Resident Status

There are a handful of television series named for their principle character -- and the character is usually a spotlight for an actor to go broad and make a meal of the role. I think no one has ever been given license to ham it up like Alan Tudyk on the series Resident Alien.

Over three seasons (and counting), Resident Alien is the story of a literal alien from outer space who assumes human form, replacing the doctor of the fictitious Colorado mountain town of Patience. He tries to maintain his cover as he plots the destruction of the human race -- but the longer he maintains human form, the more he begins to sympathize with the lowly creatures and to consider abandoning his mission.

Award shows continue pushing the lie that one hour shows are "dramas" and half hour shows are "comedies"; Resident Alien strongly demonstrates how untrue that is. Sure, each season-long arc tracks some impending jeopardy, touches on emotional developments in the lives of people of Patience, and features its share of heartfelt conversations. But the north star of Resident Alien is letting Alan Tudyk act as ridiculously as possible and do anything for a laugh.

Any fan -- of Firefly, or Rogue One, or Harley Quinn, or any of the countless Disney movies in which Tudyk has voiced everything from a duke to a tech guru to a rooster -- will know that Alan Tudyk can steal any scene he's in seemingly without effort. And no thievery is necessary in Resident Alien; the scripts are just written to hand over the goods. The show is reliably over the top, but always in service of storytelling and/or a good laugh.

It takes a while for the regular human characters to be fleshed out anywhere near as well as the show's titular alien. But many of the show's earliest and best laughs come from the alien's rivalry with a child played by Judah Prehn. (The two characters are about on the same level of maturity.) The town sheriff played by Corey Reynolds emerges as an outsized buffoon that would easily be the wildest character on any other show. Then suddenly, almost before you know what's happened, you find yourself caring about the other major characters played by Sara Tomko, Alice Wetterlund, Elizabeth Bowen, and others.

Many recognizable faces from comedy and science fiction ultimately come along to play for an episode or a protracted run, including Linda Hamilton, Terry O'Quinn, Alex Borstein, Enver Gjokaj, and Edi Patterson. (Voices too! See -- or actually, don't see -- George Takei, Clancy Brown, and Nathan Fillion.)

Through 3 seasons, each of a wildly different number of episodes, Resident Alien never quite reached "must-see" status for me amid other compulsively-watchable shows I follow. Yet at the same time, it was always good for some fluffy fun, and there was never any question that I would eventually watch all the episodes and be exactly where I am now: waiting for season 4 to arrive. If you need a lighter addition to your TV diet, Resident Alien might be the show for you. I give it a B+.

Enterprise Flashback: Shadows of P'Jem

An early fan favorite episode of Enterprise was "The Andorian Incident," perhaps in large part due to the reappearance of a Star Trek fan favorite actor, Jeffrey Combs. It should come as no surprise that the series' first notable "toe in the water" of serialized storytelling was a follow-up to that episode, with "Shadows of P'Jem."

When Andorians destroy the monastery where Enterprise exposed a secret Vulcan spy installation, the Vulcan High Command orders that T'Pol be recalled from her post aboard the human ship. She has time for one final mission to an alien world... but she and Archer are captured by hostile locals. To repay his debt to Archer for exposing the Vulcan's treachery, the Andorian Shran offers his help in mounting a rescue.

This episode has the whiff of "February sweeps" around it, with multiple veteran Star Trek actors putting in appearances in the hopes of enticing Star Trek fans to watch. While Jeffrey Combs' return as Shran is welcome, not every guest actor has a meaningful contribution to make to the episode. Character actor Gregory Itzin is one of television's most reliable weasels, but must subsume much of his oiliness beneath Vulcan decorum. The most un-Vulcan-like behavior is given to Gary Graham, who returns for just one scene as Soval, spewing venom and vindictiveness. (I guess this prequel is meant to show us that "Vulcans don't fully know how to Vulcan yet" just as "Starfleet officers are still learning how to Starfleet.")

Another oddity of wanting to air this episode during an important time for television ratings is that it feels like this sequel story is coming too long after the original. More episodes have passed between this episode and "The Andorian Incident" than there were between that episode and the premiere. As a result, it seems that the hot-headed Andorians -- enraged by the confirmation that Vulcans are spying on them -- for some reason waited three months to do anything about it.

But none of that is as awkward as specific moments throughout the episode. There's the Vulcan illogically assuming that hostage takers will behave logically. During the climactic rescue, there's a very distracting (and almost unheard of for Star Trek) use of slow motion. And let's not forget the extended, prurient scene in which Archer and T'Pol are tied up together -- a weak excuse to watch them rub up on each other before he falls face first into her chest.

Speaking of Archer, the writers keep digging a hole for the character, apparently determined to make him as unlikable as possible. He's chastised by Admiral Forrest for his lack of diplomacy. He whines that the Vulcans have no right to take T'Pol from Enterprise when they most emphatically do: she's their officer. He contrives to keep her aboard Enterprise in the end, without ever asking T'Pol herself if that's what she wants. And it's always dicey when a boss does comedy bits at an employee's expense -- as Archer does here to Trip, trying to convince the engineer he's being left out of a mission he's eager to go on.

Fortunately, there are a few good elements sprinkled throughout too. The action of the rescue is mostly well executed. Everything with Shran is entertaining, from Jeffrey Combs' performance to fun lighting to emphasize the character's articulating antennae. And it's another good episode for Phlox, from advice he gives to the only other non-human on the ship, to a very sly "lying without lying" moment at the end of the episode. (When asked if T'Pol will survive her injuries, he says only: "I wish I could say.")

Other observations:

• The guard who brings Archer and T'Pol their gruel is for some reason wearing parachute pants.

• T'Pol just straight-up lies in this episode, claiming she is the captain of the Enterprise and Archer merely a steward. Her captor then notes that Vulcans don't lie -- but T'Pol never gets a chance to justify her choice.

• At one point, Reed notes that there are only 15 phase pistols aboard the Enterprise -- and I have to wonder if this might be a "photon torpedoes aboard Voyager" kind of situation that doesn't hold true over time.

They say the sequel is almost never as good as the original. As a follow-up to "The Andorian Incident," I'd say "Shadows of P'Jem" proves the point. The parade of notable Star Trek actors helps lift it up to a soft B-, but I also feel that at this point, Enterprise has a long way to go in fleshing out the franchise's long-established-but-rarely-utilized Andorians.

He Scores!

Ask any movie lover who's into film scores, and they'll surely name John Williams as one of their favorite composers of movie music. He's been nominated for a staggering 54 Oscars, and countless other awards besides, yet it still feels like he can't be praised highly enough. A new documentary streaming on Disney+ delves into exactly why that is: the cheekily titled Music by John Williams.

I will readily confess that this is far from the most insightful documentary you could watch. It isn't here to expose a version of the man you don't know, and isn't here to tell you much new information. It's here to celebrate the man's accomplishments -- his music. And in this endeavor, it excels.

Even a fan of John Williams could be hard-pressed to name just how many amazing scores he's created. He's done what for any other composer could be called "career best" work perhaps a dozen times, and this documentary helps you appreciate the breadth of that as it presents one achievement after another in dizzying procession from Williams' long career.

I have always responded most enthusiastically to movies that make me feel the most emotions, and this documentary shows -- again and again -- how no one is better at doing that than John Williams. Not even, I would say, director Steven Spielberg, who (as Williams' long-time collaborator) is featured heavily in this documentary; Spielberg is enthusiastic to celebrate just how much of the success of his own career can be credited directly to the work of John Williams.

