HAPPY BIRTHDAY Mary Elizabeth Winstead! We Check Out The Underrated A.C.O.D.!

The Good: Decent performances, Interesting characters, Realistic character arcs, Some very funny lines
The Bad: Somewhat predictable plot, Spread thin on analysis
The Basics: A.C.O.D. is an engaging and very funny exploration of the effects marriage and divorce have had on U.S. culture.


It seems that almost every day that a celebrity death is announced of a beloved actor, musical artist or director (I have no idea how to write a tribute to Fritz Weaver!) and it is hard to escape the conclusion that 2016 has just flat-out sucked in that regard. Rather than focus on the endless parade of celebrity deaths today, though, I thought I would try to celebrate something good. As it turns out, today is Mary Elizabeth Winstead's birthday (Happy Birthday!!!!) and I just finished watching the film A.C.O.D., an underrated independent comedy in which Winstead has a disturbingly under-credited role.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead is an actress on the rise who has slowly been getting more and more featured roles in works as directors come to understand that she has range and impressive acting abilities. She recently led the cast of 10 Cloverfield Lane (reviewed here!) and it is tough to believe that there could be a young actress who could so effectively steal the spotlight from John Goodman, but Mary Elizabeth Winstead does it! A.C.O.D. features Winstead in the supporting role of Lauren, the girlfriend of the protagonist and while there are problems with Lauren in the film, none of them have to do with how Mary Elizabeth Winstead performs the character. From the way that Lauren is introduced - with a deadpan mockery of Carter intended to freak him out - to her character never explicitly saying on-screen that her parents' long marriage intimidates her (a subtext which Winstead acts the hell out of throughout the film!), a surprising number of issued in A.C.O.D. and the way its themes are executed surround Lauren. And yet, Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays the part that was written incredibly well and continues to draw the eye with her on-screen presence.

Carter is in his thirties, a survivor of his parents' rather brutal divorce and the various remarriages that gave him a presence in assorted blended families growing up. After successfully keeping his parents completely apart for twenty years, his younger brother Trey decides to get married and Trey wants both Hugh and Melissa at the wedding. After approaching his mother and his father, Carter discovers exactly what he suspected remains true: Hugh and Melissa still have so much animosity and fury between them that they cannot be in the same place together without destroying the event. To try to figure out a way to make Trey's wedding wish come true, Carter turns to Dr. Judith, a woman he thought was his therapist during the divorce. But Dr. Judith was a researcher and Carter's time with her was fodder for her book C.O.D. (Children Of Divorce). Carter tracks down the bestselling book on divorce and reads it, quickly recognizing which character in the book was him.

Attempting to reject Dr. Judith's character analysis of his faults, Carter manipulated Hugh and Michelle into meeting in a public place to discuss Trey's wedding and bury the hatchet enough so they might be civil to one another for the event. Carter's peacekeeping gesture backfires, however, when Hugh and Melissa begin having an affair on their respective spouses with one another. His life in a tailspin, Carter tries desperately to protect Trey and his step-parents from the truth, keep his business afloat and his relationship solid, all the while Dr. Judith hounds him for follow-up research for a sequel to her original book.

A.C.O.D. is a surprisingly underrated comedy that hits most of the right notes with its hilarious lines and uncomfortable moments that make humor out of people treating one another badly. Opening with Hugh and Melissa screaming at one another through Carter's ninth birthday party at the beach house, A.C.O.D. makes an art form out of realistic uncomfortable incidents. The film is complicated and smart even as it evokes grimmaces, most notably in a scene where Carter's family sits down for a meet and greet with Kieko's (the bride's) family and Carter starts to assert himself.

Adam Scott plays Carter in A.C.O.D. and the film continues to showcase that the actor has genuine range. Long before it is made explicit, Scott plays Carter as a man desperately attempting to keep things together, Carter is a man acting like everything is okay and that he has overcome his childhood modeling. An actor playing a character who is (unconsciously) acting himself is a difficult part to pull off, but Scott does so. Just as Mary Elizabeth Winstead infuses the scene outside her parents' anniversary dinner with subtext for what is going through Lauren's head, Scott infuses key scenes with miniscule physical tells that indicate his character is still wrestling with the past on a daily basis.

A.C.O.D. is one of those films that can be used by those who have been through such things as a way to enlighten those not in-the-know to a condition, but for adult children of incredibly messy and acrimonious divorces, A.C.O.D. is more predictable than it is revelatory. Dr. Judith is a user, Carter is the negotiator he is pegged in the book for being and Melissa is an embittered ex-wife who feels like she settled when the man she wanted in her life turned out to be a cheating jerk. Cycles repeat; characters who think they are aware of all of their button issues fall into bling spots. And cycles repeat. Watching A.C.O.D. together highlighted the predictibility of such things for survivors when my wife shouted out "flying monkeys!" when Gary (Melissa's new husband) tries to give Trey a check for the wedding. Survivors who are metaconscious will see much of what happens in A.C.O.D. coming.

Despite that, A.C.O.D. is very funny and makes some important statements. The cast - main and supporting - is amazing, though the parts are definitely skewed toward giving veteran actors like Richard Jenkins (Hugh), Catherine O'Hara (Melissa) and Jane Lynch (Dr. Judith) more to play with than some of the younger cast. Clark Duke, for example, is given incredibly little to play with and Amy Poehler's supporting role is given important hints of depth but not enough time to grow and develop on-screen as a truly compelling character.

Ultimately, A.C.O.D. is a solid, if occasionally unsettling, film that is well worth watching and successfully tackles its subject matter with realism and humor.

For other works with Adam Scott, please visit my reviews of:
My Blind Brother
Friends With Kids
Piranha 3D
Leap Year
Step Brothers
Star Trek: First Contact

7/10

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

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Peter David Closes The Book On One Incarnation Of She-Hulk With She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators!

The Good: Good banter, Excellent morality, Much of the artwork, Initially engaging plot
The Bad: Abrupt end, Some of the artwork
The Basics: She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators is a fine end to this chapter of She-Hulk as the heroine teams up with other powerful women to do right and save her friend!


For a while with my blogging, I would pick a hero or heroine for my graphic novel studies and would devote a year to truly immersing myself in that subject. A few years ago, I wanted a compelling female subject and when I put out feelers, my blog readers actually helped influence me. That was the beginning of my She-Hulk Year and She-Hulk turned out to be a pleasant surprise for me, even though over the course of my She-Hulk Year, I was not able to get in nearly as many volumes as I would have hoped. Since then, though, I have tracked down some of the lingering books and She-Hulk has been one of the few characters I have enjoyed catching up on. Of course, as it frequently happens, just when I discover a character in a good arc, the arc ends and such is how it is for me with She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators.

