An Hour Without An Enjoyable Moment: "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum"

The Good: Nothing
The Bad: No organic character development, Huge plot holes, Lack of impressive performances, Wonky science for the episode's many macguffins, Klingon portions are clunky.
The Basics: Star Trek: Discovery has a first contact situation in "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" which introduces a colony-style life form that possesses Saru while Admiral Cornwell gets tortured.


It is hard not to go into each and every Star Trek: Discovery review without an opening complaining about how everything that came before is an insult to the Star Trek franchise and continuity. With "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum," that complaint would most certainly be that cloaking technology was not a thing in the Star Trek universe for about a decade after Star Trek: Discovery (though that had already been compromised by events in Star Trek: Enterprise) and Klingons did not have cloaking technology of any sort until after they made an alliance with the Romulans in the third season of Star Trek. So, as "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" features the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery investigating Klingon cloaking device technology, it is hard not to kvetch right off the bat.

"Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" continues where "Magic To Make The Sanest Man Go Mad" (reviewed here!) left off and revisits the idea that Captain Lorca set Admiral Cornwell up to be captured - if not outright killed - by the Klingons. And the Klingons have captives yet again.

A StarFleet ship is under attack by six Klingon vessels when the Discovery appears to attempt to save them. A Klingon battlecruiser decloaks and when the Gagarin is destroyed, the Discovery flees. Saru, Tyler and Burnham are dispatched on the planet Pahvo where there is a crystal transmitting a signal that they believe will allow them to see through the Klingon cloaking device. When the Away Team discovers a native life form on Pahvo, their mission changes and they are forced to alter their approach in getting access to the transmitter crystal.

Meanwhile, Admiral Cornwell finds an unlikely ally in the Klingon prison; her interrogator does not want to follow Kol and pitches working with Cornwell to escape the prison. On Pahvo, Saru communicates with the alien life forms and he becomes obsessed with staying on the planet. Believing Saru has been infected, Ash Tyler takes over and begins to work on a way to get them off the planet.

Everybody continues to be a dick in "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum." One of the real strikes against Star Trek: Discovery is that none of the characters are particularly likable. Anthony Rapp's Stamets is suffering the ill-effects of now being genetically-modified to interface with the Spore Drive and he treats the ever-nervous Tilly poorly. But it wasn't like Stamets was a nice guy to begin with and his altered personality is more that he has changed how he is an asshole.

In a similar way, Saru is possessed in "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" and the traits that are brought out are only the most negative in his personality. "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" is essentially the first episode of Star Trek: Discovery that deals with an alien first contact situation and unlike the best episodes in the Star Trek franchise, there is no well-developed theme in the episode that makes it relevant outside this particular story. Instead, in "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" first contact is a desperate attempt to get new alien life forms to aid StarFleet in fighting the Klingons through their macguffin technology.

It is hard not to watch "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" and wonder if the writer had ever actually watched any Star Trek. A Vulcan says "souls" in reference to casualties, the StarFleet admiral who was a counselor (a medical professional!) holds her own with a Klingon warrior in hand to hand combat and Saru is in telepathic style contact (what the hell is it with Star Trek: Discovery and telepathic contact?!) with a life form that is everything on the planet and he has to ask where Burnham went.

"Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" feels like what happens when Star Trek writers just give up. The episode mashes together "This Side Of Paradise" (reviewed here!) and "Man Of The People" (reviewed here!) to make something that is just terrible on every level.

For other works with Jayne Brook, please check out my reviews of:
Boston Legal - Season 2
Sports Night - Season 2
Superman IV: The Quest For Peace

0/10

For other Star Trek episode, movie, and seasons, please check out my comprehensive Star Trek Review Index Page!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Discovery Arrives On "Context Is For Kings"

The Good: Doug Jones and Jason Isaacs are fine with what they are given
The Bad: Terrible characterization, Abysmal continuity errors, Boring, Prioritizes style and merchandising over substance and storytelling, Derivative
The Basics: "Context Is For Kings" meanders into a Star Trek: Discovery rip-off of Alien before just collapsing into something that will only confound Star Trek fans.


As a reviewer and a life long fan of the Star Trek franchise, it is tough not to begin each review of new Star Trek: Discovery episodes with a laundry list of things that are wrong with the new television series. This is especially hard at the outset of "Context Is For Kings," the first episode of Star Trek: Discovery that features the titular U.S.S. Discovery. The reason it is tough for a Trekker to even approach "Context Is For Kings" with anything resembling an open mind is where the episode begins. Following immediately on the heels of "Battle At The Binary Stars" (reviewed here!), "Context Is For Kings" opens after one of the most glaring continuity errors of the series thus far and it is impossible to discuss without some references as to where the prior episode ended.

"Battle At The Binary Stars" ended with Michael Burnham pleading guilty and being convicted of multiple crimes, including mutiny. People who recall the length and breadth of the Star Trek franchise will see fairly quickly the problem with this. In "The Tholian Web" (reviewed here!) when the Away Team explores the adrift U.S.S. Defiant and it appears the crew killed one another, Chekov asks is there has ever been a crew mutiny on a starship. Spock responds that there is no record of one and that - given Michael Burnham's relationship with Sarek - is just the insult to injury. Not only would Spock know that there have been mutineers in StarFleet, he would have intimate knowledge of one of them. And even if there were no record of the actual mutiny, there is now in the Star Trek universe a retconned conviction for mutiny. Yes, the "continuity experts" on Star Trek: Discovery suck at their jobs.

Six months after Burnham was convicted of her crimes, she is transferred to a dilithium mine. En route, the shuttle she is on is covered in energy-eating bugs. The shuttle is picked up by the U.S.S. Discovery and the prisoners are picked up by Security Chief Landry. After fighting in the mess hall, Burnham is sent to meet Captain Gabriel Lorca. Lorca wants Burnham's help in cleaning off the parasites that are now on Discovery's hull and Burnham is confined to quarters with her new roommate Tilly. After a black alert is declared, Burnham witnesses a strange phenomenon in her quarters.

The next morning, Burnham is reunited with Saru, who is the first officer on the U.S.S. Discovery. Saru brushes aside Burnham's apology for their former Captain's death and he warns her that he will protect Captain Lorca. After Burnham breaks into one of the Discovery's labs, she is in a meeting when the U.S.S. Glen is reported lost. Burnham is assigned to a mission to explore what happened to the Glen, which may have been overrun by spores. Exploring the Glen, the Discovery crew finds the StarFleet crew dead and evidence that Klingons were on board the ship. Burnham and the Away Team are chased off the Glen by an alien and upon returning to the Discovery, Captain Lorca reveals to Burnham just what the mission of the crew is.

"Context Is For Kings" is a boring "meet the new crew" episode coupled with a cheap horror story. The Star Trek franchise has done horror episodes before, but "Context Is For Kings" is a particularly lame rendition of Alien for Star Trek: Discovery.

In "Context Is For Kings" the emphasis on style over substance for the show. In one of her first scenes on the U.S.S. Discovery, Burnham encounters one of her former crewmates from the Shenzhou. Detmer now has a bionic implant on the side of her head, something no other StarFleet officer has ever had . . . and a technological distraction that undermines the surprise of the Borg in the universe a hundred years later. And the viewer has to ask, what the hell is the point?! Why throw something so irrelevant and distracting into a prequel show? Detmer's head appliance is as distracting as the Tribble in the captain's ready room.