What I found truly remarkable about watching Music by John Williams is just how much I was caught up in the emotions of these great films all over again. Pieces are played that I've heard, probably literally, a hundred times. They're not even played in their entirely. Sometimes they're accompanied by clips of the movies they were created for, and sometimes not. But as Jaws crashes into Star Wars, and into Close Encounters of the Third Kind, into Superman, into Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler's List (and many, many, many more), I felt myself swept up in sheer awe of the genius who created it all.

Is this documentary kind of just a "puff piece?" Sure, probably. But few subjects would be as worthy, I think. Though the documentary doesn't seem to aspire to be any more than a fan-style gushing about John Williams, in the pursuit of that simple goal, it does illuminate just why movies can evoke these kinds of feelings, and what it is about Williams in particular that does it.

So no, maybe this isn't profound, but it made me feel all of the things in the way the movies I enjoy most always do. So I find myself giving Music by John Williams an A-. Put simply, I enjoyed it more than nearly every other movie I watched in 2024, and thus I think it earned that high mark. And I think any fan of film music (even casually), would enjoy it too.

2024 in Review -- Television

While I've been posting a "year in games" review and "year in movies" review for a long while now, this is only the second time I've done a "year in TV" review.

Comparing my "Top 10 Lists" from 2024 and 2023, I'd say that the 2023 is a slightly stronger and more even list all the way through #10. But if it were just a "Top 5" list, 2024 comes out ahead -- the "best of the best" was better in 2024 than the year before.

What 5 or 10 shows am I talking about?

10) The Big Door Prize. (Season 2) Season 2 of the now-cancelled series was a notable step up from season 1. The story of a town-wide journey of self-exploration (or, as some in the show call it, "selfploration") had plenty of moving moments, sweet sentiments, and helpful observations on life -- and plenty of compelling characters just struggling to find their authentic selves. I'm sorry the series won't ever reach its natural conclusion... but then, self-actualization is a life-long process that never truly ends, isn't it?

9) What We Do in the Shadows. (Season 6) This show arguably went one season too long (a notion hilariously commented upon in the series finale). And there was certainly never any "learning or growing" among the characters (also commented upon). But the show keep squeezing funny juice out of its highly specific (and you would think limited) premise. Without this season, we wouldn't have the hilarity of Cravensworth's Monster, Guillermo's corporate job, or Nandor's moody crisis of self-worth. Even if the show did last one season too long, it ended while it was still really great.

8) Ghosts. (Season 3... and part of season 4) This sitcom remains the best thing happening on old-fashioned, non-streaming, over-the-air television. The abbreviated season 3 (shortened by Hollywood strikes and multiple pregnancies in the cast) wasn't quite up to the level of the first two seasons -- yet still very good. And so far, season 4 is fully back to its reliably hilarious hijinks. The series continues to flesh out its sprawling cast of characters in surprising ways that make you actually care about everyone beyond just the jokes -- which make me laugh out loud multiple times every episode.

7) Silo. (Season 2) The new season of Silo is still running, split across 2024 and 2025, but it should certainly count on at least one of those lists. It's working in an area of the source novels that's been far more challenging to adapt than season one, yet it has continued to excel. It manages to make me feel a real sense of jeopardy, even though I've read the story. It's kept the narrative alive outside of Juliette's immediate field of view, and Steve Zahn has given a strong performance as the challenging-on-the-page new character of Solo. For all these reasons, and the continued great performances of Rebecca Ferguson, Tim Robbins, and more, this series gets a spot on my list.

6) Masters of the Air. I didn't have much faith that a follow-up to the tremendous Band of Brothers (and "pretty good" The Pacific), coming years and years later, could be great. But it absolutely was. Perhaps this long was needed for visual effects on television to reach a point to tell this story. In any case, these tales of another theater of World War II were impactful, at times harrowing, and moving.

5) Dead Boy Detectives. We got only one season of this delightful show... which arrived just before disappointing (but credible) accusations against creator Neil Gaiman made the rounds. Despite those two dark clouds over the show, there was still so much good. A tight core of delightful characters, each compelling portrayed. "One-off" stories skillfully juggled with an ongoing storyline. To me, these few episodes were light years better than the show that loosely spawned it (The Sandman).

4) Star Trek: Lower Decks. (Season 5) I can understand ending Star Trek: Discovery. Star Trek: Picard always felt like a limited thing anyway. But it is mind-boggling to me that Lower Decks isn't going to continue for years and years to come. At least if it had to end, it went out on top in every conceivable way -- with the best season of the series, the best final season of any Star Trek since Deep Space Nine, and a jam-packed, celebratory finale episode that concluded everything well, while still leaving room for the Powers That Be to come to their senses some day. We're fortunate that there was so much Star Trek in this new age of Star Trek that there was room enough for something like this -- seemingly irreverent, while subtly laying claim to being one of the most authentically Star Trek series of all.

3) Slow Horses. (Season 4) Every season of Slow Horses has been superb, but this season made a strong case for being the best so far, with a plot-twisty story about an agent on the lam, a deadly terrorist attack, a secret past coming back to haunt one of the heroes, and more I'd rather not even hint at. The cast remains uniformly fantastic, with Gary Oldman in particular doing quite possibly career-best work (in a truly exceptional career) -- Jackson Lamb is one of television's all-time great characters.

2) Shrinking. (Season 2) There's always some sitcom somewhere on television doing a masterful job of blending laughs with serious drama; Shrinking is the best there is right now, and I dare say very few shows have ever done it so well. The second season was even stronger than the excellent first. The cast is amazing, top to bottom. Especially amazing things happen when Harrison Ford actually appears vulnerable on camera. And actors who have really only been known for comedy (Jason Segel and recurring season two guest star Brett Goldstein) show some surprising dramatic chops in this run too.

1) Heartstopper. (Season 3) This British teen romance drama centered on LGBT+ relationships was stronger than ever in its newest season. It dealt most effectively and emotionally with mental health struggles, highlighted trans issues at a very important time for that in the real world, and featured best-yet performances from its young cast. The show was devastating and hopeful in turns, and my favorite television of 2024.

A couple of honorable mentions:

• Shōgun would have been #11 on my list. I thought it was solid overall, but it lost me a bit in the finale -- hence it just missing my list.

• I'm five years behind on this, but I began watching The Morning Show in 2024, and season 1 was excellent. If this were a list of "top 10 shows I watched this year" and not specifically "shows from 2024," it would actually take the number 3 slot. (When I catch up on the whole series to date, I'm sure I'll dedicate a blog post to it.)

There's already a lot of 2025 television to look forward to: season 2 of Severance arrives in just a couple of weeks, season 2 of Star Wars: Andor will be amazing even if it's only half as good as the first, ditto for season 2 of The Last of Us... plus an Alien series from TV genius Noah Hawley is set to debut, a new Star Trek series should arrive at some point, and perhaps some new favorite I haven't even heard of yet.

2024 in Review -- Movies

As always, I kick off a new year here on the blog with a look back at the fun I had in the previous year. Yesterday was board games. Today: movies.

I watched 58 movies throughout the year. I caught 20 of those at the theater (including a special private theater for one), 1 on an airplane flight (coming back from Banff; I'll probably get around to writing about that movie at some point), and the rest at home.