She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators represents the end of She-Hulk's journey right before the Marvel Now! reboot of the Marvel Universe. I found my joy in discovering Peter David was writing She-Hulk came right before the title ended and it is hard not to feel bad for David; he came in right as Marvel was reworking its own universe, at the end of a successful run that left many dangling plot and character elements up in the air and when David or the Powers That Be at Marvel Comics were looking to take the title in a different direction, which had She-Hulk as a part of a team of powerful super heroes. She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators explores She-Hulk as a component of a team dynamic as she spends the book working with Valkyrie, Invisible Woman (Sue Storm), Thundra, and Jazinda, the Skrull bounty hunter Jennifer Walters befriended before the Secret Invasion crossover event when the Skrull were exposed on Earth. She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators tells a story that deals with the lingering effects of the Secret Invasion (and Jazinda's continued presence on Earth in its aftermath), She-Hulk's affiliation with the Lady Liberators, and works to wrap-up the lingering solo-She-Hulk threads before the title got cancelled. The book deals with those various threads with impressive results.

Peter David opens She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators with Jennifer Walters considering God and there is something to be said about David's quality as a writer in general when he can open an graphic novel with effective use of quotes from Voltaire and Mark Twain at the outset of his own, original work. Walters is a good character to use to make such allusions as she is an educated woman, with a strong scientific and legal background . . . who would feel that if there is a divine presence, it is probably somewhat demented and doles out karmic balance with a terrible sense of irony. So, having a calamity come shortly after Jazinda has survived her long-dreaded confrontation with her father (the Super-Skrull) and after She-Hulk and Jazinda have recovered their stolen R.V. to continue their skip-tracing bounty hunting, is a clever star and makes for an instantly engaging read.

Jennifer Walters trolls for work at Freeman Bonding and, after getting a critique on the Lady Liberators super-hero squad from Emilee (he boss there), she and Jazinda decide to go to the earthquake ravaged nation of Marinmer to help with the rescue effort. Marinmer has a repressive government and the U.S. Government refuses to intervene, so Walters convenes the Lady Liberators to go and help on the ground. With Jazinda bringing in transport, the quintet heads to Marinmer to get the aid that has been sent there to the citizens who need it the most. But when Marinmer's President-For-Life Darqon Par calls in the Winter Guard, the fight between Russia's Avengers and the Lady Liberators nearly costs both sides their lives. But when citizens of Marinmer arrive at the scene of the fight, She-Hulk is able to make a rhetorical argument to stop the Red Guardian.

But as the rescue efforts get underway, Darqon Par calls for She-Hulk and she separates from her friends to try to uncover his true agenda. While discussing his reign, Sue Storm abruptly appears and falls unconscious and Darqon Par reveals the nature of his trap; the burning candles have releases a knockout toxin and even Jennifer Walters is susceptible. But before Sue and Jen can be raped by Darqon Par, Jazinda arrives for the rescue and the solution she and She-Hulk come up with allows them to both be proud of the results. But upon returning to the United States, Jennifer Walters is taken into custody by the Justice Department and must rely upon Mallory Book to secure her release. While Jennifer Walters gets an offer from Book, Jazinda assumes her identity in the trailer park and begins a hunt for a villain who broke bail . . . running into another villain with a vendetta in the process!

Peter David has a great handle on dialogue and that comes through immediately in She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators. While one might get the feeling that Emilee's comments early on in She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators are the result of a creative argument David himself lost with Marvel Comics (why not call the group the Liberators? It's pretty obvious they are all women!) and tackling the idea that She-Hulk's super-hero group might just be a teenager's masturbatory fantasy early on by ridiculing the idea of the group as simply the "bod squad" frees up the rest of the volume for character study, witty dialogue and an actual story. But right off the bat as Valkyrie has to coax her horse and Thundra laments Jen not being a lesbian, She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators is a fun read.

More than just being fun, She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators promotes a higher standard of ethics than most graphic novels and it is refreshing to see. While there are moments that David is a bit heavyhanded pointing out (through Walters) that natural disasters seldom get international intervention unless oil is involved and there are a few dated references (like a Cheney hunting joke), for the most part, She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators finds absolutely the right balance between an ethical argument and super-hero buttkicking.

For a writer as talented as Peter David, there is something odd about the way the author does not use the word "rape" in the book. Perhaps it is a Comics Code thing, but Jennifer Walters is tied down to a bed, spread-eagled (albeit dressed) when President Darqon Par comes in to rape her repeatedly, with the threat to Sue Storm being the very same . . . yet every sentence that seems to be leading there gets cut before the character can acknowledge explicitly that the man was about to rape the women.

That said, She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators holds up remarkably well on its own, without any strong prior knowledge of where She-Hulk has been to understand everything that is going on (though Mallory Book's role is certainly enhanced by reading prior volumes, the context clues are enough to get casual readers by).

The artwork in She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators is erratic with many of the panels being beautiful, with clear depictions of the characters involved and a decent sense of movement to them. Some, however, are simple and a couple of panels with head shots of Sue Storm and Valkyrie feature virtually interchangeable likenesses. Outside a few times when the hair colors are a bit close, all of the coloring in She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators is wonderful.

At the end, She-Hulk Volume 9: Lady Liberators makes the reader wish that She-Hulk had been more like this volume all along and wish for more. Alas, it was not to be and the abrupt ending of the book feels like a kick to the crotch for anyone who enjoys reading a story that includes an intriguing super hero team led by a formidable, wisecracking leader with an intriguing backstory and amazing abilities!

For other She-Hulk books from this period in Jennifer Walter's life, please visit my reviews of:
Single Green Female
Superhuman Law
Time Trials
Laws Of Attraction
Planet Without A Hulk
Jaded
Here Today
Secret Invasion

8/10

For other book reviews, please check out my Graphic Novel Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Two Favorites Return In "The Time Of Angels!"

The Good: Good performances, Interesting character moments, Mood, Effects
The Bad: Creature inconsistencies, Some predictable plot elements
The Basics: River Song and the Weeping Angels return for a tense, smart episode with "The Time Of Angels!"


When it comes to science fiction, when there are serialized elements, it is very tough for producers and storytellers to continue disparate elements of a narrative without weakening the initial thrill of the origin stories. In the case of Doctor Who, there were few creatures created by Steven Moffat that were as terrifying as the Weeping Angels in "Blink" (reviewed here!) and Moffat created one of the most intriguing lingering mysteries of the franchise with the embodiment of River Song in "Forest Of The Dead" (reviewed here!). There is something impressive and ambitious about returning both River Song and the Weeping Angels to the Doctor Who narrative at the same time. The episode in which they return is "The Time Of Angels."

"The Time Of Angels" is one of the rare episodes that lives up to the expectations one might have based on the quality of the episodes that introduced the elements it includes. As well, "The Time Of Angels" might well be the first Doctor Who episode since Matt Smith took over as The Doctor where The Doctor seems like the smart, clever, advanced character who is not sublimated to the ridiculous or the prioritization of the comic elements for the character. In "The Time Of Angels," The Doctor, River Song and Amy Pond all have interesting arcs which satisfactorily advance the first part of a story that is intriguing and freaky.

