Author: Metacrone

Lifelong film, television and theater enthusiast. Choose love.

Travelers Season 1 Episode 5: Room 101 Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 14 Comments

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This episode is largely a bottle episode that turns out to be mostly filler. We do learn more about the traveler mythology though, and gain a little insight into the characters.

The episode starts with a family of four careening through a parking garage in the family car. Dad’s driving is out of control, but it wasn’t clear to me if he was attempting a murder-suicide, or if he was having a medical issue of some kind. The daughter in the back seat is screaming and flailing, begging her dad to stop. At the last second before he drives off the roof, he swerves to the side and hits the brakes. Three of the four family members are now travelers. The little girl was a misfire, as McLaren’s team tells the family when they greet the newly arrived travelers. From the sound of it, because she was moving so much, the director couldn’t get a stable lock on her and the transfer failed. The traveler who would have entered her body is dead, if I understood correctly. It’s a one way trip that fails a significant percentage of the time. In the early days, the failure rate was 30% or more. McLaren will take the little girl to stay with a relative, while rest of her team prepares for their mission.

As they drive away, Philip, Carly, Marcy, and Trevor discuss the high rate of misfires. Trevor seems to have firsthand knowledge of the first wave of transfers. This is the second hint we’ve had that Trevor is very old, even though he’s in a young body. In the episode Hall, when Rick Hall questioned letting a kid repair the damaged device, one of the team members told him that the “kid” was older than everyone in the room combined. There were several people in the room at the time.

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HBO Will ReAir Carrie Fisher’s One-Woman Show Wishful Drinking on New Year’s Day

~ Metacrone ~ 1 Comment

HBO Will Also Show New Documentary “Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds” in the First Half of 2017 [Updated]

In the wake of the tragic loss of both Carrie Fisher on December 27, and her mother, Debbie Reynolds, just one day later on December 28, HBO is changing its schedule to honor the two women. Both women were multi-talented performers with decades long careers. Their accomplishments are too long to list here, so I’ll just link to their Wiki pages and try not to start crying again. I grew up watching Debbie in Singin’ in the Rain and The Unsinkable Molly Brown, then enjoyed her later turn from spunky ingenue to crotchedy maternal type as she aged. I saw Star Wars: A New Hope as a teenager in theaters during its original run. Carrie was the same age as my sister. I cheered for her success as she broke out of her Princess Leia buns to avoid type-casting and  become a bestselling author as well. In a culture where so many female artists are benched by the time they are 40, these two kept going long afterwards.

After the cut, trailers for both films, and a 2011 Oprah interview with Carrie and Debbie.

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Watch Highlights from Amelie, A New Musical with Philipa Soo and Adam Chanler-Berat

~ Metacrone

Amelie Ends It’s LA Run on January 15; Starts Previews on Broadway March 9, 2017

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The production has released highlight footage from Amelie ahead of its move to Broadway. It will open officially on April 3, 2017 at the Walter Kerr Theatre. Tickets are already on sale.

The musical is based on the French film Amelie.

Click through to watch the highlights video.

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Watch New Extended Trailer For Lifetime’s Beaches Remake

~ Metacrone

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Starring Idina Menzel and Nia Long as CC and Hilary

The Lifetime TV network has released a new trailer for their contemporary remake of the classic 1988 Bette Midler film Beaches. The film will premiere on January 21, 2017 at 8:00 PM ET.

Beaches, according to production notes, “follows the serendipitous meeting of two young girls on the Venice Boardwalk, who, though worlds apart in lifestyle, embark on unexpected and lifelong friendship. CC (Menzel) is an aspiring singer trying to make it in Los Angeles until she is discovered by a director who gives her her first big shot. Hillary (Long) is the daughter of a prominent civil rights lawyer who struggles to find her own destiny. Their friendship—even with its ups and downs—sustains them for decades.”

Emmy Award nominee Allison Anders directed the reboot. Gabriella Pizzolo (Fun Home, Young Alison) and Grace Capeless star as young CC and Hilary. Jodi Capeless, Sanai Victoria and Antonio Cupo are also featured. The stars have recorded new versions of Wind Beneath My Wings and The Glory of Love, both songs fans of the original movie will remember. Beaches will include several other songs recorded for the movie as well.

