The FBI’s Most Unwanted 8: A New Wrinkle

[Contains spinning metal spinal columns and SPOILERS!!!]

By the time it came to shoot the eighth season of The X Files, the show’s stars were starting to get itchy feet. After a rather bitter behind-the-scenes dispute over money owed, Duchovny took a hiatus for half of the season, and Gillian Anderson insisted on being allowed to spend more time with her young daughter, Piper Maru, who was still attending school in Canada. Which is all very admirable and heart-warming for the Anderson family, but it kinda sucks for us Scully-fans, because she is absent for far too much of the time. That said, I do appreciate the fresh energy that Robert Patrick brought to the series as ‘Special Agent John Doggett’… aside from having the perfect “cop voice”, he makes for a very likeable and engaging “guy’s guy” action hero, and it’s fun to see him react to the craziness he’s faced with, while Scully is forced to play the role of his mind-opening mentor. David Duchovny was often credited with adding jokes to the more serious episodes, and I think it’s fair to say that without him The X-Files became a far more po-faced, meat-and-potatoes procedural than it ever was before. Despite being a comedy fan (and a horror-comedy fan at that), I thought this season had a more consistent tone and reality level, even if the individual episodes weren’t quite as memorable as those that came before them. I can understand why some fans might have felt alienated back in the day, but after binging on so many episodes over such a short period of time, I actually welcomed the change of pace… although I was also glad when Mulder returned to drop some of his trademark bon mots in the latter episodes.

While we’re on the subject of new characters, ep #8.14 (“This Is Not Happening”) saw the debut appearance of Annabeth Gish as ‘Special Agent Monica Reyes’… who I like to think of as a slightly less useful ‘Deanna Troi’, in that she claims to be able to perceive cosmic energy, but doesn’t seem much more insightful, intuitive or aware of her surroundings than any of the other agents! Yes, she has spooky visions now and again, but she still gets duped just as easily as everyone else on the show. The character was supposedly created to replace Scully, but… no. Not in my heart, she doesn’t! Not even close. According to Gish: “Chris [Carter] really wanted Monica to be a sunny force, which is hard to play sometimes. But it’s a natural instinct for me; I can find happiness in the midst of darkness.” And I can kinda see what they were going for, but I don’t think it works in practice… when she smiles at inappropriate moments she just looks crazy to me. As Judge Judy would say, she had an “inappropriate affect” that I found off-putting, and I just couldn’t warm to her at all… especially after the writers introduced ‘Leyla Harrison’ (Jolie Jenkins), the totes adorable fangirl FBI Agent, who buddied up with Doggett in ep #8.19 (“Alone”). Despite her lack of field experience, I think she would have made a much better long-term partner for the gruff, grizzled lawman than Reyes does… helping him to see the upside of their assignments, while he teaches her the nitty-gritty of police work. To be honest, I worried she was “dead meat” from the moment her smiley face first appeared on screen, so I was glad to see she survived the episode with all her limbs and senses intact… it’s just a shame that she didn’t become a full-time team member!

Sadly, after the guest-fest of last season, this one was rather barren on the female front:

Kim Greist appeared in ep #8.5 (“Invocation”) as ‘Lisa Underwood’, the mother of a young boy who vanished from a fairground ten years earlier, before appearing out-of-the-blue in the present day, looking the same age as he did when she last saw him! According to Wikipedia, Greist herself “disappeared from the screen” in 2002, but not before appearing in such cult movies as C.H.U.D., Brazil and Manhunter. The late Kellie Waymire appeared in ep #8.8 (“Surekill”) as ‘Tammi Peyton’, a super-cute secretary who foolishly skims funds from her sociopathic, sexually-exploitative boss. Tut-tut! Sadly Waymire died from a cardiac arrest in 2003, at the age of just 36, but she’d already racked up one-off appearances in Wonderfalls, Ally McBeal and Seinfeld, as well as recurring roles in Star Trek: Enterprise and Six Feet Under. Penny Johnson appeared in ep #8.12 (“Medusa”) as ‘Dr. Hellura Lyle’, a disagreeable doctor from the Centre for Disease Control, who went down into the deserted subway tunnels with Doggett, to investigate a mysterious death. Johnson has had recurring roles in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and 24 (as the President’s wife, ‘Sherry Palmer’), and can currently be seen in Castle as ‘Captain Victoria “Iron” Gates’… but I’ll always think of her as long-suffering assistant ‘Beverly Barnes’ on The Larry Sanders Show. Denise Crosby appeared in ep #8.17 (“Empedocles”) as ‘Dr. Mary Speake’, who winds up treating a man carrying a contagious form of pure evil, as well as looking after Scully in a later episode.

Frances Fisher appeared in ep #8.20 (“Essence”) as ‘Lizzy Gill’, a super-helpful nurse recommended by Scully’s Mum, who turns out to be secretly working with… er… that guy from the other episode who was lying about having an alien baby, because… er… nope, no idea. In fact, she later claimed to be a scientist, who’d been working on the Syndicate’s project to impregnate women with hybrid babies… before suggesting that Scully’s baby wasn’t even slightly alien, but perfectly human “without any human weaknesses”. M’kay. Fisher’s most famous film role was probably playing the mother of Kate Winslet’s character in Titanic, but she’s also appeared in funner stuff, like L.A. Story, Gone in 60 Seconds, and The Host. And finally, Dale Dickey appeared in ep #8.21 (“Existence”) as an unnamed ‘Game Warden’ who helps to deliver Scully’s miracle-baby, despite getting a bowl of boiling hot water thrown in her face by Reyes, when she finally realises the warden is an incognito alien “super solider”. Note: Reyes only figures this out after she sees the blatantly obvious bumps on the back of the warden’s neck, that literally anyone else could have seen in her place…. not by reading her aura, or sensing her energy, or anything mystical like that. Gah! Dickey is a veteran “character actress”, who’s racked up cameos in various TV shows, including My Name Is Earl, The Closer and Breaking Bad… but I recognised her from her current run on True Blood, playing werewolf grandma ‘Martha Bozeman’, whose performance has been one of the few bright spots in the terminally irritating and boring “shifter” subplot. Meh.

