PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Alphas Season 1

I found the two seasons of Alphas at the library and just took 'em home. I watched the first season over the last few days. There aren't many shows, only 11 including the slightly longer pilot, so it wasn't that hard to blast through them. I have to admit to watching them at 1.5 speed and fast forwarding after I failed to get excited by the pilot. The show got cancelled after the 2nd season which appearently ended with a big ass cliff hanger. I don't think I'll be as upset as Sheldon was. David Strathairn heads the cast as Dr Lee Rosen. He's both a neurologist and psychiatrist and he's put together a team of people with special powers to investigate criminal Alphas. He's not an Alpha but all of the team are. Nikki has the power to make you do what she tells you to, Bill is super strong some of the time, Rachel has heightened senses, Gary can see electronic signals in the air around him and Hicks can toss stuff very accurately.

Other Alphas have other powers and some of them use those powers to take stuff or kill people. Nikki used to get money and favors from people with just a word. The episodes are mostly guest alpha of the week and mess they create.There's a bit of personal drama for the regulars. Nothing much different than a lot of current shows, like Grimm or Bones. The stories are well enough written. The show looks pretty good, they have nice sets and props and lots of people to move around. There are fights and bullets flying and the odd explosion. A good number of dead people turn up. Sadly, I wasn't that excited about it all. I haven't felt I was wasting my time but I bum rushed those episodes so I was minimizing my lost hours. I'll look at the second season because it's here in the house until tuesday but I wouldn't need to watch them again.

Riverboat

 

I finally got to see Riverboat. Everyone I mentioned the show to had never heard of it. It's a tv drama set in 1830's America. I hadn't heard of it being on cable like so many other shows from the 1950's and 60's. Since I'm such a Darren McGavin fan I knew about the show and had been wanting to see it since the 1980's. I don't remember if I watched it when it was new, I would have been about 6 when it started running. If it was on before I got sent to bed, I could easily have seen it. I was a big tv watcher back then too. The two seasons of this NBC show ran from September 13, 1959 until January 2, 1961. My mom said she remembered having seen it when I mentioned getting the dvds. She didn't remember if I had been watching it at the same time. A six disc set, collecting ALL 44 episodes, came out in 2012.  A different set came out in 2007 but it is incomplete. I didn't notice the recent edition coming out until recently. I got a copy from Amazon for 25 bucks. It's was an hour long show with commercials so it took a while to plow through them.

 

Darren McGavin is Captain Grey Holden and Burt Reynolds is pilot Ben Frazer. Darren is in 42 of the 44 episodes but Burt left after doing the first 20. Apparently he didn't get along with Darren. Noah Berry Jr replaced him as the pilot in most of the remaining episodes. Darren owns the riverboat which travels up and down the Mississippi River looking to carry cargo and passengers. They would pile cargo on the deck of the boat. You could rent a room on the boat, travel was slow, or you could sleep on the deck for much cheaper. Each week they land in a different city and those customers would bring some trouble that the captain and the crew get caught up in.

 

That's Captain Darren, riverboat cabin boy Michael McGreevey and pilot Noah Berry Jr in the picture on the left. Elizabeth Montgomery is in the picture on the right. She was one of many guest stars that appeared each week. With over 44 episodes there were lots of guest stars and the Wikipedia has a whole bunch listed on the Riverboat page. Many you would know. The stories are varied but they're pretty familiar western type fair. Less gun battles, the mid-west was slightly more civilized. I did like the 1830's setting, it gives the stories a nice bit of difference. The regular characters are somewhat entertaining, though you don't get to know many of the crew. The riverboat suffers from being a poorly photographed model. They use a lot of the same shots, occasionally flopped, in many episodes. There's a shot where the riverboat runs into the bank that is used three times, once going the other direction. The actual riverboat set was ok and I thought the episodes were ok too. They aren't great but I'm not sorry to have watched them and since I have them I'll watch them again sometime.  

Disneyland TV Series

 

Here's a whole bunch of episodes from the first 6 seasons of Walt Disney's tv show Disneyland. We used to watch that every week when we were kids. There's a 120 videos, some of the first season is broken into multiple parts but the rest are whole. I haven't looked through much of it yet but the titles are intriguing. I think most would find something of interest. Use the playlist feature to check out the rest of the videos. They look pretty good when they are full screen.

Waking The Dead Series 4

 

I wound up getting series 4 of the British cold case crime drama from the library and this series they upped the number of episodes to 12. The stories are about the same as the previous series, tough, noisey, lots of quick cuts and occasional quick wrap ups. Sometimes even 2 hours isn't enough to finish the story. Some of the characters take bit of a beating this season, having some serious ups and downs. 

