mythicfox Reviews

Dana Carvey: Straight White Male, 60 (2016 TV Special)

Disappointing; We should expect better out of Dana Carvey

[1/10 · 7 July 2017]

I'll be honest, I couldn't finish this. I'm a huge Dana Carvey fan and while his comic timing is still there the material he's working with is garbage. First off, he starts right into the events surrounding the election, and maybe it's because I first saw it months later but I can't imagine people not just being so impossibly sick of hearing about Trump, Hillary, and Bernie. I know I am. And even if that weren't the case, most of that bit had already been heard almost verbatim on his appearances on talk shows over the year. Then, after that, he ostensibly goes into what it's like being a father with teenagers but it's just all the same old stereotypical digs and ripping on millennials... another subject that I (and I imagine/hope many others) am long past sick of hearing about. I just turned it off at that point.

This is little more than a stand-up comedy version of the "Old Man Yells at Cloud" joke from the Simpsons, and it's such a shame to hear from someone as talented as Dana Carvey. As someone who still thinks his Critics' Choice show from 20 years ago is still brilliant, this is just depressing to watch.

Supernatural: The Animation (2011)

A little lacking compared to the live-action show

[6/10 · 9 August 2011]

First off, let's dispense with any sort of delusions and be up-front about something: It's nigh-impossible to review this series without comparing it to the live-action source. And given how many people are going to be coming to the anime series from the live-action one as opposed to the other way around, there's little good reason not to tackle this from the perspective they're probably wanting.

First off, the series is pretty solid, for the most part. For the most part, it captures the feel of the live-action show pretty well. And given that the individual episodes are half the length of the live- action episodes, that's pretty impressive. About 2/3 of the episodes are remakes of live-action episodes with some changes and tweaks made to maintain some mystery and surprise, and the rest are listed as 'original' but a few are clearly based off of specific episodes (with about as many changes as the remakes). The overall running plot is taken from the first two seasons of the live-action series, particularly with regards to Sam and Dean's search for their father and later the hunt for the Yellow-Eyed Demon.

While I personally was neither expecting nor desiring an exact word-for- word translation of the live-action show into the animated medium, I was admittedly a little disappointed that the animated series runs off of its own continuity. Changes to events are one thing; but at least one recurring creature from the live-action series clearly works under different rules in the anime. I fully acknowledge that this entirely a personal reference, but I was hoping for something a little more supplemental to the live-action series (like how some shows have novels and comics that take place in the continuity without necessarily implying an effect on the original series). A couple of episodes do this sort of thing pretty well, fleshing out the backstories of a couple of the other 'special children' that become more prominent as time goes on, but for the most part it's clear this is a different continuity altogether outside of the big events (finding John, chasing Yellow- Eyes).

The biggest adjustment to make is in the character designs. Some effort was made to make Sam and Dean's animated counterparts resemble Jared Padalecki (who also provides the English dub for Sam) and Jensen Ackles (who dubs Dean for the final two episodes only), and for the most part they succeeded. But other recurring characters (John, Bobby, Yellow- Eyes, etc.) are completely redesigned when they appear at all. And while I can respect that they wanted to be able to do their own takes on some of these characters, I personally feel that the series suffers for it. The animated Bobby, in design and portrayal, lacks all of the warmth and depth of his live-action counterpart and he fulfills no role on the series beyond simply being a source of information or a deus ex machina rather than a substitute father figure and confidant. The Yellow-Eyed Demon also particularly suffers from the animated portrayal, partially due to the lack of an actor capable of giving him nuance; his character design is so painfully generic they could have replaced him with a talking wooden doll. All he contributes in pretty much every scene in which he appears is a booming voice that reminds everyone that all is going according to plan.

But then, most of the characters who aren't Sam and Dean suffer a bit from the show's design aesthetic. You've got the animated version of Jared and Jensen and then everyone else (even characters adapted from the live-action show) is clearly pulled out of the 'generic anime stock character' filing cabinet at the animation studio. None of them are visually interesting with the exception of Missouri, and she's just too 'busy' design-wise. And overall, the contrast between the Sam/Dean designs and everything else is extremely jarring.

Also, while "Carry On My Wayward Son" is a good song, it's actually really easy to get tired of hearing it every episode as the credits music (where it pretty much kills the impact of its use in the season finale summary montages). And the fact that storyline-important details are left for a short scene after the credits is just obnoxious. Post- credits scenes are done in American television to add an extra punchline of some sort or what have you. But people who habitually skip ahead to the next episodes when the credits start are going to be left out of major plot points, and I'm honestly not sure why it has to be this way.