On the more manly side of things: Ep #8.2 (“Without”) saw the final appearance of Brian Thompson as the ‘Alien Bounty Hunter’… and I’m glad he got to face off against Patrick, since his character was such a blatant Terminator/Terminator 2 rip-off… even if Scully was the one to take him out, with a well-aimed killshot to the back of the neck. Blam! Brent Sexton appeared in ep #8.3 (“Patience”) as a gravedigger… and then again in ep #8.12 as a structural engineer helping D&S to explore the potentially contaminated subway tunnels. Joe Morton appeared in ep #8.6 (“Redrum”), as a prosecutor trying to prove he’s innocent of murdering his wife, while his perception of time moves backwards, day by day. As a Philip K. Dick fan from way-back, I thought this was a pretty great gimmick… and Morton gave a very strong performance in the lead role, even if it did minimise Scully’s involvement in the story. Danny Trejo also appeared in this episode, as the vengeful villain responsible for the murder and frame-up job. Michael Bowen appeared in ep #8.8 as a legally blind exterminator, who exploits his twin brother’s x-ray vision to bushwhack drug dealers, so he can steal their merchandise. I read that James Franco also appeared in this episode as a random police officer, but I can’t say I spotted him myself. Arye Gross appeared in ep #8.9 (“Salvage”) as a corporate scientist intent on concealing the secret origins of a murderous metal man, played by Wade Williams.

Deep Roy appeared in ep #8.10 (“Badlaa”) as a tiny, legless Indian beggar with magickal powers, and a very icky way of sneaking through customs. In ep #8.13 (“Per Manum”) Adam Baldwin made his first appearance as Doggett’s old marine buddy and top-level informant, ‘Knowle Rohrer’ (The Rural Juror!)… who doesn’t take long to reveal the fact that he’s a secretly evil super-soldier. Boo! Eddie Kaye Thomas returned in ep #8.14 as the messed up corpse of ‘Gary Cory’, lying on an autopsy slab looking icky… so, either he’s a huge fan of the show, or his American Pie pay-cheque hadn’t cleared yet? This episode also featured the first appearance of Judson Scott as ‘Absalom’, a creepy cult leader, who actually had a lot of useful information to pass on regarding the  oft-delayed alien invasion. M. C. Gainey appeared in ep #8.18 (“Vienen”) as a friendly engineer on an oil drilling platform, who turns out to be a flesh-burning alien-stooge… just like all of his (non-Latino) colleagues. Meanwhile, Miguel Sandoval played the Vice President of the big, fancy oil company, who just wants to keep the product flowing, regardless of how many people get infected by the nefarious “black oil” they’re bringing up. And finally Zach Grenier appeared in ep #8.19 as an overambitious biologist, who can transform himself into a were-lizard with the ability to blind and pre-digest his prey with a single blast of venom. Nasty.

Oh, and I think James Pickens Jr. does some fine work as recurring antagonist ‘Deputy Director Kersh’… but I couldn’t help missing ‘The Cigarette Smoking Man’, who was totally absent this season (presumed dead… but I know he isn’t).

Liu-Pei

Shanghai Noon (2000) was on TV t’other day, so I thought I’d take a casual look, just to check out Lucy Liu’s scenes… but I was quickly sucked in by all the comedy-western-chopsocky shenanigans.

Liu plays ‘Princess ‘Pei-Pei’, who flees old-timey China to avoid an arranged marriage to a frog-faced fella… only to wind up being held hostage by a former member of her own Imperial Guard, who’s now set himself up as a slaver in America. Eep! She gets a few good kicks in here and there, but she spends most of her time playing the damsel-in-distress, humbled by her cruel captor and waiting to be rescued by the movie’s mismatched male heroes (Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson). On the plus side, she does look super-pretty here, and she gets to share a few fun scenes with the legendary Chan (playing a devoted but slightly dim Guard, who follows her to the West), so it could’ve been a lot worse.

Her helplessness is also counter-balanced by the character of ‘Falling Leaves’, a sharp-shootin’ Sioux maiden, who is married to Chan by her tribal chief father. She follows the heroes like a tongue-less guardian angel, saving them from certain death several times throughout the movie… and even gets a joke in at the end, bless her. The role was played by Brandon Merrill, who started out as a rodeo champion, before she was “spotted” in a magazine feature, and signed up by a modelling agency… though this movie remains the only credit on her acting resume, according to IMDb. The only other female character of any note was ‘Fifi’, a slightly racist prostitute played by Kate Luyben, who inadvertently instigates a minor conflict between the “Chinaman” and his blonde cowboy buddy.

Speaking of whom, I’d forgotten how funny and charming Owen Wilson could be back in the day, with his off-kilter delivery, and shaggy-dog appearance. I’m one of the few people in the universe who enjoyed Chris Tucker’s contributions to The Fifth Element, but given a choice I’d rather watch Wilson team up with Chan than sit through another Rush Hour sequel… though obviously, in a perfect world, I’d prefer to see Liu, Luyben and Merrill teaming up together, as a steampunk variation of Charlie’s Angels!

