Originality Undermines Emotion On A Fine Frenzy’s Oh Blue Christmas!

The Good: Wonderful vocals, Musical accompaniment is interesting
The Bad: Short, Reinterpretations drastically change the emotions of the songs, Original tracks are entirely moody.
The Basics: Oh Blue Christmas is an extended play disc from A Fine Frenzy, which has Alison Sudol reinterpreting three Christmas songs and adding three original, anything-but-festive, songs.


One of the things I look for in a Christmas album is originality. I’m not impressed by albums that simply have the latest pop star doing their covers of ten to twelve familiar Christmas songs that virtually everyone knows. So, if anything, I was inherently biased toward Oh Blue Christmas, a six track EP by A Fine Frenzy, the band which is mostly the work of Alison Sudol. Oh Blue Christmas followed on the heels of Bomb In A Birdcage (reviewed here!), which was A Fine Frenzy’s sophomore album. Like Bomb In A Birdcage, Oh Blue Christmas takes the lyric-writing skill that was evident on One Cell In The Sea (reviewed here!) and combines it with an increased sense of musical richness.

Unfortunately, Oh Blue Christmas is half original, half standards. The standards are mediocre reinterpretations of “Blue Christmas,” “Winter Wonderland,” and the far more obscure “Christmas Time Is Here Again.” With six tracks, clocking out at 21:49, Oh Blue Christmas is mostly the work of A Fine Frenzy. The three original tracks were written by Alison Sudol, who is (for all intents and purposes) A Fine Frenzy. In addition to playing piano and providing the vocals on Oh Blue Christmas, Sudol is credited as a co-producer of the EP, so this is very much the work of A Fine Frenzy.

“Blue Christmas” is presented as an up-tempo track. While the intriguing, poppy version is distinctly different from the mournful, moody Elvis version, it pretty much guts the emotional resonance of the song. There is nothing blue about the sound of Alison Sudol’s vocals, so the tracks comes out sounding disconnected; like she does not know the meaning of the words she is singing.

Musically, A Fine Frenzy creates a very different track with their reinterpretation of “Winter Wonderland.” Sounding more like a vocal exercise at points than a fully realized song, “Winter Wonderland” is enriched with guitars and a trumpet that give it a very rich sound. The slower, more contemplative version of the song sounds more like the winter wonderland at night than the familiar, sunny, tune.

The first of three original tracks on the EP, “Redribbon Foxes” is a guitar-driven song that has a musical protagonist who is much more moody than the instrumental accompaniment would seem to indicate. Combating the materialism of Christmas, Sudol sings “For love doesn't come in boxes / Nor truth in a crowded shop / Those red ribbon foxes are not so easy caught / But the search it never stops / For faith doesn't come in boxes / Nor God in your silver cross” (“Redribbon Foxes”). Any song that riles against holiday-themed commercialism is decent in my book, but it is hard to imagine that “Redribbon Foxes” will be the argument that finally changes the nature of the modern holiday season.

Upbeat and poppy, “Winter White” is unlikely to be a new Christmas classic. The song is overproduced, even glossing over Sudol’s usually exceptional soprano voice. She sings a little lower than usual on the track, but the percussion and guitars overwhelm her vocals. The song, which is moody with lines like “The smoke of memories in my eyes / The real misleading kind / It comes in winter white / In holiday disguise / To sabotage my mind” (“Winter White”) is a rare “angry about Christmas” track and while it’s a nice twist on the usual holiday song, the use of “god damn” in it pretty much means A Fine Frenzy is singing for adults and angry teens only.

The penultimate track, “Wish You Well” has a good intent, but an awkward execution. “Wish You Well” is about an estranged sister and brother who are meeting up for the holidays. While the sister, the musical protagonist, has the desire to reconnect – “. . . I still love you brother / But I don't know what to make of you / When I don't know you anymore” – the brother “sit[s] by your plastic tree / And tell your friends you've no family” (“Wish You Well”). The song has no resolution, at least as a musical story, and that makes it more moody than inspirational.

Of the covers, “Christmas Time Is Here” is the most obscure track. A Fine Frenzy presents a vocally literal interpretation of the song. Instead of the lonely piano that accompanied “Christmas Time Is Here” in the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. Sudol’s voice is beautiful (her soprano opening to the song sounds a lot like Heather Nova’s voice!) on “Christmas Time Is Here” and she emotes well on the song. Her interpretation of the song, however, does not truly make the song her own or redefine it.

A Fine Frenzy gets good marks for originality, but Oh Blue Christmas is missing something on the commitment front. Alison Sudol does not commit to a full-length album or to making a truly memorable holiday recording. The covers are original, but a serious mixed bag for the direction
A Fine Frenzy goes with them and the songs unique to the album are hardly going to be new holiday favorites.

The best track is “Redribbon Foxes,” the low point is the incongruent reinterpretation of “Blue Christmas.”

For other holiday albums, please visit my reviews of:
The Gift - Kenny Rogers
Midwinter Graces - Tori Amos
Wintersong - Sarah McLachlan

4/10

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

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Perfect Dark From Lindt: Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa Chocolate Squares!

The Good: Great taste, Decent quantity, Generally natural ingredients, Beautifully dark, A decent value.
The Bad: None that I can find!
The Basics: Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares are a perfect chocolate treat for those who crave and love dark chocolate!


For the holidays last year, my wife picked me up a whole sampler of Lindt Excellence Dark Chocolate Squares and that might have been one of the best values for the holidays from her; every day, I get to try a delicious new (to me) chocolate treat and some of them are absolutely delightful. In fact, ever since I had the Lindt 99% Cacao (reviewed here!), I’ve been looking for something just a little less bitter and miserable to my taste buds. Well, I found it right off the bat in the Dark Assortment. Lindt hit perfection for dark chocolate lovers with their 70% Cocoa chocolate squares!

There are very few products I call perfect, but the Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares are one!

Basics

Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares are one and 5/8” squares of chocolate that are about one-quarter of an inch thick. Each of the squares comes individually wrapped in a white and dark brown wrapper. It is worth noting that while I usually rail against the environmental impact of such things, it is hard to imagine Lindt Excellence chocolate squares not wrapped. This keeps each one clean, unmelted and intact.

Each chocolate square is a seamless square that is solid, with lines etched into the top and the Lindt name also punched into the top. The 70% Cocoa chocolate squares come in a standard 4.9 oz. bag, the individually-wrapped chocolate squares are packaged together in a thick foil paper bag. The thick foil paper bag does little to protect the squares, though I’ve never had any breakage. The bag is not resealable, though this matters very little considering that the chocolate squares do not go bad as they are individually wrapped.

Ease Of Preparation

These are candy, so preparing them is as simple as opening the bag and then opening one of the foil wrappers around the actual chocolate square one wishes to eat. There is no grand secret to eating Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares. This is a flavor that is good at room temperature or frozen; it has a delicious solid flavor to it that carries the taste in all temperatures.

Taste

The Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa smells incredibly inviting for anyone who loves dark chocolate. It smells rich and dark, consistently. These have a powerful aroma that does not diminish, so they instantly attract anyone who loves dark chocolate.

On the tongue, this chocolate is rich and powerful with its cocoa taste, without being at all unpleasant. As a result, this tastes like super-concentrated dark chocolate without any diminishing flavor. There is no waxiness or creaminess to it. While not truly sweet, the 70% Cocoa squares are not at all dry. This flavor is akin to having a slightly sweetened coffee bean, it is so potent, but not oppressive to the taste buds. In other words, it is a perfect rendition of dark chocolate for those who love the real thing!

