Fiction: part 1, “The Ex-Demon Lord Becomes an Adventurer!?”

Hi, all. Just a short note before the first part of this story. For those who don’t know, there is a trend in Japanese manga currently, playing off the idea of a Demon Lord commanding an army of monsters and the Hero and their party of warriors. I’m playing off this idea with this story. Hope you enjoy. Hopefully, I’ll be bringing you a part of this story once a month.

The Ex-Demon Lord Becomes an Adventurer!?

The Demon Lord’s Tower was located at the western edge of the continent, surrounded by continually burning plains. Hot wind blew across the area, stirring up ash that landed in neighboring fields and ruined crops. Farmers on the edge of the “cursed area”, as it was called, grumbled about both their crops and the monsters who occasionally rampaged by and destroyed whatever they could. If they had not been afraid of being overheard, they might also have grumbled about the lack of concern shown by the Church to their plight. But they were afraid, and so they did not, at least out loud. They lived there as their ancestors had done for the last 500 years, because they had no opportunity to relocate. After all, a meager living is still a living.

The latest Hero and her party approached the top floor of the Demon Lord’s Tower with caution. Through all 27 floors, they had encountered no monsters, not guards, not even obvious surveillance magic. Lycert, the red-headed Sorcerer in their party, had sent out a Detect spell before the first 15 floors, but their Rogue, X, had insisted on doing reconnaissance on the following floors, claiming a need to reserve Lycert’s magic for the final battle.

Cecilia, the Hero and Swordswoman, was baffled. When she admitted it to her party, they all agreed. Every story of previous Hero parties attacking the Tower had ended in death, chaos and mayhem long before the 28th floor. Why then was the Tower deserted?

“Mayhap,” Macdougall, the red-headed Barbarian Tank and Lycert’s older brother, mused, “it’s a trap? If our party is on the final floor, and the Demon Lord destroys the Tower, ‘twould be difficult for us to escape without injury. Then the Demon Lord’s hordes could defeat us easily.”

X nodded her head, but remained silent as always, hiding any emotions behind her black mask. Lycert scratched his scraggly beard, and shrugged. “I’ll reserve my magic, if I need to use Escape. But remember, if it winds up we do have to use Escape, I’m gonna be useless for a couple hours. The Tower has all sorts of anti-magic wards here, and they get stronger the higher we go.”

Cecilia sighed, and pushed a few loose black hairs back into her bun. “All right. I guess we still have to go, regardless of the possibility of a trap. Keep your eyes open, stay in battle formation. If we don’t make it out, it’s been an honor to make this journey with you.”

Macdougall cleared his throat. “No need to be overly sentimental, lass. We’ve volunteered to go, and we shall finish this journey with honor.”

The last door, the door to the Demon Lord’s throne room, was huge, easily three times the height of any of the Party, made of ornately carved black metal. The others hesitated, but Macdougall walked up and thumped his war club against it, calling “Open!”

The door opened silently, not even creaking. Cecilia was halfway afraid of a trap, and halfway annoyed that the Demon Lord couldn’t even prepare something to show that their presence was acknowledged. 

The throne room was small. She had expected an enormous ostentatious chamber, and saw only a plain room, empty except for a modest throne with a person sitting on it. The person wore a black cloak with a hood that shrouded their face in shadow. Black silver twined around the hood like a crown of vines. Long straight black hair fell down the person’s front, visible only by the change in texture.

The party cautiously walked in, hands on weapons. They had only a few steps to go before they reached halfway between the throne and door.

“You took your own sweet time,” the person said. The voice was low and steely. “I left a message on the front door that there were no monsters to fight, so come on up.”

“Is that what that was?” Lycert asked quietly. “That inscription looked like it was written in a different language.”

“Really? My mistake,” the Demon Lord said. “Please forgive my handwriting for being old-fashioned.”

“Demon Lord, we have come here to do battle,” Cecilia said, drawing her sword. Her heart thumped hard.

“I know.” The Demon Lord’s voice seemed to indicate that this answer was obvious.

“Then prepare yourself.” Cecilia started to take up a battle stance, but the Demon Lord simply lifted a claw-like hand. Suddenly the Hero’s party could barely stand due to an insane amount of demonic pressure pressing down on them. The air turned red, and their ears rang at barely audible screams. The pressure suddenly lifted. Cecilia staggered, but managed to catch herself and raise her sword again.

“Impressive.” The Demon Lord sounded almost gleeful. “You’re the first group to make it this far. And to withstand that… even having watched you through your whole journey, you have exceeded my expectations.”

“Do you desire battle that strongly?” Macdougall asked. “You wanted a worthy opponent?”

“Oh, not quite.” The Demon Lord raised a hand again, and Cecilia’s sword was suddenly wrenched out of her grasp and flew through the air, hovering in front of the Demon Lord. That personage stood up and took hold of the sword.

