'SNL 50: THE ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL' (2025)....THE HITS, THE MISSES, THE "BUT WHERE WAS....???"

 SNL 50: The Anniversary Special (2025    Even with 3 hours and 20 minutes, it may not have been possible to do an all encompassing recap of half a century of Saturday Night Live....

          But not that producer Lorne Michaels didn't try his best. 

          Packed to the rafters with SNL guest hosts, current cast members, past cast members and musical guests, the show took a deep dive into legendary SNL moments, characters, skits, mock commercials and general history. 

         For any fan of the show, a nostalgic treasure trove opened wide, spilling out who knows how many fond memories. 

         Also on view......the glaring omissions.

         Though SNL established a long history of mercilessly lampooning U.S. Presidents, you'd never know it from the 50th anniversary special.....MIA were cast members' eviscerations of the POTUS of the moment, from Chevy Chase's dim bulb Gerald Ford to James Austin Johnson's babbling Donald Trump.....(unless you count the montage of the young Chase's stumbling pratfalls, a signature of his Ford impression.)

          We'd hate to think this has anything to do with Trump, now armed with unlimited power and his own FCC minion, planning to exact vengeance on TV shows and comedians who've dared to mock him. 

           Also glaringly not in attendance for various reasons - some of the most monumental figures in SNL's history.....Dan Aykroyd, Bill Hader, Dana Carvey. Considering the contributions they made, you'd think Lorne Michaels should've moved heaven and earth to include them, even if from remote locations.......

          Just sayin'........

         To the special's credit, it served up a feast of mostly on target recaps, fresh skits and live musical performances over a long, long Sunday night, with few duds and missteps.

          A few random observations......

          If ever anyone needed a poignant reminder about the ravages of time, we felt both saddened and elated as Paul Simon and Paul McCartney valiantly sang their songs with weakened, aging voices.

         The tour of un-woke, now offensive politically incorrect skit characters was for us, the funniest, most perceptive bit in the show. It reminded us of when we recently watched the re-airing of the show's 1975 premiere episode. A mock news film by Albert Brooks included the breaking news that Oregon has lowered the age of consent to 7 years old, then cut to clip of a guy dating a little girl. Try imagine seeing something like that on TV today (along with Buck Henry's character of a pedophile uncle babysitting his nieces.)

          Fortunately, the golden moments outnumbered the duds.....appearances by Bill Murray, Laraine Newman, Garrett Morris, Adam Sandler, Rachel Dratch and the formidable female power players Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, Kristin Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Maya Rudolph  (We're aware, we're leaving out lots of people off these lists, but by now, you know all the others....)

         We can only feel thankful that two former guest hosts, President Elon Musk and Assistant Dictator Donald Trump declined an invitation to attend the show. Maybe Lorne Michaels shouldn't consider inviting people dedicated to wiping his show off the air......

        SNL 50 was a huge mixed bag of treats and blunders.....but then that aptly describes the 50 years of the show itself. 

       If you missed it, it's well worth streaming. 4 stars (****).

THE 2024 TONY AWARDS......OH, THE DRAMA.....THE DRAMA.....

The 2024 Tony Awards (2024)   We never miss this show every year, even though we never get to see any of the nominated plays or musicals unless someone eventually makes a movie out of them.....

         How could we not?  Film and TV awards shows, because they all pile up between January and March, start to all look the same.....the same people from the same lists of films and shows reveling in self congratulation and Uriah Heep-ish false modesty.

        After all that dust clears, the Tony awards for Broadway shows and performances pops up at the start of summer. And for sheer ego-driven spectacle and...uh....theatricality, no other show equals it. 

       Liberally peppered with staged excepts from nominated musicals, the show drips in tearful sweat to perpetuate a grand illusion.  We're supposed to believe that the Broadway community is one enormous, generous happy family, whose members dote on each other and cheer themselves on as if each one's a loving parent of the other......

          Bullshit. We spent our younger years writing plays for theater companies so we know whereof we speak.....

          In cold hard reality, theater folk are insecure, ego-driven and addicted to their own personal dramas worse than any opioids. And as they publicly clap their hands bloody in praise of their colleagues, privately, they pray for their failure.

            All of this behavior goes on full display at the Tonys.....and even as the musical casts sing and dance themselves into an exhaustive frenzy, for sheer melodramatic pageantry, they can't compete with the groveling self-aggrandizement of the winners' acceptance speeches. 

