¡QUÉ HORROR! 2018

Candidate #7

THE EXORCIST Season 2

(September 2017)

"Is there, like, some... stupid Bible verse you can say, or something?”

I only now finally got around to wrapping up my viewing of the second season of Fox’s The Exorcist TV adaptation, so I’m writing this post in the wake of the series’ cancellation last month, and that’s a shame, really.

While I do think its first season was a stronger beast, there was still a lot to commend in its sophomore outing.

But, with its cancellation, we’ll never get to see the new character dynamics that the final episode sets into place, nor the content of the message Marcus (Ben Daniels) gets in the closing seconds, nor the fresh circumstances of Fr. Bennett’s (Kurt Egyiawan), errr, new calling.

Unless of course, some other network or streaming service comes along to resuscitate the show.

For now though, The Exorcist Season 2 gets the ¡Qué horror! seal of approval.

“You can start by asking God for help.”

“Does it matter if I don’t… exactly, totally believe?”

“No. No, it doesn’t matter.”

Parting Shot: As with its first season, there are a number of callbacks to the cinematic Exorcists, including one in the closing minutes of the final episode that, if you’re a horror film buff, you should see coming a mile away…

(As to whether this scene was also meant to telegraph the narrative possibilities of a potential third season--which they were clearly laying the foundations for--is anybody’s guess at this point…)

(The Exorcist Season 2 OS’ courtesy of impawards.com.)

¡QUÉ HORROR! 2017

Candidate #7

THE EXORCIST Season 1
(September 2016)

After the terribly disappointing Damien--the A&E TV take on The Omen--I honestly didn’t have high hopes for Fox’s The Exorcist.

Let’s face it, The Exorcist is a much more towering presence in horror cinema than The Omen, so it stood to reason that a television version of it would have a much higher degree of difficulty.

But wouldn’t you know it, Jeremy Slater (who developed The Exorcist for the small screen) actually pulled an infernally feisty rabbit out of this particular hat, and gave us another notable reason to celebrate TV horror.

Not much more I can say without getting all spoiler-y, except maybe this: there are a whole bunch of callbacks to the original film peppered throughout the first season’s 10 episodes (you’ll know them when you see them), and there’s one apparently incredulous Mulder Moment courtesy of Geena Davis’ Angela Rance in the Pilot, my suggestion for which is, “Just roll with it.”

So, yeah.

If you’re in the mood for some excellent TV horror, then the power of Christ compels you to check this out!

(The Exorcist OS’ courtesy of impawards.com and dreadcentral.com.)

FRINGE
Season 1 Episode 3
“The Ghost Network”
Written by David H. Goodman & J.R. Orci
Directed by Frederick E.O. Toye
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

Okay, now this one felt more like an hour of planting plot seeds than anything else.
At its core, we’ve got the titular network, which is how the Pattern is apparently communicating. I didn’t quite catch the sciencespeak, but it’s basically a frequency no one else knows about, and is thus, secret and secure.
But Roy McComb (Zak Orth), one of Walter’s test subjects from way back, now seems to be receiving the communications, but in images, “visions” he thinks may be coming from God (or the Devil).


The meat of the episode though, seems to be all the teeny bits scattered throughout the hour:
Someone knows Peter is back in the States and is keeping track of him (whether or not it’s those people he owes money to remains to be seen);
We see, in one of those clandestine X-Files–ish meetings, that Broyles and Sharp seem to (proverbially) be in bed together when it suits their purposes, as Broyles hands some key evidence from the case over into Sharp’s cybernetic hand; they also get into some catty verbal sparring over Agent Dunham;
There’s a fleeting mention of Mrs. Bishop, and Peter says, of his mother, “that’s a story for another time”;
And apparently, Mark Valley has a cushy deal going on right now, as Agent Scott’s body (supposedly already deceased at Pilot’s end) is shown hooked up to some Massive Dynamic thingamabob, and they seem to be extracting data from his corpse; for this, he gets a special “With” credit, appearing right before John Noble…

Still, this one’s got some goodies…
Charlie’s shocking revelation at John’s funeral, Walter’s self-medication, and his blueberry pancakes.
Orth’s portrayal of the beleaguered McComb is also a highlight, which kind of makes up for the thinness of the plot.
So, not brilliant, but we are moving forward, and that’s always a good thing.
Let’s hope next episode is chockful of meaty, weird narrative…


(Images courtesy of impawards.com [Fringe OS, design by FOX IN], buddytv.com, and fringetelevision.com.)