Nutrition

These are candy, so they are not healthy, but the Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares are not nearly as bad as they could be. The primary ingredients are unsweetened chocolate, sugar and cocoa butter. There is nothing unpronounable in these candies and everything in these could be readily identified by me.

A serving of the Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares is considered four squares. From four squares, one takes in 230 calories, including 15 grams of fat. There are 25mg sodium and 3 g protein, but no vitamins (save 2% of the RDA of Vitamin A) in these chocolate squares. There is 6% of one's daily iron and 2% the RDA of Calcium in four squares, so that is a plus.

These are not Vegan-compliant (they have real milk), nor are they recommended for anyone with a nut allergy as they are produced on the same equipment that peanuts and tree nuts pass over. They are, however, kosher.

Storage/Clean-up

The bags of these Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares remain fresh for quite some time. The bag my wife gave me in late December had an April 30, 2014 expiration date. One assumes that if they are kept in a cool, dry environment they will not melt or go bad. Given that they are individually wrapped in a very sealed package, it is hard to imagine just what it would take for these to go bad outside melting and refreezing.

As for cleanup, I applaud those who actually throw the wrappers away in socially appropriate places, as opposed to litter. Outside that, there is no real cleanup needed, unless one is eating them in a hot environment. In that case, it is likely one would need to wash their hands. If these chocolate squares melt into most fabrics, they will stain. Getting them to melt is surprisingly hard, though.

Overall

Lindt Excellence 70% Cocoa chocolate squares are perfectly priced for a premium, perfect rendition of dark chocolate. They are a must-have and are likely to become a staple around my house given how wonderful they are!

For other Lindt chocolates, please check out my reviews of:
White Chocolate Lindor Truffle
Milk Chocolate Lindor Truffle
Dark Peppermint Lindor Truffle

10/10

For other food and drink reviews, please visit my Food And Drink Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Quietly Through The Eastern Front: The Monuments Men

The Good: Interesting concept, Decent acting
The Bad: No real character development, When you’ve heard the concept, you’ve pretty much seen the movie . . .
The Basics: Releasing after awards season, The Monuments Men is a splintered historical drama that fails to go beyond its one-line concept to make a film of enduring greatness.


George Clooney’s production company, Smokehouse Pictures, had a good 2012. Their film, Argo (reviewed here!) won the Best Picture Oscar and Clooney’s partner at Smokehouse, Grant Heslov, decided to use that cache to further his writing career. Heslov and Clooney co-wrote the screenplay for The Monuments Men, which was adapted from the book by the same name. What is intriguing from a production perspective is how Clooney and Heslov opted to hedge their bets for the 2013 award season. Smokehouse Pictures released August: Osage County (reviewed here!) in time to get the inevitable nominations for the Golden Globes and Oscars that Smokehouse wanted, but to not crowd the field, they held The Monuments Men off until February. February is one of two death slots for films; it’s the Friday night prime time slot for movie releases. In other words, for a company that has taken a simple-concept film and made it into an award-winner – as they did with Argo - it seems like a severe lack of confidence in their own production to release a film in February.

When watching The Monuments Men, though, the lack of push for awards season comes to make a lot of sense. Given the stellar cast, I was eager to watch The Monuments Men, which is why I was surprised at how poorly the film landed. The Monuments Men is a film whose concept is not expanded upon, developed, or enriched beyond the one-line pitch for the film. In other words, with my next line, the entire film is pretty much spoiled (or, if you’ve seen the trailer or heard anyone describe the movie, it’s pretty much done for you). The Monuments Men is about a group of art experts who infiltrate France and Belgium in 1944 as the Germans are withdrawing from their occupied territories and attempt to recover and protect any artistic antiquities they can find before the Germans destroy them. Based on historical accounts, The Monuments Men is not a riveting adventure like Indiana Jones And The Raiders Of The Lost Ark (reviewed here!), but it is a story worth telling.

Sadly, the lack of comparative excitement or sophistication makes for a poor film. The Monuments Men is a ridiculously simple concept presented with historical realism as opposed to a sense of dramatic tension. As a result, the film does not develop characters, it does not illustrate a team coming together for common purpose, it does not involve clever people piecing together clues to save antiquities. Instead, a disparate group of individuals are tasked with an assignment, they break into small teams, and target specific locations operating mostly on hope or common knowledge until one of the least important characters finally realizes a pattern that could have saved a lot of time and lives if only he had looked at a map and used his brain a year and a half (and an hour in filmwatching time) earlier.

As the Nazis advance through Europe, they collect and steal artwork. In Belgium, the painting set known as the Altar of Ghent is protected by Belgian clergy until it is stolen as well. When Frank Stokes learns that Hitler is planning to build the world’s largest museum, he convinces FDR to commit some men to recovering and protecting the artwork stolen by the Nazis before they can destroy it or get it back to Berlin. In Paris, Claire Simone is forced to work for the Nazi, Viktor Stahl, in order to protect the works of art captured in France. When Stahl withdraws, taking what art he can with him, Simone is imprisoned as a collaborator.

Stokes assembles his team of art scholars, including James Granger, Richard Campbell, Walter Garfield, Preston Savitz, the Frenchman Jean Claude Clermont, the Englishman Donald Jeffries, and the young German Sam Epstein, who enter France through Normandy (quite a bit after the invasion). They then split into teams to try to recover sculptures, paintings, and other artwork the Germans have hidden. As one team works with the priests who have hidden artwork through the war, another finds Stahl’s hideout and another goes searching for the sculpture of Madonna and Child. As the different teams meet with varying degrees of success in their mission, they manage to uncover more obviously recognized valuables, are put in harm’s way, and suffer casualties just as any other unit would. Reuniting, the team’s mission becomes more important as the Nazis begin a scorched earth policy on their stolen antiquities as the war turns inevitably against them.

The problem with The Monuments Men is that it truly is over the moment the concept is revealed; the details beyond the concept are presented in such a listless and undramatic way. The film is not about the characters, so when the team (and I use that term lightly considering how the group is split up almost immediately in order to cover more ground) suffers casualties, it seems much more inevitable than dramatic. It is hard to empathize with the characters, especially when a scene reveals a collection of teeth fillings from executed Jews. Yes, antiquities are exceptionally important, but losing a person or two who is trying to safeguard them seems diminished when one looks at a pile of fillings and realizes that innocent people were simply executed for being who they were. In simpler terms, The Monuments Men is about guys who signed up to risk their lives to recover antiquities and some lose their lives in the process, but that sacrifice is one they were prepared to make. The film does not develop the characters enough to make those deaths resonate with the audience. In fact, there is a sense that some casualties were pretty much bound to happen given the nature of the characters (they are not professional soldiers).

The acting in The Monuments Men is fine, but there is nothing extraordinary delivered by the amazing cast. Bill Murray is used to deliver comic relief, John Goodman plays an understated good guy, and George Clooney . . . he shaves his beard as quickly as possible so he’s recognizable as George Clooney. Matt Damon, Bob Balaban, and Cate Blanchett also appear in the film. The acting is fine; none of it is spectacular.

