Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress

reviewing Black Doves; Cross; Dark Matter; Dept. Q; Dexter: Resurrection; Dune: Prophecy; For All Mankind; Foundation; Hijack; Memory of a Killer; MobLand; Outlander; Paradise; Presumed Innocent; Severance; Silo; Slow Horses; Smoke; Star City; Star Trek: Strange New Worlds; Tehran;The: Day of the Jackal, Diplomat, Last of Us, Night Agent; Your Friends & Neighbors +books, films, music, podcasts, politics

George Santayana had irrational faith in reason - I have irrational faith in TV.

Showing posts with label The Terminator. Show all posts

Friday, November 28, 2025

Stranger Things 5.1-5.4: Best So Far

I binged the first four episodes of the fifth season of Stranger Things up this week on Netflix -- we'll have to wait until Christmas Eve and New Years Eve to see the rest -- and these four were by far my favorite so far.

Here are the reasons (with no spoilers):

The action is nearly non-stop. Although I've enjoyed the previous seasons, I thought all of them, in comparison to these final episodes, developed the story two slowly, and had too much talking. I suppose this might have been a necessary build-up to this final season, but the action and pace of development in 5.1-5.4 was often breathtaking.
And these four episodes -- also billed as Season Five, Volume One -- also managed to fit in some standalone stories, which were captivating. My favorite was Max's, which brings in a touch of time travel, including a mention of Madeleine L'Engle's now classic A Wrinkle In Time.
It makes sense that A Wrinkle in Time, published in 1962, would be known by Max and anyone with a vibrant mind in the 1980s, when Stranger Things takes place. Having characters spouting popular culture from the 1980s has always been one of the charms of the series, and it was also good to hear Bond and Magnum mentioned again in this finale season. I miss them both (well, maybe James Bond a little more).
Speaking of Max again, she also delivers my favorite line in this set of four episodes: "music has a way of finding you, even in the darkest places". True then, and so true in this world we're in today. (I say this as I'm beginning to binge the Beatles nine-episode Anthology. Review coming soon.)
It was good to see Linda Hamilton is this first volume of the final season. There always has been a Terminator flavor to Stranger Things, and it becomes especially prevalent in this rousing conclusion.

As a closing point -- and the closest I'll come to giving you spoiler -- the best action dramas, in science fiction and non-science fiction -- always feature ultimate heroes and villains of equal power. The first four episodes aka volume one of the fifth season of Stranger Things also does a great job of setting this up.

more parallel worlds ... "flat-out fantastic" - says Scifi and Scary

Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Emergence Season 1 Finale: Terminator

An excellent, satisfying and provocative finale (I hope of this season not the series) of Emergence just on ABC-TV. A finale in which the AIs took on some of the crucial characteristics of the Terminator over the decades.

Actually, two crucial characteristics. The most advanced AIs, Helen and Piper, can shape-shift and face-shift and therein take on the characteristics of other people and AIs. And they can move like a potent dust of nanobots. All of this adds up Jo "killing" Helen with Piper's help, Piper "dying" to absorb a lethal explosion and therein save a lot of the cast, but Piper "surviving" by, at Alex's suggestion, Jo putting Piper's code into Helen's "dead" body.

I put quotes around those words, because Piper didn't really die, and didn't really survive as 100% Piper. And neither did Helen, in both ways. The finale draws to a close with the proof that Piper is actually carrying some of the deadly Helen in Piper. Which means that Piper didn't entirely survive and Helen didn't entirely die. Which means, in turn, that the two-episode title "Killshot" for the last two episodes of Emergence was a clever flash of misdirection.

Which captures why I keep saying that Emergence has some very good qualities, and ought to be continued. I'd certainly want to see more of this AI story. And the personal relationships call out for further play, as well. I've been saying ever since we learned that Ed was very sick that Piper could and would cure him. We got just a hint of that in the finale. And Jo's complex with relationship with Alex, and now Ryan, deserves more time to work out, settle in, or whatever the best description of what will happen romantically.

