Lazarus: The Real Sense

I'm a big Harlan Coben fan -- I've given rave reviews here on this blog to 8 of Coben's streaming series since 2017 -- so of course I was going to watch his latest, Lazarus (on Amazon Prime Video) -- and I talked my wife into watching it, too.

Lazarus is somewhat different from Coben's other works.   Like them, it's a great whodunnit, that keeps you guessing until the very end about who has killed whom.  And the story is so intriguing, that I enjoyed it immensely, even though I half-guessed who one of the worst culprits was.   So, in what way was Lazarus different?

Well, the main character, Dr. Joel Lazarus (a psychiatrist, powerfully played by Sam Claflin, who was memorable is Season 5 of Peaky Blinders), sees dead people, aka ghosts.  Indeed, one of the other characters (Seth, a detective, well played by David Finn) references the signature line from The Sixth Sense, "I see dead people," as he ridicules Lazarus about his interactions with dead people.  This at the very least makes Lazarus an ideal narrative to be released around Halloween.

But -- and this is the closest I'll come to a spoiler -- Lazarus is not really seeing ghosts, he's interacting with these dead people in his head.   As we come to learn, Lazarus for a variety of reasons is himself a troubled person, and his character is also an emblem of physician heal thyself.

A real high point of the six-episode limited series is Bill Nighy playing another Lazarus -- Dr. Jonathan Lazarus, also a psychiatrist, Joel's father.   Nighy is someone who never disappoints in his acting, and he again comes through with a sterling performance.

As does Harlan Coben once again.  I consider him a 100% watch-on-sight creator of great streaming television, and I look forward to seeing his next venture.

See my reviews of other Harlan Coben streaming series: No Second Chance ... Safe ... The Stranger ... The Five ... The Innocent ... Shelter ... Fool Me Once ... Missing You

The Man Who Fell to Earth: Season 1 Finale: Unique and Tender

I just want to begin by saying The Man Who Fell to Earth 2022 TV series was one of the most beautiful, unusual, almost tender pieces of science fiction that has ever come to the screen.  And the season finale on Showtime last night excelled in all those virtues.

[Spoilers ahead ...]

Newton finally became almost a mentch, admitting he had love for Faraday.  And although Newton keeps saying they're won't be any room on the ship from Anthea to Earth for any drones, Faraday is going to make sure he gets his family on board, anyway.

But speaking of family, I very much liked the way Faraday and Justin parted.  The two clearly love each other, too. The big story may be the tale of two different worlds, one on the verge of death, the other not that from it.  But the people we've met, and see in action especially in this finale, are very much alive and have lots of life ahead.

Back to Newton.  First, what an acting job by Bill Nighy!  And what delightful details.  One of my favorite lines in the overall series is Newton saying maybe it's time to kick the habit of smoking.  As I said, he's becoming a mentch.

And rather than commenting on the rest of the finale, let me instead say how much more there is to this story.  Faraday blasted off.  Wouldn't it be great to see what happens when he gets back to Anthea?  Wouldn't it be satisfying and fun to see what happens when he gets back to Earth?

The answer of course is yes.  So bring on another season.  And in the meantime, kudos to everyone who helped make this first season so good.  In addition to Nighy, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Clarke Peters, and Naomie Harris were great in their roles.  Tell us more!

See also The Man Who Fell to Earth 1.1: Great Provenance and Excellent Start ... 1.2: The Ending We Needed ... 1.3: "I've come with a prototype ... " 1.4: "Tell my wife I love her very much ... " ... 1.5: Co-Mingling ... 1.6: Music of the Spheres ... 1.7 Game Changes ... 1.8: Battle at the Nunnery ... 1.9: Just Deserts

The Man Who Fell to Earth 1.9: Just Deserts

Well, episode 1.9 of The Man Who Fell to Earth on Showtime tonight shows I right about two important developments in 1.8:

[Spoilers follow ... ]

1. Lisa is ultimately in the employ of ... Newton.  And in the last scene, Bill Nighy never looked better in the role and more like David Bowie.   Which is one and the same thing, and a very good thing to see.

2. Josiah survived.  But in sad touch that makes perfect sense, he lost all of his Anthean qualities, and is back on the road to soon dying as completely human.  I'm hoping Faraday gets a chance to give him some more of his Anthean essence before the finale ends.

Some other points:

• I was glad to see Lisa kill Spencer.  He was one despicable character.
• Edie turns out to be a tough character after all, pushing her ill father over a cliff, after he tells her that he's leaving the company to her brother Hatch.  This has to serve some purpose in the finale, which I'm eager to see.

And now I'll make a typical plea.  I'd like to see a second season of this series.  It's compelling and original, difficult for a sequel in which the actor who played the original central character can't be on the screen because he's no longer with us.  I don't think I've ever seen a series quite like this one, and I'd very much welcome more.