Opening with a guard, drugged by a lipstick hallucinogen, leading a chase for River Song through a ship, The Doctor and Amy Pond find themselves in an alien museum 12,000 years later. There, they find an artifact which is essentially a Gallifreyan black box, with a message for The Doctor. Stealing the artifact and hooking it up to the TARDIS computer, the pair witnesses River Song's escape from the ship, complete with her request for a rescue from The Doctor. Arriving at the right time and place, Dr. River Song enters the TARDIS and displays an ability to fly the TARDIS and bring it to a safe landing next to the ship from which she escaped.

The other ship crashed on an alien world, now terraformed by humans, atop a building. Dr. Song contacts another ship, in orbit, and the military religious leader of the ship teleports down. Father Octavian is leading a search team sent to recover an entity from the wreckage of the ship, using Dr. Song to get the Doctor on board. When River Song reconnects the downed ship's video record, The Doctor and Amy realize that Bishop Octavian's target is a Weeping Angel. While Amy begins to suffer the effects of watching the footage of the Weeping Angel, The Doctor, River Song, Octavian and his team enter the Maze Of The Dead to hunt the Weeping Angel . . . with the search quickly becoming lethal!

In order to make "The Time Of Angels" work, Steven Moffat seems to mix up his own creations and he is forced to rework the Weeping Angels in order to enhance the menace of the alien creatures. When River Song was introduced in "Silence In The Library" (reviewed here!), she and The Doctor encounter the Vashta Nerada, who use the technology of the day to communicate using the voices of dead people. The Weeping Angels from "Blink" had no such ability, yet in "The Time Of Angels" they suddenly have that ability. There is little evolutionary sense to creatures who cannot communicate with one another whenever they even attempt to look at each other developing a language. "The Time Of Angels" pays lip service to this concept by reworking the Weeping Angels to suddenly have the ability to absorb the cerebral cortex of their victims and then speaking through their voices, utilizing their memories. There is no logical mechanism for the ability or the technological leap needed to exploit the ability within "The Time Of Angels."

In a similar fashion, "The Time Of Angels" alters the nature of the Weeping Angels. In "Blink," the Weeping Angels displaced their prey in time and essentially fed on the potential energy of the life wasted by the displacement. In "The Time Of Angels," the Weeping Angels are flat-out killers, snapping the necks of their victims. The explanation within the episode is half-assed; the Weeping Angel needed a body (?!). That being the case, there would only be one Weeping Angel within the episode that needed a body, yet there are three casualties . . . Making the Weeping Angels physically dangerous makes the episode scarier, but it undermines the real terror of the enemy. In fact, within "The Time Of Angels," one of the scariest potential concepts would have allowed the Weeping Angels to seem both flawed and scary - the planet the episode takes place on was terraformed; if the Weeping Angels sent victims back in time, the humans would (presumably) die right away in agony from the inhospitable atmosphere! Come to think of it, a neat idea that would have allowed the Weeping Angels to exist undiminished would have been that after the first person was sent back and died fast, the Weeping Angels start sending people back only a few days, resulting in multiple versions of the characters working together to try to stop the Weeping Angels in the present!

But, alas, "The Time Of Angels" is not so clever in that regard and it sets up "Flesh And Stone" instead of remaining consistent to the creature design from "Blink." That said, "The Time Of Angels" works with the Weeping Angels because The Doctor and River Song are both very clever. The Weeping Angels are a fairly new race to Doctor Who and in "The Time Of Angels," the Doctor learns about them through exposition at virtually the same rate as the audience. That makes The Doctor's actions throughout the episode intuitive and smart in a way that Matt Smith's incarnation of The Doctor has not yet been allowed to be.

"The Time Of Angels" fleshes out River Song nicely and has Song and Amy Pond playing off one another well. Dr. Song is instantly cool and Alex Kingston plays her incredibly well. Iain Glen plays Octavian intriguingly so the occasionally monolithic character seem rounded and realistic.

Ultimately, "The Time Of Angels" is a tight set-up episode that brings two awesome elements of Doctor Who back together in a compelling way, living up to the potential of the episodes that introduced the Weeping Angels and River Song.

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Doctor Who - The Complete Fifth Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the debut season of Matt Smith as The Doctor here!
Thanks!]

For other works with Iain Glen, please visit my reviews of:
Game Of Thrones - Season 6
Game Of Thrones - Season 5
Game Of Thrones - Season 4
Game Of Thrones - Season 3
Game Of Thrones - Season 2
Game Of Thrones - Season 1
Kick-Ass 2

8/10

For other Doctor Who episode and movie reviews, please visit my Doctor Who Review Index Page!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Front-Heavy And Weird, The 2016 On The Night You Were Born Ornament Is More Awkward Than Iconic!

The Good: Good coloring, Accurate rendition
The Bad: Seems pricy, Front-heavy, Indistinct ceramic element
The Basics: The 2016 "On The Night You Were Born" ornament is a problematic 3-D rendition of the children's picture book.


One of the new trends in Hallmark Keepsake ornaments is creating ornaments of children's books that are three-dimensional renditions of the open book with a popped out mini-sculpture in it. The ceramic sculptures are iconic characters from the books and some of these ornaments have been well-executed. I decided to check one out given their rising popularity. This year's primary book-based ornament is based upon On The Night You Were Born. From the October Ornament Release comes the On The Night You Were Born ornament, which might not be the best-executed ornament of this style.

The 2016 On The Night You Were Born ornament is a mediocre ornament that features an open version of On The Night You Were Born with a little sculpture of a baby in a basket, all wrapped up and with a very generic painted face on it . . . which is unfortunately unbalanced.

Basics

The On The Night You Were Born ornament is an ornament that features the book On The Night You Were Born with the book open and a wrapped baby in a basket bursting out of the ornament into the third dimension. The ornament is similar to the book, but open and with the mini-sculpture. The ornament, released in 2016, is a standard-release ornament, though it was one of the later ornaments released for the season, so some stores did not even display it! The On The Night You Were Born ornament is 2" tall, 3 1/2" wide and 1" deep.

Hallmark made a creative reinterpretation of the baby from the book for the On The Night You Were Born ornament. The medium-sized Hallmark ornament is heavy and features the wrapped baby in a basket at the bottom, front of the ornament. The basket is detailed more in its coloring than by its sculpted details. Similarly, Hallmark painted on the sleeping baby's face and what I learned from inspecting several copies of the ornament is that the paint job for the face is unfortunately inconsistent. Three of the ornaments I found had smeared faces!

The Hallmark "On The Night You Were Born" ornament is colored in monotones, which is perfectly appropriate for an ornament based on artwork from a children's book. The ornament's moon is arguably the most shaded aspect of the ornament and in some lighting, the face in the moon that is looking down upon the baby is obscured! The blues of the night sky on the open page and the cover are monotonal, not truly deep or shaded. Still, the ornament looks good for the book it represents.

Features

As a Hallmark Keepsake ornament, "On The Night You Were Born" could have a sound or even a light effect, but it does not. Given that there is not an iconic reading (like an essential audiobook version) of the book On The Night You Were Born, consumers have no real expectation for an additional feature.

