I was up at Lake Texoma this weekend so I missed the latest episode of The Walking Dead when it originally aired. I did, however, set the DVR for it. I came back from the lake on Tuesday of this week and while I was eager to watch most of the shows that I had recorded, I really couldn’t summon up much enthusiasm for The Walking Dead. For the show’s first four or five seasons, The Walking Dead is what I would have immediately watched but, eleven seasons in, the show no longer holds the promise of the unexpected. Instead, it has settled down into a comfortable pattern.
Earlier today, when I finally did get around to watching Rendition, it all felt very, very familiar. Once again, Darryl ended up wandering off on his own Once again, Darryl ended up getting captured and tortured by the latest group of evil humans, The Reapers. We learned a little about Reaper culture but, despite the whole religion angle, it turns out that the Reapers are just like every other group of evil humans who have shown up in the show. At this point, even Darryl should be wondering how the exact same thing can keep happing to the exact same guy.
(At first, I was going to say that this episode did change things up a bit by having one of Darryl’s ex-lovers turn out to be a Reaper. But then I remembered that Darryl’s brother turned up at the Governor’s prison and that was actually a lot more impressive because Darryl’s brother actually had a definable personality of sorts. He came across as being something more than just a plot point.)
The gimmick with The Reapers is that, before the zombie apocalypse, they served in Afghanistan and they’re now ultra-religious. That does explain why the Reaper from last week was so happy to see Gabriel and so insistent that Gabriel pray for him. It also explain why the leader of the Reapers is named Pope, even though that seems more than a bit heavy-handed on the part of the writers. But who knows? Maybe this story arc will actually give Gabriel something to do other than glare at everyone with his one good eye. One can only hope. Watching this episode, it was hard not to contrast Gabriel’s cry of, “There is no God here!” to Pope’s request (or was it a demand) that Daryl believe in the Reapers’ version of God.
That said, this episode felt way too familiar. It was well-acted and competently directed and all of that but it still felt a bit too safe for an episode during the final season of a show that, regardless of what it may be now, was once a pop cultural juggernaut. If you’re like me and you’re hoping things will go out with not just a bang but with a few hundred bangs, it’s impossible not to be disappointed with this season so far. Let’s hope things pick up and we actually do get the type of finale that The Walking Dead deserves!
Seeing as how it’s been nearly a week since it aired, I guess I should go ahead and review the latest episode of The Waking Dead. No doubt about it, we’re all about timely reviews here at the Shattered Lens!
The latest episode of The Walking Dead was …. well, it was okay. Actually, it was better than okay. It was actually pretty good. It was well-directed. It was well-acted. There was plenty of gore, if that’s what you’re into. There were a lot of walkers. The Reapers continued to do villainous things for vague reasons. Duncan and Agatha died, so we won’t have to keep track of them anymore. After being absent for the previous two episodes, Carol showed up long enough to do her whole “compassionate but ruthless” thing. Gabriel announced, “God isn’t here anymore” before stabbing a guy in the head. It was all well-done and effective but, and I say this a lot when it comes to The Walking Dead, it was also pretty familiar. That’s the problem when a show like this goes on for 11 seasons. By this point, almost any show is going start to repeating itself and that’s been the case with The Walking Dead for a while now.
The repetitive nature of the show always leaves me with mixed feelings. Yes, the Reapers are frightening and evil but how are they any different from any of the other frightening and evil groups that have showed up over the course of this show? Yes, being eaten by a walker is not a pleasant thought but, by this point, we know that, unless it’s a season finale, only minor characters have to really worry about getting eaten by a walker. Maggie is not going to get eaten by a walker, at least not this early in the season. Neither is Negan, if just because it’s fairly obvious that show’s writers enjoy coming up with sarcastic dialogue for him. That said, I do think The Walking Dead deserves some credit for remaining consistent in its portrayal of a world without hope. The world of The Walking Dead has always been dark and dangerous and the worst thing that the show could do, at this point, would be to pretend like things will ever get better. Even Gabriel has lost his faith, accepting that the world is now ruled by chaos and random destruction.