Cecilia quickly drew her short sword and dagger. She had to be prepared to defend her party, even though she knew that they would probably all die soon. She didn’t expect the Demon Lord to abruptly slash its own palm with her sword.

Blood dripped onto the stone floor, quickly making a puddle. The Demon Lord simply looked down at it, and said in a monotone, “Oh no. I’ve been defeated. I’m bleeding.”

“What?” Macdougall asked.

The floor area around the throne suddenly lit up with a black and red magic circle. The Demon Lord chanted, “Time that was, time shall be, hark ye now and list to me. Throne destroyed and crown remade, blood for blood, the debt is paid. Time that is, time be still, hear my words and do my will.”

Throughout this chant, the space above the circle shone red and black. The Demon Lord’s crown blazed with light. The very air seemed to fill with the heavy scent of magic. There was a flash of silver light, and the Demon Lord seemed to crumble into a heap of dirt. The magic circle disappeared, and there was a young woman standing there. Her long silvery blonde hair fell down to her knees, and steady blue eyes looked at the Hero’s party. She wore only a simple gray robe, her feet bare. She held Cecilia’s sword in her hand.

“What just happened?” Macdougall whispered to Lycert. The sorcerer stammered something, then fell silent.

“Who are you?” Cecilia demanded.

“No need to be so uptight, Heroes,” the woman said. She walked towards them, carefully stepping over the crumpled robe and heap of dirt. “Here’s your sword back. Thanks for the loan.”

Cecilia stared at the offered sword, now devoid of blood. The woman finally said impatiently, “I didn’t enchant it or anything. I just needed a weapon blessed by the holy church in order to break that spell. It’s not gonna bite you or anything.”

Cecilia cautiously took the sword, half-expecting something to happen. When nothing did, she sheathed it with a quick motion. 

“What was that spell?” Lycert quickly asked. “Did you cast it? Did you kill the Demon Lord? I didn’t understand its purpose. There were no elemental runes or words used.”

The woman looked at him in surprise. “Has the College of Magicks stopped teaching anything beyond just elemental magic? No wonder it took forever for someone to get this far.”

“But- but the power involved! That was at least a tier-10 cast spell. Nobody can do something like that except for the Saint.”

“Uh, except for the Saint and me, apparently. Thank you very much.” The woman snorted and turned back to the remains of the Demon Lord and picked up the crown, now covered in ash.

“But who are you?” Cecilia demanded.

“Isn’t it obvious?” The woman tossed the crown to Cecilia. “You need proof you killed the Demon King, yeah? That should satisfy the church.”

“Would you stop beating around the bush?” Cecilia snapped. “You keep saying it’s obvious, but…” She stopped. She had thought that perhaps the woman was a member of the church who had come to help, shirking away from the other idea that came to mind. But… “You’re the Demon… Lord?”

“Is it that surprising?” The woman propped her fists on her hips. “Doesn’t anyone know that the Demon Lord used to be human? How stupid have people become in the last 500 years? I knew I was out of touch since I’ve been cooped up in here, but ye gods. Do you people still even know how to bathe properly? And Miss Rogue, there’s nothing valuable in the tower anymore, so you might as well stop sending your shadows out and save your energy.”

X actually flinched. Cecilia glanced at her in surprise. This woman perhaps was telling the truth, if she could sense a Rogue’s shadows, let alone make X show emotion.

“Anyhow,” the woman said, “we might as well head out. There’s nothing around here to do. Trust me, I know from personal experience.”

Cecilia interrupted, “Wait, wait, wait. What do you mean ‘we’? If you’re the Demon Lord, you’re not going anywhere with us. More to the point, we haven’t defeated you, so we’re not going anywhere until either you or us are dead.”

“Uh, sorry. Did you not see that spell I did? You defeated the Demon Lord. To be more precise, your blessed Holy Sword drew demon blood, the demon was destroyed, and the Demonic Crown is now in possession of the Hero’s party. How did you NOT defeat the Demon Lord?”

“But- you- you’re HERE! You’re not dead!”

The woman let out a condescending sigh. “Child, may I tell you something? My name used to be Kida, the Paladin of the Northern King’s Court. A curse was put on me to seal me in this place, to create an appearance that was befitting an evil creature worthy of death. You have defeated the so-called Demon Lord. There is nothing left here for you to do. How much further can I explain this to satisfy you?”

“Supposing that what you say is true-” Lycert said, then paused briefly. “If you’re still alive, the monsters will keep attacking and killing. In order to complete our mission, we have to kill you to destroy the portal to the demon’s land and stop the invaders.”

“That portal existed long before I was forced to become the Demon Lord,” Kida said, crossing her arms. “I’ve never held it open. It simply exists. The church uses ‘Heroes’ as propaganda, to sway gullible people into supporting them financially, while using me as a scapegoat. All right? All you have to do is research the history books not owned by the church.”

“There are none.” Lycert stated this with absolute certainty.

