King Kong Escapes

Spoiler Level: Medium

I'm up to "Japanese Monster Movies" (aka "The Kaiju Collection") in my quest to copy all my VHS tapes to DVD. Last night I finished tape #22 in the set, and oddly enough this is the first time I've gotten to actually watch one of them in its entirety while I'm transferring them.

What I found fascinating about King Kong Escapes was that it was a co-production between Toho and Rankin/Bass. Yes, Rankin/Bass, the people who made the Rudolph specials. So the cast is a mix of Japanese and American actors. The Japanese characters appear to have been speaking in Japanese and dubbed into English, and the American actors are all speaking English, and from what I can gather online were dubbed into Japanese for the Japanese release! Pretty interesting.

The villain is also named Dr. Who, which I got a kick out of. I had assumed his name was Dr. Hu and that I was just being uber-geeky, and was surprised to learn in the credits that his name actually was Dr. Who!

The movie itself is pretty much what you'd expect for a 70's kaiju film, which is a fun romp with monsters being shot at by toy tanks. I would have liked it if Kong and Robot Kong (come on! He should be MechaKong) had gone at it earlier in the movie, but the final battle with them climbing Tokyo Tower is awesome.

V - "Hearts and Minds"

Spoiler Level: High

Eh. Mixed feelings on this episode.

On the plus side, it was cool to see some action in this episode with the attack on the Visitor shuttle.

On the negative side, that's an awful lot of hand-wringing over something that was a typical shot from the classic V.

I get where they were coming from. Since shuttles aren't normally shooting people down in this version, and are frequently filled with humans, it's a bigger deal.

And in the bigger picture, they're trying to say that by resisting the Visitors, the Fifth Column truly are terrorists. Isn't there an old saying about one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter? And since this show is completely unwilling to have the Visitors be fascists, then no one is going to realize that the Fifth Column even are freedom fighters.

On the other hand, by them becoming terrorists in the eyes of the world, the Visitors now have the world law enforcement agencies completely on their side, which is the perfect start of them becoming tyrants.

On the other hand, this is episode 10 out of 12. Taking an entire season to set up the Visitors as tyrants is really dragging it out. And they still haven't revealed the Visitors' true purpose. If after 12 episodes it's exactly the same as what was revealed in the original mini-series by the third hour, I'm going to be a bit disappointed.

I also can't stand scenes like the one where it's the four of them in the basement saying "we're the only ones who will stand up to them." A resistance movement of four. Well, that was certainly like the classic V... sadly though it was like the scene in V: The Series after the cast was cut, and Mike said to Kyle and Willie "Remember, if Juliet and I don't come back.... you two are the Resistance now."

Wow, I'm being bitchy. It's probably my mood.

So okay, things I do like. I like that Jack is wrestling with his morality. I like how Chad seems to think he's still in control of himself without realizing that Anna has totally Converted him. I like how Erica is finding herself in charge of hunting herself down. And I do like that the Visitors are playing on our fears to get themselves in deep.

And I like that we finally got some good space ship action.

Oh, and on a completely different note, I'm done with ABC's boring cast photos and found a program that will let me do my own screen captures for the next 30 days. Anyone recommend any free or inexpensive screen capture programs?

Smallville - "Hostage"

Spoiler Level: Really High

Well, speak of the devil! I'm guessing the nice folks at Smallville read my post two weeks ago asking about Perry White and decide to bring him back just to answer my question. How nice of them!

Seriously though, I do think the timing is great, and I hope this is leading to him becoming a regular cast member at the Daily Planet.

It was also nice to have Martha Kent back. I've always felt that she should have had a few more references here and there; having her go to Washington worked fine, but of course she would have stayed in touch, and we rarely (if ever) really saw that. Her acknowledging that she didn't want to come back because of all the memories of Jonathan works for me.

I figured out the big reveal that Martha was the Red Queen when Clark got zapped by Kryptonite. They had already stated that Tess was the Red Queen, yet they still didn't show her face for that scene. The only reason they would do that is if Tess wasn't the Red Queen, and that only left Chloe or Martha as suspects. Oh, I suppose it could have wound up being a Kandorian or Black Canary or someone, but Martha fit. And sadly it fits with the way she became so secretive when she got involved with Lionel Luthor.

And now we have the season finale preview, promising the war with Zod, Clark revealing himself to Lois, and the Superman symbol in actual red-and-yellow. I'm still not getting my hopes up. This has been possibly the best season yet, but I still don't trust them to not go back to status quo.