The stuff with Carol and the horses felt like it was mostly just tacked on to give Carol and Rosita something to do but I enjoyed the interplay between Negan and Maggie. Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Lauren Cohan had an interesting …. well, I guess you’d have to call it chemistry …. in their scenes together. The first three episodes of the season have devoted a lot of time to comparing and contrasting Maggie and Negan’s leadership styles and, interestingly enough, it seems like Maggie has more in common with Negan than she wants to admit. One gets the feeling that her refusal to abandon Alden was as motivated by Maggie’s need to not turn into Negan as it was by any humanitarian impulse. Still, one can see that Maggie is starting to see that Negan might be right. Survival in world ruled by chaos often means abandoning compassion.
Overall, this was a good episode. At this point, The Walking Dead has lost its power to shock but it’s nice to see that it can still occasionally tell an effective story.
I’ve been on a cleaning binge over the past week so I didn’t really watch that much. I did get hit with insomnia on Wednesday, which led to me watching a lot of true crime. It also led to me being beyond exhausted on Thursday. Anyway, here’s what I watched this week!
Bachelor In Paradise (Monday and Tuesday Night, ABC)
Lance Bass has replaced David Spade as the guest host. On Monday’s episode, he was very enthusiastic and very earnest and it felt totally wrong for this deeply silly and extremely shallow little show. As for Monday’s episode, the men are still hung up on stuff that happened during their time on the Bachelorette and it’s kind of pathetic. (“You weren’t there for the right reasons!”) As for the women, Demi is my favorite because she’s unapologetic when it comes to creating drama. She understands what this show is about. As for Tuesday’s episode …. well, I didn’t really pay attention to be honest. There was a lot of arguing on the beach. My favorite part of this show remains the totally self-aware and delightfully silly opening credits.
Big Brother (24/7, CBS and Paramount Plus)
I’m writing about the trainwreck of a show over at the Big Brother Blog.
Dead Silent (Wednesday morning, ID)
This is a true crime show about murders that occurred in isolated locations. I watched three episodes on Wednesday morning. One of them dealt with a particularly gruesome crime that occurred in my home city of Dallas. Yikes! It’s a scary world out there.
Dragnet (Weekday mornings, MeTV)
I’ve only got a few more episodes left until this binge is over.
On Monday, things got started with an episode in which Joe and Gannon investigated the case of a seemingly helpful woman who was actually conning old people. This was yet another episode where Joe and Gannon went undercover! I always enjoy the undercover episodes because it’s not like Joe and Gannon actually change their behavior in any way. They’re still obviously cops but no one ever seems to notice. This was followed by an episode in which Joe and Gannon investigated a murder at a boarding house, which was something that happened fairly frequently on Dragnet. This episode also featured a classic scene where Joe and Gannon convinced a reporter to hold back on publishing a story by appealing to sense of civic duty. That reporter would lose his job today. He probably would have lost in in 1970, too.
On Tuesday, the DVR only recorded the 1st episode. Either I forgot to set it to record both episodes or the cable could have gone down. (I was asleep, so who knows?) These things happen. Anyway, the episode that was recorded featured Gannon and Friday searching for a missing college student who, because of his drug addiction, had fallen in with a bad crowd. It wasn’t a bad episode, despite the fact that if featured the most clean-cut heroin addicts imaginable. For once, the emphasis was on helping drug addicts instead of just throwing them in jail.
On Wednesday morning, the DVR actually recorded both episodes. The first episode featured Joe and Gannon investigating a man who was manufacturing and selling amphetemines out of his home. They had to prove that the man was actually the one who did the manufacturing, which they managed to do through handwriting analysis. (It turns out that the man was foolish enough to leave his notes out where anyone could find them.) It was actually a pretty good episode, focusing more on police work than on heavy-handed moralizing. (That’s the main difference between the third and fourth seasons of Dragnet.) The second episode featured Joe and Gannon taking down a gang of criminals who would kidnap dogs and then return them to collect the reward. The best thing about this episode is that all of the dog owners were portrayed as being kind of crazy. I’m a cat person so I approved.
I forgot to set the DVR to record Thursday’s episodes. Sorry.