28 of the movies I saw were actually new 2024 releases... though I have not posted reviews of all 28. I've shifted my "posting strategy" over the last year or two, and now I usually skip writing about movies If I don't at least partly enjoy them. (I might even skip a movie I find moderately entertaining, if I feel like I simply have too many other things to post about at the time).

For those reasons and others, I haven't even written yet about a couple of the movies that are at least provisionally on my "Top 10 of 2024" list. But rather than waiting to post my list until after I post those reviews, I'm just going to forge ahead now, and fill in the missing reviews as I get to them. Maybe I'll even generate a tiny bit of suspense this way. ("You liked that movie? That much? Can't wait for you to explain how that's possible.")

My Top 10 (as of right now) for 2024 are:

1. Dune: Part Two
   
2. Music by John Williams
3. Inside Out 2
   
4. Challengers
   
5. Fly Me to the Moon
6. Wolfs
7. Deadpool & Wolverine
8. The Fall Guy
9. ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!
10. Civil War

There's a lot of "Oscar bait" I still haven't seen, and I do usually end up liking at least one or two of those -- so, as always, I expect to revise this list a bit in the coming months. Stay tuned!

Case in point...

Updated 2/5/25:

1. Will & Harper
   
2. Dune: Part Two
   
3. Music by John Williams
4. Inside Out 2
5. Rebel Ridge 
   
6. Challengers
   
7. Fly Me to the Moon
8. Cunk on Life
   
9. Wolfs
10. Deadpool & Wolverine
    

2024 in Review -- Games

2024 was a minor milestone of a year for me in playing board games. But before I get to why, let me start with an overview of the numbers.

Over the course of 12 months, I played 277 games. This was a very slight increase from the 273 plays I had in 2023, achieved thanks to a marathon evening of mostly short games on New Year's Eve. I played 75 different titles -- a slight drop from 2023, though this was very much the point.

See, 2024 was the first year I specifically set out to complete a "10 x 10" -- playing at least 10 different board games at least 10 times each. And while I was successful in that, I must say it's probably also the last time I'll ever set out to do that. The original intention was to bring to the spotlight some beloved games that my group and I don't always make time for amid trying out new things.

It did do that, to some extent. However, it also led to a couple of games that seemed beloved to us early on, but overstayed their welcome a bit as we sometimes played them over other options we'd rather play, just for the sake of the 10 x 10 completion. So this year's "challenge": just play more of the things we enjoy, whatever they are and however many times that may be. Duh.

Before the list, my usual caveats:

• I don't count the games made by my work if I played them for work (in unfinished forms).

• I count a few games by the "session," like The Crew and the Exit: The Game Advent Calendar. (But I don't need either of those to still have a completed 10 x 10, so don't "lawyer" me.)

Here's my 2024 List:

20    Ticket to Ride Legacy: Legends of the West
13    The Gang
11    Exit: The Game – Advent Calendar: The Silent Storm
11    Forest Shuffle
11    The Quacks of Quedlinburg
11    Sagrada Artisans
10    The Crew: Mission Deep Sea
10    Distilled
10    Kokopelli
10    Patchwork
10    Secret Hitler
10    Things in Rings
8    Nokosu Dice
8    Viticulture World: Cooperative Expansion
6    Landmarks
6    Ultimatch
6    Wyrmspan
5    Concordia Venus
4    Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig
4    Clever Cubed
4    Link City
4    Phantom Ink
4    Sky Team
3    Coloma
3    Fiction
3    Foundations of Metropolis
3    The Great Split
3    Star Trek: Cryptic – A Puzzles and Pathways Adventure
3    That's Pretty Clever!
2    Art Society
2    Big Boss
2    Cascadia: Rolling Rivers
2    Cities
2    Clever 4Ever
2    The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine
2    Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle
2    Just One
2    A Message From The Stars
2    Old London Bridge
2    Ready Set Bet
2    Secret Identity
2    Splito
2    The Taverns of Tiefenthal
2    Telestrations After Dark
2    Wandering Towers
2    Wits & Wagers
1    Azul: Master Chocolatier
1    Azul: Queen's Garden
1    Azul: Summer Pavilion
1    Cascadia
1    Clank!: Catacombs
1    Dune: Imperium – Uprising
1    Farkle
1    First Rat
1    Fromage
1    FTW?!
1    Great Western Trail: New Zealand
1    Hallertau
1    In the Year of the Dragon
1    Joan of Arc: Orléans Draw & Write
1    Knarr
1    Merlin
1    Mistwind
1    Point City
1    Rear Window
1    Rebel Princess Deluxe Edition
1    Roll for the Galaxy
1    The Search for Planet X
1    Shadows over Camelot
1    Skull
1    Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: A Gemstone Mining Game
1    Stone Age
1    Time's Up! Title Recall!
1    Twice as Clever!
1    Windmill Valley

And some random thoughts:

• This was a year for legacy games. I completed one campaign of Ticket to Ride Legacy with one group, and then jumped into a second campaign with a different group that will finish sometime in 2025. I also completed a campaign of Sagrada Artisans. I don't have any new Legacy game lined up yet for the new year, but I'm fine with that. Consider it an embrace of that "no obligations except what's fun" idea. I'm open if the right Legacy game should come around, but also happy to avoid such a commitment.
  

• The Quacks of Quedlinburg remains a favorite in my group, and now that my friends have blinged out their copy with screen-printed plastic tokens for the ingredients and wood-carved chests to hold them, I'd say it's not about to become a less popular choice.

• I continue to enjoy Distilled; despite it having no single truly revolutionary game mechanic, I find it mixes familiar gameplay in its own enjoyable way. The makers of that game have a new one coming this year, Luthier, that might make a big splash in my group when it arrives.
  

• For the second year in a row, I played multiple versions of Azul, but missed out on Stained Glass of Sintra. Clearly, it's my least liked of the series.

• While I'm not explicitly going for a 10-by-anything this year, a couple of games I'd like to play more include Viticulture World (though I feel I only want to play it with 4 players now, having tried it at a few other counts) and Concordia Venus (still a personal favorite).

• I'm also very much aware of several games I've so far played only once, that I'd like to keep at to see if I like them as much as I think I might: Fromage, Hallertau, Mistwind, and Windmill Valley. 

Here's to another fun year of gaming in 2025!

Lower Decks: The New Next Generation

I'm a few weeks behind the release of the final episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks -- partly due to holidays, partly due to travel, and partly because I'm just not ready to let the series go. But here it is, my post on "The New Next Generation."

The Cerritos must find a way to stop the destruction of their universe by a massive energy distortion. They must evade the Klingon ships chasing them, weather reality-changing ripples that affect their ship, and realize the unique strengths throughout their crew. And once they survive, things will never be the same.

This was a very well-crafted finale for a show that was always well-written. It deftly wove together different elements introduced throughout the entire fifth season, bringing back the Klingon brothers, Starbase 80, Ensign Olly, and more. So much came together in payoff of this top-notch final run.

I finally did get more of Rutherford and Tendi, as I've been asking for for the last few episodes. I do wish Rutherford's growing discontent with the Cerritos had been handled as well as Boimler's season-long arc to emulate his alternate universe doppelganger; it almost seemed as though the normally sunny Rutherford had possibly been replaced some doppelganger of his own without us knowing. But in the end, each character demonstrated the lessons they've learned as they united to save the day. Just as it should be.

