Darren

American Nightmares, Part I: Old Frontiers… (The Revenant/The Hateful Eight)

Posted on August 9, 2016 by Darren

Trying something new. Or rather something old. Been a while since we published an old-fashioned thinkpiece on here, and been thinking a lot about America as filtered through film in 2015-2016. We’ll be publishing a series of these articles in the coming week. If you’d like to see more of this sort of content, please comment or share or facebook or tweet, so we know you like it.

The United States of America is a relatively young country.

Like all other countries, it has its own history and mythology. As with many of those countries, that history and mythology intertwine. The European settlers may have inherited some of that mythology from their ancestors across the Atlantic or appropriated some from the indigenous population, but a lot of that history and mythology was cultivated wholesale. The American Dream. Manifest Destiny. The idea that this was a wild continent to be tamed through the sheer strength of will of those rugged early settlers.

Britain has knights. Ireland has rebels. America has cowboys. It is tempting to look upon these archetypal mythic figures as something far removed from the modern day, something so far in the distant past that they may never have existed as all. Particularly given the historical decline of the western genre in recent decades, it is easy to consider the cowboy a historical artifact covered in centuries of dust and disconnected from the modern world. Billy the Kid does not seem so far removed from King Arthur, Wyatt Earp from Brian Boru.

Of course, the reality is much more complicated. The overlap between the history and mythology is striking; these stories seemed to be mythologised before they were allowed to fad into history. The Great Train Robbery was released in 1903, and generally considered to be the first cinematic western. Although past its prime, the era of the American frontier was still in progress. Oklahoma would only become a state in 1907, with Arizona and New Mexico would become states in 1912. There is a sense that the country was still forming as the mythology coalesced.

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Filed under: Movies, Opinion | Tagged: america, the hateful eight, the revenant, trump, western | 8 Comments »

Star Trek – For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky (Review)

Posted on August 8, 2016 by Darren

This July and August, we’re celebrating the release of Star Trek Beyond by taking a look back at the third season of the original Star Trek. Check back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the latest update.

Well, at least it has a great title.

For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky is one of the great Star Trek titles, at once lyrical and pretension, poetic and absurd. It is a turn of phrase that nobody would ever use in conversation, but which so beautifully evokes the science-fiction concept that drives the episode. It is certainly a lot more memorable and compelling than the stock “The [noun]” naming convention employed all too readily in television production. (The Changeling, The Empath, The Survivor, The Battle, The Enemy, The Forsaken. And so on.)

Shockingly bad.

Indeed, For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky seems to be the gold-standard of Star Trek naming. Earlier episodes like The Conscience of the King or Dagger of the Mind had quoted from Shakespeare, while Is There in Truth No Beauty? alluded to the work of Keats. However, it seemed like every subsequent Star Trek title would stand in the shadow of this third season instalment. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine would make a valiant effort with titles like … Nor the Battle to the Strong or Let He Who Is Without Sin…

Unfortunately, the title is very much best thing about For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky. Outside of that, the episode is a rather generic and conventional stew of old Star Trek standards thrown together with a bunch of half-hearted soap opera clichés. It is all rather hollow.

“I will love you forever. Or until the end of the episode. Whichever is sooner.”

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky, generation ship, Leonard McCoy, McCoy, star trek | 7 Comments »

Star Trek – The Tholian Web (Review)

Posted on August 5, 2016 by Darren

Who hath seen the Phantom Ship,
Her lordly rise and lowly dip,
Careering o’er the lonesome main,
No port shall know her keel again…
Ah, woe is in the awful sight,
The sailor finds there eternal night,
‘Neath the waters he shall ever sleep,
And Ocean will the secret keep

– Albert Pinkham Ryder, 1897

Here there be ghosts…

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: chet richards, fred freiberger, ghost ship, ghost stories, judy burns, maritime, ralph senensky, star trek, the tholian web | 6 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates

Posted on August 4, 2016 by Darren

There is something subversive lurking at the heart of Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates.