Friday got started with one of my favorite episodes, perhaps my second favorite after the third season episode where Joe and Gannon appeared on the talk show and debated the hippies. In this episode, Joe was taking a night class at the local community college when he noticed that one of his classmates had a baggie of weed hidden in his notebook. Joe arrested the student and, as a result, was kicked out of class by his left-wing professor. Joe asked for a chance to plead his case. Fortunately, it turned out that another classmate was an attorney who pointed out that the professor didn’t have any any right to kick Joe out in the first place. Featuring smug liberals, anti-drug hysteria, and a self-righteously indignant Joe Friday, Night School is a classic Dragnet episode. This was followed by an episode where Joe and Gannon worked in the Internal Affairs Department and cleared the names of two homicide detectives accused of stealing money from the victim of a crime. It was a good, solid episode but it could have used more hippies.
Hell’s Kitchen (Monday Night, FOX)
The black jackets were handed out and, sadly, both Emily and Antonio were sent home. I surprised myself by crying a little when Emily was eliminated but, to be honest, it wasn’t the first time that I’ve teared up this season. I’ve actually gotten quite emotionally involved with this show.
As you may have guessed, I’ve really enjoyed this season of Hell’s Kitchen. I’ve actually preferred it to Big Brother. The fact that Chef Ramsay has been a bit nicer this season than he has in previous seasons has been a surprising but also a welcome change. As much as everyone loves it when Ramsay yells and curses, he seems to be a lot more sincere when he’s actually praising a chef that he’s sending home and telling them to keep learning and not give up their dreams.
Hometown Homicide (Wednesday Morning, ID)
This is a true crime show about homicides that occur in small communities. I watched two episodes on Wednesday morning while I was working on some things. I’m not sure why, exactly, I ended up watching so much true crime on Wednesday. I guess it was just the mood I was in. Sometimes, you want confirmation that the world is as scary and dangerous as you think it is.
It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia (Sunday morning, FX)
I watched Chardee MacDennis 2: Electric Boogaloo, which wasn’t quite as good as the first Chardee MacDennis episode but which still featured a pretty good guest turn from Andy Buckley. This was followed by the episode where Frank fell out of a window, which is one of the few It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia episodes that I’ve never been able to make my way through. That gash on the back of Frank’s head just freaks me out too much.
Man With A Van (Wednesdsay Morning, ID)
Apparently, this entire series is about men who owed vans and abducted women. I had insomnia on Wednesday morning so I watched an episode. It was about a 16 year-old girl in Arkansas who got abducted by a man with a van. It was disturbing to watch and, as with most true crime shows, it was hard not to tell that the show was exploiting a real-life tragedy. Still, the message was a good one: stay away from weird men who own vans.
60 Minutes (Sunday Night, CBS)
Good God, this show is like a hundred years old and so are most of the reporters on it. I imagine the same that can be said for the people who watch it every week. Myself, I only watch it when Big Brother gets preempted by a football game and I have to impatiently wait for Scott Pelley to get off my TV.
Talking Dead (Sunday Night, AMC)
Josh McDermitt continually pointing out that it made no sense for Maggie to leave Gage to die was the highlight of this week’s Talking Dead. McDermitt was, in fact, so charming and funny that I found myself really hoping that he’ll find another high-profile role after The Walking Dead ends.
The Ultimate Surfer (Monday, Tuesday, and Friday Night, ABC)
I struggle to follow most of what happens on this show. Growing up, I lived in a lot of different states and I experienced a lot of different cultures but I never met any surfers so I’m at a bit of a disadvantage when it comes to this show. (If it was The Ultimate Ballerina or The Ultimate Motorcycle Gang Member, I would be on more familiar ground.) But honestly, the only thing that really matters about this show is that everyone looks really good. If you’re going to make a show about surfing, be sure to populate it with people who you would actually want to see on the beach.
This is a true crime show. I woke up at two in the morning on Wednesday and, unable to get back to sleep, I watched two episodes. Both of them were about young women being abducted by crazed stalkers. It was probably not the best thing to watch at 3 in the morning, to be honest.
As a show, The Walking Dead has lately suffered a bit from the fact that there’s only so much you can do when civilization has collapsed and the world is full of zombies who only care about eating every living they come across. You can set up a little community of the living, one that will inevitably collapse because death is an unavoidable part of life and all it takes is one zombie to start an outbreak. You can keep moving, which might keep you alive for a little bit longer but still, death is inevitable. Or you can go batshit crazy and set yourself up as a dictator, which means that you’ll soon be as dangerous, deadly, and feared as the undead.
