· If you’ve ever entered a contest to touch Paul Bellini, then you’ll probably be thrilled to hear the Kids in the Hall are back, this time with an 8-part mini called Death Comes to Town that will air on CBC. So suck it, America. [Funny or Die]
Popularity: unranked [?]
With regular shows beginning to go on holiday hiatus, you’d think this might be a dull week on television, but you’d be very wrong: Doctor Who marathons! Better Off Ted returning! Lots of disaster movies! We love you, television.
Monday
With Heroes and House both taking a break for the holidays, it falls to Syfy to keep us entertained today, and they’re definitely trying their hardest, with Stargate: The Ark of Truth at 9am, followed by Stargate: Continuum at 11.
Meanwhile, if you went down the rabbit hole last night, you’ll be happy to know that Alice continues (and concludes) at 9pm.
Tuesday
Even if the day wasn’t almost entirely otherwise devoid of SF entertainment, the return of ABC’s Better Off Ted (ABC at 9:30pm) would still be at the top of our to-do list. In the first episode of its new run, the employees of Veridian Dynamics find their thoughts turning to reproduction, as Ted and Linda meet their genetically compatible matches, while Veronica tries to convince Lem to donate to a sperm bank. Oh, Ted. How did we get by without you?
If satires on corporate America are a little too close to the bone, then try the first episode of Outer Space Astronauts on Syfy (also 9:30); it’s a new sitcom set in outer space – Maybe you missed that in the title – but we’re a little worried about it based on the episode description being “Capt. Ripley invites aliens over to the O.S.S. Oklahoma for a pizza dinner, but the aliens want the ship, too.” Uh, hilarity may ensue?
Wednesday
Oh, Syfy. With a Jericho marathon from 8am through 3pm, you know how to spoil us. From there until 9pm, it’s a bit of a science fiction wasteland in terms of things that aren’t re-runs, so consider it the Television God’s way of telling you to leave the house and go and do some holiday shopping or something. Then be back in front of the visual entertainment box in time for 9 o’clock, when Discovery has a new episode of Mythbusters, with Jamie and Adam putting more gunslinging myths to the test.
Thursday
Remember 1990s SF vampire series Kindred: The Embraced? I definitely don’t, but Syfy is looking to remedy my oversight with a marathon of the entire 1996 series starring former Soul Man C. Thomas Howell, starting at 8am.
Otherwise, with FlashForward, Vampire Diaries and Supernatural already in reruns, it falls to Fringe to keep the science fiction flag flying with its new episode “Grey Matters” at 9pm on Fox. Featuring the return of Leonard Nimoy as William Bell:
Friday
Get your day started off in the right way with Syfy’s Outer Limits marathon, starting at 8am. You’ll only wish it was Twilight Zone a couple of times, honest.
Depending on who you believe, there’s either a rerun or new episode of Batman: The Brave and The Bold on Cartoon Network at 7pm (If it’s a new episode, then it’ll be the Plastic Man-guesting “Long Arm Of The Law,” but some schedules have last season’s “Duel of The Double Crossers!” listed. Your guess is as good as mine at this point).
But even if it is a new episode, that might not be enough to steal your attention away from Syfy’s Sanctuary mini-marathon, starting at 7pm and ending with a brand new episode, “Penance,” guest-starring Amanda Tapping’s fellow former Stargate cast member Michael Shanks, at 10pm.
Or you can keep up with the latest double bill of Dollhouse on Fox at 8pm, with the “Meet Jane Doe”/”A Love Supreme” match-up offering Topher discovering the potential effects of science, Echo losing control of her multiple memory downloads, and the return of Alpha.
Once that’s done, you might find yourself switching over to Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow on Cartoon Network at 10pm, just to look at how shiny the whole thing is.
