Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – The Complete Series

Just over 24 years ago, Paramount expanded the Star Trek universe again, and for the first time ever, as the sixth season of The Next Generation continued, there were two Star Trek series running on television concurrently. And what a different manner of series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was. Instead of exploring the galaxy,…

Penny Dreadful: The Complete Series

Paramount Pictures in association with Showtime is unleashing the Complete Series of the British Sky TV programme Penny Dreadful today. This danse macabre is by turns frightening, poignant, and completely unnerving. And it has never looked better. Featuring a gorgeous high definition transfer, the series looks and sounds fantastic as it takes the viewer deeper…

Rio Bravo (1959) – Howard Hawks

If someone mentions John Wayne to me, this is the movie I go to. Happily, it’s the next recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book following my screening of The Searchers. Starring Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson, Walter Brennan and Angie Dickinson, this, to me, is Howard Hawks best western. Wayne stars…

The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) – Steven Spielberg

The next stop for me in the Sci-Fi Chronicles is the dinosaur franchise that began with a novel, Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton and became a blockbuster film by Steven Spielberg. He followed up that first film from 1993, with The Lost World: Jurassic Park in 1997. While it lacks the discovery and the sense…

Red River (1948) – Howard Hawks

John Wayne gets paired with Montgomery Clift as Howard Hawks directs in the next western recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book. Wayne is Thomas Dunson, a cattle driver, and a fast gun who is a bit of a tyrant as he seizes land for his cattle ranch, and heads to…

Quantum Leap (1991/1992) – Unchained and The Play’s the Thing

Unchained finds Sam (Scott Bakula) in the body of Chance Cole on 2 November, 1956. The episode was written by Paris Qualles and had an airdate of 27 November, 1991. Sam, as Chance, is part of a chain gang, and he and another convict, Jasper Boone (Basil Wallace) a man, Al (Dean Stockwell) informs him,…

Star Trek: The Original Series (1967) -The Doomsday Machine and Catspaw

Captain’s log: stardate unknow The Doomsday Machine sent me on many adventures when I was a child. Written by Norman Spinrad, this episode had an original airdate of 20 October, 1967. Captain Kirk (William Shatner) and the stalwart crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise encounter terror in space. They arrive in a destroyed planetary system, and discover…

Terminator Salvation (2009) – McG

The final stop with the Sc-Fi Chronicles book for me with the Terminator franchise, as I’ve now had a chance to cover all of them, is this interesting entry from the same pair of writers who gave us Rise of the Machines. This one could have been alright, though I feel McG was probably the…

Liv Stein

Combining near cinematic imagery that verges on the iconic and powerhouse performances from its actors, Liv Stein, presented by Canadian Stage at the Bluma Appel Theatre in Toronto is sure to wow and elicit discussion. Director Matthew Jocelyn’s sure hand brings Nino Haratischwili’s original German play to the Canadian stage via a translation by Birgit…