Psycho docs, X-Ray nut shots, and the end of an era is just some of what's been setting the tone of my September and October of 2024...
Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...
LOOKS:
Terminator Zero - from Mattson Tomlin, this anime spin-off takes place in Japan, primarily around the doom-laden date of August 29th 1997: "Judgement Day". A scientist suffering from dreams of the coming machine-led apocalypse develops an AI program called Kokoro in order to compete with Skynet while, as is tradition, a Terminator and a Resistance member are sent back in time to change events. There's some interesting stuff going on here, such as discussing the nature of time travel or Malcom Lee stating his case for humanity's survival (albeit while leaving out an awful lot of fair arguments and evidence, one might say!), but there's also familiar ground, such as a Terminator assault on a police station.
The franchise has for too long doggedly stuck close to the bosom of the Connor family, Kyle Reese, and Arnie's T-800, but it's also fair to say that attempts to continue the series beyond T2 have been essentially pointless, flawed, or disastrous (or all three at once). Terminator Zero at least explores some new characters in a new country and introduces some new wrinkles to proceedings.
Futurama: Season 9 - the latest batch of ten episodes, since Hulu's re-introduction of the regularly cancelled and reborn animated favourite has, unfortunately, been quite the mixed bag. Some episodes have been dull and boring, while others have had kernels of gold left underdeveloped, but there have been some genuinely good episodes as well.
Richard Hammond's Workshop: Series 4 - it's time this show had a bit of a shake-up. We've had plenty of this 'trying to get a business off the ground' stuff and not quite enough car restoration, and with Hammond's purpose in the workshop now a genuine question he's having to consider, the show needs to figure out what it needs to be, and wants to be, going forward.
Apollo 13: Survival - despite my familiarity with the event from the superb 1995 movie Apollo 13, this feature length documentary nonetheless re-crafted the story efficiently and with a great deal of NASA footage and audio recordings to stitch it all together in a gripping manner.
Only Murders in the Building: Season 4 - good as always, but the middle portion of this season has felt a bit flabby with the murder investigation podcast stuff taking a bit of a back seat.
The Grand Tour "Sand Job", "Carnage A Trois", and "One For The Road" - re-watching a couple of the recent specials in advance of the very last episode from Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May. After so many years of watching Top Gear and then The Grand Tour, "One For The Road" really is the end of an era. Personally speaking, there was a sad extra note to it, as I watched both Top Gear and The Grand Tour with my Dad, who passed away after the 'Scandi Flick' special, and so missed out on the boys' last three big adventures. Still, there'll always be the chance to go back and revisit their shows.
The Sopranos: Season 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 - that documentary about the making of The Sopranos got me all hot and bothered for a revisit; just the final season to go.
Monsters: The Lyle & Eric Menendez Story - following up The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan return with this dramatisation of the 1989 double homicide committed by two brothers living in Beverly Hills. The Dahmer show was better overall, but this one still manages to grip and tell its story in a manner that doesn't spoon feed the audience easy answers. The central performances from Nicholas Alexander Chavez and Cooper Koch as the brothers, and Javier Bardem and Chloe Sevigny as the parents, are extremely well drawn, the cast able to chew on every morsel from the well written scripts, which illustrate just how difficult it can be to figure out the truth based on so many conflicting personal accounts.
The Penguin - following on from Matt Reeves' The Batman, Lauren LeFranc's Sopranos-inspired gangster saga pulls us back into the dank, gritty, shadowy underworld of Gotham's seamier side. Some out there have been surprised at how well received this series has been, but it's not a big mystery, this is just what happens when you put good writing and characterisation front and centre. It's also what happens when you respect the source material and offer up something worthwhile to the viewers. It's not rocket science as a concept, but hopefully shows like this will help steer the ship back to gentler waters after too many years of hating the source material, blaming the fans, and churning out utter pish made by people without a shred of talent.
Horror's Greatest - five-part Shudder documentary series covering topics of the genre including Tropes & Clichés, Japanese Horror, Giant Monsters, Horror Comedies, and Stephen King adaptations.
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon: The Book of Carol - the return of David Zabel's spin-off show was welcome, but it's unfortunate to say that the second season hasn't lived up to the gripping quality of the first season. There's been some egregious moments of lazy writing (something has to happen, so it just does, regardless of internal logic or bothering to just stage the scene a little differently), and it feels like it's in a bit of a rush to throw away certain characters. It's certainly not rubbish, particularly after it picks things up in the back-half, but it's a big step down compared to season one, falling back into old bad habits and some predictable routines. Hopefully season three (already filming) will buck-up its ideas.
Psycho: The Lost Tapes of Ed Gein - James Buddy Day's four-part MGM+ documentary series on 'the Ghoul of Plainfield', who inspired Psycho, Deranged, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Silence of the Lambs, and a whole host of entries in the annals of horror cinema. There are some curious stylistic choices made in this docu-series, such as certain music cues, the warning messages at the beginning, or the strange need to keep showing establishing shots pertaining to the interviewee's location rather than having anything to do with the actual story of Ed Gein himself. Despite an air of gruesome fascination not typically found in, say, Netflix's catalog of slickly-made serial killer documentaries, and a slightly scattered or drawn-out approach on occasion, it still makes for an informative watch.
The Cleaner: Series 3 - based on the german series Der Tatortreiniger, comedian Greg Davies' adaptation got off to a really good start in series one, but then had significant 'difficult second album syndrome' in series two. Thankfully, though, series three has seen a marked improvement in the writing, eliciting genuine guffaws from its quirky tales.
This Is The Zodiac Speaking - three-part Netflix documentary about the notorious 'Zodiac' serial killer in 1960s and 70s California, with revealing insight from siblings who found themselves as essentially step-children to the man who is, arguably, the most likely suspect: Arthur Leigh Allen.
The Franchise - created by Jon Brown, this satirical comedy series takes aim at, predominantly, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, during the chaotic making of yet another film in a superhero franchise. The absurdity and humour comes thick and fast, with the show acting as both a reveal of the stressful world of film production and a skewering of the 'Marvelisation' of cinema.
SOUNDS:
The Sisters of Mercy "When You Don't See Me", "First And Last And Always" (album), "Vision Thing" (album), "Some Girls Wander By Mistake" (album), "Floodland" (album)
Korn "Coming Undone", "Trash", "Twisted Transistor"
Powerman 5000 "When Worlds Collide"
Blade Runner 2049 Soundtrack
ZZ Top "Legs (12" Remix)", "Sharp Dressed Man", "Eliminator" (album), "Greatest Hits" (album)
James "Sit Down"
Weezer "Buddy Holly", "Hash Pipe"
Alice Cooper "The Road" (album)
The Hollywood Vampires "Rise" (album)
VIBES & FLAVOURS:
"Calvin & Hobbes: Revenge of the Baby-Sat" by Bill Watterson
Sniper Elite 5 (Xbox Series S) - time to snipe some Nazi bastards in the goolies with wince-inducing X-Ray vision slow motion kill cams! There's a few details that prove a bit wobbly, like some clumsy movement through the world because of cluttered spaces or imprecise parkour mechanics, more pronounced now that the game encourages the player to get their hands dirtier with more opportunity for close-quarters combat (be it stealthy or all-guns-blazing) ... but it still delivers the goods on sneaking about and getting the perfect headshot from far off. Granted, I'm only three missions deep, but the style and variety of the maps has been impressive, and it's always good fun when you suddenly cut away to a slow motion shot of a vehicle running over that Teller Mine you planted a while back. Kaboom! Have that, ya bugger!
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