Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 13th, 2009
Jack Webb invented the modern television police procedural with the creation of Dragnet, first as a radio play and eventually as a successful television series. The series told the tale of a pair of L.A. detectives. There wasn’t any flair or action sequences. No car chases and no gun fights. When Jack Webb turned his attention to the patrol officer, he realized that some of that formula would have to change. But he wouldn’t tweak it very much. There was the occasional gunfire, but it was rare and was never the focus of any given story. Instead Webb concentrated on the actual procedures and duties of the everyday patrol officers, thus the invention of the procedural drama. It was no small step for television audiences and was likely very much responsible for the shape of the young medium and the shows that would follow up to this very day. Now the episodes might seem quite tame by today’s standards, and I don’t doubt that many of you might even get a chuckle at the no nonsense dialog that has become a Jack Webb trademark. Still, you won’t get a truer look behind the curtain than Adam 12. It was a show very much of its time.
Adam 12 debuted on NBC in 1968 and ran until May of 1975. The show never really changed at all for its 7 seasons. It starred Martin Milner as officer Pete Malloy and science fiction genre veteran Kent McCord as officer Jim Reed. They rolled in the black and white that bore the call letters Adam 12. They were headquarted at L.A.’s Rampart precinct, the same area as Jack Webb’s sister show about firefighters and paramedics, Emergency. The two shows shared a rather odd relationship. They did cross over and appeared to exist in the same universe; however, an episode of Emergency once featured a storyline where the paramedics where trying to watch a nail biter climax on Adam 12 only to be called away at the crucial moment. They spent the rest of the day trying to find out what happened. Yet they would meet the characters as real police officers in their own pilot. The firefighters would also appear on an episode of Adam 12. If that’s all rather a little confusing, blame the complicated world of Jack Webb.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 5th, 2009
I, of all people, should know that one person's cultural detritus is another's fond nostalgia, and what better example of that can there be than this release. A strange mix of athletic contest, pro-wrestling posturing and silly gimmick game show, this series (which has recently been reborn) pitted hard-bodied contestants against the even-more-hard-bodied (at least in appearance) Gladiators of the title. Some contests involve knocking each off a beam, or dodging tennis balls fired from a gun while trying to get in a shot of one's own. Or then there's swinging in on a rope in the attempt to knock the Gladiator off a pedestal. It's all pretty silly, made even more so by the straight-faced colour commentary. If the intent was to satirize sports broadcast generally, then this is quite brilliantly funny, at least at first, but the joke can't sustain itself over multiple seasons. Basically, it is what it is. If you enjoyed the show when it first ran, then perhaps you'll enjoy it again (but is there anything less intended for multiple viewings than a game show?). If you are unfamiliar with the concept, probably best to stay that way. For the benefit of the completists out there, it should be noted that this set begins halfway through Season 1.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 1st, 2009
Running for a single season in 2008, this ABC Family production is a humorous pastiche of superheroics and Avengers-style adventure. Natalie Morales plays Wendy Watson, a struggling artist making ends meet as a temp. When she demonstrates incredible unflappability when a monster is unleashed at her current job, straight-arrow superhero the Middleman (Matt Keeslar) recruits her to join him in the fight against all sorts of bizarre menaces. A sampling of titles gives the flavour of the series: “The Boy-Band Superfan Interrogation,” “The Palindrome Reversal Palindrome,” “The Flying Fish Zombification.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on June 29th, 2009
Transformers are something near and dear to my heart. I grew up with them, watched all of the episodes, read many of the comics and watched the animated movie more times than I care to think about. When the original Rhino DVD set came out a few years back, I bought all of the volumes despite the hardship that roughly $50 a volume would cost me. Now, with the 25th anniversary of Transformers upon us, Shout Factory has gained the rights to the series and has re-released the first season to coincide with the release of the second live-action film. Is this simply an attempt to cash in on the mega movie hit of the summer? We shall see.
A civil war is ongoing on the planet of Cybertron. Fierce battles between the Autobots and the Decepticons have tore the planet apart and the energy sources at critical levels. The heroic Autobots decide to go to the planet Earth on the theory that these resources exist there for them to be able to use. However, the Decepticons decide to follow. Once in space, the Decepticons attack under the leadership of Megatron. Optimus Prime and the Autobots try to hold them off but soon both sides crash into the Earth.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 27th, 2009
Here we go with four more cruel experiments inflicted on Joel, Mike, Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot on the Satellite of Love. The Mad Monster is a 1942 proverty row epic with George Zucco as a mad scientist giving future Frankenstein Monster Glenn Strange transfusions of wolf blood, with predictable results. Manhunt in Space is a Rocky Jones, Space Ranger adventure – multiple TV episodes pasted together into one dreadful piece of SF idiocy. Soultaker has the unfortunate Joe Estevez, under the orders from Angel of Death Robert Z’Dar, tracking down four teens who are supposed to have died in a car crash. Finally, Final Justice sees Joe Don Baker as a Texas Ranger confronting the mob in Malta. But of course.
