DS9 Flashback: Rules of Acquisition

Women's rights and equality are getting more attention today than they did in 1993, when Deep Space Nine first aired "Rules of Acquisition." And while I'd like to think that the needle has moved at least a bit in the last 25 years, there sure is a lot about this episode that still feels current.

A new Ferengi waiter is on rise at Quark's. The shrewd and creative Pel becomes a trusted confidant just as the Grand Nagus arrives to put Quark in charge of a massive business negotiation with a race from the Gamma Quadrant. What none of them knows: Pel is actually a woman, disguising herself as male so she too can pursue profit in a chauvinist society. What Pel didn't plan on: she's fallen in love with Quark.

This story was pitched by writer Hilary Bader to The Next Generation, with Riker becoming romantically entangled with Pel and Dr. Crusher being the first to figure out Pel's secret. It was quickly realized to be a better plot for Deep Space Nine, where there were more recurring Ferengi characters and a greater interest generally in their society. Staff writer Ira Steven Behr would craft the final script, and while he certainly brought Ferengi expertise to the episode (having basically cracked how to do Ferengi well in "The Nagus"), it seems like much of the empathy for Pel must have been there in Bader's original take.

There's a nice spectrum on display here for the Ferengi. We see them at their best, through the eyes of Dax. She tries to explain to Kira that they're great because they're fun, and you always know what you're going to get. Dax is also the one who sounds Quark out at the end and realizes he really did love Pel; most would think the Ferengi incapable of love in that way. We also see the Ferengi at their worst, embodied by Grand Nagus Zek and his treatment of Kira in the episode's running harassment subplot.

We also get the Ferengi in a believable middle ground, as Quark comes off in the end. There are degrees of "wokeness." Quark is able to accept that a woman could be as successful at business as a man. He's just only willing to stick his neck out so far. He stands up for Pel inasmuch as it gets him out of hot water with the Nagus, but he's not willing to give up his own life as he knows it for love or equality. Still, this is a step on the road of making a feminist out of Quark (and he will take more in future seasons).

While the episode is explicitly about sexism, it also touches briefly on LGBT issues in intriguing ways. When Dax figures out that Pel is secretly in love with Quark, her assumption is that Pel is gay -- which is clearly of no issue whatsoever to her. (When Pel reveals the real truth, Dax is floored to learn Pel is actually a woman.) There are also moments where Pel's secret plays out rather like being in the closet. For example, when Rom snidely comments on appropriate behavior for a woman (not knowing one is in his midst), it plays much like someone making a distasteful gay joke around someone they don't know is gay.

In the overall arc of Deep Space Nine, this episode is a milestone for including the first mention of the Dominion. The writers have acknowledged that this early on, they didn't know exactly what they were building to. Still, they knew they wanted to build to something specific. As Behr put it, there needed to be more than "just unexplored space" in the Gamma Quadrant. "They did three years of that on the Original Series, and seven years on The Next Generation." Plus, with Voyager then in development, and again all about meeting new aliens every week, there was a keen desire to put something unified and anti-Federation on the other side of the wormhole.

That said, the Gamma Quadrant doesn't quite get started off on the right foot here. The Karemma -- mentioned here as powerful players in the Dominion -- hardly ever show up after this. The Dosi race, who Quark tries to negotiate with here, feel like cheap Klingons: generically short-tempered and violent, but with ridiculous face makeup. There's also the redundancy that the Ferengi were trying to expand into the Gamma Quadrant in the last episode we saw about them, yet they're only now actually getting around to it.

The episode also goes a little too far over the top in moments. Pel gets up in Zek's face to an unrealistic degree, given what she has to hide. And then there's the bedroom scene between Quark and Pel, which Behr himself acknowledges went too far into "farce." It's definitely the weakest sequence in an otherwise serious episode.

Other observations:

• In another amusing use of Morn, this episode starts on him snoring, asleep on the Promenade. He doesn't seem to have a life outside of waiting for Quark's bar to open.

• The Ferengi certainly like complicated games. Tongo somehow involves dice, two sets of playing cards, a spinning roulette-like wheel, and poker-esque betting. The writers would only continue making it more opaque in future appearances.

• It's fitting that the episode "Rules of Acquisition" would establish that there are 285 of them in all.

• There's a great camera shot where Zek lowers his hand mirror, replacing his face with Quark's.

• There's an even greater makeup trick -- the moments when Pel tears off her fake male ears to reveal real (but still, you know, fake) female ones.

• Adding to the feeling of the Dosi as wannabe Klingons, the main male Dosi is played by actor Brian Thompson, recognizable for being brawny on a lot of sci-fi shows... and in particular for playing a Klingon before.

Despite a few weak elements, I think this episode plays well as a whole. And though we never got to see Pel again, this episode did set up for some good feminist Ferengi tales down the road. I give "Rules of Acquisition" a B.

The Game's Afoot

Though Aaron Sorkin's writing is praised by critics and fans alike, many (of both) have noted that he isn't always great with the way he writes women. Perhaps in direct response to this came his most recent film -- which was also his directorial debut -- Molly's Game.

Molly's Game is based on the true story of Molly Bloom, an Olympic skier whose career-ending accident leaves her needing to make a radical shift in her life. It comes in the form of running a high-end underground poker game that eventually entangles her in an FBI investigation.

It's always nice to sit down with that crackling Sorkin dialogue. He's what many would call an auteur; although this is the first time he's directed, his style is as pronounced and distinct as that of the Wes Andersons, Coen Brothers, or Martin Scorseses of the world. Put down the phone and pay strict attention, and you will be rewarded. Molly's Game is no different.

The character of Molly Bloom herself is different written to be as prickly, swift, and witty as any protagonist Sorkin has ever created. Jessica Chastain takes this and runs with it, giving a fantastic performance. She presents the perfect balance of pretended aloofness and hidden agendas. She also deftly handles an extreme amount of voice-over narration, with such skill that it seems like the only natural way to tell this story.

But there are more stand-outs in the cast. Idris Elba plays the lawyer working to help Bloom with the FBI. Elba is excellent for not giving in fully to the Sorkin rhythms. He's a more deliberate, slow-paced, stabilizing force. His character is biting and sarcastic and insightful as so many Sorkin characters are, he just resists the pull up to the rat-a-tat pacing that normally comes with all that. Lending this second gear to the movie is very much to its benefit.

Also (perhaps surprisingly) turning in a great performance is Kevin Costner as Molly's father. It really comes down to a key scene near the end of the movie, one that comes dangerously close to wresting the narrative away from the protagonist and undermining the feminist credit Sorkin might be building here. But it doesn't quite cross that line, and that's due I think in large part to the sensitive touch given by Costner.

There are a few flaws here and there. For example, the movie gets a lot farther into the weeds about playing poker than it really needs to tell the story -- Molly herself isn't a player, after all. (And mind you, I'm saying this as someone who personally loves poker.) But overall, this is a solid movie about emotional damage. I give it a B+. Chances are you've already seen it if you're a fan of Aaron Sorkin, but if not, put it on your list.

DS9 Flashback: Melora

"Melora" is an episode of Deep Space Nine where what went on behind the scenes was more compelling than what ended up on screen.

Deep Space Nine welcomes a new Elaysian officer, Melora Pazlar. Coming from a low-gravity planet, she uses a wheelchair and exoskeleton to move around the station. They're the only assistance she wants; Melora is quite prickly to any who would coddle her. But Dr. Bashir slowly breaks through her defenses and a romantic relationship develops between them. With it comes an intriguing offer: the doctor has developed a treatment that will allow Melora to function normally in standard gravity.