I rarely mention just how gorgeous the animation can be on Lower Decks, but since this is my last chance, I want to call it out now. The look of the Klingon ships struck me as especially great, as did every aspect of the journey toward the distortion. And the big "glamour shot" that I used to illustrate this post, with its heroic angle and dramatic lighting, was everything that one final look at our core characters together needed to be.

I love that the message of this particular episode was slyly directed at fans: this may be the end, but it isn't The End. These characters have always grown and changed (unlike many animated characters), and they will keep doing so. We may not be able to watch their adventures, but they will be having them, and those adventures will be great. It felt like a pitch perfect ending to me.

...in large part because the episode kept packing in as many jokes as we've come to expect from Lower Decks. A brief appearance of Discovery-style Klingons. A great in-joke about how the design of Klingon spaceships never changes. Ransom delivering the best "go to warp" catch-phrase that any ship captain could ever adopt. I give "The New Next Generation" an A-, taking half a mark for the rushed Rutherford elements... and perhaps because I haven't yet learned the lesson it was trying to teach me about letting go.

Star Trek: Lower Decks, I'm so glad we had you -- especially this final, phenomenal season.

Lower Decks: Fissure Quest

In the penultimate episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks, the writers really just dumped out the toy box to play, giving us the cameo-tastic episode "Fissure Quest."

Boimler's transporter clone commands a secret mission on a secret starship, hopping between realities in search of the people who have been opening rifts between realities. His crew, assembled from an array of alternate timelines, includes T'Pol, Curzon Dax, Dr. Garak and his husband Julian Bashir (a medical hologram), and a gaggle of Harry Kims. When they do indeed discover who is behind the fissures between realities, they're in for a big surprise -- and also in for a catastrophe that may destroy all realities.

I'll get my one small criticism of this episode out of the way right up top here. As I noted of the previous episode, knowing that we're on the last few episodes of the final season, it feels a bit off to spend an episode not focused on all the core characters of the series -- particularly in a season that hasn't gotten a lot of mileage out of Tendi and especially Rutherford (who again, are barely in this episode). In the most cynical light, you could view this like the series finale of Star Trek: Enterprise, which -- in trying to "send off" the then-past two decades of Star Trek -- lost focus on its own cast.

But I find it impossible to see "Fissure Quest" in that cynical light -- not when the writers so clearly love, deeply, all of the disparate threads of Star Trek they're pulling together here. (While still leaving themselves one final episode for the regular Lower Decks heroes to take center stage and save the day.)

Consider what a meal they served Garrett Wang, having him return to voice a dozen different Harry Kims (Harrys Kim?) in a story line that joyfully played with his "forever Ensign" status. Wang really did get to infuse Kim with more personality than any Voyager script ever allowed him to do, plus he got to play the villain as trouble-causing Lieutenant Kim.

After decades of Andrew Robinson telling anyone and everyone who asked that "yes, I was playing Garak as a gay character, who explicitly was crushing on Julian Bashir," the writers brought him back to make that subtext into text. OK, maybe having Bashir be a hologram undermined the perfection of that moment the tiniest bit... but the sentiment seemed to come from absolutely the right place, and both Robinson and Alexander Siddig clearly had fun playing an old married couple for an episode.

In what world could any of us have imagined that Alfre Woodard would come back to Star Trek, reprising her First Contact character of Lily Sloane? But then, why wouldn't she take the part when it shined the spotlight on her character's expertise completely independent of Zefram Cochrane? Plus, it had her recontextualizing the spirit of exploration that is the very core of Star Trek in a brand new and interesting way that flipped the table on the whole "aren't alternate universes in pop culture getting tired?" argument.

Perhaps the greatest gift of all was to Jolene Blalock (here credited by first name only), brought back to play T'Pol -- mercifully, for once, not as a gratuitous sex object for a horny audience and apparently hornier writers. Instead, she was put with a captain who actually appreciated and accepted her intelligence. She was shown to be a most devoted friend (to Curzon Dax -- another fun "deep pull" from Star Trek past). And she was even, through a stitch of dialogue, given the happy ending with "Trip" Tucker that Enterprise denied her.

I love that amid this parade of cameos, we also got a clever story reveal: the "Big Bad" we've been teased with all season was not actually villainous at all, and the fissures we've seen were not part of some nefarious scheme. Nevertheless, the entire galaxy is threatened, and Our Heroes have just one episode to stop it.

I give "Fissure Quest" an A-. (It probably would have been an A, absent the disappointment of losing time with the core Lower Deckers in the final season.) Now all that's left is to conclude this series-best season with a solid finale to cement its place in the Star Trek franchise.

But How Was the Skiing?

Two days of posting about my trip to Banff, and I haven't gotten to the main point of said trip -- the skiing. (I could totally become a recipe blogger!) Alright, time to get down to business.

My husband and I have the Ikon Pass this season, giving us access to three different locations in Banff collectively known as SkiBig3: Banff Sunshine, Lake Louise, and Mount Norquay. We had four full days in Alberta, and our loose plan was to try each resort on one day and then, if we weren't too tired, return to our favorite.

On day "zero," though -- the night we arrived in Banff, we needed to pick up our rental gear. We'd decided not to lug skis, boots, and poles in our luggage, so we picked those up from a shop in town. This was my first time using rental gear since I'd struggled to learn years ago, and it was... fine. Once you know enough to know what feels right, anything else is, quite literally, "not right." But it would get the job done.

We went to Banff Sunshine on day one, which also turned out to be the coldest ski day we were there. After mistakenly exiting the gondola at a "mid-station," it took us a while to find our way to the more interesting places to ski. (And I should note that for us, "interesting" means "groomed blues." We're really not into moguls. A chance to ski into some trees -- but out again quickly -- is acceptable, but not required.) We tried a lot of different trails and found the skiing to be decent.

• At a moment I turned weird on (apparently) some patch of ice (?), I caught an edge and went down hard. I was glad to have my helmet from home... but I probably gave myself whiplash from the impact. My neck hurt to varying degrees for the rest of the trip. I'll blame it on the rentals.
  

• On one particular lift, you pass a sign telling you that you've crossed into British Columbia. And then, before you get off the lift, another telling you you're back in Alberta. I have to check out a map and see what strange spur of cartography made this possible; I'd thought the border between the two provinces was more-or-less straight.

• When you are ready to leave for the day, the run all the way to the bottom is rather nice. It's green, but not too green, and is a nice, long trail to end the day on.
  

Day two, we went to Lake Louise. It was almost twice the drive from where we were staying, and ended up having its pros and cons. The scenery is breathtaking, with beautiful vistas almost everywhere. Plus, there were long, blue runs everywhere -- just to my liking.

...but, we could only ever seem to find like two of them. It seemed like no matter which lift we took, no matter which way we decided to exit and start down, we'd very quickly link back up with a run we'd taken before, and find ourselves on the same trail to the same destination. The weather changed more than the skiing, from a biting wind up high, quickly down into a sunny day, and then into a low-riding fog bank, before back out into the sun again.

I hear there's more variety on the back side of Lake Louise? But I also hear it's mostly in the form of mogully blacks; we never went to see it for ourselves. It didn't take many of these long top-to-bottom runs to wear ourselves out (and doubt we'd ever find a different path). So, beautiful as Lake Louise was, we soon had our fill of it.

Day three was the mistake. "SkiBig3" turns out to be more "SkiBig2-and-a-quarter," because there simply isn't much to Mount Norquay. We knew going in that it was smaller, and we also knew that not as much snow had fallen there this early in the season, so not as many runs were open. But we really weren't expecting what was basically, two adjoining "learn to ski" hills, each with its own very slow lift. We skied at Norquay for barely an hour before deciding to just rest up and save ourselves for the final day.

