Blu-ray Review: The Flash:The Complete First Season (2015)

by Tony Dayoub


Spinning off from it's popular sister show, Arrow, The Flash largely succeeded from escaping Arrow's long shadow within just a couple of episodes. Where it took nearly its entire first season for Arrow to fully embrace its comic book origins and leave behind the teen soap conventions of its home network, the CW, The Flash arrived fully formed, as its creators confirm in the new blu-ray set's only audio commentary. It has done so by turning its back on the dark, brooding atmosphere popularized by the Dark Knight epics that Arrow emulates. Instead, The Flash feels sunny and optimistic, largely a credit to the enjoyable bumbling geekiness of its nice-guy star, Grant Gustin, and his interpretation of CSI tech Barry Allen. It's a show whose occasional X-Files creepiness never really exceeds Goosebumps-level frights, making it ideal for family viewing, a fact which I can personally attest to (my wife and kids love it as much as I do).

TV Review: Star Wars Rebels: Spark of Rebellion (2014)

by Tony Dayoub

Star Wars Rebels: Spark of Rebellion is the debut episode of the first Star Wars animated series to debut on Disney XD since its parent company acquired the Lucasfilm franchise. Think of it as a Firefly take on characters populating the fringe of the Star Wars universe and you'll get an idea of what it feels like. The irony is that Joss Whedon's short-lived Firefly was itself a western outlaw take on the original Star Wars that focused on a Han Solo-like smuggler and the crew of his ship (a Millennium Falcon in all but name). In Star Wars Rebels, young viewers are meant to identify with Ezra Bridger, a clever ruffian who scavenges his way through life on the Empire-occupied planet Lothal unaware that he has greater powers than he realizes.

Time is a Flat Circle or: Haven't I Seen True Detective Before?

by Tony Dayoub

When True Detective promos started popping up on HBO months ahead of its debut, it was difficult to figure what it was all going to be about. About all one could dig up was that it was an 8-episode series, shot in Louisiana (employing a few of the actors of HBO's just-cancelled Treme), starring two well-established stars, Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson—neither of whom were on the usual descending trajectory movie stars travel when they decide to move to television—with a title that evoked the pulpy aesthetic of the mystery magazine that ran for decades.

First Look: HBO's True Detective (2014)

James Gandolfini

by Tony Dayoub

I read it. I liked it. I thought it was good. But I thought they would have to hire some good looking guy—not George Clooney but some Italian George Clooney—and that would be that. But they called me and they said can I meet David for breakfast at 9 a.m. At the time I was younger, and I stayed out late a lot. And I was like, "Oh, for fuck's sake. This guy wants to eat breakfast? This guy's going to be a pain in the ass."

-Actor James Gandolfini on The Sopranos and its creator, David Chase

The passing of James Gandolfini yesterday came as a shock to just about everyone it seems. After hearing it, I went through the 21st century version of the five stages of grief. First, I visited reliable online news sources to confirm that the reports were indeed true. Second, I shared my sadness with Facebook friends. Then I went on Twitter to read the reactions of celebrities and journalists. Next, I scoured the cable guide for any showings of The Sopranos, a show I hadn't seen since its cancellation. And finally, I find myself here writing up whatever kind of minuscule tribute to the actor I can offer.

Blu-ray Review: Star Trek: The Next Generation - Season Three (1989-1990)

by Tony Dayoub

Remastered in high definition, Star Trek: The Next Generation - Season Three arrives on Blu-ray today. This is the season when the fledgling revival of the 60s science fiction classic finally took flight, in fans eyes at least. The addition of showrunner Michael Piller seemed to elevate the quality of the storytelling. Piller's penchant for giving young writers a chance injected some new blood behind the scenes. But among the fascinating extras included in the new six-disc set are a panoply of featurettes focusing on the growing pains of the new writing staff that tell a different story.

Blu-ray Review: Star Trek: The Next Generation - "The Best of Both Worlds" (1990)

by Tony Dayoub

Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG), the cerebral sequel series to the 60s science fiction classic, was just wrapping up its third season after an extended shakedown cruise when the behind-the-scenes tumult in the writer's room finally started to subside under the watchful aegis of new showrunner Michael Piller. Since taking over at the start of season 3 (reviewed here), Piller had completely overhauled the staff. He pushed out many still carrying grudges over bruises incurred in previous years in favor of new, relatively inexperienced writers (many of whom would one day go on to create their own notable sci-fi shows). The results were apparent onscreen. Many of the third season's episodes were among the franchise's best ever, shows like "The Offspring" and "Yesterday's Enterprise." (A review of Season 3's Blu-ray set is forthcoming.) But despite the new blood behind the scenes and a cast whose camaraderie offscreen was legendary, TNG still suffered from a noticeable stodginess.