The idea for Melora (the character) came during the original development of the series. Rick Berman and Michael Piller became intrigued with the idea of a character from a low-gravity world, confined to a wheelchair in most parts of the station, but free to fly around in her normal environment. It was simply too expensive and impractical an idea to achieve on a weekly TV budget at the time, and ultimately they would give up on the idea and create Jadzia Dax to be their science officer. But "wheelchair officer" went up on the board for potential episode ideas.

Evan Carlos Somers was a Writers Guild intern who worked on Deep Space Nine during its first season. Though he wasn't kept on for season two, he was invited to come back and pitch story ideas. He was eager for a sale, and thought he had the inside track. He knew about the background ideas the writing staff were considering, and was sure he had something to bring to the "wheelchair officer" idea: he himself was confined to a wheelchair.

In particular, Somers felt a "response" of sorts was called for to the Next Generation episode "Ethics." Even though Worf was an alien from a different culture, the idea that he saw himself as worthless, that he would rather kill himself than live with paralysis got "a little under my skin," according to Somers. He wanted a story about a disabled character accepted for who they are, one who's even given a chance at a cure for the disability only to turn it down. He sold the idea, but not the script. His draft was flawed, and rewritten several times (by several writers) before filming.

But several flaws remain in the final episode. One is that everything I just laid out describes a character arc, but not a story. "New character arrives, ultimately doesn't undergo a change, and is never seen again" isn't much of an hour of television. Attempts to graft more of a story into it don't seem to take successfully.

First, there's a romantic angle with Bashir. It's difficult to embrace because Bashir's a bit icky in this episode. We've already put up with a season of his hound dog pursuit of Dax. Now he turns his stalkery vibe to Melora, "Googling her" obsessively before she arrives on the station and asking her about the picture of her "husband? boyfriend?" Ugh. (Stalking wasn't a good look for Geordi either when he did it.) Bashir gets a bit more smooth and empathetic as the episode progresses, but he's certainly starting in a hole.

Second, there's a subplot involving an old associate of Quark's showing up to threaten his life. From this thread, we get a great smile from Odo (mocking Quark's predicament) and a moment of realization for Melora. She saves the day with her ability to fly around in low gravity, and decides that's core to her identity. What makes it weird is how little consideration is given to the whole "cure" before this moment. Bashir doesn't even tell her about the side effects (she can't go back to her planet again) until after the treatment has begun, and she really doesn't seem to spend any time thinking about them until it's time for her to abruptly change her mind and end the episode.

The writing of Melora herself is mixed. You certainly sense the experience Evan Carlos Somers infused into the episode, and there's a lot of support for it online from fans with disabilities. Melora is brusque, with sharp edges. Your offer to help comes off like pity, and she does not want it. But Melora is in a formalized command structure, and very low ranking. She acts like she owns the place, and is very casual/familiar/belligerent with superior officers. If she were a civilian, her demeanor would make more sense. As a Starfleet officer, I'm not buying it.

The "mechanics" of Melora don't quite make sense either. What we're told is low gravity sure seems like NO gravity whenever they depict it. And she doesn't seem as fragile in Earth-standard gravity as she should be. She isn't seriously injured when she falls. When she catapults herself across the runabout to ram Quark's would-be killer, she ought to break like half the bones in her body. But a lot of the science around her is swept away with a hand wave.

She does get a few good moments. The scene in the Klingon restaurant is great all around. Just when you're about to ask yourself if the date protocol of a "man ordering for the woman" is still seriously a thing in the 24th century, Melora unleashes fluent Klingon and takes charge of the situation. After the meal, Bashir opens up with his background, talking about almost becoming a professional tennis player. And in a TV show that almost never gives us original "source music" (music the characters can actually hear), we get samples of both a Vulcan instrumental and Klingon singing!

Ultimately, the episode doesn't "get rid" of Melora by either killing her off or shipping her out. Nevertheless, we never see her on the show again.

Other observations:

• Quark and an alien do a fun "handshake" by bumping elbows.

• Dax seems quite expert in helping Melora back into her chair. It feels like she has some sort of experience here.

• Easy week for Nana Visitor. She shows up only in the last act, and then only for two or three lines.

This episode comes from a good place, perhaps. But it goes the way of so many scripts that get worked and reworked by a parade of writers. The core flaws are never really sanded away, and the result is lackluster. I give "Melora" a C+.

Stooping Solo

The following review is spoiler-free.

The latest of the Star Wars interstitial movies has arrived, Solo: A Star Wars Story. Before I jump in with my thoughts, I want to recall something I said when discussing The Force Awakens a few years back: unlike the apparent majority of Star Wars fans, Han Solo has never been my favorite character. I suspect your opinion of this movie will be higher if he is.

There's been a long and sometimes lively debate about which Star Wars movie is the best. There's pretty wide agreement about the worst. Now we've got the most average. In maybe 10-or-so years, when there are as many Star Wars films as there are James Bond movies, I think this one will stand as "most forgettable."

Part of the reason this is a spoiler-free review is that there's very little I could point to in this movie as being "bad." There's also nothing that really stands out. Certainly, nothing about it will polarize the audience in the way The Last Jedi did. This isn't going to destroy (or affirm) anyone's childhood. It isn't that it's boring or that it drags in certain places. It just washes over you like any other disposable action movie, making no mistakes and taking no risks.

I suppose playing it safe is exactly what producer Kathleen Kennedy wanted when she fired original directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller and replaced them with Ron Howard. We may never know. Maybe Lord and Miller actually were making a Clones-level turd, and Howard's efforts muscled the movie back to the best it could be given a fixed release date. They weren't my hundreds of millions of dollars to gamble, and even if they had been, I can't say I wouldn't have made the same choice.

The result is just so aggressively "passable." Action sequences are constructed decently enough without ever really getting the blood racing. The characterization is generally thin, but the actors spackle things in just enough to keep the movie from feeling empty. There are no clunker lines of dialogue to make you groan, but I also can't remember any good ones right now, the morning after watching it.

There's a methodical checklist being ticked off dutifully. Every conceivable bit of back story you'd want to know about Han, Chewbacca, and the Millennium Falcon is here -- right down to the reason Lando pronounces Han's name wrong. Some of feels sort-of clever, but none of it really stands out. There's no "the movie's bad, but at least there's the podracing scene and the lightsaber duel." (But there's also no "I hate sand.")

There are loads of allusions to events of the original trilogy that sort of work. They don't quite feel like cheap trading on existing goodwill, but they don't really feel like they recontextualize things in a meaningful way either. (Maybe it's being hurt by the score by John Powell, which elbows your brain sharply by playing the exact music John Williams created for the original movies.)

A "perfectly serviceable action movie" might be worth a low B-. But I know I liked The Last Jedi considerably more than just taking away a "minus" conveys. So I'm going to call Solo a C+. Don't let me stop you from seeing it (not that you would have). You're not going to hate it. I doubt you're going to love it.

Maybe this will be the movie that finally teaches the masses that we can just have a Star Wars movie, without it being the best/worst thing ever.

DS9 Flashback: Cardassians

With the three-part opener of Deep Space Nine season two focusing on the Bajorans, it seems appropriate that another early episode would dig into the series' other major race, the Cardassians.

When Garak approaches a Cardassian boy on the Promenade only to be bitten on the hand, the questions begin. Who are the Bajoran parents that have been raising this boy? Have they been teaching him to hate his own people? Have they been abusing him? Who are the boy's biological parents? Do they know he's still alive after the Occupation, and might they want him back? It's an uncertain moral mine field, with an espionage component that Garak is happy to lead Bashir through.