Star Trek: Discovery is all about merchandising so far and "Context Is For Kings" is no exception. While viewers wait for an explanation as to what a "black alert" is and they marvel at the idea that the writers felt the need to include a reference to a "breath scan" when this era of the Star Trek featured retinal scans for security locks, they are treated to "Discovery" branded pillowcases. And Sylvia Tully claims to have an allergy?! Whether she does or not is irrelevant: by the time of the original Star Trek no one seems to have allergies and it is cringeworthy to consider that two hundred years from now - when allergies can mostly be controlled - allergies are still a problem.

Stamets is a terrible stereotype of a gay person. Hearing a StarFleet officer talk down to everyone and lisp out "I hate you!" to a friend is flat-out nauseating. Anthony Rapp's character is written like a Will & Grace stereotype as opposed to just an officer who happens to be homosexual. No, Stamets is the unfortunate melodramatic stereotype of a gay person in "Context Is For Kings."

Star Trek used to be fun escapism. Unfortunately, Star Trek: Discovery is a journey into miserable. Everyone Michael Burnham encounters in "Context Is For Kings" is a jerk to her. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was a dark show with a number of angst-filled characters, but even in that people managed to treat one another fairly well from the outset. In "Context Is For Kings" everyone is a dick. Yeah, that's not very professional: Star Trek: Discovery is filled with ass holes and xenomorph rip-offs. The problem with this is that none of the characters feel like they are worth watching (save, perhaps, the underused Saru). Watching "Context Is For Kings," I felt myself feeling much like I did a few seasons into Game Of Thrones; I didn't care who sat on the Iron Throne because everyone was so compromised, unlikable or boring. Star Trek: Discovery has contrived a Klingon war that manages to retroactively make idiots out of most of the prior crews of later StarFleet ships (Chekov, formerly a pretty bright boy, asks if there has ever been a mutiny on a starship when thirteen years prior it was pretty public knowledge that a mutineer started a war with the Klingons!) and by the end of the third episode, the viewer doesn't care who lives or dies in the show - we just want it to be over.

"Context Is For Kings" is just awful. Tully's exclamation of "is that a book?!" is mind-numbing given how books (physical books) appear in Star Trek with no one being at all amazed. There's another robot on the bridge and the science experiment on the Discovery is yet another head-slapper that makes viewers wonder why the hell the executive producers insisted on making Star Trek: Discovery a prequel. Regardless of whether or not the Discovery's experiments are successful or become known outside the ship at all, it seems absolutely baffling that an instantaneous teleporter - much like the Iconian gateways - not only could be developed effectively in this time period, but remain secret for the rest of the franchise timeline.

Doug Jones is good as Saru but even his very brief time on screen is not enough to save "Context Is For Kings." The third episode of Star Trek: Discovery is an absolute dud that phones in the character, dumbs down the exposition (wait, is Michael Burnham a mutineer?!) and tries to confound viewers with spectacle and chases to cover up the lack of deep performances or interesting characters. Even the credits for "Context Is For Kings" are sloppy; there is a person credited as the "Shenzhous computer" . . . when the Shenzhou does not appear at all in the episode!

But hey, there's another robot on the bridge and . . . I've got to go to the bathroom now to do what Star Trek: Discovery is doing to the Star Trek franchise.

For other works with Jason Isaacs, please visit my reviews of:
The OA - Season 1
The Harry Potter Saga
Friends With Money
Elektra

0/10

For other Star Trek episode, movie, and season reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Legitimately Terrible: "Battle At The Binary Stars" Continues The Degredation Of Star Trek: Discovery!

The Good: Special effects, Moments of performance
The Bad: Terrible characterizations, Banal plot, Less-than-subtle racism
The Basics: "Battle At The Binary Stars" continues the Star Trek: Discovery retcon of the Star Trek universe into utter ridiculousness.


Despite my many, many, trepidations about Star Trek: Discovery, I was actually quite excited about watching the second episode of the series. When I sat down to the pilot episode, I was mired in the many problems with the show's concept and the behind-the-scenes issues surrounding the show (that it was intended to launch the CBS All Access streaming service, rather than being developed based upon a strong, Star Trek concept). But, when I sat to watch "Battle At The Binary Stars," I had vented the angst about the concept and suffered through the terrible pilot episode that was kindly evaluated to be a complete mess.

"Battle At The Binary Stars" is, sadly, no better than the pilot episode to Star Trek: Discovery.

"Battle At The Binary Stars" picks up immediately after the events of "The Vulcan Hello" (reviewed here!) and it is impossible to discuss the second episode of Star Trek: Discovery. After all, "The Vulcan Hello" climaxed with the U.S.S. Shenzhou, a power struggle having broken out on the bridge between the Captain and first officer, facing off against a decloaking fleet of Klingon starships. As the name suggests, "Battle At The Binary Stars" leads to a conflict between the StarFleet vessel Shenzhou and the least-Klingon looking Klingon starships yet seen in the Star Trek franchise.

Seven years before she mutinied against Captain Georgiou, Michael Burnham arrives aboard the Shenzhou where she behaves more like a Vulcan than a human. In the present, Burnham is relieved of duty. The Klingon, T'Kuvma, acts as a prophet to attempt to unify the twenty-four Klingon houses and get them to fight the StarFleet presence as a threat to their way of life. The wounded helm officer, Connor, visits Burnham in the brig moments before the Shenzhou is significantly damaged. With Burnham trapped in the brig, the Shenzhou is crippled.

With the StarFleet fleet decimated, T'Kuvma informs the Shenzhou crew that they have been warned against exploring further into Klingon space. Burnham manages to escape the brig and when she is reunited with Georgiou, the two hatch a plan to avert a war with the Klingons. When the Klingons begin collecting the bodies of their dead, Georgiou beams a bomb onto one of the corpses. When trying to capture T'Kuvma, Burnham and Georgiou encounter resistence and Burnham is beamed back to the Shenzhou alone. Burnham is court martialed for her various crimes.

"Battle At The Binary Stars" has admittedly wonderful special effects. When the Shenzhou has holes blown in it so that Burnham's brig is basically a cube next to vacuum, the effect is awesome. The destruction of the Europa is similarly cool.

Effects, however, are a minor part of a show. The Klingons in "Battle At The Binary Stars" do not sound at all like prior, established, Klingons. The Klingons fret about their losses, as opposed to acknowledging up front that their casualties in the battle with the StarFleet are honored dead who fell in battle (for Klingons, there is no greater honor). T'Kuvma is essentially a religious figure and he is thinly, but uninterestingly, characterized in "Battle At The Binary Stars."

The title of "Battle At The Binary Stars" pretty much details the entire plot of the episode. The Klingons square off against the Shenzhou and when more starships arrive, shooting occurs. There is no real character development in "Battle At The Binary Stars;" the most interesting character dynamic continues to be the relationship between Captain Georgiou and science officer Saru, but they are not given a significant number of scenes to carry the episode.

