The Avengers 3.16 “The Little Wonders”

Steed does not look good in a clerical collar. I just don’t buy it.

There’s a crime syndicate called Bibliotheque (French for library) that has members masquerading as clergy. Their boss is dying and has called a convocation to elect his successor.

In true convocation fashion, although they don’t release any smoke. Steed infiltrates it while Cathy investigates a mysterious doll. Turns out somebody is using the convocation as an excuse to smuggle secrets.

This is a really violent episode. There’s a lot of shooting. Steed even has to seek medical attention. Voting by machine gun! In a classroom. I loved the classroom.

Oh, and they kiss. Not that it means anything; they’re fake dating and it’s key to this show that nothing like that happens.

Lastly, the bad guy’s female companion, Sister Johnson, is played by Lois Maxwell, the original Moneypenny!

One of my favorites.

The Avengers 3.17 “The Wringer”

There are some tropes that you just have to have in every spy fi series. One of them is “the protagonist gets arrested for treason and his partner has to clear his name.”

“The Wringer” is actually a pretty good example of this trope. Steed is brought in to investigate the disappearance of multiple agents, but when his friend Anderson turns him in saying he killed the other five…why?

Because he got brainwashed, of course, and there are some bad guys, including Terence Lodge, who is chewing all of the scenery experimenting with brainwashing to turn the agents against each other and ruin the service. He was wearing a Joker grin!

(We will ignore the fact that a previous episode established that brainwashing exists but nobody suspected it, because this is the 1960s and television was yet to invent continuity).

It’s always good when Gale has to rescue Steed, too.

I am also amused that Steed’s phone number begins with the digits 004.

Movie Review: Nolan’s The Odyssey

CW: The dog dies. The other dog dies. The other other dog dies. Also, body horror.

So, I’m going to start by saying I did enjoy this movie. Because I’m about to tear it apart despite that ;).

I’m often hot and cold on Nolan in general. Loved Inception, thought he did a great job with Batman, but could have done without Interstellar.

The Odyssey was definitely a movie that deserved the big screen, too. (We didn’t do Imax because of scheduling and such). It was big and spectacular. And Tom Holland was born to play Telemachus. He was so perfect I forgot it was Tom Holland.

In fact, all the actors did a great job with the material.
But here’s what I’m going to tear apart.

1.        Circe. The Circe segment spent way too much cellulose (yes, it was filmed analog) on people being transformed into pigs in full blown body horror style. Then Odysseus walked in and she caved. I think Nolan was trying to avoid presenting Odysseus as a honeytrap, but…dang it. He was supposed to earn that payoff.

2.        The shipwreck. The shipwreck was interminable, had strobe effects, had the same shot repeated multiple times. Interminable. Again, a lot of cellulose being used on something that didn’t warrant it.

3.        The final confrontation with the suitors. The final confrontation…was interminable. Noticing a pattern yet. Awesome fight choreography, just a bit too much of it.

4.        The puppy and the adult dog did not match. They were so obviously not the same animal that it threw me clean out of the movie. Come on. Dogs are not that hard to find. They could have done better.

5.        The relationship between Odysseus and Calypso was told, not shown. They were supposedly together for seven years, probably a similar length of time to how long he was married to Penelope before the war…but it’s not sold us at all. They say they love each other. Show me.

It was very much a Nolan movie. Really fun to watch, visually superb, but it didn’t quite nail the pacing for me. I enjoyed it, I don’t regret paying to see it in theater, but it probably won’t top my Hugo ballot.

Daredevil 2.2 "Dogs to a Gunfight"

And now guess who shows up. That would be one Frank Castle, who wants to stop crime, but also save the cops the paperwork.

Daredevil vs. Punisher is always an interesting contest; they both have the same goals, but one of them doesn't care how we get there. It doesn't help that Karen is now blaming Daredevil for Punisher, that people are calling him a copycat.

I'm pretty sure Frank would have gone off the deep end anyway, Matt, you're okay.

Foggy is also really struggling with what Matt is doing. He's worrying far, far too much.

Or is he?

Andor 1.10 "One Way Out"

The inevitable happens: A prison break. When the prisoners realize nobody is ever released, they also realize they have nothing left to lose...and take over the facility and escape. Except for the poor shift foreman, who can't swim, and Andor is pushed into the ocean before he can help him. Guess that guy's dead...or worse.

Meanwhile, the Rebellion is shown as using the Empire's methods; nobody has completely clean hands here, it seems. And back on Coruscant, political, financial, and even romantic dealings are happening. Arranged marriages seem to be a thing...because of course they are.

Is there even one way out, or is there none?