PopCult Reviews

Media Moment (03/13/20)

Well, coronavirus has wreaked havoc with movies and television. In these times, they are some of the least important things (or at least they should be). Because the United States is so focused on capitalist consumption, it is notable that the entire Disney theme park/cruise division is shutting down for the rest of the month. Additionally, films like No Time To Die, Fast & Furious 9, New Mutants, and others have been bumped back on the calendar or indefinitely. You have to wonder when movie theaters will starting shutting down due to a decrease in audiences.

TV Review – The Best of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Part One

Emissary (original airdate: January 3rd, 1993)
Written by Rick Berman and Michael Piller
Directed by David Carson

Where did Deep Space Nine come from? The concept started with Brandon Tartikoff, the Chairman of Paramount in the early 1990s who wanted a new addition to the franchise that was a Western. This would be about a lawman (Starfleet officer) coming with his son to a station on the edge of the frontier trying to restore order. Elements of American westerns were woven throughout with the bartender, the sheriff, the native people, the kindly doctor, etc. Showrunner Michael Piller liked the idea of a stationary Star Trek series because he saw it as an opportunity to make the effects of episodes long-lasting. Instead of a procedural, this could be a serialized program with ripples across seasons from storylines. Characters would not be part of a crew on an assignment but a community of disparate people forced to live together and learn how to survive.

Movie Review – The Deer Hunter

The Deer Hunter (1978)
Written by Deric Washburn, Michael Cimino, Louis Garfinkle, and Quinn K. Redeker
Directed by Michael Cimino

While this was intended to kick off my Meryl Streep retrospective, I wouldn’t consider it a Streep movie. Oh, she’s definitely a crucial supporting character in the story, and I will talk about her performance, but this film is more a prologue to that series. This is more a Robert DeNiro/Christopher Walken movie, and it is a damn good one. It hasn’t necessarily aged perfectly, and it’s not my favorite film about the Vietnam War, but it is a well-acted, intense, and beautifully tragic movie.

TV Review – Star Trek: Picard Season One, Episodes Six & Seven

Star Trek: Picard (CBS All Access)
Season One Episode Six – “The Impossible Box”
Written by Nick Zayas
Directed by Maja Vrvilo

Season One Episode Seven – “Nepenthe”
Written by Samantha Humphrey and Michael Chabon
Directed by Doug Aarniokoski

I’m a little lost as to what the story being told here is at this point. The pacing decisions from early on have felt unbalanced, and “The Impossible Box” is a vital example of this. The audience has known that the Artifact is where Picard eventually will arrive since episode one. The show has meandered on its way to get there with strange layovers like “Absolute Candor.” When we finally reach the reclaimed Borg cube, things suddenly happen at rapid-fire, and we’re still left with little information moving forward as to what exactly this story is.

Movie Review – Jumanji: The Next Level

Jumanji: The Next Level (2019)
Written by Jake Kasdan, Jeff Pinkner, and Scott Rosenberg
Directed by Jake Kasdan

At this point, Jumanji, as a media franchise, has little to nothing to do with Chris Van Allsburg’s 1981 children’s picture book. Jumanji was already distancing itself from its origins with the 1995 adaptation starring Robin Williams. The plot was given more complexity beyond just two children playing an enchanted and troublesome board game. A lot of people missed the semi-sequel Zathura: A Space Adventure that reframed the experience as a science-fiction style story. There was also the Jumanji animated series that ran on UPN for three years and drifted even further from the book.

February 2020 Digest

Features
My Favorite Films About Love
Book Update – Jan/Feb 2020

Movie Reviews (*** = PopCult Recommends)
Doctor Sleep
Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)

Comic Book Review – Venom Volume 2: The Abyss

Venom Volume 2: The Abyss
Written by Donny Cates
Art by Ryan Stegman & Iban Coello

Donny Cates’s run on Venom has been all about the strange symbiosis between Eddie Brock and his companion. It’s a fascinating study of body horror, precisely the moments where Eddie loses time and learns the symbiote was moving him around and speaking for him. The title leans into its horror elements more than it’s superhero roots. There’s also a desire to build out the Venom mythos beyond just being a part of the Spider-Man niche of the Marvel Universe.

Book Update 2020 – January-February

Capitalist Superheroes: Caped Crusaders in the Neoliberal Age by Dan Hassler-Forest

I don’t pretend I’m in love with the superhero film genre. As much as I love the comic books I grew up reading and still love to read today, the films never sit quite well with me. Author and critic Dan Hassler-Forest details the underlying ideology presented in modern superhero movies and how it only reinforces capitalist patriarchal hegemony. Hassler-Forest argues that these are merely an extension of the same blind patriotism seen in the Stallone and Schwarzenegger movies of the 1980s. Instead of being expressly American, due to a growing global audience, specifically China, these movies are couched around post-9-11 ideology.

Media Moment (03/06/20)

So the former student who was staying with us is now with another parent, not the one who was causing the horrible neglect in her life. We were sad to see her go, but we had an absolutely fantastic week having her in our home. While she was here, we watched a couple of horror films: Hereditary and Us. She loved both of them, pointing out the psychological aspects of each that made them a cut above a jumpscare movie. We are still in touch, and I am sure there are many more movies in our future.

Movie Review – The Apartment

The Apartment (1960)
Written by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond
Directed by Billy Wilder

As we come to the end of this Billy Wilder retrospective, we get to what might be the most excellent comedy of his later years. It’s so interesting how we began with the dark & bleak Double Indemnity and come to this comedy-drama. That isn’t to say that The Apartment lacks maturity. It’s a finely developed and sensitive picture about adults and the complexity of relationships & sex. The two films have more in common than what you might think at first glance as they are both about the darker side of adult relationships, one more outlandish than the other.