Instead, "Battle At The Binary Stars" wastes time showing how Burnham escapes the brig - apparently the Shenzhou's central computer has an ethics routine that rivals that of Commander Data's - and fleshing out T'Kuvma's backstory. But, essentially, "Battle At The Binary Stars" is a starship fight that culminates in a physical altercation between two humans and two Klingons that goes on far longer than one would expect hand-to-hand combat to last between the two groups.

For a show set in the Star Trek universe that is being championed as a triumph of progressive casting, it is hard not to cringe at the racism in "Battle At The Binary Stars." Captain Georgiou is of Asian descent (actress Michelle Yeoh is of Malaysian descent; it is unclear where Georgiou is from in the narrative). She quotes Sun Tzu, captains the Shenzhou, and prepares to make a kamikaze flight on the Klingon flagship. The white Admiral who leads the StarFleet fleet captains the U.S.S. Europa (ethnocentric much? Sure, it's a Jovian moon, but it screams "Europe!"). And by the end of the second episode, the mutinous black protagonist is headed to jail. Perhaps next week, Star Trek: Discovery will find some pleasant stereotypes about Native Americans, Jews and arabs to insert into Star Trek lore (read that with as much sarcasm as possible).

Sarek continues to be problematically rendered in Star Trek: Discovery and the concept of the Vulcan katra is completely bastardized in "Battle At The Binary Stars" to transition from an end-of-life way to save the Vulcan soul to a marginally uncomfortable video chat inside Burnham's head.

"Battle At The Binary Stars" seems like an important plot event for Star Trek: Discovery, though the titular starship still has not made its appearance. Beyond that, the episode sucks. The Orville feels more like smart, classic Star Trek than Star Trek: Discovery does two episodes in. The custodians of the Star Trek franchise continue to prioritize flash over substance and the result is television that might appeal to fourteen year-old boys, but if it does, they aren't the fourteen year-old boys who fell in love with the cerebral episodes of the original Star Trek and I shudder to think of the world they might create.

For other works with Michelle Yeoh, please visit my reviews of:
Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2
The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor
Memoirs Of A Geisha
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Tomorrow Never Dies

1/10

See how this episode stacks up against others in the Star Trek franchise by visiting my Star Trek Review Index Page where the works are listed by rating!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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"The Vulcan Hello" Makes An Absolute Mess Out Of Star Trek.

The Good: Lt. Saru is a cool character and well-performed by Doug Jones, Production values
The Bad: Dull story, Riddled with continuity issues, Atrocious character issues, Lack of impressive performances, Design issues
The Basics: "The Vulcan Hello" gets Star Trek: Discovery off to the worst start of any Star Trek franchise television show.


Star Trek: Discovery is here. As I prepared for the pilot episode of Star Trek: Discovery, I found myself deeply conflicted. Not since Enterprise was promoted without "Star Trek" in its title and under the development of a man (Brannon Braga) who was being actively quoted as saying he did not like the original Star Trek - and he was working on a prequel! - have I been less excited about a Star Trek premiere episode than I was about Star Trek: Discovery. My lack of enthusiasm can easily be defined: Star Trek: Discovery is a tool, an advertising mechanism that is once more being used to exploit the subculture I most actively identify with. I am a Trekker. I have an expert level of knowledge of the Star Trek franchise and Star Trek: Discovery was insulting to the Star Trek legacy from the first moment it was announced.

Allow me to explain.

Star Trek: Discovery was first announced as a program that would help to launch CBS All Access. Apparently, the executives at CBS did not learn from Paramount's utter failure with UPN (Star Trek: Voyager finished its run, the network collapsed and merged with The WB) and is now attempting to launch a streaming service on the back of Star Trek fans. CBS is neglecting all the available data that suggests that, like social networks, consumers have reached their peak interest in streaming services and launching CBS All Access. The insulting aspect of this to a Star Trek fan is simple: Star Trek: Discovery was not created based on a great story idea, a strong narrative or interesting characters. Before any of that - or even its title - were created, CBS announced that there was a new Star Trek series that would become the flagship of CBS All Access streaming service. Strike one - a show with strong anti-capitalist roots being used as a cheap tool for a major capitalist venture.

Then details for Star Trek: Discovery started to be released. The show was announced as a prequel to the original Star Trek, taking place approximately ten years before Captain Kirk took command of the U.S.S. Enterprise. So, as a fan, the first promotional materials for Star Trek: Discovery set me off. The uniforms in Star Trek: Discovery look nothing like the uniforms that would be in use during this time period in the Star Trek universe: "The Cage" (reviewed here!) taking place only five years prior to the events of "The Vulcan Hello." The first two pilots of Star Trek had remarkably similar StarFleet uniforms so how "The Vulcan Hello" would look so different within the canon was baffling. But hey, I get it: the outfits from the original Star Trek would look pretty dull in high definition television.

Then the characters started to get announced. Star Trek: Discovery was going to feature a female starship captain and that instantly raised my ire. My goat was gotten not because I am a sexist pig, but because I am an expert in the Star Trek franchise: a prequel to Star Trek could not feature a female starship captain and still maintain any semblance of continuity to the already-established canon of Star Trek. Only a neophyte to Star Trek would fail to recognize that "Turnabout Intruder" (reviewed here!), the final episode of Star Trek clearly established that StarFleet did not allow female starship captains (don't kill the messenger - I didn't write the episode!). The antagonist in "Turnabout Intruder" was so frustrated by the prohibition that she went insane - she had been fighting for the position her entire life. So, Star Trek: Discovery could not even be an explanation of why StarFleet did not allow female captains.

Two of these three issues could easily have been avoided by simply setting Star Trek: Discovery in a later era of the Star Trek franchise. But no, Star Trek: Discovery opted to keep the franchise mired in prequel hell.

Finally, before sitting down to watch "The Vulcan Hello," I was innundated with a load of disingenuous media surrounding the launch of Star Trek: Discovery. A few days ago, The Independent published an article from a set visit that was one of the worst pieces of factchecking I've ever read. From a title - "How Sonequa Martin-Green Became The First Black Lead Of Star Trek . . . " - that was criminally inaccurate (Avery Brooks wasn't black lead enough to be the first?!) to ridiculous, unchallenged assertions by the cast (first officer Michael Burnham is given a male name not out of any incredible bit of empowerment, but as a conceit of Bryan Fuller's works - it was a holdover from when Bryan Fuller was still developing the series, much like Lt. Saru's very un-Trek ability to sense death, a topic that Fuller's works are obsessed with). Even the IMDB's pre-launch article on the women of the Star Trek franchise was sloppy - there was a picture of Linda Park's Ensign Hoshi Sato accompanying text about Rosalind Chao's Keiko O'Brien . . . and Sato's character does not appear in the article!

So, I sat down to "The Vulcan Hello" with incredibly low expectations and a general sense that the episode would have a very difficult time living up to the scrutiny of a Star Trek expert.

Unsurprisingly, "The Vulcan Hello" did not even rise to my lowest expectations of what it could have been without nitpicking at it.

Opening with a Klingon warrior rallying Klingons with anti-Federation, pro-Klingon unification dogma, Captain Georgiou and her first officer, Lieutenant Commander Michael Burnham rescue a planet from a drought. The U.S.S. Shenzhou is retasked to repair a relay station near a binary star system. Burnham and science officer Lt. Saru clash on identifying the device that they suspect caused the damage to the relay station. Burhnam takes an environmental suit to go into the asteroid field to investigate the object. Fighting a timetable against a lethal radiation exposure, Burnham investigates the object, which is massive and she is unable to determine if it was constructed or carved. Burnham encounters an armored Klingon on the device and she kills it.