Argo was a pleasant surprise; it took an event that the entire world knew about (the Iran Hostage Crisis) and told a story most people did not know – how some of the hostages were snuck out of Iran by the Canadians. The thing is, because the story became public knowledge, Argo had only one way it could end, with the successful execution of the plan. Yet, Argo has a dramatic tension and narrative quality that makes one forget they already know how it will end. It is easy to become immersed in the moment of the film. Unfortunately, The Monuments Men never gets there. This (previously) untold story of a lesser-known part of World War II history does not have an immediately obvious resolution – the mission could succeed or fail – and it is told in an unremarkable and zestless way. Smokehouse Pictures banked on creating a historical document, which they did adequately, but they failed to make a great, or even engaging, film.

For other works with Bill Murray, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
Zombieland
Get Smart
The Darjeeling Limited
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou
The Royal Tenenbaums
Charlie's Angels
Cradle Will Rock
Space Jam
Saturday Night Live - Season 1

4.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Movie Review Index Page for an easy, organized listing by title of all the films I have reviewed!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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If This Is What It Was All Leading Toward . . . Fringe Season Five!

The Good: Good story, Good character work, Decent acting, Intriguing plot direction
The Bad: Video tapes?!
The Basics: With only thirteen episodes, Fringe comes to a powerful conclusion that makes it (almost) all worth it.


For all my complaints about Fringe when the show first began, Fringe actually developed extraordinarily well over the course of its five seasons. Unlike the staff of The X-Files (reviewed here!), who clearly had no cohesive idea of what the mythology of the show was when they began it, the writers of Fringe managed to tie most of the disparate pieces of the series together. In the fifth season of Fringe, the series took an immense leap forward and in the process, made the series – which wandered occasionally – come together in a way that was quite impressive.

Foreshadowed in a single episode from the fourth season of Fringe (reviewed here!), the fifth season of Fringe takes place in the year 2036. It is virtually impossible to discuss the final season of Fringe without revealing elements from the later episodes of the fourth season (so, read that as a spoiler alert!). The final season of Fringe has an oppressive opening credits sequence and it follows directly the events of the fourth season episode “Letters Of Transit.” In that episode, which was something of a non-sequitor in the fourth season, a young woman in 2036 was part of a team that released Walter Bishop, Astrid Farnsworth, and Peter Bishop from amber in a world where the Observers had taken over and oppressed all of humanity. Following the resolution of the alternate universe plot, Peter and Olivia get together and have a daughter, Henrietta. Etta was seen in “Letters Of Transit” and she was reunited with the former Fringe team members.

The fifth season of Fringe opens with Walter and Peter trying to figure out how to save the world from the oppressive reign of the Observers. They make a trip to recover Olivia, who they discovered was ambered while on an assignment from Walter. Back in 2015, shortly after the Observers seized power, Walter developed a way to stop them. Because the Observers can read minds, Walter scrambled the information in his mind and hid clues on video tapes in the lab and elsewhere in the country. Olivia was sent to get the device that would put Walter’s thoughts back in order when she was lost. While assembling pieces of the device that will save the world, Etta sacrifices herself for the team.

With Etta lost, Peter takes extreme measures to thwart the Observers. Realizing that the Observers have less of a biological advantage and more of a technological one, Peter removes the tech from one of the captured Observers and implants it within himself. He uses the tech to begin a hunt for the leader of the Obervers, Captain Windmark. Manipulating Windmark’s timeline puts Peter on a path to personal destruction as the Oberver’s technology begins to make him as emotionally disconnected as the enemy. With Olivia devastated over the loss of Etta and fearing that she is losing Peter and Walter terrified that he will become the unprincipled man who would lose Peter, the rebels against the Observers move to save mankind by traversing dangerous occupied territories, a pocket universe, and even the alternate universe.

From a continuity perspective, one of the most impressive aspects of the fifth season of Fringe is the return of Michael, the child found abandoned in a building in the first season episode “Inner Child.” “Inner Child” was one of the incongruent episodes that did not appear to gel with the rest of the series, but it turns out to be an exceptionally important episode when the subject of the episode pops back up and his true nature is finally realized.

The fifth season focuses heavily on Peter and Walter. Peter has a genuine arc as he reacts to the loss of Etta with a realistic sense of grief that drives him to transform himself. As Peter becomes able to manipulate time and space the way the Observers do, he loses his sense of attachment to Olivia, Walter, and humanity itself. He rationally understands how his brain is being altered and when he is forced to make a decision on how to proceed, it is one of the two big catharsis’s of the season. Walter’s arc, by contrast, is a bit more repetitive. Walter’s brain has been restored in order to allow him to think on a level needed to defeat the Observers. As a consequence of being able to process information again with the full potential of his genius and imagination, Walter begins to fear that he will become again the man who ruthlessly pursued science before in such a way that he simply uses people without regard to their inherent humanity. While the arc is performed well, the notion is repeated frequently, with little genuine development.

To better understand what is going on in the final season of Fringe, it helps to know who the characters are in this darkened future. In the fifth season, the principle characters are:

Walter Bishop – The most wanted fugitive of the Observers, he has a plan to defeat the enslavers of humanity. To that end, he begins watching videos he made of himself that explain the plan he had to save the world before he froze himself and his friends in amber to keep them from the Observers. Walter fears who he will become when his brain is restored and he begins to treat people differently than he had for the prior few years. He recovers powerful rocks, Michael, and other artifacts before finding the one other person on Earth who can help him assemble the device that will help liberate humanity,,

Olivia Dunham – No longer poisoned (or empowered, depending on one’s perspective) by Cortexiphan, she is estranged from Peter following the loss of Etta before they were all ambered. She aids Walter and clings to the memory of Etta after her daughter is lost. She becomes integral in rescuing Michael when he is captured by the Observers,

Astrid – Much more active than in prior seasons, she fires her gun quite a bit. While the rest of the team goes off in search of artifacts, she stays back in the lab more often than not and burns away the amber surrounding the tapes and other needed devices in the lab,

Nina – Head of the Science Division, she works around the Observers, but knows how to resist them. She only aids the team once or twice and when she goes head to head with Windmark, she protects Michael and shows the Observers just what humans are made of,

Broyles – Still in charge of the Fringe Division, he is not a Loyalist (a human ally of the Observers) and it is only now that he reveals to Etta how hard he has looked out for her over the years. He is forced to keep his distance from the Bishops in order to protect them,

Anil – A human resistance leader who works with Etta, he works with Peter and Olivia after Etta is killed. He provides Peter with a captured Observer, as well as weapons and other resources for the Resistance,

Captain Windmark – The Observer leader, he begins to feel uncharacteristic vengeance toward Peter and the humans he is surrounded by,

and Peter Bishop – A protective father, he is devastated by losing Etta so soon after he is reunited with her. He begins to neglect Walter when Walter needs him the most when he inserts Observer technology into himself. He slowly rekindles his relationship with Olivia, despite the distance his use of Observer tech causes between them.

In the final season of Fringe, the acting is wonderful. Lance Riddick, who barely appears in the season, plays Broyles as aged and tired with an expert variation of his physical presence from prior seasons. Blair Brown makes her infrequent appearances count as the wheelchair-bound Nina. Even Anna Torv makes Dunham interesting once again. Joshua Jackson illustrates some good range playing Peter as far less emotional when Peter uses the Observer technology. Playing the gradual increase in intelligence and decrease of emotion provides an interesting acting challenge and Jackson rises to the occasion well.

John Noble finishes the series with another exceptional performance. In the final season Noble gets to play both super-intelligent and emotionally vulnerable. Almost entirely absent in the final season are moments when Walter is crazy and spouting random, funny, lines. Noble reinvents the character well and makes the viewer care once again in the tragic hero of the series.