           Almost all the winners come fully prepared with a carefully composed, solo one act play.  This lengthy brain fart usually begins with their Oliver Twist-Little Orphan Annie childhoods and ends with their redemption and deliverance by the lure of the stage.....plus the laundry list of thanks for everyone they ever met in their life.  

             We're not denying that this stuff is fun to watch, but here's the elephant in the room.....the ridiculously overpriced elephant in the room. 

             These Broadway babies babble on about how they're bringing the illumination and perception of the theater arts to the world at large and doing their bit to make us all better people in a better world to live in. 

              What none of them ever speak of......the cheapest tickets to their shows are in the neighborhood of 70 bucks and prime orchestra seats can run up $300 a seat or more.

              Broadway box office is primarily fueled by travel agencies throwing in show tickets as part of their 5 days-6 nights in New York packages. And tourists prefer a couple hours of singing and dancing before moving on the Statue Of Liberty tour. 

                Like everyone else, we'd love the chance to see these shows in their entirety.....but that would require taking out a second mortgage on our house, and existing solely on pizza crusts plucked out the dumpster behind Domino's....

                In a way, the opening of this year's Tonys was the most perfect encapsulation of the entire show. Host Ariana DeBose kicked things off with a generic song and dance number that had absolutely nothing to do with Broadway theater, but did a good job celebrating.....Ariana DeBose.  A legend in her own mind. 

              Then the audience, nominees and winners duly followed after in the same spirit of fake brotherhood and preening pride in themselves. 

              And that's showbiz, folks!  But if you love musicals, by all means stream it for a box-o-chocolates sampler of the current hits......you'll save yourself at least $800,000 in ticket money.....

             The Tonys itself?  When they stop talking about how their shows improve the world and start talking about how to lower the astronomic costs to see their shows, we'll give them more than....1 star (*).

         

TONY AWARDS 2023......BROADWAY MINUS THE WGA.....

The Tony Awards 2023.....will occupy a unique niche in history - the first full fledged awards ceremony to put on on a complete 4 & 1/2 hour show without any use of scripted material. Such material, of course, would normally come from members of the Writers Guild Of America, currently on strike. 

               So the major thing missing, something we've all become accustomed to - absolutely no cringe-inducing cutsey-wootsy, supposedly comedic byplay between the teams of presenters. 

               Tony presenters merely announced their names and got on with the business of naming the nominees. 

               Guess what? Nobody missed the cutesy-wootsy byplay.......and I say this as a writer myself who full supports the WGA and hope their members triumph in demanding and receiving their fair share of pay from the scum-sucking reptiles who control the film studios, TV networks. and streaming channels.

              This show exists for one vital primary function.......to offer America a chocolate box sampling of Broadway musicals in all their furiously choreographed, standing ovation glory.  And convince visitors to New York that any one of these shows is worth laying out hundreds of dollars for a couple of tickets....

               Yes, you heard me right about those prices.......these days, dinner and a show on the the Great White Way could potentially force you to take out a second mortgage, or maybe postpone your kid's college education for a few years.......

             But then again, you' will watch awestruck as leading role actors burst their vocal cords belting out tunes to the upper balcony,  while dancers choreographed with military precision hurl themselves across the stage like tracer bullets. Actual real people....no CGI in sight. 

             All of that was certainly on view at last night's Tony Awards, along with the winners' well spoken, emotional and  heartfelt acceptance speeches. 

              Anyone who's ever watched a Tonys show (or been in high school drama club)  knows that the world of theater  has always been a welcoming haven and Godsend for all the gifted, creative artists of the LGBTQIA+ community. So as expected, many of the acceptance speeches addressed the toxic culture wars currently waged on them by fascist MAGA-morons of the GOP like Ron DeSenseless. 

              But exuberant, joyful show stopping performances are what dominated the night, with big numbers from "Some Like It Hot", "Camelot", "Shucked", "& Juliet", "Kimberly Akimbo", and "Funny Girl",,,,,(with all of them more than earning their Standing O's.....even for the thoroughly despised diva Lea Michelle, who ripped through "Don't Rain On My Parade" at warp speed...)

             I can only wish them well and hope these shows can collect enough tourists willing to cough up the vast amounts of cash required to secure them tickets and take in the unique thrill of live theater. 