So count me in as a definite viewer and reviewer if there is a second season. And, if not, as someone who will say to anyone who is interested that the first season was well worth watching.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom ... Emergence 1.8: Spinning ... Emergence 1.9: Benny! ... Emergence 1.10: The Search for Piper ... Emergence 1.11-12: Parents and Children

The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Terminator: Dark Fate: Bright Future

So here we go again. The critics panned it. The box-office in the first few days is not impressive. All manner of self-appointed prognosticators pronounce the franchise deader than an outmoded Terminator model, because that's what it is.

But my son Simon and I saw it tonight. In the Magic Johnson theater in Harlem, in Dolby, in seats more comfortable than a Lazy Boy, which rumbled when the action on the screen called for it, which it often did. And ... we enjoyed it immensely.

[some spoilers follow]

This Terminator movie was made by James Cameron, his first since the iconic and brilliant Terminators 1 and 2, lo those many years ago. It tells a story that take a different path, and obviates, the non-Cameron sequels that followed Terminator 2. I enjoyed those, too. But not as much as this new movie.

Skynet is indeed destroyed. But young John Connor is killed by an Arnold Terminator anyway, sent back before Skynet was destroyed. This killer Terminator took some time finding John Connor, but he did. All of that, in effect, is prelude to the story in Dark Fate, where we see another newer Terminator model - that dwarfs T-800/Arnold's powers - hunting a young woman which another monstrous digitized war-system, Legion, has unleashed on its past and her/our present. This new model, a REV-9 that goes by the name of Gabriel, is so potent a machine that no one human or lesser model like a T-800 can destroy it.

I'd say that's the makings of an excellent movie, and Dark Fate was. Linda Hamilton is back as a much older Sarah Connor, with a hatred of the T-800 who killed her son, She gave an effective performance. Arnold is no great actor, but he put in an outstanding performance as the T-800, showing a combination of humor, sensitivity, and ferocity as called for. Mackenzie Davis was good as an augmented human Grace from the future, Gabriel Luna was effective as Gabriel, and Natalia Reyes was appealing as Dani, the woman Gabriel is after, first thought by Sarah to be another mother-of-the-savior version of her , but who turned out to be someone different (that was pretty easy to figure out, but that didn't put too much of a dent in the fast action and suspenseful pleasures of the movie).

Like many time travel movies, Dark Fate suffered from the problem of, once we find out that Dani in the future sent Grace back to save her, we know that Grace had to succeed, otherwise there would have been no Dani in the future to send Grace back. There are ways of handling this - like the multiple worlds scenario - but the Terminator movies, especially the first two, were never about working out all those metaphysical paradoxes of time travel. There were about the human/machine interface, and, even though I love those paradoxes dearly, the two movies succeeded grandly.

As did Dark Fate. So, I predict that some year before too long, we'll indeed see another Terminator movie, contrary to all the current doomsayers. I'll look forward when that happens to reviewing that movie, and putting in a link to this one.

The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Friday, December 30, 2016

Terminator Genisys: You Know What? I Liked It

With 2016 coming to a close, I thought it was long past time that I saw - and reviewed - Terminator Genisys, released in 2015, the 5th movie in the Terminator saga, in which a lot of the action takes place in early 2017.

The movie did ok at the box office, better worldwide, but not enough to be fast-tracked by Paramount for sequels, which nonetheless may be still be made. It was panned by many critics. I had lots of problems with it, but also thought it had some redeeming elements. I loved the first two Terminator movies, the third almost as much, and enjoyed the fourth (though a lot of people didn't - enjoy the fourth, that is). I also enjoyed and reviewed the television series. See the links below. All told, given this history and the bright parts of Genisys, I'd definitely like to see more sequels.

Here's what wasn't so hot in the movie: A lot of the dialog is ridiculous, such as Sarah Connor saying "bite me". A lot of the acting - including Emilia Clarke from Game of Thrones playing Sarah - was nothing special, either. She was no Linda Hamilton or Lena Headey (TV series) in the role.