In summary: The series does a decent enough job of taking stories from the show, reworking them to fit in this format, and keeping things relatively fresh and surprising for people who've watched the live- action show. However, it does a crummy job handling pretty much any character who isn't Sam or Dean. Also, the pacing of some of the overarching story stuff is occasionally jerky and uneven. Unless you're a rabid collector of all things Supernatural, this is a rental at best. The people who enjoy the novelty of seeing reinterpretations of the show will find something to get out of this but hardcore canon purists are best avoiding it at all costs.

I, Robot (2004)

It could have been better, had it not been a 'Will Smith movie.'

[6/10 · 4 October 2005]

(Note, there are some minor spoilers in this.) First off, I'd just like to point out that I have nothing personal against Will Smith. He's witty and charming, and I know he's capable of acting. However, he *is* typecast worse than John Wayne. All due respect to Mr. Smith, but in the end he's only really played two characters in all of the movies and television he's done... the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and a slightly tougher version of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (for his action movies). The only exception I can think of is "Six Degrees of Separation," in which he starred to show that he had range... which was then ignored by studio producers as it wasn't much of a box office smash.

No matter how the studio tries to dress it up, "I, Robot" is an action movie. It's not only an action movie, but it's a "Will Smith movie" in the same sense that movies with Adam Sandler screaming at people and inflicting seemingly-random pseudo-slapstick violence are "Adam Sandler movies." It has a decent story, nice premise, and all that. A robot appears to have killed a human being in violation of the Asimov Laws. A cop who's paranoid about robots winds up working with one of the robot's creators to solve the mystery. And there is a mystery to be solved, indeed. However, the studio seems to think that the only thing the mystery needs is a bunch of random, over-the-top fight scenes with lots of pretty special effects.

All I kept thinking when I saw this movie is "It could have been better." It's not a terrible movie (I've seen and enjoyed worse), but I can't call it a good one with a straight face because I keep seeing that it could have been better. They could have toned down or dropped a lot of the overdone action sequences and kept this closer to a mystery centered on the characters. But they couldn't do that, because this is a "Will Smith movie" and people want to see Will Smith doing stunts with the same sarcastic smile and dialogue he's been milking for the last decade or so.

I think one of the most telling things about this movie comes from a recent conversation a friend of mine and I had about it. I asked him if it was sad or geeky that I was able to figure out the "save humanity from itself" angle of the First Law long before it was revealed in the film. He said to me "That just means you're not part of the movie's target audience."

Not a terrible movie, but it could have been a lot better if the filmmakers had stuck with the story and not made it an action flick. Of course, if they did that, then people would probably see it as "too sci-fi" even if it were a vast improvement. But that's a "lowest common denominator" problem, and beyond the scope of this review.

Battle Royale II (2003)

A sequel that loses sight of what made the original great

[5/10 · 7 April 2005]

If you've made it this far on the page, you probably know the premise of this one. One of the survivors of the Battle Royale game seen in the original movie has formed a terrorist group and declared war on all adults. The BR II act is passed, and now a high school class has been chosen to don the explosive collars and go after the terrorists in the interest of showing the younger generation who's boss (with the people in charge forgetting that they're in this mess because of the Battle Royale games). After the masterpiece that was the original Battle Royale, it sounds like that there's a lot of potential for BR II. Sadly, somewhere along the line they forgot what made the first movie so memorable.

Part of what really made the original movie was showing how the students related to each other before and how it affects their interaction now. It explores the tragedy of a group of friends forced to kill each other to satisfy the whims of a paranoid and desperate government. However, there's almost no character development for any of the new students. Sure, we see plenty of development and back-story for the survivor of the original Battle Royale, but we learn almost nothing about the new students other than certain blatant stereotypes. The lack of development is emphasized even more by the fact that the last third of the movie is peppered with lines like "I always loved you" or "I'll never forget you, so-and-so," even though there is no past context to give these remarks any significance.

The teacher, likewise, isn't nearly as interesting as Kitano in the original. Kitano could be sympathized with, somewhat, and was a tragic figure in his own right. He could at least be understood. The new teacher, though, is an over-the-top cornball played by an actor who does nothing but chew scenery and gives a high school-grade acting performance. The character contributes very little of value to the movie, but his eventual death winds up meaning absolutely nothing to the audience when the time comes, nor does it really mean anything to the characters in the movie.

One thing the movie overdoes is blaming the problems of the entire world on the USA. While I can handle the anti-American sentiment itself that the movie carries (most likely as part of a statement it attempts to make about terrorism), the movie spends far too much time harping on the evils of the United States to build a memorable message about the subject. It's like watching a small child point a finger at someone and call them a "stupidhead" over and over.