FRINGE
Season 1 Episode 2
“The Same Old Story”
Written by Jeff Pinkner & J.J. Abrams & Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci
Directed by Paul Edwards
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

“Massive Dynamic is one of the ten largest economic entities in the world. Our weapons technologies shape the Defense Department’s strategies. Our investments sway the markets and make or break presidential elections. Overseas, we have responsibilities traditionally sacred to the state: the right to direct private armies, to manage global affairs into stable equilibrium.”


Now, while a certain amount of fun was had with the short-lived Threshold, if there’s a show that’s to be crowned a successor to the late, great X-Files, it’s quickly looking to be Fringe, as it continues to display an excellent mix of speculative science and creepy horror.
And, as if to solidify that X-Files connection, X-alum Darin Morgan clambers on board as consulting producer on Fringe, which makes me a happy camper and even more eager to see what future episodes hold.

The episode’s main plot involves a serial killer/government super soldier mash-up, and writers Abrams, Kurtzman, Orci, and Alias and Lost alum Jeff Pinkner (also one of the show’s producers now) open the hour with a cracking prologue that recalls everything from Humanoids From The Deep to It’s Alive.
Of course, it really isn’t some killer mutant baby that gets born, but the horror movie echoes were welcome nonetheless. (I could have done without the subsequent Aliens–ish nightmare sequence though.)
We also get some fodder for the show’s main throughline (apparently, both Broyles and Massive Dynamic’s Nina Sharp are on a committee concerned with investigating the Pattern; this shadow cabinet, another bit that recalls The X-Files) as well as an intriguing allusion to Peter’s “medical history.”
Oh, and apparently, Dunham and company are a “new team,” and there’s a passing mention of a previous team. Hurm…


Anna Torv continues to impress, as does John Noble, who again, is the show’s MVP, nailing the script’s primo stuff (the seat warmer bit is hilarious) with apparent and enviable ease.
Joshua Jackson however, is still a tad shaky. Why a genius with an IQ of 190 (a fact repeated in this episode) would resort to using the term “magic old man baby” is a little beyond me… He just can’t seem to shake the ghost of Pacey.
At any rate, this one’s a winner and strengthens Fringe’s credentials as one of this season’s triumphs.
Bring on next week’s weirdness!


(Images courtesy of impawards.com [Fringe OS, design by FOX IN], variety.com, buddytv.com, and fringetelevision.com.)

FRINGE
Season 1 Episode 1
Pilot
Written by J.J. Abrams & Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci
Directed by Alex Graves
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

When Fringe was first announced by the trades, I had a number of reservations:
One: though J.J. Abrams’ name was attached, I can’t say I love everything he’s worked on.
If you’ve visited the Iguana before, you may know that I’m a big Lost fan, and I was also a fan of Felicity. And Cloverfield was brilliant.
But I never got into Alias, and I wasn’t that thrilled with Mission: Impossible III either.
Two: the other writer/producers announced were Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, whose scripts for M:i:III and Transformers didn’t inspire much confidence.
Three: the supreme hurdle for the show, as far as I was concerned—the premise sounded terribly X-Files-ish.

So how could the show get out from under that daunting shadow? And could the Pilot, at the very least, win this X-phile over?
I think I’d have to say the answer is a qualified “Yes.”


First off, the Pilot has a very effective pace, keeping the narrative engine going at a fast clip, while allowing time for involving character bits.
We have FBI Special Agent Olivia Dunham (Australian actress Anna Torv), whose very personal stake in the preliminary case is telegraphed well, her desperation and anxiety palpable without being overpowering.
Then there are the father and son issues between underachieving genius (IQ 190) Peter Bishop (Dawson’s Creek’s Joshua Jackson) and his mentally unstable father Walter (played most excellently by mad King Denethor himself, John Noble, incidentally also Australian).
Oh, and the case—which will require the expertise of the elder Bishop, institutionalized nearly two decades ago, and the younger Bishop, who must serve as his father’s guardian—involves the very messy deaths of all the passengers and crew on an international flight which lands at Boston’s Logan Airport on auto pilot. (I was hoping it would be an Oceanic flight, but alas, no such luck…)

Is there, perhaps, a smidgen of convenience in the speed at which matters are expedited on the Pilot? Maybe.
But I’ll let it slide, as it is, quite literally, a life-or-death situation, and the fact remains that the Pilot never drags, and it’s a great opener that’s got the thrills, the laughs, and the requisite Abrams air of mystery to make it eminently watchable.


