🧟♂️ Sunday Shuffle #20
TV/Movies/Books recommendations reviews, and more...
Greetings from Newcastle.
Welcome to the Sunday Shuffle.
🎬 Talk to Me - Netflix: As usual, I’m late to the party, but this Aussie-made horror movie has a real indie feel to it, while delivering big-budget thrills. For those later to the party than me, the plot revolves around an urban legend about a preserved hand which has become something of a party trick. And some people just have to learn things the hard way… I look forward to seeing what the Philippou brothers create in future.
📺 Heretic - Prime: Since seeing Hugh Grant in the trailer for Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen a few years back, I’ve become intrigued by the actor’s choices. Much like the Matthew McConaughey McConaissance which saw him shake off his rom-com shackles in favour of meatier fare such as True Detective and Interstellar, Grant seems to be enjoying a sort of Granaissance (okay, we’ll work on that one), and he’s popping up as a sleazy journalist one moment, children’s movie villain the next, and now he takes a turn at a horror movie. This was a thoughtful, discourse-heavy horror thriller that lost a little something in the second-half. The finale suffered because the set-up, I thought, was great. Equally great are the performances by Chloe East and Sophie Thatcher, as two Mormon missionaries, but it is Hugh Grant who stands out here. He exudes a quiet menace throughout as Mr Reed - a sort of Ned Flanders gone off the rails. Even though it’s a movie of two halves, the whole is still a good watch.
📺 Stranger Things: Netflix. Having now finished season 4 for the second time, I feel ready for the forthcoming season 5. Of course, Netflix has recently announced the new final season doesn’t drop until the end of this year. All the same, I’ve enjoyed rewatching the whole show. I’d forgotten just how much thicker the horror got, particularly in season 3, when things went down a decidedly John Carpenter’s The Thing route. Lots of melting flesh and pulp’s transformations. And although I’d remembered how much 80s horror DNA was in season 4 - particularly A Nightmare on Elm Street, I’d forgotten that even good old Robert Englund popped up in it. I enjoyed the nostalgia trip, and found myself re-evaluating season 2, which wasn’t so kindly received when it first aired. I can’t help thinking it’s because season 1 was such an unexpectedly fun and exciting show, it was hard to live up to. Sometimes these things look a little better when seen as part of the whole. And yeah, season 4 did a sort of swerve, reforging the show to fit the new direction they’d decided upon for it. Perhaps they just needed to do a hard course-correct to be able to bring this thing to a satisfactory conclusion timely enough not to be cancelled mid-flow by Netflix. Whether or not that was the case, I still find it a cracking show and I’m looking forward to the next season - I hope they stick the landing.
📖 Batman ‘89 by Sam Hamm, et al. The fact that this was a Father’s Day gift from my sons adds an extra couple of stars, or an extra 20% or so. I’m not making a wholehearted recommendation of the book here, just sharing some thoughts about it. Written by the screenwriter of Tim Burton’s 1989 movie Batman, this graphic novel collects the first arc of DC Comics’ Batman ‘89. Written as a continuation of the Burton movies, post-Batman Returns, and pretending that the Joel Schumacher movies didn’t creep in and change the tone (although back in the day, I was just hungry for more Batman movies and watched those sequels without much criticism… although Batman and Robin really tested my loyalty), this story charts the downfall of Harvey Dent, and the emergence of the villainous Two-Face. The character here is drawn to resemble Billy Dee Williams, who played Dent in the original movie. We get a Bruce Wayne/Batman who resembles Michael Keaton very well, although why he’s got so much grey hair, I don’t know (and in a very nice touch, in one scene he’s even sporting a sort of under-armour kit to be worn under the batsuit, and it’s taken from an action figure my little brother had, where you fit the cowl, armour, gloves etc onto the Bruce Wayne figure to transform him into Batman). We get a Selina Kyle/Catwoman who doesn’t all that much resemble the Michelle Pfeiffer version, a Commissioner Gordon with only a passing resemblance to Pat Hingle (looks more like the animated series Gordon), a bloody good likeness of Michael Gough’s Alfred. The story revolves around a black neighbourhood in Gotham City, and introduces us to a version of Robin not seen in the movies before, but always rumoured as being included in early scripts for Batman Returns, with Marlon Wayans apparently lined up to play him at the time (there’s even an argument that the Robin action figure sold as part of the Batman Returns toy line was a whited-up version of Wayans’s never seen Robin, as the hairstyle and facial features shown on the toybox art are thought to be somewhat representative of a young black male). Barbara Gordon’s appearance is based on a young Winona Ryder (so I’ve read), who seems like a great casting choice for a mid-90s version of the character, especially given she was a Burton favourite at the time. The plot was a bit iffy, but it’s clear Hamm has something to say about the elites using vast wealth to influence politics and justice. There’s even an attempted heist in which the main goal is to secure incriminating evidence for the people whose money is also taken. I was reminded of the Epstein list, where elites are protected in the highest reaches of society where money is no object. There were weird moments where the artwork didn’t quite hit the mark, and strange occurrences like a guy chasing someone who robbed his shop ‘up there’, and he’s apparently chasing the thief on the rooftops of the city… well isn’t that where Batman’s meant to operate - up there where ordinary people can’t just run? They also missed a trick - there’s a gang going around in clown makeup, in homage to the Joker… but they’re apparently not the Joker’s old gang, who were rounded up or killed… but wait a minute… the Penguin had the Red Triangle Circus gang, and they wore clown makeup too… couldn’t the new gang have been the remnants of those two old factions? Seems like a bit of an own-goal to miss that one. All that said, it was interesting to read this new-old version of Batman, and get a flavour of what might have been, had Warner Bros not demanded ever more kid-merch-friendly Batman movies back at the time. Amazon US|UK.
📺 Currently Re-Watching: True Detective season 1 - NowTV. It’s a classic, and the only thing that comes close to watching it for the first time, is watching it with someone who’s watching it for the first time.
📺 Currently Watching: The Last of Us season 2 - NowTV. I’m a few episodes in, and other than a few cool moments, I’m not sure about this one.
📖 Currently Reading: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton.
🎮 Currently Playing: Red Dead Redemption 2 - Xbox Series S.
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Best wishes and bad dreams,
Jack
All platforms mentioned above are the UK version, unless indicated otherwise.
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