While recovering from her ordeal, Burnham flashed back to her childhood on Vulcan. When the Shenzhou arms its weapon, a massive Klingon ship decloaks. Saru advises retreat, but Burnham denies his instinct. When the Shenzhou experiences a bright, blinding, beacon, Burnham turns to Sarek for aid in understanding it. Knocking out Captain Georgiou with a Vulcan neck pinch, Burnham assumes command and prepares to attack the Klingon ship. But when the Klingon fleet appears, the Shenzhou is menaced.

"The Vulcan Hello" is a mess. The creativity of showing a Klingon environmental suit is almost instantly diminished by the fact that the first alien Burnham sees in Star Trek: Discovery, she kills (the aliens she rescued by ending the drought emerging only after she and the Captain left the area). How very Trek; murdering when threatened.

The Klingons in Star Trek: Discovery look nothing like the Klingons that would be the established order by this era. The Klingons did not have cloaking technology in this era (it was a huge tactical issue for the Federation when the Klingons got the technology from the Romulans in the third season of Star Trek), but a massive Klingon Ship - that is textured more like a Borg ship - decloaks near the Shenzhou.

Lt. Saru steals his scenes in "The Vulcan Hello." Saru is rational, reasonable, and intriguing. Saru is a new alien race and he is given a decent characterization, while Burnham is presented as a somewhat generic soldier in her role as first officer. The science officer feels like the most direct link to the familiar Star Trek, despite the ridiculous conceit that he can sense death. Doug Jones, who plays Saru, is wonderful at managing the technobabble and speaking with a tone of reason in his voice.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Sarek. Sarek appears in the fastest transmission ever for a StarFleet communication . . . using a technology that was not introduced until late in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (holographic communications technology). Sarek speaks with metaphor and with a level of emotion that does not jive with his established character, much less Vulcans. And with Sarek being recast yet again, viewers have to wonder why the producers did not go with Ben Cross, who played Sarek in the 2009 film Star Trek (reviewed here!) and would have been an age appropriate version of the character. How is it that Sarek looks younger in "The Vulcan Hello" than Spock did in "The Cage?!" (For neophytes, Sarek is Spock's father and Sarek looks younger than an adult Spock did in an adventure that happened five years prior to this one!)  In "The Vulcan Hello," Sarek refers to Vulcans as if they were separate entities from the Federation for which he is an ambassador.  By this time period, there should have been a much more integrated Federation and StarFleet than during the last prequel.

The character of Michael Burnham is problematically established, both as an individual and as a StarFleet officer. Burnham has been serving as Georgiou's first officer for seven years and her solution to a disagreement is a Vulcan neck pinch?! Really?! How has Burnham risen the ranks and had any sort of effective working relationship with her captain when the Vulcan neck pinch is her go-to when they disagree on confronting the Klingons. Sure, Star Trek: Discovery is new, but seven years of working together (as characters) and Georgiou is unsure how the crew will react in a battle situation?! What the hell has the Shenzhou been doing for seven years?

"The Vulcan Hello" features the most inorganic introduction of characters of any Star Trek series. The characters are supposed to be a crew that has been working together for quite some time, but Saru has to give a seminal explanation to his species this far into their working relationship?! Yes, I am using "?!" an obscene amount, but "The Vulcan Hello" begs the use of the baffled explanation as the episode falls apart with even a little bit of scrutiny.

I was worried that my initial viewing of Star Trek: Discovery would be cripplingly biased by technical problems and issues with minutia, but even the broad strokes of "The Vulcan Hello" are a mess. The Shenzhou almost lands when it first appears, making it somewhat ridiculous that the transporter would need to be used instead of a shuttlecraft or a very long cable. Star Trek: Enterprise was set about seventy years prior, but Klingons are supposedly virtually unseen for the past hundred years in "The Vulcan Hello." And the title of the episode refers to Vulcans shooting Klingon ships on sight as a diplomatic tactic. Did not one of the writers of "The Vulcan Hello" or not a single executive producer of Star Trek: Discovery ever watch "Errand Of Mercy" (reviewed here!) and recognize that it characterized both the Klingons of the era and the Vulcan value of pacifism?! Spock, a half-Vulcan, allows himself to be tortured rather than succumb to violence. And for an episode and a show that seems to have been made by committee, did not one person involved raise the issue that it might seem pretty racist that the first StarFleet ship with a Chinese name is captained by a Malaysian woman?! Did it not occur to anyone on the production staff that giving the ship with the Asian name to an Asian Captain might not seem like a clever cultural nod, but an upsettingly racist concept?

Even on its own, "The Vulcan Hello" is a fucking mess. The inorganic introduction of the Shenzhou crew is paired with a familiar adversary that is presented in such an unfamiliar way as to be utterly ridiculous. The Klingons in "The Vulcan Hello" are more akin to Hirogen (the bones of their dead lining their hull) and the aliens from fluidic space (the Klingon beacon is almost organic in appearance) than anything recognizable as Klingons. Yes, if "The Vulcan Hello" is any indication, Star Trek: Discovery will be an absolute, clusterfuck of a mess that will not be worth the time and attention of Star Trek fans. If only there had been clues before the show aired that it would be such a waste of time . . .

For other Star Trek franchise pilot episodes, please visit my reviews of:
"Where No Man Has Gone Before" - Star Trek
"Encounter At Farpoint" - Star Trek: The Next Generation
"Emissary" - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
"Broken Bow" - Star Trek: Enterprise

1.5/10

For other Star Trek episode, movie, and season reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Monster Mash Mess: The Mummy

The Good: Some funny lines, Decent special effects
The Bad: Lousy character development, Predictable plot arc, No truly memorable performances, Ridiculous issues with suspension of disbelief
The Basics: Even if the preview trailers hadn't spoiled most of it, The Mummy was legitimately terrible.


One of the worst aspects of the last few Summer Blockbuster Seasons is that the preview trailers for some of the biggest films have been so revealing that the viewer has essentially seen the film by sitting through the preview before another movie. When I sat down to The Mummy, there was very little that I felt I had not already seen in the movie. Sadly, it did not take long for that idea to be borne out. The only major aspects of The Mummy not ruined by the preview trailer was the inclusion of actor Jake Johnson in the role of Tom Cruise's sidekick and the identity and obvious complications that result from Russell Crowe playing Dr. Jekyll.

Unfortunately, neither revelation truly makes The Mummy better or even worth watching. Jake Johnson plays the rogue Chris Vail and the initial fun of seeing him in The Mummy wears off quickly. In addition to his character being the first major casualty of the film, given the opportunity, Johnson plays to his strengths with a sarcastic delivery that is entirely familiar to those who enjoy his character on New Girl. Sadly, despite playing a zombie for the bulk of the film, Johnson shows off no real new skills or acting range in the movie.

