Star Wars Resistance 1×01/02 – TV Review

Originally published on Set The Tape

Following the massive critical and fan success of both Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, new Disney series Star Wars Resistance had big shoes to fill. In the build up to its release, the reaction to the show has been mixed, with some people disliking the drastic change in art style, the apparent lack of any Jedi, and some even disliking that the show wasn’t going to continue some of the plot threads left over at the end of Star Wars Rebels.

Despite a lot of vocal fans decrying the show before it had even aired, the reaction to the first episode, entitled ‘The Recruit’, seems to have won audiences over with its bright and beautiful animation, new characters, and sense of fun adventure.

The story is set several months before the events of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and follows young New Republic pilot Kazuda ‘Kaz’ Xiono (Christopher Sean) as he finds himself being drawn into the fledgling Resistance. Having gotten hold of some intel that hints that the First Order may be planning a strike on the New Republic, Kaz agrees to help Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) by going undercover to find a spy on the planet Castilon.

So, we know what this attack is going to be and how it’s going to come about thanks to the events of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, so there’s no mystery there, but the hidden spy on the Colossus fuelling station is a good enough mystery to get the series started. The platform is a unique looking place, somehow reminiscent of the wider Star Wars universe, yet looking very new.

The Colossus itself is packed with a huge variety of species for the series to show off and dozens of potential suspects for Kaz to have to investigate. There are races from the original trilogy, such as Rodians and Bith, there’s a number of pit droids and an Aleena from the prequel films, to sequel trilogy species like Abednedo and Crolutes. Despite all of these races making an appearance, the show is still able to add its own unique looking designs, with junk shop owners Orka (Bobby Moynihan) and Flix (Jim Rash) being particular stand outs.

There’s little focus on Kaz’s mission in these opening episodes, with time being given over to establishing the world instead. Because of this, there is a bigger focus on racing. It’s hard to know how much a part of the series this is going to be going forward, but considering there’s at least four other big name pilots that Kaz has yet to face, I’d imagine his racing career is going to be intertwined with his spy mission quite a bit. And after two shows about fighting huge foes, along with the Jedi and Sith, a smaller scale story like this is actually a nice change of pace.

The animation style also helps with this too, with the new cell shaded look a big leap away from the previous shows that utilised CGI animation. The new looks makes Star Wars Resistance look brighter and more colourful than either The Clone Wars or Rebels were able to be; and along with some fun comedy moments, helps to create an opening that feels somehow less oppressive and more enjoyable.

I can’t help but feel that this is an intentional choice on the part of the creators, and particularly Dave Filoni. This is set in a time period before the First Order started their campaign on the galaxy, when the New Republic was in power and people didn’t believe war was coming. It was a time of relative peace and harmony, and the tone of the series seems to be reflecting this. If the series continues to the point of the new films, I’d be very interested to see if the visual style alters to show this darker period, especially as Kaz’s father is a New Republic senator, and in theory will die during the events of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Star Wars Resistance is a bright and engaging new series with some good universe building in a time period we known virtually nothing about. The opening episodes don’t delve too deeply into the series plot, but chose to spend some time building their new world and establishing the new cast of characters. With the previous two Star Wars animated programmes having achieved such great heights in quality, it’s safe to say that this could be the beginning of something special.


Buy Amy A Coffee
Go to Amy's Blog

Follow Amy on Twitter

Add Amy on Tumblr

Connect with Amy on LinkedIn

Serpent – Film Review

Originally published on Set The Tape

Psychological thriller Serpent tells the story of Gwynneth (Sara Dumont) and Adam (Tom Ainsley), a married couple who travel to South Africa so that Tom can study a rare beetle. However, things aren’t the great when the two of them become trapped in their tent with a deadly Black Mamba, and Tom discovers that Gwynneth has been having an affair.

The concept of Serpent isn’t a bad one, that of being trapped in a confined space with one of the most venomous and aggressive snakes in the world, but the film can’t survive solely on this. There is only so much of two people laying in a tent not moving you can watch before it becomes boring. As such, the film has to bring something extra to the table.