The movie's fine for the first half or so. But it really should have spent more time having the kids deal with the fact that they've been drafted to kill the enemies of the government that wants them dead. But it breezes through the early parts of the conflict just to have the students team up with the revolutionaries they're being ordered to kill. The first half of the movie should really have been the first three-quarters. We don't have enough time to get to know these kids to really care about their personal motives for dealing with the situation. They're just a plot device to connect viewers with the survivor from the original movie, when they could have been so much more. In this movie, the students are forced to team up against their targets, linked in pairs via the collars (when one member of a pair dies, the other dies as well). This is a dynamic that really could have been explored more. But after the students meet up with the terrorists, Battle Royale II becomes just another war movie.

There was a lot in this movie that could/should have been addressed, but it spends too much time with the terrorist leader suffering from angst related to his mission. We're forced to spend all of our energy paying attention to this single character rather than being able to really get to know the students who are the true victims here. Even after all pretense of the Battle Royale game is utterly gone, the movie still gives us on-screen text identifying who's died and how many kids are left. The thing is, though, that it's obvious that it only does this because the original did it, even though it really has no effect in BR II. In this movie, we don't get to see the students enough to really worry about which ones died. We got to know the kids in the first movie, and we all had our favorites, and it was chilling to think of them being treated like non-player characters in a video game via this 'scoreboard' effect.

There were a number of devices and bits in the original movie that stick with you, make it memorable, and give you something to talk about with friends who've seen it. But they forgot or cast aside most of that for this sub-par sequel. While the first movie would have you asking yourself what you'd do if you were in that situation, all this movie has you asking yourself is why you spent the time and money to watch it.

Free for All (2003)

It's been done, and it's been done better

[14 September 2003]

With all honesty, I wasn't expecting too much out of the promos for this series when I first saw them. Well, I got exactly what I'd hoped out of it... nothing. I hear tell that it's supposed to be based on a webcomic of some sort. Well, if it is, it's based on a pretty crummy one. My first impression of the series is that it's a third-rate ripoff of a genuinely-good webcomic called Sluggy Freelance. The characters, even in their context as cartoon characters, are crude and simply unentertaining at best. The storylines are formulaic and unimaginative, and most of the humor is needlessly crude. It relies on cheap 'dick and fart joke'-sort of material, and that's unimaginative even by the standards of such humor.

The ideas behind this series have been done before. In fact, they've been done much better without having to, say, resort to twisting the nipples of a nicotine-deprived grandmother in an attempt to get a few laughs.

2.5 out of 10, but that's only because the ferret's funny.

Mutant X (2001–2004)

It has room to grow but it's not using it much.

[3 August 2002]

First off, all X-Men comparisons aside, Mutant X is a decent show. Some of the background story material is a little cliche by now, but I think what's keeping it back isn't it's similarities to X-Men. The big problem is that not enough is being done with it, between story material and special effects. Most of them (particularly those involving the powers of the characters) are obviously stock at best. One of the characters, a guy with electrical powers, apparently feels the need to perform the same arm motion every time he uses his abilities (a habit that he seems to be shedding in recent episodes, but still...). There are a couple of areas where the show just doesn't seem as believable as, say, the X-Men universe. For one, one of the characters has superhuman physical attributes (enhanced strength, agility, etc.), allowing her to pull off complex martial arts stunts. Thing is, whenever a fight breaks out, _everyone_ seems capable of pulling off these moves when they need to, whether their powers allow them to or not (speaking of said fight scenes, you can see the wires used for the stunts). The other thing that makes the setting not as believable is the fact that part of the show's premise is that the general public seems to be afraid of these 'new mutants'. However, there has been very little indication that this is the case. But then, that just might be an oversight on my part, I haven't seen all of the episodes.

Dennis Miller: The Millennium Special - 1,000 Years, 100 Laughs, 10 Really Good Ones (1999 TV Special)

Dennis is good in this one... too bad he's the only one

[8/10 · 13 March 2002]

First off, I want to point out that this is a great special. It has some interesting, original takes on events that happened during the past millennium. Dennis's performance, including the delivery of his jokes and the incredible writing of them, is at least a 9.5, if not a 10. The only thing I'd recommend (if you have a tape of this special) is to fast-forward through the Norm MacDonald sequences. Dennis makes up for it, but Norm suddenly gets extremely annoying by the second or third time he's gone out of his way to make male genitalia jokes within a one-minute time-span. But Dennis is truly funny enough that he helps you recover from Norm's feeble attempts at humor. I give it an overall 8 out of 10.