Saturday
It’s All Disaster Movies All Day on Syfy, starting with Earthstorm (9am) before offering up Meteor (11am), miniseries 10.5: Apocalypse (1pm), Ba’al: The Storm God (5pm), Ice Twisters (7pm), Annihilation Earth (9pm) and finishing with Disaster Zone: Volcano in New York at 11pm. Why so many disaster movies? Why not? Over on BBC America, there’s a Doctor Who triple bill of edited versions of “Journey’s End”, “The Next Doctor” and “Planet of The Dead” starting at 7pm, but you should really wait until tomorrow, for reasons you’ll discover in a second.
Sunday
…What’s that, you say? A Doctor Who marathon on BBC America starting at 1pm, including 1hr 15 minute (ie, unedited from U.K. broadcast, apart from ad breaks) versions of The Next Doctor and Planet of The Dead? I thought you’d say yes. The full rundown of episodes is:
1pm: Voyage of The Damned
2pm: Turn Left
3pm: The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End
5:30pm: The Next Doctor
6:45: Planet of The Dead
All of this is a lead-in to next week’s premiere of “The Waters of Mars,” and the following week’s “The End of Time,” of course. But do you care why it’s happening, as long as it’s happening?
Popularity: unranked [?]
It took some work, but four days after the National Board of Review’s list of ‘09 winners left the distinct, chalky aftertaste of WTF in America’s collective mouth (Two Lovers among the year’s 10 best independent films? Come again?), a crisp, refreshing glass of alternative awards news helped rinse the flavor away over the weekend:
Popularity: unranked [?]
Last night’s Fringe gave us a new monster nightmare: giant, tentacled worms that live inside their host until they come bursting out of their faces. But it turns out that not everyone minds an encounter with their fearsome fangs.
The Wormy Horror: This week’s bit of scientific crime centered around a bunch of vaguely Lovecraftian worms with creepy tendrils surrounding a vagina dentata of a mouth. The worms have remarkable healing powers, but they need to be incubated inside a human host. But when the worms mature, they tend to exit their host in the most painful and deadly way possible. There’s a definite Alien vibe to the premise, but Fringe manages to acknowledge it (for a moment, it looks like one such worm might burst through its host’s chest) while changing it up a little bit. Then next time I feel a tickle in the back of my throat, I’m going to think about those skinny tentacles snaking through my nasal passages.
Walter Grows Up: Walter is asserting his independence at last. He’s gone from being unable to sleep alone to choosing his own wardrobe and insisting he can go out without adult supervision. Granted, he’s acting like an eight-year-old crossing the street alone for the first time, but there’s something more tragic here than Walter’s childlike nature. Walter is preparing himself for the day when everyone learns his terrible secret, the day when he’ll lose Peter for good, and maybe Olivia and Astrid to boot.
Never Take the Seasickness Pills: A crew of worm traffickers have found the perfect hosts for their facebursting monsters: Cantonese refugees coming to America by boat. The traffickers infect the refugees by inserting worm larvae into “seasickness” pills and turning their passengers into unwitting worm mules. It’s sort of like the folks who take weight loss pills and end up with an intestine full of tapeworm, except I doubt the refugees’ pills actually cured seasickness.
Walter Can Get High Off of Anything: Seriously. Walter, of course, assumes that the worms must be psychotropic because he can’t imagine any other reason they’d be worth killing so many people for. But the worms’ value isn’t recreational; it’s medical. The worms are the ultimate form of alternative medicine, boosting even the most worn-down immune system. But just because the worms aren’t a drug doesn’t mean Walter can’t enjoy getting bitten, as we see in the clip at the top.
Agent Farnsworth, Is That You?: I get that Astrid’s abilities seem to be largely linguistic and technical, but she is a trained FBI agent. She can’t evade foggy Walter’s notice for a few hours? On a separate note, it’s telling that Walter has started calling her “Agent Farnsworth” instead of some odd variation on her first name.
Kick the Puppy: Also on the “Isn’t Astrid a trained FBI agent?” note, she’s followed back to the lab and fails to notice the tail, then is caught completely unawares by the worm traffickers. This wouldn’t be so odd if it weren’t the second time Astrid has been attacked in the lab. She was attacked and sedated last season — by Walter himself.
