The Great: Season 2 – TV Review

TL;DR – There is an absurd chaos on display from start to finish.  

Rating: 4 out of 5.
The Great: Season 2. Image Credit: Stan.

The Great Review

There is something so odd watching something proposing to be one thing but is another. There is a level of tonal dissonance that can take you out of the experience if there is not a deft hand on show. Today we look at a show that dances through history while ignoring actual events for a more engaging story.

So to set the scene, at the end of Season One, Catherine (Elle Fanning) finally made her move on Peter (Nicholas Hoult) with the help of her advisors Orlo (Sacha Dhawan) and Velementov (Douglas Hodge). Catherine had to sacrifice her lover to take the crown, but her love for Russia overtook her personal desires. However, Peter still has some support at court and weeks in. He still controls part of the Palace even though he is now surrounded. Time is short, and the one constant is everyone around Peter and Catherine has made it clear, they need to kill the other. Now from here, we will be looking at the season as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

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Occupation: Rainfall – Movie Review

TL;DR – A sequel that improves on the first in every way, full of action, and a ride from the start till finish

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

NominatedBest Australian Film & Fascinating Worldbuilding

Disclosure – I was invited to a screening of this film.

Occupation: Rainfall. Image Credit: Monster Films.

Occupation: Rainfall Review

A couple of years ago, I got to see this little Australian Science Fiction which was punching far above its weight. It was a movie filmed on a minuscule budget that did more with that budget than those with a much larger purse. It was a good representation of an alien invasion film, and full of some great action set pieces. So it was great to see that it was getting a sequel, and I am glad to say it improves on the first film in every way.       

In the years since the first film Occupation, the resistance movement has fought from the hillside towns and villages down to Sydney’s heart. It is a war of attrition and small hit-and-run operations, trying to take the city back one small section at a time. For Matt Simmons (Dan Ewing), this is a battle of zero compromises because it is a fight for their lives. But for Amelia Chambers (Jet Tranter), she is trying to find a diplomatic answer or try to find a cooperative way to work with the other subjugated aliens. However, when Wing Commander Hayes (Daniel Gillies) calls a retreat, and all hope seems lost, a rumour about a new weapon called Rainfall starts to spread. Rainfall could be their one hope, or humanities final downfall.

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The Death of Stalin – Exploring the Past

TL;DR – A farcical look at the reality of when an inept leader dies and leaves a vacuum to be filled.     

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

The Death of Stalin. Image Credit: Madman.

The Death of Stalin Review

Way back in the before times, I had planned to see The Death of Stalin in cinemas, with a planned double session. However, after being emotionally obliterated by Gurrumul, that got put on hold and very came to fruition. I have kept meaning to watch it since then, but now given I have some time thanks to the current state of the world, I thought it would be the perfect time to dive in.  

In 1953, Joseph Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin) was ruling the country with an iron fist, killing all those who oppose or even annoy him. There is a raucous almost frat house feel around dinner as Nikita Khrushchev (Steve Buscemi) and Lavrenti Beria (Simon Russell Beale). While this jocularity goes on, Stalin requests the recording of a concerto performance he just heard on Radio Moscow, one small problem. No one recorded it. Chaos erupts as Yuri Andreyev (Paddy Considine) tries to record the performance, while buses round people up across the city. It would be the worst time for something to happen to Stalin, but as the title of the film suggests that is what happens because pianist Maria Yudina (Olga Kurylenko) slipped a note of sedition into the recording. As Stalin read it, he suffers a cerebral haemorrhage and becomes paralysed, and no one comes to his aid till morning.

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TV Review – The OA Part 1 and 2

TL;DR – This is a show that entrances you and then just when you think you have everything worked out it shifts the game completely and you are left in awe with what just happened.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

The OA Part 1 and 2. Image Credit: Netflix.

Review

I have tried to keep up with all the new sci-fi shows dropping on Netflix, but occasionally one of them slips through the cracks, and this week we are looking at one of those with the brilliantly odd The OA. When a friend highly suggested that I give it a watch I thought I would get it an episode or two to see how it was and then at some point during Part 2 I looked up to see that it was 3 am and I truly wondered if I should watch the two last episodes then and there, so that should give you an indication as to how good the show is.

So to set the scene, we open with a rainy day as people drive over a bridge when someone records a woman in white running across to the edge of the bridge and then falling off into the water below. She survives, but won’t tell anybody her name or where she is from. Meanwhile in a small town, in a housing estate that was never finished, Nancy (Alice Krige) and Able (Scott Wilson) are going about their day when someone sends them a link to something online and they watch at their long lost daughter Prairie (Brit Marling) jump off a bridge. They race to her hospital, retelling the story of how their daughter went missing one day seven years ago, they race into her hospital bed where the woman in front of them goes by The OA not Prairie and does not recognise who just walked in, that is until she touches Nancy’s face. For you see when Prairie was taken she was blind but now she can see. Now, from this point onwards, we will be looking at Part 1 and Part 2 as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: Chapter 2 and Season 1 Overview   

TL;DR – We started with a group of people on a ship in space, and over the season, as adversity after adversity piled up, we ended with a crew. I mean I just wrote 1000 words just on the cast, the show is that good.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

The USS Discovery being all majestic and what. Image Credit: CBS Studios.

