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My Dune Books Problem

 Problems, realistically speaking.  Dune is one of my favorite books ever. Full stop. And I’m quite happy with Villeneuve’s Dune films (and cannot wait for his Dune 3 closing act). I liked Dune Messiah and Children of Dune nearly as much. But things kinda fall off a cliff after that.  I hated God Emperor so much that, when I decided to finish the series a few years ago, I skipped over it completely and simply started with book 5. 5 & 6 (Heretics & Chaperthouse) were fine, though I had problems… the books are very talky with a lot of the action seemingly happening “off-screen”. And the sexual politics of the latter Dune books are best left undiscussed (the Bene Gesserit are constantly referred to as witches, while theHonored Matres are usually called whores. Let’s leave it at that.) And then we get to the Brian Herbert/Kevin J. Anderson Dune books. They’ve done far more with Dune than dad ever did, turning it into their own extended universe. I’ve lost count of the trilogies and
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Star Trek TOS

So I've been watching the remastered Star Trek TOS lately (needed something to have playing on in the background while doing chores, working, etc.). That whole background thing maybe not so effective, since I keep sitting down and watching, but hey, it's Star Trek, so not bad, right? Some of the things I've noticed... With these remastered, color corrected episodes, it's amazing just how green Spock really is. As I recall from the old reruns I used to watch, he never seemed all that green... But damn, he's green.  We all know the Motorola flip phone was inspired by Star Trek communicators. But there are other moments of "prescience" or inspiration. Watching Requiem for Methuselah, for instance, there's a scene where the immortal Flint is watching Kirk on a flat screen monitor that wouldn't look out of place on my desk today.  And then there's the infamous third season. Long reviled as the weakest of the original series seasons, I can't argu
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The First Omen

Legacy prequels and sequels appear to be the order of the day, as studios attempt to milk every possible dollar out of their back catalog IP. So it's not terribly surprising that 2 classic demonic horror films got this legacy treatment recently.  I was interested in seeing Exorcist Believer ... Until the near universal bad reviews convinced me I had better things to do with my time. The First Omen , on the other hand, had some decent reviews so, when it popped up on Hulu recently, I decided to give it a shot.  I'm just wondering what those reviewers saw that I missed... Cause frankly, I really disliked this one. For two reasons...  First is the rank cynicism of the film. Without going into spoilerish detail, the ending of the film spins out from the source material in ways that clearly open it up to new franchise possibilities, allowing them to dodge the existence of the original series of Omen films. I should not be surprised by this... The whole legacy prequels notion IS buil
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Review: Redshirts

Redshirts by John Scalzi My rating: 5 of 5 stars View all my reviews
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Review: The King in Yellow

The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers My rating: 3 of 5 stars View all my reviews
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Review: Something More Than Night

Something More Than Night by Kim Newman My rating: 3 of 5 stars View all my reviews
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A Painfully Dumb Movie

 Coming, as it does, from Happy Madison productions, one should not be surprised to find the Out-Laws playing hard to the comedy lowest common denominator. But seriously, this one really scrapes bottom.  I started watching the other day due to a dearth of other appealing options (everything else on my multiple watch lists seemed too heavy, deep, dark or just unappealing at the time), so I opted for the dumb movie. And after a relatively short time, I found myself stuck watching it from shear "are you kidding" me incredulity.   The moment that really broke me was the armored car chase scene after their bungled second-act bank robbery. As they start fleeing the scene of the crime, Brosnan and Barkin's characters jump into the back of the car as Devine, complete with Shrek mask/makeup running down his face, drives. AND, of course, as he pulls away, they leave the back doors of the car open, so that the money can fly out over the course of the chase that follows. I'm pre
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I kinda need a break from myself

 Or, perhaps, simply from my darker sensibilities.  Since I'm between jobs again, once I'm done with the morning's scanning of job listings (I can only spend so much time reading job descriptions till the words stop making sense), I find myself watching a lot of movies and TV. Yesterday was not a banner day for me.  I started with Mike Flanagan's The Midnight Club . I've enjoyed every one of Flanagan's series on Netflix (the Haunting of Hill House , the Haunting of Bly Manor , Midnight Mass ) and am definitely looking forward to what he does with the Fall of the House of Usher . So I figured I'd check out Midnight Club. I should have taken a cue from this for the rest of my day, but 10 minutes in I realized that watching a series about terminally ill teeanagers really wasn't cutting it for me. So I went looking elsewhere.  For some reason, I ended up watching Men after this. Not sure how this seemed like a good idea, but at least there weren't any t
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The Banshees of Inisherin is NOT a Comedy

There, I've said it. And the Golden Globes, and this writer from VOX who called it "a delightfully madcap tale of Irish zaniness" and everyone else chortling to themselves as they hop on the comedy bandwagon can all f off.  (This movie's been out long enough that I don't feel the need to worry about spoilers. So suffice it to say that, if you haven't seen the movie yet… and intend to… and you don't want any surprises spoiled, bookmark this post and come back after you've seen it.) Let me be clear… I understand black comedy. I enjoy black comedy. And I loved In Bruges , the last movie these guys did together. So I looked forward to Banshees and couldn't wait to check it out.  I've now seen it three times, and only truly laughed at any of it the on the third watching (more on that in a moment). And I am more certain than ever that this movie, as good as it and its performances are, is not a comedy.  The first time through (early on, before the
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