Here's what I liked: Arnold Schwarzenegger reprising his Terminator role, in fact as a young, middle-aged, and old version of him/itself. He did this with just the right mix of seriousness, wooden style, and humor - including a smile he is trying to convey, to make himself seem more human, but which only makes him more frightening, right in the uncanny valley. The plot around this Terminator is good, too.

And the same for the overall storyline. There's respect for paradoxes of travel to the past, attempts to explain how someone could remember a history which his or her action had eliminated, and some good twists regarding heroes and villains. And the Genisys being Skynet, drawing a connection between our social media giants and the emergence of Skynet, was a nice touch, too.

J. K. Simmons also was excellent as an older detective who had an encounter with our heroes when he was a young cop, and Jason Clarke as John Connor was pretty good, too.

So, yeah, I'm down for another movie or two or more. Emilia Clarke says she won't be back - sorry, but she's much better in Game of Thrones. Our growing 24/7 immersion in social media - which I actually think is mostly a good thing - makes the Skynet story, especially now as Genisys, more relevant than ever. Hey, maybe my enjoyment of social media is part of the very problem that made our species so vulnerable to Skynet. But I'm not worried - as long as there's a good Arnold-Terminator model on hand to help us out.

See also Terminator Salvation: A Compelling Time Travel Story Nonetheless

and also my reviews of The Sarah Connor Chronicles 2.1 Cameron's Back ... 2.2 Firing on All Cylinders ... 2.3 Who, Truly, Is Agent Ellison? ... 2.4: Meet Allison ... 2.5: Unpacking the Future ... 2.6: Terminator Mom, Human Daughter ... 2.7: The Saving Robbery and Cromartie ... 2.8 Perspectives and Death ... 2.9: An Idiot's Guide to Time Travel in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... 2.10: Riley Lashes Out at Facebook ... 2.11: Cameron Meets A. E. Housman and Andre Bazin ... 2.12 Sarah Connor Chronicles in Triple Time ... 2.13: Space, Time, and Blogging in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... 2.18: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and the Life of Riley ... 2.20: Sarah Connor vs. Death in Two Forms ... 2.21: Profound Lessons from a Kidnapping in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 2 Finale

And from Season 1: The Sarah Connor Chronicles 1 and 2 ... 3 ... 4. A Robot Primer ... 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8-9

time traveling a little further back in history ...

Monday, December 2, 2013

Almost Human 1.4: Almost Breaking Bad

A top notch Almost Human 1.4 tonight - I've been saying that about every episode - in which the nerdy roboticist Rudy makes like Walter White, or pretends to be like Mr. White, except in Rudy's case a master chef of the bends, the futuristic equivalent of blue meth.

Of course, Rudy isn't at all like Walter White, in that Rudy is operating entirely within the law not outside it. But it's beginning to become dangerously clear on Almost Human - which is to say, clearly captivating television - that we cannot completely know who is ultimately good and bad. Certainly not with a new character, a captain who struts on the scene, played by Benito Martinez, who also played a captain in The Shield, one of the best series ever on television. In The Shield, Martinez's captain is usually good but by no means always. In tonight's Almost Human, he's just bad bad bad - a police captain who is king pin of the bends drug ring - which almost leads to Rudy's demise.

Kennex and Dorian and even Rudy prevent that, and Dorian in particular gives us an excellent scene reminiscent of The Terminator, in which he fights the bad captain's bad robot. The robot has the braun, but Dorian has the brains, and gets the better of the braun in the end.

The mix of futuristic feel and gutteral humor continues to appeal, especially the literally live food that we see Kennex eating in a sushi bar at the beginning of the episode. Years ago, I was in a sushi place in Riverdale, NY - a take out joint - and the sushi chef tried to talk me into taking a live, wriggling clam home for dinner, or as part of it. I knew my wife would be less than thrilled, but, truthfully, I said no because I couldn't quite wrap my head around eating anything live. But I always regretted that decision, and so it was good to see Kennex go for it, so I could at least relate to eating live vicariously.

