Captain’s log: stardate unknown Marc Scott Zircee came up with the episode’s story that was adapted to teleplay by Dennis Bailey, David Bischoff, Joe Menosky, Ronald D. Moore and Michael Piller. Airing on 18 February, 1991, this Riker (Jonathan Frakes)-centric story puts the strange new worlds shoe on the other foot. Riker is undercover on…
Mother! (2017) – Darren Aronofsky
The cult of celebrity, the ‘ownership’ of fans, the price of love, and the need for peace, privacy, and solace from the madness that is the modern world. Aronofsky’s divisive film, Mother!, comes home on DVD and blu-ray today. Vaguely Lynchian there is the semblance of a ghost story at the heart of the film…
South Park: The Complete Third Season
The fun, comedy, and sheer insanity of what is South Park Season Three blazed across my screen this week, as I delved into The Complete Third Season of the Comedy Central show available now on blu-ray from Paramount Pictures. Over the course of seventeen episodes the small Colorado town of South Park is explored through…
Star Wars: The Last Jedi – The Visual Dictionary (2017) – Pablo Hidalgo
Available now from DK Canada is this amazing companion piece to the new Star Wars film. Filled with hints, that are now canon, about characters, both new, like Supreme Leader Snoke, and old, like Luke Skywalker. Leafing through the pages , I catch things that I didn’t see in the screening but ties in nicely…
Star Wars: The Last Jedi – Incredible Cross-Sections (2017) – Jason Fry and Kemp Remillard
Star Wars: The Last Jedi blasted its way into the theatres this past weekend, and delighted viewers all over the globe, this one included. DK Canada has released books to celebrate the film’s debut, and our further exploration of not only the Skywalker Saga, but the story of hope which runs through it all. The…
Platoon (1986) – Oliver Stone
Walking away with Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Editing, and Best Sound, Platoon is the next recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film following my screening of Apocalypse Now. The film serves as a commentary on the horrors of war, even as two sergeants seem to be fighting for the…
The Deer Hunter (1978) – Micheal Cimino
Micheal Cimino’s examination of the effects of war, framed around the Vietnam conflict and a small industrial town in Pennsylvania is the next recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book following my screening of Apocalypse Now. Laying out the scars, physical, mental and unseen that affected those who fought in it,…
Doctor Who (Matt Smith) – The Wedding of River Song, and The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe
The Wedding of River Song, which aired on 1 October, 2011, was penned by Steven Moffat, and brought the sixth series of the relaunched Doctor Who to a close. Things are strange from the off, as the Doctor (Smith) seems to be stuck in a bit of an alternate timeline where all of time seems…
12 Years a Slave (2013) – Steve McQueen
What kind of species are we that we can enslave our fellows? There are two scenes in McQueen’s masterpiece 12 Years a Slave, that shook me to my core. The first was a scene in which Chiwetel Ejiofor’s Solomon Northup is left to hang, while life goes on around him, and another when Solomon is…
Star Trek: The Next Generation (1991) – Devil’s Due, and Clues
Captain’s log: stardate 44474.5 With an airdate of 4 February, 1991, this episode, written by Philip LaZebnik, from a story by LaZebnik, and William Douglas Lansford, has always been a fun one for me. Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Data (Brent Spiner) find themselves in a mystery when they answer a call from a planet that…
The Mind Reels 