“Oh yes, there are. You just have to look properly. Anyway, can we head out now? I’m bored. I’d like some fresh air.” Without hearing an answer, Kida walked past them and out the door. Cecilia, after a pause, ran after her. When she passed through the doorway, she stopped.

Rather than being in a stone stairwell, she was standing on a windswept plain. Sun broke through the scattered clouds overhead, making the area dappled with dark gray-blue areas and blindingly bright areas. Kida spread her arms wide and spun in a circle, her hair brushing the grass around her. She laughed gleefully, almost dancing.

“What happened here?” Macdougall asked.

Cecilia spun around to see the party exiting a small stone building. No matter how far she looked, the menacing stone tower and burned, ashy lands of the Demon King had vanished.

“So the legends were true,” X murmured. When the others looked at her, she looked down and murmured again, “When the Demon Lord is vanquished, the land will be healed and the Western plains will come into being again.”

“I told you!” Kida shouted from where she was running through the grass. “You defeated the Demon Lord! What more proof do you need?”

Macdougall sighed and scratched his head, stirring up his unruly hair even more. “What do we do, lass? This is far different than we had bargained for.”

“I know. But we need to confirm her story, right?” Cecilia nibbled on her lip. “If anything she said is true, then we’ve been lied to all our lives, by the Church. I don’t… I hope she’s the one lying. I don’t want to deal with the consequences if she’s not.”

“Same here,” Lycert answered. He leaned on his staff, looking tired. “I’ve only ever studied at the Church-owned College or Library. I remember there being a library near the next-to-last town we went through on our way here. If we can spend a few days there, we can do research.”

“Sounds like the beginning of a plan, at least.” Cecilia sighed and turned east. “Let’s go then.”

They started making their way east, their return journey much different than their journey to the Tower. Grass, as high as Cecilia’s waist, swished around them and rustled in the warm wind. Before, they had walked on crackling and fiery ground, covering their faces in scarves to filter out the ash. They could see the sun now, unlike before when smoke had blocked it. They all inwardly marveled that such a barren and cursed land could so quickly become full of life.

Cecilia suddenly stopped and turned around, seeing that Kida was following them a few paces behind. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“I’m coming with you. Duh.”

“Excuse me?!” Cecilia gaped.

“Well, it’s not like I’ve got any place to go back to, right? And I’m tired of staying in one place. It’s mind-blowingly boring. Seriously.” Kida walked past them and kept heading in their destined direction. “I’m most curious about the food. Has it changed at all in the last 500 years? I sometimes got glimpses of food stalls when I watched you guys, and some things looked totally new. I’ve had nothing to eat, and I’m not hungry now, but I know I will be soon.”

“You are NOT coming with us!” Cecilia bellowed.

“Wait a second,” Lycert interjected. “If she really is the Demon Lord, isn’t it better to have her come with us so we can keep an eye on her? If she stays here, no telling what she could do.”

Cecilia started to speak, then stopped, started and stopped again. This situation was so bizarre and not anything like she had expected. She couldn’t argue with Lycert’s logic, but she still didn’t like the idea of traveling with the infamous Demon Lord who was single-handedly responsible for most of the national disasters over the last 500 years.

“I told you I was a paladin, right?” Kida asked. She had stopped and turned around. “I was a holy knight of the Church. I fought for justice. Finer points of the law have probably changed since then, but I will not break the law unless someone is in danger. I will not kill unless provoked. I’ll even hold off on doing any magic above tier-1. Will that satisfy you?”

“Sounds good to me.” Lycert quickly caught up with Kida. “Tell me, how do you learn tier-10 magic?”

The two of them started walking again, and their conversation quickly took on a technical turn. X shrugged and followed them.

“That’s my brother for you,” Macdougall muttered. “He cares less about the state of the world and more about the state of magic.”

Cecilia sighed. “I don’t know what to do, but I guess we’re stuck with her for right now. C’mon, better get as far as we can before sunset.”

Review of MSW “Seal of the Confessional”

Howdy, folks. I haven’t been reviewing MSW for a month, I think, due to life and adult stuff. Yippee. Welcome back to me?

So this episode, “Seal of the Confessional” (season 6, episode 2 of “Murder, She Wrote”) comes with a spoiler warning for this review, and also a possible trigger warning for some people. There is reference (although nothing is shown, thankfully) to a stepfather trying to sexually abuse his teenage stepdaughter, and a flashback does show him trying to attack her, although she manages to stab him and escape. The episode just made me feel all sorts of icky. I’m going to try to do a bit of play-by-play reviewing this time, as I actually don’t have plot holes or other issues to pick at. My main issue is the camera work and some of the actors, as I’ll cover at the end. So this post will be longer than my other reviews so far.