Balance

As with all ornaments, the intent of the Hallmark Keepsake "On The Night You Were Born" ornament is to be hung on a Christmas tree. And the "On The Night You Were Born" ornament is a poor option for anyone who has fond memories of childhood associated with the book upon which the ornament is based, based on the ornament's balance. The ornament has the brass hook loop embedded into the top of the book, slightly to the right from the spine. From that point, the On The Night You Were Born is very poorly balanced as the heavy sculpture weighs down the front at a noticeable and awkward pitch.

Collectibility

Hallmark Keepsake began delving into the collectibles market in 1991 with Star Trek when it introduced the exceptionally limited edition original U.S.S. Enterprise ornament (reviewed here!). Within a few years, every major franchise from Star Wars to A Nightmare Before Christmas to Indiana Jones started making Hallmark ornaments. "On The Night You Were Born" is a non-genre ornament that is not part of an annual series, but seemed to come to Hallmark from their licensing with Dreamworks. Given that it was one of the later releases of the season, it was not the most popular or best-selling ornaments Hallmark produced this year! With the original issue price of $15.95 seeming a little high and it not selling out anywhere I've found, it seems unlikely to appreciate in value anytime soon, especially if many of them are sold only via after-season clearance.

Overview

Fans of cute ornaments, children's books, Hallmark ornaments, and generic Christmas ornaments are likely to find the On The Night You Were Born ornament a bit of a disappointment for the price, especially with its severe balance issue.

For other non-genre Hallmark ornaments, please check out my reviews of:
2016 Holiday Celebration Barbie ornament
2016 "An Honorable Proposal" Gone With The Wind ornament
2015 The Poky Little Puppy Golden Book ornament

5/10

For other ornament reviews, please visit my Ornament Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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R.I.P. Ron Glass: Tonight We Listen To The Firefly Original Television Soundtrack For You!

The Good: Musically interesting, Decent duration
The Bad: Incomplete, Short pieces, Poor album flow
The Basics: Greg Edmonson's Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is an accurate collection, but not one that allows Edmonson to show off his musical prowess for more than three at a time.


Today, news broke that acclaimed actor Ron Glass died and it only continues to reinforce just how terrible 2016 has been. Ron Glass had a long career, which had new life breathed into it when he appeared on Joss Whedon's sleeper hit Firefly (reviewed here!) as Shepherd Book. Glass guest starred on a couple of episodes of Whedon's Marvel Cinematic Universe spin-out Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D., but rose to prominence on television with Barney Miller. Like innumerable fans of his work and Firefly, the only personal stories I have of Ron Glass involve encountering him at science fiction conventions. Still, he was one of the most gracious, kind, and articulate (I write that because one might be surprised how many actors have absolutely no opinions on their character or the work they are performing on - but Ron Glass did!) celebrities I ever met.

Tonight, as I contemplate the life of Ron Glass and fondly recall my brief meeting with him, I found that he was one of the casualties of 2016 who I wanted to write about and commemorate in my blog. The problem I quickly discovered, however, was that everything I have directly encountered with Ron Glass in it has already been the subject of a review! So, I thought I would sit and listen to the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack as I thought about Mr. Glass and his career and it occurred to me that I had never reviewed the album!

The Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is an interesting musical work that is intriguing to me as a fan of both Firefly and classical/modern classical music. It is also one that made me almost instantly regret using it as a way to commemorate Ron Glass. The Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is almost entirely the work of Greg Edmonson and the album is more than enough to make me want to track down an album of his original works. Sadly, Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is not a compelling work on its own.

It is not long into the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack that I was forced to recognize two things: 1. composer Greg Edmonson is hampered by his subject and 2. Firefly's soundtrack and themes might have been integral to the work, but they hold up very poorly out of context. The first point is a classic argument for television soundtracks, especially for works that have a lot of action in them. Composers like Edmonson create musical works to match scenes on a monitor and they work to heighten mood and convey a new emotional depth to subtly influence the viewer in other key scenes.

What Edmonson is not doing on the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is creating well-rounded musical works. Unlike something like The Red Violin Soundtrack (reviewed here!), where the pieces are of significant duration that they can musically develop as their own works to stand up outside the context of the film, the pieces on Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack are largely short and fractured. Within the twenty-five tracks on the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack, there are 44 titles and almost as many musical themes. Outside the Main Title theme, "River's Dance," "Inara's Theme," and "River Understands Simon," none of the tracks seem truly long enough to develop on their own into fully-realized musical pieces with their own development, themes and complexity. The song starts and before it can truly go somewhere transformational in the moment it was developing . . . we cut to commercial or worse, the song abruptly transitions from a soft, contemplative musical composition into a frenetic noisy piece that aurally shocks the listener.

With 25 tracks clocking out at 60:15, Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack accurately translates the music of Firefly to the listener. The music of Firefly is almost all present - Jayne's Cobb's bar tribute song is very noticeably absent from the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack. The average musical piece is in the two minute range and contains a blend of guitar, violins and mellow percussion. There are more noisy, cacophonic sequences that amp up the percussion and feature more aggressive guitars, but most of the more aggressive music is on the album's first half.

Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack fails to create a coherent musical expression and rather than beat that dead horse, it is germane to explore the second epiphany I had while listening to the album. There is very little music on the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack that is evocative of the show. I've listened to a lot of television soundtracks and usually I run into the opposite problem; I hear the musical composition and all I do is react to how it was in the television show. The Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is a suite of musical clips that evokes shockingly little in the way of recall to the moments they were paired with on the television series.

In other words, the compositions on the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack successfully enhanced the moods of the scenes they were present in, but in no way became so integrally linked with those scenes as to allow them to evoke them in the listener's mind. Perhaps the Firefly - Original Television Soundtrack is a good tribute to Ron Glass by contrast; his subtle deliveries and his mere presence enhanced every scene he was in, but his absence is keenly felt when he is absent.

For other soundtrack albums, please check out my reviews of:
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier Soundtrack
An Inconvenient Truth Soundtrack
Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack - The Bee Gees

4/10

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

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Mild Cocoa: Jelly Belly Hot Chocolate Jelly Beans Are All Right!

The Good: The flavor is not bad and does not fade, Good ingredients
The Bad: Environmentally irresponsible bulk, Flavor is not terribly strong, Only seasonally available!
The Basics: Jelly Belly Hot Chocolate jelly beans are interesting, but more average in their execution than they are exceptional.


Sometimes, ambition undermines a brand. In the case of Jelly Belly jelly beans, the idea of some of the flavors have been undermined by the Jelly Belly Dips, chocolate covered jelly beans. Before the Dips were created, chocolate-flavored Jelly Belly jelly beans were easily the standard of what a chocolate flavored jelly bean could be. Unfortunately, by making chocolate covered jelly beans, the Dips line of Jelly Belly beans has raised the bar for what one could expect of a jelly bean that is supposed to have a chocolate flavor. Having had some good flavors of Jelly Belly Dips, it is hard to go back to chocolate flavored jelly beans that do not contain actual chocolate. As such, it has taken me a while to get around to reviewing the Jelly Belly Hot Chocolate flavored jelly beans.

The Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans are only available for a limited time, in limited quantities, outside their seasonally-available winter Holiday Favorites assortment! So, I had to find the Hot Chocolate jelly beans in a one pound jar, as opposed to the bulk packages I usually like getting.

For those who might never have had Jelly Belly jelly beans, these are easily the best jelly beans on the planet, packing a lot of flavor into a very small size. Unlike most jelly beans which are only vaguely flavored and are more based on colors, Jelly Belly jelly beans have a wide variety of actual flavors, like Cranberry Sauce, The Beanboozled Assortment, Pancakes And Maple Syrup, or their signature flavor Buttered Popcorn.

The Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans are (currently) only available within assortments or in one-pound packages on their own. There is not currently a bulk option for these seasonally-available beans.

Basics

Hot Chocolate is a limited edition flavor of Jelly Belly jelly beans, which is being returned to the market as a seasonal bean. Jelly Belly jelly beans are approximately one half inch long by one quarter inch wide and they are roughly bean-shaped. These little candies are marketed to taste precisely like holiday Hot Chocolate and they have a somewhat chocolatey flavor that mimics the popular beverage.

Hot Chocolate flavored Jelly Bellys are remarkably easy to recognize and distinguish from other Jelly Bellys, except the other red/brown-colored beans. Hot Chocolate Jelly Bellys are a simple brownish red color.

Ease Of Preparation

These are jelly beans, not trying to make Hot Chocolate with milk over an open flame. In the case of the one pound jar, one might want to put them in a candy dish of some form as opposed to always going into the jar. Then again, the jar is not very large, so it’s not like you could spill a ton if your jar tips.

Taste

Hot Chocolate Jelly Bellys do not have a strong scent at all. Opening the bag of Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans, there is a vague cocoa smell, much like the scent of a mug that had hot chocolate in it, but the fluid has been drunk. The Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans are not overly aromatic.

On the tongue, the Hot Chocolate Jelly Bellys taste mildly chocolatey, a condition that is more generically sweet than they are distinctly chocolatey. The chocolate flavor is nowhere near as strong as the actual chocolate flavor from the real chocolate on Jelly Belly Dips. However, as one chews the Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans, the flavor of chocolate explodes from the center of the jelly beans. The Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans actually start to taste more and more like hot cocoa the more of them one places in the mouth!

Despite a somewhat more mild chocolate flavor than one might like, the Hot Chocolate flavored Jelly Bellys do not diminish in flavor, regardless of how many one consumes. One might have to eat a lot at a time, but they do not start tasting less flavorful as one goes on, which is nice!

Nutrition

Again, these are jelly beans, so anyone looking to them for nutrition needs to understand they based upon something that is not inherently nutritious! Fortunately, these are not at all fatty like chocolate has a tendency to be! Jelly beans, even Jelly Belly jelly beans, are not a legitimate source of nutrition. These are a snack food, a dessert, and are in no way an adequate substitute for a real meal. A serving is listed at thirty-five beans, with each Jelly Belly jelly bean having approximately four calories. This means that in a single serving, there are 140 calories, which is 12% of your daily recommended intake of carbs.

The thing is, Jelly Belly jelly beans are not as bad as they could be in the nutrition area. They have no fat and no protein, but for those who have ever dated a Vegan, these are Vegan compliant because they contain no gelatin! So long as your Vegan does not mind beeswax, these are Vegan compliant. They have only one percent of the daily sodium with 15 mg and they are gluten free! The Hot Chocolate jelly beans are made in a peanut-free factory and the main ingredients are sugar, corn syrup and modified food starch.

Storage/Clean-up

Jelly Belly jelly beans have a shelf life of approximately one year and I have yet to run across a stale Jelly Belly. They remain freshest when they are kept in an airtight container (the jar is fine, if it is kept sealed without air in it) and they ought to be kept in a lukewarm environment. Storing them in hot places is likely to make the beans stick together and be gross. Kept in a cool, dry place, the beans retain their flavor perfectly.

As for cleanup, unless one allows the Jelly Belly to get hot to the point that the waxy coating on the bean melts, the dyes on these do not bleed or denature, so there is usually no cleanup necessary, not even washing one's hands after eating them (even if they don't melt!). I've never had Hot Chocolate Jelly Bellys stain anything.

Overall

Hot Chocolate Jelly Belly jelly beans are all right, but the chocolate flavor is very mild, especially when compared to the Jelly Belly Dips, making them a harder sell for fans of Jelly Belly jelly beans than they ought to have been.

For other Jelly Belly jelly bean flavors reviewed by me, please check out:
Egg Nog
Tabasco
Coconut Dips

5/10

For other Jelly Belly jelly bean reviews, please check out my Ultimate Jelly Belly Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Agent Carter Flounders Through "Smoke & Mirrors"

The Good: Special effects, Character backstories are well-executed
The Bad: Imbalanced performances, Very obvious plot development and character arcs
The Basics: "Smoke & Mirrors" erratically mixes the past of Peggy Carter and Whitney Frost with clumsy progression of the season-long mystery around Zero Matter.


Whenever constructing a mystery, there is a tough balance to be found between servicing the story, servicing the characters and servicing the audience. Most mysteries unfold with the viewer learning at the same pace as the protagonist, with clues peppered in that they might have missed, which allow the viewer to get there first or have something to return to the work to look for in subsequent viewings. The least satisfying mysteries are those where the revelation is a long exposition at the end that is based upon leaps the detective makes that the viewer would not have been privy to. The other major way the formula can be shaken up is by letting the viewer know what is going on before the audience. In the second season of Agent Carter, the mystery the season is constructing is following that model. The key to pulling off such a mystery is in finding the right development that allows the protagonist to learn the truth in a reasonable amount of time. "Smoke & Mirrors" does not keep the viewer waiting very long.

"Smoke & Mirrors" continues the story where “Better Angels” (reviewed here!) left off, with Carter and Jarvis investigating the mystery surrounding the Zero Matter. As the second season of Agent Carter is essentially one long mystery, it is impossible to discuss the current episode without some revelation of how the show has gotten there. By the fourth episode of the second season of Agent Carter, the main players seem to be in place in the form of the mysterious Arena Social Club (which appears to be related to HYDRA) and Whitney Frost, who is a scientist posing as an actress. Frost is contaminated with the Zero Matter and has been revealed as able to release it at times, though her control is not yet clear. As "Smoke & Mirrors" picks up, Carter is hot on the case and given that the season has ten episodes and "Smoke & Mirrors" is episode four, viewers might come into the episode wondering just what will keep Agent Carter going the whole season when she is already so far up the right track.

Opening with Peggy Carter as a little girl playing before chided for being unladylike, the episode leaps up to 1947, where Agent Carter is discussing the truth about Whitney Frost with the disembodied Dr. Wilkes. Wilkes reveals that Frost was a scientist beyond genius who modified a power source to generate a stunning amount of power. As Frost tries to learn the extent of her abilities to use Zero Matter by trying to release it upon lab mice, Jarvis tracks down Mr. Hunt, Chadwick's driver and guard.