Writer and director Amanda Evans chose to make a relationship drama; again, this isn’t a bad choice. Whenever people are trapped in dangerous situations together, personal interactions can be pushed to the extreme and relationships can be strengthened or destroyed completely. However, the biggest issue is that it’s hard to care about Gwynneth and Adam.

They’re the only characters in the film and as such it’s down to them to populate this world for the audience. Gwynneth starts the film apparently trying to break off her affair (although it’s hard to tell for certain as she never states this once). She is ignoring calls and from whomever it is that she’s been sleeping with. It gives the sense that she’s trying to get away from him and wants to rededicate herself to her marriage, especially when she begs Adam to take her with him on his trip.

It’s easy to see why she would have an affair and hard to understand why she wants to be with Adam as the two of them have very little chemistry. The film is filled with long, awkward silences between them, one of them walking off screen instead of answering a question, or long glaring looks. They feel like a couple whose relationship is already long over.

Whilst you could chalk this up to Adam having been suspicious of Gwynneth having an affair it’s pretty obvious by his reaction when he finds the messages on her phone that he’s taken completely by surprise. That actually leads me to one of my biggest issues with the relationship drama between the two of them.

Adam uses her phone’s screen light to try and distract the snake whilst inside the tent. He picks up her phone and it immediately unlocks, bringing her texts with her mystery man up on screen. Now, anyone who is seriously cheating on a partner would have a lock on their phone, would not have the messages open ready as soon as the phone unlocks, and if the affair is over, they would delete all of those messages. The fact that as soon as Adam touches her phone all the evidence pops up on screens is incredibly convenient for the plot and unbelievable for real life.

With the added realisation that his wife has cheated on him, Adam discovers that he’s trapped in a tent with two serpents (I see what the film did there). Whilst most people would probably shelve this issue until they’re more hand inches away from a horrible death, Adam decides that it’s a perfect time to pin his wife down and try to strangle her to death. His pregnant wife I might add.

The cheating wife trope, the unfiltered physical violence he enacts upon her, the use of Serpent as the title, and the poster of the snake slithering over a woman’s mouth in a mock shushing finger pose all make the film feel very misogynistic and a little sexist. It plays up to tired old tropes and hackneyed storylines that not only feel out of place for 2018, but astounding when considering they were written by a woman.

The actual snake feels very secondary for much of the film, only really coming into play in the final act when both parties end up bitten. Luckily they have some meds that will save them, but only enough for one person. What kind of person goes out into an area they know is full of dangerous snakes and only brings the one dose? Seriously?

The ambiguous ending is both incredibly grim and unsatisfying. The personal drama feels strangely forced and the relationship between the two characters is mostly unbelievable. Despite some brilliant performances from Dumont and Ainsley, the film ends up feeling drab, overly long and very underwhelming.


Buy Amy A Coffee
Go to Amy's Blog

Follow Amy on Twitter

Add Amy on Tumblr

Connect with Amy on LinkedIn

Night of the Creeps – Blu-ray Review

Originally published on Set The Tape

If you asked me what I thought of Fred Dekker before I watched the release of the Night of the Creeps Blu-ray I wouldn’t have been able to give you much of an opinion. However, having now seen the film, and realising that he was also the writer/director of Monster Squad, a number of Star Trek: Enterprise episodes, and Robocop 3 (even he’s not proud of that one), I have to say he might be one of my favourite directors.

Night of the Creeps is Dekker’s first time as a feature film director, but watching the movie you’d be hard pressed to tell. It’s sleek, stylish, has great effects, a brilliant cast, and a sense of fun that directors who have been working in the industry for decades sometimes fail to achieve.

Beginning in space, the film shows a battle on an alien spaceship, complete with little rubber space men and laser guns. During the fight a mysterious canister is ejected from the ship and crashes to the planet below them, Earth. Landing in a quiet American town in the 1950s, the canister is found by a college couple and the boy becomes infected by a strange parasite.

This opening sequence is brilliant. The alien spaceship is so completely different from anything else in the film, yet doesn’t feel jarring or out of place, and adds an extra layer of scope and scale to what could have been a fairly small story. Once the pod lands on Earth the film switches to black and white and evokes the feel of a 1950’s B-movie, complete with parking teens, radio announcers talking about an escaped mental patient, and said mental patient wielding an axe.