             Well done, loads of fun and just about the only awards show I actually look forward to seeing year after year. 5 stars (*****)

ROUTE 66'ERS BATTLE TRUMP'S BFF'S IN 1962!

"To Walk With The Serpent" (Route 66 -Season 2, Episode 14 - 1962 )    While re-living old 'Route 66' episodes, we watched this one with our mouth in a frozen WTF gape........

             Colorize it and it'd look like something you stumbled upon on in this week's nightly news.......or a Trump rally.

              Briefly, for you young 'uns.......'Route 66' followed the ongoing adventures of two young men hoping to find their direction in life by tooling around the USA in their spiffy Corvette convertible.....  

             Stopping in endless big cities and small towns, every temporary part time job they stumble into invariably gets them embroiled in somebody's overheated drama.  Our heroes, Tod (Martin Milner) a college educated preppie and Buzz (George Maharis) a rough and tumble street brawler usually resolve these mini-soap operas with common sense, empathy, a bit of romance and any number of fistfights. 

                Their stop in Boston somehow collides them with John Westerbrook (a superb Dan O'Herlily) a demented would-be Hitler, complete with his own set of slimy minions and a cadre of goon stormtroopers.

               Westerbrook's '  Neo-Nazi 'Awake America' movement comes complete with his foaming-at-the-mouth speeches about sweeping the immigrant garbage out of America.........and even includes his followers using a stiff right arm 'Heil' type salute.

               The FBI promptly recruits our two heroes to infiltrate this loathsome cabal and find out what they're planning to do with a truckload of plastic explosives they've stolen. 

                Buzz, being a 'mongrel' of dubious parentage, gets beaten and bounced out of the gang early on, but Tod hangs around to discover the mad, mad Westerbrook plots to blow up the crowd at one of his rallies......for no other reason than to call attention to himself.

                A chilling episode for sure........and almost ruined by the music underscore consisting of a mock patriotic march implying that( the composer thought this stuff was funny. 

                 As in many 'Route  66' entries, the climactic wrap-up and is rushed and abrupt, with the Feds thwarting Westerbrook before one his thugs detonates the explosive-laden tri-corner hat on Paul Revere's statue.  The babbling, loony-toon make believe Fuhrer is immediately thrown into a straight jacket...........(if only the wheels of justice spun that fast for all of Trump's indicted swamp-thugs.)

                   What immediately struck us about this episode, of course, was the spot on resemblance of these idiotic nutjobs to the the modern day fascists that Trump embraces as 'very good people'.......which made watching it all the more unsettling. 

                  ..........and reminding us once again that the upcoming election is the most crucially important in United States history, a clear choice between democracy and totalitarianism.

                  For "To Walk With The Serpent", 3 prescient stars (***) .....for Trump and all the insane people he loves because they like him.......minus Infinite stars.

'JEOPARDY'S 1ST EPISODE!........TREBEK TO THE FUTURE......

Jeopardy!  (1984-2020) For a real summertime Blast From The Past, nothing beat watching the very first episode of the beloved game show that was hosted by equally beloved Alex Trebek.......

                And holy Daily Double, there was a dark haired Alex, talking so fast he sounded like he'd either  taken 5 Red Bulls intravenously or ingested all the meth from the entire seasons of 'Breaking Bad....he was like a live action version of Muppet game show host Guy Smiley.......

                What we loved the most.........given his frenzied delivery, Alex kept the usual mid-point contestant chit-chat' to 12 seconds per person........

                  ........so none of them got make us to lose the will to live by doing one of those, "That's right, Alex, my wife and I were married on top of a moving train and then we lost our luggage in Rangoon and fell off the top of the Matterhorn right after we met the Dali Lama'........

                  We're pretty sure though, that the 'Jeopardy' staff must have conferred after that first, ridiculously easy Final Jeopardy question......"Uh....listen guys.....whaddya say we make the final question a real ball buster from hell.....ya know, something like "Richard III's second cousin on this mother's side died of this debilitating sexually transmitted disease.....{

                 No matter. Vintage 'Jeopardy' made for the perfect summer cooler. 4 stars (****)

'ZZZZZ'.......FORGET BEYONCE, MEET THE REAL QUEEN BEE......

ZZZZZ (The Outer Limits - Season 1, Ep. 18 (1964)   Even by the high, imaginative standards set by this wondrous sci-fi anthology series, this episode was especially off-the-charts bonkers.........

