Sleepy Hollow S01E01 – “Pilot”

Sleepy Hollow
If there is one show in the fall 2013 season I am excited for, it is Sleepy Hollow. Sorry, Agent Coulson. Sleepy Hollow hooked me because of the ridiculous image in the trailer of the Headless Horseman with a machine gun. It holds the promise that things will be crazy, and I love crazy shows. Sleepy Hollow follows the story of Ichabod Crane, who was a spy for George Washington that hunted down a demonic British soldier, lopped off his head, was badly injured, and then awoke 250 years later. And so did the now headless demonic soldier, who once again is riding around on a horse lopping off heads. The mystery of what the heck is going on is our hook, while Ichabod’s adjustments to modern day and teaming up with police Lt. Abbie Mills is the meat.

Sleepy Hollow

It’s me, Benedict Arnold! Oh, wait..


Sure, fish out of water, supernatural stuff, all has promise. But, this is from Alex Kurtzman and Bob Orci’s production company, which means it could either be really good, or be really really really really bad, depending on how much writing they did. Thanks to an interview, it appears the part of the show I like the least is their brainchild. (And if Bob Orci wants to appear in the comments and hurl nasty language at me, he’s welcome to do so until his handlers yank him off the internet again!) But besides that, overall the premier episode – imaginatively entitled “Pilot” – was enough to keep me coming back. And I was looking for an excuse to follow a show for a season…
Sleepy Hollow

Let’s work together, two heads are better than none!


Overall, I liked it, but there were some things that were icky and some things that I hope are just pilot jitters. The whole Book of Revelations things is pretty boring and done to death. Here’s hoping the mythology goes beyond just quoting a Bible verse each week. The hint of George Washington as a demonic fighter and reuse of the eye of the pyramid imagery hints to maybe some sort of National Treasure conspiracy things happening. Maybe even a Founding Father or two will pop up in Sleepy Hollow to battle evil. And also to handle slavery much worse than Ichabod did. Here is hoping Sleepy Hollow becomes a mix of X-Files and police procedurals that isn’t afraid to be weird.
Sleepy Hollow

Best. Show. Ever.


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Starship Troopers RiffTrax Live Trip Report

RiffTrax Starship Troopers
[adrotate banner=”1″]RiffTrax beamed across America and also some other strange country called Canada to give the world some of the fruits of their Kickstarter, a RiffTrax of Starship Troopers. Disclaimer: I donated to said Kickstarter, which was originally meant to try to snag the film Twilight. You can find my internet name on the thank you page. I was joined as is usual at the theater events by Todd from Die, Danger, Die, Die, Kill!,

As per usual, the preshow featured funny trivia cards and word jumbles (My favorite being the Magneto/Cerebro jumble!) The show began on the Starship Troopers-themed set, and unlike the usual shows, we jump right into the movie without shorts (the film is long enough there probably wasn’t any time)

Mike, Kevin, and Bill also thanked the cast of Starship Troopers that have been helping promote the event (and a few watching in theaters), including Casper Van Dien, Dina Meyer, Denise Richards, Jake Busey, Neil Patrick Harris, and Clancy Brown, along with please for them not to be mad or want to murder them later. As of yet, no member of RiffTrax has been found dead.

We all know the classic story of Starship Troopers – in a crazy fascist future, teenage models battle killer bugs and blood and guts fly everywhere. Verhoeven is a big fan of the blood and guts, and also of extremely ridiculous violence (one only has to look at his filmography to catch this!)

The ridiculous violence no one seemed to have a problem with. However, there is the famous coed nude shower sequence, which seemed like sort of a weird thing to be riffing over. Thus, it got hit with a skit for a Gorilla-gram! Which was weird and didn’t work that well. Maybe next time there is a RiffTrax film with lots of gonzo nudity we’ll get a different way to deal with it. Like just showing it, as they showed some of the nudity later. Or bring back the two Gorilla-grams, that seemed to work!

Quips were usually on point, with lots of references to past and future output from the cast. There was even a The Dog Who Save Christmas Vacation joke, showing a strong ability to look at IMDB links. Among the great bits was a sequence with the ferret, the pointing out how often the movie’s dialogue is just “Move!”, the Airplane! reference, and the very true slam on AT&T. I would rate Starship Troopers as among the best of the RiffTrax Live shows, maybe bested only by Manos (and the Daredevil one I saw actually live, which always win for me meeting Bill, Mike, and Kevin!)

There was minor controversy among a few disgruntled sourpusses who thought that doing a RiffTrax of a film that had satirical elements was somehow the worst thing that happened in the entire universe. This view was shocking, even as a big fan of Starship Troopers. Do people not know the movie is still ridiculous? I hold the view that you can RiffTrax anything (and there is a RiffTrax audio for Casablanca!), and Starship Troopers lends itself easily to that role. It’s not like you have to be a rocket surgeon to detect the satirical elements in a film where characters are literally wearing Nazi uniforms.

This RiffTrax Live will not be released as a separate digital download/DVD, so I was glad I was able to see it. There will be an audio file released eventually that will be able to synch with a copy of Starship Troopers, for a similar but not quite the same experience at your home.

Next up on RiffTrax Live is the original Night of the Living Dead.

Lego Batman hits May 21st!

Lego Batman Movie
[adrotate banner=”1″]Stack up your batarangs and be sure to get enough of those bricks that have slight slants so we can make a cool Lego Batmobile and not something that is all blocky. Because Lego Batman: The Movie is here! Despite being Lego Batman, Lego Superman is running around as well as other super heroes as they battle the Joker and Lex Luthor teaming up to be evil and very evil. And there is a Lego chicken, so that’s especially evil. So much evil, it’s like Mego Bloks are trying to take over! I see your game now, Joker. Some people just want to watch the world go to pieces and then someone steps on a piece at 2:30 AM while going to the bathroom and that really hurts! Is that what you want, Joker? Because the jokes on you! I have a nightlight! MuHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Lego Batman: The Movie will be available on DVD, Blu-ray, and VOD on May 21st from Warner Brothers Home Video.

official synopsis:

LEGO Batman: The Movie – DC Superheroes Unite provides the ultimate blend of action and humor guaranteed to entertain fanboys of all ages.

The film finds Lex Luthor taking jealousy to new heights when fellow billionaire Bruce Wayne wins the Man of the Year Award. To top Wayne’s accomplishment, Lex begins a campaign for President – and to create the atmosphere for his type of fear-based politics, he recruits the Joker to perfect a Black LEGO Destructor Ray. While wreaking havoc on Gotham, Lex successfully destroys Batman’s technology – forcing the Caped Crusader to reluctantly turn to Superman for help.

LEGO Batman: The Movie – DC Superheroes Unite features the definitive voice of Lex Luthor, Clancy Brown (The Shawshank Redemption, SpongeBob SquarePants). In addition to Baker and Willingham, the cast includes Christopher Smith (Mortal Combat vs. DC Universe) as the Joker, and Charlie Schlatter (Diagnosis Murder) in a hilarious turn as the voice of Robin.

via MTV Geek