Following this frankly inspired opening the film jumps forward in time to the 1980s where it follows college students Chris (Jason Lively) and J.C. (Steve Marshall) as Chris decides to try and woo the beautiful Cynthia (Jill Whitlow). When Chris decides that the best way of doing this is to join a fraternity, he and J.C. get roped into performing a prank that requires them to steal a body. Sneaking into the college labs they discover the frozen body of the boy from the 1950s and let him out, unwittingly unleashing the parasites inside him upon the town.

The set up is silly and simple, two things that are definitely needed for a film as ridiculous as this. The characters don’t take themselves too seriously, J.C. seems determined to make everything into a joke, and they are content to have fun with their misadventures. Whilst the film isn’t an out and out dark comedy, the college students bring a level of levity and humour to the film that stops it going too far into the realm of horror.

Dekker would go on to release Monster Squad a few years later, and it follows a similar mix of humour, charm, and horror, though aimed at a younger audience. As such, if you enjoyed Monster Squad but have not seen Night of the Creeps you’ll very much feel at home here.

One of the best characters has to be Ray Cameron (Tom Atkins), a gruff and grumpy police detective who is haunted by events in his past. He brings a level of seriousness to proceedings, even having the darkest and most emotion filled scene of the film, yet also has some of the best comedy lines too.

‘I’ve got good news and bad news girls. The good news is your dates are here.’

‘What’s the bad news?’

‘They’re dead.’

 The zombie effects are top notch, with everything in the film being done practically by an incredibly talented team. Whilst some practical effects can age very quickly, a lot of the work in Night of the Creeps still looks great. The head bursting effects of the zombies are over the top and at times ridiculous, but they work so well because the film as a whole feels over the top and ridiculous.

There’s not really a moment of the film that feels slow or dull, and it was thoroughly entertaining throughout, especially when you spot the little cameo appearances from people such as Dick Miller, Greg Nicotero, and Shane Black. The script is punchy and witty, and the editing and music are perfect for a cheesy 80’s flick.

The Blu-ray presents the film in the director’s cut version, which boasts an extra scene of zombie killing action in a tool shed, as well as the original ending. The release does provide the alternative, theatrical ending in the extras, but it’s good that the film is presented in the way it was originally intended.

The Blu-ray also gives two commentary tracks that are both filled with great behind the scenes stories and insight, as well as behind the scenes documentary, and an interview with Tom Atkins who briefly discusses his career.

Night of the Creeps is an absolute gem of a film, one that I’m disappointed that I’d never seen before. The new release corrects that, giving not only the best looking version of the film on home release but a slew of extras that are more than worth exploring. A must have for any fan of horror, or the 80’s.


Buy Amy A Coffee
Go to Amy's Blog

Follow Amy on Twitter

Add Amy on Tumblr

Connect with Amy on LinkedIn

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. 1×12 – ‘Seeds’ – TV Rewind

Originally published on Set The Tape

After two weeks delving into the overall story of the season with Centipede and the mysterious Clairvoyant, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. takes a step back to adventure of the week, but brings a level of charm and fun to proceedings that has been missing for a while.

When a group of S.H.I.E.L.D. cadets at the academy fall foul of a mysterious assailant who uses a device to try to freeze them to death, Coulson (Clark Gregg) and his team are called in to get to the bottom of it. What’s surprising to the team, and the audience, is that it turns out that Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) and Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge) are something of superstars in the science division.

Giving Fitz and Simmons the spotlight without making a thing of their obvious love for each other was a welcome change, and we actually get to see the two of them having a lot of fun. They both seem incredibly comfortable being back in the academy, and fit well into the roles as mentor-like figures for the younger cadets. If the show were to suddenly spend a handful of episodes just following the two of them at the academy, helping out the future agents, it would be a great little diversion.

It turns out that one of the victims of the ice attack, Donnie Gill (Dylan Minnette), orchestrated the entire event specifically to get Fitz back at the academy in order to get him to fix the power source for his machine. Whilst this isn’t the biggest or most shocking secret plan in the history of espionage fiction, it’s kind of brilliant in its simplicity. Fitz identifies with the young Donnie, and desperately want to connect with him and help him come out of his shell, so of course he helps him with his project. But the project is actually a secret weapon that Donnie and his friend Seth (Daniel Zovatto) plan to sell to the shady Ian Quinn (David Conrad).

