Reflections and Horizons - Dec 31 - Friday Video Distractions

     Several false starts on this piece, as I remind myself this is about television, movies, and streaming media, not a place to clear my head, much less to do so moaning and kvetching. I can do that in a different blog.

     Last week Disney+ wrapped the latest for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with the sixth and final episode of Hawkeye. That series was strong on character development and emotional content, and continued to build and expand the universe of characters to be revisited and mixed in the future. In terms of plotting and details, however, it was unfortunately weak. The story (aside from some necessary flashbacks) was all set in the week of Christmas, and played strongly to themes of family, heroism and legacy, and I generally enjoyed the characters we spent time with, so on the whole it went into the "win" column for me.
     Venturing into the realm of the spoilery for a couple paragraphs:
     Even just that we came out of it with Kate Bishop, ably realized by Haileee Steinfeld, set up to take over the mantle of Hawkeye, is enough.
     I was particularly happy that we get to see - via a flashback scene and her involvement in this story - more of Yelena Belova (played so well by Florence Pugh) as the new Black Widow (not officially picking up that mantle, as she's one of many from that same program) for the first time since she was introduced in Black Widow last year. She's a fun character who's still sorting out her world, while mostly being used to behaving as if she knows everything going on. Much more mixed reactions to having Vincent D'Onofrio appear formally in the MCU as Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin, who had previously been used in the Marvel Netflix Daredevil series. It's a delicate subject, because they plainly want to use both the actor and much of what they built into him as a character, but at the same time it's not directly validating anything seen in those Netflix stories as official MCU canon. Here we get a more physically-enhanced version of the character, who's also much more hands-on. D'Onofrio brought as much of the character we met in Daredevil as he could. I'll be interested to see how far they'll be able to take this.
     I'm a little sad about the plotting sloppiness, knowing that such things are both unnecessary and much more likely to snowball, or at least serve as unfortunate precedent for unrelated sloppiness in the future, but I also know that the legacy of comics fandom includes clever people taking later steps to retroactively fix, patch and/or explain seeming incongruities (I've been one of them -- the well-intentioned fixers, that is) -- so in a season of hope I can let that be one more.
     This week's new weekly Wednesday entry for Disney+ is for the Star Wars universe, with the first episode of The Book of Boba Fett. Based on the first episode, we're being given a parallel set of

stories, as we're both seeing what immediately happened to Boba Fett following his disappearing into the great maw of the Sarlacc, beneath the sands of Tatooine in Return of the Jedi, and, later, as he assumes the local crimelord vacancy left by the death of Jabba the Hutt.
     This will be running for seven, weekly episodes, and will wrap February 9th.
     I've always been a casual Star Wars fan. I was in high school when the films began - too old then to have tapped into the toys, and never disappearing into the comics, novels, games, nor cartoons that variously named even minor background figures, and provided great swaths of character and culture backgrounds. I'd watch the movies, and then pick up some of the connecting information from context or (post-'90s) with Internet checks. I don't have any fan ego tied up in this, and am generally confident that if there's anything I'll really need to know, it will eventually be made plain. No one's paying me to be a fan, and I'm in no competition with the writers and directors to stay a step ahead of them nor to immediately spot every Easter egg. It's entertainment, neither a religion nor a job.
     As for this new series, I enjoyed this opening episode. As I've aged - though it's been something I've appreciated as long as I can remember - I've increasingly liked stories where someone on the wrong side of the law still has some restraint. A personal code of behavior, where while he wants to set up a situation that will serve him, providing wealth and power, he isn't interested in or even comfortable

with others abasing themselves as if he were a king or emperor whose ego needs constant polishing. I'm not surprised to find some people whining about it - that's what the Internet's for, right? Most of the complaints I've seen appear to be those who wanted a younger actor and more instant, non-stop, "badassery", not something that marks development and makes a character more interesting. We can only hope that these people eventually mature, have an epiphany, and experience an appropriate string of memory-prodded cringes as they remember rooting for the forces of stagnation.
      Here's the series trailer:

     I'd also suggest watching the 22 minute Under the Helmet: The Legacy of Boba Fett mini-doc that gives us more background on how the character came to be in the script and the portrayals. It's not needed for the story, but I thought it was interesting to get the development background pinned down.
    While you're on Disney+, for a different, much more grounded adventure, I'd suggest watching the six episode National Geographic: Welcome To Earth series. In it, Will Smith is our surrogate, accompanying explorers and scientists into fascinating and extreme environments here on Earth.

     A recent addition to Netflix is a Japanese adaptation of a 1957 Robert A. Heinlein novel, The Door Into Summer (2021  1h 58m). A brilliant, young robotics engineer and inventor is faced with yet another, devastating loss in a life rife with such losses, and tries to work his way out of it.
     Very sentimental, it was the right film at the right time for me, and despite at least one significant plot misgiving (I don't want to give away too much by being specific) I'm happy I watched it. This is the Japanese trailer, because it was the best YouTube option, so it's offered here for a likely non-Japanenese-speaking/reading audience, primarily for the visuals. One can watch the movie itself dubbed into English, or Japanese with English subtitles, etc.

     Back over on HBO & HBO Max, I greatly enjoyed Street Gang: How We Got To Sesame Street (2021 1h 47m). The history, heart, energy and creativity of the show, it was another desperately needed message of hope this year. Not everything has to be driven by financial profit, and vital, creative individuals can find worthy aims to rally around.