That's the kind of series Almost Human is - strange, compelling, and unexpected in its rush of details. It may be a new kind of television - at least, for the traditional networks.

#SFWApro

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Dexter 7.5: Terminator Isaac

Deb continues to be torn between supporting Dexter in Dexter 7.5 and declaring she wants nothing to do with her white knight / serial killer brother. This time it's that she doesn't like lying to Batista. But she does a great job in protecting Dex against an incriminating photo from a case long ago, as LaGuerta continues to pursue her hope/hunch that Doakes is not the Bay Harbor Butcher after all.

This continues to be a superb season, because the above is only one of three excellent threads.

Dex and Hannah would be the second. As I mentioned in an earlier review, she's a perfect romantic interest for Dexter, looking like Rita and Lumen, and actually, better, if you ask me. But in a very interesting - and thoroughly true-to-the-logic of Dexter twist - it turns out he's interested in her because he's discovered she helped her serial-killing boyfriend in his killing, to the point of killing one of his victims herself. She thus has become a suitable target of Dexter, who has actually gone a bit long without a thoroughly Dexterian kill. Still ... I'd rather see him bed with than kill Hannah.

I'm thinking that Dexter might figure out a way to use Hannah to dispose of Isaac in the end. Isaac's proved to be far more than a ruthless Russian mob boss. When Dexter sets him up to be killed by a bar-full of Colombian drug dealers, Isaac turns the tables and kills them all by himself. Deb dubs him the Terminator.

Isaac ends this episode behind bars, but, like the Arnold, this terminator will definitely be back, as Dexter takes on not only him but potentially LaGuerta - who, as Deb astutely says, likely won't be stopped in her pursuit of the real Bay Harbor Butcher by Deb's removal of the incriminating photographic evidence.

See also Dexter Season 7.1-3: Sneak Preview Review and Dexter 7.4: The Lesson in Speltzer's Smoke

"As a genre-bending blend of police procedural and science fiction, The Silk Code delivers on its promises." -- Gerald Jonas, The New York Times Book Review

Friday, June 24, 2011

Falling Skies

Caught the first two episodes of TNT's Falling Skies. Quite good.

More like The Walking Dead and The Terminator than V - much closer to the ground - Falling Skies is probably most like H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds. Steven Spielberg had a hand in both the 2005 movie version of War of the Worlds and the new Falling Skies, which so far looks considerably better than the movie.

It's good to see Noah Wyle back on television, best known for his great work in ER. Moon Bloodgood, in such shortlived science fiction gems as Daybreak and Journeyman - seriously - and on the cover of Maxim, too, plays a pediatrician with the freedom fighters. The rest of the cast is also good and believable.

The most-of-humanity-wiped-out motif is not an easy one to bring to a television series, despite the success of The Walking Dead, at least so far. Come to think of it, Battlestar Galactica succeeded with this, too - except out in space not with alien invaders down on Earth - though its success, unfortunately, was more with critics than big numbers of viewers. If television's prime advantage is to provide a little relief and release from the hard day, you can see why apocalyptic stories have such a tough time of it. On the other hand, it's not as if Criminal Minds is such a joy ride, and it's generally a winner in the ratings.

Well, I'll be watching Falling Skies even its ratings fall, which, with any luck, will move in the opposite direction.

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The Plot to Save Socrates
"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Friday, January 1, 2010

Terminator Salvation: A Compelling Time Travel Story Nonetheless

I saw Terminator Salvation on DVD last night, and, contrary to the ton of criticism and weak box office it received last summer, I thought the movie was pretty good - powerful, intellectually provocative, with fine action scenes. It was not as good as the first two Terminator movies, to be sure, but it was better in some ways that the third Terminator, and makes an important contributor to the overall Terminator story and lore.