Naturally, the real interest of these releases is not in the films themselves (which are, with the partial, nostalgic exception of The Mad Monster, utterly unwatchable), but in what Joel or Mike (depending on the episode) and the ‘bots do with the films. Two hits here, and two misses. The comments aimed at The Mad Monster and Final Justice are disappointingly unimaginative. The failure of the latter is a special sore point, since MST3K’s previous shot at Joe Don Baker, Mitchell, is one of the series’ masterpieces. This time around, the boys don’t have much to say other than to comment on the man’s eating and digestive habits. On the other hand, inspiration was at hand for both Soultaker and for a good chunk of Manhunt in Space (i.e. the first half, and with the accompanying episode of General Hospital).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 27th, 2009
So there's this group of flight attendants, and we follow their swinging adventures and affairs on and off planes. One, for instance, hopes to be an actress, and hooks up with an advertising executive. And if you care what the plot of “the first 3D sex film” is, you need your head examined. Much of the what goes on is mind-numbingly banal (SEE Wine being poured SEE Drinks being mixed HEAR Dull conversations ), though the acid trip that leads one woman to make out with a lamp in the form of a greco-roman head is something you don't see every day.
The film is an object lesson on how far mere novelty can take a film – it was a huge success at the time, and 3D was, in 1969, a rarity again after its initial craze in the 50s. So there are numerous shots of legs and pool cues (and feet) jabbing at the camera, enough, presumably, to have kept audiences entertained while everything else remained mundane beyond words. Or, so the situation is for most of the running time. But the last act takes a sudden turn into the starkly dramatic, and becomes very dark indeed. It is also rather more imaginatively shot than most of the rest of the film. The ending is a vicious sucker punch that must be seen to be believed, and suggests that the filmmakers were storing all of their creative juices for the cruel finale. In fact, as the accompanying featurettes reveal, the dramatic plot was added to the film after the rest of it was completed, and indeed, after it had already been released in some markets. In the final analysis, this is a vital piece of low culture.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on November 3rd, 2008
As I get older, I still find myself watching a lot of cartoons. New ones, blue ones, ones that I have no idea how they got made in the first place. So, with this practice I often run into cartoons that I have never seen but feel the need to give them a chance and see if they have any draw whether to kids, parents or me the cartoon nerd who enjoys such things. In my review pile, I stumbled upon one such cartoon and that was Pucca. From a critical eye, one might dismiss the odd characters and strange style rather quickly. However, to the careful eye one might find something a little more entertaining.
Pucca lives in Sooga Village. She is consumed by one thing and one thing only, the pursuit of love. Or more importantly the love of a silent ninja named Garu. Garu might run from her kisses but he can not deny the constant trappings of the kung fu queen. They each have a best friend. Pucca has Ching, a very cute and very happy girl who looks like a reject off the Powder Puff squad. The best friend of Garu is a Bruce Lee look-a-like named Abyo who manages to rip off his shirt every episode at the earliest convenience. Together they fight in a series of eleven episodes against various forces including Tobe, the deadly ninja who is trying to beat Garu at his own art.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on August 25th, 2008
Sonic Underground would be an interesting study in the land of Sonic Cartoons if one was into such a thing. The series lasted forty episodes and was made at the request of Sega who needed the promotion for their Dreamcast console in the fall of 1999. The show itself was an odd departure from the first two series in that it always contained a musical number and featured three main hedgehogs instead of just one. The show did serve to introduce a couple of new sub villains and Knuckles the Echidna. I honestly don’t remember Sonic Underground; I am more familiar with the previous two series, but with one look at the dvd cover and description on the outside, I might have begun to see why.
Queen Aleena the Hedgehog had three children: Sonic, Sonia & Manic. However, Dr. Robotnik & his robots decide to overtake things and force her out. Aleena went into hiding. But before doing so, she separated Sonic, Sonia & Manic. When the threesome became older, they heard of a prophecy that they could reunite with their mother. They would be able to end the tyrannical rule of Dr. Robotnik and resume their rightful leadership. The three also have medallions that can change into musical instruments to play as part of Sonic Underground and are also used as powerful weapons against the forces of Robotnik. The last twenty episodes join the trio as they try to find their mother and keep themselves alive against the selfishness of evil.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 1st, 2008
If you’ve followed my reviews, you know that I love Stargate. SG-1 or Atlantis; I can’t get enough of them. When the collection of Stargate Infinity discs arrived at my doorstep, I tore into them like a Wraith into a red shirt. Now the Stargate might be an incredible mystery that delights a legion of fans. What is not much of a mystery is why this children’s cartoon version of the franchise only lasted one year. I missed the original broadcast window and having watched these DVD’s I’m glad I did. I found the series to be an insult to Stargate fans. I understand that the show has been dumbed down and is geared toward the very young, but there’s no excuse for the preachy nature of the stories and the lack of respect shown toward the original material. Unfortunately, even the animation is sub par looking like an early 1980’s Saturday morning cartoon.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 12th, 2007
So here we have another double feature of episodes from Movie Macabre, with Elvira this time taking on Maneater of Hydra (1966) and The House That Screamed (1969). The former has the disconcerting spectacle of Cameron Mitchell appearing not only as a baron (ookaaayyy) but being dubbed. He’s experimenting with plants on his remote Greek island, and a group of tourists run afoul of one of his results. Given how long it takes for the titular plant to show up and relieve the dullness, one starts to wonder if the title doesn’t refer instead to one of the hot-to-trot tourists.
The House That Screamed, meanwhile, is a Spanish effort that is something of a period giallo. The setting is a private girls’ school where a series of brutal murders take place. The production is handsome enough, though its concept is no less sleazy for all that.