Clearly, this is the first Orci-Kurtzman script that’s kept me attentive and absorbed, and all involved lucked out with their casting of Noble as the certified (and certifiable) genius.
Noble delivers a portrait of tragic intelligence, laced with an unnerving air of potential lunacy, the kind of brilliance fueled by an unfettered mind. And what is more freeing, after all, than insanity?
Plus, Walter gets the best lines, and Noble delivers them with a grand, understated flourish. (The LSD bit is priceless.)

If there’s anyone in the cast who still hasn’t completely won me over by the Pilot’s end, it’s Jackson, who, unlike Noble, doesn’t quite emanate “genius” (unstable or otherwise) from his acting pores. Sorry, but at the moment, Peter just doesn’t seem to scream “190 IQ.”
We’ll see though. Still early in the game…


Getting back to the pluses, the mystery throughline for the show—“the Pattern”—is introduced effectively in the Pilot, a hook which is central to Fringe’s viral marketing, complete with the show’s catchphrase: Find the Pattern.
There’s also a megacorporation—Massive Dynamic (“Your World Is Our World.”)—that figures into the narrative goings-on, has a connection to the elder Bishop’s past, and whose motivations are, to say the least, shadowy.
Oh, and their equivalent of the on-screen text to establish setting (ala X-Files) is a neat visual which takes a page from Heroes’ chapter titles. (I particularly love the bit in Iraq.)

Now, all indications seem to point to the show being more episodic, as opposed to the heavily serialized nature of Lost.
Given though that there is “the Pattern” to contend with, I imagine Fringe may follow the lead of—and yet again, the comparison arises—The X-Files, which was largely episodic in nature, with the mythology episodes popping up over the course of its run.
Or, perhaps the template here will be more akin to Alias, as I can’t imagine Fringe will have out-and-out comedic episodes as The X-Files did.


Regardless, the show owes much to Chris Carter’s pioneering work, as well as all the test driving the post-X-Files shows of this stripe managed over the intervening years.
While it understandably took stretches of The X-Files’ freshman season for all involved to work the kinks out of the show (after all, there wasn’t really any precedent as far as the kind of series it was aiming to be), the Fringe Pilot is pretty much a fully-formed, ably constructed entity.
Not as audaciously slap-in-the-face as, say, the Lost Pilot, or, going back further, Twin Peaks’ opening salvo, mind, but effective and involving nonetheless.

So consider me hopeful and strapped in for the ride, though I will admit to still having some reservations about the upcoming experience.
Colour me cautiously optimistic over this one.


(Images courtesy of impawards.com [Fringe OS, design by FOX IN], latimes.com, tvweek.com, fringetv.blogspot.com, and fringetelevision.com.)

FUTURAMA:
BENDER’S BIG SCORE
(Review)

Sweet Yeti of the Serengeti! They’re back, baby!
And I honestly hadn’t realized how much I’d missed Fry and Bender and Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth and the rest of the crew till a few minutes into the opening sequence of the direct-to-DVD movie, Bender’s Big Score.
It’s only here, apparently, when the crew finds out that they were cancelled two years ago! And it’s only now that Farnsworth actually remembers to inform them that they’re fired.
It seems that the “brainless drones” and “asinine morons” at the Box Network (or is that Fox Network?) saw fit to pull the plug on Planet Express. But fret not, for Farnsworth gets a call and is informed that they’ve all been renewed again, and all those drones and morons have been “ground up into a fine pink powder,” which has a million and one uses, and becomes a running joke through the length of the hilarious Big Score.
It was also only here, after Farnsworth gives us all the good news, when I realized I’d missed that signature theme too.
Oh, the little things…

Bender’s Big Score is a sweet ride that should be a blast for all you Futurama junkies out there. It’s got some familiar faces, the debut of the alluded-to-but-never-before-seen Chanukah zombie (voiced by Luke Skywalker himself, Mark Hamill), some neat and catchy tunes, a rather familiar-looking rabbit, and the reason why Al Gore lost the presidency in 2000.
It’s got time paradoxes and spam and inevitable doom and true love and New Scamadonia and remote-controlled solid-gold Death Stars and Kitten-class attack fighters.
Oh, and more Benders than you can shake a rusty wrench at. Plus, “the ancient and terrible secret of Fry’s buttocks”! What more could you want?!

I think we all know it’s a big universe out there. Massive. But it feels that much bigger without Zoidberg, doesn’t it?
So go on. Get ‘cher new Futurama fix, out on DVD. Now.

