I Am Not Okay With This (2020)

 

Sydney Novak is a 17-year-old living with her mother and younger brother, a year after her father's suicide. Sydney is deeply unhappy and frustrated.  She misses her father deeply.  There's never enough money at home.  She's largely socially isolated at school.  She and her mother never talk about her father's death.  Her best - almost only - friend Dana just started dating an obnoxious jerk.

Oh, and she may be developing super-powers over which she has little to no control.  So, you know, all the normal teen stuff.

Sydney's efforts to cope with everything in her life, understand what's happening to her, her entry into an awkward romance/friendship with her neighbour Stan and her increasing worry that someone knows about her powers form the basis of this seven episode series.

Based on the comic book of the same name, I Am Not Okay With This is a dark comedy comedy of age story.  Despite the super-powers element providing a novel element, it is very much centred on the awkwardness of the teenage experience.  Sydney's often uncomfortable life is relatable even if the specific events are not ones we would have had ourselves.  The fine young cast definitely helps on this front.

Events in the series culminate - as they are wont to do in high school coming of age stories - at the homecoming dance, where Sydney will have to face the truth about herself on several different fonts.

This all culminates in a final scene that was obviously setting up for season two.  Alas, these seven episodes is all we will get, as - after originally being given the green light - any further seasons were cancelled due to production delays caused by the COVID pandemic.

Which is a shame, because I definitely would have checked out a season two, given the opportunity.

Annihilation (2018)

 

A meteorite crashes into the southern United States. Three years later, the area around the landing point has become known as the "Shimmer", a strange and unknowable zone where electronic communications cease to work and from which no human expedition has returned.  They all simply vanish, never heard from again.

At least, that's the case until someone does return.  A year after entering the Shimmer, a man named Kane suddenly reappears at his home, hundreds of miles away.  His wife Lena is shocked and thrilled to see him, then horrified as his physical condition dramatically deteriorates.

Kane is brought to a the military base near the Shimmer, where his condition is serious and he is barely clinging to life.  Lena is desperate to find a way to save her, and when she is offered the chance to join the next expedition into the Shimmer, she agrees.  Perhaps there she will find the answers she needs.

Lena knows why she wants to risk the Shimmer; she should perhaps be asking herself some other questions: why do the other members of the team want to risk it?  Why did the team leader choose to invite her?  And are the humans the only ones with an agenda here?

Annihilation is based on - "inspired by" might actually be a more accurate phrase - Jeff VanderMeer's novel of the same name.  The director's avowed focus was to take the premise and "dreamlike tone" of the book, not to directly adapt the story to screen. I think this was a good call, myself.  But then, I didn't much like the novel!

The resulting film has gorgeous visuals and definitely captures the strange, otherworldly atmosphere for which it was going.  I also think the plot it presents - while far from straightforward in how it is laid out, and still willing to leave things open to interpretation - is significantly more coherently presented.

A fine example of how to make a successful adaptation of a novel by focusing on theme and feel rather than specific details.

Teenage Bounty Hunters (2020)

 

Fraternal twins Blair and Sterling are lifelong best friends who always have each other's backs, whether the situation is clique politics at their Christian high school, or concealing the fact that one of them is sexually active with her boyfriend - ironically, it is 'good girl' Sterling, not 'rebel' Blair - or accidentally stumbling into a career as bounty hunters after they have a traffic accident with a bail jumper.

One of these things is not the like other things, and it is of course the central hook of the show.  After subduing the bail jumper when he tries to run, Blair and Sterling need cash to repair their dad's beloved truck - hopefully before he notices the damage - and they cajole legitimate bounty hunter Bowser Simmons into letting them work as his 'interns'.  Which doesn't mean they're going to be able to ignore high school politics and romantic drama while they do so, mind you.  Sometimes both at the same time.

Teenage Bounty Hunters is a fun comedy-drama with engaging leads and snappy dialogue.  Sure, the premise is deeply implausible, but the writing embraces that absurdity by smartly contrasting it with the more plausible but also more absurd antics of their lives outside of bounty hunting.

Alas, despite being a smartly-written show with a great cast and some real emotional heart to go with its oddball antics, Teenage Bounty Hunters doesn't seem to have found an audience and was cancelled after this single season.  Which is a shame, though at least this one season we got has a satisfying conclusion.  Not every issue in Blair and Sterling's life gets resolved in it, of course, and I would definitely have watched a season two if it happened, but it's definitely still possible to watch and enjoy these ten episodes on their own basis.