Crowe's role as Dr. Jekyll opens up a disturbing failure in the suspension of disbelief. While The Mummy asks viewers to accept a number of supernatural elements, the protagonist Jenny Halsey is a scientifically literate character who is ethically-guided and smart. As she dominates much of the first third of The Mummy before Jekyll and his organization are introduced, she instantly lends credibility to the shadowy organization that is engaged in studying and stopping supernatural creatures on Earth. The problem, however, comes in when Dr. Jekyll is introduced and his alter-ego, Hyde, surfaces and is recognized as a separate entity by the computer system. It absolutely stymies believability that a powerful organization with an immense financial backing and no accountability would be led by someone suffering from such a dangerous, unstable, and predictably destructive condition as Dr. Jekyll.

In ancient times, a woman kills her husband before she is entombed herself. In modern Iraq, Nick Morton and Chris Vail are using their military intelligence connections to gain access to antiquities to steal. On the hunt for treasure, Nick sleeps with Jenny Halsey to get a map from her. After stealing her map, Nick and Chris end up in a combat zone where they inadvertently discover a tomb. Exploring the tomb with Halsey, the scientist recognizes that the ancient location - in addition to being about a thousand miles out of place - is designed to keep in something, as opposed to keep the dead buried. Nick, however, is determined and he convinces Colonel Greenway to exhume the sarcophagus. On the plane with the sarcophagus, Chris falls asleep and becomes possessed, attempting to cut loose the sarcophagus. Between the gunplay in the cargo hold and a swarm of crows, the plane goes down with only Halsey surviving.

Despite dying in the plane crash, Nick wakes up in a morgue in England. Halsey is shocked that he appears to have survived, while Nick is unsettled by seeing Chris various places. The two head in the direction of the plane's wreckage, though Nick seems to be psychically linked with the occupant of the sarcophagus and brings them to her current resting place. What follows is a long chase wherein Ahmanet, the mummy who was in the sarcophagus and is now resurrected, kills and takes control of people, hunts Nick and Jenny and is then captured by Halsey's organization. While Dr. Jekyll wants to put Ahmanet down permanently, his mechanism for doing so means that Nick, too, must die.

The Mummy is not a particularly compelling film as the emotional investment the viewers might have in the characters on screen is entirely lacking. Nick is not inherently interesting, in fact, he seems very much like a half-baked version of Indiana Jones without the charisma of Harrison Ford (doesn't Indiana Jones sleep with a woman to steal her map, too?). Halsey is generically presented as both the dupe (she slept with Nick, though as he points out, they hadn't intended to have a relationship) and a scientist. Halsey, however, is not credibly written as she does not seem particularly smart or resourceful. Despite beginning The Mummy with a sense of authority, Halsey spends much of The Mummy being dragged along like a traditional damsel in distress.

Dr. Jekyll is included in The Mummy as a ridiculous conceit. The idea of the organization that Jekyll runs is an attempt to build a franchise - his laboratory has a vampire skull, the arm of what appears to be the Creature From The Black Lagoon, etc. - but his character is a poor choice for running the organization. Add to that, The Mummy pops the cork early on Dr. Jekyll by revealing Hyde right away, leaving no real surprise for future films in the same shared universe.

Sofia Boutella is fine as Ahmanet, exhibiting no real traces of the character she played in Star Trek Beyond (reviewed here!), but the role is not a particularly complex one. Similarly, Tom Cruise has done the "action hero" thing so much that there is not truly anything left for him to mine in the genre. Cruise's role of Nick Morton adds nothing to his portfolio; he shows us nothing we have not seen from him before many, many, many times. In fact, it was not long into The Mummy that I started thinking, "No wonder all Cruise was talking about in the week The Mummy came out was the sequel to Top Gun!" Cruise is given some objectively funny lines to deliver, but he is upstaged on the humor front by Jake Johnson and his jokes tend to fall flat.

Ultimately, The Mummy is an action-horror movie without any real spark. Viewers can save their time and money by simply watching the preview trailer; there is not much substance to the film beyond that, just long sequences of more of the same and ridiculous conceits that fail to land.

For other films currently in theaters, please check out my reviews of:
Wonder Woman
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales
Baywatch
Alien: Covenant
Guardians Of The Galaxy, Volume 2

1.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Counting Up To Six: How The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro Loses Its Way. . .

The Good: Good performances, Pretext of character development
The Bad: Over-the-top special effects, Entirely derivative plot, Lack of spark
The Basics: The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro starts off remarkably well, but continues to add in elements until it is diluted into being Just Another Superhero Sequel.


I went into The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro with reasonably high expectations, despite having never been a fan of the Spider-Man franchise. I enjoyed The Amazing Spider-Man (reviewed here!), but found it largely to be an example of “better ingredients, better meal.” In other words, the reboot started out from an advantageous place considering that the actors in it were of a higher caliber than those who began in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man Trilogy. So, bolstered by the success of the reboot a few years back, I turned to The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro ready to be solidly entertained.

Little did I know that Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci (the two who brought us the reboot of Star Trek, reviewed here!), and Jeff Pinkner were basically going to turn in a rewrite of Batman Forever (reviewed here!) for the Spider-Man franchise. Okay, it’s not quite that bad, but The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro has a primary villain who bears a striking resemblance in terms of character arc to the Edward Nigma character in Batman Forever and he is juggled clumsily between other budding villains so he never quite pops the way viewers might hope. In fact, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is such a jumbled mess of elements that it would be more accurately subtitled (for those markets that include the subtitle): The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Set-Up For The Sequel.

Therein lies the fundamental problem with The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro: the whole film has a grossly assembled feeling to it. Of course The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is an assembled work: there was a writing team, a director, the actors add their own stuff, the studio comes in with notes, etc. Almost all films are collaborative works that start as a work cobbled together from ideas that writers hope will work together. The trick in moviemaking is that the film’s elements need to feel organic, not assembled. When the great moments of reversal come, the viewer should be able to say, “that makes sense” even if they did not see it coming. The best films make one stop looking for the tricks and get so engrossed that when the surprises pop up they truly are surprising. Unfortunately, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro doesn’t do that. Instead, the film follows a troublingly rigid formula that cobbles together elements from The Amazing Spider-Man, Batman Forever and classic Spider-Man comic book storylines that are so well known that even non-fans like myself are entirely aware of them. In short, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro has no surprises for anyone who is awake and has seen any five comic book-based films over the last ten years; what’s worse is that it misuses the talent present in the film in a way The Amazing Spider-Man did not.

Opening with a ballsy rehash of Richard and Mary Parker fleeing Oscorp and New York City (which keeps the protagonist of the film off the screen for the first seven plus minutes!), Peter Parker’s parents meet an untimely end, this time on-screen. As their plane goes down, Richard sends his files to a secret Roosevelt facility using wi-fi technology I’m pretty sure we didn’t have during that time period. In the present day, New York City is besieged by deranged thief Aleksei Sytsevich, who has stolen some vials from Oscorp and is fleeing through downtown with his thugs when he runs into the New York City police department and Spider-Man. Spider-Man manages to foil the robbery, much to the chagrin of Detective Stacy, who – like Peter Parker (Spider-Man’s mundane alter-ego) is kept from the high school graduation by the chase. Parker makes it to graduation just in time (just in time for an awesome Stan Lee cameo!), but having seen Detective Stacy recently, he feels conflicted about actually taking Gwen Stacy up on her generous offer to join the Stacy family for dinner that night. Appearing at the restaurant, Peter tells Gwen he can’t really keep seeing her and Gwen breaks up with Peter for not having the balls to break the promise he made in the prior film to her father outright.