The lack of choice when it comes to what to do during a zombie apocalypse is one of the key parts of the genre and the best zombie films — like Romero’s Dead films for example — explore what happens to people when they find themselves in a hopeless situation. From Night of the Living Dead to Survival of the Living Dead, George Romero always remained consistent in that the undead were ultimately going to win. You simply can’t outrun death.
The first few seasons of The WalkingDead managed to capture that feeling of inescapable doom perfectly. However, now that The Walking Dead has started its eleventh season, it’s hard not to notice that there don’t seem to be any new stories left to be told. The Walking Dead has done it all and the series now often feels as if it’s just repeating itself. Last night’s episode was well-directed and well-acted (particularly by Lauren Cohan, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Josh McDermitt) but it just all felt a little bit too familiar.
Once again, we had Maggie and Negan coming to an uneasy truce while seemingly trapped in an inescapable location by a bunch of walkers. Even Maggie’s decision to leave Gage to be killed by the walkers felt like a replay of the same stuff that Rick used to do in almost every single episode. I felt sorry for Gage but I could see Maggie’s reasoning, just as I could understand Negan’s reasoning for leaving her behind last episode. It’s a dark world where only the ruthless and unsentimental survive. We already knew that, though. A few season’s ago, Gage’s death would have been shocking but, after 11 seasons, everyone watching should have known Gage would eventually end up dead. Darryl, of course, saved everyone because that’s what Darryl does. At the end of the episode, we met a new group of masked villains, the Reapers. And, again, we’ve been through all this before. There’s always a new group of villains showing up and they always announce their presence by killing a minor character. Sorry, Roy. The plot mechanics demand that you die.
Meanwhile, Eugene, Princess, Ezekiel, and Yumiko have been accepted as citizens of the Commonwealth which …. hasn’t this happened before? Again, it all felt very familiar and rather expected, right down to the sudden introduction of a woman claiming to be Stephanie, the woman that Eugene was trying to find. At this point, it’s pretty obvious that the woman is not really Stephanie and Stephanie probably doesn’t exist but was instead an elaborate ruse that the Commonwelath came up with to trick Eugene.
The sad truth of the matter is that all shows eventually run out of stories to tell and they end up recycling. Just think about the final three seasons of The Office, where everyone was suddenly developing an unrequited crush on a coworker in an attempt to recreate some of the Jim/Pam magic of the first four seasons. Running out of new stories to tell is especially likely to happen when your entire show revolves around how impossible it is to avoid death. As well-directed and well-acted as last night’s episode was, it still left me with the feeling that The Walking Dead has run out of new stories. The actors will always hold my interest but, from a narrative point of view, it’s definitely time for this apocalypse to come to an end.
Welcome to the second part of my week in television!
Hell’s Kitchen (Monday Night, FOX)
The Red Team crashed and burned in dramatic fashion this week and, as a result, poor Sam lost his dream of working for Chef Ramsay. Somehow, Antonio and Brynn survived, despite doing far worse. Still, I have to say that I appreciate that Chef Ramsay is being a bit nicer when he kicks the chefs out. He had some nice things to say to Sam before sending him out the door. Sam seemed like a nice guy so I’m glad that he left with words of encouragement instead of being told to go to Hell.
I Lived With A Killer (Friday Morning, Reelz)
The premise of this true crime show is right there in the title. The episode I saw profiled the ex-wife of Omar Mateen, the prick who was responsible for the Pulse Nightclub shooting. The show was undoubtedly exploitive but, at the same time, it really did capture a very real fear. I mean, what must it be like to discover that someone you were close to, someone who you slept beside and who you slept with, was capable of committing such an evil act?
Last Man Standing (Friday Evening, CMT)
As I think I’ve said in the past, LastMan Standing is the epitome of a good “background noise” show. It doesn’t require that you pay much attention to it and the show itself is never good nor bad enough to distract you from anything else that you have to get done. This Friday, I was cleaning around the house and I had Last Man Standing on for two hours. I’m pretty sure one of the episodes featured Tim Allen’s son-in-law getting into a fight at a baseball game while the other featured the eldest daughter worrying that she had missed out on getting an education. As I said, I’m really not sure what happened but it provided adequate background noise while I was doing some dusting and vacuuming.