The action takes place at a time in the future when John Connor is high in the resistance command, but has not yet taken command, and has not yet sent Kyle Reese back to save Sarah Connor from the bad Arnold T-800 Terminator. But the most compelling character is someone/something new - Marcus Wright, first seen as a prisoner being executed in 2003 (before the rise of the machines), but who turns up in the future in the same time as John Connor. Turns out Marcus hasn't time traveled, though. He's been rebuilt into a half-human, half-machine - a cyborg - but by whom? And for what purpose? With the characteristics of both human and machine, Marcus makes for the perfect infiltrator - he can pass as human (until a machine-killing mine unveils him), and as a machine (able to pass Skynet scans). If the humans had created him, Marcus would be an ideal destroyer of Skynet, and vice versa. The denouement hinges of what Marcus really is, and is played out just right.

There's no time travel in this Terminator movie, which for me is unfortunate, but the John Connor we see has lived through the earlier Terminator movies - he knows he will later have to send Kyle back to save his mother, and become his father - and this makes Kyle, a teenager at this time, the person to most need protection and saving in this story. Early on, we and John Connor learn that John is the second most wanted human on Skynet's hit list, and Kyle is the first. Which makes sense, because if Skynet kills John Connor but leaves Kyle alive, he could conceivably still go back in time and father another John Connor with Sarah. Thus, even though there is no time travel per se in this story, it informs the story in a way that makes it a fine, harrowing, paradoxically pummeling time travel narrative anyway. (One of my commentators in this blog, "radabad," wonders why Skynet didn't just kill Kyle when it had him in custody, instead of using Kyle as lure to get John. See my response, in the 5th comment below.)

No mention is made of any of The Sarah Connor Chronicles in Terminator Salvation, but nothing in the movie contradicts what we saw on television for two years, and we do get to see a good minute of bad Arnold in the movie. All in all, if you're a Terminator and/or time travel buff, I highly recommend Terminator Salvation. Don't listen to the critics. They don't know it, but they were probably programmed to dislike it.

See also reviews of The Sarah Connor Chronicles 2.1 Cameron's Back ... 2.2 Firing on All Cylinders ... 2.3 Who, Truly, Is Agent Ellison? ... 2.4: Meet Allison ... 2.5: Unpacking the Future ... 2.6: Terminator Mom, Human Daughter ... 2.7: The Saving Robbery and Cromartie ... 2.8 Perspectives and Death ... 2.9: An Idiot's Guide to Time Travel in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... 2.10: Riley Lashes Out at Facebook ... 2.11: Cameron Meets A. E. Housman and Andre Bazin ... 2.12 Sarah Connor Chronicles in Triple Time ... 2.13: Space, Time, and Blogging in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... 2.18: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and the Life of Riley ... 2.20: Sarah Connor vs. Death in Two Forms ... 2.21: Profound Lessons from a Kidnapping in The Sarah Connor Chronicles ... The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 2 Finale

And from Season 1: The Sarah Connor Chronicles 1 and 2 ... 3 ... 4. A Robot Primer ... 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8-9

The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Avatar in Science Fiction Perspective

My wife and I just came back from Avatar in iMax-3D. I guess I'm partial to any stories about Alpha Centauri - my second novel, Borrowed Tides, is about a one-way trip there, and Pandora in Avatar is a moon thriving with life around a gas giant planet circling Alpha Centauri A - but I think Avatar sets the gold standard for sheer beauty, visual imagery, and excitement in a science fiction or fantasy movie, standards previously held by the Star Wars and Lord of the Rings sagas. The attention to botanic detail, and for that matter all the beings, sentient and nearly so on Pandora, was a breathtaking sight to behold.

Avatar's story has a lot in common with Star Wars and Lord of the Rings, too. Good people or beings, in tune with nature, beset by a cruel, military force bent on taming, and if not, destroying the gentler souls. Indeed, many of the best battle scenes in Avatar come right out of Star Wars, and the single star fighters taking on huger cruisers, and Lord of the Rings, with Frodo and allies fighting the bruisers and monsters hurled against them by the evil lords, and the good beings all rallying in the end. There are echoes of Harry Potter as well as Lord of the Rings, too, with heroes flying great winged creatures, and of Terminator, with killing machines which also recall what the Empire used to attack the Ewoks in Star Wars.