Carter is reunited with Sousa to interrogate Hunt. When Hunt is resistant to torture, Peggy uses a Stark bioweapon to get him talking. But, when Carter and Sousa prepare to make a raid on the Arena Club, Vernon Masters arrives to audit the West Coast SSR instead.

Peppered throughout the episode are flashbacks to young Agnes Cully (before she started using the alias Whitney Frost) and Peggy Carter as she was brought into the proto-SSR in Europe in 1940. The two groups of flashback offer contrasting views on the directions that both women took to get where they were. Agnes was a genius always studying and pushing herself to be more, resisting social conventions and family pressures in Oklahoma, while Carter was characterized as a code breaker who wanted to follow a very conventional lifescript until she was given an offer she could not refuse. Carter and her relationship with her brother Michael is vastly more interesting than any of the adult relationships Carter fumbles with in "Smoke & Mirrors." Unfortunately for Agent Carter, Agnes Cully is painted in "Smoke & Mirrors" as being more initially compelling than Peggy Carter through her backstory.

In the main narrative, Peggy Carter's relationship with Wilkes begins to develop true chemistry and sexual tension while they are entirely unable to act upon it. But, at the same time, Sousa comes through for Carter against Masters in a substantive way, which makes the episode feel like it is taking the shotgun approach to Carter's romantic life. This plays poorly in an episode where her committing to being a spy is finally revealed and Carter takes on a sense of adult resolve. Her seriousness in her albeit predictible flashback arc seems ridiculous beside the goofy buckshot romances of Agent Carter and her and Jarvis bumbling through getting to Hunt.

Arguably the peak of "Smoke & Mirrors" comes up early with a fairly original take on a character who is out of phase with our reality. The disembodied Wilkes is an interesting take on the old "ghost" character. As Wilkes attempts to describe what being affected by the Zero Matter feels like, the show has a feeling of being original. Seeing Wilkes look into the heart of the Zero Matter is an interesting moment of perspective that is well-executed as well.

Beyond that, "Smoke & Mirrors" develops Frost's condition by illustrating the side effects of releasing the Zero Matter by having the fissure on her forehead grow with each use. Hunt delivers a lot of exposition by revealing some of the members of the inner circle at the Arena Club, which puts Carter on track to discover all she needs to know about the proto-HYDRA group.

"Smoke & Mirrors" falters in trying to find a balance and remain at all compelling. The erratic nature of the character relationships and yet another work where torture is illustrated as being an effective means of getting reliable information is frustrating. But, for the overall narrative of season two of Agent Carter, "Smoke & Mirrors" is necessary for developing Whitney Frost and her newfound powers, even if it is hardly consistent.

For other works with Chris Mulkey, please check out my reviews of:
Whiplash
Cloverfield
Dreamland
Twin Peaks

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Agent Carter - The Complete Second Season, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the final season of Agent Carter here!
Thanks!]

3.5/10

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

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Less Defined Than They Could Be, The 2016 Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set Is Mediocre!

The Good: Some of the detailing, Sculpts are not bad
The Bad: Vastly overpriced for the size, Lack of coloring detail, Crowded bar
The Basics: Harry Potter fans have a lot to be excited about this holiday season, but the Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set is a tougher sell than it ought to be.


With the cinematic release of Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, there is renewed worldwide interest in the Harry Potter franchise (I'm not part of that fandom, so it it being called the Rowlingverse yet?!). Hallmark seemed to anticipate that that could be a factor this year and they released the Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set during the Ornament Preview Weekend back in July. The mini-ornament set of three tiny ornaments is a recreation of three prior Hallmark ornament releases in miniaturized forms. They are a nice way for fans to finally get the highly collectible ornaments that they might have missed . . . without diminishing the value of the original releases, which are - admittedly - higher quality releases.

For those unfamiliar with the franchise, the Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set contains miniaturized replica ornaments of three of the most important and distinct objects and familiars from the Harry Potter film series (reviewed here!): Hedwig, the Sorting Hat and the Golden Snitch. All three of the subjects of the 2016 Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set have been released as full-sized ornaments, but some - most notably the Golden Snitch ornament - were limited edition ornaments that sold out quickly and exploded in value in the secondary market.

In 2016, Hallmark released a limited edition set of three mini-ornaments of three distinct icons from the Harry Potter franchise with mixed results.

Basics

The "Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set" ornament set is a very simple ornament set, made of solid plastic, with a metal bar that connects the three mini-ornaments. The bar becomes crowded with the three mini-ornaments on it.

The Sorting Hat in the 2016 Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set is a 1 1/4" deep, wide, and tall ornament that is an excellent sculpt of the Sorting Hat that places every child at Hogwart's into their House. The Sorting Hat mini-ornament is a faithful sculpt of the old hat - though it does not have any threadbare aspect to its fringe to make it appear weathered. The face for the Sorting Hat is vaguely molded into its folds, but the eyes and mouth are not colored to highlight them, which makes it unimpressive.

The Golden Snitch looks like the Quiddich "ball" with very light surface detailing. Colored in monotones - a non-metallic gold and silver/gray plastic - the Golden Snitch is 1/2" tall, 7/8" wide and 1 3/8" deep. The Golden Snitch looks just liked the winged ball that Harry Potter caught and houses one of the Deathly Hallows, even though the wings are not as fine or in scale as they would need to be to perfectly replicate the enchanted object. Obviously, it does not open at the close.

The Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set version of Hedwig the owl is decent. The owl has her wings spread wide, with a vague recreation of Harry Potter's Hogwart's acceptance envelope in her talons. Hedwig is 2 1/2" wide, 7/8" tall and 1 1/4" deep. Hedwig's wings are a masterwork of fine detailing that show just how well Hallmark can make its small-scale ornaments.

Features

As a Hallmark Keepsake ornament, "Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set" subjects could have a function like a sound chip or light effect, but they do not. Given how they have such simple subjects, Hallmark did well without any bonus features. Though fans might have wanted a sound clip from the Sorting Hat used again, Hallmark opted for a less expensive, less sophisticated ornament. Far more problematic is the smaller nature of the bar upon which the three ornaments hang.

Balance

As with all ornaments, the intent of the Hallmark Keepsake "Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set" ornaments are to be hung on a Christmas Tree. And for those creating the ultimate fantasy Christmas Tree, the "Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set" ornaments are an intriguing addition, but not at all an essential one. Each ornament has a hook loop at the top of the character or artifact and they hang on a little metal bow that is balanced, but very crowded with the three mini-ornaments on it.

Collectibility

Hallmark Keepsake began delving into the collectibles market in 1991 with Star Trek when it introduced the exceptionally limited edition original U.S.S. Enterprise ornament (click here for that review!). Since then, they have delved into virtually every other collectible franchise in an attempt to cash in on every major license. The Harry Potter series has had several ornaments made for it and the "Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set" ornaments is an inexpensive way to get in some of the more expensive subjects from the Harry Potter Hallmark ornament line.

There are very few limited edition Hallmark ornaments that have remained available the way the 2016 Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set has, but if Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them actually reaches its audience and reinvigorates the merchandising surrounding Harry Potter, odds are excellent that this ornament set will appreciate in value.

