Monday, March 18, 2024

Vacation at the Lake

There's more "prestige television" available now than any person could ever keep up with. Yet I would posit that even if you tried to do so, watching nothing but "serious, award-worthy television," you'd burn yourself out with the weightiness of it all. I say you need some fluffier, low-stakes diversions in your TV diet. And for me, lately, that's been The Lake.

The Lake is a Canadian series streaming on Amazon Prime. It centers on Justin, a gay man who has returned from overseas to spend a summer bonding with a now-teenage daughter, Billie, that he gave up for adoption. But there are plenty of hijinks with the "heartfelt," as Justin is also trying wrest control of a lakeside family cottage from his hyper-competitive step-sister, Maisy-May.

Over the course of (so far) two 8-episode seasons, The Lake has been a light and breezy half-hour show that has the spirit of a sitcom without (usually) trading in the rote "setup / punchline" construction of that format. Actually, for most people, the acting might be the main avenue into interest in the show. Orphan Black fans may recall Sarah's wild brother Felix from that show; here actor Jordan Gavaris gets center stage (and a more comedic canvas to play broadly on) as Justin. His foil is a performer I think everyone has seen in at least one movie at some point, Julia Stiles. She's perfectly vindictive and "wound too tightly" as Maisy-May.

Try a few episodes, and soon you'll find you're as interested in other performers rounding out the odd ensemble cast. Madison Shamoun plays Billie, who grounds the wilder elements with a beyond-her-years poise. Terry Chen is fun as Maisy-May's retired pro-hockey-playing bro of a husband, Victor. And young Declan Whaley is an absolute scene-stealer as Opal, Maisy and Victory's gender-queer son.

The first season is the better of the two; it's centered on the bitter rivalry between Justin and Maisy. Season two wisely recognizes that that story can't be stretched to fill another season, and so introduces a mystery instead... but that never quite reaches the comedic potential inherent in the "step-siblings at odds" premise of the original. Regardless, both seasons are simply fun, a welcome de-escalation from the sort of "life and death" stakes likely at play in other television shows you're probably watching.

I give The Lake a B. No decision has been announced yet on a season three; I only want them to do it if they really feel like they can find another entertaining story to tell. Either way, I'm glad for the lightness that it's brought so far.

Thursday, March 14, 2024

Meet a Stranger

The Academy Awards may now be in the books, but I'm ready to talk about a "snub" in the nominations. That's because I've only recently watched the movie All of Us Strangers.

From writer-director Andrew Haigh (and nominally adapted from the book Strangers by Taichi Yamada), All of Us Strangers centers on a secluded writer named Adam. As the film opens, he meets a drunken neighbor, Harry, whose amorous advances he declines. But he can't get Harry out of his head, nor can he thoughts of his parents -- who died decades earlier, before he came out as gay. When Adam decides to visit his childhood home, he discovers the ghosts of his parents still living there, giving him the opportunity to share with his parents the man he truly is.

Let me first say that I'm not certain I would have put All of Us Strangers in contention for Best Picture. (Not, at least, if you were to just literally list my personal 10 favorite movies as the nominees.) I'll get into why in a moment. But this is certainly the kind of movie that usually catches Oscar's eye, and there are certainly a few categories in which it should have contended.

Most notably, Andrew Scott should have been a nominee for Best Actor. His performance as Adam is simply remarkable, handling a raft of huge emotions with a careful subtlety. (Perhaps too subtle to have courted the notice of Oscar voters?) The character says he's out and proud, but his actions sometimes give the lie to that. He tells his parents he is happy, but his solitary demeanor isn't readily recognizable as such. In scenes with Adam's parents, Andrew Scott adopts a childlike deference that's wholly absent in scenes with Henry. Every moment of the performance has a potent context that shapes the behavior.