           The first shot tells it all.....at the country home of an entomologist (Phillip Abbott), a colony of bees turns their queen into a human-sized, smokin' hot, smokey-eyed fake woman (Joanna Frank)......arriving in the Doc's  garden already nicely clothed in a tight white dress........

             These are some goddamned smart bees we're talkin' about here........

              And don't give yourself a stroke trying to figure out how the bees pulled off this scientific miracle.......the teleplay writer, Meyer Dolinksy, probably didn't know either......

               Dolinsky does reveal what the Queenie and her hive are up to........nothing less than cross breeding herself with the good doctor himself.......and from there, presumably taking over the world with Bee People........

                We did warn you how bonkers this episode was, right?

                 Her Royal Buzzing Majesty poses as 'Regina' (heh, heh, heh), who's answered the Doc's ad for a lab assistant.........and this doesn't sit well with Mrs. Doc (Marsha Hunt) who suspects this slinky purring vamp is.....uh.....weirdly inhuman......

                 Her suspicions are more than confirmed when she spots Regina in the garden, transformed back into a big-ass bee so she can suck off some flower nectar as a light snack......

                  Stop laughing and remember the 'bonkers' warning we posted twice already........

                 As if this couldn't get crazier, Regina stays in touch with the hive via the Doc's bee-translator machine, which turns their busy buzzing into stiff mechanical English, much like alien visitors spoke in 1950's movies.......("Did we not make you perfect?")

                  This being "The Outer Limits", things go horribly awry for everyone concerned......Regina and her brood learn to mind their own buzz-ness.......and next time the bees try fashioning a facsimile of a girl, you can bet they'll aim higher than creating a semi-comatose Kardashian.......

                   Somewhere buried in this lunacy is the script's message about the eternal difference between human love and insect instinct.........okaaaay, if they say so.......sure.

                    As for BQ, we loved Joanna Frank's sultry Bee-autiful honey of a girl.......and now that we've exhausted every cheap, low bee gag.....4 stars (****).......(how 'bout a feature film remake.....

,,,,,"That Sting You Do" ?  

             

              

THE GLOBES.........OUR FAVORITE TRAINWRECK....

The Golden Globe Awards (2020)

                    The Hollywood crowd never had a more deserving host than Ricky Gervais....

                     Especially as they kicked off their tortuous 'awards season', where they subject the entire world to a several months long orgy of self-congratulation.........kissing their own pampered asses while lecturing us paycheck-to-paycheck proles to 'not be afraid to follow your dreams....'

                      And so the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, premier ass-kissers themselves, either from perversity or show-biz savvy, inflicted the acerbic Gervais on the star-studded assemblage.........

                      The result: the expected rancorous spectacle of Gervais hurling jokes brimming with withering contempt at the wincing, uncomfortable crowd of Hollywood-ites......

                        In the BQ's mission statement, this definitely came under the heading....'cool stuff to watch....'

                        Other highlights:  Joaquin Phoenix giving a brilliant wonderful performance.......playing an unhinged, manic depressive actor named Joaquin Phoenix. He nailed it....
And astounding moment when the show poked Disney in the eye by skipping over "Frozen 2" and "Toy Story 4" for "The Missing Link", one of those animated films that come and go in one weekend,  faster than the life cycle of a mayfly.

                        We're begging you, H.F.P. A..........throw enough money at Gervais to get  him to come back next year.......We don't know what the awards season would be without him........

                   

DOUBLE JEOPARDY.........THE FALL OF KING JAMES, THE RISE OF PRINCESS EMMA.......

             Like millions of people, BD (Beloved Daughter) and BQ take turns shouting our answers to 'Jeopardy' questions at maximum volume.........usually so loud that if the show were broadcast live, the contestants might actually hear us from thousands of miles away.........

              And in the great Universe maxim of "Sooner Or Later, Everybody's Gotta Go Sometime", the relentless sports better James Holzhaur went down to defeat.........

               .......at the hands of an equally relentless 27 year old Librarian, Emma Boettcher......(delighting our veryown librarian BD to no end.......)

               Watching this Clash of The Titans can be both exhilarating and depressing..........fun when you know the answers along with the champs.......but soul-crushing as you mutter, "How the hell do they know this shit?????"  when they nail the correct answer to  "Charlemagne's third cousin married this Princess who ruled the duchy of Schlembledorff"......and you don't.

                  Watching them, you realize James and Emma are the real stable geniuses among us........and they're really good at making the rest of us look dumber than Trump.