On DVD and Blu-Ray, the final season of Fringe looks great. The bonus features augment already wonderful primary programming and help give those going through Fringe withdrawal a little something extra to enjoy after the show ends. Finally the people who work with J.J. Abrams finish a show well!

For other final seasons of J.J.Abrams or science fiction shows, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Lost - Season 6
Alias - Season 5
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Season 7
Angel - Season 5
The X-Files - Season 9

8.5/10

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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Mildly Whitening, Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint Toothpaste Works!

The Good: Tastes good, Actually whitens teeth, Inexpensive, Stops oral irritation
The Bad: Does not whiten teeth very fast.
The Basics: Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint toothpaste is good, but not the miracle whitener one might hope for.


Recently, I had my long-present split molar removed. It was, honestly, a relief to me after all this time. However, it left my mouth in a lot of pain and vulnerable to infections. So, in addition to using Listerine Total Whitening (reviewed here!), my wife and I started using Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint toothpaste. This is significant because the “Sensitive” aspect of the toothpaste comes from some Orajel-like additive that numbs mouth pain and it legitimately worked.

My wife and I purchased the 4.5 oz. tube of Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint, which lasted more than the full month of my convalescence when using it twice daily. The key selling points of the toothpaste were the whitening aspect – which it did not deliver exceptional results very quickly – and the Orajel which worked to numb the area where my tooth was extracted. After about four weeks of using Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint twice a day, I noticed less yellow on my teeth, which confirmed that whitening aspect of the toothpaste was working, but it was not working all that quickly.

Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint is an inexpensive, but surprisingly effective, toothpaste with several selling point functions. It comes in a classic tube design with a plastic top that unscrews from the tube. The 4.5 oz. tube is five inches long by two inches wide and it tapers near the end with the nozzle. When the cap is unscrewed, there is a hard plastic nozzle which directs the product out of the tube and onto one's toothbrush. Toothpaste is easily dispensed from this type tube by flattening the plastic tube from the bottom toward the top and this also allows the user to get the most out of it.

To use Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint, simply dispense a small amount onto the bristles of a toothbrush and bring the brush up to your mouth and spread the toothpaste over teeth using the brush. Then agitate the toothpaste into a foam to clean teeth entirely and expectorate the product (the process takes about a minute). Rinse mouth to remove any excess toothpaste and theoretically, the process should be complete and your teeth ought to feel wonderful.

The reason I continue to use Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint is that it seems to work very well and it did not taste bad. Unlike many whitening products, there was no chalky flavor to this toothpaste. Since starting to use this toothpaste, I have developed no cavities and there has been no noticeable tartar or plaque build-up on my teeth. Add to that, my teeth have gotten lighter, though only by a shade or two. Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint only whitened my teeth about one shade on the color shade chart after a month of use. Despite not claiming to be tartar control, I have noticed less tartar on my teeth, though I suspect the fact that I increased my regular flossing may be as responsible for that as the toothpaste.

Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint significantly freshens breath. The toothpaste tastes minty, with a mild peppermint flavor. It has an instant cooling effect to it that makes my whole mouth taste fresh and clean. The taste of mint is appropriately strong and the intensity of the toothpaste is refreshing. It instantly makes my teeth, gums, tongue, cheeks and throat feel cool and fresh. . . until it mildly numbs them! After brushing with Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint, my mouth left me feeling numb, but fresh.

Arm & Hammer Sensitive Whitening Fresh Mint works well and though it might not whiten very fast, it is a great option for those who have oral surgery and mouth pain and want to brush their teeth and feel all right.

For other oral care products, please visit my reviews of:
Aquafresh Extreme Clean Whitening Action Mint Blast toothpaste
Colgate Whitening Rinse
OxyFresh Dental Gel

9/10

For other health and beauty reviews, please visit my Health And Beauty Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Age Makes For Seasoned Conflicts And Decent Humor In Quartet!

The Good: Acting, Decent humor, Interesting characters, Good use of soundtrack, Decent direction
The Bad: Very predictable character and plot arcs
The Basics: Dustin Hoffman’s cinematic rendition of Quartet is smart, entertaining, and well worth watching for anyone who likes strong character-centered dramas.


It seems like lately I have been watching a number of films with mature casts dealing with the issues associated with aging and dealing with consequences of relationship complications that have remained unresolved for years. The latest film in the Swarts Geriatric Film Festival is Quartet. Quartet is a film by Dustin Hoffman, based upon a play and screenplay by Ronald Harwood. It is worth noting up front that I’ve not seen the play, so I cannot provide any comparative analysis. That said, Dustin Hoffman deserves a lot of credit for directing the film.

Hoffman’s direction makes Quartet into something much more than a play on screen. Unlike something like the classic The Lion In Winter (reviewed here!) where the director uses the camera and scope in such a limited fashion that makes one feel like they are just watching a play on the big screen, Quartet uses the film medium well. Hoffman catches the reactions of background characters, makes stylistic shots (focus on falling flowers and a cut to a wide landscape shot at night nail home one of the film’s most powerful emotional moments), and using the soundtrack to enhance mood and setting making for a well-rounded film that has remarkably good flow, despite being very formulaic in its plot progression.

The Beecham House is a retirement home for retired, aged, musicians. The residents keep themselves busy by practicing and performing with one another. A month before a gala that is intended to raise funds needed to save the exclusive facility, the gala’s chorus is running into performance problems. With the death of one of Beecham House’s star performers, the gala’s ticket sales drop off. When soprano vocalist Jean Horton arrives at Beecham House, the potential to save the gala soars. Horton, however, is reclusive and insists on staying retired as opposed to performing like the other residents and Reginald, her ex-husband, is anything but happy to see her join the community.

While Reg and Jean struggle to reconcile the issues that led to their divorce decades prior, Cedric (who is promoting and organizing the gala) strikes upon a capital idea: he wants Reg, Jean, Wilf and Cissy to perform their quartet from Rigoletto. Jean is resistant to the idea, but the rest truly want to perform and save Beecham House. When Jean angrily pushes away her friends and actually hurts Cissy, she is easily manipulated into performing the quartet and doing her part to save Beecham House.

Despite the plot predictability, Quartet is thoroughly enjoyable. The dialogue is sharp and the movie is packed with witty zingers. In fact, the film is so much more vivacious than one might expect given how the average age of the performer in the film is over eighty. Quartet, despite being fictional and the result of wonderful writing, is a great reminder of how much life can still exist for people of any age. Wit need not be limited to the young and the speed of delivery is not dependent upon youth. The dialogue makes one almost forget that they know exactly where the film is going (not to the film’s distributors: horrible preview trailer; if you’re making a predictable film, try not to show the whole damn thing in the trailer).

Hoffman is able to sell Quartet using a tremendous cast. Led by Tom Courtenay and Billy Connolly (who has never been funnier than in this film!), the characters in Quartet are memorable and well-defined. Pauline Collins is delightfully batty as Cissy and her ability to emote makes her character’s swings from forgetful and somewhat delusional to insightful and inspirational is incredible to watch. Maggie Smith has been given so many roles of late where she plays a reserved, “proper,” woman that it’s beginning to feel like she’s typecast. She makes Jean Horton believable and brings gravitas to the role that makes the emotional conflict between Jean and Reg credible.

On DVD, Quartet features a commentary track which is insightful and featurettes on six aspects of the film (some of which are a little repetitive). They are pretty much what one expects from a drama film.