Я Могу Петь Радуги

I’m rather behind the curve with this story, but today I discovered a photo of Tilda Swinton flying a rainbow flag outside the Kremlin (and risking 15 days detention in jail), in honour of the LGBT community in Russia, and former Soviet republics… while also drawing attention to the oppressive laws used to persecute said community.

Personally, I believe that Russian is an incredibly beautiful language, and I’d love to be able to speak it myself… but (try as I might), I find it very hard to see the country as the sort of fun, happy place I’d ever actually want to visit, and that does diminish my motivation somewhat.

I have a lot of sympathy for the historical suffering of the Russian people, and I’m tired of seeing them depicted as treacherous villains in English and American films… so I can’t help wishing that Putin and his pals would mellow out and stop playing the villains in real life!

God Wants You Wet

I decided to catch up on some of the shows slowly accruing on my DVR… which included a BBC2 documentary about the Great Kumbh Mela, an “awe-inspiring celebration of the world’s oldest religion [which] happens every 12 years at the place where Hindus believe two sacred rivers meet. For many Hindus this is their most important pilgrimage, and it happens at one of the most holy sites in India. Hindus come to cleanse themselves in the sacred waters of the river Ganges, to pray and emerge purified and renewed.” The programme followed several UK-based believers (including a white lady who’d been staying at a yoga retreat in India) as they took in the sights, sounds and smells of the festival, before taking a dip in the Ganges… or not, as the case may be.

One of the participants was Shivali Bhammer, a former investment banker born and raised in London’s fancy-schmancy Knightsbridge area, who is now pursuing a career as a devotional singer and dancer. She’s already released two albums, The Bhajan Project and Urban Temple, which apparently went to No. 1 on the iTunes World Music chart. To quote the lady herself: “Urban Temple is a reflection of my own personal journey, merging my western background with my Indian roots. The music is the western side of my upbringing, and the lyrics are a direct result of my discovering the core of my roots and the spirituality it inspires in me. I feel truly blessed to be in this unique position and want to share it with others.”

Clips from one of her videos were shown during her introduction, and she also broke out some dance moves after encountering a group of Shiva-centric singers on the street. Obviously I’m not an expert on Indian music and movement, but I thought she had a very sweet voice, and a very graceful body… and seemed admirably un-phased while chatting with naked, ash-covered Sadhus (holy men). Unfortunately, after all the build-up (which including hiring a private boat to take her out to a quieter, cleaner section of the river), she chickened out and decided against immersing herself in the karma-cleansing waters… contenting herself with a little arm-washing, and a bit of defensive rationalisation. To be fair, I totally sympathise with her (for all its sacredness, the Ganges is lousy with sewage), and would probably have done the same thing myself… it’s just unfortunate for her that she had a BBC camera crew sat in the boat, filming her flip-flop… and that all the other, less-well-off pilgrims had cheerfully gone bathing in the murky brown water by the banks.

So, a good showcase for her as a performer, but I doubt we’ll be seeing her presenting a Bear Grylls-style survival show anytime soon!

The FBI’s Most Unwanted 7: God Wants You Hot!

[Contains baby snakes and SPOILERS!!!]

The seventh season of The X Files saw two plucky new writers joining the creative team… a couple of starry-eyed ingénues named William B. Davis and Gillian Anderson!

Davis’s episode (#7.15, “En Ami”) saw his character, ‘The Cigarette Smoking Man’, taking Scully on a cosy road-trip to meet a whistle-blower who could provide her with the much-coveted panacea for all known diseases (conveniently stored on a shiny little CD single). This was a pretty solid episode for both actors, and it was great to see them spending so much time together, but I have to admit to being disappointed that it all turned out to be a long-con in the end. Damn you, Smokey! Anderson also directed her episode (#7.17, “all things”), in which our heroine took a more internal journey, encountering a series of synchronicities surrounding an ailing acquaintance (a married professor which whom she almost had an affair in her med-student days), and opening herself up to a more Eastern flavour of spirituality. This story should have been right up my alley, considering my own beliefs and interests in this area, but I found the episode itself a bit of a drag… and I get the feeling from Anderson’s (otherwise very endearing and amusing) commentary track, that given her druthers she would rather have made a feature length indie melodrama about Scully’s complicated romantic history, with no supernatural or X-File-y elements in it at all!

Besides those two Scully-centric  episodes, her standout moments this season included a fearsome throwdown with returning villain ‘Donnie Pfaster’ (Nick Chinlund) (ep #7.7, “Orison”)*, her hilarious background demonstration of how to run in high-heels (ep #7.19, “Hollywood A.D.”), and her gleeful giddiness over discovering an invisible man on her autopsy table (ep #7.21, “Je Souhaite”). Hee! Meanwhile, her frenemy ‘Agent Fowley’ (Mimi Rogers) met her (off-screen) demise in ep #7.2 (“The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati”), following an extended dream-sequence in which she and ‘Mulder’ (David Duchovny) shacked up together in the suburbs! I’m presuming she was killed for passing on secret information to Scully, so I guess it’s an honourable way to go… but I wish they’d kept her around long enough to take over from Mulder in the eighth season! Apparently Rogers figured out she was for the chop long before she got to the end of the episode’s script, because she was featured in so many long scenes: “It occurred to me, uh-oh, this is way too good. I have too much to do. They’re going to kill me.” Bless. Farewell, Agent Fowley… we barely knew ye… but you did look smokin’ hot in that black nightie…