There are some very sophisticated issues at play in this episode, and it grapples with some more effectively than others. An intriguing contradiction is introduced to the Cardassian race. The importance they place on family has been mentioned before (on The Next Generation), but here we see how little regard they have for orphaned children, learning there's "no place" for orphans in Cardassian society. You can observe in the real world plenty of people who claim to have the interests of children at heart, but whose practical outlook rarely extends beyond their own children (or unborn children). Helping kids who face poverty, starvation, violence? Their parents should be the ones stepping up, not us. No, it's not hard to believe this anti-orphan streak in Cardassian society at all.

There's an intriguing allegory here for interracial adoption. (Well, I suppose it's not even allegorical. Cardassian children being taken in by Bajoran parents is literally interracial adoption.) People in society at large have conflicting views about what values and traditions a child like that should be taught. "The child was born of this heritage, and should be exposed to it." "We took the child into our family, and we're going to raise them as we see fit." Both sides have a point, from which it's hard to find common ground.

No surprise, then, that the episode can't resolve it satisfactorily in 42 minutes. But it is a bit disappointing that it doesn't keep focus there. The more the episode unfolds, the less it is about the struggle between young Rugal's adoptive Bajoran father and his Cardassian birth father, and the more it becomes a mystery about what political game Gul Dukat played. That angle is interesting to a point, but far less sophisticated. And at the end of the episode, Rugal is shipped off to live with a father he barely knows in a society he's come to despise -- with no real examination at all of what this means!

This marks the first time since the pilot that Dukat appears in person (not just on "FaceTime"), and reveals him as a manipulator so forward thinking that he can enact an eight-year, slow burn plan to humiliate a political rival. The episode does even more to flesh out "plain, simple Garak," in the character's second appearance. Actor Andrew Robinson had been told by many on set during his first episode how much they were enjoying his work and how they'd like to have him back, but was too wily an industry veteran to trust it. He said he knew they truly meant it when he got this offer, and he was "thrilled" to return.

Robinson felt that Garak really developed in this episode, noting that Bashir's humanist tendencies rub off over the course of the hour. I'm intrigued that Robinson saw it that way -- and of course, it's the actor's job to look for deeper facets within his character. I just don't see it myself. Robinson has given interviews on this episode, and talked about Garak slowly coming around and helping Bashir with this orphaned Cardassian. To me, the motivation seems more vengeful. The deeper into the mystery they dig, the more it appears that unraveling it will hurt Dukat politically. That's more than enough for Garak, with no altruism required. Perhaps I latch onto this angle more because it fits with other details in the episode -- Garak's continued insistence that he isn't a spy, his ability to break into Bashir's quarters undetected, and the way he taunts the head of Bajoran orphanage with twisted glee. It is, I admit, a less nuanced reading of the character.

Even though recurring characters figure heavily into this story, many of the regulars are well utilized throughout. Sisko shows his diplomatic skills as he calmly defuses anger between Rugal's warring parents. And Avery Brooks makes a great moment of glaring at Bashir's interruption of a conversation with Dukat to play detective. (I don't know what's more delicious: the dressing down that follows, or the "better you than me" reaction Kira gives Bashir as it happens.)

Of course, it's a big Bashir episode, as Garak draws him into a web of mystery and espionage. But a very effective runner makes this a good O'Brien episode too. The writers dare to depict him in a bad light, being unabashedly racist toward Cardassians when he finds out his daughter has been playing with one. Keiko shuts down this ugliness immediately, in the strongest moment written so far for that character on this show or The Next Generation. And ultimately, Miles reaches a minor milestone in understanding that this young Cardassian isn't bad -- they share a mutual hatred of Cardassians (culture, food, generally).

The only down side of this compelling story arc for O'Brien is that making room for it in the episode means there's no time for Jake Sisko to appear. It would have been interesting to see to see Rugal interact with someone his own age. Then again, Rugal's "own age" isn't particularly well defined -- he feels a bit old to be biting people, even when they creepily approach him and touch him without asking.

Other observations:

• Some particularly distracting aliens are placed in the background of the opening scene. Costume Designer Robert Blackman says these weird hatbox aliens (my term, not his) were the beginning of an experiment to use more hats on the show. Said experiment ended before the season did, which Blackman chalked up to producers and directors (generally, not just on Star Trek) saying one thing but wanting another. From one interview: "You draw them up, they like it, you do it, and then it's 'I hate it. Take that thing off. I can't see the face.'"

• The accusation that Rugal is being abused by his Bajoran parents doesn't get much exploration. The alien who mentions it doesn't seem a particularly credible source, and vanishes before any follow-up questions can be asked.

• This episode establishes the prior name of Deep Space Nine while it was under Cardassian control: Terok Nor.

This is another episode that hints at the eventual quality and sophistication Deep Space Nine would regularly achieve. Of course, the few aspects of the plot that don't quite deliver on their promise show that there was still a little work needed to get there. I give "Cardassians" a B+.

My Struggle IV

I approached the finale of the recent season of The X-Files with great hesitation. The season premiere had been quite possibly the worst episode of the series ever. Chris Carter seems like the kind of person to keep digging after hitting rock bottom. Gillian Anderson had been widely candid in the press that she was done with the series at this point; was it out of frustration with more total stupidity?

With expectations like that, I suppose there was nowhere to go up. So maybe it shouldn't be surprising that they actually did. The finale gathered up the ridiculous loose strands in a passible bundle, rocketed toward a real conclusion that gave rather definitive endings for all characters, and ended on a cheeky ellipsis more than on an actual cliffhanger. That'll do.

And now, anyone who ever loved The X-Files should hope that Gillian Anderson holds firm on not ever coming back for more. Chris Carter has said he won't do more without her. And there should never be any more. No movie, no episodes. Nothing.

Mind you, this wasn't an amazing ending. It wasn't on a level with the series finale that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. just delivered (that turned out not to be a series finale). But it was roughly as good as the original 2002 finale of The X-Files was. And given that the 16 episodes of the two revival seasons was only good for about 2 truly great episodes, maybe 2 pretty good ones, and a bunch of "filler at best, garbage at worst," I'll happily take "we got back to where we started" and go cash out at the window.

This "series finale 2.0" was more propulsive than the original. Instead of a wordy trial meant to walk us through an incomprehensible conspiracy, we got a simple mission: find William, Scully and Mulder*'s son. The clarity made for a swift hour, and in moments an appropriately emotional one.

* Not actually Mulder's son. Why again was this twist necessary?

On the other hand, the hour was often too swift. Blink and you'd miss the unceremonious killing off of Reyes and Skinner. Sure, the story isn't exactly about them... and yet both were "in the opening credits" cast members for part of the series' run. Don't they deserve better?

Back in the "plus" column, this felt like a much more compelling end for the Cigarette Smoking Man than his "first death" in the original finale. It was personal, in the form of a bullet from Mulder's gun. And it was swift payback for just moments earlier, when CSM thought the roles were reversed and he was killing Mulder. The setup also read like William was trying to sacrifice his life for a noble purpose -- I wasn't necessarily convinced that he knew he'd survive the gunshot. (And for the record, and did like the button at the end revealing that he had.)

But back in the "minus column," did we really need a repeat appearance from the wacko TV conspiracy theorist played by Joel McHale? Or yet another dressing down of Skinner from the permanently dour Assistant Director Kersh? Or the what-could-be 19th "closing down of the X-Files" by the Powers That Be?