                  So all hail this mighty transference of power.......(which happily coincided with Alex Trebek's increasing optimistic news of his cancer battle.)

                   James no doubt will pop up on Championship games, doing battle with that collection of vaguely obnoxious former winners, like Buzzy, Austin and that Creepy Smile Guy whose name I can never remember.......(the one who looks like his smile is achieved by ramming a cattle prod up his ass...)

                 And best of luck to take-charge Emma as she begins her reign using James' take-no-prisoners, go-for-broke strategies......(hit the big money clues first and hunt down those Daily Doubles.....)

                   .........that is.....until she runs out of luck.......and straight into Sooner-Or-Later-Everybody's-Gotta-Go-Sometime........

               

             

MEMO TO "KILLING EVE" CREATORS............DROP DEAD

Killing Eve (2018)    Oh, wait a sec......almost forgot.......DON'T READ THIS IF YOU DON'T WANT TO HEAR A GIGANTIC SPOILER.......EVEN IF THE POINT OF THIS POST IS THAT THE "SPOILER" IS A NOTHING BUT THE USUAL CRAPPY MARKETING SCAM PERPETRATED BY TV SERIES SHOWRUNNERS!!!!!!!!!

                 Well, I'll say this much........"Killing Eve" Season 2 provides truth in advertising......

                  Eve's killed.

                  Until the already announced Season 3..........

                 Which means.........Eve's not dead?

                  BUT OH MY ****IN' GOD!  THE LAST EPISODE LEFT US STUNNED AND SHOCKED BEYOND ALL COMPREHENSION!!!!!! WHAT THE ****!!!   WE'RE BUMMED OUT OF OUR MINDS!  WE'RE NEAR CRIPPLED WITH SURPRISE!

                  Uh..............no we're not.

                  By this time, everybody's starting to catch on that network executives and series showrunners think their viewers are gibbering idiots.......and can be easily poked, prodded and goosed like lab animals.........

                   Part of their procedure means providing faithful viewers a season final episode designed to leave them with their mouths agape.......drool and half-chewed nachos dribbling down their chins...

                  After all, the masterminds surmise, how many of us can think that far ahead to realize that there's a Season 3 in the works...........(aaahhh........a thought dawned! They wouldn't dispense with Sandra Oh, one of the most gifted actresses working in TV right now..... would they? )

                  And kiss goodbye the ratings and advertising bucks???

                   Oooopsie.......the BBC-America bigwigs don't want us thinking too much........better if we spend our time tweeting, "WHAT THE **** DID I JUST WATCH???"

                    BQ Memo to all creative participants  of "Killing Eve".......congrats for pulling off what you no doubt think is a wham-bam of a season finale.......stop high-fiving yourselves for a minute......

                    You killed Eve?  Breaking news:  everyone knows you didn't.

                     For the series, 3 stars (***)......for whoever wrote the season finale, Zero (0)....you're so not as smart as you think you are......

"THE ZANTI MISFITS" (THE OUTER LIMITS).......BRUCE DERN VS. REALLY ILLEGAL CRIMINAL ALIENS

"The Zanti Misfits" (The Outer Limits, Season 1, Episode 14) (1963)    How could we have had this blog running for over 2 years without covering this........our all time favorite episode of TV's most memorable, beloved sci-fi series........

                 What more could you ask for in 50 minutes of television........Bruce Dern at his scuzziest......playing an on-the-lam crook who stumbles into a top secret military base......

                  Real bad news for Bruce........our top brass at the base has cut a deal with the planet Zanti,  agreeing to incarcerate their worst hardcore convicts.........alien criminals way, way worse than the hordes of mythical Mexican rapists that Trump warned us about in 2015.........

                  Even more bad news for Bruce....(along with all the clueless military).......these outer space MS-13 gang members are repulsive ant-like creatures with particularly nasty humanoid faces, scuttling about via stop-motion animation....(an expensive, time-consuming effect rarely seen in 1960's television....)

                  Not much of a spoiler to tell you that Bruce comes to a bad end as he's overrun by the insectoid bad-asses.....(this episode falls somewhere in between Dern getting bludgeoned to death by a child in "Marnie" and having his head and hand cut off in "Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte"....)

                Wilder fun ensues when the ant-creeps stage an all out violent prison revolt against their would-be human jailers. For sci-fi-horror-fantasy fans, the episode's climax is a little bit 'o classic heaven........