In Star Wars, humans are pretty much equally distributed between heroes and villains, and the same is true of magical beings in Lord of the Rings. In Avatar, the humans are mostly bad, and the in-tune alien Navi on Pandora are all good.

This has led some critics to characterize the movie as an attack on humanity, and, because the ugliest Marines in the movie all have American accents, as an attack on America and American values. If this is so, it would be an attack on America in the 19th century, when Americans of European descent subjugated and wiped out most of the Native Americans on behalf of our selfish commercial interests. In that sense, Avatar was in many ways more like a Western, a cowboy and Indian movie, than a science fiction story - though the two genres are closely related. But seeing as how America in the 20th and 21st centuries has for the most part only gone to war when first attacked, or in attempt to preempt an attack, rightly or wrongly foreseen, the bad guys in Avatar bear little resemblance to us, and certainly not much to our current, professed ideals.

The most original part of the story concerned humans taking alien form, itself a science fiction chestnut in many a story, novel, and Star Trek episode. In fact, the story told in Avatar seemed more like an extended Star Trek episode than any of the individual Star Wars or Lord of the Rings movies. The human dynamics were also reminiscent of Star Trek, with Jake (the human hero) disobeying orders much like Kirk, and also falling in love with an alien.

But the women in Avatar were stronger than the women in Star Trek, and the heroine reminded me of Padme in Star Wars, especially when she literally lent a hand to killing the vicious Marine colonel. Speaking of Marines, that aspect of Avatar was reminiscent of Starship Troopers, though in that movie our Marines were all good guys, fighting marauding tank-sized and bigger bugs that attacked humanity.

So, all in all, James Cameron's Avatar was a splendidly rendered, multi-derivative science fiction movie - well worth seeing, in iMax-3D if you can, if your eyes and soul delight in visual magic, and/or if you just like science fiction. And, hey, Lost fans - you'll love seeing Ana Lucia in action again.

6-min podcast review of Avatar

*Note added January 17, 2009: Delighted that Avatar just won the Golden Globe!

**Note added January 18, 2009: See The Planets of Alpha Centauri: The Hunt for Pandora for a good summary of current attempts to find real worlds there.

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Tuesday, October 7, 2008

The Sarah Connor Chronicles 2.5: Unpacking the Future

Another prime Episode - 2.5 - of The Sarah Connor Chronicles last night, in which we get to see Kyle Reese in the future.

Kyle, of course, is John Connor's father and Derek Reese's brother. He was the heart and soul, in many ways, of the very first Terminator movie. Last night, we get to see Kyle and Derek in the future, along, with Martin Bedell (memorably played by Will Rothhaar).

Bedell is leading a mission to save John Connor and other prisoners. Kyle and Derek are his right-hand men. Skynet would love to wipe Bedell out of existence, so the mission never existed.

Skynet sents an Arnold-type terminator back to 2008 - a very nice touch, since it was of course the original Arnold who was hunting Sarah in the first Terminator movie. Excellent action as young Bedell and older Derek beat the terminator in 2008, with young John Connor's help. Also a fine little time-travel loop here, as the experience of killing this terminator convinces Bedell not to leave military school.

Sarah gets in some good time with another Martin Bedell in 2008 - a younger boy with the same name. I wonder if he'll have some role in the future. And Catherine Weaver reveals herself, once again, as the deadly liquid terminator model she is, while drawing Agent Ellison into the process. (He says "nucular" rather than "nuclear" at some point ... first non-obviously-Republican I've heard say this, but that's another story.)

And in the future ... well I won't tell you what happens to Bedell, if you haven't yet seen this episode.

Suffice to say it's one of the best episodes this season, in what is continuing to be a top-notch season indeed.

See also 2.1 Cameron's Back ... 2.2 Firing on All Cylinders ... 2.3 Who, Truly, Is Agent Ellison? ... 2.4: Meet Allison ... 2.6: Terminator Mom, Human Daughter, Questions

Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

The Sarah Connor Chronicles: 3

Episode 3 of The Sarah Connor Chronicles was excellent, and brought back most of the exciting complexity of the pilot.

