Arrow 'Lian Yu' Review

Part of me wants to just go up to the writers of Arrow and shake their hands and say "good job, ya redeemed it". This whole season part of me was just waiting for that one episode or that one plot twist that was going to just completely ruin the whole season, but it never came, they stayed consistently good...mazel tov.

In this finale we see Oliver at his most desperate, Chase has put together his own evil Team Arrow consisting of Talia Al Ghul, Captain Boomerang and Artemis, so Oliver has to recruit his former enemies to help him including Deathstroke, Nyssa Al Ghul and Malcolm Merlyn. Let's talk about Deathstroke, because I have always been adamant that he was Arrow's best villain, now I'm starting to consider him being Arrow's best character. He joins Oliver after he appeals to his sense of fatherhood, offers him a chance to be united with his son and reminds him of the fact that they were allies at one point. In fact there's a very nice subtle callback to season one of the show where Slade makes it look like he's double crossed Oliver and tells Artemis to point the gun at point blank range, giving Oliver a chance to counter, a manoeuvre Slade taught him back in the first season. It felt so good to see Slade again and it's rather fitting that they save his return for a time where the show is finally good again.

Something I'm curious about is how they'll handle the flashbacks next season, are they going to pull a Lost and do flash-forwards? Will we get flashbacks for other characters? Because being honest the flashbacks only felt necessary half the time, the other half they were very clearly just filler and either didn't tie in thematically or tell a compelling parallel story, but were there to make the 40 minute run time. The flashbacks in this episode while didn't feel completely like they tied in, mostly there just to finish the story, being honest, it was a damn good story. That final scene of Oliver calling his mother is possibly the best performance we've ever seen from Stephen Amell, mostly for how different it is from his usual gruffness, he's a broken man finally able to speak to his family for the first time in 5 years, it was a touching moment and was really well done.

Now for Adrian Chase, I don't recall if Oliver was always able to beat him or if this is just Chase making it easier for him but I really like that Oliver just completely kicked his ass this episode. It is most likely because he wants Oliver to kill him so he puts up as little fight as possible. Though granted at times he was a villain who felt far too much in control, it wasn't to the extent of Ra's Al Ghul where he unrealistically godlike. He was a character who was so adamant in his beliefs and had planned everything out and did it with such sadistic glee, I think that's what makes him a great villain above all else, his personality. He was a psychotic madman but he took so much pleasure in torturing Oliver and bringing him down that I'm willing to overlook some of the more critical elements of him, like his motivation felt rather weak, or the fact that he was always 10 steps ahead somehow. Then of course is him doing the villain cliche of killing himself so he can get the final win, by blowing up Lian Yu with all of Team Arrow on it...GEE, I WONDER IF THEY'RE REALLY DEAD.

This is a weird choice in cliffhanger because we know they're not going to have killed off 90% of the cast off screen in the season finale. I guess the hanging question could be "Oh how did they survive?" but we know there are underground bunkers on the island, that would be my best guess. But what about people who weren't in the group? Artemis? Black Siren? Malcolm? Did they somehow have time to pick all of them up and then rush to a bunker? Oh yeah, speaking of Malcolm, we all know he ain't dead. Rule One of superhero deaths: Unless they die onscreen, they ain't really dead. Rule Two: Even if they do, they'll get better. But regardless it makes for a good closure on Ollie's life, 5 years of flashbacks of him on the island to end with the island itself being destroyed.

Like I said at the start of this review, I was surprised by how consistently good this season of Arrow was, but that's not to say it was fully consistent. I'm still pissed about Ragman and how they just got rid of him so unceremoniously, and how they screwed up Artemis as a character (And also forgot about her for a while), and hey, what ever happened to The Vigilante? But overall the writing seemed a lot more well thought out. Chase made for a great villain, everything tied in thematically to fatherhood and coming full circle with the 5 year journey, the romance took a back seat, the fight scenes are still really well done and we were able to avoid some of the dreaded cliches that plagued the past few seasons. While I'm not sure this season is as good as season two, I could definitely see it being on par with season one. Though I do think some people are blowing the quality of this season out of proportion just because of how much better it is than the past two seasons.