Movie Review: 21 Jump Street (2012)

by Tony Dayoub

21 Jump Street, a reboot/remake of the popular late '80s cop series that launched Johnny Depp to stardom, has been in development for years. It's got not one but two directors, Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who's biggest claim to fame is the mediocre 2009 animated movie Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Which is to say, this buddy film has been through a lot of hands. Not ulike the stoner action-comedy, Pineapple Express, which fizzled in the over-elaboration of its contradictions, 21 Jump Street has its own schizoid quality: is it a grisly, violent cop thriller or a drug-fueled high school comedy? The big difference is that despite these disparate elements stacked against the new movie (compounded by the flatness owed to its small-screen origins), somehow, 21 Jump Street works.

Random Sample: Legends of the Super Heroes (1978), Mad Max (1979) on Blu, and Hotel Terminus (1988)

by Tony Dayoub

As the holiday season approaches, demands on this writer are growing. The holiday season arrives soon with its requisite family vacations, end-of-year awards screeners and best-of lists, not to mention major new home releases timed to take advantage of gift-giving celebrations. So I'll clear the deck today with some thoughts on a few recent releases I caught up with at home this past week.

TV Review: Boardwalk Empire (2010)

by Tony Dayoub

I try to see.
Well, I guess that I'm blind.
It's fine with me
'Cause i'm going to keep trying.
And I've made disappointment
My very best friend.
I wait and see
Who you're going to be
And when.

-"Straight Up and Down" by The Brian Jonestown Massacre

From the opening credit sequence in which we hear the lonely guitar of the Brian Jonestown Massacre (a band I previously mistook for the Rolling Stones) as waves roll into the Jersey seashore, I knew Boardwalk Empire had me. A quick survey around the internet reveals just as many who hated the opening track, but I would guess many of these folks are oblivious to the stylings of this first episode's director, Martin Scorsese. While I can't recall such a blatantly anachronistic use of music in any of his previous films, Scorsese has always had an instinctive grasp of how to marry music to film to create cinema. In this case, "Straight Up and Down" feels so right that to quibble about it is a petty bit of complaining. But to do it after you've taken a peek at its lyrics is even more wrongheaded.

Blu-ray Review: Sons of Anarchy Season Two

by Tony Dayoub

On the commentary for "Balm," the eventful tenth episode of Sons of Anarchy's second season (which debuts on DVD and Blu-ray this week), director Paris Barclay avers:

I think this is why [Sons of Anarchy] is going to end up being a classic television show years from now... It's just like NYPD Blue did, and Hill Street Blues before (in the David Milch universe). You could be doing something else, cop work, detective work—in this case biker club—what have you. If the family works, the show goes on. And [this] family, in its dysfunctional way, works great.

The series, masterminded by creator and head writer Kurt Sutter (The Shield) recalls The Sopranos in the way it explores a criminal subculture, Northern California outlaw club SAMCRO, and its ties to its community (the ironically named Charming) and extended family. Though the club has its redeeming qualities, namely its protection of Charming from any corrupting criminal activities (including their own... well, it's their aim at least), as a viewer my allegiance to its characters is complicated by the fact that I often realize I'm cheering for its protagonists during the commission of some heinous crime. The show's dark second season is a portrait of a family imploding. And there is hardly a better ensemble cast to help pull it off.

Lost without Lost

by Lissette Decos

It has become painfully clear that my ever growing list of ailments must be in response to something, but what?

For weeks now I've had headaches, backaches, bouts of acne, a heat sensation on my right toe, no sensation at all on my left toe, loss of appetite, irritability, inability to connect with others, and an uncontrollable desire to slap people who say they hated the final episode of the thought provoking and life fulfilling hours that made up the series Lost.

The John Williams Blog-a-thon

by Tony Dayoub

Matt Zoller Seitz and Ali Arikan are on Day 3 of a wonderful Blog-a-thon dedicated to John Williams, a household name when it comes to composers of film music. It continues through May 30th over at Edward Copeland on Film. I've been on a short sabbatical enjoying time with my parents, in-town to visit with our kids who are out from school until next week, but I wanted to briefly interrupt the vacation to direct fans unfamiliar with his earlier work to two of my favorite themes of his.

