Change Your Image
jaktrancer
Reviews
The Power of the Dog (2021)
This is a dead parrot
Well there's 'brooding', and then there's 'comatose'. Did no-one at the test screening say, 'Um Jane.... I know it's meant to be slow but... do you think maybe.... possibly... it's just a bit... um... you know....too... slow.'
And if they had, would Jane have said 'It's not slow, it's brooding... and anyway, never mind that... I know how to get an Oscar... everyone will interpret the snail-like pace and fabulous cinematography as art.'
Well like Monty Python's dead parrot... it might have great plummage, but it's still dead.
Doctor Who: Orphan 55 (2020)
Doctor Crackerjack
Years ago, the original 'Crackerjack', did very silly mickey takes of various programs. I remember an episode where the Tom Bakeresque Doctor had a ridiculously long scarf. Russ Abbot and others mined this rich landscape too. These type of programs no longer need to do silly parodies of Doctor Who - how do you parody a parody?
There was not one aspect of this implausible fiasco of an episode that doesn't deserve criticism, but it was so so bad, it doesn't even deserve a review.
Did she really say 'One possible future?' Oh my God - the writers know nothing of the program they're writing for.
Like Bobby Ewing I'm going in the shower - hopefully I'll wake up and find out that none of it really happened
Silent Witness: Seven Times: Part 1 (2020)
The 'Domestic Abuse is Really Bad' Episode.
The 'Domestic Abuse is Really Bad' Episode.
I'm beginning to wonder why I ever liked this series. Has it got worse or have I become more critical? As the previous reviewer noted, the box ticking was so blatant in this double episode it was laughable.
Nikki and Jack arrive on the scene. Apparently it's a very accessible bit of electrified rail in the middle of a housing estate. A body has tripped the power out - lucky that. In typical SW coincidence - it delays the train Thomas is waiting for. He's on his way to meet someone who will also, later on, have yet another coincidental connection with the case. Out on the street and down at the track, the SOCO extras haven't been given much to do - just make notes and carry little cases until the Lyall experts arrive. Cue this week's quirky copy character - a bald cockney bit of a lad in a colourful shirt and a wheelchair - coming from the opposite direction to everyone else. (Let's not ask how they got his wheelchair down the steep embankment). We're never told how the angel of vengeance actually managed to get the body there unseen - ah well. Anyway, the episode digs deep into its worthy subject of domestic abuse... a little too deep, because in this episode, virtually every character has been affected by it. The audience is then abused - battered and bludgeoned by the writers who think we might have missed something. You can imagine the production meeting and someone saying 'can we crowbar in a gay couple? We want the audience to know we realize this abuse can happen in all flavours of relationships'. The audience battering continues with Nikki's flashbacks. After the third one you think 'okay, we got it... Nikki is letting her past experiences affect her judgement'. But it doesn't stop there... she gazes off into the middle distance about ten times in all, as we're treated to more and more over saturated shots of her traumatic childhood. I'll put aside the contrived way the Lyall team are involved in far more of the process than they should be... that's been going on for quite a while now and I guess we're supposed to be blind to it.
I hope it improves. In a week that screened the absolute worst episode of Dr Who ever made ('Orphan 55' - so so bad it doesn't even warrant a review), you start to wonder where the license fee money is going. Certainly not on scriptwriters.
The Rendezvous (2010)
Mediocre acting
Spoiled for me by Tim Dutton's mediocre acting. Never seen him in anything good!
Black Mirror: Shut Up and Dance (2016)
damp squib predictable ending
Well shot, well acted. Builds to what you feel is going to be a clever ending. Then it ends, and you feel like blowing a big rasberry at the tv. How can the same writer that created the clever episode 'USS Callister', also knock out this twaddle?