I feel like the scales of good and bad here are almost close to balanced. Maybe a little in favor of good. Add to that that the show actually did give us closure, something that was by no means certain, and I'm inclined to be a bit generous to in grading the episode. B? Well, okay, not that generous. B-.

But more than feeling generous, I'm feeling done. So long, X-Files.

Everyone Back in the Pool

After the surprising success of the original Deadpool (surprising, that is, to everyone who had somehow forgotten the success of The Hangover, Beverly Hills Cop, Ted, 300, Gladiator, The Matrix, There's Something About Mary, etc. etc. etc.), this past weekend brought us a sequel, Deadpool 2. Overall, I think it entertained me about as much as the original... though I think this new installment was a much more uneven movie.

In particular, I found the first act of this new movie very lacking. The pacing is quite slow. It meanders about, almost testing the waters of two or three potential storylines before finally landing on the one that's going to carry the rest of the movie. It also starts off in a very cliche and disappointing direction. (SPOILERS for the rest of this paragraph.) Can we please get over motivating the hero by killing off the love interest? Or at least play with the gender roles more? And if the answer to that is somehow "no," then can we at least not motivate both the protagonist (Deadpool) and antagonist (Cable) of the same freaking movie with the same tired cliche?

Once the movie does actually bring Deadpool and Cable into conflict, though, it finally figures out what it wants to be. It also starts being consistently very funny. The fourth wall breaking humor becomes more biting; perhaps because the movie's own choices become stronger, it's no longer afraid to wink at them. The movie also begins to regularly reference its own predecessor, repeating and one-upping gags like "what Deadpool's face looks like" and "the awkwardness of regrowing severed limbs."

The second act also introduces the movie's best prolonged gag, the new X-Force team Deadpool recruits. In particular, we get the fun and fantastic character of Domino. Opposite a personality as large as Deadpool's, it really isn't possible to steal the movie away. But Domino, as portrayed by Zazie Beetz, comes as close as possible. Her quirky combination of detached cool and self-assuredness is great.

As the movie presses into Act 3, anything can and will go, and the frenetic pace of the jokes and the action totally work. Even composer Tyler Bates gets in on the action with his musical score, in a particular cue that made me laugh the hardest of any joke in the entire movie. (And it totally makes me want to buy the soundtrack album.) Plus, when they promise the best "end credits scene" of any movie ever, they may be wrong only in the sense that it's technically a mid-credits scene.

The peaks are higher, and the valleys lower, than the original Deadpool. But all in all, Deadpool 2 entertains. I'd give it a B+. You may be similarly frustrated with it in moments, but if you liked the first one, you're likely to enjoy the second.

The End

Well, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. went and did it.

Wait... okay, hang on a minute. SPOILERS (for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., obviously, but also Avengers: Infinity War.)

Alright now. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. went and did it. No, not picking up on what happens after Thanos snaps his fingers. They pointedly (and rightly) did not do that. (And I'll pick up on that a bit later.) What they did do is write what felt quite definitively like a series finale. Faced with uncertainty about their renewal, given the choice to do a conventional cliffhanger anyway, or a more open-ended conclusion, the writers did right by their fans, and gave us actual ending. To everything. I'm in the weird position now of being a bit sad that the series actually was renewed for another season.


First, they wrapped up the Talbot storyline. A bit neatly and quickly perhaps, but they had a bigger agenda to get to with the characters. Daisy took a power-up booster shot and Quaked the bad guy so hard he was launched into space. Neat and quick, maybe... but also pretty damn satisfying and entertaining.

Far more important was how they gave all the main characters a compelling ending. Mack was recognized for his unwavering moral compass and put in charge of the entire team. Daisy made the right choice for the group here, but also very much the right choice for her -- keeping herself in the field as fully as possible. She also faced the loss of her biggest father figure straight on, doing what Coulson asked and using his one shot (literally) at recovery on herself, to save the world.

Yo-Yo had, appropriately, an up and down ride of emotions. She started at rock bottom, a Cassandra figure unable to convince anyone they were about to destroy the world. She got some consolation from Coulson, who told her he agreed with her. But she was still there at what could have been Coulson's final moment, to save his life for just a bit longer.

Fitz's story was the part that hit hardest. He'd been barreling down a dark course all season, and sure enough, there was a big consequence for that. He heroically tried doing the right thing at the end, but heroism got him killed. And for me, this loss strongly contrasted with the ending of Infinity War in terms of effectiveness -- though I'm sure some would argue it's fundamentally no different.

To me, it was. They sat in the moment of Fitz's death, very honestly, and made it believable. Only then did they let us off the hook, and then only by reminding us of a "loophole" already established -- somewhere floating in space is an earlier Fitz, in hibernation, trying to get to a future that now no longer exists. Even this "out" to save Fitz hardly undoes everything. If they ever find him (well, "when," since we now know the show will have another season), he'll have missed out on a great deal, not the least of which is his own wedding. He'll also still be full of the demons of his behavior in the Framework, without having had a way to purge them -- he'll be a ticking clock that needs to make different choices than the ones we've seen his doppelganger make.

What I especially love in this is that we only got the briefest taste of any anguish from Simmons. Just a few seconds of silent slow motion when she received the news of Fitz's death. She is, of course, a woman of science, and has always been the bright optimist. The moment she realized that a version of Fitz was still alive out there somewhere, she was not mournful, but hopeful. That hope is all they really showed us.

The most fitting ending of all, of course, was reserved for Coulson and May. It's impossible to imagine any better send-off for Coulson than finally, actually going to Tahiti to relax for the rest of his days. Well, other than for him to do that with someone who loves him dearly -- and he got that too. Sure, there's melancholy in the fact that they only have a few weeks together at most, but for two characters who've been in constant emotional torment all their lives (often self-inflicted), a few weeks is still a paradise. I frankly don't want them to find some last minute way to keep Coulson on the show for another season, as much as I love Clark Gregg's performance, because I feel like it could only undermine this perfect ending.

Hell, even Deke got a great ending. We never actually see him "wink out of existence." Fitz was proven wrong about the nature of time, so who's to say whether he got this part right? Did Deke disappear? Or is he out there in the open air, living a real life for the first time? Either ending works, and you're free to choose the one that works best for you.

So, the one thing we didn't get was that final connection to Infinity War. It turns out that all the talk of Thanos was not building to a particular reckoning in the finale, it was just motivation for Talbot's descent into darkness. And deciding not to show us any version of "half" the characters winking out of existence was absolutely the right choice for this, if it's a series finale. We got an end to this story, and it's left to us to imagine (if we want to) what happens to them in a post-Thanos universe. (But it being a show run by Whedons, that's not terribly hard to imagine. Either Coulson or May vanishes -- May would be the more wrenching choice. Simmons probably goes, to make it extra painful when they do find Fitz and revive him. Take Mack, since we've all just agreed he's the new core of the gang. Leave Yo-Yo and Daisy alive to work through their differences.)

I've really come to understand why I was so curious about what Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. would do post-Thanos, and it has nothing to do with the show itself. I was looking for them to save Infinity War for me. Among many complaints I have about that movie, the biggest was that I felt no weight to any of the deaths. I want to see people forced to live with real consequences of events. Yet it shouldn't be on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to provide that for me. They had nothing to do with that movie and no say in what happened there. Why should they clean up the mess? The first part of season one, remember, was a rocky treading of water until Captain America: Winter Soldier was released, killing off S.H.I.E.L.D. as an official organization, sending the TV characters underground, and essentially starting the "real" show. That wasn't great, so why wish something like it on them again?