I'm giving this finale an 8/10.

And I'm giving the season as a whole a 7/10.

-Danny

The Flash 'Finish Line' Review

I knew it. I goddamn fucking knew it. You couldn't do it. You didn't have the balls to do it. You couldn't kill off Iris and given Barry a huge emotional obstacle to overcome and have proven that he can't be consumed by the darkness...but you find a way to give him something else to redeem him. There's an irony here, last season Barry acted fine until the last episode where he went completely out of character, this season was the reverse, he acts out of character until the last episode. With no options left, he tries the one thing someone consumed by darkness would never do, show compassion. He offers Savitar a chance, a chance to live a normal life, to be redeemed, to present him with the possibility that they don't have fight, and for a second there, Savitar even starts to consider it. But in the end, Savitar represents everything Barry should never be, so of course he doesn't take the offer and they have to have a final duel in which Team Flash wins. But it doesn't end there, the speed force needs a prisoner, if it can't be Savitar, another speedster needs to take his place, and Barry willingly sacrifices himself to the speed force. This is an idea that I suggested weeks ago back when Jay initially stayed in the speed force. Barry needs to be punished, even if he does the right thing in the end, he has spent a whole year being selfish, idiotic or reckless, he needs to make a sacrifice, he needs to show why he's a hero and we got that, we finally have Barry making the selfless choice.

Now that being said, there are of course some issues with this episode, most notably is all the bizarre moments of our heroes hesitating to kill. The first one was during the fight between Cisco and Caitlin where it looked like Cisco was about to kill her but hesitated...when was he ever going to kill her? When was that even remotely an option that Cisco had considered? Caitlin's his oldest friend, he's the one that would go farther than anyone else to help her, the idea of killing her would never even cross his mind, why the random moment of hesitation? Then there is a very similar moment where Barry was about to kill Savitar, but he didn't because he would never turn himself over to the darkness like that. Guys. Barry has already killed multiple times in this show! Atom Smasher, Sand Demon, Tar Pit, it wasn't a big deal for any of them, plus he was more than willing to kill Reverse-Flash, stop acting like this is a big deal for him anymore or that it would affect him in any way. Wasn't the idea that Iris' death was the only thing that could turn Barry dark?

Oh yeah, speaking of, Iris didn't die, they didn't go through with it. Instead they killed H.R. Because I guess they realised "yeah he was kinda useless". Which is not to say he was season-one-Iris bad, but he didn't contribute nearly as much as the two prior Wells'. Every so often he made a contribution by giving an out of the box idea, but sacrificing himself to save Iris was probably the biggest contribution he made as a character and as bad as it might be to say, I won't miss him, and hope the next Wells will give more.

Now, the season as a whole...it was a fucking mess. This is quite possibly the worst characterisation of Barry Allen I have ever seen, nothing about him was heroic. This person was selfish, moronic, hypocritical and made so many bad choices yet nothing of consequence ever came of it. It was a season of everyone telling him how much he fucked up but "gosh darn it he's trying!". Savitar as a villain was a fine enough concept, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who is sick to death of the speedster villains, for the love of god give us something new. Caitlin was either resorted yet again to another stupid love interest subplot or was inexplicably a villain (They still haven't explained why her ice powers made her evil). Pretty much everyone else had a strong season, Wally was finally useful (Hallelujah!), Cisco is now a superhero so good for him, and Joe is still the strong, supportive father figure that he's always been. A show like this lives or dies based on its main character and this season, The Flash was an awful protagonist, if this was my introduction to him I would never want to follow someone as awfully written as this. The Flash deserves better than this guys, fix it.

This isn't to say the season as a whole was irredeemable. Some of the standalone episodes were absolutely fantastic, in particular 'Attack on Gorilla City' and 'Duet'. When the show embraced the silly and over the top comic book nature and just fully embraced everything about the superhero genre without a smidge of embarrassment is when this show is at its best. Though in reality, a series where the standalone episodes are better than the season long plot is rarely a good thing. I want this show to get better because to me, season one of The Flash is still the best thing DC TV has ever produced. There are certainly good things about this season, but whenever I think about it, I'm only ever going to think about how awful Barry was as a character, and that's not a good thing.