The episode opens with people at the Maine beach, such as Jessica Fletcher, fellow jogging enthusiast and teacher Donald Barnes, and mentally handicapped Eddie Frayne. After a conversation, JB and Donald agree to meet for breakfast in the morning and discuss teaching and books. That evening, someone is lurking about the church in town, but this figure in a black cloak is better suited for lurking about the Shire and Bree, rather than the hamlet of Cabot Cove. (Yes, that is a Lord of the Rings reference.) The cloak wearer comes into the church for confession, and the young Farah Fawcett lookalike is surprised to find that FATHER Donald Barnes (yes, the guy JB met earlier) is filling in while Father Molloy is on vacation. She dramatically puts a blood-stained hand to her chest (with a dramatic camera zoom-in) and asks to confess. In the confessional booth, she admits to killing a man in self-defense, and that “I swear I didn’t mean to kill him, but I’m not sorry I did it. He was evil. He deserved to die.” She cannot go to the police, although Father Barnes asks her to, because someone would not be able to withstand the revelation. She immediately regrets having come and runs out.

The next morning, JB meets Sheriff Metzger, who asks Father Barnes a very important religious question about bingo. (Metzger goes like full Comedy Central in this episode, but to me, it doesn’t jive well in this dark episode.) Father Barnes is on edge, as he doesn’t know what to do about the young woman’s murder confession. He manages to convey to Jessica that since the Catholic Church abides by the seal of the confessional (meaning that whatever is said in the confessional booth stays in the confessional booth), he cannot go to the police and tell them anything. And since he doesn’t know who the woman was, he can’t try to persuade her to go to the police. JB intuits that he’s talking about someone confessing to murder (seriously, does she have ESP or has she simply lived in Cabot Cove long enough to know that another murder has to have happened?), and that he wants her help, but cannot say anything. He says that they don’t teach things like this in seminary, which makes me wonder why not, because this seems like it would come up occasionally.

Next scene takes place on the beach again, where a dead body is found. Metzger is still surprised at the communications system in the small town, as JB is there without being summoned, having heard passersby hollering at each other. Father Barnes comes to perform last rites, as the dead man, Evan West, was relapsed, but his wife Doris is a devout Catholic. Seth Hazlitt, MD, is also there, and when asked what the cause of death was, says it was likely the massive stab wound in his chest. Seems clear-cut to me. Seth knows that the new guy is Father Barnes, simply because he’s the new face in town.

Metzger is admittedly quick to jump to conclusions, but I appreciate seeing the rough New York cop trying to be sensitive and talking gently to the new widow, Doris Evans, who is totally broken up over her husband’s death. She is in a wheelchair, which is an important plot point. We see her daughter, Kelly, come in, who we as viewers recognize as Father Barnes’ late night confessor. Seeing how much Doris is grieving, and how much she had loved Evan, we get a sense of why Kelly had felt she couldn’t go to the police about killing Evan. So now we begin to get into darker waters in this episode.

Eddie Frayne, the mentally handicapped man, shows his new knife to a guy he knows. The guy recognizes it as belonging to Evan West, the latest murder victim, because this guy had given Evan the knife a while back. Eddie insists that it’s Eddie’s knife, because he found it and cleaned it up. And then I went into full rage mode, because this man proceeds to grab Eddie like he’s fighting for his life, and declare that Eddie must be the murderer. This was not only unnecessary, but… OOOOOOhhhhhh. Eddie is mentally handicapped, you piece of week-old trash, and you know this. You could have asked him to talk to the police, but you treat him immediately like he’s a dangerous criminal! And that’s on top of treating him like a total nuisance when he came to see if he could help you with your catch. And please pardon me as I go off into a rant, but very few people in this episode treat Eddie like an actual human being. They refer to him as “the little guy” or “the little fellow”, like he doesn’t even have a name or real existence instead of calling him “him” or “Eddie.” My younger sister is also mentally handicapped, and yes, sometimes she’s annoying, but SO IS EVERY OTHER FRICKIN’ PERSON I’VE EVER MET. Just because your brain doesn’t work the same as the majority of the population doesn’t make you less human. JB, Kelly and Father Barnes are the only people in this episode who treat Eddie like he’s an actual human with emotions, and it grates so severely on my nerves. *hhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa* *deep breath in as I step down off of my soapbox*

Anyhoo, Eddie also somehow knows that Evan West wasn’t the good guy he pretended to be. JB decides to go to the West household, which requires her riding her bike while in a tight skirt and dress jacket, so mad props to her. Marilyn the registered nurseis cleaning the extra wheelchair in an effort to keep busy, which draws a suspicious camera zoom-in and Kelly fussing ostentatiously over. JB and Doris engage in some comforting widow talk, which seems not necessarily necessary, as this is the second time Doris has been widowed (the first was Kelly’s dad Tom), and JB talks like it hasn’t happened. Then the scriptwriters get very conniving, as Father Barnes is coming in, Kelly can’t escape through the sliding glass door because it’s stuck again and Doris hasn’t called anyone to fix it yet, and JB happens to be there. It may sound better in my paraphrase, but it’s very obviously contrived in the episode. JB pursues Kelly outside, where Kelly learns that Eddie has been arrested for Evan’s murder, and the evidence seems pretty damning. She is distraught, but firm in her refusal to confess.

