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Millennium – Bardo Thodol (Review)

Posted on July 29, 2015 by Darren

This July, we’re taking a trip back in time to review the sixth season of The X-Files and the third (and final) season of Millennium.

As with Saturn Dreaming of Mercury and (to a lesser extent) Darwin’s Eye, Bardo Thodol continues to boldly push Millennium towards abstraction.

The plot of Bardo Thodol is actually fairly basic, in the same way that the plot to Darwin’s Eye is fairly basic. Mister Takahashi has done terrible things. Fleeing the Millennium Group assassin known only as Mabius, the mysterious scientist seeks refuge in a Buddhist Temple. As his body turns against him, Takahashi seeks to atone for his crimes. At the same time, an FBI raid on a cargo ship turns up an ice box packed with severed hands. Inevitably the two threads turn out to be intertwined.

Give the man a hand…

However, as with a lot of Millennium scripts, the details of this fairly simple plot are delightfully askew. Bardo Thodol feels almost like a game of Millennium word association. There are cloning experiments, assassination attempts, meditations on reincarnation, actual meditation, discussions of forgiveness, ominous messages delivered by computer virus, lots of atmosphere, an oppressive sense of paranoia. Adjectives like “cluttered” and “stuffed” come to mind, to the point that it feels like a lot of Bardo Thodol ended up on the cutting room floor.

As with Darwin’s Eye, it feels like Bardo Thodol works better as a mood piece than as an example of storytelling television. It is not a hugely satisfying forty-five minutes, but it is always interesting.

Yes. Yes the show is.

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Filed under: Millennium | Tagged: bardo, bardo thodol, buddhism, Chip Johannessen, millennium, millennium group, peter watts, Reincarnation, reinvention, thodol, Tibet | 2 Comments »

Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers of Victory: Mister Miracle (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Darren

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium. We’ve got a special treat for you this week, which is “Seven Soldiers Week”, so check back each day for a review of one of the Seven Soldier miniseries that Morrison put together.

Morrison’s fascination with Jack Kirby creations continues. The author also reworked the Newsboy Legion and Klarion the Witch-Boy as part of Seven Soldiers, but Mister Miracle allows Morrison to play with perhaps the most iconic additions that Kirby made to the DC pantheon, dating back to his return from Marvel in the seventies, the New Gods. It goes without saying that this four-issue series actually serves as more of a lead-in to Final Crisis than an exploration of the Seven Soldiers mythology, but it’s still an absolutely fascinating look at some of Morrison’s big ideas.