The finale I'm giving a 6/10.

The season overall I'm giving a 5/10.

-Danny

Supergirl 'Nevertheless, She Persisted' Review

Well, I gave the finale of Legends of Tomorrow this treatment, only fair I do it for the others as well. This week I'll be giving individual reviews of the finales of each DCW show and my thoughts on the seasons overall. And in a shocking turn of events, Supergirl is up first.

I'll give this episode one thing, it feels like a season finale, they pulled out all the big stops, alien invasion, returning heroes like Superman & Miss Martian, ending with some major character and plot progression with a hint of what's to come for season three. Honestly I'm just really impressed with what they did with the invasion, it felt huge, and everyone got a moment to shine and be a badass. Except for maybe Maggie but...well she's a cop, probably can't do much compared to aliens and secret agents. But with that being said, it still sort of felt like a standard invasion that we've seen plenty of times before in superhero stories, especially DC. Hell, this isn't even the first alien invasion we've had in the DCW this year. Part of me is just desensitised to it now.

The real highlight for me was the final conversation between Cat Grant and Kara, the bond between them is genuine and touching, and her speech about wearing emotions on their sleeves is what makes them strong holds some genuine truth. Also they finally admitted she knows Kara's Supergirl because boy she is not good at keeping that a secret. That's something upon reflection of the show as a whole is that the bond between the characters seems very genuine. All of the DC Shows reflect a different type of group, Team Arrow feel like co-workers, Team Flash like best friends, and the Legends are the dysfunctional family. Supergirl's case is the perfectly healthy nuclear family (Except with aliens).

Though really this is kind of a difficult season for me to come to a consensus on. It's certainly much better than last season, the characters have stronger relationships, the writing is more consistent, the episodes more memorable. But there's still clearly an unbalance in the main plot, as if this season couldn't really decide what it wanted to be about. At one point Cadmus were the villains, then it was the Daxamites, and somewhere in there all the stuff about the martians came and went with no real conclusion. The only real plot that had a consistent focus and structure was the romance between Alex and Maggie, which I'm sure most people will walk away from thinking that was the best part, and it's easy to see why. It got the perfect amount of screentime, never overshadowed anything else, didn't come across as forced and is adds more diversity to the series. That's another thing I can say about this season, it is certainly the most socially aware of the DCW shows, with plenty of relevant social commentary and reflections of real world issues. Even down to the title of this episode is in reference to US Senator Elizabeth Warren. It does put more effort into what it's series is saying and I respect that.

However then there are the subplots that really don't work. The main one being James playing superhero, which I have complained about numerous times. He doesn't make a good superhero, he only does it so he can feel useful, his contribution is minimal, he constantly goes against the logical and sensible thing to do. He's the definition of a vigilante, he takes the law into his own hands and decides on his own brand of justice and we're supposed to support him even though he's being selfish, irresponsible and dumb. Then there is the romance with Mon-El which while I don't hate nearly as much as some people, I can't disagree when they say this is clearly a messed up character. He's manipulative-even if he doesn't know it-he constantly contradicts himself, he's selfish and was pretty much made irredeemable when he so casually says he misses living on a world where he was allowed to be misogynistic.

This season may have had its misses, but in my opinion I think it had just as many hits, if not more. There's been a large improvement from the first season, it's more entertaining, has best character relationships, features more of my favourite characters from the comics that just give me a big ol' smile.

The finale I give a 7/10.

The season overall I also give a 7/10.