Overview

The 2016 Harry Potter Ornament Collection Set is a mixed execution of previously-released Hallmark ornaments that are marginally interesting, but somewhat unnecessary even for die-hard collectors. While they might have enduring collectible value, that value is based more on their rarity than their inherent quality.

For other Harry Potter ornaments, please check out my reviews of:
2016 Ollivanders Wand Shop
2015 Platform 9 3/4
2014 The Sorting Hat
2013 Hogwarts Castle
2012 The Final Battle
2011 The Golden Snitch (Limited Edition!)
2011 Fleeing The Fiendfyre
2010 The Pensieve
2010 A Gift For Dobby (Limited Edition!)
2009 "Harry! Happy Birthday!"
2001 Hogwarts School Crests mini-ornament set

4.5/10

For other ornament reviews, please visit my Ornament Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Descent Out Of Charm: Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life Peaks Early!

The Good: First two episodes, Most of the acting
The Bad: Second pair of episodes, Character and plot direction
The Basics: Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life starts with an intriguing reuinion of beloved characters who are all experiencing some sense of loss . . . before the show treads in the most familiar and unpleasant directions that Gilmore Girls went in.


When Netflix started producing Netflix Original Television programs, it was interesting to watch how quickly they moved from producing new content from previously-cancelled shows - like Arrested Development - to creating original content, like House Of Cards and Hemlock Grove. What seemed intriguing was how long it took the "network" to go back to buying up shuttered projects to revive them with new seasons. The latest revival is Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life, a four-episode season that returns the viewer to the world of Gilmore Girls (reviewed here!). Picking up ten years after Gilmore Girls is an interesting concept, though it is hard to see the inherent need (the final season of Gilmore Girls did a very good job of closing the book on the portion of Lorelai and Rory's lives that the show chronicled) and requires a lot of faith that the writers would do a condensed season justice.

The concept of Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is a solid one: there are four ninety-minute episodes, each one presenting a season of a year in the life of the three main Gilmore women - Rory, Lorelai and Emily. Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is a tough execution of the concept and it is strange that executive producers and writers Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino skew toward where Gilmore Girls went before instead of treading into something truly new. After an initial high level of charm as Rory and Lorelai come back into each other's lives in more meaningful ways, there is torsion in their relationship and both protagonists find themselves aimless. But fans of Gilmore Girls have seen that before; when Rory had an affair with Dean while he was married and lost Lorelai's respect . . . and Rory ran away to Richard and Emily's.

It wasn't until the end of "Summer" that I came to recognize that I had some expectations for Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life and that those expectations were not being met. Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life could have been the story of an adult child floundering in a world beyond her control and her turning to her floundering mother and the two lifting each other out of their depressions and fears. But long before "Summer" ends, it is painfully clear that Rory has become unlikable in addition to aimless (her disdain for the Thirtysomething Crowd seems arrogant and her cheating on Paul with Logan creates a forced level of moral ambiguity that feels entirely cheap) and Lorelai has become so painfully emotionally distant that when the musical number in "Summer" comes up, it shines a light on just how broken Lorelai has been.

But the real wrench in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is how the characters - who have been characterized by communications - are simply not communicating. Fans of Gilmore Girls who might be thrilled to seek Lorelai and Luke living together soon realize that there is no passion in their relationship; fans of the mother/daughter story of Lorelai and Rory quickly see that the two aren't actually having conversations (which is a real bummer because Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life opens with a classic patter between the two). So, instead of growth and development, Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life quickly forces conflict between Lorelai and Emily and Lorelai and Rory.

Opening in winter when Rory returns to Stars Hollow after leaving her apartment in New York, after getting a piece published in The New Yorker, Rory and Lorelai are reunited. Rory is trying to remember to break up with her utterly forgettable boyfriend, Paul, while jetting around trying to sell her next piece and crashing at various friends' homes. Lorelai is struggling with trying to find a new chef for the Dragonfly Inn and with her estrangement from her mother, following an incident at her father's funeral. Rory's return forces Lorelai and Emily back together and an offhanded remark from Emily causes Lorelai to explore having children with Luke. After a somewhat disastrous visit to Paris Geller's surrogacy business (while Rory is off in London meeting with Naomi, the subject of the book she wants to write, and hooking up with Logan), Lorelai and Luke reach the conclusion that they will not be having a child together.

In Spring, Lorelai goes to therapy with Emily, which is completely unpleasant for both of them. While Rory tries to get good material out of Naomi in London, Stars Hollow struggles with b-list actors who are working on a film in Woodbury occupying the Dragonfly Inn. When Conde Nast continues to put off their meeting with Rory, she turns to Logan Huntsberger's father for help. Emily has a private meeting with Luke where she reveals that Richard left money for Luke to franchise his diner . . . and then she takes him out to look at properties. Rory's life comes unhinged after an alumni event at Chilton when her writing options are winnowed away and she tries to write an article for GQ, but ends up having her first ever one night stand with a cosplay Wookie!

Rory moves back to Stars Hollow (despite her protestations) in summer. April visits Lorelai and Luke's and soon after, Jesse visits the town. To try to bring revenue to Stars Hollow, Taylor commissions a play: Stars Hollow: The Musical and Lorelai soon cuts out of the therapy she had continued after her mother bailed when her therapist auditions for a role. Emily becomes listless and obsessed with getting Richard's headstone right, after Rory encourages her to go back into the world. Stars Hollow's secret bar becomes the setting by which Michel tenders his resignation to Lorelai and when Rory pitches writing a book about their lives together, Lorelai rejects the idea soundly and decides to go on a walkabout.

Fall finds Lorelai going on a Wild-style walkabout in the Pacific Crest Trail. Jess returns to Stars Hollow to help his mother and T.J. and Luke. While Lorelai struggles with her walkabout, Rory is reunited with the Life And Death Brigade for a wild night. After Logan offers her a place to write, she rejects the offer and returns to her job renewed. When she cannot find her permit, Lorelai goes for a very short walk and it leads her to call her mother to tell her the story of her best memory of her father. When Lorelai returns home, Luke stands up for himself and their relationship. And Lorelai finally makes a leap with Luke that shows him how she feels.

As one might expect, the return of the beloved characters from Gilmore Girls are a key aspect of Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life. For those who are unfamiliar with them, the key characters in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life are:

Lorelai Gilmore - Rory's mother and the owner of the Dragonfly Inn, she is struggling to make her relationship with Luke Danes work when she comes to realize that years prior he hinted he might want a child with her. She drinks a lot of coffee and is psyched to have Rory in her life more frequently again, even as she searches for a replacement chef for Sooki. She attends therapy with Emily, but when her mother abandons her grief counseling, she continues on her own. She tries to guide Rory, but is unsettled when Rory returns home. Goaded by Emily, she starts to see the dysfunction in her relationship with Luke and she decides to go to nature rather than actually deal with Luke and Rory.