Click through to watch the new extended trailer.

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Travelers Season 1 Episode 4: Hall Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 2 Comments

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We open on McLaren and his FBI partner, Forbes, on a stake out, watching a deal being made for some kind of tech between two groups of men, out of the trunks of their cars. The deal goes bad, shots are fired, and the FBI moves in. One of the injured men gives McLaren a traveler message as he’s dying. There’s another team in need of support.

When McLaren arrives at the coordinates, he discovers it’s one of the groups who was at the shoot out. Two of them have been seriously wounded. Marcy and Carly are on their way to help. It turns out the deal was between two teams of travelers, but the second team, a group of Russians, had gone rogue, and tried to steal the tech. McLaren questions why travelers would betray the mission that way. The more experienced team replies with a condescending, “You must be new.”

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Travelers Season 1 Episode 3: Aleksander Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 2 Comments

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Marcy and David set off for the doctor visit Marcy agreed to in the last episode, but when Marcy realizes that she’s already had an MRI, she backs out. David is still confused by the changes in her. Later in the episode, Marcy asks Philip to hack into the hospital’s records and retrieve her MRI. We don’t see the results in this episode.

Philip is back to using heroin, ostensibly just enough to keep him functional as he weans himself off the addiction. It ends up being too tempting to also use it to deal with his guilt over the deaths they aren’t allowed to prevent, though, and he increases his use. As the team historian he’s memorized the death dates of hundreds of host candidates, and every death weighs on him. Marcy notices his condition and calls him out on it, but he’s out of control.

Philip goes to Stephen’s funeral. He’s overwhelmed with guilt for not saving original Philip’s best friend. Traveler Philip is a sensitive soul.  He gives his condolences to Stephen’s parents, but they blame him for their son’s death. He has Ray, his lawyer, make more winning bets, then distribute the money to Stephen’s parents, and Gower’s family (the cop he watched die of a heart attack in the pilot). He also begins calling in anonymous tips based on his memorized knowledge, to prevent a few more deaths. The FBI tracks the IP that the tips are coming from, but McLaren intervenes in time to stop the FBI from finding Philip.

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No Tomorrow Season 1 Episode 10: No Soup for You Recap

~ Metacrone

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We start where we left off in No Truer Words, with Evie confronting Xavier with an X about the hidden past that Timothy dug up while researching his article. This deep, dark past consists of changing his name from Hamish Stegner, Jr to the much cooler Xavier Holiday (wouldn’t you?), and having been arrested 8 times in 5 months for trespassing, public nudity, and disorderly conduct. Xavier explains his crimes away as normal youthful rebellion where he comes from. Honestly, it was not that unusual where I come from, either. He didn’t commit any violent crimes, it was a long time ago, and they haven’t been dating that long. I’m not sure he owed Evie every single detail he might have forgotten to mention yet. One of their first dates was helping a cousin (that Xavier had just broken out of prison) to flee the country, so I’m not sure why him having a bit of a history himself would be such a shock. Seems more like an excuse for cold feet to me.

Eventually, Evie realizes that Xavier’s arrests all happened right after his mom’s death, and he changed his name because of his issues with his father. She points out  that Xavier avoids his own issues, while making everyone else confront theirs. Evie breaks up with him until he can live an honest life, be his whole self, and deal with his shit, since he lied about his debt and other things too.

Xavier is floored that Evie broke up with him. He has a hard time with consequences. But he did listen to Evie, and considers what she said. He decides to go through with it and calls his dad.

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Travelers Season 1 Episode 2: Protocol 6 Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 1 Comment

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This episode opens seconds before the pilot ended, just as Mclaren is being taken over by a traveler. Marcy injects him below the left ear with a coms device. She’s already injected the rest of the team. McLaren is impressed that Trevor found the time to build coms as an after school project. Traveler Trevor is a hard worker, unlike original flavor Trevor. The police arrive in response to original McLaren’s call for backup. The lead officer is a traveler who hands off a package to Mclaren, and tells him to “Go save the world!” Carly lets the police know her police officer baby daddy is locked on the roof.