There were also a shedload of noteworthy female guest stars this season, so let’s get our list on! Jonelle Kennedy appeared in ep #7.1 (“The Sixth Extinction”) as ‘Dr. Amina Ngebe’, a science-lady who helped Scully investigate a downed alien spacecraft, discovered on an African beach. Besides a minor recurring role on The Mentalist, Kennedy has also had supporting roles in Dreamgirls, The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. and Seinfeld. Judith Hoag appeared in ep #7.3 (“Hungry”) as ‘Dr. Mindy Rinehart’, a surprisingly dedicated and compassionate psychiatrist, called in to talk to the staff of a drive-thru burger restaurant, after a murder on the premises. Hoag is probably best known for portraying ‘April O’Neil’ in the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles flick… but she’s also had minor roles in Armageddon, Salt, Quantum Leap, The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. and Castle. Future Oscar-winner Octavia Spencer had a one-line cameo as a psychiatric nurse (named ‘Nurse Octavia’) in ep #7.4, which was intended as a crossover “finale” for Carter’s other, abruptly cancelled supernatural-detective show Millennium.

Nicki Aycox appeared in ep #7.5 (“Rush”) as ‘Chastity Raines’, the fearful highschool girlfriend of a sadistic douche who had acquired superhuman speed from an alien source. Tara Buck appeared in ep #7.7 as ‘Blueberry’, a prostitute who makes the mistake of propositioning an escaped serial-killer at a truck stop, and winds up brutally murdered in a bathtub. These days, Buck is best known (and beloved) for playing ‘Ginger’, the oft-glamoured Fangtasia waitress in True Blood. Beth Grant appeared in ep #7.9 (“Signs and Wonders”) as ‘Iris Finster’, a well-meaning church-lady, who gets killed by snakes summoned by her seemingly  kindly and inclusive reverend, after sticking her nose into his dubious doings. Grant has had a minor recurring role in several Bryan Fuller shows (Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies and Mockingbird Lane), and currently appears as one of the many ill-fitting pieces in the jumbled jigsaw puzzle of jokes that is The Mindy Project. Tracy Middendorf appeared in the same episode as ‘Gracie O’Connor’, the teenage daughter of a crazy snake-handling preacher who is set up as the red herring suspect for all the serpent-related homicides. Besides minor roles in Angel, Ally McBeal, and Six Feet Under, Middendorf also appeared in Lost as one of the suspiciously foxy “Others” holed up in the underwater Looking Glass station.

Patience Cleveland appeared in ep #7.11 (“Closure”) as ‘Arbutus Ray’, a retired nurse who once worked at a hospital where a 14-year-old ‘Samantha Mulder’ fled to escape the tests being conducted on her at a nearby Air Force Base. The poor, long-suffering girl was then spirited away by supernatural forces, to become starlight, or some other such bullshit. Frankly I had a problem with the premise of this whole episode… partly because I was quite happy with the idea that Mulder’s sister was all grown-up and living in the suburbs, not wanting anything to do with her crazy brother (as stated in ep #5.2, “Redux II”), partly because it ripped-off an earlier, equally frustrating maybe-Samantha-got-snuffed-by-a-serial-killer story (ep #4.10, “Paper Hearts”), and partly because I don’t understand how the ghost-children can be “in the starlight”, but also stuck on earth playing stupid games over their own shallow graves! And how do these “walk-ins” choose which kids they’re going to save over the ones they’re going to let suffer and die? And why did they wait until Samantha had already been through so many traumatic tests (and was, in fact, no longer a child) before intervening? Couldn’t they get past the base’s security? Meh. Besides appearing in Seinfeld as the “Old Lady” that George infamously shoves out of his way while escaping a fire at a child’s b-day party, Cleveland is probably best known for playing  ‘Roberta Sparrow’ (aka “Grandma Death”), in the time-travel mind-f*ck flick Donnie Darko.

I couldn’t help feeling sorry for María Celedonio, who appeared in ep #7.12 (“X-Cops”) as ‘Chantara Gomez’, a pink-haired prostitute who falls victim to a shape-shifting fear-monster. Despite a fairly sizeable speaking role requiring some serious emotional acting, the faux “fly-on-the-wall” reality TV gimmick meant that her face was completely blurred out for the entire performance! So harsh. Celedonio doesn’t have many other big credits on her resume, but she did co-star with Natasha Lyonne in Freeway II: Confessions of a Trickbaby, which I’ve wanted to see for a long time now (sadly its obscurity has really driven up the price of the DVD). Krista Allen appeared in ep #7.13 (“First Person Shooter”), as ‘Jade Blue Afterglow’, a stripper whose body and likeness was scanned into a virtual reality computer game, and applied to ‘Maitreya’, an inexplicably powerful avatar with the ability to kill gamers for realsies. After kicking off her career in the soft-core erotica series Emmanuelle in Space, Allen has appeared as an irresistible vixen in several genre shows, including Smallville and Mutant X… though comedy fans might remember her best as the “Elevator Girl” Jim Carrey slobbers over in Liar Liar. Maitreya’s computer-geek creator, ‘Phoebe’, was played by Constance Zimmer… who seemed slightly miscast in the role, in the sense that she and Allen are both very pretty brunettes with (somewhat) similar features, and I thought they were the same actress in the early scenes. Maybe that was intentional? I don’t know. She does give a good performance though, so I’m not knocking her acting!