-Danny

DC TV Weekly #23

Supergirl 'Resist' Review
Wow. I guess I'm a Cat Grant fan. You never realise how much you like something until it's gone. She disappears at the start of the season and shows up for the finale to be sassy and cool in front of everyone and I honestly loved it. No joke, I had a huge grin on my face when she showed up in the middle of a debate between President Wonder Woman and Queen Bitchface-and within a millisecond was already done with everyone's shit, that's pretty badass. That being said it seems this series is suffering from the same finale syndrome other DC Shows have, that being, having the same finale over and over again. Now granted, this isn't the finale yet, but an alien invasion focused specifically in National City and humanity regaining control through a televised speech about hope? The similarities are there. I will say this is certainly the best we've seen Supergirl in a while, not to say she's been poorly written or anything, but after saving the day she still goes through the extra effort of offering Mon-El's mum (Yeah I never learned her name, she's kinda boring) a chance at surrender, which is a very Supergirl thing to do. Unfortunately that's all I have to say. The story was structured the same as the finale last year, Cat Grant was awesome but it's an episode that can be written off as just standard. Enjoyable. But standard. 7/10.

The Flash 'Infantino Street' Review
A season of dicking around, Barry acting out of character and a season long story arc that I really couldn't care about and here we are, the penultimate episode, and I have one request. Go through with it. You have killed off Iris, don't you dare have Barry travel back in time, or bring in an Iris from another world, or somehow heal this one, go-through-with-it. Show that you still know how to write Barry Allen. Savitar's main goal was to break Barry, corrupt him, make him desperate enough that we'd believe he could turn into a villain. Everything has lead to this, Flashpoint, Savitar, time travel, let this be the absolute lowest Barry can be, let him be in pain, let him feel failure, let him accept that he can't change things, and have him recover. That's what I want our next episode to be. I want Barry to defeat Savitar without corrupting himself. I want him to admit he can't change things because he's spent a whole season trying to break the rules and be told how big of a fuck up he is. You want to make up for that? Well you've put him in the worst position he could possibly be in, have him push back. Don't take the easy way out, let the season end with him defeated Savitar but be depressed over the death of Iris, and use the time in between seasons as a chance for him to recover. I'm not saying he has to be back to his happy self for season four, but have him grow up. In fact, I'm not going to rate this episode. Because the quality of this depends entirely on where they go from here, for the love of god Flash, don't screw this up.

Arrow 'Missing' Review
Wow, a villain who's plan all along was to get captured, thrown into a see through cell and then break out, haven't seen that before. But to be fair at least this one has a little bit of creativity by having the hero forced to break him out. It's also nice how personal this finale is shaping up to be, with Chase capturing Oliver's friends & family instead of any kind of city destroying nonsense like we've had literally every other season. In fact starting the episode with a birthday party and the characters even joking about how they always get the summer off made for a nice change of pace. Plus the flashbacks were small yet had high stakes and gave Stephen Amell a chance to show off his acting chops, showing a weakness to Oliver that we rarely get to see. And I'm not gonna lie, the idea of Green Arrow and Deathstroke fighting side by side makes me a little bit giddy. Though this makes all those angry denial posts Manu Bennett made a few weeks ago claiming he wasn't in the finale very odd. Malcolm Merlyn has gone back to his irritating state, after being a fun villain on Legends he's now just wining about his daughter again for the millionth time. It's hard to review the episode seeing as this is basically part 1 of the finale, but as far as set ups go, it's quite a strong one. 7/10.

The Button - Cheap Thoughts

I've talked about DC Rebirth in the past, DC's relaunch of all of their titles, combining the prior universe with The New 52 and also setting up the introduction of the Watchmen to the DC Universe. Well, nearly a year since Rebirth, we've had our first major step forward in the story. We've certainly inched closer with things being set up and foreshadowed in other books, but DC are certainly taking their time with this "mystery" and honestly I kind of love that. They're not rushing into anything, they've used this past year to re-establish the status quo and only now when everything is comfortably placed and Rebirth has been a bonafide success have they progressed the story.

The Button is a 4 part crossover between Batman and The Flash where they make the first bit of progress in months after finding the mysterious Watchmen button in the Batcave, as Reverse-Flash shows up and claims to know where the owner of the Button is, however, he quickly returns a burnt up corpse with one dying statement "I...Saw...God.". Thus, Flash and Batman have to travel through the speed force to try and find out what happened to him and end up coming across Flashpoint, as well as Golden Age superhero Jay Garrick.

