I’m very grateful to be able to say that I have had another review published at Buzz Magazine. This one is for Wonder Woman which is drinking in the sweet smell of success with critical acclaim and box office moola! You can read some of my thoughts here http://buzzmagazine.com.au/4882-2/ and I can’t help but link below a video review from the How It Should Have Ended team because quite frankly I think Daniel Baxter is really perceptive about the appeal and major themes of some recent releases. HISHE is correct, they got Wonder Woman right and from there everything else flows.
Based out of Victoria, Buzz Magazine was one the longest running street press magazines in Australia being published in print from 1993 to 2010. Some fine writers have worked for Buzz over the years and gone onto successful careers in media since and there is simply no way to measure the contribution the mag made to local music over its print run. With such words and minimal advertising on the website the impression could be taken that Buzz is now semi-retired. Yet the site is quite prolific with new write-ups on a daily basis, the ongoing interest of fans old and new and contributions from some very talented people indeed.
I really appreciate everybody who takes the time to click on the links and check out these reviews, I hope you’re enjoying them. Out of the blockbusters I’ve seen so far this season Wonder Woman is only surpassed by Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
Simon Pegg the fan boy who made good has finally become part of the establishment co-writing the latest Star Trek movie. It took the original cast 16 years to get old but only 7 years after the 2009 reboot introduced a hip new happening cast to take over these iconic roles and now at the age a lot of the original actors were when they began the TV series a lot is made in this film of middle age ennui.
Captain James T. Kirk, the lustful wanderer always looking for the undiscovered country, here feels lost having surpassed his father’s age and therefore apparently his shadow. Talking over with Starfleet command he’s become disenchanted with going in search of new horizons and considers taking a desk job as a Commodore which fits with William Shatner’s version ending up an Admiral at one point and also maybe reflects that this is a different Kirk. There’s a nice drinking scene between friends Kirk and medical officer Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy (Karl Urban) that deals with this but lacks Commander Spock to complete the triumvirate. Reference is made about the closeness of Spock and Kirk but all evidence suggests they’re barely able to carry out a conversation between the two of them.
Into this state of mind the U.S.S. Enterprise is called to help out on the fringes of known space where they are attacked by a new type of a species and end up crashlanding on a nearby planet with the crew separated into groups. Sadly the late Anton Yelchin is given little to do as navigator Pavel Chekov but raises a few smiles. While the bulk of the crew including helmsman Hikaru Sulu (John Cho) and communications officer Nyota Uhura (Zoe Saldana) are held prisoner by mysterious villain Krall and plot escape, Bones and Spock are put together as an odd couple forced to survive and admit some of their feelings. Spock is dealing with breaking up with Uhura and whether he is best needed elsewhere with the endangered Vulcan race having received news that Ambassador Spock (Leonard Nimoy) has passed. Engineer Montgomery Scott (Simon Pegg) meets a “friendly” alien called Jaylah (Sofia Boutella) who is repairing a ship to leave the planet and could be their best hope of escape. Chris Pine as Kirk meanwhile ends up riding a motorbike like a Crusty Demon which sent the internet into meltdown last year fearing a Fast and Furiousifcation of Trek by director Justin Lin.
Some of the action is poorly shot due to darkly lit sequences but most are very exciting. Space battles against bug like small explosive vessels are a neat twist on the classic dreadnought engagements of old, Sofia Boutella gets a great hand to hand combat sequence and an early scene aboard Starbase Yorktown in the first act sets up later the finale where people fight in various gravity vacuums and ride ships down tunnels that barely fit them. There’s a child’s joy in some of these action sequences of building a set and then staging something exciting in it. It may be worth checking the film out in 3D and one positive that can’t be stressed enough is how good the special effects look in this film and how beautifully realised the world is.