The Tomorrow War (2021)

 

During the broadcast of the 2022 Soccer World Cup, soldiers from the year 2051 arrive to warn that, in their time, humanity is on the brink of extinction due to a war with alien invaders referred to as "Whitespikes."  These creatures appear in Russia in 2048, and relentlessly swep over the planet, driving humanity to the brink of extinction.

For some reason, humanity's response has been to research time travel, so they could come back nearly thirty years and draft soldiers to help them fight the war in the future.  Though they don't share the information widely, they only draft people who are known to have died before the Whitespikes appeared.  In essence, if you get called up, you're already dead.

The Tomorrow War focuses on James Forester, a biology teacher and former green beret who is drafted into the war.  What he learns in the future might not just save the world as a whole, but also his and his family's future more specifically.

I'm something of a sucker for high concept SF action films, so from the moment I heard about The Tomorrow War, I was keen to check it out.  Alas, sometimes movies do not live up to our hopes, and for me this was definitely one of those cases.  The Tomorrow War's execution is generally mediocre.  Its alien antagonists far less interesting and intimidating than it builds them up to be and its action sequences derivative and lacking in tension.  Worse still, its plot contrives to be both utterly nonsensical and utterly predictable, both at the same time.  Which is an impressive achievement, but not one to celebrate!

Maya and the Three (2021)

 

Princess Maya of the Teca is celebrating her fifteenth birthday the same way she spends most of her days: humouring her bombastic father and squabbling with her mother, whom she finds over-protective and confining.  Of course, given that Maya spent the previous night illicitly participating in blood sports and begins her birthday with a dislocated shoulder and a blackened eye, her mother probably has reason to worry about Maya's safety.

And frankly, even those injuries are about to seem like a very minor concern.  Later that day, Maya's coronation ceremony is interrupted by the demi-god Zatz, bringing a message from Lord Mictlan, the God of War.  Lord Mictlan demands that Maya be handed over to him for sacrifice.

Fortunately, there is a prophecy about human warriors overcoming the Dark Gods.  So perhaps there is hope.  The thing about prophecies, though, is that they are slippery things, open to many interpretations, and whether either Maya or her parents truly understand what dangers they face, and how those threats might be overcome, is very much yet to be seen.

Maya and the Three is an animated series in a setting that is heavily based on Mesoamerican cultures, particularly that of the Aztecs.  I'm very pleased to see a show taking non-European inspirations for its setting.  I'm a bit more ambivalent about the fact that - at least in the English language version - it presents those Mesoamerican cultures as using Spanish terms and expressions.  While Spanish is now the dominant language of South and Central America, it's also the language of the nation that conquered and nigh-on destroyed several of those cultures.

I also think that, while nine episodes is roughly the right length for this story, several of those episodes would have been improved by being trimmed down in length.  Most run 35-40 minutes, which generally felt a little long, to me.  Certainly episode 8, at a comparatively lean 26 minutes, felt much more effectively paced than did most of the other episodes.

It's definitely not all bad news, though.  While perhaps occasionally a bit over-indulgent in the time it takes to tell its story, Maya and the Three has many positive qualities: several genuinely funny moments, a few touching ones, lovely animation, and a great voice cast.

Overall, while probably a little too long and potentially too intense for younger audiences, this is a solid show for those who are a bit older.

I Am Mother (2019)

 

After a catastrophe wipes out mankind, an automated bunker activates. This is facility is stocked with embryos, and staffed by a single robot named 'Mother'.

Mother grows one of the embryos in an artificial womb and begins to raise the resulting child.

Some time later, teenager 'Daughter' is growing restless with her life in the bunker.  She is tired of the complex moral and ethical lessons that Mother insists she undertake, in preparation for an upcoming exam.  She is also curious about the outside world.  Mother warns her that surface contamination makes contact with anything from outside the bunker potentially lethal.

Which presents rather a conundrum for 'Daughter' when a strange woman suddenly appears at the airlock of the bunker, begging for help ...

This Australian SF film was produced on a low budget, but like Pitch Black, which was also filmed here, it is one of those low budget productions that spends its money wisely.  The full body robot suit is by the skilled team at Weta Workshop and the small cast - which includes Oscar winner Hilary Swank - are all excellent.  It never looks or sounds cheap.

Of course, that's only going to help if the script is solid, and I'm happy to say that it is.  While I don't think the story really delivers any huge surprises - certainly the overall arc followed the basic trajectory I expected it would, when I saw the premise - it's certainly well-executed.  I'll take execution over innovation if I have to pick.  Having both is best, of course, but that's no easy task.

Well acted, well directed, well structured.  This is a solid and engaging science fiction drama.  If you find the basic scenario interesting at all, check it out.