The film’s single best gag comes very early in the film, putting a wry twist on audience expectations. The movie’s opening credits feature the eponymous characters at a number of family occasions; birthday parties, weddings. Like any pair of overgrown manchildren, Mike and Dave imagine themselves to the be the life of the party. And, for the length of the opening credits, the audience is invited to see them in that manner. Their dance moves look impressive. Their costumes are fabulous. They brought their own fireworks. These guys, they know how to party.

More like “Wedding Crushers”, am I right?

In another comedy about arrested masculine development, that would be the end of it. The credits would establish the pair as the life and soul of any social gathering and maybe need to learn to balance that with some maturity. It is to the credit of Mike and Dave Need Weeding Dates that the film returns to that montage quite quickly. Insisting that the boys behave themselves at their sisters’ wedding, the duo object and insist that they are the party. “We thought you might say that,” remarks their father, reaching for the home media system.

The film then proceeds to demonstrate what happened directly after the impressive shots from the opening credits. There is devastation. There is catastrophe. There are broken bodies. Dave protests that this is not at all representative, and demands that their father edit back in the “epic tracking shots” that showcase how cool they are. It is the movie’s strongest moment, a skilful subversion of a comedy standard that suggests Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates might have a much better sense of irony than its two lead characters.

Mike and Dave need to have a long conversation about the direction their life has taken.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: adolescent, comedy, male gaze, men, mike and dave, Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, non-review review, review | 6 Comments »

Star Trek – The Empath (Review)

Posted on August 3, 2016 by Darren

Like Is There in Truth No Beauty? before it, The Empath is very much “weird big ideas” version of Star Trek.

It is a simple story, as Kirk and his away team visit a planet in a star system about to go nova. It deals with fairly universal themes, like compassion and humanity. There are stakes, there are aliens, there is a test of worthiness. In many ways, The Empath is a quintessential Star Trek episode, one of those classic “humanity proves their worth to a powerful alien species” narratives in the style of Arena or Spectre of the Gun. The biggest deviation from that template is the fact that it is not humanity on trial; it is an unknown species represented by an anonymous mute.

The triumvirate triumphant.

However, The Empath works in large part due to this simplicity. There is an elegance to the story, one that distils a lot of core Star Trek ideals down to their very essence. The Empath is very much a “humans are special” story, in the vein of episodes like Lonely Among Us or The Last Outpost. However, it works better than most of these stories because it hits on a very strong core idea. The Empath suggests that what makes humanity special is not necessarily unique or intrinsic or intangible. According to The Empath, what makes humanity special is pretty basic.

As the title implies, humanity’s greatest virtue might be its empathy or its compassion.

Although humanity also offers “Shirtless Shat.”

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: compassion, humanism, star trek, the empath, utopianism | 4 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Suicide Squad

Posted on August 2, 2016 by Darren

Suicide Squad is a mess.

Like many contemporary blockbusters, it is overplotted and convoluted. For a film with a (relatively) straightforward story and an impressively large ensemble, Suicide Squad twists and turns in a way that makes it impossible to pin down. The film never seems entirely sure when enough is enough, and always seems ready to pile more on top. The film is never entirely sure what the audience should know at a given moment, particularly compared to the characters. Character development is secondary to a series of quick gags and cheap one-liners.

Whacky.

At the same time, there is a certain charm to the film, once it gets past the clunky exposition or the twisty plot or the inevitable myriad of complications that serve to eat up screentime. The core concept of a team of supervillains enlisted to deal with a national crisis is a great story hook, and Suicide Squad featured a collection of intriguing characters brought to life by a fairly great cast. Suicide Squad works best when it lets those characters cut loose, when it cedes the screen to Margot Robbie or Will Smith. There is an energy and verve to it that is contagious.

That energy does not make up for the movie’s shortcomings, but couple with David Ayer’s sense of momentum, it helps to keep the train from coming off the rails for most of the movie’s two-hour runtime.

‘Sup Squad?