Quartet is a little film that feels like what it is, a tight, somewhat predictable character-driven drama that tells a very specific story. It tells the story well and is worth watching.

For other films with a mature cast, please visit my reviews of:
A Late Quartet
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
Unfinished Song

8/10

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

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Formulaic Independent, Why Stay Disappoints.

The Good: Scenery, Acting
The Bad: Painfully predictable plot and character arcs
The Basics: Moody and predictable, Stay both epitomizes and defies the conventions of the independent film.


One of the truly wonderful things about independent cinema – and, when applicable, not reading the books upon which an indie film is based – is that such films have the potential to go in any direction and, unlike most mainstream movies, they tend to actually go in more original directions. With Stay, the potential for surprise and originality diminishes with almost every minute. Stay is Taylor Schilling’s first major film project since her success with the first season of Orange Is The New Black (reviewed here!), but the movie does not afford her much in the way of opportunities to showcase any additional talents she possesses as a performer.

Having not read the novel upon which Stay is based, I cannot provide any concrete analysis as to how the movie stacks up against the book. That said, there are elements of the film that are presented so obviously on screen that one may only hope that they worked better in the novel. In a film about a man who loathes the idea of having his own children, the only point of a sustained plotline involving him interacting with a boy is to soften him to the concept of having a kid of his own. About A Boy (reviewed here!) executed the idea fairly well; Stay does not. Unfortunately, the moment the camera starts following Sean around, the viewer has to figure that he will act as a conduit for the crotchety older man’s character growth and that Dermot does not send the kid packing pretty much immediately makes no real sense in the film. Instead of being an audacious film, Stay feels like a formulaic novel put on screen; early in the movie there is foreshadowing to past events, a diary pops up, conversations are had, and all the truths come out to give the characters greater understanding of themselves and what they truly want in life. While this is pretty much essential to all storytelling, most films (and books) today have some subtlety and sophistication to them. Stay does not; it’s a movie that pretty much perfectly embodies the formula.

Opening in Ireland with Dermot bringing his student and lover, Abbey, breakfast in bed, Abbey has a sense that things are not quite right. She goes into town, where she discovers getting a job will be hard with the stigma attached to her relationship with her and Dermot, Abbey picks up a pregnancy test and discovers she is pregnant. With Dermot eager to continue enjoying his life the way it has been, Abby tiptoes around telling him and when he finds the pregnancy test, the two have a falling out. While Abbey makes the trek back to Montreal, Dermot’s mail carrier dies and her pregnant daughter Deirdre returns to the village for the viewing. When Deirdre goes into labor at her dead mother’s side, Dermot has to help deliver the baby.

Abbey returns home to discover her father has broken his arm and is generally as surly as she remembers. In discussing Dermot’s desperate proposal to her, Abbey’s father quickly realizes his daughter is pregnant. Frank actually likes the idea of a grandchild and tries to get Abbey to stay in Canada while Dermot puts up with Sean, a local schoolboy, insisting on building a fence for him (ostensibly Sean is trying to help his family out given that his father has just taken a bath on a bed and breakfast when investors disappeared on him). Abbey debates keeping the fetus when her mother’s diary turns up and informs her exactly why her mother abandoned her and her father, which puts her in an emotional tailspin. Dermot reveals to Sean why he lives in exile in the middle of nowhere and he finds himself helping Deirdre out with her new son. Independent of one another, Abbey and Dermot come to realize what they want out of life and their relationship.

Sean is a pretty obvious character for the themes of the film and it is unfortunate that Dermot’s character is undermined so quickly after he is established. Sean’s whole purpose is to teach Dermot one of the film’s Valuable Life Lessons and the youth lacks the charisma or intelligence to be a valuable life teacher. There are no defining characteristics of Sean that set him apart from young people in a way that would make him defy the expectations Dermot has for children, so how this particular kid gets under his skin makes no real sense.

Furthermore, Wiebke von Carolsfeld’s direction is annoyingly unclear in establishing Dermot’s character. After Abbey decides to go home, the reasonable expectation is that Dermot is driving Abbey to the airport. And yet, Dermot drops Abbey off by the side of the road to hike. It’s a pretty dick move for a man to strand his pregnant lover on the side of the road to walk to a bus station, which is fine. Dermot is free to be an asshole, if that’s what he is supposed to be. But, if that’s the case, it makes his taking Sean under his wing all the more inexplicable.

For all the issues with Stay, the acting is good. Aiden Quinn’s face when Abbey tells Dermot that she wants to go home to “get perspective on things” is priceless. Taylor Schilling is given more to do than to stare at the camera and look dumbfounded. Abbey might not be the most interesting character for her to portray, but she does it well. Michael Ironside plays Frank without a hint of smugness – every other character I’ve seen him play is smart, powerful, and smug beyond belief, so this was very much a departure for him – and Barry Keoghan plays off Quinn very well.

Ultimately, Stay is not a bad film, but it plods along until its inevitable end and its plot and character direction seems far more obvious than audacious, making it less pleasant to make the journey. For a more interesting indie film with pregnancy, irresponsible men, and a lot more character, check out Waitress (reviewed here!).

For other works with Taylor Schilling, please check out my reviews of:
Orange Is The New Black - Season Two
Argo
The Lucky One

4/10

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

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Reworking The Prequel Well, “Cold Station 12” Continues The Augment Arc!

The Good: Good acting, Engaging story, Decent special effects
The Bad: Irksome flaw in Soong’s character, A little light on character development
The Basics: “Cold Station 12” is one of the strongest middle acts in a longer arc of Star Trek: Enterprise and it puts the Enterprise crew in a compelling dilemma.


The fourth season of Star Trek: Enterprise did not take very long to get going with its stated purpose. The show sought in its fourth season to realign Star Trek: Enterprise with the rest of the Star Trek franchise. Almost immediately, the show had an arc that dealt with the genetically-engineered humans, who were left over from Earth’s Eugenics Wars. In the previous series’s in the franchise, the left over genetically-engineered humans were all full-grown and sent away on sleeper ships, unfortunately revived through a mistake hundreds of years later. With the arc that began in “Borderland” (reviewed here!), that is retconned.

Following directly on the events of “Borderland,” “Cold Station 12” has Archer going toe to toe with the Augments. In this case, the Augments are genetically-engineered humans reanimated from fetuses stored after the Eugenics Wars. The existence of Eugenics Wars-era fetuses does not contradict anything previously established in the Star Trek franchise, but it does make it seem strange that Dr. McCoy (at least) would not have been better able to identify Khan when the Enterprise first encountered him in Star Trek.

Opening with a flashback to eleven years prior, where Dr. Erik Soong tells the Augment children of their importance and greatness, the young Malik is excited to learn there are more Augments in the Universe, which Soong tells him the youth must one day rescue. In the present timeline, Soong, having been liberated from the Enterprise by the surviving Augments, charts a plan to rescue the remaining Augments from Cold Station 12. Soong charges Malik with the task of rescuing the Augments without killing any of the humans at Cold Station 12. The Enterprise arrives at the Augment’s colony and there they find Ludar (Smike), a young man who is not an Augment, but is unwilling to help Archer track down the Augments. On the Klingon Bird Of Prey, Malik plays Soong by lying to him about how Raakin died and he confides his distrust of Soong to Persis.