At least two supporting performances might well have been nominated too. Paul Mescal plays Henry, exuding a perfectly uneasy charisma with Andrew Scott that makes their relationship believable while simultaneously making you sense that something isn't quite right. Claire Foy plays Adam's Mom. Because her ghostly character appears at the age she died, she's actually younger on screen than her son Adam, but Foy's performance wields every bit of the parental authority that the story needs.

While I loved a lot about All of Us Strangers, I have reservations about the movie as a whole. It's hard to get into exactly why without spoiling key moments in the story, but suffice it to say that I found the script strange. Almost cruel, even. What sets out like an uplifting tale about going back to actually take the "road not taken" winds up heaping sadness on top of sadness by the final act. I felt somewhat similarly about it as I did to last year's critical/award contender Tár.

To save you the click, it boils down to this: I absolutely want stories about LGBT+ characters in entertainment to represent humanity in all its good and bad facets. But right now, I worry that negative portrayals simply feed the persistent toxic views that still get the oxygen they need to be starved of. All of Us Strangers does not depict any predatory monster, so in that sense it's nothing like the destructive character at the center of Tár. (And importantly, where Tár came from a straight writer-director, Andrew Haigh is himself LGBT+.) Still, it would be easy to watch All of Us Strangers and say, "well... if you choose to be gay, of course your life is going to be full of sadness and regret."

Still, if you're reading this blog, that's quite unlikely to be your read of the film. And so I think I can recommend All of Us Strangers to you -- certainly for the performances, if nothing else. Overall, though, I think I'll give the movie a B-. I don't think its shut-out from even any Oscar nominations was necessarily sinister; there were LGBT+ artists nominated for their work. Still, it does seem like a bit of a head-scratcher to me in the case of Andrew Scott, who did probably his career-best work in this movie.

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Voyager Flashback: Repression

Star Trek: Voyager featured three two-part episodes in its final season (including its finale). And yet one story that to me really cried out for two episodes, yet didn't get it, was "Repression."

Maquis crewmembers aboard Voyager are falling into comas, and soon it becomes clear that some assailant aboard the ship is responsible. No sooner than Tuvok reaches the inescapable conclusion of the culprit's identity is the true purpose of these attacks revealed: a Maquis agent from the Alpha Quadrant has used his mind control techniques, and the monthly data streams to Voyager, to reactivate his "compatriots" in the Delta Quadrant.

While this episode doesn't have two different story lines exactly, it does take a sharp turn partway through... and I feel like both parts are intriguing without either getting full space to breathe. Initially, the episode is a mystery, following Tuvok as he investigates a series of attacks. This aspect of the story admittedly couldn't be stretched too much further for a few reasons. For one, the timing is wrong -- this story would have played much better earlier in the series, when there was more mistrust of the Maquis aboard Voyager. (It would have also helped to show Tuvok doing his security job early on, more than just standing at the tactical station.) For another, the episode's twist is totally spoiled during the scene in which the holodeck extracts a shadowy image of the attacker; the figure isn't shadowy enough, and you can totally make out Tuvok's Vulcan ears and the gold of his uniform.

Still, a bit more more could have been made out of Tuvok uncharacteristically following a "hunch," and of digging deeper into the histories of the Maquis victims. (After all, the episode actually goes to the trouble of bringing back multiple characters introduced in previous episodes.) It could have gotten a bit more mileage out of the paranoia among Maquis about who might be attacked next, and could also could have extracted a few more minutes in the Doctor seeking a medical solution for Tuvok's condition once it's fully exposed.

None of that is strictly necessary, of course. But I'm looking to flesh things out to roughly a full episode's length, so we can end on a cliffhanger of "sleeper cell Maquis" taking over Voyager. Because the rest of the story after that feels like an interesting premise of its own that gets far too little time in the episode as aired. Voyager crewmembers working against each other is a great thing to dramatize. So is trying to stage a retaking of the ship when you can't use lethal force to do so. Taking the ship back should be really difficult, but we really don't see any of that.