Lonesome Dove (Wednesday Night, DVD)
This week, the #WestWed live tweet concluded it’s viewing of the 1990 miniseries, Lonesome Dove. The cattle drive finally reached its conclusion, sadly without Robert Duvall’s Gus McRae, who died as the result of an infected arrow wound. Tommy Lee Jones’s Woodrow F. Call did survive, though with the knowledge that he was the last of a dying breed. He brought Gus’s body back to Texas and buried him. It was a bit of a sad episode, to be honest. Still, it was a great miniseries and I’m glad to have watched it.
The Office (All Week, Comedy Central)
On Tuesday, I caught the Prison Mike episode. “I AM HERE TO SCARE YOU STRAIGHT!”
Real Life Catholic (EWTN, Thursday Night)
Chris Stefanick travels the country and talks to “real life Catholics” about their life and their faith. On Thursday’s episode, he talked to a police detective, a lobsterman, and a hermit monk who lived in a Maine lighthouse. Usually, this isn’t my type of programming but, after spending the day being bombarded with horrific images from Afghanistan, this show did provide some relief.
Reasonable Doubt (ID, Friday Night)
Reasonable Doubt is a true crime show in which families ask a detective and an attorney to look into the cases of relatives who have been convicted of murder. The families usually believe that the conviction was unjust. The detective and the attorney look at the evidence and announce whether or not they believe there’s reasonable doubt. The episode that I watched on Friday was about Tim Wright, a vet who convicted of killing a romantic rival. Tim’s sister and father are convinced that Tim is innocent. The detective and the attorney were not convinced. This inspired me to do some research of my own and I came across the Innocence 4 Tim Facebook page where Tim’s sister had some pretty harsh words for this show and the people involved. I’m not picking one side or the other but if you do watch the show, make sure to read what Tim Wright’s family has to say as well.
Silk Stalkings (ZLiving, Weekday Afternoon)
I watched two episodes of this wonderfully shallow 90s cop show on Friday afternoon. Every was very attractive, often undressed, and occasionally violent. It was a lot of fun, up until the end of the day’s first episode, when Chris (played by Rob Estes) was shot by a suspect. Fortunately, the end of the following episode, it appeared that he was on the road to recovery. Yay!
South Park (Comedy Central, all the time)
I watched one episode on Friday morning. Chef returned to South Park after spending the summer with the Super Adventure Club. Yay! Except …. oh my God, there’s something wrong with Chef! The Return of Chef has always been an interesting episode. On the one hand, it was an episode that Trey and Matt had to make after Isaac Hayes walked off the show, supposedly to protest the way the show poked fun at religion. (It’s been suggested, by both Hayes’s son and the creators of South Park, that Hayes’s resignation letter was written by some Scientologists in Hayes’s entourage while Hayes was too weakened by a stroke to really understand what was going on.) And indeed, there’s a lot of anger in this episode. Not surprisingly, there’s also a lot of sadness. One gets the feeling that Trey and Matt were deeply hurt on just a professional level but also on a personal level by what happened with Hayes.
Talking Dead (Sunday Night, AMC)
Chris Hardwick is a charming host and he seems to genuinely love talking about The Walking Dead. To be honest, it’s been a while since The Walking Dead has been the show that everyone’s talking about but Talking Dead is still fun to watch. If nothing else, watching it is a good way to relax when you’re wondering whether or not Maggie’s dead.
The Ultimate Surfer (Monday, Tuesday, and Saturday Night, ABC)
This is a new reality competition show that premiered after Bachelor in Paradise on Monday, in which a group of surfers compete to be the ultimate surfer. I kind of like that they didn’t try to do Surfing with Celebrities or anything stupid like that. These are real surfers and they were fun to watch and it helps that everyone on the show is extremely attractive. Shallow that may sound but it’s an ABC reality program. You don’t watch a show like this because you care about the people involved. You watch because you want to see attractive people on the beach or in the ocean.