Wendy Schaal appeared in ep #7.16 (“Chimera”) as ‘Martha Crittendon’, a seemingly respectable middle-class wifey, who was one of several women having an affair with the local sheriff, behind the back of his betrothed. Schaal has had a pretty long career, with small roles in classic 80’s action shows like Knight Rider, Airwolf, and Macgyver, as well as a three-episode run on Six Feet Under, but she’s probably best known now for voicing ‘Francine Smith’ in American Dad! The late Gina Mastrogiacomo appeared in the same ep as ‘Jenny Uphouse’, Martha’s glowering, blue-collar rival for the sheriff’s affection (and sperm). Mastrogiacomo made her screen debut in a movie called Alien Space Avenger, before landing a role in Goodfellas as the main character’s mistress… but sadly this episode was the last thing she filmed before her untimely death from a heart infection, at the age of 39. Stacy Haiduk appeared in ep #7.17 as ‘Margaret “Maggie” Waterston’, the angry, angry daughter of Scully’s silver-fox college professor. Apparently Anderson’s script ran long, and they had to cut out all the exposition explaining that Maggie’s mother killed herself after the supposed affair, which would have given us more insight into her antagonism towards our heroine… as it is, she just comes off as a bit of a beeyotch. Haiduk got her big break playing ‘Lana Lang’ in the Superboy series, and went on to score recurring roles in SeaQuest DSV, Kindred: The Embraced, and Brimstone… she also popped up in the current season of True Blood as a buck-naked werewolf hooker hanging out in a motel room with future-X-Files-star Robert Patrick!

Duchovny’s real-life-wife Téa Leoni appeared in ep #7.19 (“Hollywood A.D.”) as “herself”, playing a Hollywood-ised parody of Scully. I found this episode quite self-indulgent when I first watched it, back in the day… but second time around, it’s actually rather charming, with plenty laugh-out-loud lines, and some great scenes between the leads… plus a protracted homage to Plan 9 from Outer Space! Gotta love that. I used to have a big crush on Leoni back when she was starring in The Naked Truth, but I don’t see anything else on her resume (other than A League of Their Own) that I’ve really enjoyed. Kathy Griffin appeared in ep #7.20 (“Fight Club”) as a pair of identical, paternal twins named ‘Betty Templeton’ and ‘LuLu Pfeiffer’, whose lives are irrevocably intertwined, despite their mutual antagonism… and when the two of them get together, all heck breaks lose! I generally have a high-tolerance for Griffin’s acting work (which isn’t to everyone’s tastes, I know), but this episode was way, way too silly and cartoony for its own good… in terms of the writing and direction, I mean. Arlene Pileggi also appeared here as an FBI agent who bears a striking resemblance to Scully… which isn’t too surprising, consider that Pileggi first began working on the series as Anderson’s stand-in, before being promoted to a speaking role as Skinner’s secretary, ‘Arlene’, from the fifth season onwards (as well as marrying Mitch Pileggi). Finally, Paula Sorge appeared in ep #7.21 (“Je Souhaite”) as ‘Jenn’, a world-weary and cynical “jinniyah” (genie), who ends up offering Mulder the requisite three wishes. I really liked Sorge’s work in this episode, and thought she brought a lot of charm and personality to the character, so I was convinced that she must be a “someone” I recognised from somewhere else… but she hasn’t really had any other roles as prominent as this one, before or since. Shame.

On the manly side of things: Mark Pellegrino appeared in ep #7.3 as an ex-convict who becomes the prime suspect in a murder, while blackmailing the real culprit (a brain-eating monster disguise as a meek young man). Lance Henriksen appeared in ep #7.4 as ‘Frank Black’, his pre-existing character from sister-series Millennium. I never watched that show myself, but I can understand why Henriksen might have felt this episode was a pretty poor send-off, considering how little he actually gets to do in it. On the plus side, zombies! Yay! Willie Garson made his second X-Files appearance in ep #7.6 (“The Goldberg Variation”), this time playing a super-lucky schlub who wants to use his power to help a neighbour’s sickly son (played by Shia LaBeouf!). Scott Wilson appeared in ep #7.7, as a prison chaplain who uses his (supposedly) God-given time-stopping powers to free dangerous criminals, so that he can kill them himself. Mmm‘kay. Billy Drago appeared in ep #7.14 (“Theef”) as a fantastically creepy Appalachian fella, who uses witchcraft to punish the doctor who euthanised his “Jane Doe” daughter. Tobin Bell appeared in ep #7.18 (“Brand X”) as a surprisingly chipper “human guinea pig”, who exhales deadly beetle spores after being experimented on by the Morley tobacco company. Duchovny’s old chum Garry Shandling appeared in ep #7.19 as “himself”, portraying a parody version of Mulder. And finally, Eddie Kaye Thomas appeared in ep #7.22 (“Requiem”) as a curious highschool kid, who gets caught in an invisible energy field while investigating a crashed UFO. Uh-oh!

———–

* That episode also featured a line from a Cake song (“Sheep go to Heaven, Goats go to Hell”) scrawled on the prison chapel’s walls, inspired by the fact that Anderson was a big fan of the band at the time! I love that song too, so it’s nice to know we might have something in common to talk about if we ever met at a signing or an ashram or something…

Pissy

[Contains lonely thunder-clouds and SPOILERS!!!]

Ch4 were showing Percy Jackson & The Lightning Thief (2010) on Sunday, and I was tricked into recording it by the stacked cast list… Bean! Brosnan! Coogan! Dawson! Keener! Pantoliano! Thurman! Winstone! Names, names, names!!!