This is really a story to take issue by issue when it comes to analysing it, because all 4 issues are very well produced and have stand out moments, but for different reasons. Issue 1 written by Tom King is excellently paced, taking place over the course of one minute as Batman simply needs to stall the Reverse-Flash, knowing he can't take him in a fight, he uses all the tricks he has to keep him there until The Flash arrives. Because while Batman is a genius and an excellent fighter, Reverse-Flash could kill him in less than a second, but the man's an ego-maniac, he knows he's going to take his time to gloat. Which is not to say Batman doesn't get a few good punches in, but it's all just a distraction until Flash can show up. But what really stands out about this issue is the panel work. Jason Fabok subtly pays tribute to the Watchmen nine-panel layout throughout most of the issue, only breaking this structure to emphasise particular events.

Then we move onto issue 2, and each issue from here on out is written by Joshua Williamson, who is I had to pinpoint one of his strongest features as a writer, it's nailing emotional dilemmas between characters. The way he writes people feel so honest and open, the weight of a moment is always felt. But that's more of a discussion for issue 3. This issue however, while arguably has the least momentum in the story, still moves things along nicely, with Batman and Flash travelling through the speed force we have them acknowledging the real origins of the Justice League, and we also get some beautiful colouring for the speed force from Hi-Fi Colouring, really gorgeous to look at.

Then we have issue 3, which is where Williamson's skills at emotional weight come into play. Batman meets his Flashpoint counterpart, Thomas Wayne, his father. The conversations between these two are so simple yet so elegant that so much is said in just a few words. "There was one thing I wanted to tell you above anything else. You're a grandfather. I have a son." Damn if that doesn't hit you where it hurts. But then they have to go and top that emotional wallop by having Thomas give his son one last piece of advice before he disappears "Don't be Batman." Telling his son to give up the life and just be a loving father to his son the way Thomas wishes he could have been to Bruce. For the longest of time Bruce has been written in a way that suggests he does what he does out of some desire to please his parents, whether it be out of survivors guilt, honouring a legacy or whatever your interpretation is, there's always been that connection. Yet recently, in Tom King's run he's been challenging that idea of Bruce doing this just for the sake of his parents and how true that statement is, and now hearing it from his father's lips, that is surely going to complicate things. In face in the final issue we see Bruce watching over Gotham when the bat signal turns on, Alfred asks him if he's going to answer it and he simply looks down in doubt.

Then the final issue which is where we come full circle, we get a little bit more of how Reverse-Flash died, plus Jay Garrick comes back...sort of, he returns for a minute in a similar style to Wally West, but in this case Barry was not his anchor, so...guess he's just stuck in the speed force still. In all honesty this final issue left me slightly disappointed because it felt like not a whole lot had been achieved, the characters are no closer to knowing what's happening, we just got a lot of set-up and reaffirmation of things we already knew. But still, that doesn't change the fact that the journey getting these was one heck of an emotional roller coaster.

Within these 4 issues we get great character moments, emotionally gripping storytelling, very well done artwork and for the first major event in Rebirth, i'd say it delivered, even with a slightly lacklustre ending. 8/10.

-Danny

My Favourite Films - Man With A Movie Camera (1929)

Let me ask you a question, how much does a filmmakers intent matter to you when watching a film? Or how much do you let other opinions sway you? Because Man With A Movie Camera is one of those films that is beloved in its genre and is considered one of the best…the problem is I disagree with which genre it falls under.

Man With A Movie Camera is a documentary directed by Dziga Vertov (Thank god I don’t have to pronounce that) and it is simply a collection of seemingly random shots of whatever the filmmakers could shoot. There is no purpose, no content, no message, yet it is often praised for it’s style of creating a visual melody through creative editing and challenging the medium of film as a whole. The question of what film’s purpose is can be widely debated, for me it’s like any art, I think it should either entertain or challenge you, films that do both are usually the ones I fall in love with. Not to say Man With A Movie Camera is “entertaining” per se apart from an easy listening score (Depending on which version you watch). But it is certainly a challenging film, a film that challenges the definition of what a documentary should be. But is it a documentary?