That was my initial reaction while watching the premiere episode of the 11th and final season of The Walking Dead. You have to understand that it’s been a while since I last watched The Walking Dead. I lost interest in the show after Carl died during season 8. I could put up with the slow pace, the constant introductions of new eccentric colonies, and the occasionally overwrought dialogue but the death of Carl pretty much removed the element of hope from the show and without hope, what’s the point?
Though I wasn’t watching, I did vaguely keep up with what was happening on the show, largely through my friends on twitter. I know, for instance, that Rick Grimes is believed to be dead, even though he’s alive. I know that Michonne is alive but no longer on the show. I know that Negan is alive but basically a prisoner. I know that Maggie’s in charge and Darryl is her second-in-command. I know there’s been a time jump. And I know that season 11 is slated to be the final of the original series, which is why I decided that I might as well watch and attempt to review it.
(I say attempt because, honestly, this show has a history of capturing my acceptance with a few good episodes, just for me to subsequently lose interest once the narrative momentum stalls out about halfway through the season.)
While I knew a lot about what had happened on the show, what I did not know were that Father Gabriel and Eugene were still alive. I seriously figured that, if anyone was destined to either get eaten by walkers or beaten to death by whoever the season’s big bad was, it would be Gabriel and Eugene. And yet, Gabriel and Eugene are still alive, whereas so many other strong characters have died. In Eugene’s case, I’m going to guess that he’s a fun character to write for and Josh McDermitt’s performance in the role is so wonderfully odd that I can imagine the show’s producers and writers want to keep him around as long as possible. As for Gabriel …. well, who knows? He’s got one eye and that collar is still amazingly clean but otherwise, I’m stunned that Gabriel is still getting in the way.
As for tonight’s episode, it felt like a typical episode of The Walking Dead. (Or, at least, that’s the way it felt to me. As I said, it’s been a few years since I last regularly watched.) We had two storylines. In the first one, Negan, Darryl, Maggie, Gabriel, and a bunch of doomed, anonymous people went on a journey to a possibly abandoned military base. However, a storm forced them to take shelter in a subway tunnel. The tunnel turned out to be full of walkers and, in typical Walking Dead fashion, there were hints that the tunnel was also the home to yet another colony of weirdoes. Negan challenged Maggie’s authority but, for once, he managed to do it without launching into a ten-minute monologue. (Instead, it was just a three minute speech.) The show ended with the suggestion that Negan may have abandoned Maggie to be eaten by walkers. I have a feeling that Maggie’s going to survive and probably meet a bunch of weird people living somewhere in the tunnel.
The second storyline featured Ezekiel, Gabriel, Princess, and Yumiko being held prisoner in the Commonwealth, a community where everyone dressed like an Imperial Storm Trooper. In a nicely-edited scene, the four of them were interrogated and asked a series of questions that may have seemed meaningless but which were clearly designed to break down their defenses and brainwash them. I actually preferred the second storyline to the first, if just because of the enjoyable eccentric dialogue and the performances of McDermitt, Khary Payton, Paola Lazaro, and Eleanor Matsuura. I’m actually looking more forward to the continuation of their adventures than I am to several episodes of Darryl and Negan yelling at each other in the subway tunnel.
This episode of The Walking Dead was better than I expected. I did miss the quiet authority of Andrew Lincoln but, at the same time, the action moved a bit quicker than I remembered it moving back in season 8. As well, the subway tunnel was a wonderfully creepy location and I’m genuinely curious about what’s going on with the Common Wealth. I’m looking forward to next week’s show. It’s been a while since I watched but I’ve still got enough emotion invested in the show that I can say that I hope Maggie’s alive!
As I said above, I’m going to try to review this final season. The Walking Dead started the same year as Through The Shattered Lens, after all! Though I think everyone here at the TSL has had our frustrations with the series, it’s still definitely a part of this site’s history. I’m looking forward to seeing how (and if) the story ends.
4 Shots From 4 Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking.
For our final 4 Shots From 4 Films of this October season, we pay tribute to William Henry Pratt, the patron saint of horror cinema, with….
