Media Round-Up: April – May

I got this idea when I was doing another post and mentioned how many Blu-Rays I picked up recently, I said in that writing that I may do an entire article just on those purchases. That’s where this comes in. Rather than tacking on my media consumption and recreational viewing habits to unrelated posts, I thought I might just do a sort of catch-all, rounding up all the media I’ve picked up or taken in over a one to two month period. So, let’s begin.

Blu-Ray Purchases

Wow, that’s a lot of stuff when I list it out like that. In my defense, I’m not making any more purchases for a while and a lot of these I got a good deal on. Pretty eclectic mix. A lot of practical effects/genre film/b-movie oriented stuff in there. Most of these are from the 80’s and 90’s as well, with a couple outliers that are older (G.I. Samurai) and newer (Tokyo Gore Police). A lot of Asian cinema too, China and Japan, there’s a wealth of stuff from that side of the world that I’d like to see. I prefer dubbed works, for immersion reasons, so those take priority for me; if you don’t mind subtitles though, there’s a treasure trove of cinema for you to check out. My interest in that media started when I was a kid, that’s how I found Hakaider and Kamen Rider; back then, the internet wasn’t like it was today and actual long-form video was hard to come by, so I ended up looking at pictures and reading about things mostly. Those will be nice to finally view in full, in high quality. I’ve included links here, some direct to places you can buy these yourself, others to where you can read about the film and see if it’s even something you’d be interested in. I think it’s fair to say these titles are not for everyone. Even the ones with the widest, most accessible appeal are not inherently crowd pleasing. That said, they’re right up my alley and I’m excited to have them. On this list, I’ve only actually seen a couple of these (Action Jackson I viewed just recently, I’ll get to that down below), the rest will be wholly new to me.

Movies Watched

I didn’t just buy movies, I watched them too! Some of them you’ve heard about in prior posts, most recently though, I saw Over Your Dead Body in the theater and I loved it! Solid performances, twisty narrative, writing that made me laugh and tear up at different times, and then a Chromatics song toward the end; I can’t ask for much more than that. Samara Weaving (two for two this year with Ready Or Not 2), Jason Segel, and Timothy Olyphant all deliver the goods. Really good, highly recommend it.

I also recently watched Drive (re-watched, still great), Crazy, Stupid, Love (re-watched, still great), Lone Wolf McQuade, Action Jackson, Friday The 13th: A New Beginning, and Harley Davidson & The Marlboro Man. None of these newly watched older films blew me away but they were all enjoyable. Lone Wolf McQuade was good but not great, classic Chuck Norris (R.I.P to the legend); strong casting too, with Norris going up against David Carradine. Action Jackson is a solid Carl Weathers (R.I.P to the legend) vehicle with a beautiful supporting cast (Vanity and Sharon Stone never looked better) and fun set pieces, but technical issues involving sound and a lacking narrative bring it down. Friday The 13th Part V is an all-around decent entry but is let down by the ending, which insists upon the death of Jason and continues to reap the Tommy Jarvis protagonist/antagonist seed that was sewn in part IV. Thankfully, Jason lives (literally) in the next installment, and I’m looking forward to that. Harley Davidson & The Marlboro Man was shallow viewing but didn’t offend me either, it was like one long Rock video from the early 90’s; great costumes, nice motorcycles, cheesy dialogue, simple but effective action sequences. It did prove slightly prescient funnily enough, being set in an undisclosed future year, with gas prices almost identical to the ones I’ve seen in my area lately. I can sum it up with a single quote from the film: “It’s better to be dead and cool, than alive and uncool.”, that should tell you everything.

Television Watched

My cup runneth over with television lately, too. There’s been a lot of shows, too many, both week-to-week, new, and returning. I’ve had to set some aside for later viewing because there’s only so much I can take in. I am not one of these consumerist viewers who can binge non-stop, my approach to “binging” is one episode a night of a show, if they’re all available. If they’re not all available, I’m more than happy to tune in once a week. At most, I’ll watch one episode of two to three separate programs at the end of the night, and sometimes I don’t even manage that. After that, I read, and go to bed. That’s the general routine and I’m sticking to it. I’m currently watching the following: Rooster, Hacks, Your Friends & Neighbors, Margo’s Got Money Troubles, Running Point, and The Boys. Yeah, it’s a lot. Thankfully, all but one of these are week to week. I’m “behind” too and haven’t been in a rush to catch up on a couple of them either, so I’ve had some room to breathe. Even so, I’ve had to place some things on the backburner, namely the new season of Beef and new series, Widows Bay. As far as this current viewing palette goes, I’m impressed with all of them and would largely recommend them to anyone. A couple veer closer to comfort viewing than high art, but that’s okay, not everything should be “prestige”; all I ask is that they do their best, entertain me, and hopefully make me feel something.

As for shows that I recently wrapped up, those include Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette, Shrinking, DTF St. Louis, Scrubs, and Big Mistakes. All very good and fairly different for the most part, too. Love Story was typical Ryan Murphy-core but was propped up by an unbelievable soundtrack and some extremely inspired casting choices. Shrinking delivered its third and possibly best season yet, with standout performances from Jason Segel, Jessica Williams, and Harrison Ford. Evidently they’ve got one more in the tank, so here’s hoping they go out strong (unlike Bill Lawrence’s other big Apple title, Ted Lasso, which originally “ended” with a middling third season and one of the most sterile send-offs I’ve ever seen). DTF St. Louis was a well acted, off-beat, enjoyable oddity of a limited series; a great trio of actors make up the main cast and it quite possibly features a career best performance from Jason Bateman. Scrubs (another Bill Lawrence joint, just producing this time) returned with a revival season and it was like hearing from an old friend that you haven’t heard from in many years, yet picking up right where you left off despite all the time that had passed. Not high art, like I mentioned, just a charming workplace sitcom that has returned to the top of the network sitcom heap where it always belonged (in my opinion). Big Mistakes was Dan Levy’s new vehicle, co-created with the lovely and talented Rachel Sennott. It took some time to warm up and get me invested in the characters and their world, but by the end, I was fully in and they stuck the landing big time. Dan plays to his strengths too, exploring family dynamics not unlike Schitt’s Creek did, this time with a more tense, crime comedy backbone.

Books Read

I finished ‘Salem’s Lot and boy, it might have taken me a while, but it was a very good read. I need to check out the adaptations now, see how they did. A great, timeless vampire story and rock solid Stephen King. I won’t call it his best work/my favorite of his but for something so early in his career, he really did accomplish something. I’ve since started my next read, Tender by Mark Childress, which is a fiction novel but essentially an analog for the life and career of Elvis. I’m about 90 pages in and it’s proven to be a smooth, pleasant read for sure. I’d recommend it to any fan of Elvis or any fan of music-related fiction. I’m glad I picked it up, it’s a bit obscure but it’s out there for very cheap. Not sure what my next read will be but my hope is to knock out three or four books at least, I’ll set the goal low this year in hopes of meeting it.

The Last Word

In closing, there’s a lot of great stuff out right now and coming down the line too. I’m planning on seeing Michael and Mortal Kombat II in theaters this month. Next month, I’ve got Masters Of The Universe on the docket as well (the more I see of it, the more excited I get, it just looks like fun and I’m hopeful it does well at the box office). As always, I advise you to go to the theater; it’s been a good year for them so far but movies continue to need our support. I hope to watch some of these Blu-Rays I’ve picked up too, not sure which yet, we’ll see. I’m definitely going to watch Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives this week or next, looking forward to that. I guess that about does it. Watch something from back in the day, watch something new, read something, enjoy yourself.

Thanks for reading.

~ FW.

FAINT WAVES