When Tucker realizes that Soong and the Augments took incubators, Archer fears that Soong is going to grow the 1800 remaining Augment embryos to maturity if he can reach Cold Station 12. Archer also learns that Phlox’s associate, Dr. Jeremy Lucas, is now on staff at Cold Station 12. Soong’s Augments hijack a Denobulan ship which they use to gain access to Cold Station 12, where Soong imprisons most of the staff and begins interrogating Dr. Lucas. Soong tortures Lucas as Archer and a team infiltrate Cold Station 12.

“Cold Station 12” might be one of the better episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise, but it has some flaws that are irksome for fans of the larger Star Trek franchise. The first big one is that Dr. Soong is characterized as brilliant, yet he resorts to torture not only once, but twice. Torture has never been a reliable means of gaining information, which Picard notes quite potently in “Chain Of Command, Part 2” (reviewed here!). Soong gets an explicit example of how torture does not work when Malik tortures one of the scientists on Cold Station 12 to death without breaking Dr. Lucas. Yet, he allows Malik to do the exact same thing a second time and expects a different result.

Sadly, Dr. Lucas’s character – which is instantly compelling and smart by how internally strong he is – is diminished when Lucas breaks. Dr. Lucas has to realize that the Augments must not be allowed to leave Cold Station 12 with the fetuses and he ought to have been trained to resist longer. Barring that, why Lucas did not sacrifice himself, his crew, and the fetuses when the facility came under siege is somewhat disappointing. Come to think of it, one of the whole purposes of Star Trek Enterprise was to illustrate how hard life for the early explorers was supposed to be: when the Augments note that another ship might be along soon and be less reasonable than Archer, that is an unfortunate leap on their part; there are no other StarFleet ships as fast as Enterprise or in the area that could realistically menace the Augments. As a result, Lucas should have been more willing (not less) to destroy the facility to prevent the Augments from taking the fetuses.

That said, “Cold Station 12” is a pretty wonderful action-adventure episode of Star Trek: Enterprise. On the character front, Archer starts to illustrate some real characteristics of a traditional Star Trek captain. He treats Smike with compassion and tries to connect with him on a very personal level. He talks about a philosophy, consistent with Roddenberry’s ideals of self-determination, where Smike would not be held accountable for his parents’ crimes. Archer is good in the episode, though Brent Spiner’s Dr. Arik Soong steals the show.

In “Cold Station 12,” Spiner illustrates what viewers might have hoped in “Borderland.” Soong is a villainous idealist, much like a James Bond villain, and in “Cold Station 12,” he plays Erik Soong as a misguided idealist working to correct wrongs of the past with his own philosophy. While that philosophy is ridiculous – Soong seems to think the Augments were merely the product of bad training and poor education as opposed to having a genetic defect that heightened their aggression in addition to their ambition to an unhealthy level, as evidenced by Soong’s failure to correct the genetic problems associated with Khan – it is present. Spiner plays Soong as more smart and desperate than angry and as such there is not a hint in his performance of Lore, which is nice.

Alec Newman also overshadows the performers in the b-plot (T’Pol and Tucker attempt to remotely detonate Cold Station 12 from the Enterprise when Archer’s diplomacy fails) as Malik. One suspects he watched Ricardo Montalban’s performance as Khan to make Malik resonate and the performance works. Newman is a credible Eugenics Wars-type character.

On the continuity front, “Cold Station 12” actually has some clever aspects. Sure, T’Pol is still not in a StarFleet uniform and the transporter is now being used pretty frequently, but writer Alan Brennert actually manages to make something very subtle in the episode. In Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, Saavik quotes a general order to Kirk about having shields up when communications with an approaching StarFleet vessel cannot be established. “Cold Station 12” provides an explicit reason (by inference) for why such a directive would be necessary in the future! That’s pretty smart retconning.

Ultimately, “Cold Station 12” is a fast-paced, relatively smart action-adventure episode that leaves viewers eager for the next episode in the arc!

The three biggest gaffes in “Cold Station 12:”
3. Cold Station 12 has a security parameter that allows the station’s crew to be incapacitated by a gas. In the original Star Trek, in episodes like “Wolf In The Fold” (reviewed here!), no such protocol existed; Spock releasing a gas through the environmental control systems took quite a bit of time and was a serious hassle,
2. Given this incident with Augments and how it would have been part of StarFleet records, Khan should have known about the ability to remote-control StarFleet facilities by Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan (reviewed here!). In short, Kirk and Spock’s gambit to drop the Reliant shields should not have worked because Khan should have known that StarFleet vessels and facilities could be destroyed remotely,
1. Archer has quite a bit of specifics for Smike pertaining to the young man’s parents and he notes that they have quite a bit of information on them. This directly contradicts assertions in “Space Seed” (reviewed here!) and other episodes that mention how records from around the Eugenics Wars and World War III were lost and fragmented. As a result, there is no reason Archer should have such records, but Kirk, Picard, etc. would not.

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Star Trek: Enterprise - The Complete Fourth Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the final season here!
Thanks!]

For other works with Fernando Chien, please visit my reviews of:
Iron Man 3
Red Dawn
The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor

7.5/10

For other Star Trek episode and movie reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Final Season Of Star Trek: Enterprise Yields A Pretty Wonderful Trading Card Set!

The Good: Excellent image quality, Good writing, Good chase
The Bad: Unnumbered autograph cards, Rarity issues
The Basics: With interesting signers and great costume cards, the Star Trek: Enterprise Season Four set is a great value and boxes yield much for collectors and fans to love!


Following on the shortened third season of Star Trek: Enterprise (reviewed here!), the fourth and final season of the show was eventually cut down to twenty-two episodes, despite having brought on Manny Coto and writers who loved the Star Trek franchise to try to save the series. They failed.

Rittenhouse Archives, who produces Star Trek trading cards and had a generally successful run with their Star Trek: Enterprise Season Three set (reviewed here!) benefited in many ways from the collapse of the series. Costumes became more prevalent, celebrities who participated in the series were willing to sign trading cards for their release and as a result, Rittenhouse Archives managed to take an uncertain season of television and make it into a pretty wonderful set of trading cards!

Basics/Set Composition

Continuing in common card numbering, but not the autograph or other chase (save, bizarrely the costume cards), Star Trek: Enterprise Season Four was the fifth release of Enterprise trading cards from Rittenhouse Archives. Properly assembled, the set is a collection of 148 trading cards and the official Season Four binder from Rittenhouse. All but ten of the cards are available in boxes of Star Trek: Enterprise Season Four cards, making it one of the sets with enduring collectibility. The cards were originally released in boxes that contained forty packs of five cards each. Boxes tended to run in the $60 - $75 range and guaranteed one common set, two autographs and a costume card per box.

Collation in the "Season Four" set was generally good, save for some of the high end cards. Whatwith the number of episodes being less than some prior releases, often collectors could get three entire common sets out of a box! To complete a true master set of "Season Four" cards, collectors had to purchase at least six CASES of the cards and a binder, as there were two multi-case incentive cards and cards exclusive to the binder. Even then, there were exclusive cards that had to be hunted down elsewhere.

Common Cards

The common card set consists of 72 trading cards, which are printed on standard cardstock and have a glossy UV resistant coating. This causes cards to stick together occasionally, but this is a moot issue as the vast majority of trading card collectors keep their cards in binders these days to protect and display their cards. The seventy-two card set focuses exclusively on the episodes in the fourth season of Star Trek: Enterprise and there are three cards per episode, detailing the plot of each episode.