Doing Everything the Hard Way: Walter’s experiment in independence hits a snag when he can’t remember Peter’s phone number. Well, to be accurate, he can remember all the digits, but can’t recall the order. When Peter scolds him, reminding Walter he stuck the phone numbers in Walter’s pocket, Walter barely seems to register it. Is Walter — either consciously or unconsciously — rejecting Peter’s paternalistic help? Or does it not even occur to him that there might be a simpler solution to his problems?
Walter Moment of the Week: Walter realizes that it’s his fault that Astrid was attacked; he gave her slip and tipped the traffickers off to the giant worm in his lab. He’s genuinely remorseful, but he responds in a typically over-the-top Walter fashion: he embeds a transponder in his neck so that Peter and Astrid can always locate him electronically. I wonder how this will come into play when the interdimensional tensions heat up.
Popularity: unranked [?]
CAROLINE: I wasn’t that excited for the new movie “Brothers,” starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Natalie Portman and Tobey Maguire, mostly because it seemed a little heavy and melodramatic. Maybe I went in with lowered expectations… because I wound up really, really liking this movie.
RYAN: I went in with much higher expectations and sadly, they were based on my imagination of what this movie would be rather than what it’s actually about. But I still liked it.
CAROLINE: Well, I thought the trailer was pretty self-explanatory. It’s about a guy who comes back from war and has to readjust to his family and how close his wife and brother have become. What part was in your imagination?
RYAN: I was hoping for more fighting and tension between the brothers.
CAROLINE: There definitely is some, no?
RYAN: I know, but it’s not two brothers trying to kill each other for the whole movie, which is what I wanted.
CAROLINE: Maybe you saw a different trailer than the rest of us.
RYAN: Exactly. The performances are all good, but I have to say Tobey Maguire seemed very self-conscious to me. He would widen his eyes and try to look all intense and it was just so obvious that he was “acting.” I thought Natalie and Jake G. were much more natural.
CAROLINE: I was more disturbed by how much weight Tobey lost for this role! He looked so gross. I know he had to for the role, but he’s not exactly a looker to begin with.
RYAN: He took a page from Christian Bale’s “Machinist” experience.
CAROLINE: Natalie Portman was a revelation to me. I usually find her acting atrocious, but she was so good in this movie. She made me cry several times. This film really moved me.
RYAN: Totally. I’ve always liked her even though she’s usually a terrible actress. But she’s great in this, and even I welled up a couple times.
CAROLINE: This movie has some seriously intense moments. If you know someone suffering from PTSD, this will be a very hard movie to watch.
RYAN: There’s one scene at the dinner table that is just unbelievable. It’s the best scene in the movie. I thought it was so realistic. And how amazing was that little girl who plays the older sister? If she plays her cards right, she could be the next Abigail Breslin.
CAROLINE: I thought both kids were great. This movie as a whole really surprised me; it was excellent. I should have known it would be since Jim Sheridan directed it. I loved his movie “In America.”
RYAN: Me too. And it’s nice to see Jake Gyllenhaal in a role that doesn’t emphasize his hotness. Here he’s just a good actor, and he gets to show off his chops.
CAROLINE: Sam Shepard and Mare Winningham play the parents and they’re both great, even though it was weird seeing Mare in a grandma role.
– BOTTOM LINE –
RYAN: I’ve all but sworn off war movies, but this one didn’t bother me; especially since it stars three fine young actors whom I really like. It’s incredibly slow though, to the point where I actually closed my eyes. I still listened though and made my best effort not to doze.
CAROLINE: Really? I never got bored at all. I was riveted throughout.
RYAN: The exciting, intense scenes definitely perked me up and made the movie totally worthwhile.
CAROLINE: It’s just a very real look at the effects of war on a family. There are a few scenes in Afghanistan but it’s much more about coming home from war than an actual war movie, which is a relief. Some people will probably be put off by the topic, but for anyone who can stomach it, it’s really worth seeing. I thought it was great.
– RATING –
Popularity: unranked [?]