Scanner Cop II (1995 Video)

Not bad for a B-Movie, but it's missing something (slight spoiler, minor plot point)

[24 February 2001]

Scanner Cop 2 is decent, for a B-Movie. It's certainly watchable. It's not as bad as, say, Scanners 3, but it certainly has its moments. However, I personally feel the movie was cheapened a bit... a constant point of stress in the Scanners universe involved the inner struggle between using Scanner powers and experiencing the side effects, or taking the drugs that dull their powers, possibly becoming addicted and becoming vegetables in the process (as shown by Scanners 2). In this movie, a new Ephemerol is magically created to allow the scanner cop to use his abilities with no penalty, without going nuts in the process. True, addition of this plot point may have possibly taken some of the focus from the movie, but that would be like making a Batman movie which completely ignores the blow dealt to Batman's social life by is 'nightly job'. But I'm getting off-track. Scanner Cop 2 is definitely a good movie, compared to some of the others in the series.

TV Funhouse (2000–2001)

Intended for the Ren and Stimpy generation

[29 January 2001]

First off, this show is fantastic, if you can appreciate the humor. Comedy Central puts out shows that try to be a lot funnier than they are... Sports Night is a perfect example. TV Funhouse is intended for people who grew up on gross cartoons like Ren and Stimpy, and are looking for an adult cartoon of that same flavor (since none of the current Ren and Stimpy knock-offs on Cartoon Network even come close). I've been searching for a show like that for years, and TV Funhouse really does the trick... my only complaint is that the host, Doug, just really bites. Typical Comedy Central Original Series trash (I don't count South Park as a Comedy Central Original Series, as it wasn't created by them). The rest is great, though.

Sliders (1995–2000)

A good show, once... (note: minor spoiler for those who haven't seen the show's last couple of seasons, major spoiler for those who haven't seen the last episode)

[24 December 2000]

Sliders, at the start, was great show. Great stories, fantastic chemistry between the four star actors. The show's "What if" premise was great... once or twice I brought taped episodes to my history teacher to have shown in class, as a supplement for certain lessons (For example, the episode where the Soviet Union conquered America, and the one where England won the Revolutionary War). But unfortunately, Fox canceled the show... when I heard the Sci-Fi Channel was going to pick it up, I was overjoyed... until some point afterwards, when the show went from "Sliders" to "Khromag Fighters". They completely changed the premise of the show, instead of just trying to write better "What If" stories. I almost stopped watching altogether, just occasionally dropping in for an episode so I didn't become completely lost. By the end of the series, every member of the original four Sliders had been gotten rid of except for Rembrandt... which was ironic, given that he was the only character on the show who ended up being a Slider purely by accident. The last straw was the last episode, where they ended it with Rembrandt going alone through the portal back to his homeworld to cleanse it of the Khromags. And that was where the episode ended. The final episode. And we're left to wonder what happened. The WORST way to end a series. My scores on the show: First few seasons on Fox, 9 out of 10. Last couple of seasons on Sci-Fi: 3 out of 10.

Star Trek: Generations (1994)

Typical of movies made from TV shows

[6/10 · 24 December 2000]

Star Trek: Generations is far from horrible, but far from spectacular. It's just like every time a movie is made from a television show. They made everything flashier, prettier, etc., at the cost of giving us a sub-standard plot. I think the biggest disappointment came when Captain Kirk died without even seeing the Enterprise_D. Sure, that would have been predictable, that he would see it, but quite frankly I think that's what the fans would have liked. They would have loved to see Kirk on the bridge of the Enterprise-D. Or at least that's my opinion. A friend of mine commented to me once that Generations should have been longer, and a two-parter, with the 'To be continued...' coming after the Enterprise-D was supposedly destroyed after hitting the planet. If you ask me, that wouldn't have been a bad idea.

Daria (1997–2002)

So realistic you forget its animated

[15 December 2000]

I don't have too much to say in this, except that Daria has to be the most realistic portrayal of high school life I've ever seen on television, animated or otherwise. It's very well written, with all of the typical high school stereotypes realistically portrayed (if that isn't an oxymoron).

The Mighty (1998)

Fantastic

[10/10 · 5 December 2000]

The Mighty is the best movie I've seen in a long time... beautifully written, with some incredible acting. Definitely a must-see. The story moves along at an well-timed pace, and builds up to a truly touching ending, the kind of ending people talk about and just say "Wow..."

NetForce (1999 TV Movie)

Another movie in the tradition of not being NEARLY as good as the book (POSSIBLE SPOILER)

[3/10 · 4 July 2000]

I read the book long before I heard about the movie, and given past history with books being translated into movies, I expected NetForce to suck but hoped it didn't. Well, it sucks big time. I was hoping for something remotely close to the book, which it is... for about 10 minutes or so, until Steve Day is assassinated. Then, after that, it bears no resemblance to the book. I was disappointed, but based on my expectations, not THAT disappointed. 3 out of 10