Trevor Eve plays Detective Superintendent Peter Boyd, he heads up the unit, and he's having more than his usual anger management issues this series, so much so that he finally goes to a therapist. Wil Johnnson plays Detective Sergeant Spencer Jordan and he fairs better than most of them when he makes Detective Inspector during the season. Claire Goose plays Detective Constable Amelia "Mel" Silver and sadly she's murdered after she makes Detective Sergeant. She said in interviews that she wanted to leave the show to take some new chances. I guess the producers wanted to make sure she can't come back. Holly Aird plays Dr Frankie Wharton, she's the forensic scientist. She too leaves the series but we don't even know until the start of the 5th series. Not sure why she left the series. Sue Johnson plays Dr Grace Foley, she's the profiler on the show and nothing much too bad happens to her.

I dug around on YouTube and there the episodes were for the series. They were listed under the title W/\Kl/\/G DD. You have to get creative at times.

In Sight Of The Lord Pt 1 & 2 Nine Inch nails figure heavily in this one. Heads too.

False Flag Pt 1 & 2 Skeleton in a garage.

Fugue States Pt 1 & 2 Thirteen years ago twins disappeared, now one turns up in a hospital. Where's Cindy?

Anger Management Pt 1 & 2 Frankie is unconvinced a man killed himself.

The Hardest Word Pt 1 & 2 Sorry carved into dead men's seamen covered backs. Ewww!

Shadowplay Pt 1 & 2 Psychiatric problems lead to death. Ain't that the truth.

There's nothing to much to complain about the writing, other than it's too darn serious. I'm still liking the variety of the cases and there's often some nice buildings and places to look at. It's not overly guesome or gorey. I wasn't sure I wanted to go along after they killed off Mel but there you go. I wouldn't be too surprised if I get around to series 5 and 6 sometime in the future. I have them on my library queue.

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles 22 Hollywood Follies

Finally getting to the last movie. I bet you can tell from the title that our adventurer is in Hollywood. He's still on summer break from college and after the Broadway troubles he gets a job with Universal Pictures. They send him to Hollywood where he goes to work for Carl Lemmle. His first task is to get Erich von Stroheim to finish Foolish Wives. It's all over budget and there doesn't seem to be an end in sight. Then he gets a job with John Ford and does some stunts on a western movie. Wyatt Earp is working at the studio as a western consultant. It was a pretty entertaining way to end the series. I laughed but I like the subject matter. Even after all these movies I'm still not much of a fan of Sean Partick Flanery and his Indiana Jones. He's a good looking fellow but not my favorite actor. Not much I can do about that. It's partly the scripts fault. He doesn't seem changed as much as the stories might make you think he would be. Still I like the series as a whole. Not enough to rush out and pick them up. By the time I want to see them again I have an inkling that they'll still be available on line.

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles 21 Scandal of 1920

Indiana is living in New York while on summer vacation from college. He's staying with family friends and dating three girls. That doesn't come out very well in the end. He's working for George White who is struggling to get his new production, Scandal of 1920, up and running. His idea is to create a Broadway revue with original music by George Gershwin. indy helps get the show made and fills in for the director on opening night. Indy meets all the critics of the New York theater scene and visits the Algonquin Round Table. I had a brief interest in that world back in the 1980's. You can see a fair version of the group in the fictional Mrs Parker And The Vicious Circle. I enjoyed Indy's adventure in the theater, it had a few laughs. This is the second last movie.

Ode To Joy

 

Here's a very nice shortish version. Nice to listen to. After that you can watch the Shuttle being moved through Los Angeles here. It's way cool.

Broadway Danny Rose

 

Here's a movie I haven't seen in ages. I watched a copy of Broadway Danny Rose from the library and it made me laugh out loud. I first saw it in the theater when it came out in 1984 and then got a vhs copy from cable. I recorded over it ages ago and never bothered with the dvd when I started buying them. I was more of a Woody Allen fan back in the 70's and 80's but lost interest in his work. I have seen less than half the movies he's made since 1999 and I'm not interested in seeing the rest that much. I haven't been motivated to revisit any of them either. When I saw BDR at the library it looked like the perfect opportunity to see it again.

 

The movie opens with some comedians talking at a table at the Carnegie Deli in New York's Broadway district. They are telling Danny Rose stories, which we see in the form of flashbacks. Woody plays Danny Rose, an ex-comedian who became an agent. Unfortunately he doesn't get too many clients, most are small time acts, like the balloon folder above. Danny really cares about his clients and tries really hard for them. Things aren't always so good. He's not getting rich. His prize client is Lou Canova, played by Nick Apollo Forte, a singer who had a hit years and years ago. He's not been getting the good gigs and Danny is helping him try to get some better work. The movie gets more and more complicated. Lou's cheating on his wife with Mia Farrow and he wants Danny to be his beard. Mia used to date a mob guy. That guy is pissed at Danny for dating Mia and he sends out goons to beat Danny's skinny little ass. There's some running around, then some more family issues, Danny's car gets beat up, and then finally we get to the end of the bittersweet story. We're back with the comedians at the Carnegie Deli where Danny has a sandwich named after him.

