Shameless: Season 4

 

Shameless is one of my favorite TV shows. It has consistently stayed well written and acted and directed through four seasons now. Season 4 might be the strongest and best season yet. How Emmy Rossum, William H. Macy, and Jeremy Allen White have been overlooked for the last three years for Emmy nominations is beyond me. While William H. Macy (Frank Gallagher) is a bit underused this season, Emmy Rossum (Fiona Gallagher) and Jeremy Allen White (Phillip "Lip" Gallagher) give their best performances yet.

Season 4 is just like the previous three seasons, lots of laughs, lots of raw emotion, nudity, drug and alcohol use, and shocking moments. After every season ends, my girlfriend and I miss spending time with the Gallagher family. It seems like the season flies by, even though waiting week to week for a new episode seems to last forever. I can't wait to rewatch season 4 without any week long breaks. If you haven't seen season 4 yet, you're in for a big shocker at the end of the season finale. So when the credits start to roll on the final episode of season 4, don't turn it off. There is a big shocker during the end credits. If you haven't watched Shameless yet, you need to. FULLY APPROVED.

Elsa & Fred

ELSA AND FRED is the story of two people who, at the end of the road, discover that it's never too late to love. After losing his wife, Fred (Christopher Plumer) feels disturbed, confused and alone, so his daughter (Marcia Gay Harden) helps move him into a small apartment where he meets Elsa (Shirley Maclaine). From that moment on, everything changes. Elsa bursts into Fred s life like a whirlwind, determined to teach him that the time he has left to live be it more or less is precious and that he should enjoy it as he pleases.

Tusk [Blu-ray]

I honestly don't know how many stars to give this weird, creepy little movie. I love Kevin Smith, but this is Kevin Smith doing his version of the Human Centipede. (Though I guess if I think of it in those terms, it was much better than Human Centipede if only because in this alternative reality of greatly suspended disbelief, the idea of turning someone into a walrus is much more believable than sewing people together rear-to-mouth. I mean, come on, the centipede's whole digestive and excretory system is completely unworkable, while turning someone into a walrus is .... oh, never mind.)

The soon-to-be walrusized Justin Long is really (and I assume deliberately) unlikeable in this movie, which I find complicated my loyalties as a viewer. While I was horrified at the idea of anyone being mutilated like this, having it happen to someone as unfeeling, crass and utterly lacking in humanity left me wondering whose side I was actually on. Even his girlfriend's ruminations on "what happened to the guy I fell in love with" (i.e. the one who cried at Winnie the Pooh) only made me wonder, "What are you still doing with this jerk? Are you sure you want to go find him?"

Yet I will confess, I was impressed by Long's ability to recognize literary quotes from Hemingway to The Rime of the Ancient Mariner; he may be a jerk, but he's a well-read jerk, and that means a lot to a writer and former English major like me.

What is enjoyable (though not as much as I would have hoped) is the "KevinSmithism" humor that creeps in. The passport guy at the airport is perhaps the funniest part of the movie. Canadian humor, eh?

Joel Haley Osment, who no longer sees dead people because right after that enormous success he suffered the fate of so many child actors: a growth spurt into puberty that rendered his once too-cuteness into something of rather awkward proportions. Luckily he seems to have grown into his features now. But he has such a tiny part in this movie, it's wasted.

I don't know how many people even know that Johnny Depp is in this movie, even after they've seen the movie. I give Depp credit as an actor for completely disappearing into the character of a Clouseau-like French Canadian detective. I had to Google to see if it actually was him. However, like most of this movie, he'd have been better and funnier with a little less screen time. LIke so many movies and tv shows, you get the feeling this was a good joke that would have made a great half-hour skit, but a really slow two-hour-ish movie.

The Equalizer [Blu-ray]

McCall (Denzel Washington) has put his mysterious past behind him and is dedicated to living a new, quiet life. But when he meets Teri (Chloë Grace Moretz), a young girl under the control of ultra-violent Russian gangsters, he can’t stand idly by. Armed with hidden skills that allow him to serve vengeance against anyone who would brutalize the helpless, McCall comes out of his self-imposed retirement and finds his desire for justice reawakened.

If someone has a problem, if the odds are stacked against them, if they have nowhere else to turn, McCall will help. He is The Equalizer.