The common cards look wonderful, following in the same format that made Enterprise Season Two and Season Three trading cards popular. The landscape format is held through the entire common set and it is distinguished from the "Season Two" and "Season Three" set by having a green border framing the top and bottom of the front image and framing the text on the back. This set is a wonderful mix of character and special effects shots and the primary images on the front of each card tend to favor shots of characters and aliens over special effects shots (at least 2/3 people). This makes the set a good one for fans to get autographed at conventions. There are three images per card, with the front being dominated by a single image and the backs sandwiching two windows of images in next to the text. It's nice to see that Rittenhouse Archives sought to uses as many images as possible while maintaining image integrity and collectibility. The images on the back tend to have more special effects shots.

The format is one that was pioneered back when SkyBox was producing "Episode Collection" series' of Star Trek: The Next Generation trading cards. The cards are numbered 235 - 306, continuing the numbering begun with "Season One" (even though the style of card changed) The backs are well written, adequately detailing the plot of each episode over the course of the three trading cards. Indeed, the "Season Three" trading card set makes it seem like the show was worth watching, so well written are the cards!

Collation on this set was excellent, so the common sets averaged three per box, which was good for collectors, but generally devalued the common sets (common sets almost never hold their value these days).

Chase Cards

There are 76 chase cards in the "Season Three" set, with 66 found in the boxes of cards and the remaining ten available outside the boxes and packs. The bonus cards that can be found within the boxes were the In A Mirror Darkly cards, Genesis cards, Archer In Action cards, Costume cards and autograph cards. This is the first set of Star Trek: Enterprise cards to not have a "First Contact" chase set (it was a common thread through the three prior releases) and the costume cards do follow the numbering and style of the two prior costume cards (one each released in "Season Two" and "Season Three").

The most common bonus cards in this set were the In A Mirror Darkly cards. These cards are intriguing foil cards illustrating the alternate universe personas of the Enterprise crew. There were two of Archer and one of Forrest in order to bring the number up to a full set of nine. The cards had no writing on the back so those unfamiliar with the characters and actors were lost as to the significance of these people. These cards were slightly thicker than usual and were silver foil and look just great. This is one of only two groups of cards in this set that is oriented in the portrait orientation. Every now and then an inexpensive chase set dazzles and this is consistently a fan and collector favorite. As there were only four of these per box, it took at least three boxes to complete a set of them.

At two per box were the Genesis cards, simple cards with a large headshot of the subject on both sides. This is the "genesis" of the make-up effects and one side of each card has an image of a character or alien race as it appeared in the original Star Trek and then on the obverse how the race appeared in its Star Trek: Enterprise incarnation. This set is nice because it has a straightforward contrast between such favorites as the Klingons, Andorians, Tellarites and Gorn! Outside the subject matter and the rarity, these cards are fairly unremarkable bonus cards. The set of nine took five boxes to complete, with ideal collation.

In each box there was one Archer in Action card as well. The Archer In Action cards were double-thick foil cards with a raised border. The images contained Captain Jonathan Archer doing something heroic, like fighting the Andorian Shran in an honor battle. One wonders why Rittenhouse used a shot of Archer playing basketball as part of this set, but generally the idea is good. Honestly, when many of us heard there was going to be an "Archer In Action" subset to "Season Four," we thought it would be a group of lenticular cards, with actual movement. In this fashion, the Archer In Action subset is a disappointment. Even more of a disappointment is the fact that even with ideal collation, it takes nine boxes to complete this set!

Also one per box were the costume cards and herein lies the benefit of the downfall of Star Trek: Enterprise to the card collectors; "Season Four" was released with fourteen different costume cards (numbered C3 - C16). These represent some of the most intriguing costumes and characters from the series and fans will appreciate that there are three different costumes from T'Pol, alternate universe costumes for Archer and Mayweather (and T'Pol!), and that the supplemental characters who have costume cards in this set have some of the more interesting costumes. Especially noteworthy are the C10 and C8 cards. C8 is Silik, the Suliban's, costume and it is a pleather ridged fabric that is very intriguing. The C10 card is made from and even thicker rubbery fabric that has deep channels in many of the costume pieces! As a result, packs with the C10 were known to come with only one other card given how thick the costume fabric and resulting card were!

This brings us to the autograph cards. The Season Four set has twenty-five autograph cards available in the packs, in a style unique to the "Season Four" set. These are large images on each card, comprising about the upper 5/8 of each portrait-oriented card. The signers included such notables as Jolene Blalock, Linda Park, Jolene Blalock (all of whom were categorized as Very Limited, meaning they signed only 250 - 300 cards each) and Anthony Montgomery. Montgomery, Bill Cobbs, Vaughn Armstrong, Gary Graham and Steve Schirripa were all limited signers meaning they each signed less than 500 cards. The set is rounded out by some decent signers like guest stars Jeffrey Combs, Richard Riehle (whose signature is absolutely terrible! It could be an echocardiogram!), John Schuck and Kaj-Erik Eriksen, who played one of the Augments but is probably better known for his role in the first season of The 4400 (reviewed here!). Star Trek: Enterprise fans will no doubt appreciate the fact that four different actresses who played Orion Slave Women are included in the set as well.

The problem with the autographs was that they were especially uneven in terms of numbers (rarity) and the fact that they were not numbered. It is especially sloppy whenever a set is designed such that the cards cannot be numbered for ease of organization and collectibility. As a result, the twenty-five autographs remain unnumbered and it's up to each collector to decide how they would like to put the set together. But two of the autographs seem to come up with alarming frequency, the cards from Leslie Silva and the one from Eric Pieroint. In a case of twelve boxes, I pulled three of each of those two autographs! Given how it might take two to three cases before a collector pulls each of the Very Limited autographs, this seems rather unbalanced.

Also problematic to collectors is the fact that Linda Park was a Very Limited autograph. Signing only 250 - 300 of the card increases its inherent worth, but finding people willing to pay the hundreds of dollars that usually accompany Very Limited autographs is near impossible, so unpopular was her character.

Non-Box/Pack Cards

As with most "modern" trading card releases - certainly the ones from Rittenhouse Archives - not all of the cards needed to make a true master set are available in the boxes of these trading cards. In this set, there are ten cards that cannot be found in the boxes. There is the usual promo card which foreshadowed the series release which is common enough to find (P1). There are two cards exclusive to the "Season Four" trading card binder, the binder promotional card (P3) and an autograph of Lee Arenberg, who played Gral on Star Trek: Enterprise but is known to genre fans best as Pinzetti in Pirates Of The Caribbean (reviewed here!)! The P2 card is a promotional card available only through Non-Sports Update Magazine and it might take a little work to track down (though the magazine offers back issues pretty readily). As well, there was a convention-exclusive promotional card and that might take some digging to track down.

Even more limited were the UK exclusive promotional card and the near-impossible to find promotional card given out at the San Diego ComicCon. These are only available now in the secondary market and they are largely unremarkable, save their value as promo cards.

The remaining three cards are the casetopper and the two multicase incentive cards. The casetopper is a dual-costume card featuring fabric from the shirt and pants worn by Brent Spiner as Arik Soong. This is actually a very nice card and the fabric swatches look just like the outfit in the picture that accompanies it!

For every two cases, dealers were given an autographed costume card of Linda Park as Hoshi Sato. The fabric swatches are unremarkable dark blue of her uniform jumpsuit and her autograph is just as legible as the one in the regular release. Again, Park's general lack of popularity does not make this a highly hunted card, meaning most people will be able to find it much cheaper than what it's worth in the secondary market these days!