Sadly, the opening scenes were so achingly dull, with such lame, stilted dialogue, I ended up fast-forwarding through most of it, only stopping to check out the contributions of the major female cast members, who were totally wasted in thankless supporting roles. Catherine Keener plays the rundown, emotionally-abused mother of the eponymous demigod, who’s eventually nabbed by ‘Hades’ (Lord of the Underworld), and held hostage in return for a magickal “Master Lightning Bolt” that everyone believes ‘Percy’ stole from ‘Zeus’ (King of the Gods). Uma Thurman plays ‘Medusa’, a Gorgon with a chip on her shoulder and CGI snakes for hair, who gets beheaded by the movie’s hero. And finally, Rosario Dawson plays ‘Persephone’, the supposed “wife” of Hades… in the sense that he abducted her, and tricked her into eating food from the Underworld, thus dooming her to remain there for six months of every year, for all eternity (according to classical mythology, I mean).

As I say, I didn’t watch the movie properly, so it would be foolish of me to try and critique the way women are treated in this movie overall… but I did watch all of Persephone’s scenes, and couldn’t help feeling she got rather a raw deal. From the moment she’s first mentioned, she’s depicted as an abused, imprisoned woman who takes in “secret visitors” behind her husband’s back… but weirdly this situation is played for nudging, winking laughs, rather than the tragedy it really is. When she first meets the hero and his sidekicks, she makes a saucy comments about “having” his Satyr friend (‘Grover’), and keeps eye-f*cking him for the rest of the scene. After a lot of blah, Hades finally gets his hands on the Bolt, and decides to go back on the ransom deal by feeding Percy and his friends/mother to the flaming souls of the Damned. Uh-oh! Persephone bravely snatches the Bolt away from her “husband”, and blasts him with it, thus saving the hero’s life, and everyone he loves. Hurrah! And how does Percy thank her for this timely intervention? He does not. At all. In the slightest. Not even a cordial nod or a smile!

Then there’s the whole issue of going home again. Apparently, the only way to get out of Hades is to use the magickal pearls that Persephone had left scattered around the real world (for her “gentleman callers” to use), which the hero and his two friends had collected during the “quest” segment of the story… but because they’re idiots and can’t count (or they were hoping someone would die along the way), they’d only picked up three pearls, for the four of them. Maybe if they’d actually bothered to show some gratitude to Persephone, she’d have given them an extra one, but instead she just shrugs and leaves them to decide amongst themselves who has to stay. Grover nobly volunteers to remain behind with Persephone, who sets about seducing him shortly after the others leave. Later, when Percy returns the Bolt to Zeus, he pleads with the God to release his friend from the Underworld, specifically stating that Grover was “the only reason” they escaped in the first place. Ungrateful git! He doesn’t even give Persephone (who happens to be Zeus’s daughter, btw) a shout-out for the rescue, or appeal for her to be freed from her dismal domestic situation. Some hero he is! And when Percy meets up with Grover again in the closing scenes, they don’t even mention her, or what the two of them got up to together, or how sad her situation is… they just fuss over the young Satyr’s budding new horns. Feh!

P.S. There were trailers for the soon-to-be-released sequel in all the ad breaks, and the only observation I can make about that is: Nathan Fillion’s a funny guy, eh?

Demon vs. Dick 1: Sloat Happens

[Contains static, tripod-mounted SPOILERS!!!]

I finally got around to watching Paranormal Activity (2007) this week, but I don’t think I saw it under the ideal conditions. A slow-burning, supernatural suspense story like this one should really be seen in a darkened cinema, surrounded by speakers, so that you can really immerse yourself in the experience… rather than sat in a sunny bedroom, watching it on a knackered TV, with banal commercials breaking the tension every twenty minutes or so. It’s perfectly possible that if I’d seen it on the big-screen when it was first released, then I would have been reduced to a shivering, snivelling scaredy-cat… rather than the bored, fidgeting sceptic that this viewing produced. That said, I know I’d never have the drive to get something like this made off my own back, and I can still appreciate some of the movie’s plus-points…

The problem with a lot of post-Blair Witch “found footage” flicks (and I’m thinking particularly of Diary of the Dead here) is there’s no plausible reason for the characters to keep lugging cameras around (and stopping to reload/recharge them), when they should be running and fighting for their lives… but here, the conceit makes perfect sense, with a tech-obsessed young man seeking to document the spooky noises and movements that occur in the house he shares with his girlfriend. The fact that his girlfriend frequently tells him to put the camera away also helps to answer the question of why he keeps filming to the bitter end… the answer being that he’s an insensitive dick, who cares more about making a “cool” video than hearing and respecting her feelings, or avoiding antagonising the demonic forces that torment her. And I’m glad that his dickishness was a consistent plot-point, rather than something that the writer/director was blind to, and we were simply meant to forgive or suffer through without a pay-off. I was pulling for his death the whole way through, and couldn’t help viewing the violent ending as a “happy” one, no matter what happens in the subsequent sequels. Apparently the original ending (before Paramount bought it, and tinkered with it) had the girlfriend being killed by some random cops, which would have been a real downer for me… so I’m glad they reshot that final scene (and didn’t shoot her!).