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: batman, David Ayer, film, Movie, non-review review, review, suicide squad | 10 Comments »

Star Trek – Is There in Truth No Beauty? (Review)

Posted on August 1, 2016 by Darren

The third season of Star Trek is very odd. It stands quite apart from the previous two seasons.

There are a lot of reasons for this; a new executive producer, the loss of veterans from the first two seasons, production limitations imposed by a slashed budget. Star Trek was never a lavish show, and it always faced production challenges, but those challenges were never more acute than during the third season. In a lot of cases, that oddness is not a good thing. And the Children Shall Lead and Spock’s Brain are very strange pieces of television, but not in a good way. They are clumsy, cheap, ill-judged and ill-advised.

Healthy green glow.

At the same time, that strange vibe of the third season is not inherently bad. There are a number of episodes produced during the third season (particularly during this stretch of the third season) that feel weird and odd, but also refreshing and exciting. Episodes like Is There in Truth No Beauty?, The Empath and The Tholian Web have an eccentric and ethereal quality to them that feels quite removed from the first two seasons of the show. They are also three of the strongest episodes of the season, feeling adventurous and playful.

After all, for all that the third season is maligned, it is surprisingly influential. The third season of Star Trek contributes a great deal to the language and iconography of the franchise, perhaps as a result of the unusual constraints and production realities that inform it. Is There in Truth No Beauty? is an odd little tale, but it is also a clever and effective metaphor that explores grand ideas in the classic Star Trek tradition.

Jonesing for for some Diane Muldaur.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: diane muldaur, feminism, is there in truth no beauty?, Jean Lisette Aroeste, kirk, lovecraft, ralph senensky, spock, star trek | 11 Comments »

Star Trek – Spock’s Brain (Review)

Posted on July 29, 2016 by Darren

Spock’s Brain is not the worst episode of Star Trek ever produced.

Indeed, Spock’s Brain is not even the worst episode of the third season as a whole. More than that, Spock’s Brain is not even the worst episode of the third season to this point. Spock’s Brain is a pretty bad piece of television, but it seems difficult to argue that the episode is quantifiably worse than Elaan of Troyius, The Paradise Syndrome or And the Children Shall Lead. However, the episode’s reputation looms large in the broader context of the Star Trek canon. Many would point to this as the worst episode that the show ever produced.

“Check out the big brain on Spock!”

To be fair, Star Trek fandom has never been entirely consistent or even-handed when it comes to identifying the worst that the franchise has to offer. This is a fandom that decided that Star Trek Into Darkness was somehow a worse film than Star Trek V: The Final Frontier or Star Trek: Nemesis, and that Threshold was somehow the worst episode of Star Trek: Voyager despite sharing a season with episodes like Tattoo and Alliances. When dealing with consensus fan opinion, it is always interesting to wonder why such things matter over others.

Spock’s Brain is pretty dire. It is sexist, it is ill-judged, it looks cheap, and its underlying premise is beyond absurd. It was also the first episode of the third season to be broadcast. In a way, it seemed like the ultimate affront to fandom. After all, these fans had worked really hard to convince NBC to bring the show back for a third season. Having those same hardcore fans tune into the new time slot to catch Spock’s Brain must have seemed like the ultimate insult, a hokey sci-fi b-movie premise executed on a tiny budget from a show that normally did much better.

The brains of the operation.

There is an element of nostalgia to this reading of Star Trek. The franchise has always had a goofy side, even beyond the necessity for science-bending budget-saving plot devices like warp drive or the transporter. The franchise has a long history of misunderstanding the concept of evolution (see Genesis, Threshold or Dear Doctor) or embracing Erich von Däniken (see Return to Tomorrow, The Paradise Syndrome or The Chase). Star Trek has always run on ridiculous ideas, opening with a story about how voyaging outside the universe turns a person into a god.