Sons of Anarchy: Season 7

SOA is one, single work of art. It can't fairly or accurately be judged or critiqued based on an episode or a season. It is one story. I am so tired of reading about the violence of Season 7 and the lack of "emotional resonance". There is a reason that things are so different now. The decisions that have been made by the characters in the past have brought them to this point. There is no "emotional resonance" with Jax because he has shut down all of his emotions due to the pain of losing his wife and he is totally emotionally numb. Obviously, if he lives long enough and the narrative continues long enough, we will get to see him have to deal with his emotions when they come crashing back. No one can box their emotions away indefinitely. We will also get to see him have to deal with the consequences of all the violence that has been caused by his mother's lie and his numbness-fueled rage. The violence is an integral part of the story and anyone who is offended by it shouldn't even own a television. The worldviews and behaviors of the characters have no bearing on the character of Kurt Sutter.

All of you who want to personally attack Mr. Sutter because of the behavior of his characters are of low I.Q. and questionable parentage. The behavior of his characters is based on behavior exhibited by thousands of thousands of real people everyday. Criminal organizations have always been racially segregated. They have always used, dare I say, the "N-word", and other racial epithets when referring to individuals outside of their group. These people are a product of their environment and they are morally bankrupt. The world is full of them. And all of you who want to censor Kurt or any other storyteller because the world's that they create contain people that you don't agree with would love to do the same thing to the world we live in. You are SICK. Violence and racism are alive and well. Born in the hearts of men. This story contains some of those men and it certainly doesn't take anything away from its value or credibility. This show is pure genius.

Regardless of how it ends, nothing can take that away. I will mourn these characters when they have passed from my life.

Game of Thrones: Season 4 (Blu-Ray+Digital Copy)

Game of Thrones is one of HBO’s signature series and a huge runaway hit for the network. This year, a plethora of compelling storylines will play out to their inevitable, and bloody, conclusions. As the season begins, encouraged by the Red Wedding slaughter in the Riverlands that wiped out many of their Stark nemeses, the Lannisters’ hold on the Iron Throne remains intact … but can they survive their own egos as well as new and ongoing threats from the south, north and east? While an unbowed Stannis Baratheon continues to rebuild his army in Dragonstone, a more immediate danger comes from the south, as Oberyn Martell, the Lannister-loathing “Red Viper of Dorne,” arrives at King’s Landing to attend Joffrey’s wedding to Margaery Tyrell, and perhaps act on an ulterior agenda. In the north, a depleted Night’s Watch seems overmatched against the inexorable Wall advances of Mance Rayder’s army of wildlings, which in turn is being trailed by an even more formidable foe: the undead White Walkers.

If that’s not enoug, Daenerys Targaryen, accompanied by her fierce trio of dragons and Unsullied army, is poised to "liberate" Meereen, the largest Slaver City in the east, which could provide her with an imposing force to execute her ultimate plan: to sail to Westeros and reclaim the Iron Throne the Lannisters usurped from her family.

Masterpiece: Downton Abbey Season 5

Downton Abbey remains one of the most anticipated shows on both sides of the Atlantic, and with the UK shows already underway, those of us who are lucky enough to watch them know that the tribulations of the Grantham clan are already in full swing

We left season 4 with Carson and Hughes wandering into the ocean, ankles exposed. It appears that the liberality of the modern age is starting to effect the help! Soon they will be asking to take off weekends. What is a weekend? The Dowager is just as confused about it too. There are too many plot lines to even recap, with various murders, hidden children, old-fashioned forbidden love; Season 5 continues along the same line.

Each of our well-worn characters seem to find themselves in familiar territory: Mary is advancing on and yet infuriating suitors, Edith is hopeless at trying to hide her love-child, Lord Grantham is still waiting to bet the family fortune to show he is anything but an impotent landlord (I hear dirigibles are a great investment), while the help are falling into similar conundrums as in Season 4: Mr. Carson remains in a continual strain of retreating from modernity though steps into the wireless age, albeit mostly unwillingly, Bates continues to quietly menace while we wonder if he really is a cold-blooded killer, while Ms. Pattmore and daisy continue their upward ascent (Daisy might even make head cook someday).

Though it often feels like the ground has been covered before, Season 5 is just right for those Downton fans who have grown fond of the characters and get to follow them in their ascent to the modern age. Though sometimes bordering being too melodramatic, the show is a tried and true companion in the winter months. Sometimes just getting to see Isis wander through the scene and hear the Dowager utter a one-liner is enough for a fine Sunday evening. The new season, so far, does not disappoint; a must for Downton fans.