chris knowles | the m0vie blog

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 3, Episode 22 (“Goodbye to All That”)

Posted on April 13, 2021 by Darren

Last year, I was thrilled to spend a lot of time on The Time is Now discussing the second season of Millennium. Since the podcast has moved on to the third season, I have taken something of a step back as a guest. That said, I have been a bit more active in the second half of the third season. I was flattered to get an invitation to discuss the show’s final episode, Goodbye to All That, with host Kurt North and guest Chris Knowles.

The series finale of Millennium is a strange beast. It tries to do a lot, and doesn’t always accomplish what it attempts with particular grace or finesse. Still, it does represent an attempt to reconcile the show to itself, to bring the characters and the narrative to a place where something resembling closure is within reach. It doesn’t entirely work, but it is a valiant effort.

As ever, you can listen directly to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: chris knowles, conclusions, endings, frank black, goodbye to all that, kurt north, millennium, peter watts, serial killers | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 3, Episode 21 (“Via Dolorosa”)

Posted on April 6, 2021 by Darren

Last year, I was thrilled to spend a lot of time on The Time is Now discussing the second season of Millennium. Since the podcast has moved on to the third season, I have taken something of a step back as a guest. That said, I have been a bit more active in the second half of the third season. I was flattered to get an invitation to discuss the show’s penultimate episode, Via Dolorosa, with host Kurt North and guest Chris Knowles.

The series finale of Millennium is an episode that I’m admittedly divided on. It’s a two-parter that attempts to a staggering amount: to tell one last serial killer of the week story, to pull back and look at the bigger picture around these monsters, to wrap up the major character arcs for both the season and the show, and to serve as a satisfying conclusion to an uneven season and to a wildly disjointed series as a whole. It’s a lot to ask of a two parter, and Millennium certainly makes a valiant – if imperfect – effort.

As ever, you can listen directly to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: chris knowles, kurt north, millennium, Narrative, podcast, reflection, serial killers, show, Television, the time is now, violence | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 3, Episode 12 (“The Sound of Snow”)

Posted on January 26, 2021 by Darren

Last year, I was thrilled to spend a lot of time on The Time is Now discussing the second season of Millennium. Since the podcast has moved on to the third season, I have taken something of a step back as a guest. That said, I was flattered to get an invitation to discuss The Sound of Snow with the fantastic Kurt North and the wonderful Chris Knowles.

The Sound of Snow my favourite episode of the third season of Millennium, serving as a nice epilogue to the second season finale The Fourth Horseman and The Time is Now. It is an episode that is largely about grief and moving on, about coming to terms with loss and about working through it. In some ways, it feels like a necessary story for the third season of Millennium as a whole, and it is only a shame that it takes half a season for the show to reach the point where it can tell this story.

As ever, you can listen directly to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: catherine black, chris knowles, death, frank black, grief, kurt north, millennium, podcast, the sound of snow, the time is now | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 1, Episode 19 (“Powers, Principalities, Thrones and Dominions”)

Posted on September 2, 2019 by Darren

Wrapping up a late-first-season exploration of Millennium with the incomparable Christopher Knowles, I was thrilled to pop onto The Time is Now to discuss Powers, Principalities, Thrones and Dominions.

In case the title doesn’t give the game away, Powers, Principalities, Thrones and Dominions is a delightfully weird episode of television. It finds Frank Black confronting the loss of his best friend Bob Bletcher by becoming embroiled in an epic and existential conflict that exists at the very limits of his understanding. It might involve a ritualistic killer and a corrupt lawyer, but it may also involve renegade angels and the forces of hell operating on the mortal plane. The beauty of Powers, Principalities, Thrones and Dominions lies in the ambiguity.

Indeed, that ambiguity was a huge part of the fun in discussing the episode with Chris. I think we both had slightly different reads on what the episode was about and where it was coming from, which speaks to its strength as an episode of television. It’s a staggering piece of work, one that obviously lays the groundwork for Patient X and The Red and the Black in the fifth season of The X-Files.

As ever, you can listen to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: angels, chris knowles, demons, epic, frank black, millennium, war in heaven | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Time is Now – Season 1, Episode 17 (“Walkabout”)

Posted on August 26, 2019 by Darren

As ever, a delight to stop by The Time is Now to talk about Millennium, this week reteaming with the fantastic Christopher Knowles.