See also The Man Who Fell to Earth 1.1: Great Provenance and Excellent Start ... 1.2: The Ending We Needed ... 1.3: "I've come with a prototype ... " 1.4: "Tell my wife I love her very much ... " ... 1.5: Co-Mingling ... 1.6: Music of the Spheres ... 1.7 Game Changes ... 1.8: Battle at the Nunnery 

The Man Who Fell to Earth 1.2: The Ending We Needed

Well, I just loved the second episode of The Man Who Fell to Earth, especially the ending.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

I mean, with the world and this country in the states that we're in, it was especially good to see this happy ending on the science fiction screen.  And it was set up perfectly.  Faraday aka The Man Who Fell to Earth had said earlier that it was time for Justin's father Josiah (always great to see Clarke Peters) to die.  He had lived his purpose.  And we'd previously seen that guy up in Alaska take his life, after almost killing Spencer.  So ...when Faraday walked into Josiah's room, and put his hands on Josiah, asleep ... well, I thought the worst.  And instead: Faraday cured him, draining out and taking in what had wrecked Josiah's body.  And he was whole and healthy again.   Good to see on this day.

And though Faraday was on the floor and his hands were curled, we know he's going to get better because we saw him in the first episode making that speech in the future.  And though I was annoyed with that kind of start when I first saw it last week, and said so in my review, now I'm glad I saw it.

It also was good to meet Thomas Newton at the beginning of this episode (always great to see Bill Nighy, too).  He came from Faraday's planet and has been on Earth 40+ years and got too distracted to carry out his mission.  That's totally understandable, and that's why Faraday so urgently needed to come here.  Newton's character in this new series makes it a sequel to David Bowie's 1976 The Man Who Fell To Earth movie, in which Newton was The Man Who Fell.  My only regret, of course, is, as good as Nighy is, it would have been great to see Bowie reprise his role.

Back to Spencer for a moment: I'm not sure, at this point, whether he's a good guy or a bad guy.  His conversation with Drew in the diner was unsettling (good to see Kate Mulgrew, too -- for some reason, women tend to have names that men usually have in this story).  At this point, it looks like those two could be bad news.

Last, for now: wasn't that scene with "Poppa Was a Rolling Stone" in the car and everyone singing great to see (and hear)?  Yeah, it was.  And I gotta say, those voices in the car worked really well with the Temptations.

See you back here with my review of the next episode next week.

See also The Man Who Fell to Earth 1.1: Great Provenance and Excellent Start

first spaceship to Alpha Centauri from Mars

Valkyrie and Defiance

I finally saw Valkyrie and Defiance last night on Netflix DVD - a Nazi true-story double-header in the household. As harrowing as such movies are, we watch them from the cushion of knowing we won the war, in the end - though not before horrendous damage was done to humanity, including the Holocaust.

Valkyrie was a reasonably good rendition of the daring 1944 Germany Army bomb plot that almost killed Hitler. Tom Cruise was effective as von Stauffenberg - who planted the bomb and in many ways spearheaded the operation - and Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Terence Stamp and Tom Wilkinson are a pleasure to see in any role.

The plot failed for several reasons. Hitler survived the bomb because it went off in a meeting room larger and more open than expected. Had the explosion occurred in the original room, its bunker construction would have contained and thereby made more lethal the explosive power. And the briefcase with the bomb was inadvertently moved to a place under the table where the blast was somewhat deflected from Hitler.

With Hitler alive, the only chance the plot had was for the conspirators to quickly wrest power from the Gestapo, and this turn in depended on the belief that Hitler had perished in the explosion. Hitler's voice on the phone to a key army official was the decisive turning point depicted in the movie. I favor the interpretation that Hitler's voice on radio, the day after the explosion, was even more decisive, because the radio reached everyone (see The Soft Edge for more), but the point remains about the power of the voice to save or change everything in an age of telephone and radio. Given the capacity for spoofing and deception in the digital age, that power may no longer exist today.

Defiance tells the heroic, inspiring story of the four Bielski brothers, who escape into the forest and organize resistance after the German occupation and slaughter of Jews in Belarus in 1941. Daniel Craig as Tuvia, Liev Schreiber as Zus, and Jamie Bell as Asael are simply superb, and I'd say Defiance was one the best movies I've seen in years (better than the excellent Munich, in which Craig also played a take-no-prisoners Jewish fighter, and better than Valkyrie). My wife and I have grandparents and relatives who come from that area, and we could see their faces and hear their voices in this movie.

All of the brothers - and their love interests (it was good see Mia Wasikowska, Sophie on In Treatment, play Asael's in Defiance) - survived against all odds, and our knowing that Tuvia, Zus, and Aron (who was a boy in 1941) made it to New York after the war, and opened a trucking business, was especially satisfying. (Asael joined the Russians against the Germans and was killed in action.) Tuvia died at 81 in 1987, Zus at 82 in 1995, and Aron is still alive.

So, yes, the bomb plot failed, the Bielskis did not, and we beat the Nazis.

But as the extremist part of the debate now raging about health care reform in America now shows - with some opponents of Obama likening him to Hitler, which is itself a classic Hitlerian propaganda tactic (false association and insistent exaggeration) - we need to take care more than ever to keep our democratic processes and protections real and robost. The Weimar Republic, which the Nazis overthrew, was after all a democracy too...