                 While we dearly love all the "Outer Limits" episodes, "The Zanti Misfits" earns an extra special 5 star (*****) FIND OF FINDS........any show that combines Bruce Dern at his Dern-siest and killer stop motion bugs is a glorious dream come true.......

               

LET THE CHRISTMAS MOVIE ONSLAUGHT BEGIN!.....BQ OPENS THE FLOODGATES.......

           Once upon a time, Hallmark Channel Christmas movies remained a quaint, undiscovered secret among their many fans......

            No longer. Now they're so much a national Pop Culture Event, other networks have gotten into the act, including Netflix......

            Since we fell victim to Christmas movie addiction long before the rest of the country, we stand amazed at the amount of attention these movies now command..........(including three guys who started 'Deck The Hallmark', their own Hallmark Christmas Movie podcast......)

            So to mix it up a little, we kicked off our own Christmas movie marathon with a split double feature......Netflix's "The Holiday Calendar" and Hallmark's "It's Christmas, Eve"....(the latter automatically receiving our award for best title of the season so far.....)

            "The Holiday Calendar" (2018)   What we love most:  Even though Netflix farms these out to the same filmmaking bunch who make the Hallmark movies, they're given more freedom to deviate from Hallmark's carved-in-stone tropes......

               First off, way more diversity in the casting......in almost all of the Hallmarks, African-Americans are consigned to the BFF roles, if at all......

               We especially appreciated this film's refreshing take on a Christmas movie's most thankless role, the ultimately rejected boyfriend......played here by Ethan Peck  (Gregory's grandson).

               Usually this character is established right away as an insensitive, thoughtless jerk, who does everything but wear a "I'm Gonna Get Dumped" sign around his neck.

                With the script's sly help, Peck gives off such a smooth, romantic vibe that, for a while,  he actually tricks you into believing he's THE guy........at least until later on, when it's subtly revealed that he's .......well, a thoughtless, insensitive jerk. (He uses the feeding of lovable old homeless guys to impress his dates.......and later disses the old fellows, even though they're Christmas Movie Homeless Guys, with no lice, foul odors or public urination problems....)

                  Even better, the movie springs a heartwarming twist on its primary gimmick, an Advent calendar that magically spits out little toys that predict our adorable heroine's love life.  We had a Holly Jolly good time with this one.....4 jingle bells...(****)

                 "It's Christmas, Eve"  (2018)  While Hallmark never dares tamper with the rigid structure of their Christmas movies, we're more than happy to see them brighten it up with songs and singers......in this case, country music star LeAnne Rimes.

                   Sweetening the movie with her vocals, Rimes plays an interim school superintendent, tasked with slicing the schools' budget by deep-sixing the music and arts programs. This doesn't sit well with her own suppressed musical background.......not to mention falling for the school music teacher who lives next door.......

                    Only those of you who've never, ever experienced a Hallmark movie would wonder how this is all going to resolve itself........

                     Rimes make a fine addition to the growing Hallmark collection of dependable romantic leads......(let's face it, none of these actresses have Meryl Streep level demands put on them......as long as they're  gently sweet, loving and ready for their long awaited kiss at the 1 hour & 58 minute mark. 

                   For the added music, we'll sing out 3 stars (***)......(keep in mind, we're grading all these Christmas movies on a deep curve.......based on their ability to deliver everything they promise......it's a little bit like looking for something better or worse in a Big Mac.........we'll still stay on the lookout for any of them to avoid or not to miss.......)

THE NEW DOCTOR WHO........JODIE FALLS TO EARTH......

Doctor Who -  The Woman Who Fell To Earth (2018)   Sorry to admit.......throughout our lifetime, we've only been a casual tourist through the 'Who -universe'.......skipping and hopping through whatever episodes that became available to us and that we had time to watch.......

              Sadly, just when we planned to hunker down and binge watch all the 'Who' seasons on Netflix......Netflix pulled it off their schedule.......(what we now consider one of our greatest lost opportunities....)

               So BQ eagerly assembled our sci-fi-fantasy-lovin' butt, along with the rest of the world,  in front of BBC America to watch the groundbreaking introduction of the 13th Doctor Who......and the first woman who......became our new Who......Jodie Whitaker.

                That's right, U.S.Senate Republicans........your worst nightmare - a really smart, independent woman who battles evil.....