We decided to go back to Banff Sunshine for that final day, and were glad we did. The weather was warmer than it had been on day one, and we were able to explore more widely. I got a photo on a run inexplicably called "Star Trek"...

...and we generally found the resort to be better than we'd thought on day one.

It was a good four days of skiing overall. But also overall, I think it made us appreciate just how good we've got it in Colorado. Traveling itself was nice, and skiing somewhere completely new a novelty -- but Coloradans don't have to travel to another country to have amazing skiing. Though we did have fun, I'd say the "SkiBig3" still fall short of Vail, Aspen Snowmass, and maybe even a handful of others right here in Colorado.

Maybe I just missed my own ski gear that much. I still have several months of the season to test that theory.

Men About Town

On our Canadian ski trip, we spent a lot of our down time in the town of Banff. It's the sort of town that accompanies many ski resorts, a couple square miles of shops, restaurants, and bars for the incoming tourists to wander. Just on the edge of town was the castle-like Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel -- not where we stayed, but part of the lovely view from the place we did stay.

Some of the destinations we visited included:

Park Distillery. A local maker of spirits, with a solid cocktail menu. Many of those were offered 50% off during a happy hour that ran every day from 3:00 to 5:00 pm -- easily doable on a "ski day" schedule, and thus a popular spot. They smoke one of their drinks by just charring a slab of wood and resting it on the glass: a low tech but effective technique. We stopped here enough that later, at the end of the trip, when we arrived early at the airport with little to do but stroll through the duty-free shop, I impulse-bought a bottle of their Maple Rye to take home. I'd never had a Park Distillery spirit straight, and it turns out they have their cocktails down to a science. The rye itself is syrupy in texture and sickly sweet. I'll need to experiment.

The Canadian Brewhouse. A sports bar, Canadian style. Which means dozens of TVs everywhere, nearly all of them showing hockey. We never actually watched our hometown Colorado Avalanche here, being too tired at the end of each ski day to wait around for the possibility. We did catch one Avs game in our hotel room, though. (Thanks to the greed of the team owners in TV licensing, it's generally easier to watch the team in Canada than in Denver.)

 

Tim Hortons. I'd heard about this donut-and-coffee chain but had never been to one. We ended up hitting the one in Banff a couple of times for something fast and easy when that's exactly what we needed most mornings. Not bad -- especially their classic "Honey Dip" style donut. Plus, they call their donut holes "Timbits," which is a bit funny/weird. Almost as funny/weird as a commercial we caught in which someone who gets out of physical therapy from a hospital going back to bring Timbits to their nurse in the strangest act of Yuletide cheer.

Three Bears Brewery. A decent restaurant and maker of craft beer. They have a big mural on the wall that we were seated right next to: a forest in which the three bears of their logo were hidden. I spent half the meal obsessed with finding the last "baby bear," and thankfully did at last, or it would have haunted me forever. Also, the place is a stop on....

Banff's Hot Chocolate Trail. For a month-and-a-half in November and December, something like 50 different places in town each offer their own custom hot chocolate concoction. Some are boozy, some are not. Some fit the theme of the restaurant or coffee shop, others don't. But you can pretty much pick at random and find a delicious hot chocolate anywhere you go. I wish I'd tried a few more while I was there, but there's kind of only so much sweet you can take, no matter how you appreciate the warming beverage.

Evelyn's Coffee Bar. There is a Starbucks in Banff... but I don't know why you'd ever choose their "tastes burnt" coffee when, just half a dozen doors down, you can support someplace local instead.

Banff Upper Hot Springs. We sort of tried visiting this place, expecting a natural spring you could soak in. Instead, water from the spring had just been directed into a large swimming pool... which was quite crowded. We took one look and decided "never mind"; if it had seemed more "attuned to nature," or less crowded, we probably would have stayed, but both seemed like a deal breaker.

The Maple Leaf. Our nicest dinner of the trip was at this place, that served us two tasty entrees: a delicious steak and a bison bolognese.

Zyka. An Indian restaurant we hit for dinner one night. Not as good as our local favorite Indian restaurant back home, but still very good.

Aside from walking in and out of more souvenir shops than I could count, that basically covers our time in the town of Banff. Which only leaves, for next time, the skiing...

National Park, Canada-Style

Hello, readers! I've just returned home from a fun vacation to Canada -- specifically to Banff National Park in Alberta. The place is renowned for skiing at the "Ski Big 3" destinations of Lake Louise, Banff Sunshine, and Mount Norquay, and my husband and I decided to check it out for ourselves.

I often blog day-to-day stories of a vacation, but I think my recap this time will be a little less chronological and a bit more "random observational." That's because each day of the trip was largely similar: skiing somewhere in the day and then heading into the town at night for eating, drinking, walking, and shopping. But there were certainly highlights from each day, and I want to record them on my blog for my own aging memory and your possible entertainment.

First, a few general observations. Banff National Park is a truly beautiful place. I am spoiled to live in Colorado, where beautiful scenery is easy to take for granted. But the Canadian Rockies do have some little bit extra. There's something about the landscape that feels more fantastical, something about the way they hold the snow that's a bit more magical. Take the first sunrise we saw, while having breakfast at the hotel where we stayed:

 Watching sunrises has sort of becoming a thing my husband and I have done on several of our trips, but we really didn't have to wake up early for this one. Up north in Canada, right at the winter solstice, the sun was coming up past 8:30 am and setting barely after 4:30 pm. Between so much darkness and so much time skiing, we actually spent a lot of time sleeping on this vacation -- sleeping in as we rarely ever do anymore, and always feeling like it was time to go to bed early.

Stepping out of our room at the Juniper Hotel and Bistro was always a pleasant experience, because there was always a smell in the air of a campfire burning. I never actually saw a fireplace anywhere, but the aroma of a freshly-served smoked cocktail was somehow always there.

Being in the room was not as pleasant. Every time the heat kicked on or off -- which was often -- it was preceded by a clicking noise like you'd use to train a dog. I myself felt properly trained to anticipate the furnace before the end of the trip.

There are a lot of people from other countries working in Banff. I lost of how many Australian accents I encountered. A server from the U.K. remarked that my own speech reminded her briefly of her home, before I clarified I'm from Colorado. (A place many people seemed to find quite exotic, when they asked.) According to Google, anyway, all the seasonal jobs in Banff make for lots of work visas given out, and lots of people from other countries eager to snap them up.

The "license plate game" is very difficult to play in Banff National Park. With only 10 Canadian provinces to spot (and 3 territories you likely won't), it felt like "collecting them all" would be doable in a nearly week-long trip to a national park. But everyone's car is filthy from driving around in the slush, covering up a huge chunk of the license plates. And, it seems, most Canadian provinces don't require a plate on the front of the car -- just the back; so you'll get no help walking back to your car after a day of skiing.

Conversions really are a challenge for an American traveling anywhere else in the world. You can quickly get a sense of the value of a Canadian dollar relative to an American dollar -- but since they're both "dollars," the conversion never becomes a thing you just do automatically. Celsius temperature wasn't too difficult, as the only numbers we really needed in Canada in the winter were "below freezing," "just above freezing," and "what to set the thermostat to." (click!) But gas -- by the liter, at Canadian dollars -- was inscrutable. And my very favorite conversion moment of the trip came in a candy store where something was being offered at $4 per 100 grams. Might as well have asked us to calculate how much dilithium would be consumed for each light year of travel at warp 8 -- which seems equally made up. (Yes, I suppose we Americans do this to ourselves.)