FIRST LOOK - TV Review: You Don't Know Jack

by Tony Dayoub

HBO's You Don't Know Jack follows the rise and fall of "Dr. Death" in the media as he championed the cause of doctor-assisted suicide in the 1990s. It is probably director Barry Levinson's most memorable film since Wag the Dog (1997). But the real triumph belongs to the marvelous Al Pacino (Carlito's Way) who, as Dr. Jack Kevorkian, gives his most nuanced performance in nearly twenty years.

DVD Roundup: Waking Dreams

by Tony Dayoub

I'll be brief today on the subject of two surrealist DVD releases which debuted in the last couple of weeks. One is based on a cult series of some renown. The other has quickly developed its own small following.

TV Review at The House Next Door: Caprica - "Rebirth"

by Tony Dayoub

Those interested in Friday's Caprica episode, "Rebirth," the first of its weekly hourlong entries, can read my recap, up now at The House Next Door. "Rebirth" should be on heavy rotation this week on the Syfy Channel.

Continue reading at The House Next Door

DVD Review: Warner Archive Ventures Into TV Movies

by Tony Dayoub



Once upon a time when there were only three major networks, a handful of local channels, and you received your television signal from an antenna, there were TV programs called telefilms, better known by the oxymoron, "TV movies." You see them from time to time on cable now. Lifetime Channel has made a virtual cottage industry out of them. But back in the seventies, they often served as testing grounds for the major networks. They were used to test new actors, or familiar actors in different types of roles than the ones they were known for. Duel (1971) was a telefilm that showcased the budding talent of director Steven Spielberg. Sometimes the networks used telefilms as a tryout for a new series concept. And some of the most risky concepts to test were science fiction or horror efforts. Well, I'm happy to say that Warner Home Video is now offering consumers some of their favorite telefilms—primarily in these genres—through the Warner Archive Collection.

Seventies Cinema Revival: Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)

by Tony Dayoub


[This is a contribution to the Robert Wise Blog-a-thon currently running at Octopus Cinema from September 1st through the 7th.]

Almost thirty years ago, on December 7, 1979, Paramount released the long awaited Star Trek: The Motion Picture. One of the last films Robert Wise would direct, it followed the reunion of the intrepid crew of TV's starship Enterprise as they head out to confront an enormous cloud of energy threatening Earth. Once referred to as "The Motionless Picture" in Harlan Ellison's 1980 movie review for Starlog, the film was definitely a sober, more restrained version of the kaleidoscopic-paletted science fiction adventure series it was based on. But the story behind the making of the movie is full of the kind of gossip and intrigue that is the stuff of Hollywood legend.

Interview: Battlestar Galactica's Ronald D. Moore on Virtuality - Part 2

In Part 1 of this interview, Ronald D. Moore described how Virtuality (an unsold pilot airing at 8-10 p.m. ET/PT on FOX) differs from the show that was his claim to fame, Battlestar Galactica. Today he goes further, expanding on some of the details that set Virtuality apart from other well-known science fiction series. In terms of how Virtuality's virtual reality and reality show aspects comes into play, Moore wondered, "What would NASA or the space confederation do at that point to keep them from going crazy? They’d probably have a really advanced virtual reality program to help them while away the hours, and there’s interaction between those two worlds. "Somewhere in those discussions we started talking about when they would be broadcasting pieces back to earth, obviously, like astronauts do today, and hey, what if they made a reality show out of that? Then it all kind of started to come together. You had these three layers of storytelling going on in the show where you had what was happening in the real world on the ship, what was happening in the virtual space, and then what was the reality show that was seen back on earth. Were the needs of the reality show starting to impact what was happening on the spacecraft? Were people being manipulated in order to make better drama for the reality show? The astronauts themselves would start to wonder about, 'Are they telling us the truth about what’s happening back on earth, or is that something to just get us to be upset for the cameras?' It did sort of become this really interesting sort of psychological crucible that they would all be put in." Concerning the similarities to Caprica's virtual reality subplot, Moore says, "They do have different purposes and different sorts of constructs to them. They both involve putting a set of goggles on your face, so they’re similar in sort of that perspective. In Caprica it’s really much more akin to the Internet where you go out and the virtual spaces are practically infinite and they intersect with one another. On Caprica you can go from the V-Club where we establish in the pilot is sort of a hacked world and then, presumably, there are Worlds of Warcraft type of worlds, etc., etc. It’s all sort of interconnected into their version of the Internet. "In Virtuality we’re looking at something much more discrete, much smaller, much more of a gaming type of environment where an astronaut has a specific virtual reality module that they go into and play whatever game or have whatever experience they want, but there is no expectation that you can cross from one module to another." Moore also gave an intriguing taste of what one could expect in Battlestar Galactica: The Plan, a movie that reframes the events of the defunct series through the Cylons' perspective. "I think there are definitely surprises. It’s really a piece for people who love the show. If you love the show you’re probably going to be really intrigued by The Plan, because it’s going to have all of these little bread crumbs and throw away lines and indicators and suggestions from other episodes. You’ve seen the show. You’ve watched the finale. You know how the story ends. Okay, here’s like an additional slant on some things that you didn’t know about." But Moore really hopes his fans tune into FOX tonight to try Virtuality. "It certainly does not resolve itself in two hours. I mean it sets up for a [series], so it’s got some pretty heavy things that go down in it and kind of leaves you going, 'Whoa! Where is that going?' by the end of it." Virtuality airs tonight at 8-10 p.m. ET/PT on FOX.