As the show moves through the second half of its first season, it becomes progressively more adventurous and ambitious. While complaints about the “serial killer of the week” format might be a little unfair to the first fourteen or so episodes, the final stretch of the season embraces a more experimental aesthetic. Walkabout centres on a drug trial, one in which Frank appears to have been a participant. His memory foggy, Frank struggles to figure out what he might have been doing there. As tensions rise with both Catherine and Peter, Frank becomes convinced there’s more to the situation than meets the eye.

It was a joy to discuss the episode with Chris. As ever, you can listen to the episode here, subscribe to the podcast here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Millennium, Podcasts! | Tagged: chris knowles, drug trials, frank black, millennium, pharmaceuticals | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The X-Cast – Season 3, Episode 2 (“Paper Clip”)

Posted on June 8, 2018 by Darren

A real pleasure to re-team with Tony Black to round out our coverage of “the unopened file” on The X-Cast, following on from our discussions of Anasazi and The Blessing Way. And this time, it’s an even stronger line-up. The wonderful Chris Knowles is joins us for the discussion of the final part of the season-bridging trilogy.

As ever, a huge thrill to be a part of this. Anasazi, The Blessing Way and Paper Clip represent a landmark moment for The X-Files as a television show, and it’s been an honour to talk through those changes with Tony. However, Paper Clip is something special because it’s clear how much Chris loves this episode. There are few pleasures in life quite as satisfying as sitting down with somebody to talk about something they love.

I’ll be back on The X-Cast later in the season, to the point that I think the members of the Patreon may already have access to one of my own smaller side projects as part of the podcast. However, it was a delight to get to talk about three episodes that are so close to the core of what The X-Files is for a combined runtime of close to four hours.

The truth is in here. You can listen to the episode here, or click the link below.

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Filed under: Podcasts!, The X-Files | Tagged: america, anasazi, chris knowles, conspiracy, freudian, history, mytholgoy, nazis, paper clip, podcast, second world war, the unopened file, the x-files, tony black | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The X-Cast X-Files Podwatch – Episode #92 (Alone/Essence)

Posted on December 20, 2017 by Darren

I’m thrilled to be a part of The X-Cast X-Files Podwatch, a daily snippet podcast rewatching the entirety of The X-Files between now and the launch of the new season. It is something of a spin-off of The X-Cast, a great X-Files podcast run by the charming Tony Black. Tony has assembled a fantastic array of guests and hosts to go through The X-Files episode-by-episodes. With the new season announced to be starting in early January, Tony’s doing two episodes of the podcast per day, so buckle up. We’re in the home stretch.

I’m popping in for the penultimate episode of the eighth season, drawing the curtains down on the eighth season by discussing Alone and Essence with the wonderful and insightful Chris Knowles.

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Filed under: Podcasts!, The X-Files | Tagged: alone, babies, chris knowles, comic books, essence, existence, lizard monster, super soldiers, the x-files | 2 Comments »

New Podcast! The X-Cast X-Files Podwatch – Episode #57 (Travelers/Mind’s Eye)

Posted on December 1, 2017 by Darren

My third (and penultimate) episode of the fifth season reteams me with the great Chris Knowles, a man who has forgotten more about The X-Files than I will ever know. We’re talking about the episodes Travelers and Mind’s Eye, both somewhat underrated fifth season episodes that (we think) tap into some of the show’s core strengths.

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Filed under: Podcasts!, The X-Files | Tagged: chris knowles, Lili Taylor, mind's eye, the x-cast, the x-cast podwatch, the x-files, travelers | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The X-Cast X-Files Podwatch – Episode #18 (Red Museum/Excelsis Dei)

Posted on October 31, 2017 by Darren

My first appearance of the second season is covering the episodes Red Museum and Excelsis Dei with the always insightful Christopher Knowles. I do a couple of episodes with Chris over the course of the podwatch, and very few people understand the workings of the show, its symbolism and its fascinations, as thoroughly as Chris. It was a joy recording these episodes, and I hope it’s as much fun listening to them.