Despite my relative comfort and detachment, I did find a couple of scenes genuinely chilling and unsettling… the first being the Ouija board catching fire, and the second being the part where the girlfriend is dragged out of bed by an invisible assailant. Everything else was pretty much water off a duck’s back though, sad to say. One of the strengths of Blair Witch is that, even though the story was contrived and the protags were hired actors, they were really living out there in the woods, reacting to disturbing noises they heard and creepy artefacts they found, so there was a raw, realistic edge of desperation and fear to their performances… whereas the scenes in this movie were filmed out of order, without a set script in place, and sometimes the acting isn’t quite up to snuff, when it came to contrived scenes like the one where the boyfriend discovers a burned childhood photo of his girlfriend in the attic. I just didn’t feel they were sufficiently freaked out by something that would have had me peeing my pants in their place. Apparently the whole thing was shot in a single week though, so that’s not meant as a comment on the talent of the cast… given a polished script and some rehearsal time, who knows how much better that scene might have been?

As I say, I probably wasn’t in the right headspace to start with, but I also kept being distracted by Katie Featherston’s décolletage (which is just a fancy way of saying I kept staring at her boobs). I doubt her low-cut tops were the only reason for this movie’s unparalleled financial success, but I’m willing to bet they were a factor…

The FBI’s Most Unwanted 6: Save Your Own Ass, Sir!

[Contains big piles of manure… also, SPOILERS!!!]

Fight the Future was a refreshingly illuminating info-dump for viewers of The X Files, as far as the show’s shadowy “myth-arc” conspiracy was concerned, so fans can be forgiven for expecting that narrative momentum to carry through into the sixth season of the series. However, those expectations were quickly thwarted by a consecutive run of lightweight, unrelated “comedy” episodes, in which supporting characters repeatedly mistook ‘Mulder’ (David Duchovny) and ‘Scully’ (Gillian Anderson) for a romantic couple, or suggested that they should be. Spread out across the course of the season, these broader episodes might have made for welcome comic relief from the darker and more serious shit that was going down… but here they were all crammed together, into a sugary blast of wacky schtick, which got quite wearying after a while. Even worse than that, when we finally learned the name and game of “The Syndicate”, they were hastily dumped in the show’s trash can, so the restless writers could move on to newer, shinier mysteries, like bored children who’ve already broken the toys Santa brought them by Boxing Day, and were busy drafting their B-Day wish-lists for the coming year. GAH!!! The whole alien invasion/rebellion plotline would be enough to keep most other show’s going for a full year by itself, but here it’s shrugged off in the space of two episodes, like a grudging contractual obligation, so they could devote the vast majority of the season’s running time to taunting ‘shippers with the prospect of a “Mully” (“Shulder”?) hook-up. Meh.

As for our heroine, well, in ep #6.10 (“Tithonus”), we finally got an answer to the question left hanging by Clyde Bruckman’s earlier prediction that Scully would never die, as she catches on to a seemingly ageless, death-proof crime scene photographer, who confers his immortality on to the unwitting agent, after literally taking a bullet for her. Not that she’d ever acknowledge or exploit this superpower, of course… and it’s worth noting that “immortality” isn’t the same as “invulnerability”. My favourite Scully moment of this season would have to be the insanely long shot of her storming around the FBI building in ep #6.3 (“Triangle”), desperately trying to cajole or bully someone into helping save her lost-at-sea partner. Personally, I think they overdid the whole “continuous shot” gimmick in this episode… it’s the kind of showy effect that I find quite distracting, because I’m always looking for the secret cuts, rather than concentrating on the action… but I think that particular scene worked really well as a show-stopper, and Anderson gave a great performance in what must have been a pretty stressful and exhausting shoot for cast and crew alike! I also enjoyed the old-timey OSS agent she played in Mulder’s alternate-reality fever-dream… and her giddy “drunk/drugged” acting in ep #6.20 (“Three of a Kind”), stealing a supposedly serious exposition scene by pulling silly faces. Bless.

As for her nemesis, ‘Agent Fowley’ (Mimi Rogers), I really liked the idea of her and Spender being assigned to the X-Files, working as a sort of mirrorverse version of the lead characters… so it’s a shame the writers didn’t run with that concept and give us a full episode of their anti-heroic adventures. Her most memorable contribution to the season has to be ep #6.22 (“Biogenesis”), where she turns an addled, incoherent Mulder into a raging basket case, just by removing her blouse and doing sexy things to him off-screen! Boo! Hiss!

According to Wikipedia, one of the complaints levelled against this season by fans at the time was that, after moving from Vancouver to California, the show had “gone Hollywood”, and was stunt-casting too many distracting stars in supporting roles… but in retrospect it’s one of the least star-studded seasons so far!* Wendie Malick appeared in ep #6.1 (“The Beginning”) as “Assistant Director Maslin”, spokeswoman for the Office of Professional Review (OPR) which shit-canned M&S. Malick is currently starring in the sitcom Hot in Cleveland, but I’ll always think of her as ex-model-turned-boozy-magazine-editor ‘Nina Van Horn’ on Just Shoot Me!. Nora Dunn appeared in ep #6.4/5 (“Dreamland”), as ‘JoAnne Fletcher’, the dissatisfied housewife of a so-called “Man in Black”, whose marriage is thrown into turmoil when her husband swaps bodies with Mulder. Aside from minor roles in Drop Dead Gorgeous, What Planet Are You From?, Southland Tales, and Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23, Dunn also played The Hebrew Hammer’s mother, and appeared in an episode of Pushing Daisies with Malick as a pair of synchronised swimmers! Julia Vera also appeared in this episode as ‘Lana Chee’, an elderly Hopi woman who swaps bodies with an arrogant young “Top Gun” pilot! Her scenes were a lot of fun, so I was quite disappointed when the reality-warp-thingy corrected itself.