The grail of the set, outside the Jolene Blalock autograph in the regular autograph release, is the 6-case multicase incentive autographed costume card. The card is an autograph and costume card of Jolene Blalock as T'Pol! It features a fabric swatch from her second season blue uniform and combined with her autograph and the card's rarity, it is the hardest card to find in the set and one that is highly desired by fans of the series and card collectors alike. It, like the casetopper and first-tier incentive cards, comes sealed in a toploader with the gold Rittenhouse Archives seal. This card was given to dealers every time they purchased six cases (72 boxes) of the product and they are only available in the secondary market. Given how hard it is to track down Jolene Blalock for conventions (she rarely does them) this is a keeper.

Overall

Overall, the set looks nice, and despite my problems with them not numbering the autograph cards, Rittenhouse Archives did a great job at getting signers who were interesting, many of whom have been in other projects! The only real annoyances involve the rarity of some of the out-of-the-box cards, like the 6-case incentive and the difficult-to-find promotional cards. But, it's a strong set for collectors and fans of Star Trek: Enterprise.

Like the series, Rittenhouse Archives ends the Star Trek: Enterprise trading card releases on a high note!

This set culls images from Star Trek: Enterprise Season Four, reviewed here!

This is a set of trading cards I proudly sell in my online store! Check it out at Star Trek: Enterprise Season Four Inventory Page!

8/10

For other trading card reviews, please visit my Trading Card Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Blue With Disappointment In The Generic Quality Of Joni Mitchell's Supposed Great Album.

The Good: Moments of lyrics, Moments of voice
The Bad: Sounds like virtually every other early Joni Mitchell album, Dull instrumentals, Short.
The Basics: Dull, slow and sounding like virtually every other Joni Mitchell album, Blue disappoints anyone ready to be wowed by her whole album (not just lyrics and voice)!


A little while back, I went through an intensive study of the works of Joni Mitchell and I was disappointed when I found there were gaps in the collection I was evaluating. One of those gaps was one of her early albums, Blue, which several individuals informed me was one of Mitchell's seminal albums and without it my study was more or less wasted. I was therefore excited when two weeks ago I managed to get Blue in and I listened to it right away.

It's taken me two weeks and twelve listens to muster up the enthusiasm to write a review of it. Those who believe this might be the ultimate Joni Mitchell album might not have heard her other early works because Blue is hard to argue as her best when it sounds like, pardon the rhyme, the rest.

With ten tracks clocking in at 36:15, Blue is inarguably the work of Joni Mitchell. She wrote all of the songs and provides the primary vocals for all of them. While the album's liner does not credit Mitchell with any instrumentals, it also does not credit anyone with the piano which is evident on several tracks, like Blue. It seems a fair assumption that Mitchell might be providing that. Strangely, there is no production credit in the liner either, the closest being that the album engineer was Henry Lewy. Regardless, it seems like this is a distinctly Joni Mitchell work.

The fundamental problem here is that the album sounds like virtually every other early Joni Mitchell work. One could swap tracks from Blue, Song To A Seagull and Ladies Of The Canyon and not truly tell the difference. It's a sad commentary to consider that Mitchell might have grown so little as an artist over those few early years that such an exercise would be possible and easily executed.

What Mitchell had from the beginning, and displays right from the beginning of Blue, is the ability to write. Joni Mitchell is a rather decent poet and songwriter and Blue seems a concept album about places, travel and relationships. Mitchell's musical persona journeys through the album between places and relationships searching for the place she fits. And each song works independently and the album comes together quite well as a collection of poems.

So, for example, on "Carey," Mitchell sings about feeling trapped in both a place and a relationship with lines like, "The wind is in from Africa / Last night I couldn't sleep / Oh you know it sure is hard to leave here, Carey / But it's really not my home . . . Get out your cane / And I'll put on some silver / Oh you're a mean old Daddy, but I like you fine." She has a wonderful sense of imagery and includes many subtle references to things that keep her trapped, like beach tar and the silver which is reminiscent of shackles. She wonderfully creates a sense of building up to moving on and many of the songs that follow "Carey" have her on a journey, like "California," "This Flight Tonight" and "A Case Of You."

She manages some decent lyrics with the sense of finding place on tracks like "California." There, she writes and sings, ". . .He cooked good omelets and stews / And I might have stayed on with him these / But my heart cried out for you, California / Oh California I'm coming home / Oh make me feel good rock 'n' roll band / I'm your biggest fan / California, I'm coming home" ("California"). She creates an enticing image of all she misses and the lines work to embody and idealized place.

Similarly, she has wonderful lines on "A Case Of You," where her musical protagonist begins to pick apart her traveling companion. Lines like "Oh I am a lonely painter / I live in a box of paints / I'm frightened by the devil / And I'm drawn to those ones that ain't afraid / I remember that time you told me, you said, / 'Love is touching souls' . . . Oh you're in my blood like holy wine / You taste so bitter and so sweet" ("A Case Of You") perfectly capture the duality of what attracts us to another and the realization that we can no longer live with them. This captures well the emotional resonance of the drifting apart and lyrically, it's hard to argue that Blue does not have something good going for it.

Similarly, it's difficult to argue that Joni Mitchell does not have a great singing voice. Mitchell has a wonderful soprano voice that she sings out clear and high on tracks like "A Case Of You," "California," and Blue. Mariah Carey has nothing on Joni Mitchell the way Mitchell performs "The Last Time I Saw Richard." She is able to go lower and smoky on tracks like "Carey" and "My Old Man."

The problem comes when one listens to the album with any sense of context of her body of works. There is nothing vocally new here that anyone who has heard any other Joni Mitchell album has not already heard. There is no growth, no stretching, no differentiation between what Mitchell had put out before and what is on this album. She goes in no new directions, she keeps everything slow, moody and within her extensive vocal range. There is no auditory challenge for the listener on Blue to make one think anything other than that she is phoning the album in from her comfort zone.

At least as bad is how unimaginative the music is. If it's not a stark-sounding folk guitar track, it's a piano and vocal driven track that sounds like the quiet guitar tracks, save on piano. Mitchell uses some of the same chords in the same progressions on the album's opener "All I Want" and three tracks later on "Carey." If you're going to resuse elements of your harmony over, it helps to put them far apart on the album!

"Little Green" opens with the same chords as "The Circle Game" and Mitchell's vocals have some of the same resonances, making it a disappointingly similar musical experience for anyone who has heard her other works. Moreover, it illustrates a lack of growth in Mitchell as time went on. She simply reused a tune that worked and how that won't disappoint anyone who wants to like Joni Mitchell's works is a mystery to me.

There is one interesting musical moment on Blue, but it is the use of a production element as opposed to any genuine change in the musical style. On "This Flight Tonight," Mitchell sings about what is on the radio and she produces the lines to be scratchy and mono-sounding to embody the sound of an old time radio. It's actually pretty cool and there ought to be credit for the imagination of it.

Ultimately, though, this is a tough c.d. to recommend, which I see puts me in the minority. The thing is, it easily could have been put on the same disc with one of her adjacent albums to give the disc added value, but one suspects that this would only have revealed the depth of her musical lack of imagination and/or innovation over the albums. Then again, it could have been a stronger overall listening experience or at least given the listener more for their money.

The strongest track is the bitter "A Case Of You," the weakest endeavor might actually be the title track, Blue.

For other works by Joni Mitchell, please visit my reviews of:
Song To A Seagull
Ladies Of The Canyon
Turbulent Indigo

4/10

For other music reviews, please visit my Music Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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