Outside of the Fitz and Simmons focus the episode sheds a little more light onto the mystery of Skye (Chloe Bennet) and her past, in particular her connection to a failed S.H.I.E.L.D. operation in the past that led to several deaths. Not only did these developments put an end to Skye’s search for her parents, but hinted at some deeper mystery to her past that could tie her into more important plots.

The best things about this episode though are the sense that the show has finally started to spend a little money on its episodes, and it painted S.H.I.E.L.D. as a larger organisation in a better light.

Donnie’s weather machine looks great, especially on a television budget, and the team behind the scenes managed to make things look fresh and interesting. We get to see the bus in an action sequence that wasn’t just the camera shaking on the set whilst the actors threw themselves around feigning turbulance. We got to see the plane from the outside as it fought against the deadly storm. It might not seem like much, but after so many episodes of seeing the plane just flying from place to place it makes a difference to see something a little more spectacular happening.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. academy is also portrayed as a really nice place to be, which is a stark contrast to the hectic nature and cold personalities of the Hub. You can see the hope in the eyes of the staff and the students, you get a sense that they’re eager to become part of something bigger than themselves, something that stands for what’s right. We get a small moment of this when Coulson takes Skye to see the wall of fallen agents. It’s an inspirational moment, and even the nod to Captain America can’t ruin it when she just happens to pick out the name Bucky Barnes out of all of them to read.

‘Seeds’ is a very different episode from what has come before. It doesn’t appear to play into the central plot in any big ways, but doesn’t feel like previous adventure of the week episodes. It has a sense of comfortableness that comes from a series that has finally found its feet.


Go to Amy's Blog

Follow Amy on Twitter

Add Amy on Tumblr

Connect with Amy on LinkedIn

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. 1×11 – ‘The Magical Place’ – TV Rewind

Originally published on Set The Tape

After Agent Coulson (Clark Gregg) is kidnapped by the villainous Centipede in the mid-season finale, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. slows down slightly a little as the team are forced to search for their missing leader in ‘The Magical Place’.

The episode sees the return of Victoria Hand (Saffron Burrows) leading the S.H.I.E.L.D. team as they try to track down Centipede and rescue Coulson. Hand makes for a good leader of the organisation in the absence of Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders). She represents the facelessness of the organisation, the rigid rules and unwillingness to break from protocol.

We see how much leeway Coulson’s team actually have in the way they are treated when he is no longer there. The team are allowed a lot of freedom and whilst their standard way of operating might end up well for them, it’s far from the norm for S.H.I.E.L.D.. This is no more obvious in Skye’s (Chloe Bennet) role in the episode.

Thrown off of The Bus, Skye is left to her own devices to try to find Coulson. Normally this might not be much of an issue for her, but she’s slowed down by her inability to use any tech thanks to her S.H.I.E.L.D bracelet. However, after 10 episodes, we get to see that Skye has finally learnt some spy skills.

The main season arc moves forward as more information about the mysterious Clairvoyant is teased. Sadly, with this still being halfway through the season, very few real answers are given here, though the story does seem to be finally advancing with a clearer narrative.

The episode ends with the surprise reveal that Mike Peterson (J August Richards) wasn’t killed in the previous episode, but is now being forced to work for Centipede with one of the eye implants first introduced in the episode ‘Eye Spy’. It’s good that Mike hasn’t been killed off as he’s one of the best characters in the show. His shift to working for the villains definitely produces some extra drama. It’s also a nice thing that the show didn’t hide this reveal for a later episode and actually gave us some information up front for once.

‘The Magical Place’ doesn’t so much as provide answers to the mystery behind Coulson’s resurrection as much as it just confirms suspicions. Hopefully now that the cat is out of the bag, the series won’t be as stingy with information as it has been up to this point. ‘The Magical Place’ continued on from ‘The Bridge‘ by giving the audience a much improved experience, embracing a larger narrative and decent character moments over adventure of the week stories.


Buy Amy A Coffee
Go to Amy's Blog

Follow Amy on Twitter

Add Amy on Tumblr

Connect with Amy on LinkedIn