There’s many references to the sometimes maligned Enterprise series and an interesting development about the villain even if we never really understand his motivation, a very touching inclusion of the original cast and a renewed focus on bringing it back to the characters and where they are emotionally. The problem here is they are not nearly as interesting as they were in previous films. Quinto and Urban in particular nailed the characteristics of Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelly previously but seem too comfortable and low energy in this. So much so I wonder if there is a phone ringing nearby. The most involving character is new addition Jaylah with PTSD from her family’s death and simple heartfelt references to a ship being a home. Alas the old crew as a family doesn’t seem as together emotionally or physically. Star Trek: Into Darkness was full of references to another Khan centric film but arguably still more engaging than this. Critical and peer responses to this film have been more positive than my assessment of it so feel free to explore this latest undergoing for yourself but as an enormous fan of the reboot I find myself missing the old gang more and more as this young crew ages. Alas Yelchin now leaves the role sadly and it’s not a bad film to dedicate to him and Nimoy’s memory. These voyages are ongoing but it’s nice to remember those who have gone before.
Post Super Bowl programming deserves sports parlance as much as anything and in the case of CBS this year you could describe it as Stephen Colbert fumbled a great opportunity and James Corden showed up to play.
Late Night Talk Show Hosts are cults of personalities. Always have been. Johnny Carson the story goes turned to a young producer once about a show he was about to start. The producer had been explaining the skits, the formula, the guests, the production values. When the producer was done Carson leaned in and told him “These shows are all about the guy behind the desk.” They are and I can tell you this because without my guys Craig Ferguson and David Letterman the genre has held less appeal this past year. All that remain are talented entertainers but they’re not Craig Ferguson and David Letterman and so I have not felt compelled to write about them. Where I live and with the technology I have I semi-regularly catch whole shows of Stephen Colbert, James Corden and Jimmy Fallon. I chase down viral bits from Conan, Kimmel and Meyers on YouTube. Alas I’m not catching anything from Comedy Central because “I’m an overseas viewer.” Their loss or mine? Who knows in this social media driven culture. What I see I like and champion.
Coco’s ratings scores have been as low as 300,000 viewers during the low season and he has never crested a million on a regular night in years. Yet a little Cuban special snagged two million viewers taking in DVR recordings after the telecast last year. Relegated to TBS O’Brien has a social media presence and a youthful demographic that belies his years. He is the epitome of punching above his weight. Kids watching him now may not even know about the Leno fiasco of ’09 but they know about Uber, Tinder and Grinder, Ride Along with Kevin Hart and Ice Cube, Call of Duty, Archer, Magic Mike XXL and crucially they know funny and Conan O’Brien remains as funny as he has ever been. At 53 he is out doing remotes when Letterman was sending Biff Henderson and Rupert Jee into the fray. His cultural reach far exceeds his real numbers. Sure some of the interviews are boring, sure sometimes the monologue is lame. Who cares? This man shows up to work again and again and rather than coasting on old NBC bits he’s been reinventing himself for a new generation. GO COCO!
Jimmy Fallon
Fallon is King and moment to moment I doubt there’s anybody funnier that’s why he regularly rates higher than his competitors. You tune in for Trump on Colbert. You watch Fallon no matter who’s appearing because Fallon is appearing. His monologues actually make me laugh; he has an easy rapport with his house band The Roots which amongst being bonafide musicians all have unique personalities which are comfortable to get involved in sketches and on the spot riffing. It’s true they’ve had six years to get this down pat but they’re running like a well-oiled machine at this point. The question remains when will we get tired of this routine. Will Fallon ever mature into the statesman Carson and Letterman became? Does it really matter? Jimmy Fallon has no edge, so what? Late last year he asked a question of Trump who replied “These were not the question we agreed to.” In this simple gesture he made Jimmy Fallon more badass than any question he was going to ask would have made him. He once turned to Hilary Clinton and asked “Why don’t you release the e-mails? I’m sick of hearing about it, aren’t you?” and she agreed. He asked the question and he put it in terms that were on most American’s minds. Frustratingly they just moved on but that is not to say Fallon is a push over. He has actually been very steadfast that he wants to make a fun show and he wants his guests to have fun on his show like everybody else. You can tell Fallon’s politics as clearly as Colbert but like Conan O’Brien his show is not about politics but about having fun. As long as that is happening I don’t think he’s going anywhere. Can he be the fun guy for multiple generations? Can he do dance offs with the next pop sensation when he’s 55 or will it lose something when it isn’t a peer like Justin Timberlake? Time will tell but the man is incredibly talented, hardworking and he has the most entertaining show on late night television consistently. However short the reign he has not been a flash in the pan. He is the current King of Late Night Television. Fact.