Rory Gilmore - Having written a piece for The New Yorker that makes everyone in Stars Hollow proud, she is struggling to find her next piece that will sell. While finding that she is in a two year relationship with Paul, she meets with the eccentric Naomi Shropshire in London and pitches a book deal with her. She has boxes of her possessions shipped all over so she can crash with anyone of her friends and family. She finds Naomi is too drunk to be coherent and when the website that has been wooing her changes their mind after interviewing her, she moves back in with Lorelai! She takes over the Stars Hollow Gazette when the old managing editor abruptly retires. After taking a few stabs at doing things her way, she returns the newspaper to its traditional narrative. She is encouraged by Jess to write a book about her life with her mother and when her mother rejects the idea, she turns to Logan for support . . . only to discover that his arranged relationship plans with a French society woman are finally being executed.

Sookie - Having gone on sabbatical from the Dragonfly Inn, her absence forces Lorelai to try to hire someone new to cook. She pops up, though, to help Lorelai at a key moment in her friend's life.

Lane Kim - She is still married, with her two children and she is still in her band. She has not seen Rory for quite some time before Rory returns to Stars Hollow and has some boxes shipped to her place. At the Spring food event in Stars Hollow, she runs the Korean food table. She starts supporting Rory when Rory returns to town full-time, including trying to help her kick her Logan habit. She and Zack play music at the Silent Bar in Stars Hollow.

Paris - Now the owner and manager of Dynasty Makers surrogacy service, she is estranged from Doyle. She is as aggressive as ever, but is highly successful (namedropping to Lorelai and Luke that her service was recently used by Neil Patrick Harris!). She turns to Rory for help when they go back to Chilton for an alumni event (she terrifies the students she speaks to!) and she is psyched when Rory is willing to look after her kids occasionally.

Kirk - Still flitting from project to project, he starts as the owner of Ooo-ber, a car service, before he starts a grog cart business. He helps Taylor run the Spring International food celebration in Stars Hollow. He releases his second film, finally, and he is shocked (as a pig owner) to realize that his love of BLTs makes him a purveyor of pig genocide.

Michel - Married for five years to Frederick, he still works for Lorelai at the Dragonfly Inn. He is anxious about Frederick suddenly wanting children and about Lorelai firing every great chef who comes to work at the Dragonfly Inn. He becomes restless when the b-list actors stay at the Dragonfly, which makes Lorelai convinced he will abandon her, just as Sooki did. After visiting New York City and one of the prestigious hotels there, he tenders his resignation as he knows Lorelai cannot afford to pay him what he is worth. He starts to act kindly toward children visiting the Dragonfly Inn to prepare for possibly having a kid of his own.

Emily Gilmore - Lorelai's mother, widowed by Richard four months ago, she has been estranged from Lorelai because of things Lorelai said at Richard's funeral. She mistakenly gets a portrait of her dead husband made in a massive size and tries to declutter her mansion because things there do not bring her joy. She takes Lorelai's advice and gets into therapy. After a few unproductive sessions with Lorelai in therapy, she turns her attention to franchising Luke's diner . . . even though he has no desire to franchise. She retreats from the world, but is encouraged by Rory to re-engage. Getting active in the D.A.R. and at the club again brings her a renewed sense of vitality. She begins to see one of Richard's old friends socially. She stands up to the artifice of her old life rather abruptly.

and Luke Danes - Living with Lorelai and giving out false wi-fi passwords at his diner to patrons there, he is now ambivalent to the idea of having a child with Lorelai. He is still annoyed by Taylor (who is obsessed with a Stars Hollow sewer project) and put off by Rory's unmemorable boyfriend, Paul. He lives with Lorelai and is shocked when Emily tries to execute Richard's wish to have his diner franchised. He has been going along with Lorelai's arrangement for the two of them and he is shocked when Lorelai decides to go on a walkabout.

Fans of Gilmore Girls are likely to love the cameos, both integral (Sebastian Bach!) and obscure - the appearance of Jason at Richard's funeral is an excellent touch that makes perfect sense for the continuity, even if he was a largely forgettable relationship in Lorelai's parade of men. The Town Troubadour is back and characters like April, Doyle, and even Francie make brief appearances. There are some fun cameos for those who love the actors on Gilmore Girls - like Mae Whitman, Lauren Graham's on-screen daughter on Parenthood, who shows up just long enough to be recognized. And when Jason Ritter and Peter Krause show up, it is hard not to smirk.

Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life misses the opportunity to tell a fresh story, though, as the characters move toward a predictable sense of conflict. Gilmore Girls was often at its best when it was the Gilmore women against the world - woman vs. society stories. In fact, the essential conflict that opened Gilmore Girls was one woman struggling against a sense of poverty that pushed her to fight for something better for her daughter. Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life has everyone unhappy and there is nothing entertaining about that. Lorelai has been in a relationship with Luke for nine years . . . but they don't talk, they don't connect, they just live together. Rory is cheating on one man with a man who is engaged to be married . . . there's nothing interesting or compelling about her lack of integrity or character in not cutting Paul loose and maintaining an emotional dependence upon Logan. And Emily's journey through her grief in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is woefully underplayed (in favor of a strange series of jokes involving her new housekeeper who does not speak a recognizable language) and is not used to truly advance the character or the relationship Emily has with her daughter or grand daughter.

On the acting front, Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life provides some wonderful actors with familiar parts to play and more than giving viewers something new to thrill to, it simply reminds the viewers what they loved about the performers before. Lauren Graham has a good cry in "Summer" that allows her to illustrate emotional range without any lines and when Scott Patterson's Luke finally stands up for himself, it is a welcome thing. But Alexis Bledel is overshadowed by Liza Weil in every scene they share and Bledel playing Rory as listless quickly wears thin. Bledel never acts loving in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life and given that the core relationship of Gilmore Girls is the bond shared by a mother and daughter, Bledel and Graham lacking chemistry is somewhat devastating in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life.

The fact that one of the biggest emotional scenes of Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life allows Milo Ventimiglia and Scott Patterson to illustrate a depth and development of their characters' relationship says something. Jess and Luke grew into a relationship where they can be emotionally honest with one another, while Lorelai simply goes where Wild (book and movie) went before. Kelly Bishop is consistent as Emily, though she is unfortunately underused for her range and abilities.

Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is not bad, but it belabors the references to Gilmore Girls - the return of the Life And Death Brigade is particularly droll and seems like time that could have been better spent doing something with Rory and Lane to actually develop their adult relationship - while highlighting a number of the worst character aspects of the beloved characters and neglecting the aspects that made Gilmore Girls fresh. The dialogue in Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is nowhere near as fast, the references are far more sparse and the relationships are more strained than they are emotionally deep or connected. Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life is not bad, but it peaks early and becomes dramatically less charming as it progresses.

For other Netflix exclusive television shows, please check out my reviews of:
Luke Cage - Season 1
House Of Cards - Season 3
Orange Is The New Black - Season 4
Daredevil - Season 2
Jessica Jones - Season 1
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt - Season 2
Grace And Frankie - Season 2
Sense8 - Season 1
Arrested Development - Season 4
Stranger Things - Season 1

5/10

For other television series and episode reviews, please visit my Television And Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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