Lily Tomlin appeared in ep #6.6 (“How the Ghosts Stole Christmas”), as ‘Lyda’, the female half of a cynical, sadistic couple of spooks, who get their kicks by coaxing young couples into killing themselves on Christmas Eve. Tomlin is a veteran actress, comedian, and writer, who’s just one Oscar shy of the full “E.G.O.T.” (Emmy. Grammy. Oscar. Tony.), and has starred in several genre comedies, including The Incredible Shrinking Woman and All of Me. Debra Christofferson appeared in ep #6.15 (“Arcadia”) as ‘Pat Verlander’, the self-appointed “welcome wagon” for a seemingly idyllic planned community, where the rules must be obeyed on pain of bloody, muddy death! Besides a cameo in an episode of American Horror Story, Christofferson also had a recurring role in Carnivàle… another supernatural series that I really need to check out at some point. Melinda Culea appeared in ep #6.16 (“Alpha”) as ‘Karin Berquist’, a reclusive canine expert with a secret crush on Mulder, who alerts him to a case involving a suspiciously wily wild dog. Culea is probably best known for playing ‘Amy Amanda Allen’ in the early seasons of The A-Team… before being written out for (allegedly) getting too uppity with the producers and pushing for more involvement in the action scenes, to the indignation of male cast members like George Peppard. I hate it when a sexist plan comes together!

On the manly side of things: Bryan Cranston appeared in ep #6.2 (“Drive”) as ‘Patrick Crump’, an anti-Semitic hick who learns that his head will explode unless he travels West as quickly as possible… for reasons that are never entirely explained. Michael McKean appeared in ep #6.4/5 as ‘Morris Fletcher’, a “Man in Black” who switches bodies with Mulder during a freak UFO crash. Although I enjoyed McKean’s performance a great deal, I find it slightly disappointing that it took Scully so long to figure out his ruse… I mean, she’s already encountered two shape-shifting faux-Mulders by this point, so you think she’d be able to spot the clues a little quicker. The fact he called her “Dana” should have sent up an immediate red flag… and the butt-pat should have sealed the deal long before she ever saw the waterbed and mirrored ceiling he’d installed in Mulder’s sad-bachelor-pad! That said, I loved Scully’s line in that scene: “You call me ‘baby’ one more time, you’re gonna be peeing through a catheter!” Eep! Bruce Campbell appeared in ep #6.7 (“Terms of Endearment”) as a disguised demon, desperately trying to have a normal child with a human wife… or wives, technically speaking. I’d say this was probably the most serious dramatic role I’ve ever seen Campbell play, and he really rose to the challenge… obviously I was already a fan of his, so I’m a little biased, but I think this was a great episode, with a clever twist ending. Jesse L. Martin appeared in ep #6.19 (“The Unnatural”) as a preternaturally gifted baseball player, who turned out to be an incognito alien. And John Billingsley appeared in ep #6.20 as a government agent masquerading as a conspiracy geek. Ooh, what a lot of fibbers!

———–

* Er, no offence intended!

“Scrotum!”

E4 are currently airing the (so-called) “second season” of Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23 here in the UK (in all its randomly-ordered, storyline jumbling glory), and I’m enjoying it just as much the second time around… perhaps even more so, now that I know there’s only a finite supply of funny left to be savoured.

This week’s instalment was ep #2.7 (“A Weekend in the Hamptons”), in which Chloe takes the gang to stay at an old friend’s house in the eponymous Long Island resort, on an impromptu bender. I was watching the flashback to a previous party, and wondering who the hottie standing next to our heroine was… only to later check the credits and realise that it was Olivia Taylor Dudley, of Mindy Project typo fame! This episode is a much better showcase for her talents (and, no, I’m not just talking about the scene where she takes her top off), since it gives her actual dialogue and a character to play… namely ‘Katarina’, a reformed party-girl struggling to cope with a pair of new born twins, who’ve reduced her to a tense, terse shadow of her former, funner self. I thought she gave a good performance, and would love to see her come back in the third season… except there won’t be one now, will there? GODAMMIT!!!

P.S. I also thought Liza Lapira was very funny (and cute) in this episode… just a shame she got saddled with such a non-starter of a character.

Euro 2013: Get Angerered!

Football news: Yesterday saw Germany win the final of the UEFA Women’s Euro 2013 Championship, with substitute striker Anja Mittag scoring the only goal of the game (off a pass), and impregnable goal-keeper/team-captain Nadine Angerer fending off two separate Norwegian penalty shots! Apparently this is their sixth consecutive, and eighth overall, Euro win (despite failing to qualify for the 2012 Olympics), so snaps to them.

In a wacky reversal of traditional gender roles, I know next-to-nothing about the sport, and can only make a facile comment about how cool the German uniforms looked, with their black base, red shoulders and gold lettering… much better than the boring old red-white-and-blue that Norway were wearing!

The match itself (which took place in the Friends Arena, Sweden) was given a prime afternoon spot on BBC2, with an hour-long “highlights” programme following in the evening, on BBC3… during which the commentators were already hyping up the 2015 World Cup qualifiers, coming in September. One of the matches will be taking place in a town quite near me, and I’m almost tempted to attend… but it’s at moments like this when I’m faced with my own unmanliness, wondering how exactly a chap might go about acquiring tickets to a football match, and how one is expected to behave at such an event. Will I be required to sing something disparaging the referee’s parentage…?