The Brak Show: Volume 1 (review)

This exercise in stream-of-geeky-consciousness insanity and slightly disreputable animation manipulation defies explanation — you’re either in the cult, or you’re not — but here goes nothing anyway. Once upon a time, in the 1960s, there was a Hanna Barbera cartoon called Space Ghost and Dino Boy, which was quite bad and which hardly anyone remembers … more…

Alien Apocalypse (review)

No Wood There’s a certain level of expectation built into a Sci-Fi Channel Original Film. One tunes into expecting — nay, hoping — to see laughably incoherent plots, full of holes and aping, in a cheap, made-for-TV way, some cheap, made-for-the-big-screen SF flick; ridiculously bad FX, replete with awful bluescreening and obvious CGI that some … more…

The Greatest American Hero: Season One (review)

Believe it or not, it’s only now that this charming fantasy series is hitting DVD, and it’s most welcome. Half tribute to the Superman mythos and half sendup of it, this cult-favorite series — and one of the more inspired successes from prolific producer Stephen J. Cannell (Silk Stalkings) — laid the groundwork for all … more…

The Pacifier (review)

So I’m sitting there in the dark with my little reporter notebook, diligently taking notes and formulating theses to support my contention that *The Pacifier* fails as a film, and I think it was during a burst of abject whimpering from the very famous critic sitting next to me, whom I guarantee you’ve seen on TV, that I suddenly and finally realized the futility of life, the ubiquitousness of pain, and the infinite emptiness of the universe that we puny humans on our puny planet in our puny corner of the cosmos cannot hope to ameliorate.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman (review)

It’s kindness, at first, that leads you to suspect that someone is pulling our collective leg with *Diary of a Mad Black Woman,* because surely anything this jaw-droppingly awful must be a joke. Surely this is not being proffered with any genuine intention of it being seen as, well, an actual *movie,* with a plot and characters and scenes that connect in some reasonably logical sense. This *must* be a *MAD TV* sketch that went horribly wrong and escaped into the wild where it turned feral. Right?

Downfall (Der Untergang) movie review

Berlin has been reduced to rubble, the Russians are overrunning the city, 10-year-old kids are fighting alongside soldiers in the streets, and a once-proud citizenry has been completely demoralized. The reaction from the nation’s leadership: “The German people chose their fate,” Joseph Goebbels says with a shrug — after all, they elected the man who … more…

Constantine (review)

Fifteen years ago Bill and Ted took a seriously silly journey to the underworld, and this one is seriously freakishly disturbing. Imagine if Bosch and Dante were 21st-century geeks and they collaborated on a graphic novel (and maybe that’s a good description of Jamie Delano and Garth Ennis’s book *Hellblazer,* upon which this is based, but I don’t know cuz I’ve never seen it).

Oliver’s Travels (review)

Oh, how glorious to find a TV miniseries that’s this delightfully grown-up! That it’s also charming, erudite, and witty is the icing on the cake. Laid-off professor of comparative religion Oliver (a rumpled, scrumptious Alan Bates: Spartacus), a fan of wordplay and jazz, teams up with vivacious policewoman Diane (a lovely Sinéad Cusack) to find … more…

Murder One: The Complete First Season (review)

Years before 24, in 1995, Steven Bochco (NYPD Blue) gave us Murder One, the story of a single court case told across a TV season’s worth of episodes — 23 in all here, though the series terms them “chapters,” a completely appropriate affectation. The plot — a sordid tale of sex, drugs, blackmail, and of … more…

Hunter: The Complete First Season (review)

He’s a renegade who wipes the streets with the scum of the earth. She’s a tough broad… but beautiful. They’re cops! Stephen J. Cannell (Silk Stalkings: The Complete First Season) strikes again — or struck again, in 1984, with Hunter, which would become one of the most popular crime series of the decade. Detective Sergeant … more…