It might also have been good to understand more of what Teero Anaydis, this distant Alpha Quadrant puppeteer, was really planning here. Janeway is right to ask at one point: what good does it do to have just one Maquis ship, thousands of light years from home? What was he trying to do? Why mind control only Maquis crew members, when it seems like mindmeld-fueled brainwashing would have worked on the Starfleet crew equally well? (It can't be that you already have to be sympathetic to the Maquis; Tuvok himself never was.) Maybe I just wanted to see more of guest star Keith Szarabajka, who enjoyably played this sort of righteous zealot on other genre shows I've seen over the tears.

So yeah, my issue is that this episode is overstuffed. Yet it does still make time for a few nice moments. The movie theater is a fun new holodeck setting (especially B'Elanna's snark about using a 3D environment to project a 2D image, then wearing glasses to make it appear 3D again). Harry's reaction to having his mail read and then being accused of a crime by Tuvok feels like a rare bit of earned conflict between main characters. It's also nice to more heavily feature the relationship between Janeway and Tuvok (even if I think it's a stretch that a simple talk from her can overcome mind control; that's something that also could have been given more time in a two-part episode).

Other observations:

  • Whenever people in TV and movies decide to break off into pairs, someone in a pair always finds a reason to head off alone so they can become a victim. Like, why do the writers even have the characters suggest the whole "work in pairs" thing only to have to then come up with a weak excuse to undermine that so the plot can progress?
  • And while we're playing the hits, gotta do the "never give someone a working 'gun' and ask them to prove their loyalty" trope.
  • Brainwashed B'Elanna is enthusiastic about marooning all the Starfleet people on some planet. It would be nice if the episode could acknowledge that she's now married to one of those Starfleet people.

I love the potential of this story, but I think the execution has problems. The mystery is exposed too early, and the far more interesting "friends against friends" part of the story gets short shrift indeed. I give "Repression" a B-.

Monday, March 11, 2024

Less Snarky Oscars Thoughts

Sorry, readers -- no Oscars snark this year. Half of the group I usually gather with to watch the Oscars was out of the country on vacation this year, and for those of us who were left, it seemed like we weren't feeling the need to convene for what was likely to be one of the more "foregone conclusions" Oscars in recent years. But if you care for a few less snarky scattered thoughts on this year's awards, here you go:

I did not see all the Best Picture contenders this year. I made it to 8 of the 10 as of this just-past Friday, when I watched (and loathed) Poor Things. Yet that still doesn't make it the Best Picture nominee I liked least: I actually tried sitting down to watch Maestro a few weeks back, got perhaps 20 minutes in, and decided to "nope" out. (That leaves The Zone of Interest as the only nominee I've not attempted at all. I'm open to it, but very much need to be in the right frame of mind.)

Usually, there's a "clear winner" in my mind, one movie that stands out above the rest and usually has no actual chance of winning. (And usually, my personal favorite movie of the year isn't in contention at all.) This year, the Anatomy of a Fall would have been my personal pick from the available options -- though I would have been equally appreciative of Barbie or American Fiction taking top honors. (But none of the three had any actual chance of winning this year.)

As for the ultimate winner, Oppenheimer... it's a classic example of Oscar doing Oscar does: awarding a person who has not done career-best work, because they missed the boat years earlier on awarding someone's best work (when they were busy giving some other person an overdue award). I maintain that one-third of Oppenheimer's runtime is devoted to a subplot that undermines the core thematic conceit of the movie (but hey, Robert Downey Jr. must be happy Nolan saw fit to put it there, as he won his own "time delayed" Oscar as a result).

The broadcast itself had some nice highlights. The best were comedic: the over-the-top live performance of "I'm Just Ken," John Cena's memorable "Best Costuming" intro, Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling's banter (that convinces me that the upcoming The Fall Guy will probably be better than I expect), and John Mulaney effectively auditioning to be a future Oscars host. More earnest moments played well too, like Da’Vine Joy Randolph's acceptance speech moving half the audience to tears, the filmmaker of 20 Days in Mariupol wishing he'd never made the movie, and some of the past acting winners paying tribute to this year's nominees. (You could easily tell who meant what they said and who, let's say, would not be up for an Oscar for presenting an Oscar.)