Meanwhile, the military is forcibly removing antimatter from a lab in the city. They’re taking it to an undisclosed location outside of town for undisclosed purposes. Their containment unit begins to fail, which means the antimatter will explode. An explosion this close to the city will destroy it. This is what happened in the travelers timeline. Their first mission is to seize and contain the antimatter, then hand it off safely to another team.

McLaren and Carly are on stake out duty, watching for the convoy with the antimatter. We learn that they are a couple, who are very much in love, but in this time McLaren has been married for 11 years and Carly has a baby. Both will have to keep playing those roles for the time being. Cue the relationship angst.

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The Man in the High Castle: Speculation for Season 3 (That Will Obviously Turn Out to Be Wrong)

~ Metacrone ~ 3 Comments

Here are our predictions for season 3 and beyond of The Man in the High Castle. (Or, probably more accurately, our hopes and dreams.) This is what we would do if we were writing the show:

Childan and Ed will be running their antiques business in the Neutral Zone, which will obviously also be a front for some less legitimate side business, and for the new and improved Resistance as well, once Juliana finds them.

Childan and Ed will be having an affair, both finally having admitted they’re either bi or gay. It’s clear Ed’s been in love with Frank since childhood, but he thinks Frank’s dead, so it’s time to move on. They may have him try to act on his crush on Juliana, but I think he knows she’s out of his league, and she’s emotionally unavailable anyway. Statistically, this show needs some queer characters. I’m going with the idea that same sex relations are forbidden in the Empire and the Reich, so no one is out, but things are looser in the Neutral Zone.

Abendsen will help Juliana and Trudy find Ed and Childan. Juliana will be in mourning for everything she’s lost. Tagomi may make his way to her at some point in this reality to make sure she is okay. She and Trudy might set off to find their parents and get them to the Neutral Zone. Eventually Trudy, Sarah, and Arnold will run the Western Resistance.

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The Man in the High Castle Season 2 Episodes 9 & 10 Recap: Detonation and Fallout

~ Metacrone ~ 4 Comments

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We start episode 10, Fallout, with the only cold open of the season, maybe of the entire series so far. It’s December 11th, 1945. Smith and Helen arrive at a small cottage outside of Washington, DC. Helen is very pregnant with Thomas, who she says is kicking up a storm. As they’re settling in, an atomic bomb goes off in the distance, seen behind them through the cottage’s picture window. They realize the Nazis have bombed Washington. As we know from watching the series so far, this is the event that caused the Americans to surrender to the Nazis.

This little scene is one of my favorite things they’ve done so far. It’s so brief, but it tells us so much, and reminds us of so much. And it’s shot gorgeously. We start out watching the couple from inside the cottage with the camera at a slight distance, framing the room as if it were a family portrait or a painting. There’s even a Christmas song playing in the background. Everything is perfect for them, despite the war. The room is dark, and the sky is graying outside the window as the sun sets. They are in the dark about what is about to happen. Change is coming. John turns on the lights, and they discuss his work at the Pentagon and the baby, with Helen telling Smith that she thinks it’s a boy. They are working to keep their situation happy and normal, despite the war. As they’re talking, a loud rumbling starts, along with a flash of light. For a split second, you think it could be thunder and lightning, but the flashes and crashes continue. Helen and Smith turn toward the window, holding hands. They, and we, realize something is very wrong, but they are in this together. The camera pulls closer and closer to them, then finally between them, up to the window, where we finally see the red sky and mushroom cloud from the atomic bomb in the distance. This is the event that will eventually come between them. This is the episode where that comes to fruition. They walk toward the window, and the camera pulls around in front of them. Now the camera is outside the window, looking in. We’re in the Looking Glass world now, no longer the world that made sense just 5 minutes ago. We see the mushroom cloud reflected in the window while we see Smith and Helen at an angle and shadowed, through the window. Everything in their world and their futures is now off balance, askew, dark.

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