V - "Heretic's Fork"

Spoiler Level: High

Yayy! A Visitor Soldier! Okay, so he's a ninja and not a shock trooper, but I'm still happy.

"Name one bad thing they've done since they got here! You can't, can you?" Okay, well I can see how Erica couldn't answer Tyler without being, oh, honest with him, but she could have told the assassin guy "Well, I saw them slaughter a whole room full of people who just showed up to hear a guy's conspiracy theory about them." Or, "Well, my partner turned out to be a Visitor, and when I found out he tried to kill me." And that's just off the top of my head.

I loved all of the stuff between Ryan and Val, and I can see how she can't stay with him after discovering that he was lying to her about being a human being and didn't come clean when he accidentally impregnated her with a lizard baby. But I hope this doesn't mean she's out of the show. Her plotline is just too important to have her just ride away on a train.

And I like that Chad and Lisa's loyalties are being put to the test. I wonder if they converted Chad when they "fixed" his aneurysm?

Doctor Who - "The Time of Angels" (Part One)

Spoiler Level: I'd say somewhere in the range between ther higher side of medium and the lower side of high.

I was debating not reviewing this episode until I saw the second half of the story, but there's so much to love in this episode I figured what the heck. River Song, for starters; I love the whole idea of seeing a future companion (hey, she got to travel in the TARDIS in this story, so she's an official companion in my book now) and that we're getting to see her story from the Doctor's perspective and not from River's. The 11th Doctor's reaction to her, which is much more humorous than the 10th Doctor's. The interplay between Amy and River; it's always fun to see companions from different time periods banter.

I also feel like the romantic relationship between the Doctor and River works better for me than his relationship with Rose. Now I'm not hating on Rose at all, and in hindsight I'm quite okay with him having fallen in love with Rose and their love being the light that put him back on track after the Time War; but at the time I just felt she was starting to steal the show from the Doctor. By contrast, we meet River and immediately learn she's going to be special to the Doctor, and now we have the intrigue of wanting to find out how and why. Plus, by being a semi-recurring companion, she doesn't overpower the show. So I'm really looking forward to seeing her story unfold. I hope she ends up becoming his wife out of a sincere love on the Doctor's part, and not out of some cheat as in "The Doctor's Daughter" or plot device as in "The Aztecs." (Do you realize we know of the Doctor having gotten married three times now?)

I also felt the Weeping Angels were very well handled. I have to admit, although I feel "Blink" is the best Doctor-lite episode made yet, I didn't really think there was much more that could be done with the Weeping Angels, let alone as a two-parter. But this story has been great at expanding their mythology, as Rich put it after we watched it. They did a good job creeping out Mylene as well, although I think the monsters to creep her out the most this season has been the Smilers.

Looking forward to Part Two. I'd like to learn more about the hints they dropped about River, but I'm betting they won't be answered until later seasons.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Lethal Trackdown"

Spoiler Level: Medium

So... who's this squeamish kid they replaced Boba Fett with?

I can handle that they're trying to say that Mandalorians and Jango Fett had a sense of honor. I can handle the concept of Boba Fett being an honorable rogue and as such a story's hero, like he was handled in the Legacy of the Force books. But this just felt like a mess. This felt like they wanted to start setting Boba Fett up to be used as a hero later, but they couldn't go all out because he has to still be a bad guy in Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. The result just didn't work for me. And if you can't let Boba Fett go all out because he's a kid, then it's better to not use him at all.

On the plus side, the various cantinas and Hives of Scum and Villainy were very, very cool.

Smallville - "Sacrifice"

Spoiler Level: High

Gotta admit, I found this episode pretty disturbing. Zod's murder of his lover and (even if he didn't realize it at the time) unborn child is of course the worst of it. The fact that he'd then twist that to incite his own people to war against humanity is pretty messed up and shows how he's completely become as evil as the original General Zod.

So does this mean that Ollie's going to have a big scar on his chest in the shape of a Kryptonian "Z" from now on?

Back to the Chloe of Questionable Morality. I have to admit, I thought the idea that Chloe and Tess would now trust each other after what they went through together a bit hard to swallow, but I at least expected it to last until the end of the scene. Here's hoping that Ollie's willing to shell out some more money to fix up Watchtower.

