Medium Mashup

Category: Reviews

Reviews of Movies, TV, and Games

  • Rectify Season 3 Premiere Episodes Review

    rectify

    (The following review covers the first two episodes of Rectify’s third season, and contains spoilers. The premiere aired on July 9th, and the second episode is set to premiere on July 16th. Both episodes are available to watch for free, with no cable subscription, at sundance.tv)

    Rectify has never played by the same rules that most televised dramas abide by. Its first season, consisting of only six episodes, was largely averse to plot progression. Instead, the show was more interested in how the release of Daniel Holden, a man convicted of raping and murdering his girlfriend at the age of 19, would affect his family and community. It was certainly a slow burn, but there was an attention to character that is rarely matched in any medium, and the slow reveal of Daniel’s character gave the show the sense of growth that it would otherwise be missing.

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  • Batman: Arkham Knight Review

    (This review is based on the PS4 release of Arkham Knight. I initially purchased the PC version, but the port is so bad that Warner Brothers had it pulled from retailers)

    Of all the games releasing this year, Arkham Knight was probably my most anticipated. The Arkham series was one of my favorites of the last console generation, a franchise that expanded greatly between its first and second release. Arkham Asylum was a terrific take on the “Metroid-vania” gameplay genre, set in a gorgeous and original version of Arkham Asylum. The level design was superb and both primary gameplay types, combat and “predator rooms,” were rock-solid.

    Two years later, Rocksteady released Arkham City, which took the core gameplay components of its predecessor and worked them into an open-world scenario. The result was terrific, with Rocksteady incorporating a “grapnel boost” into Batman’s grapnel gun that, combined with his ability to glide, created a zippy and satisfying way of exploring the city. Warner Bros. followed this up with Arkham Origins two years after, which was more of a step sideways than forward. Few were bothered by this, though; Origins was created by Warner Bros. Games Montreal while Rocksteady prepared their next-gen Batman game, so it was pretty clearly a stop-gap release. The hope was that the next true evolution in the Arkham series would come with Rocksteady’s follow-up.

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  • St. Vincent Review

    St. Vincent

    St. Vincent is a perfectly fine movie. It has some funny dialogue, a strong Bill Murray performance, and is centered on a particular character’s arc. The relationship between Murray’s Vincent and child protagonist Oliver (Jaeden Lieberher) is fun to watch, and it feels like a “complete” story. It doesn’t outright bungle any particular aspect of its narrative and if you’re looking for something to watch, you could certainly do worse.

    But the problem with St. Vincent, like the paragraph above, is that it is unremarkable and by the books. It takes the shape of an emotional dramedy with a flawed protagonist and his young, innocent new friend, but it doesn’t seem to have a unique point of view or any flair to differentiate it from other movies. Despite the best efforts of the cast, St. Vincent lacks the soul to truly elevate it.

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  • Inside Out Review

    inside out

    Pixar has proven over the last decade that they can consistently deliver all-ages movies that are both popular and emotional. A major part of their power comes from Pixar’s mastery of the bittersweet. In their best moments, Pixar overloads its audience with powerful feelings both positive and negative, intertwined in a way that makes it difficult for the viewer to rationalize. In Up, we see the entirety of Carl and Ellie’s life together in a short montage, taking the viewer through a beautifully executed sequence of extreme highs and lows. In Toy Story 3 we watch Andy give away the toys that the series has focused on for all three films, a moment of loss, abandonment, and a new beginning rolled into one. Both moments require a herculean effort on the part of the viewer to hold back tears.

    Given Pixar’s history and proven skill with mixing joy and sadness into potent cinematic moments, it makes perfect sense that their newest film, Inside Out, takes the concept of complex emotional entanglement and makes it the subject. The film attempts to tackle the psychological drives that power us all on a day-to-day basis. In addition to characters representing fear, anger, disgust, joy, and sadness, the movie also tackles the imaginary, our core values, abstract thought, the subconscious, dreams, and long-term memory.

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  • Orange is the New Black – Season 3 Review

    orange-is-the-new-blackOrange Is the New Black was never really intended to be a smash hit. While Netflix threw lots of money into promoting House of Cards, Orange was always positioned as something of an experiment, a low-risk series meant to reach a different section of Netflix’s audience. However, right from its first season, Orange has been a major sleeper hit, continually growing an audience based almost solely on positive word of mouth. At this point it is more successful (and, frankly, better) than House of Cards, and something of a phenomenon for Netflix. It just goes to show that if you write a show driven by empathy for its characters and make it readily available to people, it will find an audience.

    But can Orange Is the New Black keep its quality up now that audiences already know what to expect? Personally, I think so, but there are some indications in the recently-released season three that it may have some obstacles to overcome in its transition from sleeper hit to popular institution.

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