In the next few days of posts, I'll highlight some places we visited in town. And, of course, the skiing. But -- "spoiler alert" -- I both had a lovely time, and am glad to now be back home for the holidays.

Die Medium?

With barely a week to go before Christmas, the internet is deeply engaged in one of its most enduring holiday traditions: the debate over whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie. Netflix is here to say that not only is it a Christmas movie, it's one to be emulated. And so it has brought us the new action movie Carry-On.

It's Christmas Eve at LAX. In addition to the usual crush of airport travelers is a deadly "facilitator," working for an unknown employer to sneak an unknown suitcase through security. TSA officer Ethan Kopek's world is upended when he's targeted to look the other way... lest his pregnant girlfriend be killed. Ethan must soon call on every bit of ingenuity he can to keep his girlfriend -- and then, the ultimate target of this nefarious scheme -- safe.

I will say that to whatever degree you accept Die Hard as a Christmas movie, Carry-On is decidedly less so. The Christmas time setting is just a convenient bit of lampshading to attempt to explain how the scenario of this movie progresses as far as it does. But that's hardly the point; no one really expends any effort on debating how realistic Die Hard is, and Carry-On is not here to make you wonder if this could actually happen. It's here to be popcorn-devouring, escapist fun.

It is that at times. And also plenty broad, and occasionally a bit silly. But it does have points in its favor. The calculating villain at the heart of this piece is played by Jason Bateman, who chews the scenery in a most delightful way. There are never any outsized histrionics; he barely even raises his voice. But his every moment on screen is just deliciously, unapologetically villainous, giving this story exactly what it needs.

The movie is very much an action-thriller. Or, more accurately, a thriller-action movie, in that the first half of it is all tense conversations, threats, and coiled danger. Frankly, I feel like Bateman keeps this part of the movie afloat, because his scene partner -- Taron Egerton as Ethan -- is on the other side of a phone call, separating the two actors and stymieing any real fireworks.

Then, at almost exactly halfway through the movie, comes one of the most bonkers, over-the-top sequences I've seen in an action movie in the last several years. It's a brazen, epicly long single take full of stunts, visual effects, fisticuffs and danger. It's so outsized, it kind of makes you laugh... but in the best way possible. And from there, the movie really "wakes up."

The last 45 minutes of the movie are almost non-stop action, opening up the scope of the movie beyond the airport security line in a way it desperately needed. You see every set piece you'd want to see at an airport and more -- enough to do Die Hard proud. (Or, I suppose more fairly, Die Hard 2 -- actually set an airport.)

Is Carry-On going to become anyone's new appointment holiday viewing? I sure don't think so. But instead of watching your holiday favorite for the 20th time, or pretending to be an iconoclast by watching Die Hard, perhaps you want to drop this sugary confection of a movie into your queue. It would be a lot better with a stronger first half, but I'd still say Carry-On merits a B-.

Lower Decks: Upper Decks

The very concept of Star Trek: Lower Decks came from a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode that took a look at life aboard the Enterprise outside the view of the main characters. Now the series loops back upon itself to do the same thing, but kind of in reverse, for "Upper Decks."

It's a hectic (but perhaps quite typical) day aboard the Cerritos, as members of the senior staff become entangled in a variety of problems. Alien invaders try to seize the ship, and Freeman must stop them. Alien creatures are lose in one of the cargo bays, and Ransom must rally a group of ensigns to contain them. Shaxs is at war with his own psyche. Dr T'Ana is cranky about being asked to review her Sickbay's pain management protocols. Billups works on an especially dangerous repair in engineering. Meanwhile, Mariner, Boimler, Tendi, Rutherford, and T'Lyn carve pumpkins.

This is by far the most stuffed episode of Lower Decks we've ever seen. It features twice as many story lines as we usually get -- and I haven't even mentioned the evolving/de-evolving crewmember hosting a sousaphone recital. Sitcoms do this sort of deft writing all the time, and it very often flies under the audience radar. Telling compact stories with a true beginning, middle, and end is a real art that the best sitcom writers quietly excel at, and the Lower Decks writers show they are among the best here as they keep all these balls juggling, coherent, and funny.

Admittedly, you have to squint pretty hard to find the "Star Trek morality tale" in the episode. Perhaps it's Shaxs' story line, showing how a dark past will always remain with you and be something you must constantly overcome to be a good person. Perhaps it's the Ransom story line, which reveals the character as willing to subsume his own ego in the name of being good at his job. But really, this is one of those episodes that's just going for the funny, and I don't mind that at all.

To that end, this episode perhaps isn't peak funny, as it has to work hard to keep all the plots straight. But there are a lot of laughs. I was most entertained by the 3x dose of technobabble we got in the Billups story line, but you might just as well go for Freeman saving the day with compliments, or T'Ana cursing up a (censored) storm as she tests her own pain threshold. Regardless, I must give props to the incredibly clever joke about how to stop a mind-reading cave person: think of fire.

Now here's where I'll be a little unfair. If I knew we had another season of Lower Decks coming, I might call this an A- episode. But in the context of this being almost the end, I'm a bit disappointed that we haven't spent much time with Rutherford this season, and barely more with Tendi. Sure, Freeman and Ransom are technically main cast too, and the whole episode did center on long-established characters. Still, I couldn't help but feel a little like one of the precious few episodes we have left wasn't being used for the core Lower Deckers. And that makes me feel like this was perhaps more of a B+. Like I said, maybe a little unfair.

Prodigy: Ouroboros, Part II

Here at last, my thoughts on the season 2 finale of Star Trek: Prodigy, "Ouroboros, Part II."

Our heroes must send the Protostar through a wormhole back in time, to preserve history and ultimately kick off their own grand adventure. But in the aftermath, what will become of them all?

I've been a little down over the end of this season's story arc, but I really did appreciate the way this final episode specifically wrapped everything up. I was reminded of my thoughts on the series finale of Voyager, where I felt the story ended too quickly and left important character questions unanswered. Prodigy does the opposite, quickly resolving the big question of saving the day (which, come on, was never really in question), to allow room for an extended "coda."

Part of that is explicitly setting up a possible season 3, of course, by showing the cadets on a new ship. I feel like that was sort of the same ending as season 1 had -- but, at long last, the ship is actually called "Prodigy," closing the real "ouroboros" I felt at the core of the show.

I appreciated that the character of Maj'el, who has increasingly been a "part of the group" as the season unspooled, was more officially made a full-fledged member of that group in this final episode. Despite Star Trek: Prodigy having plenty of interesting characters, Maj'el filled a role that wasn't otherwise being covered, and I feel like this was the show fully acknowledging that.

One of my favorite aspects of the coda was the time the writers made to explicitly connect to the final season of Star Trek: Picard. Having featured Wesley Crusher in their season two finale, Picard had no way of organically working the character into the grand reunion that was season three. That felt like a source of unresolved tension to me, and here Prodigy finds a couple of minutes to relieve some of that tension. Giving us one more moment between Beverly and Wesley was wonderful, and giving us the moment of the two of them with Jack that Star Trek: Picard never did was icing on the cake.