JB goes to talk to family friend Jack, who had left as JB arrived at the Wests, and they reminisce over how he had once been very close to Doris, but she chose to marry the “cooler” Tom; we also learn here that Kelly had abruptly left sophomore year to attend school in Vermont, to which Jack claims he doesn’t know why. We get some more much-needed Seth time, as he is having breakfast with JB, as he delivers the news that Evan had drowned. In spite of being stabbed, and receiving blunt force trauma to the head, Evan’s cause of death was drowning. While Seth finally gets a chance to eat his now cold eggs and toast, JB fills him in on the seal of the confessional, or as much as she is able to. Seth appreciates her predicament, saying it’s similar to the doctor-patient confidentiality, except that the Church answers “to a higher authority than the state medical board.”

JB goes to the police station to deliver comic books to Eddie, and learns that George Woodward, the West’s attorney, has been asked to defend Eddie. JB pretty quickly figures out that Kelly had asked Doris who had asked George to do this, but now we learn that Marilyn the housekeeper had witnessed Eddie prowling about the docks the night of Evan’s murder. She says she heard arguing, which for Metzger and George means further proof that Eddie is the killer. JB and George then walk downtown and talk, and George remembers a time he and Evan had been out drinking and Evan had said that he “had married the wrong Barrett.” George is pretty sure that Evan was drunk then, because Kelly had only been 16 and it was “just sick to think about.” JB then learns that Evan was broke and sponging off of Doris.

Back at the West house, JB arrives to see that Jack is giving Kelly an alibi, so supposedly there’s no way she could have killed Evan. Marilyn lives out back, on the cliffs overlooking the beach, and affirms that she saw Eddie by the docks, and that since Kelly has come back and taken over, she isn’t really needed as a nurse anymore there. JB then goes out to the docks and to the West family boat; through the magic of TV, the empty dock in one shot has a boat at the end in the next shot. JB finds a large dried smudge of blood on the wall by the coat hooks, and with yet another dramatic zoom-in, Jack comes and finds her on the boat. When he escorts her away, JB finally gets a nearby Kelly to tell what had happened the night of the murder. She had gone to the boat, which originally belonged to her father before Doris gave it to Evan, and Evan had caught her. He ran out to the docks after her, and she fought him away, grabbed his knife from a nearby tackle box, and he came after her again and impaled himself on the knife. After he toppled off the dock into the water, Kelly ran away and had unthinkingly dropped the knife on the beach. Jack may or may not have known about Evan’s attempted molestations before Kelly had gone to Vermont, but he knows now, and wanted to protect Kelly by giving her an alibi.

JB convinces Kelly to talk to Metzger, and then explains to both of them that Kelly wasn’t the murderer. Based on Kelly’s description of the fight and Seth’s explanation of Evan’s wounds, JB realized that Kelly had only stabbed, not killed, Evan in self-defense. Kelly had scraped Evan’s arms in her fight, which meant he hadn’t been wearing his bright red windbreaker during their fight, but he had been wearing it when his body was discovered. Metzger admits that since the windbreaker was only partially zipped up and the stab wound was above the zipper, he had assumed that Evan had been wearing it when someone went all Stabby McStabberton on him. JB points out the blood smudge she found on the boat, then surmises that Evan had not died when stabbed, but had pulled himself back on the boat and put on his windbreaker since it was cold, and went to get help for his stab wound. They reason that he wouldn’t have gone to Seth or the hospital, because it would have raised too many questions. And then they realize that the boat was very close to the house, where help was.

We next see Marilyn the registered nurse hurrying into a cab taking her away from the West home, but Metzger, his deputy, and JB arrive just in time to block the driveway. Marilyn denies everything at first, but FOR ONCE, MSW has concrete evidence in the form of blood specks in the wheelchair she had been cleaning. Marilyn breaks down and admits it, as per MSW norm. Evan had come to her for help after getting stabbed, and while she was trying to stop the bleeding, he had moaned about Kelly stabbing him and how she was probably going to tell her mother. Marilyn then scolded him for again going after Kelly (RAGE), and he said that she was no longer a kid (MORE RAGE), and said that maybe it was the end of the road for him. Marilyn agreed, then offed him with a fireplace poker to the head. She used the extra wheelchair to take his body out to the cliff and dump him over, then cleaned up as best she could. When she learned that Eddie had been accused of the murder, she said she had seen him because she thought that “Kelly had been through enough.” She admits that Evan and she had once had a good thing going, but that night, she suddenly couldn’t bear the thought of him ever touching her again.