                We're far from experts in Who-abilia, but we get that the new Doctor invariably arrives a bit addled and disoriented from having switched bodies with the previous Doctor.......

                 So we sympathize with Jodie Whitaker, in that she had to hit the ground running, talking up a storm, dealing with a scary intergalactic threat and attempting to put her own personal stamp on the character........that's a frightening, daunting task for any actor taking on a role that 12 other actors have already made their own, each in their own way.......

                  We imagine the next guy(or woman??) who takes over as James Bond from Daniel Craig will face a similar challenge.

                   Jodie Whitaker, as far as we're concerned, got it done.  With the whole Who fan base watching intently,  she delivered it all........humor, intelligence, humanity and wit at the speed of light......

                 For her First Official Monster do to battle with, the show came up with a doozy......a huge Predator-like lug who decorates his face with the teeth of his many victims......yummy.

                 And to the delight (we're pretty sure) of the vast, dedicated global mass of  Who-Fans, Whitaker, in the heat of battle, finally recalls and assumes. her identity, triumphantly shouting out the three words we've all been expecting...."I'm the Doctor!".

                  We don't know enough about the world of Doctor Who to call ourselves a knowledgeable fan, but we know what we like......and we won't miss any of Jodie Whitaker's episodes.  4 stars (****).......(we do hope, however.......if the Daleks come rolling through the Trump White House screeching "Exterminate! Exterminate!"......maybe Doctor Who could take that day off and just let the chips fall where they may.....)

'ZOMBIES'.......THE DISNEY UNDEAD IN THE AGE OF TRUMP......

Zombies (2018)   Naturally, the star-crossed circumstances that led us to this Disney Channel musical came from a request by the BD (Beloved Daughter) to sit down and watch it with her.

               As we've mentioned in other posts, we consider most Disney Channel fare suitable for use as punishment tools inflicted on incarcerated terrorists at Guantanamo Bay......

                But like most fathers since the dawn of time, BD has the BQ wrapped around her little finger......so with grim determination, we steeled ourselves, screwed our courage to the sticking place.......yada, yada, yada......

                Well,we do love musicals.......and the sight of platoons of rubber-limbed dancers contorting themselves into near-collapse always commands our attention.  And this movie, bless its exhausting little heart, contains a dance sequence every 7 or 8 minutes......

                 But here's what struck us.........maybe the people who slapped this together didn't mean it intentionally, but they created a perfect storm of a musical for the toxic divisiveness of the Trumpian age,,,,,.

                The film's Disney-fied mythology, outlined in comic book type illustration, sets up a deeply divided society of mostly lily-white humans and "the other"........zombies ostracized and segregated into their own shithole slum dwellings, roundly hated, villified and shunned.

                Hmmmm.........what's this remind us of? 

                Feel free to write in your own analogies........as for us, the only thing missing here is a President threatening to build a wall around the zombies.....

                 Keep in mind, however, that these are Disney zombies we're talking about........they're only a tad green, but the guys are hunks, the girls are cute and they all wear special watches that somehow prevent them from going full brain-chompin' George Romero on anybody......or turning into Mexican rapists......

                You could optimistically choose to believe that the movie's climactic dance number - humans 'n zombies gettin' down as one big brotherly group  - is a more than subliminal pitch for diversity by the Disney executives.  That burst of energy as the white and green kids come together does look like Trump's worst nightmare......

                 But more likely it's due to the carved-in-stone Mouse House commandment that Thou Shalt Always Have A Happy Ending......good news for these teen DACA zombies.....undead Dreamers.....

                  Whatever the reason, it still made us smile......intentional or not, a refreshing rebuke to the Trumpian worldview that has us all at each other's throats.

                 And that, plus those peppy dance numbers, gets these Zombies 3 green 'n white stars (***)

               

             

'THE ALIENIST'..........STILL AS D.O.A. AS ITS RIPPED UP BOY WHORES.....

The Alienist (TNT series, 2018)       5 episodes in (out of 10) and we're still waiting for this one to develop a pulse......

                What a colossal bore.

                 Years ago, our first attempt at reading Caleb Carr's bestselling book went nowhere.

                 We gave up after 50 pages or so. Couldn't hack our way through the glacial pace, the thick, impenetrable prose.  For all the praise it received, we thought it was a futile chore to read.

                  A year later, we put our nose and reading glasses to the grindstone and finally read it from start to finish. Damned if we could ever remember a single thing about it.