In this 1936 film (which has absolutely no relation to the AMC zombie show), Boris Karloff plays John Ellman. John Ellman is perhaps one of the unluckiest guys ever. Seriously check this out:
John Ellman was once an acclaimed concert pianist. However, he was wrongly convicted of killing his wife and spent ten years in prison. Now that he’s finally been paroled, he can’t get anyone to hire him. Meanwhile, the judge who originally sent him to prison is in the news for having defied the mob and sentenced a well-known gangster to prison. The mob is out for revenge but, rather than take the fall themselves, they’d rather frame a patsy. And who could be a better patsy than a man who everyone already knows has a grudge against the judge?
Nolan (Ricardo Cortez), a crooked lawyer, arranges for Ellman to be given a job. Ellman is told that he simply has to spy on the judge for a few nights to determine whether the judge is having an extramarital affair. Ellman agrees and soon finds himself being set up. The gangsters kill the judge and plant the body in Ellman’s car. Ellman is arrested and sentenced to die. It doesn’t matter that there are witnesses who know that Ellman’s innocent. No one is willing to cross the mafia.
Ellman is convicted and promptly executed but his story isn’t over. A scientist named Dr. Beaumont (Edmund Gwenn, who later played the man who might be Santa Claus in Miracle on 34th Street) knows that Ellman is innocent. He takes Ellman’s body and, through an artificial heart and a bunch of other science-y things, he manages to revive Ellman. John Ellman lives again! Of course, he’s a bit of a zombie now and he doesn’t have any memory of his former life. And yet, he instinctively knows who set him up to be executed and he sets out for revenge.
What’s interesting is that Ellman doesn’t kill anyone. Even after he’s revived and presumably has no concept of right and wrong, John Ellman remains a rather passive zombie. For the most part, the racketeers die because of how they react to the sight of the previously dead Ellman coming towards them. For that matter, Beaumont isn’t the typical mad scientist that you might expect to turn up in a film like this. He’s a benevolent man who was simply doing what he thought was the right thing. Though the film ends with a warning about playing God, one can’t hep but get the feeling that, unlike Frankenstein, the film is overall very supportive of the idea of reviving the dead.
Directed by Michael Curtiz (who also did Casablanca, Mildred Pierce, The Adventures of Robin Hood, and countless other classic films), The Walking Dead is a combination horror/gangster film. The film’s plot is a bit too convoluted for its own good but, overall, The Walking Dead works because of Boris Karloff’s performance. He’s poignantly pathetic as the living John Ellman and then rather chilling as the vengeance-driven, recently revived Ellman. The film’s most effective scenes are the ones where he just stares at his enemies, fixing them with a gaze that takes no prisoners and offers no hope. It’s a great performance that elevates an otherwise uneven film.
First, in 2000, there was Unbreakable. Then, 16 years later, there was Split. This January, M. Night Shyamalan brings us the third part of his Eastrail 177 trilogy, Glass. The first trailer for Glass was dropped at SDCC this weekend and it leads off this week’s trailer round-up.
Also dropping at SDCC was the first trailer for Aquaman. The DC hero that everyone loves to ridicule is finally get a movie of his very own. The trailer hints at the origins of Arthur Curry, features the expected underwater action, and features enough ironic line readings that it could almost pass for the latest entry in the MCU.
If Glass and Aquaman are not heroic enough for you, there is always Shazam. Back in the 1940s, Shazam was known as Captain Marvel and his adventures were published by Fawcett. Claiming that Captain Marvel was clear rip-off of Superman, DC attempted to sue Fawcett out of business and then purchased the character, renaming him Shazam. Now, Shazam is coming to theaters. Shazam’s appeal has always been retro so, naturally, the trailer is full of references to Game of Thrones and self-reflexive humor.
Following the 2014 Godzilla reboot and Kong: Skull Island, Godzilla: King of the Monsters is the third chapter in Legendary’s Monsterverse. This one will see Godzilla meeting Mothra, Rodan, and King Ghidorah. Godzilla: King of the Monsters will be released on May 31st, 2019.
Also released at SDCC was the latest trailer for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Gridenwald. Fantastic Beasts will be released on November 16th.
In Patient Zero, Matt Smith and Natalie Dormer try to find a cure for a virus that is transforming humanity into zombies. The film is scheduled to be released through video-on-demand on 14 August 2018, before a limited theatrical release on 14 September 2018.
I Still See You is the latest B-movie to feature Bella Thorne getting stalked. Will you see I Still See You when it’s released on October 12th?