Review

This year has been a strong year for Sci-Fi on TV we have Lost in Space, Altered Carbon, The Rain, as well as more Westworld, 3%, and The Expanse. In the middle of all this was a release, which for me was probably anticipated more than anything else, a new Star Trek series. Now the fact that I really like the Star Trek franchise should come as no surprise, indeed a wrote an article all about my love for Star Trek Deep Space Nine. However, there was also a lot of trepidation going in, since DS9 we had Voyager that had some great individual episodes but nothing really came together as a series, and Enterprise that took three seasons to find out what type of show it wanted to be and when it got there decided to end on just about the most insulting note that it could (yes I know it was not meant to be a series finale but still). However, I went into this thinking that I can at least give it a season, and boy what a season it was. So in the first season of Star Trek Discovery the broke it up into different chapters, we took a look at Chapter One here, and today we are going to take a look at Chapter Two which was the back half of the season but also some of the themes that transcend all of the season, you can also see all of our reviews for the individual episodes here. With this in mind, just a warning that we will be looking at the season as a whole, and as such there will be some major [SPOILERS] discussed in this review. So caution is advised if you have yet to finished Season One of Star Trek Discovery, and we would recommend you giving the first season a watch.

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: Will You Take My Hand?  

TL;DR – In the end, we started with a group of people on a ship in space, and over the season, as adversity after adversity piled up, we ended with a crew.

Score – 5 out of 5 stars

Will You Take My Hand?

Review

Oh wow, we have reached the end of Season One and what a season it was, there were jumps in time and space, war with the Klingons, even a sojourn in the Mirror Universe. Now all of this was like a freight train barrelling towards tonight’s finale and here we are. So today we are going to take some time to look at how the episode worked on its own, before looking at how the whole season worked as a while in an article a bit later this week.

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: The War Within, The War Without  

TL;DR – The season is hurtling towards the season finale and today is about putting all our ducks in a row waiting for next week’s growing dilemma.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The War Without, The War Within

Review

It is hard to believe that we are almost at the end of the first season of Star Trek Discovery, and that today’s episode is the penultimate entry for the season. Now, this more than any episode this season was all about getting everything ready for what I am assuming is going to be a massive season finale. Which is good because you can see where it is going in the future, but does leave this being one of the weaker episodes this season, but given the strength of the season it still is a fascinating one to watch. Now as always, we will be going into depth with the episode, so there may be [SPOILERS] ahead.

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: What’s Past is Prologue

TL;DR – Tonight’s episode takes the twist from last week and ploughs forward at 100km an hour

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

What's Past is Prologue banner

Review

So right out of the gate, I have to say that last week’s episode Vaulting Ambition (see review) completely caught me off guard. Lorca’s (Jason Isaacs) reveal was such a masterful stroke on the part of the writers, it was a surprise but it was also hiding in plain sight all the time. That is such a difficult thing to nail, especially when you were setting it up all the way back in Context is for Kings (see review). So it is in the afterglow of that reveal that we start this week’s episode, the continuation of our now four episode Mirror Universe arc, where we discover a number of things, including that I was completely wrong last week and that reactor is totally not Romulan.

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: Vaulting Ambition

TL;DR – Just when you think Star Trek Discovery is done surprising you, it pulls out an emotional punch followed by a 2 by 4 to the head

Score – 5 out of 5 stars

Vaulting Ambition

Review

I have to take my hat off to the team over at Star Trek Discovery, tonight had a reveal that spent episodes building up, the reveal felt completely justified and not contrived, and I did not see it coming at all. That is such a difficult difficult task to pull off and make it feel natural, it was magnificent to watch. Now we will get into that a bit later when we can get into spoilers, but wow, this is one of the best episodes of Star Trek I have seen in a very long time.

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TV Review – Star Trek Discovery: The Wolf Inside

TL;DR – Trapped in the Mirror Universe, old friends appear, and secrets are revealed … oh and an Andorian

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

The Wolf Inside banner

Review

So before we start, because this is Part 2 I want to be clear from the start that there will be [SPOILERS] from both last week’s Despite Yourself (see review) and this week’s The Wolf Inside in this review. As well as this, because there are some big reveals that we have to talk about, if you have not watched the episode can I really recommend that you do that before you read this review.

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