The Art of Crime (serial)

Season 1

French police/buddy-cop procedural. Or more likely an odd-couple procedural. Captain Verlay is the Parisian cop assigned to the art theft division. But he knows nothing about art. He is a lone wolf, rough guy, solver of crimes. Florence is an art historian at the Louvre. When she is assigned as a consultant on a case, she and Verlay become unlikely partners. This is a fun series as each 2-episode sequence is a single case, based on some art based intrigue. There is great chemistry between the leads along with the occasional wacky scenario that just makes you laugh out loud. 

5 stars (out of 5)

Tattoo Redo (serial)

Reality series where each episode shows 3 clients come in with an awful tattoo that needs a coverup. The twist is that the client's friend gets to choose the cover tattoo. Fun to see the artists do their magic, and the customers always leave happy.

3 stars (out of 5)

Win the Wilderness (serial)

A BBC reality series where 6 British couples go to Alaska and compete to be given the remote homestead of an elderly couple (the Ose's) who have built a super remote (air access only) cabin. Each couple has to complete tasks that show they could survive in the harsh Alaskan wilderness. A quick series, kinda cheesy, but fun to see Alaska.

3 stars (out of 5)

The Mandalorian (serial)

Season 2

Continuing where Season 1 left off, Mando is following up with his quest to deliver the kid to his kind. He is looking for other Mandalorians who might help him, finds some, finds some fake ones, unites with some old ones, meets and helps a Jedi, who can't help him. Every episode is a side action plot with a little bit of motion toward his goal. It feels like a Jack Reacher novel. In the first 5 minutes, the distracting but essential damsel in distress is revealed and the episode will resolve the distress. In the meanwhile, a small step is take toward the season long goal. The one storytelling oddity I find is that Mando regularly asks for information from the first person he sees, receives the info, generally trusts the information, and then acts on it successfully. Probably this is more true to life (there really aren't many people out in the real world trying to "get you") but isn't consistent with dramatic storytelling by any means. I suppose I like it, but it is deviant enough for me to notice. Overall, I just don't get enough exposure to the Star Wars universe to be oversaturated, so I end up loving every minute. 

5 stars (out of 5)

Monster Hunter

After a couple of days, this will be nearly forgettable. But in the moment, it has pretty good visuals and well structured man v monster fight scenes. A military squad is caught in a dust/lightning storm that transports them to another world. After some bad decisions based on bad assumptions, all of them die except one, Mila Jovovich. She meets a local and the two of them fight big spiders and stegosaurus like sand worms things. Then they go to the source to battle big. The back story didn't really work for me, although I am not sure why since it isn't that much different than the Pacific Rim alien monster invasion which didn't bother me at all. 

2 stars (out of 5)

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (serial)

Really the only thing these series are prompting in me is the need to go back and find where they fit in the overall storyline. Which is strange since they are more time than the original movies and have the ability to show more depth of characters. Shouldn't the movies fit into this storyline? Maybe they will when they start releasing movies again. Bucky is struggling with his past as a psychologically brainwashed super soldier and Sam is struggling with his decision to not be the new Captain America. They purport to be reluctant superheroes, but when new super-soldiers show up, they jump in immediately with the attitude that "only we can take care of this". Overall, an engaging storyline that fits in well in the universe and keeps us looking forward. Nothing new or novel, but solid.

3 stars (out of 5)

Jolt

Kate Beckinsale plays a young woman with impulse aggression control issues. Her psychologist has prescribed an electronic shock harness that Beckinsale self initiates in order to reset her thinking when she finds herself annoyed enough want to damage someone. When the guy she has dated twice is killed, she goes on a revenge warpath to avenge his death, finding out lots about herself and her situation along the way. Mostly following the action/revenge formula, but uses the shock harness and background story to good effect, and has a consistently sharp comic like color theme throughout (think Dick Tracy or Hotel Artemis). Nice summer action that surprised me with how enjoyable it was. 