It's been announced that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. won't be returning until next summer. By then Avengers 4 will have already wrapped up everything, leaving it to the series to decide to acknowledge what happened (or not) as they see fit. I still wish I could see some real, believable consequences from the events of Infinity War, but even more than that, I want Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to be its own thing. They already have their hands full anyway, needing to come up with a way to continue the show that doesn't undermine the integrity of the perfect series finale they just gave us.

Of course, I'll be there anyway when the show does come back. Quite nervously, though. But at least I've got more than a year to enjoy this grade A "conclusion."

Skating Your Case

After the Oscars briefly experimented with 10 Best Picture nominees each year, they switched to their current system, which can produce anywhere from 5 to 10 nominees. Since its introduction, this method has always resulted in 8 or 9 nominees, spurring some discussion of what the 1 or 2 other likely contenders would have been. In this most recent award season, the "10th film" is considered in most circles to be I, Tonya.

The movie is the story of Tonya Harding, focusing (of course) on the scandal of the attack on Nancy Kerrigan before the 1994 Olympics. The film has a mockumentary framing device, despite being based on true events, as the absolute truth is hard to know here. You get things shaded one way by Harding herself, another slant from her husband Jeff Gillooly, and still another view from her mother LaVona Golden. Whenever the story seems to become too fantastical to be true, up pops one or more of the trio to remind you that, in fact, maybe it isn't, quite.

It's a funny movie, much more so than Oscar typically considers. If it was in the hunt, I think it's because it really does make a sympathetic character out of Tonya Harding. Anyone old enough to remember the original events will know that's as hard a feat as landing Harding's signature triple lutz, as she was thoroughly vilified in the media at the time. (Deservedly so? That's what the movie is asking.) The overall message here isn't obscured: everyone has their own side of the story. There's more to a person than the caricature you might perceive them to be.

The problem is that as the film spoon feeds you that message with one hand, it contradicts itself with the other. Every other character in the film feels as much a caricature as the on-screen Harding protests being reduced to. Everyone is a hapless idiot or a monstrous tyrant... or both, in turn -- everyone except Harding, the only person given a well-rounded treatment by the film. (And that's why it's called "I, Tonya," I suppose.) This construction certainly works to generate laughs and to achieve the primary mission of making her sympathetic, but it very much undermines the core message that there's always a story behind the story.

For me, that's why the movie itself didn't actually warrant Best Picture consideration. But it did receive three other nominations, and each one seems well deserved. First, Tatiana S. Riegel was nominated for Best Film Editing. The editing here is spectacular, from wry cuts to "interviews" for comedic effect to outstanding work putting together the film's many skating scenes. There's great camera placement and visual effects trickery at play too, but the alchemy of it really puts you on the ice for these make-or-break competition moments.

Margot Robbie was nominated for Best Actress for her performance as Harding. Certainly, the script gives her the gift of playing the most realistic character in the film, which helps her stand out. That's not to say she doesn't bring plenty to it, though. She has to play Harding at various ages, has to pop in and out of scenes to directly address the camera, and of course nail all that physicality in bringing the skating to life. It's a very solid performance.

Then there's Allison Janney, who won the Oscar she was nominated for, Best Supporting Actress. Part of me feels like the work she does here is nothing spectacular for her. But she is, without question, one of the most talented actresses working today. I can't in any way begrudge her a win for any particular performance, and certainly not this one. She is great, and since she works primarily on television (prior to this win, anyway), she doesn't have a lot of opportunities to even be up for an Oscar. Sure, give her the statue. She's every bit as funny and hateable here as the movie wants her character to be.

If you watch this movie, I think you'll be watching it for these performances. (And also that of Sebastian Stan, who really sheds his Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier image here as Harding's husband.) But I still wouldn't say you're missing out on a lot if you choose to skip it entirely. I give I, Tonya a B-.

Tales from Decrypto

Decrypto is a new game I've seen a few people online describe as a "Codenames killer." That seems a bit over the top to me; I don't anticipate this more complex word game taking off to that degree. But I personally did enjoy it a great deal. Indeed, in my group of friends, it may well kick Codenames off the particular perch it inhabits.

Players split into two teams. Each team is given four words, placed in a reader that assigns a number (from 1 to 4) to each word. Everyone in the team can see the words and their corresponding numbers. Each team is given a sheet of paper to track everything that's about to go down.

The first round is straightforward. One member of a team draws a clue card with three different digits on it in a random order. They then give three clues to three of their four words that, in order, point to that code. Looking right at the words in the reader, the team comes to a consensus on the code.

Once the game enters round 2, things get more interesting. Again, one designated clue giver must give clues to the three-digit code they've drawn. But they can't repeat any clue that's been given previously in the game. And then, before their own team gets to guess the code, the opposing team gets a shot at it. Only if they fail to "intercept" can your own partners guess the code.

The core challenge of the game is this: you must give clues opaque enough to slip them by the opposing team, but clear enough to be grasped by your own team. The first team to intercept two opposing codes wins the game. But if your own team fails to guess a code, they receive a "failure to communicate" token. Two of those, and you lose the game.

As rounds progress, the game gets more and more challenging. As a clue giver, you have to try to come at a word from a new angle to keep things from becoming obvious. As an opposing team, you have to look at all the clues that have been given for a specific word over the course of several rounds and see if you can identify a commonality. If you're getting deeper into things, and your opponents messed up on one of their own clues, then you can try to factor in how it was their wrong guess might have been misconstrued as a clue for something else.

Like Codenames, this is a "Password"-style word game that rewards you for thinking outside the box and considering multiple meanings and associations for words. Improving on Codenames (in my view) is that the role of clue giver passes multiple times during a round, picking up the pace a bit and giving more players a chance to experience all aspects of the gameplay.

It's not that I wouldn't want to play Codenames again, but I'd surely prefer Decrypto whenever it too is on hand. I can see it becoming a staple of large-group game nights with my friends. It's a bit harder to wrap your head around than Codenames, and I do suspect for that reason it may not become the same massive hit. But it seems great for my group. I give Decrypto an enthusiastic A.

Nothing Lasts Forever

The best episode of the recent revival season of The X-Files was an all-out comedy in the mold of classics like "Jose Chung's From Outer Space" and "Bad Blood" -- some of the most highly-regarded episodes of the series. But there's another very different episode that also routinely ends up on "best of" lists: the gory and profoundly disturbing "Home." That's not a personal favorite of mine, though I can understand why they'd want to try revisiting that well one more time. I imagine that's how we got "Nothing Lasts Forever."

Mulder and Scully investigate the gruesome and ritualistic murders of a pair of organ harvesters, and soon find themselves hot on the trail of.... vampires? A cult? Both! Sort of. A charismatic couple, an actress and an unethical doctor, have built a group of followers literally willing to die so that the two might prolong their lives and remain forever young. But the sister of one of these wayward followers is also in pursuit, with vengeance on her mind.

This episode seems to exist mainly just as a vehicle to gross out the audience with body part smoothies, graphic impalings, gruesome operations to stitch people together, and whatever else they can think of. There's a loosely woven plot around prolonged life apparently making you crazy, but it appears to subscribe to the notion that "crazy people don't make sense," and so neither does this plot need to.

There's a tiny sprinkling of meta commentary throughout, about aging in general, and the aging of our two heores in particular. It's definitely the episode's strongest element. We see Mulder struggling with vanity and embarrassment as he has to resort to progressive lens eyeglasses (not bifocals!) in order to read. Scully the doctor tries to tell him that it's a natural stage of life, to which Mulder gets a dig in on how she's not just leaving her appearance to nature either. This is just one of a few nice moments with the characters, though none are as effective and simple as the show's opening credits -- which still, after all these years, show our baby-faced, season 1 protagonists crashing through a door, circa 1993.