Reservation Dogs, Season 1 (2021)

 

Bear, Cheese, Willie Jack and Elora are all indigenous teenagers living in rural Oklahoma.  They  have a collective plan, inspired by the long-held dream of their deceased friend Daniel, to put together enough money to move to California.  To finance this plan, they engage in a variety of fairly minor time criminal activities.

Of course, even the best laid plans can go awry.  And it's safe to say that the quartet's plans aren't always the best laid to begin with.  They'll have to struggle with various challenges as they pursue their goals.  There's the law, of course, given their illegal activities, but also the antics of their often-eccentric friends and family; the arrival of a rival gang looking to muscle in on their turf; and most fundamental of all, the long-unspoken question: "Is Daniel's dream actually my dream?".

Reservation Dogs is a solid comedy-drama.  I was tempted to call it "quirky" but that may simply be my cultural biases showing.  The show is written and directed entirely by indigenous creators, and what seems quirky to me may simply be unfamiliar because I'm a middle-aged middle-class white guy, and I'm used to almost everything on TV coming from a similar background to my own.

I can however say that I enjoyed the show.  The cast are talented and make their characters empathetic and likeable, while still being flawed and human, and the show touches on serious issues and questions without ever feeling like its drifting into polemic.

It's likely that the show's sense of humour won't be for everyone, but I encourage everyone to at least give it a try: it's definitely a show with a different kind of voice than we usually see on TV.

Cosmic Sin (2021)

 

In 2519, humanity fights its first interplanetary war.  Not against an alien species, but against one of our own colonies, which is trying to secede.  The rebels are ultimately crushed when General James Ford deploys a Quantum Bomb against them.  This kills 70 million people and makes him the most hated man in human civilisation.

Twenty-five years later, we have our first encounter with an aggressive alien species at an isolated mining outpost.  The survivors of the attack are brought back to Earth to debrief, and the aging General Ford is called in to consult.

The 'survivors' prove to be under alien control, and are a diversionary attack while the aliens invade the human colony planet of Ellora.  Human authorities scramble to assemble a strike team to send to the besieged planet.  Despite his age, General Ford is assigned to this force on the basis that the mission may need someone of his proven ruthlessness.

Cosmic Sin is a sloppily directed, sloppily written, sloppily acted mess of a film.  I'm not sure how Bruce Willis ended up attached to it*, but it's one of eight movie credits he has for 2021, with a similar number slated for 2022 on his IMDB page.  Perhaps he has reached the Danny Trejo "As long as the cheque clears, I'll be in anything" stage of his career?  Certainly his presence in the film is purely physical, with no indication of any emotional connection to or interest in the project. 

So does the film have any value?  Well, perhaps as a practical example of time dilation theory.  I mean, if you want to make 98 minutes feel like they're about 12 hours long, Cosmic Sin's muddled narrative, clumsy dialogue and at-best-mediocre acting will certainly do the trick.

* edit 28 March 2022: it has now emerged that Willis has early onset memory loss and is churning out as many films as possible to make money while he can still work.

Saved by the Bell, Season 1 (2020)

 

After California Governor Zack Morris slashes the education budget, low-income schools are forced to close. Faced with condemnation for this, the rattled Governor makes an impromptu announcement that the students from these schools will be given transportation to schools in more affluent areas - including to his own alma mater, Bayside High.

Suddenly finding themselves as Bayside students, newcomers Daisy, Aisha and Devante must now adapt to glamorous, wealthy and somewhat surreal environment of their new school.  There to help them make the adjustment are the governor's son Mack, his dim but sweet best friend Jamie, and his diva-tastic "best frenemy" Lexi.

On hand to help all the kids - or at least try to - are two other former students who were high school friends of the Governor; football coach Slater and guidance counsellor Jessie Spano.

The stage is set for wacky hijinks aplenty, and Saved by the Bell duly delivers.  

This is a sequel-slash-reboot of the 90s TV series of the same name, and like that series it embraces an over the top, hyper-stylised version of reality where characters have massively exaggerated personality traits.  This is particularly true of the long term Bayside students. For instance Mack's only way of dealing with the world in general, and his father in particular, is through elaborate pranks, while Jamie still needs his mom to cut the crusts off his sandwiches.

New student Daisy, meanwhile, is literally able to call 'time out' and break the fourth wall to directly address the audience.

So 'realistic' is not something that this show in any way attempts to be, but I don't personally think that is in any way detracts from its entertainment value.  It leans into the madcap possibilities of its own absurdity, while still telling engaging stories about flawed but likeable people trying to sort out their lives (the adults as much as the teens).

Great cast, funny situations, heart in the right place.  I like it.