Following their break-up, Max Dillon, an Oscorp employee who has created a revolutionary new power grid for New York City, which is housed in Oscorp, finds himself alone and stepped on by everyone around him. Having been rescued by Spider-Man during the Sytsevich heist, he has a bit of hero worship for Spider-Man. On his birthday, the lonely engineer – who is stepped on by everyone around him, most notably an Oscorp employee who is many years his junior, but seems more outwardly ambitious and a bit of a jackass – meets Gwen Stacy and is thrilled by the simple fact that she remembers his name. Unfortunately, that is the day that Norman Osborn, the founder of Oscorp, dies. Norman dies after having recalled his son, Harry, from prep school and revealing to him that he has prolonged his life using terrible means which have mutated him into something not-quite-human. Harry inherits Oscorp and the employees are all sent home. Unfortunately for Max Dillon, that means his jack-ass superior is unwilling to turn the power off in the conduit he is fixing for the company and Dillon is electrocuted and falls into a tank of electric eels . . . which naturally turns him into a glowing blue man who resurrects in the company morgue hours later.

Scared and unsure of his own abilities, Max Dillon walks out into New York City where his thirst for electrical energy leads him to absorb massive amounts of electricity in Times Square. This makes Peter Parker’s spider-sense tingle (though not explicitly referenced) during his conversation with Gwen Stacy, with whom he is attempting a friendship. Spider-man arrives on the scene and, despite having one of his two web-slingers knocked out by the electrified Dillon, he is able to incapacitate Max Dillon (largely because conversation with Dillon was going remarkably well until one of the police snipers jumped the gun and shot at Dillon). While Peter Parker reaches out to the mourning Harry Osborn, Max Dillon is experimented upon at the secret Oscorp facility, Ravencroft Institute. But soon, Harry’s quest for a cure to the genetic disease that killed his father and whose first symptoms he is now experiencing hits dead ends and corporate intrigue. Following Kurt Connors’ experiments in The Amazing Spider-Man, Oscorp destroyed a number of experiments to avoid lawsuits, including the radioactive spiders that bit Peter Parker. Harry’s right hand man at the company, Donald Menken, is working against him to advance to the CEO position himself. So, when Harry realizes he needs Spider-Man’s blood, he asks Peter Parker for help (thinking Peter knows Spider-man because he has photographed the superhero). But Peter Parker’s own quest for answers has led him to discover the Roosevelt facility and, in the process, he has learned the circumstances under which his father fled. Peter knows that his blood cannot help Harry, but when he and Spider-man refuse to help Harry, Harry takes a different path. He breaks into Ravencroft to free Electro (Max Dillon’s now-villainous alter-ego) and set him upon Spider-man. With the power out in New York City and a determined Gwen Stacy insisting on helping him, Spider-Man must stop Max Dillon and an obsessed Harry Osborn before they destroy New York.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro juggles a lot and while it is not too much for a single film, it is too much for this particular film. The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is an odd film as far as pacing goes. It starts out with an interminably long sequence with Peter Parker’s father, becomes engaging for the bits involving Peter, Gwen and the actual rise of Electro, but stumbles through the entire Harry Osborn plot. The Harry Osborn plot is good, but it feels like it is part of another movie entirely. And, in order to make it work and all come together, the writing team and director Marc Webb seem to have given up. Much the way Princess Leia in Return Of The Jedi (reviewed here!) bears almost no resemblance to the character seen in the two films that precede it, Max Dillon/Electro bears no real resemblance to the character seen in the first two-thirds of the film. Harry Osborn gives Dillon the weakest argument for turning against his hero, Spider-man, ever conceived and Dillon just goes right along with it. In a film where the viewer knows so much of the mythos (Sam Raimi’s Spider-man movies are not terribly old and it’s not like they were not popular!) (It’s hard to call Gwen Stacy’s fate a “spoiler” when it was the subject of a comic book FORTY-ONE YEARS AGO!), the team that assembled The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro takes all of the easiest possible ways out. Max Dillon spends the first two-thirds of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 being set up to be Spider-man’s sidekick. He’s a likable guy, stepped on by schmucks around him until he is given a series of powers he does not at all understand. Then, he’s tortured by the same people who screwed him over his whole life so . . . how is it we’re supposed to believe he goes after entirely the wrong guy in the last act?! Did the writing team learn nothing from Star Trek: Nemesis* (reviewed here!)?!

So, Electro . . . utterly generic villain after one of the coolest super hero origin stories that could have been. That leaves The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro with two villains and a phantom antagonist. First, the villains. Aleksei Sytsevich is cartoonish in his original appearance and when he pops up at the climax of the film as the Rhino, it embodies a problem that has been present through the entire film: the special effects. The special effects in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro are just ridiculous. Gone is a sensible proportion, a realism of physics that was more apparent in The Amazing Spider-Man than in anything from Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man Trilogy. In fact, from his first moments on screen as a CG webslinger, the Spider-man in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro looks like a collection of b-roll from Sam Raimi’s trilogy. The attempt at spectacle is over-the-top, distracting and makes the film look like an animated film as opposed to a serious super hero work. But when the Rhino, in this incarnation a massive tank-like mech blasting through New York City, makes his appearance, it is much more worthy of a groan than a gasp.

Then there’s Harry Osborn. Harry is played by Dane DeHaan and he is, to be entirely fair to him, really good in the role. DeHaan holds his own opposite a heavily made-up Chris Cooper who plays the dying Norman Osborn and he has enough on-screen gravitas to be a compelling leader of Oscorp. DeHaan is as good in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro as Andrew Garfield was in The Amazing Spider-Man. And it’s not DeHaan’s fault that the character is written so thinly, cramped in between two other villains and manages to absurdly talk Max Dillon into completely betraying his established character. I can understand why the studio did not want to risk everything on Dane DeHaan and a Spider-Man film that focused on the Green Goblin as the villain . . . no, wait, they risked at least as much on a reboot of the franchise and won, so why wouldn’t they play to their known strengths for the mythos?! Yes, one of the big reasons The Amazing Spider-man 2 is likely to be released in the U.S. without the Rise Of Electro subtitle is because audiences will recognize the film to be equally the Rise Of The Green Goblin and wonder why the hell Sony isn’t touting that. If you’re going to turn the story on its ear from what fans of the Spider-Man film franchise know anyway, why not completely reinvent the origin of the Green Goblin and give him his own film?!