There are still more 2023 movies than 2024 movies in my personal viewing mix right now. But "officially," the movie year of "Barbenheimer" is now in the history books.

Friday, March 08, 2024

Two Good

Just when everyone was at last able to see Dune: Part Two... I headed out to Louisville for GAMA Expo 2024, and had no time for blogging. But now, as the sequel heads into its second weekend, I have a moment to put down my thoughts on the film.

I should perhaps start by locating my "Dune fandom" on the map: I've read the original book a couple of times and have enjoyed it well enough -- but I'd say that anyone who would call themselves a "Dune fan" surely feels more passionate about it than I do. It's not really fair to come too hard at a book written in 1965 for feeling "dated," and I would say that Dune has held up better than most classic science fiction from the most heralded authors of the genre.

Still... I think Dune really shows its age. Herbert had themes in mind that the world wasn't quite ready for in 1965, taking a dim view of religious zealotry and highlighting the dark sides of colonialism. But at the same time, he could only "reach toward" some of his own themes more than he could fully "grapple with" them. Most keenly, he was ahead of the curve enough to question the "white savior" archetype... but hardly gives it a full-throated rejection in his original book.

All that is a perhaps too-long walk leading up to this: given what the underlying themes of Dune really are, I don't think you could tell the story of Dune any better than director Denis Villeneuve and his co-writer Jon Spaihts have done here in Dune: Part Two. This adaptation changes a fair amount -- though I've been pleasantly surprised to hear fewer complaints from "book purists" than I would have imagined. The changes are all in service of sharpening the core of the story.

The central themes of religion and colonialism are heightened in this adaptation, and while the character of Paul (of many names) is still the conventional protagonist, it's really almost more "Chani's movie." The character, rather underdeveloped in the books (if you ask me), is given so much more material in Dune: Part Two (more than making up for her minimal appearance in Part One), and Zendaya really rises to the occasion.

She can't quite steal the movie, thanks to the other great stuff going on. Javier Bardem's version of Stilgar delighted me, a spot-on portrayal of unthinking zealotry that's utterly impervious to reason. Rebecca Ferguson has somewhat less to do here than in Part One, but what she has is excellent: not only does she negotiate this adaptation's take on Alia (very clever) without seeming mad, she leans into the character's dark side most effectively. The Jessica of Dune: Part Two strikes me as almost being a villain in how manipulative she is -- and her aspirations for her son come off as equally self-serving.

The production design remains incredible, which could almost go overlooked because so much of the look and feel of this was established in the prior Dune movie. Still: Paul's worm-riding sequence could have looked so dopey (it's such a far out concept), yet it felt visceral and dangerous and powerful. Much has been said about the infrared photography used for the outdoor scenes on Giedi Prime... but much should be said, because the look was striking. New costumes for new characters, new sets -- all top notch work. (It always annoys me when movies like this lose production design Oscars to period pieces where the design team was able to simply do historical research to create their looks. Everything here is invented, and it's cohesive and perfect.)

I will say that even at two hours and 45 minutes (which don't feel overly long), the movie still doesn't have enough space for all its characters. This is another "unadaptable" part of Herbert's book, and while this adaptation does remove both Hasimir Fenring and Thufir Hawat, and reworks Alia into something that will play on-screen better than a murderous "toddler adult," it still has more characters than can be serviced well. You don't really need a name as big as Christopher Walken to play an Emperor with this little presence in the story. And while Margot Fenring made it into the movie where her husband did not, it hardly felt like her brief story arc contributed much to this story (as opposed to laying track for later ones). Still, Villeneuve and Spaihts strayed farther from the source material than I would have imagined, and I'd rather give them credit for what they did do than quibble with still deeper changes they didn't.

