Epiphany
Alien nuns! Alien cops! Punks! Patrick MacNee is wasted in a guest apperance as a Soviet bigwig. Everyone is rude to Ironhorse. Harrison is in an inexplicable rage. Ironhorse fears reds under the bed. A Russian woman shows up and wants to defect. Ironhorse takes paranoia to insane heights. This was howlingly bad and atrocious. This was not satisfyingly eerie or delightfully dark. There is no ready atmosphere of disaster. Harrison is selfish. There is no suspence or jeopardy just bad acting.
Best Lines:
“Leave me alone!”
“Make me!”
“No sanctuary here.”
Among The Philistines
This was incoherent as the team try to recruit a new member and babble about new aliens showing up. The new team guy asks questions about the alien's FTL system, language and culture. Something nobody has asked since 1953. Ironhorse broods. The new guy turns out to be an alien. FFS. An alien is defeated by a voice-activated wheelchair. FFS! There is a ridic montage to close this ep out featuring a 'dead' character who we never saw before. Oh piss off show.
~
The ABC Murders 1x02&1x03
Poirot was a refugee in 1914. There is a grim reminder that the 1930s weren't always glam. People feel Poirot invites judgement. Poirot stares at stockings. People have withering criticism for him. The slutty secretary's avowed aim is to marry her boss. There is no emotional truth. The husband explodes into anger at her and she's out on her ear. Viewers claim this has no conformity to the facts of the book – but it is better than the David Suchet version. The baddie eats a sandwich in unpleasant fashion.
There is an ideological confrontation between the baddie and Poirot as the husband is done in with a shovel. Throughly bad decisions are made. People wear racist pins. Poirot is harangued and he is steadily defiant. People are incapable of non-judgmental interaction. The baddie's issues escalate. There are social pressures. There is no conscious living. There is a prolonged scene involving a boil and a fried egg. The copper is not a serious force.
Tensions are not eased. This demands an emotional response. One is souring on the ineffective lax tale. Poirot is excoriated by people who are perturbed at him. Poirot is inscrutably private. The coppers are less than vigorious. The prostitute daughter sits with her legs wide apart. There are tonal differences between this and the David Suchet version. Poirot is deeply unpopular. There is no forseeable end to the loon's rampage. Things are fraught with difficulty.
There is a moral quandry. If Poirot has gone to seed, how does he pay for things? The secretary now moves in on the dead man's brother and gives herself a makeover. The secretary is a slut and Betty's boyfriend has a level of anger and is undyingly loyal to her memory. Poirot has worldly regard. Poirot is often-misrepresented. The loony annoys with carefree abandon. Poirot tries to be a calming presence.
The cooper does not listen or help. There is a prolonged S&M scene. Megan is unloved. Her ex Donald is a horrible useless man. The discredited elite bray. Does the dying woman have TB? The slutty secretary throws a strop. A chamber pot is seen. There is blood in this unconfident ep. Poirot does not go to confession. Where is Adrienne Oliver? How does the loony know where his victims are? People wander around Doncaster and there is a case of mistaken identity. With the omnipotent serial killer, this is verging on 'Profiler' territory.
There is loud wallpaper and one wonders if there is much money in being a travelling salesman of stockings. There are odd goings on in a men's convenience. The police are on to the loony and his Twinkle Toes stockings. What is the loony's prime motivation? There is no moral ownership. People unite in hate of Mr Cust. The cooper and Poirot get on it. There are flashbacks and Cust the loony is mad. Why is the prostitute fond of the piteous Cust? There are trains, bad VFX and uneasy joy.
Cust has a tumour and is dying. Poirot is endlessly resourceful. The cooper has stopped being testy. This was not cohesive. Why wasn't the prostitute arrested for trying to help Cust? Donald preens. Megan is sad. The slutty secretary, Thora, has a flapper haircut that should be dated in 1933. There is constant reiteration of flashbacks and madness. There is no inspiration. Cust disruptes and bedevils. Poirot suddenly says someone exploited and used Cust as a patsy. Poirot seems to develop powers of teleportation as the miniseries comes to an end.
The ending is changed somewhat from the book. Thora loses the fruits of her whoring. Crome broods. The real loony baddie is revealed. How did he find and exploit Cust? There is abject resignation. Poirot is a social critic. I don't care about Cust or his complete distress. The final ep was vigorously stupid. There is a bulldog, the woman with TB dies and is carried out of her manor house on a plank and Donald decides to marry Megan after all and she is not happy. So she runs away and overcomes her confidence problems. Thora homes in a new mark. Where is and who is the prostitute's dad? The real baddie does a perp walk.
Flashbacks reveal that Poirot was a priest in Belgium! His congregation were killed by the Hun. Why didn't the Hun kill Poirot? The real baddie gets a last meal. How was Poirot such a loser in 1x01? People set their fate.
Best Lines:
“You come to my door wearing that?”
“Deranged sexual pervert!”
“Depraved lunacy.”
“A petty cruel thing.”
“We've had something of a fracas.”