I wouldn't dream of giving back those minutes pack with the Crushers... but I do feel like a bit more room should have been made somewhere for the Holo-Janeway story arc. Very, very late in the season two game, we're told that she will have to make a sacrifice, losing her memory to go back in time aboard the Protostar. In this episode, even later in the game, there's suddenly an oh-so-convenient quick fix that gets her out of making that sacrifice. While I appreciate that an escape was needed here (especially in light of the fact that her season 1 story also ended in a noble sacrifice), I wish that this problem and its solution hadn't felt like such an afterthought hastily squeezed into this episode.

I give this episode of Star Trek: Prodigy a B -- which is probably also how I feel about the season as a whole. The great episodes in the middle of the season were really quite great, but I feel like season 1 had an overall higher consistency that I appreciate.

Officially, no call has yet been made about a season three of Star Trek: Prodigy. You would think signs point to no, since the show was already basically cancelled by Paramount and saved by Netflix. If it had done renewal-worthy numbers on Netflix, they would surely have announced that renewal already. Still... I feel like Star Trek as a franchise really benefits from having at least one animated show in the mix. And since, apparently, that can't be Lower Decks (which still baffles me), I find myself hoping that Prodigy can beat the odds.

Prodigy: Ouroboros, Part I

With Star Trek: Lower Decks about to end (sniff), it struck me that I really ought to wrap up season 2 of Star Trek: Prodigy before that happens. So, with just two episodes left there, I turn my focus to "Ouroboros, Part I."

As Asencia unleashes all her forces to attack Voyager and the Protostar, the cadets fight on the planet below to take control of an installation that will allow them to open a wormhole through time. If they can hold off Asencia and Drednok long enough, the Protostar can be sent back in time, restoring the timeline.

In my reviews of late season 2 Prodigy, I've come down on some of the twisted machinations of the plot. I haven't felt like Asencia makes a credible Big Bad (no matter how fun Jameela Jamil is voicing the character). I've felt like the lampshading of Wesley Crusher's "Traveler powers" has been overly convenient. I've seen the danger of the Loom as variably menacing, depending on circumstance. And all of that continues here.

But of course I recognize that the table has been set. This is essentially a one-hour finale, broken in two, and no reasonable consumer of entertainment would expect the story to just completely change course at this point. So... yeah... a fair amount of what's happening here in this episode doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It's kind of so much action and noise. But this is the ending we've been working to, take it or leave it.

Still, there are moments that I found effective. Dal's part in all this is especially strong, as he completes his season-long arc to better learn what it is to be part of a team. He puts himself on the line to help his friends generally, and Gwyn in particular, and I think the emotions behind that really work. Plus, it doesn't hurt that he's basically put in a Back to the Future-style "Doc Brown on the clock tower" situation where he has to connect the power in time to save the day. An homage to the best.

Gwyn gets a re-match of her one-on-one fight against Asencia from earlier in the season, and this time gets help from her own people in a somewhat spiritual union that cements her as a righteous leader. Murf vs. Drednok is the all-out fight I didn't know I was waiting to see. And Janeway gets to bark all sorts of fun captainy dialogue as she guides Voyager in battle.

Yet the real meat of "Ouroboros" comes in Part II -- so much so that I almost feel I should just immediately turn focus to that and talk about it here. But I've devoted a separate post to each Prodigy episode until this point. It feels a little weird to change that up right here at the finish line. So I'll give "Ouroboros, Part I" a C+, and then tease an upcoming post on Part II (which I enjoyed a good deal more).

Lower Decks: Fully Dilated

Several times already in its final season, Star Trek: Lower Decks has served up an episode that gave me all I could want from the series (and then some). It did so once again with "Fully Dilated."

A fissure to an alternate universe expels debris that crashes on a planet with a pre-warp society. Mariner, Tendi, and T'Lyn are sent on a mission to contain any cultural contamination... but they also must contend with a time dilation effect that makes a week pass on the planet as only one second passes on the orbiting ship. When a transporter, uh, accident delays their retrieval, the three must set up more permanently on the planet. Mariner wants to seize the opportunity to improve herself, while Tendi tries to bolster her credentials to become chief science officer aboard the Cerritos -- with help from an unexpected source.

This episode really had it all. Star Trek doesn't really have a more classic formula than going undercover in a more primitive alien society, and seeing a Lower Decks take on that is just rife with comic potential. Combining that with the concept of time dilation is fun too -- but doing that so Mariner could chase an "Inner Light"-style moment of self-revelation (and have her explicitly label it as such) was just next level hilarious. The reference comedy did nothing to undermine that previous all-time great Star Trek episode... and even paid off in a semi-serious way as Mariner actually did learn a lesson hidden in plain sight.

Great as that was, though, the episode will ultimately be remembered as the one featuring Brent Spiner voicing Purple Data's Head. It would have been enough just to have Lower Decks log another cameo appearance from yet another legacy Star Trek actor. (It's had so many great ones!) But Spiner really gets a meaty role! Not only does he recapture the comic naivete of early Next Gen Data in his vocal performance, he's actually central to the other big character story at play in the episode: Tendi's jealousy of (and competition with) T'Lyn. Data's impartial (and famously emotionless) perspective on the situation is exactly what Tendi needs to hear -- even if, of course, she can't hear it at first. But everything ends happily with a sweet moral about friendship and communication.

Plus, we get some ridiculous interludes with Boimler and Rutherford licking spilled Micheladas off of the transporter console.

Yup -- I really couldn't ask for more. I'd call this another grade A episode in a season that's served up a few already. I still wish Lower Decks wasn't going out... but at least it's going out on top.

Jury Duty

We're pulling into "prestige movie" season. Nearly every such season has a legal drama in the mix, and this year it comes from writer Jonathan Abrams and director Clint Eastwood: Juror #2.

When Justin Kemp is called up for jury duty, he is shocked to find he has a personal connection to the case. When this goes undiscovered by the lawyers and he is actually seated on the jury, he finds himself in a moral quandary. He wants to steer his fellow jurors to the right outcome... but he must do it without confessing to his own rapidly growing web of lies.

This movie asks you to accept a lot to get the story rolling: wild coincidence, gross negligence, and much, much more. Different people will possibly think different elements of it are "a bridge too far," but I doubt many will just buy the whole premise. This is not a "this could happen to anyone" kind of story. This is more a situation where... sure, you could imagine this eventually happening to some person, somewhere, and this is that story. And I suppose the script tries to lampshade these issues as much as it can.

Ultimately, though, you've just gotta roll with it. And at least the acting is here to help. Nicholas Hoult plays Justin Kemp, and it's a big, meaty role -- real "tip of the iceberg" stuff where almost none of the emotional performance is conveyed in dialogue. Hoult has to convey everything with just a look, and is given very few moments of release; instead, we see him and his character just get wound tighter and tighter over the course of two hours.

The movie doesn't ask very much of its other stars, though. Mind you, there are some great actors here -- Toni Collette and J.K. Simmons are always welcome in pretty much anything. Kiefer Sutherland is well deployed as an Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor who you sense has been through the wringer himself. Chris Messina is a perfectly credibly public defender. But none of these performers are really doing any heavy lifting here: this movie is all on Nicholas Hoult's shoulders.

The results are something of a "through the looking glass" version of the recent Anatomy of a Fall. What that movie wants to keep secret and leave open to doubt, this movie opens up to its audience. Juror #2 also feels like more approachable "popcorn" fare -- which is perhaps why, even though it's arriving in prestige season, I don't hear much buzz about it for awards.