I gave Dune: Part One a B+, and this movie is undeniably better. So I'll call Dune: Part Two an A-. It excited me to see still more of the story in a way that the books themselves never really did. And judging by the box office, it seems like we all will get to.

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

Defiant to the End

I've finally finished my first series written by Brandon Sanderson: I recently completed Defiant, the fourth and final book of the Skyward series. This concludes the saga of Spensa, the brash young warrior who flies space fighters against her people's powerful alien adversaries. (Ok, there's way more too it than that, but I'm not going to spoil four novels and three novellas' worth of plot here, even if I could find a way to do so succinctly.)

Sanderson is best known, of course, for his fantasy writing -- not science fiction, as this series is. But I've stalled in finishing his original Mistborn trilogy after what I thought was a lackluster book two. So this was my first exposure to one of his endings -- endings being arguably the other thing he's best known for (having completed many series of his own, as well as Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time). Did Sanderson have what it took to stick the landing?

Mostly, yes. From a story perspective, I was more than satisfied. The Skyward series has more than a dozen notable characters, and that's more than I'd expect to receive a "great" ending. But the story wraps up well for the main character, Spensa; the most important secondary characters also conclude satisfying arcs; most of the tertiary characters get a potent moment in this final installment. (And in a deft bit of narrative construction, the story does very much end while still leaving the door open for future stories of a different nature -- and it's already been announced that Sanderson's co-author on the Skyward novellas will be taking that up.)

But I had some reservations about the writing of this final book. Every part of the Skyward series so far has been told in the first person. The fact that you only get Spensa's perspective on things plays a crucial role in how the story is received by the reader. It's also part of what made the three novellas (in my view) essential reading in the overall narrative: when Spensa is separated from the rest of the characters for the bulk of books two and three, it falls to the novellas to chronicle what's happening in her absence. (And notably, even the novellas maintain a first-person conceit, each of the three being told from a different single character's perspective.)

This final book starts out from Spensa's perspective just as all the other main books have done. But just as the final act begins, about two-thirds of the way through the book, that convention is compromised. About half the chapters continue to be "first-person Spensa," but the other half are told third-person, focusing on different characters. Some of these aren't even the characters who were featured in the novellas. One, most jarringly, is the antagonist of the story -- why, this late in the game, do we need to know this person's inner thoughts?

The answer would seem to be purely practical: there's too much happening at the end of this story that the main character cannot personally be present for, and so it's difficult to deliver a satisfying ending without breaking the first-person convention. And yes, I want that satisfying ending, and so I suppose I ultimately have to agree with breaking the established "rules" in order to provide one. At the same time, this feels like trying to have your cake and eat it too. There are reasons a writer chooses to tell a story in the first person, and there are consequences of that choice that you have to accept and work around. Sanderson did that for three-and-two-thirds books... and then just gave up at the finish line. Did he always know this was the general ending he was working toward, and just never cared? Did he just need to get on to his next book, and didn't want to make time to try for some other ending? (I guess I can respect the choice not to become a George R. R. Martin, Scott Lynch, or Patrick Rothfuss.)

Most readers might not even care about this sort of thing, and might say I'm just nitpicking here. "Rules are made to be broken," some say. But I would say that when it comes to writing, rules are made to be ignored. There are countless "rules" of storytelling, and a writer is welcome to curate their own collection of which ones to embrace and which ones to abandon. But I feel like once you choose your toolbox, you really have to earn the decision to abandon it later. Defiant is a good enough ending to the Skyward series. But I think it's not that good.

I give Defiant a B. (Like I said, "good enough.") I think the series as a whole is worth reading (with or without the novellas, though my recommendation would be "with"). At the same time, this wasn't really the stellar experience I might have needed to nudge me into finishing book three of Mistborn -- that's going to take some more time.

Monday, February 26, 2024

Voyager Flashback: Drive

Star Trek: Voyager was a show that didn't like to mess with the status quo very much. But it's likely they knew from the very beginning of season seven that it would be their last. And since the writers wouldn't really have to live with the consequences of major changes for long, I think they became more open to taking chances -- as they did with Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres in "Drive."