First, to bring these reviews up to speed - because my intro review was non-spoiler - our trio of heroes used a time machine in the bank to travel to our present. Which opens up all sort of possibilities.

And the trio is Sarah, John, and beautiful Cameron Phillips (yes, homage to James), a new terminator model played fetchingly and cold-bloodedly, sweetly as in innocent and angel of death, as needed, by Summer Glau. Cameron is a fine addition to the Terminator crew, and even brings some continuing lines of humor to the story, as Sarah reminds Cameron in just about every episode to keep her clothes on when at home. (Sarah doesn't John want to get too attracted and who knows what else to Cameron. I say - go for it, John.)

But don't let the humor fool you. Episode 3 and The Sarah Connor Chronicles in general are deadly serious, and grapple with profound moral dilemmas much like Battlestar Galactica - which, come to think of it, bears a kinship to the Terminator universe, if only because of the flesh-and-blood and "toaster" model interplay that characterizes both series, in different ways. (And Bear McCreary also does the superb music for both series.)

The moral issue in tonight's Episode 3 of The Sarah Connor Chronicles is as wrenching as it gets: should Sarah kill a guy who is working on a life-like chess program, which could well be the basis of the killing machines. Of course, one of the conceits of all the Terminator movies is that, however much we humans and good Terminators try to prevent Skynet from arising, something always slips through someone's fingers in the past or present, and Skynet happens anyway. Still, it's fun to play this game, and when you add into the mix that stopping Skynet will likely erase Cameron (Phillips not James) from existence, and we wouldn't really want that - she's much more lovable than Arnold - we get a nice, complex story. (By the way, is it only me, or do you feel like you might be using something connected to Skynet every time you make a call or IM on Skype?)

And there are other dangerous things brewing in this series - including a really bad Terminator (maybe the bad Terminator from T2) who is trying to get some meat on him, and sort of reminds me a little of Darth Vader, another good movie resonance.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles is touching a lot of good bases, juggling a lot of flaming pins, and I'm very much looking forward to more.

See also: The Sarah Connor Chronicles 1 and 2 ... 4: A Robot Primer ... 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8-9: Terminate with Puzzles, Surprises, and Soul

Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

Monday, January 21, 2008

The Sarah Connor Chronicles: 1 and 2

Well, I wasn't going to watch and review it. I didn't want to disrupt my recollection and appreciation of Terminator 1 and 2, which I thought were superb, or even Terminator 3, which I also enjoyed. That, and I don't think movies shrink very well to the television screen. For every Stargate and Buffy, in which the television was far better than the movie, you have tens of Alien Nation, Blade, Animal House, Dirty Dancings.

On the other hand, the Terminator stories are about time travel. And that, as readers here know, is a pretty big hand, for me. And I heard some good things about The Chronicles...

So I saw the first two episodes on Fox's On Demand online website last night.

And I thought they were excellent. The pilot, in fact, is one of the best hours of television I've seen in the past few months - meaning, it's right up there with the best of Journeyman and The Wire. And the second episode was powerful and appealing, too.

The story in The Chronicles starts after T2. Sarah, played by Lena Headey (of 300 fame), is living quietly with her fiancé and son John in the midwest. One of the problems with any remake is new acting talent playing a character whose face and mannerisms belong to another. It's still hard to imagine anyone other than Linda Hamilton as Sarah, but Lena Headey's performance is strong and convincing.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles also has lots of nice attention to detail. Sarah's fiancé - Charley Dixon - is played by Dean Winters, who looks a lot like Kyle Reese/Michael Biehn. Makes sense that Sarah would be attracted to the same kind of man.

There are some fine jolts in the plot, which I won't give away in this review, except to say think more Terminator models and, of course, time travel - but done with surprise and panache.

And Lost fans - Penny (Sonya Walger) has a continuing role in the Chronicles! I hope she hasn't given up searching for Desmond, but she's certainly better off without that cold fish she was married to in Tell Me You Love Me.