Stephen Colbert
Colbert is booking CEOs, civil rights leaders and journalists in a way nobody else on network late night television is. This is classic counter programming which won’t place him in No.1 but will hopefully snag enough of a high income audience to justify his existence. The thinking person’s alternative though lost to Kimmel and Meyers throughout the month of December and those guys provide some of what he is selling to audiences as well. That makes it tricky. Plus nobody really bitches about Meyers lack of viralness because his lead in from Fallon makes him the highest rated in his timeslot by a country mile. The Colbert Report was so good for so long that we took for granted what an upheaval a new show would be. Colbert a former improve actor could sing and dance, his quick wit and intelligence was undeniable, his interviews in his old persona were actually really insightful and on top of it all he had a youthful openness, a yearning to ask questions and find answers rather than accuse and demean. Yet The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has been rife with teething problems of any first year out program. Jon Batiste is a talented musician and Colbert and he appear to genuinely like the other but chemistry comes from a variety of factors and right now… they don’t have it. Joe Biden’s interview on Colbert was a gift that reminds us what a great television moment of authenticity can be. A man clearly laying bare his emotions in a public forum without anything to gain from it as it turned out since he didn’t end up running.
I like a lot of the sketches Colbert has established written by his clever writers like “A Big Furry Hat” and even more so “Big Thoughts with even Bigger Stars.” Yet Colbert’s celebrity interviews are often as awkward as Fallon’s ass-kissing routine where everyone is so great and so funny. An easy rapport with Chris Pine and Josh Brolin recently had me questioning why can’t all Colbert interviews be like that? This may not be entirely fair for someone who just renovated a theatre on Broadway and has big numbers in it but Colbert doesn’t seem to do remotes. Neither does Fallon to an extent but you feel it with Colbert. The guy is busting his ass, dabbling in live shows and doing five nights a week but when you take a break six weeks after your debut it feels lazy.
Which brings us to the Superbowl.
CBS took the unprecedented step of following their Super Bowl 50 coverage with a live telecast of their late night programs The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and The Late Late Show with James Corden. The Late Show started strong with a monologue that involved him throwing the football to first soldiers overseas, an astronaut and then the President. It’s the kind of extra expense stuff you save for such shows which also tugs at the heart strings of Americana. Support the troops, we can reach outer space and our Commander in Chief enjoys a throw of the ole pigskin as much as we all do. It got even better when Colbert involved in some meta humour. The President pointed out he was in a pre-taped bit to which the host insisted he was doing the show live. President Obama proved his point by bringing Colbert onscreen in the bit to talk to his live studio self. It was a neat sketch and was true to Stephen’s comic sensibilities.
Unfortunately the rest of the show was not as strong at all. Colbert followed with an interview with Tina Fey and Margot Robbie that was average despite Fey usually being funny. It was awkwardly interrupted by a cross to the Super Bowl stadium to have a satellite interview with MVP winner Von Miller. When it concluded Fey joked “Now about this movie.” Will Ferrell followed with a neat joke about being a new animal expert for the show and refusing to talk about Zoolander 2 which he was there to spruik. Yet I couldn’t help but flashback to his lip sync battle with Kevin Hart last year on Fallon and just feel these were half measures. A popular sketch from Key and Poole related to football also made an appearance before finally Megyn Kelly showed up to engage Colbert in the type of interview that he’s good at but at that point the hour had drawn near. 22,000,000 viewers watched this fucking show. Two decades ago at the height of his powers with a four network landscape and a Winter Olympics lead in David Letterman mustered 14 million on a weeknight. Last year when he retired he pulled 13.7 million. You’ll never get 22 million again, this was a golden opportunity to draw a wide net and grab some extra casual viewers over the long haul to hopefully remain a viable competitor. To be fair it wasn’t for lack of tyring, Key and Poole, Fey and Ferrell are all comedy superstars and were well chosen. They referenced football, they got the President and the First Lady to show up and Megyn Kelly is a high profile reporter and brings an audience that doesn’t tune into Colbert. It was the kind of aisle crossing inclusivity the late show host has practiced since he booked Jeb Bush on his first night on CBS. Yet it didn’t flow seamlessly, it was a mess of ideas and priorities. Look here’s celebrities but we’ve got to cross to an actual footballer. Here’s a sketch from another show because it involves football which means it will be fifty minutes before I talk to Megyn Kelly which arguably is going to be the best bit but will not be funny and we need to be funny right?