The episode ends with a nice palate cleanser to Eddie and Father Barnes playing beach-side football with some town kids. Seth and JB agree that it’s wonderful to see Eddie laughing again, and Seth imparts some town gossip that Father Barnes may be taking over for Father Molloy more permanently and teaching in town. When JB expresses surprise at Seth’s knowledge of local gossip, he smugly tells her that if she would get her hair done more often at the hair parlor, she might know some of these things too.

So I think I’ve mainly covered the relevant points and tangented enough, so for scores:

Plot: 9/10. There were a few tiny holes, and I would have like to see how Doris took the news and how Kelly managed to move forward. But for the most part, there wasn’t a lot of red herring misdirects, and there was solid evidence to lead to the conclusion, but the normal “killer makes a small mistake when talking to Jessica.” It all sits together nicely as a mystery, and moral dilemma.

Guest Stars: 7/10. The actors mostly did well. Father Barnes’ moral agonizing was clear to see, Eddie was likeable without being pathetic, and George’s apathy was clear. But the actors for Kelly, Doris and Evan, the main weight-bearing actors, felt like they were playing more of a soap opera overblown style, instead of a more somber tone that would have carried the subject matter better.

General Enjoyability: Ehhhhh…. 8/10. As I mentioned before, this episode made me feel all sorts of icky, but it tackled the subject matter with a fair amount of respect. I felt the score was lowered by the aforementioned “dramatic camera zoom-ins” and overblown acting of some of the main actors.

Solveability: I think this would rate a 8/10. The red windbreaker is such a great clue that is visible and noticeable, and that provides the impetus to think further than just Kelly as the murderer. If they had focused a little more on the fact that Marilyn was a registered nurse, and not a housekeeper, I think it would have been easier to solve. As it is, there’s barely a breath between talking about Evan looking for help and Marilyn heading to the cab to show the audience who the killer is. With a bit of finangling, it would have been better.

So that is the long-awaited MSW review. I make no promise about what’s going to be posted next week. I’ve learned better. So for now, I’ll catch you on the flip side.

Fiction: The Antique Shoppe

The Antique Shoppe

Once Upon a Christmas Eve (second half)

One month later…

Jenny sighed as she flipped the door sign to “Closed”. It had been a long day. People had come and left in waves. Ceici had actually had to come from the back for once and help customers. Jenny was surprised that people had actually come to a secondhand shop for the “perfect present” that might be found in the middle of all the clutter. She would have to reorganize the entire front of the store after the holidays finished.

“Good work today, Jenny.” Ceici opened the register and started counting up the cash. “You can go ahead and leave early if you want. The cleaning can wait until after Christmas.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. Go do something nice. Your bonus, by the way.”

Jenny accepted the envelope hesitantly. “Thank you. This is the first Christmas bonus I’ve ever gotten.”

Ceici smiled broadly. “Then go out and get something nice to eat, if you can. Laze about in bed tomorrow. Treat yo’self, as they say.”

Jenny grinned briefly. “Actually, there’s a church around the corner from the center that’s having a Christmas Eve service in a couple hours. I’ve been thinking about going. Would you be interested in going with me?”

Ceici smiled. “I’m sorry, but no. I have a business appointment tonight. You’ll have to go without your security blanket.”

Jenny blinked. “You’re not a security blanket!”

“That’s how you see me, whether you admit it or not. Go and make some friends already, little Jenny Wren.” Ceici shooed her towards the door. They exchanged Merry Christmases and goodbyes, then the doorbell rang as Jenny left.

Ceici snapped her fingers, and her eyes briefly turned golden. The door locks snapped into place, and the lights turned off. She went into the back room, the bead curtain clacking against itself in the silence.

At the end of the hallway, pushed up against the wall, was a large wooden chifforobe. One half of it was full of drawers of every size,  while the other half was an elegantly carved door covering the wardrobe half. The carvings had been portraying a woodland, then abruptly changed to a scene like a Greek ruin. The door then opened, and out stepped a small woman. She was dressed impeccably in a black pantsuit and flats, her dark gray hair pulled into a bun. Her black eyes narrowed as she saw Ceici.

“Hiya, Maggie,” Ceici said cheerfully. “Merry Christmas.”

“The name is Magdala, and I could not care any less about your seasonal greetings.” The woman’s scowl deepened, as impossible as it seemed. “I have business in other realms to take care of, so let’s get this over with.”

Ceici sighed. She gestured to her outfit: forest green leggings, a knee-length denim skirt, and a dark golden turtleneck sweater under a black leather vest. “And I got dressed up for our appointment. I wanted to make a good impression on my parole officer.” Her eyes turned gold, and black boots appeared on her feet. “Doesn’t the effort make any impression?”

“Listen, you could be dressed like Queen Elizabeth the First and I wouldn’t care. I’m here for my job, so stop trying to make friends.” Magdala slammed the door of the chifforobe shut, waited until the carvings turned into a large mansion, and opened the door again. “Come on.”