In the upcoming comedy, Second Act, Jennifer Lopez plays an ambitious woman who is mistaken for a high-level business consultant. With a plot like that, Second Act sounds like it could be the funniest film of 2004. Second Act will be released on November 21st, 2018.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg has already been the subject of one of the year’s most successful documentaries. She gets the biopic treatment with On The Basis of Sex. Felicity Jones plays Ginsburg while Mimi Leder returns from her cinematic exile to handle directing duties. On The Basis of Sex will be released on December 25th.
Finally, the trailer for the 9th season of The Walking Dead dropped at SDCC and promised a new world with new rules. Season 9 premieres on October 7th.
According to Collider, the next season of The Walking Dead will be Andrew Lincoln’s last. After eight seasons as the star of The Walking Dead, Lincoln is apparently ready to move on and that means that The Walking Dead is about to lose Rick Grimes.
Of course, the television show began with Rick Grimes waking up from a coma and finding himself in a world that was far different from the one that he remembered. In the early seasons especially, Rick stood-in for the audience. We discovered the realities of the zombie apocalypse at the same time that Rick did. When we were upset over the death of a character, Rick got upset with us. When Rick hoped that a new, better world could somehow be created from the ruins of the old, we hoped along with him. Among an ensemble cast that was filled with talent, Andrew Lincoln was the often underappreciated anchor that held the show’s narrative together.
Of course, many would argue that the show lost its way over the last few seasons. I certainly would. As the show grew more inconsistent, so did Rick’s character. Often times, it seemed like Rick’s personality would change from episode to episode, depending on what the show was trying to accomplish that week. It’s hard not to feel that, as an actor, Andrew Lincoln deserved better than to have to spend the majority of season seven in a nearly catatonic state, silently suffering as Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s Negan devoured every inch of scenery.
And yet, Andrew Lincoln was always good. Sometimes, the scripts were weak. Sometimes, Rick was required to do things that didn’t make much sense. But, through it all, Lincoln remained the anchor. For all intents and purposes, he was The Walking Dead.
In much the same way that Lost simply had no choice but to end with Jack Shepherd sacrificing his life on the island, I’ve always felt that The Walking Dead had little choice but to end with Rick dying. The show has always been his story and it’s always seemed that, when Rick’s life ended, so would the show. Of course, the perfect ending would have been for Rick to die and Carl to pick up the mantle of leadership. Unfortunately, Carl’s dead so that’s not going to happen.
(I realize that the Collider article stated that Lincoln was leaving the show and not that Rick was going to be killed off. But, honestly, it’s hard to imagine this show not milking Rick’s death for all the drama that it can. And, at this point, it would feel like a cop out not to kill him. That’s just not the way things work in the world of The Walking Dead.)
Who will take over as the new leader on The Walking Dead? Maggie was an obvious choice but Lauren Cohan just had a pilot picked up by ABC. (Of course, there’s no guarantee that the ABC series will be a success. For one thing, it’s entitled Whiskey Cavalier, which is one of the stupidest titles I’ve ever come across.) Norman Reedus just managed to get himself a nice pay raise, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see Daryl become even more prominent. Or Negan might suddenly turn into a good guy and become the new leader. Who knows? About the only thing we can say for sure is that, with Carl dead and Rick leaving, the show is inevitably going to move further away from the comic that inspired it.
Though they’re two very different shows, it’s hard for me not to compare Andrew Lincoln leaving The Walking Dead to Steve Carell leaving The Office. Let’s just hope that Rick’s replacement won’t be Andy Bernard.
Finally, in honor of the legacy Rick Grimes…
Those schoolgirl days of telling tales and biting nails are gone
But in my mind I know they will still live on and on
But how do you thank someone who has taken you from crayons to perfume?
It isn’t easy, but I’ll try
If you wanted the sky I would write across the sky in letters
That would soar a thousand feet high ‘To Sir, With Love’
The time has come for closing books and long last looks must end
And as I leave I know that I am leaving my best friend
A friend who taught me right from wrong and weak from strong
That’s a lot to learn, but what can I give you in return?
If you wanted the moon I would try to make a start
But I would rather you let me give my heart ‘To Sir, With Love’
Through the Shattered Lens 