Then there’s the phantom antagonist. Detective Stacy has no real presence in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro. He pops up, glowers once or twice and disappears from the narrative. In fact, anyone who looks at basic movie structure will look at the film’s climax and wonder just where the hell Detective Stacy is. Peter Parker stands around at the same location for quite some time, a place where Detective Stacy would be bound to go, and yet there is no scene where the law and order cop who spent the entire first film loathing Spider-man’s vigilantism appears, sees Peter Parker and snaps just long enough to kick the kid’s ass. Detective Stacy is recharacterized in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro as a complete wuss. In fact, the only analogy I have is to my own life. When I met the woman who became my wife, we met online and for our first in-person meeting, we met at the restaurant at which she was working at the time. I was caught in a snowstorm and was late and her friends had been ragging on her and when I finally appeared (an hour and a half late), she was relieved and her friends were wary. Her friends, protective as they were, said to me, “If you hurt our girl, we’ll kill you.” Well, me being a pragmatist, bored, and wanting to spend time with the woman I had come to see, I said, “Didn’t you say that about the last guy she dated?” The answer from her friends were, “Well . . . yes.” So, I won some points with some and made some pretty freaked out when my response was, “Well, it’s hard to take your threat seriously when I know for a fact he’s still walking around above ground.” Detective Stacy, like my wife’s friends, talk a good game, but when confronted with everything he feared . . . the good detective completely disappears from the storyline. It’s impossible to take him seriously and I know if I ever go back and rewatch The Amazing Spider-Man, I’m going to laugh my ass off at Denis Leary’s over-the-top indignation as Detective Stacy.

That brings us to the big plot event that anyone who knows comic book history knows would eventually come to one of the key characters in the Spider-man cinematic stories. Without revealing that “spoiler” to those who are not so well-versed, it does happen in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro . . . in exactly the way it was done in the books (which I was surprised by because I thought it happened differently, but upon further research, yup, it was right on the mark!). That brings a decent tragic element into The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro.

Unfortunately, it comes too late and after so many other threads have been introduced and disappointed the viewers and quite a bit before the ultimate climax to the movie. Moreover, the impact on Spider-Man is not one of a vigilante hero. Spider-Man is given an arc that is pretty much the opposite of Batman in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro; in analogous terms, Spider-man’s arc here would be like if Batman were an established vigilante and the death of his parents led him to hang up the cowl, as opposed to hunt down the mobsters that killed them. That Spider-Man spends no time on-screen hunting the villain that instigates the tragedy that knocks Peter Parker off his game makes one wonder just who Spider-man was setting out to help when he put on the mask (it clearly wasn’t himself!).

The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is a good example of better casting than performances. Jamie Foxx is good as Max Dillon . . . unless one has seen him in The Soloist (reviewed here!) in which case he’s adequate and peaks at reprising his role from that film. Colm Feore is given too little to do in the underdeveloped role of Donald Menken (which would have been a much more effective role had the character appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man as an ambitious up-and-comer who was screwed over by Harry’s return in this film) and Felicity Jones (who has given some amazing performances in the past) could be replaced by a house plant for all that the role of Felicia offers her . . . or the film. Paul Giamatti’s role of Aleksei Sytsevich is presented with so much enthusiasm that viewers have to wonder how much is the character and how much is Giamatti laughing at the studio for paying him so much for such a ridiculous role (and the promise of future appearances as the Rhino!). Sally Field, Chris Cooper, and Marton Csokas (Dr. Kafka at Ravencroft) are all adequate in their roles, sometimes even good.

But The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is headlined by Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone and for two performers who can usually do no wrong, they fall unfortunately flat in this film. Gone entirely is the on-screen chemistry between Garfield and Stone . . . and that has severe ramifications for the movie’s climax. The two have mediocre banter that is delivered adequately, but from Stone and Garfield, viewers expect sparks. Garfield’s initial voiceovers are quips as the CG Spider-Man flies around and Garfield sounds bored delivering the lines. Not to be outdone, Emma Stone’s valedictory speech for Gwen Stacy is delivered with such a lackluster quality that I was bored . . . and it wasn’t as long as a real graduation! Sadly, the pair reaches their peak for a scene in a maintenance closet where they almost break the fourth wall by acknowledging the cliché of hiding in the janitor’s closet whilst being pursued by company thugs (who, like Star Wars Stormtroopers see a closed door and assume that those they are hunting cannot possibly be on the other side of it). That banter is good, but subsequent scenes simply throw the pair together after months of being apart without any organic incidents to allow them to truly rethink the decisions that drove them apart. Could Garfield and Stone have sold it? It’s possible, but they don’t and that undermines The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro.

Despite the over-the-top web-related effects, Electro looks pretty awesome in The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro. Sure, Marc Webb essentially resurrected Dr. Manhattan from Watchmen (reviewed here!) for Electro in the film, but the effects work better than almost anything else in the movie. Sadly, given that Doc Ock’s tentacles can be seen in the Oscorp lab and rumors have leaked for months that the Sinister Six (six villains from Spider-man who team up but never seem to quite be able to actually kill Spider-man once and for all) might well get their own film, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro seems largely like a set-up film for that. The essential Spider-Man characters are present, they are doing their own things, but every opportunity to look back (for a dead character, Richard Parker spends a lot of time on-screen in this film!) and look forward is utilized to push those characters out of the way for painfully obvious foreshadowing moments. The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro is almost enough to make viewers wish for six stand-alone films featuring the rise of each of the Sinister Six . . . just so long as they bothered to develop each one well. As it stands, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro puts three potentials in play, but does so in such a way that the viewer doesn’t give a damn if they ever grace the screen again. At least Webb and his team were smart enough to not recast J. Jonah Jamison on-screen (Sam Raimi got him absolutely, perfectly right, with J.K. Simmons!).

If you feel you must watch The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise Of Electro, I’d say hold out for its appearance on DVD; this is one of those films that the more one contemplates, the more faults they see in it and I cannot imagine it will age any better.

For other movies based upon the Marvel comic books, please check out my reviews of:
X-Men: Days Of Future Past
Guardians Of The Galaxy
The Wolverine
The Avengers
Ghost Rider: Spirit Of Vengeance
Captain America: The First Avenger
X-Men: First Class
Thor
Iron Man 2
The Incredible Hulk
Spider-Man 3
Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer
Blade: Trinity
Elektra
Daredevil

4/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

*For those who don’t catch the reference, in Star Trek: Nemesis, the villain was tormented by Romulans, discarded and despised by Romulans, and when he assembled a massive military power that would have allowed him to actually get proper revenge on the Romulans, he instead turned his aggression toward the Federation, which made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Come to think of it, his whole mission in life was blood, too, so between Harry Osborn and Max Dillon, the writing team just picked all the worst aspects of villain motivations from Star Trek: Nemesis and ran with them!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not The Rip-Off Of The X-Files It Initially Appeared To Be: Why Fringe Succeeded!

The Good: Great long plot arc, Most of the acting, Quirky lines, Most of the characters
The Bad: Anna Torv is not the strongest lead, Some of the bottle episodes are less compelling/requires a lot of trust for the investment
The Basics: With one hundred episodes, Fringe The Complete Series builds up to a conflict between our universe and an alternate and becomes embroiled in plots to save the world from invaders from parallel realities . . . and malicious, future, humans!


I have been starting out 2014 by finishing off some television series’ that were long-running or that had my attention, lost it, and I found again to finish off. One of those shows was Fringe and, to date, it represents the best investment of time and attention for my returning to. Fringe, now available in a compact full series bundle pack, was the fourth major television series J.J. Abrams was affiliated with (though, unlike Felicity, Alias, and Lost, Abrams neither wrote, nor directed a single episode of the series) and it represents one of the few television series’s in recent memory that requires a tremendous amount of patience and attention. Fringe, which initially seemed like a second-rate rip off of The X-Files, takes a long arc and while the five seasons each have fairly distinctive concepts, the entire series is actually one long story. To wit, one of the apparent throwaway episodes in the middle of the first season is not paid off until the last few episodes of season five!

