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johnnyzmayhem
Reviews
Resident Alien: Sexy Beast (2021)
A mix of cringe and cliche
Generally this show lets us see Harry's awkwardness in a genial, humorous way, without delving into outright cringe. Some people like cringe humor, and that's fine, but I don't. In fact, I find cringe humor to not even be funny, so when this episode veered into it - for example, when Harry was trying to one-up Ethan - I groaned. Being socially awkward without being hard-core cringey is a difficult trick to pull off, and until this episode, Resident Alien managed it. But, this episode felt like it was missing a step.
But, there's also the cliche elements. I loved the fish out of water story of the alien trying to fit in with the small-town locals, all while trying to dodge around a murder case, and a little kid who knows who and what you are. But, whenever you have a space alien, I suppose they have to get chased by the FBI/CIA/Men in Black (doesn't matter what branch they're from, it's all the same.) Up to now, the hard turn into cliche-land wasn't so bad, as it was very limited. And I'll admit, parts of it were funny, like in this episode, when Lieutenant Logan first meets his new partner. But, it all starts getting dull very fast. I'm hoping the next episode will give us a surprise on that score, but I'm not hopeful.
Limetown (2015)
Strong start, weak finish.
This is a two season podcast, and each season is very different in tone and style.
The first season is about Lia Haddock, an investigative reporter, who is trying to track down what happened to the people of Limetown ten years earlier. She meets several people who had been there, records her interviews with them, and we get to hear what happened the same time Lia does. In the Napoleon episode we learn how one survivor learned to communicate with a pig. It didn't end well, the result was horrific and gave me chills. In the final episode of the first season, Lia meets a survivor who finally starts to put the pieces together for her. But in a twist, the survivor sets a timer and gives her 12 minutes to ask questions before brutally ending the interview. It was a damn good end to the first season.
The second season involves two people discussing the events of Limetown and its aftermath. We haven't been introduced to these characters in season one, and it's difficult to say much about it without giving spoilers, but it's basically a cat-and-mouse game of deception. We get more answers, but the edge is gone, and in time, the discussions get tedious. By the time we got near the end, the show was dragging and if it had had a third season, I probably would have given up. The ending was... well it was an ending.
I gave this seven stars overall. Season one is a ten, season two is a four. Combined, that's a seven.
Resident Evil (2022)
Many Issues With This One
I've read many of the reviews, and most were written by people who were fans of the games, the movies, or both. I've never played the game or seen any of the movies, so I'm going into this show able to review it on its own merits. And yes, I've watched all eight episodes.
This show has two time tracks, before and after the "apocalypse," about 15 years apart. The "apocalypse" was caused by the Umbrella Corporation, which manufactured Joy, a drug that had very bad effects.
The earlier track is focused on Jade and Billie, two teenage girls who are supposed to be twins. Much of this section in the early episodes deals with the normal teenage angst issues. I'll confess that I have never liked teenage shows, I find them vapid. This show wasn't much different, the girls were full of complaints and hated their father, etc... (It grew tiresome for me, but as I said, this isn't my kind of story.) It had the kind of teenage tropes that you've seen before, at least in supernatural shows. At one point, one of the girls has been infected by a virus and believes she is dying, and may just turn into a homicidal beast. So, does she want to go to a party that night, despite facing her death in just hours, or even the possibility of becoming a killing machine? Why yes, of course she does. Many of the decisions made are of this variety. And then there are the unbelievable moments, like teenage girls sneaking into a high security building which just happened to have no guards anywhere. There were scenes that were head scratchers as well. For example, in case the girls had to escape Umbrella in the middle of the night, their father left them a bag full of money, new passports, and a gun. But, to find it, they have to follow a series of clues, which included playing the piano. If you're in a position where you have to run for your life, are you really going to spend time figuring out some kind of treasure map? Wouldn't you be too panicked to think straight anyway? In fairness, there were good scenes in this timeline. The attack by an infected dog was thrilling to watch, but there were too few moments like that.