Mike Kaiser sat at his desk in his opulent office. The last month had changed his appearance. Before, he had been a little heavyset, bordering on fat. Now he had noticeably lost weight, but the haggard look on his face and the dark circles under his eyes made the most difference. He flinched as a knock sounded on the door.

“Come in!” he snapped.

He jumped from his seat when the door opened. The shop owner strode in casually, followed by a small woman.

“How did you get in here?” Mike yelled.

“Through the front door, naturally.” Ceici smiled broadly. “We didn’t bother coming down the chimney, since your living room fireplace is just for show.”

“But…”

“Oh, your guards? Don’t worry. They’re fine. For now.” Ceici sat down in one of the leather chairs in front of Mike’s desk. Magdala sat in the other chair, silent. “But I must say, you do not look fine.”

“I’ve just…” Mike tried to bluster.

“Had nightmares every night for the past month? Unable to sleep well? Let me guess, your dreams have involved a lot of memories of your past.”

“How do you know that?” Mike contemplated whether he could take his revolver out of his desk drawer without them seeing. Something had been causing all of this. It had to be the shopkeeper. Ever since she had talked him into signing that contract with her.

“It’s the same thing that has happened with every owner, far back into antiquity. Did you think you could escape the Tiger Demon’s Curse?”

Mike scoffed. “Curse. Words like that mean nothing to me.”

“Oh, they’re far more real than you want to believe. Speaking of, have you successfully kept the terms of our contract?”

“Of course I have. So get out of here.”

“I’ll need to see proof of that. Otherwise, I won’t leave.”

Mike yanked his desk drawer open and pulled out his revolver, cocking it in one swift move. But Ceici wasn’t in her chair. He spun around to see her lifting down a painting from the wall by his desk, exposing his private safe.

“Get away from there!”

The locks and tumblers on the safe spun and clicked open. Ceici opened the door and pulled out the black velvet box. “You can shoot if you like, but it will do you no good.” She opened the box as she turned around. She took out the diamond and held it to the light. The golden hue of the gem had almost entirely faded, and the gem looked black instead. “My, my, my. You really have been a naughty boy, Mr. Kaiser.”

Mike snatched it away from her and stared at it in disbelief. He had looked at it multiple times per day for the last month. Why had he never noticed it changing color? “What’s the meaning of this?”

“It’s hard to notice gradual changes, isn’t it?” Ceici sat back down in her chair and crossed her legs, propping her chin on her hand. “Becoming the owner of the Eye of the Tiger Demon, quite a weighty burden. And with your reputation to uphold, no way easy way to refrain from business as usual. Tell me? How many people have you ordered killed in the last month? How many lies told in business transactions? How many transactions done for the sake of getting something you coveted, perhaps even stealing things? How many women have you lusted over? Whether thought or deed, it all counts.”

“This is a fraud,” Mike stammered. “How did you change out my diamond?”

“I didn’t. That is the genuine thing. But you are unwilling to accept the rumors of something supernatural, because your life deals in facts and numbers and money and bloodshed. Blood demands blood, Mr. Kaiser.”

Mike hurled the diamond at her. Ceici caught it easily, and held it up, holding onto it with only two fingers. Her words rang out like a death knoll:

“Michael William Kaiser, you have violated the terms of our agreement in all aspects. In addition, you have persisted in unrepentant behavior. Despite knowing what the consequences of your actions would be, you chose the path you end at. I now pronounce judgement, and may God have mercy on your soul.”

She let go of the diamond, and it fell to the carpeted floor. The outer shell of the diamond shattered like glass, and the darkness inside swirled and grew. There was a shrieking growl that split the air, and the darkness lunged at Mike. He screamed and fired his revolver multiple times, but the darkness seeped into his mouth and eyes. He then slumped to the ground and the darkness swirled around him again, then shot through the air and out through the study door.

Ceici sighed, and stood up. “Shall we go outside and watch the show?”

Magdala stood up and straightened her pants. “You care too much for theatricality.”

Jenny clenched her hands from her seat in the church pews. She had been afraid she wouldn’t be dressed well enough, since the church was built in a traditional manner of stone and stained glass. But a large amount of the people crowding in were dressed casually. She couldn’t shake her nerves though. She hadn’t been in a church since childhood, and she had strayed so far since then. Tugging her sleeves down as far as possible to hide the needle marks on her arms, she tried looking around to distract herself, and caught the eyes of a little girl. She was watching over her dad’s shoulder, and waved at Jenny before sucking on her thumb again. A giggle threatened to escape as Jenny waved back. She could do this.

The choir stood. The words to the Christmas carols were projected onto the wall at the front of the room, and people began singing along. “O holy night…“

Ceici and Magdala stood outside the mansion, on the gravelled driveway that shone in the moonlight. A silvery white frost covered the bare trees and bushes, making the scene look as though it were covered in snow.