Fringe is a series that is greater than the sum of its parts and works better when one sits down and binges on the hundred episodes, as opposed to meandering through the series with weeks between each episode. Fortunately, the new 20-disc Blu-Ray set allows viewers to do just that. Fringe The Complete Series us basically a compilation set of:
Season 1
Season 2
Season 3
Season 4
and Season 5

Fringe opens with a plane setting down, its entire crew killed by a mysterious flesh-eating virus. The multi-organization task force includes the FBI, Homeland Security, CIA and others. One of the investigators is Olivia Dunham, another is her lover from a different intelligence organization, John Scott. While investigating the plane and the virus, Dunham learns that the virus bears a similarity to one created years prior by a scientist who has been institutionalized for seventeen years. Enlisting his next of kin, Peter Bishop, Olivia and Peter spring the apparently insane scientist Walter Bishop. When John Scott is struck down by the virus, Olivia allows Walter to give her an untraditional therapy that allows her to enter his mind.

The cases that follow have Olivia investigating strange biological occurrences and physics anomalies that are forming an intricate pattern of destruction, all of which seems centered around Walter Bishop and his old scientific partner William Bell (and the company that sprouted up after Bishop was institutionalized, Massive Dynamic). Olivia’s history with Walter Bishop is soon revealed as she uncovers a painful truth; Olivia was one of the subjects of Walter’s experiments – in her childhood she was part of a clinical drug trial for a drug called Cortexiphan. Cortexiphan was designed to allow children to develop incredible powers and Olivia’s soon manifests – she can perform limited operations using thought alone and she was trained to be a solider in a war that seems inevitable with an alternate universe. The source of Walter’s social awkwardness is also quickly revealed; he suffered a tremendous loss in his past and to try to save the world from himself, he had part of his brain removed. Walter’s history with the alternate universe is deeply entwined with the alternate universe and his son, Peter, which Olivia slowly uncovers and has to accept as they work intimately together.

Fringe is a clever series in that it tells a story, steeped in consequences of events from long before the series began (which, fortunately, we get to see!). The extensive backstory of Walter, Peter, and Olivia comes together in a compelling way and then develops into a story for a very intense struggle that is very compelling. As Peter and Olivia wrestle with consequences of Walter’s scientific explorations in the past, Walter is tormented by the man he was . . . and an alternate version of himself from another universe whom he wronged years prior. The series is filled with strange creatures (like worms that gestate in people and burst out a la Alien), bizarre medical anomalies (like spontaneous scar tissue forming over people’s eyes and mouth), and physical aberrations (such as a bus’s occupants suddenly being caught in amber, freezing everyone inside in a form of suspended animation) and character drama that have surprising realism to them. The contrast of things like Olivia wrestling with Peter unwittingly developing a relationship with her alternate version plays off the fringe science freak of the week stories well.

To better understand Fringe, it helps to know who the characters are. For the bulk of the series, the principle characters are:

Walter Bishop – A classic mad scientist, he is shaken and socially awkward. Having spent seventeen years in St. Claire’s mental facility, he returns to his Harvard laboratory where he is legally under Peter’s care and assisted by Astrid. He has a brilliant mind, but one that is scattered and leaves him socially awkward. He slowly comes to understand that his experiments on people and (especially) children in the past has immense consequences on both our universe and another universe he invaded years prior,

Olivia Dunham – A by-the-book FBI investigator (her illicit relationship with John Scott notwithstanding), she opens up to extreme possibilities when she sees the evidence of Walter’s work carried on by Massive Dynamic in his absence. She has a sister and niece whom she is very protective of and she develops a relationship with Peter. Horrified to realize that Walter used to experiment on her, she slowly remembers the nature of those experiments and uses them to empower her,

Astrid – She is the straight-laced assistant of Walter who puts up with having to milk his cow and the fact that Walter cannot remember her name. She is a competent agent, but is largely used to question Walter’s theories so he can explain them, but she is an invaluable member of the Fringe team,

Nina Sharp – The power behind Massive Dynamic, she is the only person who knows where the reclusive William Bell has disappeared to. She tries to recruit Olivia and acts as both antagonist and aid to the Fringe Team,

Philip Broyles – The leader of the Fringe Team, he is an FBI bureaucrat who slowly opens to the extreme possibilities under consistent attacks by followers of a document written by William Bell. Trying to stop the terrorist David Robert Jones, Broyles encounters more strange phenomenon that lead him to fight for funding for the Fringe Team,

Charlie Francis – Olivia’s partner at the FBI, he is attacked by one of the creatures the Fringe Team discovers and tries to help Olivia through her loss after John Scott dies (and subsequently appears to Olivia),

and Peter Bishop – A swindler and con man, he faked his way into classes at M.I.T. Found by Olivia in Iraq, he reluctantly comes back to the United States and he holds Walter together. Made a consultant with the FBI, he quickly develops feelings for Olivia and slowly comes to accept that Walter is not the root of all evil. He is shaken when he learns the truth of his past, but makes a conscious choice to live in our universe, even when it causes him to be erased from time.

Amid the main characters are Observers, bald men who have an inhuman understanding of time and space. One of the Observers saved Peter’s life as a child and events now seem to be building to Walter being forced to repay that debt.

The performances in Fringe are, unfortunately, erratic. Anna Torv, who plays Olivia Dunham, is a painfully weak lead for the series. She starts the series stiff and it takes quite a while for her to come into her own. In fact, it is arguably not until the alternate universe version of Olivia is introduced that Torv manages to show off her acting chops. Given a very different way to play the character, Torv slowly warms up to be a decent protagonist.

At the other end of the spectrum are Joshua Jackson and John Noble. Jackson plays Peter and he plays the character wonderfully. Jackson plays a credible con man and he does so with the charisma needed to land the role entirely realistically. Noble is incredible as Walter Bishop. John Noble is funny and able to get through the technobabble expertly. As he plays Walter slowly coming back into reality, John Noble illustrates more depth and talent than almost anyone else working on network television. Noble emotes with his eyes deep sadness that plays perfectly to the character’s sense of remorse for the past. As the series goes on, he is able to play Walternate and his past self with a range that is great.

On DVD and Blu-Ray, Fringe The Complete Series is loaded with bonus features from deleted and extended scenes to featurettes that both illustrate the making of the show and how various elements are tied together over the seasons. The Complete Series Blu-Ray set does not include any exclusives that were not in the prior season sets.

In the end, Fringe is actually the effective embodiment of what J. Michael Straczynski sought to do with Babylon 5 (reviewed here!); it is a novel for television that develops over the course of its hundred episodes to tell a deep, transformative story that puts the characters at the beginning in a completely different place by the end.

For other shows that originally aired on FOX, please check out my reviews of:
Family Guy - Volume 10
Glee - Season Three
House, M.D. - Season 4
Arrested Development
Kitchen Confidential
Wonderfalls
Firefly
The Lone Gunmen
Millennium
Ally McBeal
VR.5
The X-Files
Ned And Stacey - Season 1
Friday The Thirteenth: The Series
The Adventures Of Brisco County Jr.
War Of The Worlds - Season 1

7.5/10

For other television reviews, please be sure to visit my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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