There are plenty of laughs, you might like them, you might not. Who can say? All the actors are great and Nick Apollo Forte stands out among the support characters. He's quite entertaining. The script is tight and the story elements all work well together. There are plenty of shots of New York and those look great. It's worth seeing if you haven't, and worth seeing again if you have. There's a link up at the top of the post for the whole movie on YouTube. Or use your local library as a resource for free media. After all you are paying for them. If the visitors keep coming back then the places might stay open.

Science Fiction Sunday 255

Revenge of the Cybermen is the 79th Doctor Who serial and the 4 parts started airing April 19 1975. It was the first of the serials to come out on home video. The VHS tape edition came out October 1983 and it was an edited version with the credits cropped. Thirty years ago this month. Wow, huh. The dvd I'm watching came out in 2010 and it's got the full episodes and some extras. Iusually watch the dvd in my pc so I can have the show play out at 1.5 speed. It makes the time go quicker, especially for the more tedious 6 part serials. The other reason is the BBC dvds come with a huge number of intor ads and general shit you have to wade through to get to the title card to hit play. On my pc I use VLC Player and that sweetly opens the dvd to the title card. Nice, huh. Fuck the BBC, that's all I can say. You can see the whole serial at Dailymotion in the link above and you have to give the BBC any money. Dailymotion seem to have a lot of stuff on their site and I've barely looked at anything there. Who's got the time.

The last serial had the Doc, Harry and Sarah travel teleport with the special Time Ring. They land on Space Station Nerva thousands of years earlier than the last time they were there. The Tardis isn't anywhere in sight but the Doctor thinks it will arrive soon. It takes a while to show up and the Tardis gang get involved with the story going on in this serial. The men on the station have been attacked by a plague. Turns out it's really a cybermat. We know that's it's only time before the Cybermen show up. Sarah gets bit by a cybermat and the Doctor sends her down to the astroid Voga to be cured. Harry goes with her and both of them get captured by the Vogans. There's some drama on the station as a traitor is unveiled. The Cybermen show up and there's plenty of action and running about for the rest of the program. The Doctor puts their plan to destroy Voga and the gold there. The Cybermen are weakened by gold so they want to get rid of it. You can guess that the Tardis gang will win out.

Some of the sets and props and things are ok but the story is barely average and not a good way to end the season. Sadly the long story ark that they built the season on is still not over, it won't wrap up until the first serial of the next season. Unlike the poor Brits, I don't have to wait several months to find out what happens I have to wait until next week. The location shooting is in Wookey Hole Caves. They look kind of interesting and there's even a subterranian lake. They had some trouble there, here's the bit from the Wikipedia on it.

The location filming at Wookey Hole was plagued by a series of problems which the crew blamed on a curse. The curse apparently was brought about when the production staff found a small rock formation that the locals called "The Witch". Despite warnings, they proceeded to put a witch hat and cloak on it. The assistant floor manager suffered a severe attack of claustrophobia, another crew member fell ill, and an electrician suffered a broken leg when a ladder collapsed. During the scene when Sarah Jane rides one of the water skimmers, the boat went wild and Sladen was forced to jump off, treading water despite heavy boots until her rescue by Terry Walsh, the programme's longtime stuntman. Both required precautionary vaccinations at a local hospital but were otherwise unhurt.

The Lost Missle - From The Earth To The Moon

   

The Lost Missile is a 1958 science fiction film that you can see for free on YouTube. That's good really, you wouldn't want to pay for it. I last blogged about it in 2009:

Turner Classic Movies ran some science fiction movies the other day. I had seen all of them but two. The Lost Missile is a 1958 cold war scare movie about a really fast missile that is racing around the world. It's burning at a million degrees and leaving a 5 mile wide strip of destruction in it's wake. Who sent it? No one claims to. Is it from space? How to stop it? It's written by Jerome Bixby and William Berke (who also directed) and stars Robert Loggia. He's one of a group of science guys who figure out what to do. He dies because of some hoods and he's just one of many victims. The whole city of Ottawa is destroyed. The acting is fair to poor and there's a ton of stock footage. It's more documentary style with all the constant narration. It's like a snapshot of the time when the world lived in fear of missiles falling from the sky. It's got a great poster.

Jerome Bixby wrote a couple of books I liked. He wrote 5 episodes of the original Star Trek and an episode of The Twilight Zone. This movie isn't that good sadly. Still it's free. Here's a better movie to watch.

 

From The Earth To The Moon is also a 1958 release but the budget is much larger and Byron Haskins is the director. Joseph Cotton is a munitions manufacturer and he's got a new more powerful explosive. He plans to build a missile that everyone will want for their armies. He builds a rocket to go to the moon and it's sabotaged. George Saunders is metalurist who thinks the powerful explosive is against God's will. He put the fix in on the rocket. They all nearly die. It's pretty entertaining.