I'm not sure anything on television (certainly not network television) could be as shocking today as "Home" was in its time, so I feel like this episode was chasing something that could never be caught. Add that to the fact that I never thought much of that original episode, and I found this a rather lackluster installment of the show. I give "Nothing Lasts Forever" a C-. As I'm finally winding down the season, I'm ready for it to be done.

The Force of Gravity

With just one episode remaining now in this season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., there's more ambiguity than the show has ever had wrapping up a season.

First, as of the moment I'm writing this, we don't know whether the show has been renewed yet -- so we could be approaching either a season or series finale. Second, five years is a long run for many shows, and it's not unusual for cast shake-ups to happen; it's possible to imagine that even if the show continues, they maybe could kill off Coulson (and/or other characters) in the finale. Third, the series has been weaving in references to Thanos and Infinity War, making it clear that they'll reckon with the events of that film in some way. Which leads us right back to the other two points.

Even the question of why they haven't announced a renewal or a cancellation yet plays into the ambiguity and speculation. Are the Marvel corporate overlords demanding silence to preserve secrecy around the conclusion of the series? Or to avoid any possible risk (however minor) to their billion dollar movie? In any case, it's effective. While I'm certain our heroes are going to save the day (and the world) in the next (last?) episode, I'm honestly not prepared to wager on who I think will survive that episode.

But really, that's all on a meta level, beyond what we see on the screen. The most recent episode itself wasn't as tense as all that, or as full of surprises. Not that it needed to be. The crazy journey that Talbot has been on really demanded certain plot points unfold, and indeed they did. He returned home to try playing the hero for his son, only to terrorize the boy and his mother. He continued to display villainy masquerading as heroism, from his absorption of Creel to his kidnapping of Robin and her mother.

Elsewhere in the episode, we got a completely over-the-top (and pretty fun) kiss between Coulson and May, and a great reaction from Daisy (who totally 'ships them). We got a wacky bit of physical comedy from Deke as he wormed his way around in the middle of a classic May fight sequence. And if that wasn't enough fist-fighting for you, Daisy got some hits of her own in too.

But mostly, the episode was moving all the pieces into place for a Big Choice: save Coulson or save the world. This has been the stuff of superhero stories since day one: save the day or save the person you care for most. Here, we've seen the consequences of making the wrong choice. Of course, we've now also seen Fitz's rationalization that maybe it's trying to save Coulson that dooms everything; actually saving him might be the right play. Either way, the story elements seem set to lead in either direction.

It's admittedly been a while since Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. served up a genuine grade-A episode, but there has been a consistency throughout this story arc that I've found refreshing and entertaining. I give this episode a B, but I'm all in and eager to see how it all wraps up next week.

(For good?)

Familiar

After the atypical episode that was "Rm9sbG93ZXJz," The X-Files revival season returned more to form with "Familiar."

Mulder and Scully investigate the death of a young boy in a small town. Though the local police are quick to chalk it up to wild animals, our heroes suspect abduction and murder. And as both strange evidence and a second death rack up, Mulder begins to suspect a witchcraft angle -- the victims are all being lured to their death by a beloved television character.

This episode essentially plays things for straight horror, and does an effective job of it in a few ways. The two TV characters brought to life, "Mr. Chuckle Teeth" and a Teletubbies homage, are truly terrifying in appearance. (Actually, too much so. It's hard to imagine a small child ever liking them and not being scared to death of them.) They're brought to life with great costume design, great performance, great editing, and great music composition. They will absolutely give you the chills.

The mystery itself is somewhat intriguing, if you set aside the unlikelihood that Mulder and Scully would ever be sent to investigate this in the first place (as all outward evidence initially suggests it's not even a crime, much less supernatural in nature). There's a tangled affair at the core of it: two spouses and an "other woman" who is also married. This serves up many suspects along to way to favor and dismiss.

There's also a brief parable woven in about the difficulty of an ex-con getting a fair shake. For a time, the eye of suspicion falls on a former sex offender, and this ends very poorly. Though the episode doesn't really spend much time on the social commentary, the fact of his innocence and of his treatment by an unruly mob and vengeful cop paints a recognizable picture.

But the episode doesn't fully dig into many of the angles it sets up. It's not really a show built for social commentary, nor is "whodunit" its bread and butter. So all these elements sort of meander by at a surface level, with a creepy monster showing up occasionally to make your skin crawl.

As such, the episode really doesn't stand out. This isn't a highlight you'd remember if it had aired in the show's original nine season run; it would be one you'd dimly recollect until it clicked for you 10 minutes into the rerun. I give "Familiar" a B-.

DS9 Flashback: Invasive Procedures

After burning through seemingly half of the second season's budget in the opening three-part episode, Deep Space Nine dialed things down to a more personal scale with "Invasive Procedures."

The station is emptied to a skeleton crew as an interstellar storm sweeps through the region. This leaves the senior staff vulnerable to a surprise attack. An unjoined Trill named Verad boards the station with a team of mercenaries (and help from a scheming Quark), plotting to steal Dax's symbiont for himself.

A lot about this episode reads as an elaborate budget saving measure to compensate for the expenditures of the season's opening three-parter. There are no background actors, all the scenes take place on existing sets, and there are only the most rudimentary effects depicting space outside the station. But to hear script co-writer Robert Hewitt Wolfe tell it, there was a larger storytelling goal here. The writing staff wanted to introduce the idea that not all Trills are joined, that it's in fact a rather rare thing. They reckoned that this would reflect on Dax, making her special and exceptional in much the way Spock or Data were on their respective series.

Interestingly, this doesn't much play like a "Dax episode." It's all about her, yes. But once the lives of her friends are threatened and she chooses to voluntarily give up her symbiont to protect them, she all but vanishes from the story. We basically get just two scenes with her after that... though they're boosted a lot by Terry Farrell's performance, and no doubt are why she cites this as one of her favorite episodes. First, we get to see a little of Jadzia without Dax. It's interesting to see how the very strength (of Dax) that allowed her to go through with her self-sacrifice vanishes on the post-op table when she's now just a young woman in her 20s fearing for her own life, cut short. Second, we get to see Dax later reunited with Jadzia, now forced forever to carry the memories of the brief, terrible things she did to her friends as Verad Dax.

The terrible acts of Verad, however, aren't as big an issue was what Quark does in this episode. He's directly responsible for the criminal gang getting aboard the station in the first place. While I totally respect the instinct to keep Quark a little wicked and not let him become a totally de-fanged sweetheart of a character, the pendulum swings way too far here. His act of atonement in getting them all out of trouble doesn't count for much when he got them into the trouble. Also bad, he's rather stupidly caught off guard when he gets double-crossed, revealing that he really had no long-term plan here. At least keep Quark smart if you're going to make him "evil."

For what it's worth, the man himself agrees with me. Armin Shimerman spoke negatively of this episode in at least one interview, noting that he worried "when Quark doesn't get punished for really sizable crimes. It makes the character less important since his acts trigger no consequences, and it makes Odo look a little foolish, in that he's the law keeper and he can't get this little troll punished." That certainly cuts to the heart of another problem here -- there are no lasting consequences. Kira says, partway through the episode, that Quark has crossed a line this time... but we never see any payoff for that, now or in any later episode.