Indeed, goofiness is part of the joy of Star Trek, from the giant green space hand in Who Mourns for Adonais? through to the pleasures of space!Lincoln in The Savage Curtain. More than that, the goofiness can even lead to truly spectacular episodes and stories in its own right, as with the weird space!amoeba in The Immunity Syndrome or the “planet of the gangsters” in A Piece of the Action. (Similarly, the “planet of the Romans” in Bread and Circuses and “planet of the Nazis” in Patterns of Force are also underrated episodes.)

Okay, Kirk. It’s not THAT painful.

It is perhaps a combination of factors that accounts for the hatred directed at Spock’s Brain. It is not just the goofy premise, because there have been goofier premises before. It is not just the sexism, because there has been more overt sexism before and there is more overt sexism to follow. It is not just the bad script, because there have been terrible scripts before. It is not just the cheapness of the episode, because the show’s ambition always outstripped its production budget.

It is a combination of these factors, culminating in the decision that Spock’s Brain should be the show to open the third season of Star Trek on television. This is the stalking horse for the disjointed and uneven third season, and it seems like it is the first show caught in the cross-hairs.

Matters come to a head.

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: camp, feminism, Gene L. Coon, organ transplant, sixties, spock's brain, star trek | 10 Comments »

Star Trek – And the Children Shall Lead (Review)

Posted on July 27, 2016 by Darren

Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don’t criticize
What you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly agin’
Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin’.

– Bob Dylan, The Times, They Are A-Changin’, 1964

Either you Gorgan, or you be gone.

And the Children Shall Lead is a notoriously terrible episode of television.

It is also another reminder that the sixties are coming to an end, and (with them) Star Trek. For a so that is widely considered progressive and utopian, Star Trek often seemed to struggle with its perspective on the various social issues of the sixties. Fans might point to episodes like A Taste of Armageddon or Errand of Mercy as sweeping condemnations of the Vietnam and the Cold War, but they tend to gloss over the patriotic defence of United States foreign policy in episodes like A Private Little War or The Omega Glory.

“I regret to inform you, Captain, that the script is indeed ‘that bad’.”

Star Trek seemed very strongly divided on the countercultural movement. In many ways, Spock spoke to a generation of young people distanced from their parents and disenfranchised from the status quo, while the franchise imagined a bright future in which people of different colours and creeds worked together. On the other hand, the show was also quite anxious and condescending about the threat counterculture posed to the establishment, as demonstrated in episodes like Operation — Annihilate! or This Side of Paradise.

Although The Way to Eden tends to get treated as the third season’s definitive statement on the hippie movement, And the Children Shall Lead is a much more patronising and reactionary response. It is a fifty-minute public service message about the dangers that radical ideas pose to young minds and why those young minds should never dare to question their elders, who almost certainly know best.

A healthy green glow…

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Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: and the children shall lead, children, counterculture, fred freiberger, gorgan, hippies, melvin belli, star trek, youth | 16 Comments »

Star Trek – The Enterprise Incident (Review)

Posted on July 25, 2016 by Darren

The Enterprise Incident is generally regarded as one of the masterpieces of Star Trek‘s much troubled third season.

The third season of Star Trek has cultivated a reputation as a failure or a disappointment, a collection of episodes that are wildly disjointed at best and openly frustrating at worst. This disappointment is largely justified. While the third season struggled with a number of problems beyond its control, there were also a number of serious self-inflicted wounds. The production team consciously chose to bury Spectre of the Gun deep in the running order while pulling Spock’s Brain forward to be the season premiere.

When on Romulus…

However, the third season of Star Trek is not the disaster that many would claim. Taken as a whole, the season is much weaker than the first two seasons, but it also has its share of strong and classic episodes. There are classics upon which everybody agrees, like The Enterprise Incident or The Tholian Web. However, there are also any number of delightful oddities like Spectre of the Gun or The Empath. Still, there is a sense that the show is not everything that it once was, and that things have changed.

In some respects, The Enterprise Incident is the most conventional and “classic” of the third season episodes, the episode that feels the most “of a piece” with the first two seasons. It is also the last Star Trek episode of the original series to be credited to franchise veteran Dorothy Fontana.