But it does entertain well enough. I give Juror #2 a B. Once you're over the hump of plausibility, the moral dilemma makes for a fun little suspense thriller.

Lower Decks: Of Gods and Angles

The back half of the final season of Star Trek: Lower Decks kicks off with the no-that's-not-a-typo title, "Of Gods and Angles."

The Cerritos plays diplomatic host to two feuding species. When it appears a member of one of the species has been murdered by a member of the other, conflict escalates and threatens the ship. Mariner must solve the case, with the help of a new ensign she's taken under her wing. Meanwhile, Boimler continues to remold himself in the image of his alternate universe doppelganger -- and the next step of that is to have Dr. T'Ana bestow him with a nickname.

Lower Decks often revisits classic Star Trek tropes to give them a comedic spin. Here, we've seen the "host diplomacy for warring species" stories in the classic "Journey to Babel" and The Next Generation's "Lonely Among Us." This time, the writers stir in a serving "The Outrageous Okona" (or really, Romeo and Juliet). And also, they follow up on the classic "Who Mourns for Adonais?" by presenting a new "half-demigod" character.

All that might sound like this is an overly derivative episode... but it doesn't really come across that way thanks to how much the focus is really on the central Lower Decks characters. This is really a showcase for how far Mariner has come since season one. She's still fun-loving, giving real "chaotic good" energy, but is now earnestly trying to help others try to learn from her past mistakes. I'm a little disappointed that so much time in this episode is spent building up the new character of Olly. The series is about to end, so a) we can't follow up much on her; and b) I'd rather we spend the precious little time we have left on established characters. But this is mostly a vehicle to show us that Mariner can be herself but can now also be an effective mentor. So it mostly works for me.

Mariner is learning, but Boimler isn't. As his season-long story arc continues, the message is getting more explicit: he really needs to learn to be himself. (Not someone else, and not even a version of himself.) But while he's still in the process of learning, we get some great jokes -- around his alternate universe PADD with its telltale bevel (and color!), and Dr. T'Ana's prodigious (and hilariously bleeped) swearing. Boimler gets a nickname in the end -- just not one fit for the average Star Trek fan site.

This is still a really solid episode of Lower Decks; it just isn't quite soaring to the heights of many others this season. I give it a B+.

Saving the Best for "Last?"

Thanksgiving has come and gone, and the Christmas season is now upon us. People have all sorts of Christmas traditions -- but one in particular, that it seems has become more popular in recent years, kind of gnaws at me.

"Whamageddon" is the challenge to go for as long as you can in the holiday season without hearing Wham's original version of the song "Last Christmas." I'm sure everyone who participates in this is just having some goofy fun. (And if you've already posted about "Whamageddon" online, please know that this blog post is not at you in any way. I was thinking about all this... well... last Christmas.)

The thing that increasingly bothers me is: why, of all possible Christmas songs, is it "Last Christmas" by Wham that you're supposed to avoid?

If the challenge were about sheer difficulty, there are more ubiquitous Christmas songs you could set out to avoid. A true Christmas warrior would try dodging Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" for the holiday season.

If the challenge were about keeping goofy synth-pop instruments out of your ears, surely the challenge would be based around "Wonderful Christmastime," Paul McCartney's agonizing contribution to the Christmas canon. (I'm still haunted by that song, more than 25 years after I worked a retail job through several holiday seasons.)

Maybe there's something about the melancholy nature of the song, and wanting to avoid sad sentiments over the holidays? But the challenge could just as easily been about avoiding Elvis Presley's "Blue Christmas," or The Carpenters' "Merry Christmas, Darling," or "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (the original version being especially dark).

Even though I know it's all "in good fun," I find myself wondering if the dark reason everyone is supposed to avoid the song "Last Christmas" is because it's the gay Christmas song.

George Michael was closeted for most of his life, including at the time he wrote "Last Christmas." Sure, that doesn't automatically mean the song is about gay love. But if you really listen to the lyrics, I feel like you can't avoid the distinct impression that it's the story of a gay romance gone sour because "the other guy" wasn't ready to be public about his sexuality or the relationship.

Add to that the fact that Michael himself seemed to indicate how important the song was by the fact that he played all the instruments on the recording, which he did not normally do for Wham songs. Also, for years he downplayed the song, trying to distance himself from it and not embracing it until later in his career. (Perhaps because it was only later in his career that he lived openly gay?)

Like I said, I'm sure that the "Last Christmas" challenge is meant in good fun. But, as we now stand on the brink of a major backslide for LGBT+ rights, I kinda don't feel like letting even the innocent things slide without comment. Sure, when tomorrow the U.S. Supreme Court hears argument in a major transgender case, and telegraphs some horrific and hostile development in the law they're going to realize by next June, whether or not you enjoyed avoiding one particular Christmas song is not going to matter at all. But since it can sometimes feel so impossible to affect the big things, I'm gonna try to notch a completely symbolic win on an admittedly insignificant thing.

And so, this humble proposal: let's all ditch "Whamageddon" and just openly enjoy the song "Last Christmas" without treating it like some kind of holiday contagion.

The Horror... The Amor...

Casa Bonita is a Denver institution, famous to everyone who ever lived here, long before an infamous episode of South Park depicted it for a wider audience. The bizarre Mexican restaurant with TARDIS-like interior dimensions and entertainments from puppet shows to a "haunted house" to cliff divers was decaying in decades of squalor before the creators of South Park bought it, refurbished it, and reopened it to more public demand than ever.

That story is chronicled in a new documentary streaming on Paramount Plus: ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor! I found it both quite entertaining and more than a bit horrifying.

First: the entertaining part. The film really demonstrates how improbable it is that Casa Bonita even continues to exist. Only because South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone stepped in was the rundown restaurant saved. Parker in particular is portrayed as a Don Quixote who has made this project his personal windmill. Most people are familiar with the deep lure of nostalgia, but few of us have the kind of financial resources he had to just keep throwing money at a problem past the point of reason.

In the course of this documentary, we see the already-exorbitant sticker price of the restaurant become laden with repair costs that rise, then sail, then soar well past any possible expectations. Casa Bonita has been called "the Mexican Disneyland" by some, and it starts to look like it might cost as much.

That leads to the horrifying part of the documentary. I actually ate at Casa Bonita many times over the years, including a few visits during the 2010s, not long before it closed prior to Parker and Stone's purchase. When the documentary shows you what was actually going on in the walls of the restaurant at that time, I wonder how I've even lived to tell the tale. Vile filth infesting walls, ceiling, and floors feels like only the beginning, as we're shown how much money needs to be spent just to turn Casa Bonita into an inhabitable space -- never mind restoring it to its former glory. You can only wonder how the place was passing inspections for all those years. Bribery? People looking the other way out of their own sense of nostalgia about the place? This documentary is a sort of real-life version of the 80s comedy The Money Pit, where everything that can go wrong does.

But the story does have a happy ending -- and the documentary even showed me things I never knew about Casa Bonita. It points out several spruced up or wholly new features that I didn't notice in my one visit since the place reopened, sparking a feeling in me I hadn't had since visiting the restaurant as a child: there's always something new to discover there, some nook or cranny with something you've never noticed before.

It may be that ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor! would hold less appeal for anyone who has never personally visited the restaurant. Then again, maybe it would be interesting to see how this funhouse fever dream is actually a real place. Regardless, I myself give the documentary a B+. It's a fun, wild watch.