Tom Paris wants to enter the newly-rebuilt Delta Flyer in an alien race. But B'Elanna Torres sees an enthusiasm for this that he apparently doesn't share for their relationship... which she's thinking about ending.

"Drive" is an episode that has its heart in the right place, and it is moderately entertaining. But it's had its "thunder" stolen in multiple ways. First, as I noted in the previous episode, it aired out of order, undermining the rebuilding of the Delta Flyer after its destruction. While we don't really see the shuttle being rebuilt anyway (why would we when we got plenty of it being built the first time around?), this story is about testing the ship out -- which hardly seems necessary after it's already been in use.

Of course, the story is also about Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres finally getting married, but this too is undermined. We've already seen the marriage of the two characters, in the form of the "duplicate life forms" from another episode. So for the same reasons you don't want to watch the Delta Flyer be built again, you don't want to see another wedding. And yet, not seeing it sure makes it feel like it isn't a big deal (especially after Deep Space Nine made an entire episode only out of the wedding of two main characters).

But enough about what isn't in the episode; let's talk about what is. The race conceit works better than I'd have expected. Yes, space is so big and empty that the idea of having an "auto race" there falls apart if you poke at it too much. But the writing and editing of the episode generally works: it's both fast enough that you don't poke at that too much, and fast enough to give racing vibes.

The cast of guest stars is fun. We get an alien woman for Harry Kim to chase, a hard-ass "racing is life" type who makes for a fun heavy, a fun little twist about which racer is really a guerilla terrorist, and actor Brian George as the alien administrator overseeing it all. The production design on all of this is even better, from a variety of CG ships to interesting alien makeups to fun "race suit" costumes. (The Starfleet version is one of the most flattering uniforms ever created on Star Trek.) And the script allows for fun character moments for most of the main characters: Janeway blessing the idea (when Tom's building up steam to have to convince her), Seven's lack of enthusiasm for the whole affair, and Neelix usurping the role of color commentator.

I actually quite like the Tom/B'Elanna storyline too... I just wish that it didn't conclude with marriage in this episode. Basically, I side with B'Elanna. For three seasons, Tom Paris hasn't done much to suggest that he actually cares about his girlfriend's feelings. This episode is an especially well-drawn magnification of the little slights we've seen along the way. When B'Elanna decides to address the problem by inserting herself into her boyfriend's hobby whether he likes it or not, the scales tip in an interesting way -- until still more boorish Tom behavior tips them back. But in the end, rather than split up as many couples realistically would as a result of all this, Tom and B'Elanna actually have a meaningful conversation where they air all the frustrations and misunderstandings of several years. I do kind of wish it resolved with "now let's be better to each other for a while" rather than jumping straight to "great, now we're ready to get married." But hey, it's television, so what are you going to do? (And people do get married far more impulsively, of course.)

Other observations:

  • Another Dune reference sneaks in, as one letter is dropped from a planet's name to give us "Gedi Prime."
  • Sometimes, a sci-fi show decides it has to give you the futuristic version of a thing that isn't likely to be that different in the future. Here, it's golf, which we're supposed to believe is going to one day involve blinking, glowing balls and a weird putter that looks like it's been cross-bred with a meat tenderizer. OK, when you're looking for your ball on the course, maybe the glowing/blinking thing would be useful.
  • I've commented before about how the supposedly limited number of photon torpedoes aboard Voyager (established in the pilot) was never really something the show was going to take seriously. (At this point, they've used many more than they ever actually had.) But it seems especially egregious to detonate a torpedo to signal the start of a race.
  • After all that work B'Elanna was doing to coordinate holodeck time, which could have been used for a killer honeymoon, they just take off for a day trip on the Delta Flyer?

I'm glad that Voyager finally decided to take the Tom/B'Elanna relationship seriously. Still, I feel like this episode is trying to make up for years of narrative neglect all in one grand gesture. I give "Drive" a B-.