Interview: Battlestar Galactica's Ronald D. Moore on Virtuality - Part 1

Ronald D. Moore, executive producer and developer of the late, great Battlestar Galactica, is an ambitious man. In addition to two Galactica follow-ups—TV movie The Plan (which airs this fall), and prequel series Caprica (airing in 2010)—Moore is hoping the new science fiction pilot he co-created, Virtuality (airing Friday, June 26th, at 8-10 p.m. ET/PT on FOX), will prove popular enough with viewers to go to series. Virtuality follows Earth’s first starship, the Phaeton, and its crew of 12 astronauts who embark on a 10-year journey critical to the survival of life on Earth. They have reached the point of no return where the crew must commit to traveling to a distant solar system millions of miles away. If they commit, they cannot turn back. Tensions are heightened even further as surveillance cameras capture their every move for The Edge of Never, a reality series back on Earth. To give the crew a vital recreational outlet on the long journey, the ship has been equipped with revolutionary virtual reality modules. Each crew member can assume avatar-like identities—from a war hero to a rock star to secret lovers—as they explore self-created worlds in the ultra-life-like simulators. These are their psychological lifelines, and each module’s unique setting was chosen by the crew member before departing Earth. But there is a bug in the system. As crew members go in and out of reality, they realize that a virus has entered their private world. Is someone on the crew responsible? When the intruder crosses a violent and disturbing line, Commander Frank Pike (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) makes a difficult decision to shut down the modules. But before he can, a tragic event threatens the mission. Is it an accident or a crime? Real or virtual? I spoke to Moore about Virtuality, asking him how the idea for sci-fi thriller came up. "It was an unusual situation in that [executive producers] Gail Berman and Lloyd Braun had wanted to have a sit down—a general meeting with me—and then separately they wanted to have a sit down meeting with Michael Taylor, who was one of the writers on Battlestar. So I sat down with Lloyd and Gail, and in that conversation Lloyd had this idea of, 'I would like to do a show about the first long-range mission to Mars.' We kind of talked about that a little bit in just a get-to-know-you meeting, and kind of expanded on the idea of what a long-range mission would be. "They had a similar meeting with Mike Taylor. The same kind of topic came up. He sparked to it from sort of a different angle, and then Michael and I started talking about it separately. Then the three of us started talking, and it all kind of became this sort of 'Here’s a show.' Then we just took it to FOX. We went into FOX and pitched it to [entertainment president] Kevin Reilly and his team—and they really liked it—and it kind of went from there." When asked how it differs from Galactica, Moore says, "It’s a much less serious situation than Battlestar was dealing with. Battlestar was literally a post-apocalyptic show where the future of humanity rode on their every decision, and death was stalking them continuously. So it’s not set up in the same way. The crew aboard Phaeton signed up for what just seemed like a very straight-ahead mission of exploration and they were chosen with that in mind. They were also chosen to participate in this sort of reality show that’s being broadcast back to Earth. "So there was a conscious attempt on the part of the people who put the crew together to sort of have an interesting mix of people. There are debates within the crew themselves who was chosen just for sort of their demographic content and who was legitimately supposed to be there. Now, you’ve got a group of 12 people stuck in a metal tube going in a straight line for a decade or so, and that’s going to just sort of produce a lot of tensions and frictions and manipulations and sort of cross problems between the characters. It has a stronger element of fun and suspense, and sort of interesting plot terms in terms of what characters will do with one another than did Battlestar. Battlestar was very driven by the internal pressures of the huge weight that was on all of their shoulders from the beginning of the miniseries." In Part 2 of the interview (which will be posted on Friday), Moore will discuss some of the more unique aspects of Virtuality that set it apart from other science fiction series, and give us a taste of what to expect from Battlestar Galactica: The Plan. Virtuality airs Friday, June 26th, at 8-10 p.m. ET/PT on FOX.