I'll be watching The Sarah Connor Chronicles on Fox, reviewing them right here on Infinite Regress, and after giving you a chance to see the first two episodes (which play nicely on Fox's web site), I'll start discussing significant plot elements with spoilers in the reviews - that will be later tonight, after I see Episode 3 at 9pm.

It's good to have The Terminator story back on the screen. It always had a unique blend of mostly breathtaking action and a sprinkle of winning humor. The Chronicles has that, too.

In one telling scene, a bad Terminator is about to smash into a bank. He notices lots of police, bristling with weapons, out front. His screen quickly sizes them up, and we see a brief advisory - "no threat".

The police are no threat - that's the kind of thing I like to see in a story...

See also The Sarah Connor Chronicles 3 ... 4: A Robot Primer ... 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8-9: Terminate with Puzzles, Surprises, and Soul

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Sunday, July 1, 2007

Live Free and Die Hard: Great Movie!

I saw Live Free and Die Hard with my son this afternoon, and loved it! (He did, too.)

It was an especially satisfying and appropriate movie, in this the weekend of the iPhone.

Some background and explanation -

1. I thought the first Die Hard movie was superb, the second excellent (meaning, not quite as good as the first), and the third very good. I'd rate the fourth - Die Hard and Live Free - as definitely better than the 2nd and 3rd, perhaps as good as the first, and in some ways, even a little better.

2. This movie had a James Bond and Terminator feel - two different things, of course - but LF&DH had them both. Bruce Willis (John McClane) was a little smoother than in the previous movies (and Daniel Craig was a little rougher in the most recent Bond, which drew the two characters and performances closer). The Terminator quality - by which I mean getting up from an explosive fire burning all around you - was also in the previous movies, but was more pronounced and effectice in LF&DH. One of my favorite scenes had Bruce taking on a figher jet - from the ground - and doing pretty well for himself.

2a. McClane also has a heightened MacGyver quality in this movie, harnessing the little and big technologies around him, making them work in ways against the villain, when hands and feet and guns are not enough.

3. Justin Long was fine as Matt Farrell, the (at first, reluctant) hacker sidekick. If you think Long really looked the part, you'd be right - he's the "I'm a Mac" guy in the Mac-PC commercials. He also looks somewhat like Kevin Rose of Digg fame, but people sometimes think my "looks like"s are a little off...

4. Timothy Oliphant was a good, tough, highly intelligent bad guy for McClane - following the tradition of the other Die Hards - and his bad girl friend, played by Maggie G - was hot, as well only almost as bad, tough, and viciously intelligent as Oliphant.

5. The true meaning of the movie: Farrell at some point explains to McClane that although so much of our lives and jobs is conducted online, there are still essential off-line components. This not only plays a major role in the movie, but symbolizes McClane - it takes his analog, real-world attributes to combat an ingenious and ruthless cyber-villain (who also understands that the real payoffs may be offline). In other words, there are some things even an iPhone can't do.

Hey, I like this lesson so much, I even wrote a book about it in 2003 - Realspace: The Fate of Physical Presence in the Digital Age.

But you won't need to read it to see Live Free and Die Hard - it's great on its own.

Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

"challenging fun"
- Entertainment Weekly

e-mail received from a reader:
Dear Paul, I just dreamed of airships flying between raindrops. I just returned from 2042 CE, where I sold my hardcover copy of The Plot to Save Socrates for seventy million Neo-Euros, because it had your response to this e-mail from way back in 2007 scotch-taped onto the inside of the cover. A Paul Levinson collector paid top Neo-Euro, because of the authentic archaic e-mail printout from you. It turns out that not many of your e-mails from before your tenure as CEO of HBO/Cinemax and terms as United Nations Secretary General will survive that far into the future. So, please respond to this e-mail, to help found my great-grandchildren's fortune. My Will will stipulate that they must share with your great grandchildren. Thanks! Tom

I of course happily replied...

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