                 So here we now have the mini-series. And it's wonderfully faithful to the spirit of the book in that it moves like a squashed deer on the highway and is riveting to sit through as watching the grass grow on your front lawn.

                 The producers of this series have foolishly presented it as a weekly basic cable show instead of making all its episodes available for binge streaming.  Big mistake.

                  Seven days between episodes?  You could easily forget what happened in any of these episodes 10 seconds after you've seen one, let alone 7 days.

                  In fact, they could have run the 5 episodes we've endured so far in random order and we doubt anyone would have noticed the difference.

                  We do appreciate the meticulous production design, the studious recreation of late 19th century New York in all its corruption, squalor and brutal divide between the immigrant working classes and the aristocratic wealthy.

                   But for a dramatization, it lacks any forward momentum. And for a story about an 'alienist' (a prehistoric psychiatrist) tracking a Jack-The-Pedophile-Ripper who carves up boy hookers, the lack of pacing does more damage to this show than its psycho does to the kids.

                 We'll give it this much.........at least the show's casting director has a perverse sense of humor casting Sean Young as the prime suspect's uppercrust mother.  If anyone knows about batshit crazy behavior, it's her........

                  As for the rest of the cast......well, they look awfully spiffy in their period duds.

                  1 star at the halfway point of this show (*) and that's primarily for the decor. We'll visit again after the finish.......and who knows how many cups of strong coffee it'll take to keep our eyes open........

'THE SAINT' TV EPISODES........EVIL THWARTED.....ROGER THAT.......

The Saint (1962-1969)    While Bond-mania swept the world throughout the 1960's, Roger Moore, the actor who seemed like the next most Bondian contender, steadfastly soldiered on as 'The Saint' on television. Based on the slightly rogue-ish, globe-trotting do-gooder created by novelist Leslie Charteris, the series had the smooth, impossibly suave Simon Templar (Moore) conveniently popping up in exotic locations, just in time to foil murderers, kidnappers, blackmailers, third world dictators......and even, we swear, a mutated giant ant.

               The BQ can't describe how much an all night binge on these episodes gave us a comfy cozy feeling. Comfy cozy for international swashbuckling?  Absolutely.....and here's why.  A typical episode opens with a stock footage shot of some gorgeously far flung locale where it's going to take place......but the episode itself entirely unfolds on the cramped little indoor sets of Britain's Elstree studios. (Outdoor scenes, like the Scottish Highlands, feature cardboard mountains and painted skies)

              Call us crazy, but those cheapjack sets, dictated by the demands of fast, volume-oriented TV production schedules, make the "Saint" episodes, to us, adorably quaint and soothing. And since these episodes, unlike shot on location movies, couldn't dwell on their hastily slapped together versions of foreign streets and buildings, the actors involved held your full attention........they were the only things interesting to watch.....

               And what actors! Like so many British TV series, the cream of British, Canadian and international acting talent show up in supporting roles. Unlike Hollywood, which still enforced an unofficial actors caste system, separating film and TV actors, European actors freely moved about from theater to TV to feature films.  Sooner or later, all of them show up in "The Saint".......and it's a no end of fun spotting them....(Hey, isn't that 'Miss Moneypenny' herself, Lois Maxwell?)

              Episodes usually begin with Moore arriving in a sparsely populated, room-sized foreign airport (only the wall posters change, so you know which city he arrived in)  In about a minute or so, for reasons linked to the plot, somebody take a swing at Roger, provoking him into a roundhouse right cross to the guy's jaw. After that, it's time to squire around the episode's too-cute-for-words ingenue, almost always a virginal little blonde with a severe 1960's hair style.  Before the 50 minutes wind up, a few dead bodies hit the floor and a bunch more thugs need their jaws massaged by Roger's fists. The Saint cocks one eyebrow upward as the catchy theme song swells up.....

             Call it old-fashioned cheese, but we're all in with "The Saint".....with its Community Theater sets and props and decidedly old-school brawling....(we smile every time we watch the show's stuntmen hurl themselves over tables, chairs and couches)   For the BQ, it's like munching a box of year old cookies......stale and soft, but still sweet and addictive.   After a whole night of watching the dear departed Sir Roger Moore roll his eyes up to view the cartoon halo above his head, we cock 4 eyebrows upward for "The Saint" (****)....a pure guilt-free pleasure.