James Corden On The Other Hand
The Late Late Show followed and scored a franchise high of 5 million which is impressive when you consider some affiliates were going with local news at that point after cutting Colbert’s last few minutes. So let’s talk about James Corden. James Corden a portly British television and theatre star has spent twelve months on his show embracing American culture including kicking a half time field goal at a local game and hanging out at a tailgate party.
Following this formula he did a similar thing with his signature sketch- he did Carpool Karaoke with Elton John. This part of the show referenced nothing about the Super Bowl but it was Corden’s superstar sketch with a major superstar in it for his biggest audience ever. That’s how you do it. By organically filling the rest of the show with football the Elton John bit did not need it and since Carpool Karaoke is such a signature Corden bit its inclusion did not feel awkward or out of place either in the Super Bowl special. Speaking of Carpool Karaoke, a recent one with Adele has hit 67,000,000 views on YouTube. That’s more than anything on YouTube from any late night TV show. The Late Late Show with James Corden is not perfect but I marvel sometimes at it. It has a spirit of fun, has established its own identity within weeks of airing for the first time, Corden’s chemistry with Reggie Watts is easy and Watts is not a sidekick but his own thing. One night I tuned in and James Corden and Tori Kelly went out to restaurants in a remote and sang for their supper. Working outside the studio with a shaky premise and uncertain of how crowds are going to react makes for exciting if awkward television. As it advanced Reggie’s house band came out and Tori Kelly got people up and dancing to her song Nobody Love. The punch line made me smile.
Zoologist Jack Hanna of Letterman fame showed up with Betty White a great animal lover along with Amar’e Soudemire. Rachel Platten closed with a powerful rendition of her pop hit Stand By You. My God it was fun!
You can read some of my thoughts here http://buzzmagazine.com.au/4882-2/ and I can’t help but link below a video review from the How It Should Have Ended team because quite frankly I think Daniel Baxter is really perceptive about the appeal and major themes of some recent releases. HISHE is correct, they got Wonder Woman right and from there everything else flows.
Some of the action is poorly shot due to darkly lit sequences but most are very exciting. Space battles against bug like small explosive vessels are a neat twist on the classic dreadnought engagements of old, Sofia Boutella gets a great hand to hand combat sequence and an early scene aboard Starbase Yorktown in the first act sets up later the finale where people fight in various gravity vacuums and ride ships down tunnels that barely fit them. There’s a child’s joy in some of these action sequences of building a set and then staging something exciting in it. It may be worth checking the film out in 3D and one positive that can’t be stressed enough is how good the special effects look in this film and how beautifully realised the world is.
The most involving character is new addition Jaylah with PTSD from her family’s death and simple heartfelt references to a ship being a home. Alas the old crew as a family doesn’t seem as together emotionally or physically. Star Trek: Into Darkness was full of references to another Khan centric film but arguably still more engaging than this. Critical and peer responses to this film have been more positive than my assessment of it so feel free to explore this latest undergoing for yourself but as an enormous fan of the reboot I find myself missing the old gang more and more as this young crew ages. Alas Yelchin now leaves the role sadly and it’s not a bad film to dedicate to him and Nimoy’s memory. These voyages are ongoing but it’s nice to remember those who have gone before.
Back to the Drawing Board Productions 