And if you’ve never seen Futurama before, well, all 72 episodes are out on DVD, meatbag, so go make those Fox… errr, I mean Box Network morons happy and flash those credit card digits. So says Hypnotoad.
And don’t worry. This ain’t no scam. (You can leave your email address at the door.)

Parting shot: There’re three more straight-to-DVD Futurama features scheduled for 2008, The Beast with a Billion Backs, Bender’s Game, and Into the Wild Green Yonder.
All four features will then reportedly be edited and slightly reconfigured to serve as a score of half-hour long episodes which will then air on Comedy Central; some reports say 13 episodes, some, 16.
(Okay. Whatever. Just so’s I got me my Bender…)

(Futurama: Bender’s Big Score DVD cover art courtesy of amazon.com; images courtesy of ilovebender.com.)

reVIEW (18)
WONDERFALLS

Instead of taking a look at an old film, this installment of reVIEW is about the sadly cancelled Bryan Fuller co-created TV series Wonderfalls. Consider it a companion piece to TV Watch 2007 (3), where I heartily recommended Fuller’s new ABC series, Pushing Daisies.

“It’s a really quirky, smart, feel-good show about a pathological narcissist who wakes up one day to discover the universe has sort-of forced her to become fate’s b!tch.”
-- Bryan Fuller, when asked to describe Wonderfalls


Classic Gen Y underachiever, Jaye Brewster (Caroline Dhavernas) has a Philosophy degree, but works a dead-end job at the souvenir shop of Niagara Falls. However, inanimate animals—wax lions, metal monkeys, stuffed donkeys—begin to speak to her, giving her cryptic instructions, which she finds herself hesitantly following, inadvertently helping others, when all she’d really rather do is nothing in particular.
That’s the quirky premise of a great TV show called Wonderfalls (one of its working titles during its development, Touched by a Crazy Person), which almost never got seen.


Fox, you see, unceremoniously pulled the plug on the show after a mere four episodes, despite the fact that it was a critical darling. Apparently, the show wasn’t racking up the ratings Fox would have liked, and the network wasn’t willing to wait for an audience to discover its witty charm.
(It should be noted that this isn’t the first time Fox has speedily kicked a show off the air. They’ve done it to Chris Carter twice, despite the phenomenal hit he gave them in The X-Files—with his virtual reality series Harsh Realm, and the X-Files spin-off, The Lone Gunmen.)


The magnitude of this injustice is compounded even further when you consider that, a) Wonderfalls was actually a really good show, and b) as I’ve pointed out before, this is a world with three CSI’s. Three CSI’s and we can’t have room for one unique show with a voice all its own, managing to fuse the inertia of Gen Y slackdom with the inevitability of destiny, turning in an existential comedy bristling with witty dialogue, and pop culture referents and metaphors aplenty.

“She’s a snarky character, so she’s going to be snarky about the things that she encounters in her life. When tchochtkes start talking, let the snark reign.”
-- Bryan Fuller, discussing Jaye


As Jaye Brewster, Dhavernas (from a host of Canadian productions) displays a refreshing, disarming quality, even when she’s in her persnickety slacker mode, and witnessing the character’s torturous metamorphosis from self-involved, aimless cynic to confused, hesitant Samaritan is a peculiar joy.
Surrounding Jaye with their own brand of insanity is her family, father Darrin (William Sadler, from The Green Mile and Kinsey), mother Karen (Diana Scarwid), sister Sharon (Katie Finneran, from You’ve Got Mail, and the 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead), and brother Aaron (Lee Pace, from Soldier’s Girl).
Of particular note amongst the Brewsters is Scarwid (from What Lies Beneath and Party Monster), whose Karen is the aloof, snotty socialite who nonetheless loves her family (though she may not particularly understand them).

Ultimately, Wonderfalls is a show that manages to give us a funny glimpse at the workings of those “mysterious ways” we keep on hearing about. It’s like an Early Edition or a Touched by an Angel, but with a lot more wit, and a lot more brains; a show that displays the causality of destiny, and how every little thing we do, no matter how seemingly insignificant, impacts somewhere, on someone, thus keeping the great engine of life moving in perfect synchronicity with the Will of some higher, manifest Power, a Power that, apparently, has a pretty hip (and often absurd) sense of humor.


Parting shot: Though only four episodes of Wonderfalls were broadcast on Fox, thirteen were actually filmed, and all are available on DVD.

(Images courtesy of aintitcool.com, episodeguides.com, hollywoodjesus.com, and logoonline.com.)
(The above is an altered version of a previously published article entitled “The Causality of Destiny (Or, The Greatest TV Show You May Never See).”)