This is where my point about disagreeing with intent comes into play. Because to me, this is not a documentary, but a surrealist film. When it comes to my personal definition of what a documentary is, this is not a film that falls under it, it’s not informative, it doesn’t follow any standard conventions, the only definitive trait it has in common with documentaries is that it films real life, but to no real narrative. Now most people say this is why it’s amazing for how it challenges your preconceptions of documentaries, but under that analysis I simply don’t find much value. However, as a surrealist film and from what I know of that genre, this very much is a masterpiece. Surrealist films have never been one of my favourite genres because from what my understanding of what a surrealist film is-that being an interpretation of dreams, or emotions, a stream of consciousness, etc.-none of them ever feel accurate. A film like L'Age d'Or or Un Chien Andalou to me don’t represent dreams, they come across as too constructed or nonsensical. Dreams-though very hard to define-to me where always both structured and non-structured. You could have a dream where a story is being told, or it could be nonsensical images and sounds, but enough there that even in our hazy states, we still believe what we’re seeing is logical enough.

Man With A Movie Camera is the first film to accurately portray this. It’s a film that feels structured, yet random. If you told me they laid out all of their film, closed their eyes and just pointed at random strips and said “I want this one, then this one, this one played twice, this one played backwards and this one upside down” I would completely believe it. And within this film there are many mini-narratives being told, single stories contained within just a few seconds of film. Emotions riding high, multiple events happening at once, and yet at times it does come across as just a random assortment of sounds and images.

So I ask, even if this is not the interpretation everyone has, does that really matter when we end up at the same conclusion? If we both say its one of the greatest films of all time, me presenting it as a surrealist film, you presenting it as a documentary, does it matter? All of film is up to interpretation and either way it is still an incredibly challenging film. Anyone who knows me (Or if you’ve read other instalments of this series) would know the phrase “Russian surrealist film from the 1920s” is not exactly a type of film I would usually be a fan of. Yet here we are, Man With A Movie Camera, to most, one of the greatest documentaries of all time, to me, one of the most surreal.

-Danny

Doctor Who 'Oxygen' Review

A disabled Doctor along with his black lesbian go through the painstaking efforts to crush capitalism...Capitalism, racism, depression, I think this season has a theme!

Oxygen is possible the safest Doctor Who episode so far. It's a very standard episode, stuck on a spaceship, something's trying to kill them, very few members of the original crew survive. It's very much like series 2's 'The Impossible Planet' or series 3's '42'. The Doctor and Co are trapped on a space station, unable to use the Tardis or Sonic Screwdriver because of one reason or another, they run into a rag tag group of forgettable survivors who are just there to be killed off, and by the end of the episode nothing of consequence has been lost...Oh wait.

So, The Doctor has lost his eyesight. I'll be honest I won't be surprised if this only lasts for one more episode before he's healed for good, it just seems like one of those things that would be an interesting gimmick for a one off episode but would be tedious for the writers to try and find a path around his ailment. It's like how they have to find a reason why the Tardis and screwdriver can't help, they're the kind of plot devices that hurt a writer more than they aid. Though this episode certainly had its fair share of conveniences, like how the oxygen didn't get expelled from the space station until the trio realised that was about to happen.

Nardole finally plays a significant role in an episode, in a way. In reality he didn't actually do that much to help The Doctor or other characters, but at least he was actually there, rather than just showing up at the end of the episode, tells a joke and then leaves. Though his final scene where he was telling off The Doctor was actually quite effective.

I'm not entirely sure how to rank this episode, it was a very by-the-numbers type of episode, but that doesn't necessarily make it bad, it just makes it safe. Nothing sticks out one way or the other, so I'll say a strong 5/10. But even then that feels a tad too low, but it's an average rating for an average episode.

-Danny