3 stars (out of 5)

Endeavor (serial)

Season 7

Morse, Thursday, Strange and Bright are back at it, pursuing two sets of serial killers in 1970 Oxford. The first along a canal towpath and the second a series of fatal accidents. Seems like a lot of murder going on for a small town. Add to this the conflict and tension in the personal lives of Morse (an affair), Thursday (fear of aging out) and Bright (his wife battling cancer), and seeing how all of that interpersonal angst is really tied into the cases. As is the pattern, all of these multiple threads of stories all weave into a single fabric of plot, with everything tying together in the end. And in good murder mystery fashion, there are enough false flag clues thrown about to keep the viewer engaged in "figuring things out" as the story unfolds. Well done BBC.

4 stars (out of 5)

Sniper: Ghost Shooter

Definitely a B-movie in the action/war genre. Both the dialogue as written and as delivered are noticeable as contrived, showing how hard it is to actually have a film feel authentic. The story follows a JSOC sniper team (4 sniper/spotter pairs in a team) who travel around and do sniper stuff. In the current assignment, they are providing protection for some VIPs at a Georgian oil pipeline and the bad guys seem to know exactly where they are. The shooter has an idea about what is wrong, the officers don't believe him, send him to Siberia (literally) where he learns valuable lessons, comes back and saves the day as it turns out he was right. All pretty standard in terms of plot, and pretty plain in terms of execution. 

2 stars (out of 5)

Gunpowder Milkshake

I like myself a good action assassin film. This entry is a grindhouse-like film, with Hotel Artemis vibes, but instead of steampunk coloring (strangely) I kept feeling Roger Rabbit. I know that's not right, but... Anyway, Sam is left by her assassin mother, and then grows up to be an assassin, and then everything goes wrong (she is left hung out by the Firm after on little mistake). This has hints of a #metoo assassin tale, but really is just a straight forward action shoot-em-up a la John Wick...some of which I liked too.

3 stars (out of 5)

Black Widow

My first theater film in 18 months and the first Marvel feature in even longer. Black Widow does not disappoint with action, connections both forward and backwards in the universe and a pretty well written and acted "family dynamic" between sisters. The storyline follows Natasha after the breakup of the Avengers, with nothing to do but hide, finding her sister and joining forces to take down (again) the red room and the widows project. On all those counts, it was a success and well done. But somehow I came out wanting more depth. Marvel, I think, would be well advised to transition out of sci-fi comic entertainment and into sci-fi with social and cultural commentary in order to stay relevant for another decade. Something that makes you think about who you are, why you are, etc. This would have been an easy place to start.

4 stars (out of 5)

Major Grom: Plague Doctor

Russian action film in the vein of a realism-superhero (no super powers, but fighting against bigger than life villians). Igor is a cop who works on his own to bring down the criminals of St Petersburg. When a vigilante serial killer starts taking out the most corrupt businessmen and political leaders, and gains a huge following leading to near anarchy, Igor is on the case. But he can't necessarily do it alone. A fun, comic style action film.

3 stars (out of 5)

Vampire Academy

Like most vampire entertainment of the past few years, this is really a teen drama with some vampire action thrown in. In this case, there are good vampires and their mortal protectors as well as the bad vampires. The good vampire protagonist is the last of her line and the princess heir. She and her protector left the safety of the academy, and upon return, found that someone within the academy wanted her dead. So a mystery, with a little bit of magic, and a little bit of romance and... well you get the picture. Ok as a teen romance drama, not so interesting as a vampire film. 

2 stars (out of 5) 

Big Timber (serial)

A reality series in the vein of Swamp Loggers or Rust Valley Restorers. A family runs a mill and logging operation on Vancouver Island. The series follows the owner as he works to clear a timber claim and keep all his old junky equipment running. Not quite as well put together as Swamp Loggers, but still fun as a short series and seeing some of the behind the scenes of small time logging. 

3 stars (out of 5)

Tehran (serial)

A Mossad agent enters Iran undercover in a plot to disable air-defense systems and allow an Israeli attack on nuclear facilities. The agent is relatively new to undercover work. Her family connections to Iran are what make her the ideal candidate. In fact, there are Persian-Jewish connections throughout this series that is really interesting - highlighting again that fact that people groups and family and culture are generally unrelated to national boundaries and politics. In many ways, this is a classic spycraft series and it is done well, with appropriate near-misses and improvisations and moral-fine-line-walking. 

4 stars (out of 5)