“Like he was being dirty!”
“A risque comic.”
“You bloody bastard!”
“Storm of slaughter.”
“I stopped being good.”
“Heave her down a flight of stairs.”
“Ranting on about the foreigns.”
“A tea room. They do cakes.”
“Feel free to eat it in the other room.”
“I will think what I please.”
“Failed terribly.”
“I doubt all of it.”
“You dozy bastard!”
“God forgives all!”
“But I do not.”
“I hate cockneys!”
“A fruitcake in London.”
“Is the killer even English?”
“Sneaking him in up the backstairs.”
“Let's get this bastard!”
“Men buy lady friends gifts.”
“Sod all to do with me.”
“I got hemarroids.”
“We don't do London.”
“You looked old and tired.”
“Always the quiet ones. Always.”
“I know things.”
“Sit quietly with your mother.”
“Don't you dare let him die!”
“Will he live”
“Long enough.”
“How long are you going to be?”
“As long as I want.”
“Verbal flourish.”
“Well then, kindly leave.”
“Don't you pity me.”
“Sick of these hazards in my vestible.”
“Such vapid nostalgia for the gentle past.”
“Cruelty is not new.”
“You killed him for his title and his money.”
“Disgraced, derided and reviled.”
“Strange little games.”
“Your soul is a charnel house.”
~
The Kenny Everett Video Show Disc 3
What is a spool box? There are endless dance rountines by Hot Gossip. The Do-It-Yourself Bee-Gees skit is a classic. There is some dated dodgy humour that isn't funny. The stupid cartoon is still on.
Best Lines:
“Plaiting fog.”
“Action yob.”
“Buck off.”
“DJ drivel.”
~
The Invaders 2x18
Counter-Attack
David Vincent is accused of murder, again. The presumption of guilt is instant. This was trash and DV acts like a crackhead thug and I don't care about this ep or DV's spiral of trauma and violence.
Best Line:
“We have ways.”
~
Black Lake (2016-?) 2x01&2x02
This is a prequel to season 1. This is Swedish, subtitled and a slow inexorable crawl toward an inevitably dark finale. Yawn.
~
The Stand (1994) Parts 1&2
The Plague
This miniseries adapts Stephen King's most famous book, badly. In some army base, something gets loose and the workers die instantly where they stand. This stars Kareem Adbul-Jabber, Joe Bob Briggs, Sam Raimi, John Landis, Ed Harris, Kathy Bates, Molly Ringwald, Jamey Sheridan, Laura San Giacomo, Ruby Dee, Ossie Davis, Miguel Ferrer, Corin Nemec, Matt Frewer, Adam Storke, Ray Walston, Rob Lowe and Patrick Kilpatrick.
The flu kills people, a lot of people. There is mumbling and what idiot designed such an uncontrollable bio-weapon? How did it get out? Why did it kill some instantly and others slowly? The plague kills and those who are immune dream of Mother Abigail (Dee) and the evil Flagg (Sheridan). The acting is bad and this was over-lit, stagey and dated.
Ed Harris does haggard thousand yeard stares. This does not show the unimaginable horror or pitiless turmoil of the plague. This was bored and boring and it was blank inspipidity. Stu does dramatic turns. Flagg is unimpressive and does not cause mortal dread. This was not emotionally profound. Bates plays a radio host who gets shot off screen. All the interesting stuff like the plague happens off-screen.
Best Lines:
“We've lost one of the vaults!”
“Jump to the outside.”
“Number 1 on VH1!”
“A storm coming! His storm!”
“Our town bad boy.”
“Flu victims? Body dumps?”
“Burning bodies in waste treatment facilities.”
“Beast is loose in the streets of Bethlehem.”
“Leave you to live.”
“Uninvited fascist guests.”
The Dreams
The unfathomable pain of Fran as she prepares her dead father for burial as she's exiled from normality is rendered ridiclious by bad acting. Harold and his bad acne makeup begins to escalate into a series of increasingly momentous and appalling choices. Again undermined by terrible acting. There is no cold dread. Where are the flies and rats from all the unburied plague victims? Larry navigates via atlas and meets Nadine. There is no sign of any incredibly vile ghastly squalor in post plague NY. People dream of Mother Abigail and Flagg and flock to them across a ruined country in frenized acolyte adoration, off screen.
Ruby Dee babbles about god a lot and spews down home common sense as she overacts. Nadine wears dark lipstick and none of the female characters seem dressed properly for a post-apoc world. Fran talks about her fanny. Julie shows up and overacts as a slut. The lights are on in Las Vegas and somehow Flagg has assemebled an army of followers there, off-screen. People spew sappy dialogue as a carefully driven formation of bikers and cars show up to follow Mother Abigail, oddly the road is clear. This was hilariously bad and inept.
Best Lines:
“He said they were coming!”
“He was right.”
“Since the roller rink went bust.”
“You have any idea what it's going to smell like in 2 weeks? 5 million people rotting in the July sun!”
“Pleased to meet you Lloyd. Hope you guessed my name.”
“Ugh?”