With the roles of Dax and Quark handled strangely here, the episode might actually be the best showcase for Sisko and Avery Brooks. The commander gets to be the thinking captive in the hostage situation, working every possible angle to try and turn the tables. The moment Verad and Dax are joined, Sisko is trying to appeal to the better nature of his "old friend." When that doesn't work, he tries to drive a wedge between Verad and his girlfriend Mareel. Ultimately, he surprises everyone by risking the death of Dax to prevent the escape of Verad. It's fun to watch the character go through all these calculations in a short span.

It's a bit of a mixed bag for the other characters, though. Bashir throws attitude at a dangerous Klingon and earns some respect... but he also displays terrible bedside manner when he raves to a panicking Jadzia about the success of the operation to remove her symbiont. We learn that O'Brien has two brothers, but I don't think this fact is ever paid off in a future episode. Kira just comes off poorly all around, first complimenting the Cardassians on the construction of the station (as if!), and then failing to best another woman in hand-to-hand combat. (And even as Sisko manages to take down a Klingon. I guess I'm saying I think Kira could take Sisko in a fight.)

But it is a good episode for the guest stars. John Glover plays Verad, and serves up distinctly different takes for the unjoined and joined versions of the character. Megan Gallagher (later a regular on the TV series Millennium) makes a lot out of a stock character -- the kind-hearted criminal who ends up turning against her vicious partner. Tim Russ appears here in his second Star Trek role, less than a year before he'd become Tuvok on Star Trek: Voyager.

One angle that's completely unaddressed is whether joined Trills are or aren't an appropriate analogy for transgender people. Of course, television wasn't ready to take this on in 1993, not even by Star Trek allegory, but it is intriguing to think about what this episode might look like if made today. There is a clear angle here in which a Trill assumes a new identity and becomes a new person... who nevertheless carries the memories of the former person. In this specific story, there are different ways that people who knew the old person react to the new. On the other hand, a transgender person isn't becoming a new individual so much as acknowledging the one who's always been there. Nor is there the notion that past Trills (former hosts, or the previously unjoined Trill) were anything less than a full, true person. I certainly don't have the answer here, but that makes me wish all the more that the question could have been explored.

Other observations:

• Dax's willingness to sacrifice her own life for others is in keeping with behavior in the previous season's "Dax."

• Not only do we learn of O'Brien's brothers in this episode, we learn Dax has a sister. (We never meet her either.)

• One of the Klingons in this episode, T'Kar, is motivated by hatred of the treaty with the Federation. It gives me a sort of neo-Nazi vibe, in that the treaty is old enough (and T'Kar seems not old enough) to truly remember what it was like before the peace. So where did he get these attitudes/opinions?

There are some intriguing ideas at play in this episode, but a lot of them aren't paid off. With the handling of Quark a particularly sore point, I can only rate this episode a C+. It's the first true misfire of the second season.

The Deal of the Artemis

If you're an author whose debut novel is a wild success, I'd imagine the temptation is overwhelming to follow it up with more of the same. It's a high-class problem to have, to be sure -- one that faced Andy Weir, the author of the runaway hit The Martian, as he wrote his latest book, Artemis.

With just one other book to compare to, many readers will surely have different notions about what Weir should or shouldn't have tried to change about his "formula." I feel like his brand was clearly putting as much science into his science fiction as possible, and that was perfect for him. Check that box with Artemis -- it's set in the future on a lunar base, and it's peppered with all sorts of fun facts about the moon and what it would be like to live there.

Smart people solving problems is a core element of The Martian that Weir preserved in Artemis. But here, he tried to disrupt his formula with his cast of characters. The main character of Artemis is Jazz Bashara, and seems calculated to be very different from The Martian's Mark Watney. Jazz is female, has a Muslim father (though she herself is atheist), and uses her ingenuity in a far less heroic way -- she's a criminal running a low-key smuggling operation for the local population of the lunar base.

Jazz is emblematic of a clear effort at diversity by Weir, one that permeates this new book. Jazz's Muslim father is an important secondary character. So is her ex-boyfriend, Dale, whose relationship with Jazz fell apart when he came out as gay. The future moon base was built by a space agency in Kenya, and its current "mayor"/administrator hails from there. The "bad guys" of the story are a Brazilian crime syndicate.

But most of this diversity feels only skin deep. Jazz's criminal tendencies are a key differentiator, to be sure, but in basically every other way, she's Mark Watney, Weir's first starring character. She's sarcastic under pressure, clever and inventive, often crass and always suspicious of authority. She tells her story in the first person. Weir has to remind us on a fairly regular basis that she's female, because her "voice" is very much Mark Watney's. (His voice, presumably.) And, as in The Martian, the secondary characters have almost no personality to speak of, beyond being "lesser Mark Watneys" (smart but less so, witty but less so).

That's not to say the book isn't fun. It certainly is. The plot is substantially different, while being the same type of puzzle-oriented page turner as The Martian. I found it a quick, breezy read, and I did like it overall. But it also had essentially the same flaws as The Martian. That didn't keep me from enjoying that book, nor did it keep that book from being a monster hit that spawned an Oscar-nominated, financially-successful movie. Still, I'd hoped Artemis would show an evolution of Weir's writing skills, and it doesn't really do that.

I suppose Weir could turn out several more books like this, and it would probably take a few before I'd tire of the formula. He's no Dan Brown. Yet there are diminishing returns here. I'd give Artemis a B, and probably a recommendation. But I'll probably regard Andy Weir's third book, when it comes, with a bit more skepticism.

The One Who Will Save Us All

The latest Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. brought us Talbot's not-at-all-slow descent into madness and megalomania. The heady cocktail of HYDRA brainwashing, solitary confinement, gravitonium, and threat of global annihilation dragged him farther from heroism minute by minute.

Not that Talbot was acting especially "heroic" even when he was still mostly helping the good guys. His signature move of crushing people into compact cubes remains gruesome and cold, whether we're seeing it done to the aliens of the Confederacy or the ill-fated General Hale. (R.I.C.) He thinks he's doing it all to help save Earth from Thanos (hello, crossover synergy), but the speed at which he latched onto that mission tells you all need to know. He's taking the word of some duplicitous aliens (one in particular revealed as the ancestor of early season villain Kasius), he's never seen Thanos in the flesh, and he knows nothing of the Titan's plans, but he's eager and ready to pack some fleshy boxes.

It's his failure to understand Coulson's reluctance that's the problem. Of course, Talbot doesn't have the benefit of a trip to the future to have seen where this road leads. This leaves Coulson (and May and Daisy) playing a deadly verbal game of Operation, where they have to be careful not to touch the sides that represent Talbot's wrath as they try to talk him down from global annihilation. Two horrifying threats in a 24-hour period. Not a good day for the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Although this episode was heavy on narrative as we sprint to the end of the season, there were a few moments sprinkled in for conflict among the characters. Mack and Fitz was a particularly effective clash, an argument between the most noble hero on the show right now and the most pragmatic. In a testament to how well both characters' journeys have played this season, I really don't know who to side with there -- though it was definitely Mack who got in the most cutting dialogue. (Maybe I shouldn't be siding with Fitz, though. There are certainly shades of Thanos in his "sacrifice some for the good of the rest" viewpoint.)

We also got a taste of an all-out fight between Daisy and Yo-Yo. It was perhaps unsatisfying to have it cut short by May, but the idea that they would come to (super-powered) blows at all illustrates just how fractured that relationship is. And why wouldn't it be? Yo-Yo thinks Daisy bailed on them in a crisis to do the one thing that will explicitly lead to the end of the world. Daisy thinks Yo-Yo has a bailed on them all in spirit by refusing to help save Coulson's life. Another good conflict where you can understand both sides. (Though if you take Future Yo-Yo at her word, it's hard to side with Daisy on this one. And if you judge by Yo-Yo's unconsidered and ineffective methods, you wind up feeling for Daisy.)