     I was too old to be among the target audience for Sesame Street, but I still got a little taste of it out on the periphery when it debuted, even if I didn't appreciate it at the time. I try to keep this in mind moving forward, to try to avoid summary dismissals of things simply because they don't immediately fit my needs or desires.
     Also on HBO, arrived just this past Wednesday, is another documentary that was worth the time. Not a high-minded subject, like Sesame Street, but an interesting deep dive, done with much obvious affection, of dry comedian Bob Einstein. It's The Super Bob Einstein Movie.

     Here I have to confess that this was almost completely me looking in from the outside of a career I was barely aware of. I didn't recall him from his bits on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (I was too young to be part of the target audience being between 6 and 8 during that run), don't recall him from The Sonny and Cher Show, never saw an episode of John Byner's Bizarre, while I may have heard of Super Dave Osborne I never caught an episode of any of his shows, his appearances on Letterman didn't make an impression on me - the straight-faced, irritated to angry persona that was much of his trademark never

connected with me in an entertaining way - and I've not seen much beyond commercials of either Curb Your Enthusiasm or Arrested Development; the former has perpetually hovered in that "I heard good things, I'll get around to it" zone, and a couple of attempts at starting at the beginning with the latter show found me bailing because I didn't enjoy my time with the characters. None of that is set in stone as far as tastes are concerned, and there's always the chance that a year from now I'll be a staunch fan of one or more of those series, but right now I can only report where I am. This was someone who had a big time career, almost all of which I was never looking in his direction. Generally someone has to be a sports star for me to be this level of disconnected, where I knew little more than that there was someone out there by this name, who others knew.
     That said, even for an outsider, it was an interesting documentary and tribute. I can only expect that for anyone who was a fan of any of his work it would be a must-watch.
     Arriving today on Netflix, we have the fourth season of the Karate Kid sequel series Cobra Kai. The first three seasons surprised me by drawing me in to something I didn't expect to be drawn into, and I'm hoping this fourth one will manage to do that again. All ten episodes of this latest season will be in place. I have no idea if I'll start to tug on that thread right away, or will leave it for another time.

     Also arriving on Netflix today is the latest Harlen Cobin novel adaptation via an eight-episode crime drama miniseries Stay Close. This is the latest Cobin adaptation under his five-year development deal with Netflix, where Cobin gets to adapt his own novels into new screenplays. One thing that seems unusual is that after so often seeing stories set in other countries rewritten for the screen with U.S. locales, the 2012 novel this is based on was set in Atlantic City, NJ, but the series adaptation sets it in the British seaside resort of Blackpool. As is key to most of Cobin's work, the plot plays off shocking secrets about their pasts that they'd hidden from friends and family... until someone shows up who knew them when.

     The cast includes Cush Jumbo, James Nesbitt, Richard Armitage and Eddie Izzard.

     While it's available to be rented or bought online via Prime, Vudu or AppleTV, it doesn't appear any of the streamers (maybe via Roku?) are just carrying Soylent Green (1973) at no extra charge at the moment. TCM is where I've usually seen it in recent years, but they don't currently have it on their schedule. The timely point of interest here is that that particular dystopic future, with pollution, overpopulation, and runaway greenhouse gases was set in the then far-off year of 2022, a seemingly impossible 49 years off.
     I have very clear memories of watching that with an old friend at the Eric Fairless Hills back in 1973, and watching it decades later I was thrown by how solidly it had printed on my memory. I was surprised to see how much of it I could recite the dialogue along with the film when I saw it again many years later. It was a film I'd only seen once on the big screen, but the performances were good, with particularly strong chemistry between leads Charlton Heston and Edward G. Robinson, the latter playing his final role.
     The two trailers for the movie are terrible -- when they're not openly misleading, they're giving away too much of the plot. Rather than running either of those here, I've found that someone uploaded the themed opening sequence, which ends with the title. That's a much better choice.

    Here on the final day of 2021, I'll close with a few minutes of gentle reflection on those in the broad world of film and entertainment for whom 2021 became a final, Earthly destination. I'd already forgotten we'd lost several of them this year.
     I've watched for an updated version of this (current 4:55 run) knowing this list was posted Dec 21st, and that even then it had already omitted at least one - Sally Ann Howes, who while celebrated largely for her Broadway and West End stage career, was also a film and tv actor, passed on the 19th - missing the cut-off for when this was compiled. (If I see a newer version sometime soon, I'll swap it out.)

      Oh, for those with TCM, starting at 8pm (Eastern) they'll be running six Thin Man films back to back, starting with The Thin Man (1934), and ending with Song of the Thin Man (1947.) Here's the trailer for the first film. Pretty snappy company to have any New Year's Eve.

    I've no set plans for how I'll pass into the new year.
    Only in very rare years have I done it in a party setting. Usually I just bury myself in some activity, reading or writing, and am only reminded of the local change of day by the sudden noise outside. 2022 is planned to be a year of some hugely substantial changes for my family, and I'm trying my best to embrace the coming changes warmly, but that's a big ask for me. The current plans will see the dynamics of place change radically, and will also see me separated for the first time from one family member. It's tough for my first reactions to be other than trepidation and sadness. I'm not a truly, openly hopeful person by nature, feeling that open happiness is begging the lightning to strike. All that said, here's to seeing out 2021 pleasantly, and to 2022 being an improvement. I hope to see you back here next week, for the first Friday of 2022. Welcome to the future. Don't forget your meds.- Mike