The second timeline starts with Jade in a sort of urban jungle, studying zombies that have been created by Joy. For several months she's been alone in the middle of nowhere -- which makes no sense, surely she'd have a team with her? -- and walks around looking like she just came out of a high end hair salon, the usual kind of issues you get with apocalypse movies and TV shows. We also get a ton of different kinds of monsters, from zombies to sand worms to oversized alligators, and of course the lickers, but nothing was fully developed to give us either terror or thrills. It felt like monsters were just thrown at us randomly, and then went away. The lickers had real potential (in my opinion, anyway), but nothing was really done with them beyond one short scene. Worse, the show didn't exactly feel "apocalyptic." There seems to be places that are running just fine. And Umbrella, the big corporation, seems to have no problems operating. How does a large corporation run in a real apocalypse? How do they make the profits they'd need to pay people? Would money even matter in the apocalypse? If everything is in ruins, how would they get the fuel for cars and helicopters? Maybe dystopia is a better description?
The acting was alright, nothing special outside of Lance Reddick. Some reviewers attacked the actors' work, but I think everyone did what they were asked to do. My biggest issue is the two time tracks. I'm not against having that, but in this case, why? What did we get out of it? We find out that Umbrella caused the virus? Surely we could have someone explain the basics of that in one short conversation. Bottom line: The earlier time track could have been cut, and the second track beefed up and been a better show for it. And the ending of the show made me groan. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but it was really bad.
There is one other element that struck me. At one point in the second track, one of the Umbrella goons talked about wanting to get back to his children, that he misses them. He then showed Jade a picture of his dogs. I thought it was weird, then realized this was supposed to be a humorous moment. There was a few other scenes like this, supposedly dark humor, but they came off more bizarre or off-kilter than anything else.
This is a basic overview of the show, which leaves a lot out. Granted, if there were chills and thrills and compelling characters, most people, including me, wouldn't care so much about these issues, but we don't get enough of that. In fact, I had a hard time watching this show, often turning it off and coming back to it later. I only kept watching because it's gotten so much hate, that I wanted to give it a fair shot. Resident Evil had real potential, but didn't live up to it. My recommendation: Give it a pass.
The Directive (2019)
Interesting Premise for Post-Apocalypse Movie
Because things came up, I had to watch this over two evenings, first half one night, second half the next. In between the two viewings, I found myself thinking a great deal about the scenario. A young guy named Dylan, who's not too bright, is on his own at a Red Cross station after a viral outbreak has killed off most of the country. Unsure what to do or where to go, he kills a lot of time throwing a ball against a wall, or pretending he's driving a get-a-way car in some action movie scenario, until a robot ends up on his "doorstep." To keep this spoiler free, I'll just say this robot convinces him to travel to a safe zone. Alone most of the movie, Dylan and the robot talk, and we learn more about Dylan as well as the viral outbreak and the reasons for it. In addition, a sort of "relationship" grows between the two, though not a healthy one, as you might expect from AI.
There's been quite a few mean-spirited reviews that were unnecessarily harsh. This is a low budget film from, what I gather, a new director, and it did have some problems. The writing and pacing were off, it took far too long before the "hero" set out on his journey, and in many places the action drags. Instead of Dylan just playing in the junked cars, or walking around the woods, those sections could have been shortened and additional obstacles could've been thrown up when he was walking to the safe area.
Another problem was that the lead was inexperienced, and he often mistook loudness for intensity. This might not matter in other films, but he was the only person in most of the movie, so it's important that he be compelling, and sometimes he wasn't. But, to be fair, he really did create a believable, three dimensional character. And what's unusual, is that in these movies with just one person in difficult situations, the cliche is to present a character who is intelligent, educated, and probably deep. Dylan is, to be honest, just an ordinary doofus. In addition, it's really, really hard to act against nothing. Throughout most of the film the lead was talking to a robot, a hunk of wire and metal, not to a real human being. Trying to create emotions in that kind of scenario must have been difficult and often frustrating. Even a highly experienced actor would have a hard time doing that.
This movie has flaws, and you might find it dragging in some places, but it's worth watching. I'd like to see a sequel, to see what happens to Dylan in this new world, after being separated from people for so long.