Two episodes left, and it appears the show isn't shying away from tying into the events of Infinity war. What's that going to make the season (series?) finale look like? We shall see. As for this installment, I give it a B.

Thursday in the Park

Last night, I went to the Colorado Symphony Orchestra for their performance of John Williams' score to Jurassic Park, synced live with the movie. I've written before about these movie/symphony shows, but I continue to go and continue to be impressed. It still feels like a thrilling high wire act, playing complicated music in perfect unison with an unyielding film.

I hadn't seen the original Jurassic Park in some time. I'd forgotten what a swift, spartan film it is. Though it's a touch over two hours, it doesn't feel like it. Dinosaur mayhem erupts from the very first scene, and continues steadily throughout. Character work is done simply and efficiently. And almost the instant our heroes are out of danger, the end credits roll. No summarizing or reflecting on what has happened; the ride is over.

John Williams' score for the film might also be characterized as swift and spartan, at least in comparison with many of the other films he's most famous for. This is not a knock on him, by any means. Jurassic Park may be his most popular, well-known score of the 90s. He knew exactly what the film needed, and delivered.

For one thing, there aren't as many themes established here as in earlier John Williams scores. Many of the cues are one-off compositions. Instead of developing a broad palette of themes, he returns again and again to the amazing one I'll bet you're humming in your head right now. Not that this is lazy. It's an incredibly smart, well-constructed theme, designed to change tone dramatically depending on the instrument that plays it and the key its set in. It's majestic when delivered by the trumpets, contemplative when played by the oboes, and almost sorrowful on piano. You hear it on all those instruments throughout the score, and on violin, french horn, and more. Every time, it feels different.

Jurassic Park may also be John Williams' (and director Steven Spielberg's) most daring experiment in not scoring part of a movie. The key scene in which the Tyrannosaurus attacks the children in the jeep plays entirely without music, relying on sound effects to create the tension. It somehow felt even more tense watching the scene unfold with an orchestra of nearly 100 performers sitting there silent. Come on! Play something! How can you just sit there?! But it's totally the right choice for the scene.

As with all John Williams scores, watching the performance was a lesson in how specific sounds are made -- the different effects achieved by trumpet vs. trombone vs. french horn, the dense use of percussion (and getting to see the instruments that make the noises), and more. Once again, a real treat.

My one reservation is that the original recording of the score makes key use of a choir, and the CSO did not have one for its performance. A couple of key scenes were covered with a recorded choir performing the part, but that's totally cheating around the spirit of this kind of performance. (Though if you didn't know the music as well as I do, I doubt you'd notice.)

If you're reading this on Friday and want to go, the CSO has one more performance of Jurassic Park tonight. (Then, in July, Jaws is up next.) At the risk of repeating myself, I highly recommend it.

Rm9sbG93ZXJz

This isn't exactly the most timely of reviews for this blog, but resting quietly in my DVR, I still have the four episodes of The X-Files that aired after the Winter Olympics concluded. With subdued expectations, I recently sat down to watch the first of those, the awkwardly titled "Rm9sbG93ZXJz". (The internet tells me this is "Followers" in 64-bit.)

This episode was a play on technology running amok. Mulder and Scully have a bizarre dinner at a robotic sushi restaurant, and are pursued by vengeful technology after Mulder refuses to leave a tip. Self-driving taxis, robot vacuums, smart homes, drones (and drone delivery), cell phone tracking, 3D printers, and more are all brought up in this quirky episode that straddles the line between comedy and horror.

In much the same way a Darin Morgan episode is welcome for its departure from the self-serious norm of the series, I found this episode enjoyable for its departure from the usual format. (Significantly, it's one of the few episodes of the entire show written by women, Shannon Hamblin and Kristen Cloke.) Mulder and Scully are separated from each other for the bulk of the episode, each on their own misadventure with technology. Even when they're together, the dialogue in this episode is sparse, reinforcing the notion that technology is taking over everything.

There's a delightfully meta quality to this episode. While the idea of an army of drones chasing our heroes is a fantasy, most of the episode really doesn't feel like one. This isn't exactly reality turned up to a Twilight Zone level of weird; it feels like reality turned up just a notch. And yet, had this episode aired during the original 1990s run of The X-Files, everything would have been fantastical nonsense. UFO-like drones delivering packages, robots sweeping up dirt in the home, getting into a taxi without a human driver, a giant touch screen in your lap that you use to turn on your lights or TV or fireplace... from a 90s perspective, we're all living in the X-Files.

The episode was great fun, but I do wish it had had a little more courage in its convictions. The first act, set at the restaurant, is a dialogue-free affair (outside of the approving "yum" of the touch screen waiter). Mulder and Scully say nothing to each other, in an obvious commentary on how technology can separate people even when they're at a dinner table together. And while the episode goes on to be dialogue light, it is not dialogue free. The intro went much farther than was necessary to make the point and tell the joke, so far that I was disappointed when the gimmick did not in fact last for the entire episode.

Even after Mulder and Scully do begin to speak (to automated voices on the phone, and to each other when they reunite), the episode does continue with a second gimmick -- there's no one actually on screen but the two of them. It's a subtle push on the idea that the world has been overrun by technology, as the hour is nothing but Mulder, Scully, and technology. Almost. The final scene is set in a conventional diner, bustling with customers. Though I can see the "old ways can be good" conceit of the scene, I again wish the episode had stuck with an idea all the way through to the end credits and not shown us anyone else.

Still, while the episode didn't dare to be all the way unconventional, it was enough of a change (and a successfully executed one overall) that I enjoyed it. I'd give (copy-paste) "Rm9sbG93ZXJz" a B+.

Option Two

All its audience may have been at the movies seeing Infinity War, but Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. still had a new episode last Friday. It was a rather tight hour, with the bulk of our heroes all together in a single plot line.

Trapped in the Lighthouse thanks to Coulson's impatience over menu options, the gang had to stave off an alien siege from quasi-vampiric monsters that attack in darkness. After weeks of being used only as comic relief, Deke swung sharply into more dramatic territory -- he was the one character who really knew about these aliens, and that little bit of knowledge was terrifying to him.

Though most of the episode was spent running from monsters, there were still moments throughout that were about character more than action. A real rift has emerged between Mack and Yo-Yo. His staunch moral compass won't allow for Yo-Yo's handling of the Ruby situation. It's a well-constructed storyline, as both of them seem to be acting consistently with their histories, doing what they'd do and reacting as they'd react. It's separating them in a plausible way, not an artificial, it's-TV-so-we-have-to-do-the-"will-they-won't-they"-thing way.

While there was also fun repartee between Coulson and May, and Fitz and Simmons, the episode really belonged to Talbot. Lost in a sea of guilt and brainwashed uncertainty, he decided he had to do something to atone. Never one for small measures, his solution was to infuse himself with the gravitonium, becoming the potentially world-cracking problem it has been feared Daisy or Ruby would become. It seems unlikely that exposing Talbot to more crazy is going to counteract the crazy he was already dealing with, so this sets up a serious problem for the gang. (One it seems could sustain more than just the three episodes we have left, but we'll see how they handle it.)

I'd give this episode a B+. It was in many ways mostly setup, but the atmosphere of the thing, and the depth of what it did setup, made it a solid hour in my book.