in urgency or purpose, bringing in and dropping plot threads hither and thither, while never finding a solid throughline to latch onto. For every component that worked exceptionally well, another would be altogether lacking (Kate Mara's reporter turned blogger rock star arc is best enjoyed by those who thought David Simon's lecturing about the death of journalism in Season 5 of The Wire was too subtle).

Similarly good, but not great, was Season 2 of Veep. Again, all the right elements are there. The talent in front of, and behind the camera is all-star material, and the executive branch is a comedic goldmine. But that just left me further confused as to why Veep would be consistently enjoyable, but never transcendent. Perhaps The Thick of It, with its more fanciful four-letter language, and less familiar setting, over-clocked my expectations for how Armando Iannucci's vicious wit would play on the other side of the Atlantic (I don't think I even finished Season 1, come to think of it).

Both shows have a good shot at squeaking into the back half of my Top 20 this year, but given the number of interesting freshman shows 2013 has had already given us, that's no guarantee. This weekend's likely going to be spent seeing if all the fuss about Netflix's newest series, Orange is the New Black, is justified. Here's hoping it is, because a Best of 2013 list dominated by newbies is something I'd really be happy to see (especially given how many buck the "White Male Anti-Hero" trend that's defined the Golden Age thus far. Check out Brett Martin's awesome new reflection on the WMA phenomenon, Difficult Men, if you get the chance).

That's all for now. Play me out, gag reel from New Girl-and-wait-I-forget-to-mention-I-finally-watched-New-Girl-which-is-thoroughly-enjoyable-and-I-liked-more-than-the-three-shows-I-just-talked-about-so-whoops-I-guess-I-buried-the-lede-on-this-one

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New Articles for the Week of June 24th: Glorious Return Edition

Well, I guess it's been a little while, hasn't it? I should really consider just live-updating this thing with links instead of getting into a big rigamarole over doing a whole write-up just to say, yes, Mad Men happened this week, here are some thoughts. Then again, it's been a pretty busy month, one spent sampling, digesting, and then regurgitating thoughts on a whole host of things not strictly related to TV. Let's start with old business first: -Mad Men: The season finale is tonight, so if you've been using my reviews as a guide to the season, then my humblest apologies for dumping not one, not two, my God, not even three, but four recaps mere hours before Don Draper and company take their bow for 2013. Then again, that's a pretty odd way to be involved in one of TV's best shows, so don't judge me for working up a review backlog.

-Hannibal: I had the pleasure of reviewing a third episode of this year's biggest surprise, as well as share some thoughts on the season as a whole with the finale that aired a few days ago. The short version is that Hannibal will likely show up on my Top 20 for the year, based on its haunting aesthetic, terrific performances, and total commitment to being the most twisted and Goddamn insane network TV show since Twin Peaks. I have been legitimately more creeped out and frightened by Hannibal's 13-episode first season than any other piece of media I've viewed in the last 5 years, and the fact that it's often a really compelling drama doesn't hurt either. NBC left the show to die during the spring burnoff season, but they at least had the decency to pick it up for a second season, the time until which will hopefully involve many people discover this bloody little gem on streaming and DVD.

That's all from the world of TV recapping, and you can expect a Mad Men finale review in the evening hours tonight, as well as a review for CBS's Under the Dome pilot tomorrow. For now though, let's move on to a few odds and sods.

-Orphan Black: Got 10-hours to spare watching one of the most gleefully insane, and best acted TV sci-fi series in ages? Well you're in luck, because I caught up with the cult BBC series a couple weeks back and can now say I see what all the fuss is about. I won't get much into spoiler territory, but the basic premise allows for Canadian-born actress Tatiana Maslany to give five of the best performances on TV,  and with that in mind, you can probably guess that Orphan Black isn't your average cup of tea. It's a complete tonal fruit salad, shifting from sci-fi, to thriller, to mystery, to comedy and back between and within scenes, and is a BBC production shot in a Toronto masquerading as New York. Needless to say, those expecting the production values and laser focus of an HBO drama should look elsewhere. Those, however, looking for an exceptionally fun, thought-provoking, and blisteringly-paced little series should go out of their way to seek this out.

-At the Movies: Haven't spent much time in the local theatres lately, though when I tell you that the TIFF screening of "R. Kelly's Trapped in the Closet Sing-Along" was the best thing I've seen in cinemas the last month, it's confirmation that this summer has been pretty awful for movies. This is the End, a surprising critical high-water mark for the season, was packed when an attempt to see it was made this week, so a viewing of Now You See Me was had instead. Seeing as the trailers made it look one of the year's most obnoxious and irritating offerings, it was unlikely this would ever be my jam, and sure enough, it wasn't. I can't remember the last time a film so completely fucked up the idea of identifying someone to root for, as in this case, my options were the asshole magician thieves, the asshole Interpol detective, or the asshole millionaires and shysters funding them. It's reductive, and more than a little mean to call it Ocean's Eleven for stupids, but that's the movie they made. At least I wasn't disappointed by it, unlike...

Man of Steel. Oh man, this one hurt. That's not to say that it's abhorrently awful, but, after resisting it for so long, I got swept up in the zeitgeist (read: marketing) for the film in the last weeks before its release. Based on what had been shown it really, really looked like Snyder and Nolan might have cracked the Superman nut. This was the movie that was supposed to save the summer, which is an unfair expectation on my part (I can really only blame myself for going to tentpole blockbuster films lately). Turns out, what we got was a movie more dour and joyless than even Nolan's Batman pictures, which could afford to be so. Superman, on the other hand, can fucking fly and lift mountains over his head: he's the last character that should be weighed down with a script so leaden with ponderous dialogue, pacing so manacled by the obligatory origin story, and a structure that weights all the action toward a numbing and concerning third act. Again, it's not reprehensible, or utterly awful, but Man of Steel is perhaps the biggest misfire in a summer season that's all but been dedicated to them.

Finally, just thought I'd mention I managed to finish The Last of Us yesterday, and I'm already planning another big ol' essay/bout of thought-diarrhoea about it like I did for Bioshock: Infinite, and what Sony's latest tentpole release says about how storytelling works within the framework of a videogame. Bottom-line: while it shares many of Infinite's faults, The Last of Us attempts (and often succeeds at) the kind of bold gameplay design, and narrative focus I was begging for in my last video game diatribe, and for at least trying to do so, I'm kinda in love with it. Even bottom-er line: I have never cried because of a video game, but within 15 minutes, The Last of Us nearly had me bawling like an big dumb baby over a bunch of pixels. That's some straight up Pixar shit right there, and I can't wait to dig deeper into what's made this game something special.

That's all for now. Play me out, wistful, and depressing video game soundtrack!

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