So, we have two episodes left. Are we really going to get an all-out war? After Doomsday, I'm skeptical. I figure all the budget for the season was probably spent on the JLA episode, but that's okay, that episode would totally make it worth it. But I'll say one thing-- Clark better get over his not wanting to fly if he's going up against an entire group of super-powered Kryptonians. Let me rephrase that, the producers better get over not wanting Clark to fly if he's going up against an entire group of super-powered Kryptonians.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "R2 Come Home"

Spoiler Level: Low

This is what's cool about having a Star Wars TV show: you get Artoo-centric episodes. This is exactly the kind of story I used to do with my action figures when I was 10, right down to making Artoo fly (and he wasn't even able to back then). I absolutely love it.

Gripes: Bossk speaking Basic. And after last episode showed what a great shot Boba Fett was at hitting multiple targets, his not being able to take out two stationary hyperdrive rings felt a little contradictory. But those are both easily forgivable with such a fun episode.

Doctor Who - "Victory of the Daleks"

Spoiler Level: High

This episode has gotten a lot of negative buzz around the net, but I really liked it. I didn't think it was perfect; I thought it felt rushed, and I don't like the new Dalek design as much as the previous design. But other than that, I thought it was fantastic.

First and foremost: I loved that the Daleks are really, truly BACK. The "I have the chance to destroy the Daleks once and for all!" approach has really gotten stale. We know they're coming back. We want them to come back. Is it fair that the Daleks have managed to restore themselves after the Time War and the Time Lords haven't? Probably not, but there are only so many ways you can have one small group of Daleks survive the latest "final destruction of the Daleks," so I really feel it's better this way. Let them establish a New Skaro and build their empire again.

And this was a great way to come back. When Bracewell was talking how all these ideas would just come to him, I was starting to think that somehow the Daleks were influencing his mind from wherever they were currently trapped and he really was building a new breed of Dalek, just like the Cybermen in "Rise of the Cybermen." So the twist that it was the other way around was a real surprise to me.

And I love the look of Bracewell's Daleks. I love the pockets, the camo paint and the Union Jack under the eye stalk! The canteens on their backs reminded me of the discs on the Daleks' backs in "The Dalek Invasion of Earth."

As to the new Daleks: I LOVE that multi-colored Daleks are back. I can't wait for there to be armies of each color. I like the idea that each color has its own job. The things I don't like about the new design is the big blocky ring around the "arms" and the swooped vents under the dome. But hey, when I look at it I still say "Yep, that's a Dalek." And besides, in the old days the Dalek design was tweaked a little bit with practically every new appearance, so the parts I don't like may get tweaked away in the future.

And I loved that the new Daleks immediately hated the other surviving Daleks for being unpure. The swift destruction (and the old Daleks willingness to be destroyed) felt like a true passing of the baton (or maybe passing of the plunger), signifying a new era has begun for the Daleks.

Once again, Amy rushes in and provides what the Doctor has been missing to save the day. The Doctor tries to grip on to the feelings of pain and loss to bring forward Bracewell's humanity, but Amy gets him to grip on to feelings of love. And so love stops the oblivion bomb. A little cheesy, but still nice.

Oh, and I didn't notice a prominent use of "zero" in this one, so either I missed it or I was totally off-base on that one.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Death Trap"

Spoiler Level: High

Things I really liked about this episode:

* Boba Fett is already becoming a bad-ass. Seeing his father killed has already made him toughen up and become the Boba Fett we know and love.

* Those beautiful opening shots of the frigate docking with the Jedi cruiser. A great throwback to the original Star Wars opening, and so beautifully rendered.

* Boba Fett not being able to kill a Clone Trooper when staring him in the face, since they all have the face of his father.

* Aurra Sing and Bossk!

* Boba Fett using the fact that he's also a clone to infiltrate the Clone Troopers and get his revenge on Mace Windu.


Things I didn't like:

* Clone Trooper cadets? Huh? That seems a pretty inefficient way to produce more Clone Troopers. Weren't they all programmed in the cloning chambers and born as adults? Boba Fett was supposed to be the exception. So while I like the concept of his using it to his advantage, I don't like that they had to create this conceit to make it work.

* Mace Windu's quarters get attacked and the two troopers who pointed out to a kid where he could find Mace Windu's quarters just a short while earlier don't step up to say something? Even if one of them was the trooper who died, the other one should have made the connection.

* It's a lucky thing for Boba Fett that escape pods have a "make everything go wrong" button, and that he happened to get the seat right in front of it.


...So the things that I thought didn't work about the episode really didn't work for me, but everything else was good.

From what I can gather from starwars.com, it seems like they aired all three episodes of the season finale already. They've still only posted one of them online though, so I'll have to wait to a little longer to see the other two.