Meanwhile, the mansion was shrouded in darkness. All of the windows and open doors were completely black. The screams and gunshots had faded finally. The darkness slowly crept towards the two women, coalescing into a form of a crouching feline form, the so-called Tiger Demon.

“Had fun?” Ceici asked. She still wore a smile, but there was no emotion in her eyes.

“I… hunger.” The voice from the creature was grating, like multiple voices whining at once. “More …”

“No.” Magdala said. “You have been given enough.”

“More…” the creature insisted, stepping forward.

“Do you hear that?” Ceici asked. She motioned upwards. The air around her shimmered. Strains of music wafted through the air. Instruments and voices sang Christmas songs. “The sound of humans worshiping something other than their own greed.”

The creature shrieked, trying to overcome the noise. Ceici closed her eyes and sang along, her voice rising above the noise. “A thrill of hope, a weary world rejoices. For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn…“

While she sang, threads of gold flowed through the air from her to the creature. 

“Fall on your knees. Oh hear the angel voices. O night, o holy night…“

The sounds of singing clung to the threads and wrapped around the creature. It struggled and shrieked again and again, but shrank and was surrounded by crystalline walls again. 

Ceici sang the last three words of the carol, letting the notes vibrate through the air. “O night divine.” She then took in and let out a deep breath. 

Magdala walked forward and picked up the diamond from the frosted ground. She inspected it carefully. “All correct.”

Ceici caught the diamond as Magdala tossed it to her. “I’ll take that as a compliment. After all, I have been doing this for quite a while. Now then, can we go get some takeout before going back to the shop?”

“No.” 

“Ah, c’mon. We can go anywhere. Someplace isn’t closed for Christmas.”

“No.” Magdala reached out and turned an invisible doorknob, then pushed. A doorway of light opened, leading back into the shop hallway. She glared at Ceici, who sighed. In spite of that, she walked back into the shop, leaving behind a frost-covered mansion and empty bodies. It would be found in the morning by housekeepers, and the news media would be full of nothing else but the mysterious deaths of a local gangster and his men.

But for now, Ceici pouted as she stepped back into the shop. Her boots disappeared once they touched the hardwood floors. She turned around to see Magdala standing in the chifforobe doorway, holding the door open.

“All righty then. Same time next year?” Ceici asked.

“There’s a stupid question if I ever heard one. Here.” Magdala shoved a plastic sack towards Ceici, who took it. “This is not because we’re friends. It’s keeping with human tradition. Nothing else.”

Ceici grinned, and said in a teasing tone, “Aww, and I didn’t get anything for you.”

“Good-bye!” Magdala slammed the door shut.

Ceici wandered back out into the quiet storefront. She set down the bag and opened containers of Greek food. “Oooh, and she even remembered the baklava! I have to think of something for her for next year.”

She put the Eye of the Tiger Demon on the counter, and stared at it while she started eating. “None for you. You’ve eaten enough. Not that anything besides human essence and greed is what you crave. Oh well. You miss out on the best things that way.”

Finis

Fiction: The Antique Shoppe

The Antique Shoppe:

Once Upon a Christmas Eve (first half)

Mike Kaiser would never admit it, but he liked his name. The hard sounds made him sound tough, even as a young man fighting his way through a cutthroat business. He would also never admit it, but that toughness had helped him amass a fortune as a gangster. Not that it could easily be proved, as he took advantage of every loophole and dodge to appear a respectable middle-aged businessman with multiple businesses under his belt.

It was with this mindset that he entered an antique shop in a quiet commercial district in his town. The front room was large and crammed with furniture and every conceivable knickknack. Bookshelves were against every wall and filled with books, board games, and more knickknacks. It had the air of either a pretentious secondhand shop or a garage sale gone wild.

Even though the bell on the door had rung when Mike and his two bodyguards had entered, no other humans were in sight. Finally, Mike cleared his throat loudly.

“Coming!” someone hollered from the back. A beaded curtain parted, and in came a tall slender woman. Long honey brown hair was draped over her shoulder in a loose braid. She wore something similar to a Regency-era day dress (Mike knew this because of his last girlfriend), but went barefoot. “Can I help you?” she asked politely. 

“You the owner?” Mike asked. 

“Yes.”

“I heard you can get the Tiger’s Eye here. That true?” Mike had never cared for formalities, so he always went for the jugular.

The woman smiled, and leaned back against a table, crossing her feet. “And if it is?”

“I wanna buy it.”

“Do you have enough?”

“Within reason.” He wasn’t stupid.

The woman shrugged. “Yes. I have it, actually. What are you willing to pay?”

The front door opened behind Mike. His bodyguards spun around, hands going to their guns under their suit jackets. The young woman who had come in froze in surprise, almost dropping the drink carrier in her hand.

“Jenny, good timing,” the owner said. “I was getting hungry.”

“Uh, sure. Yeah.” Jenny slowly made her way around the men, and back to the counter by the back wall. Mike surveyed her. Not a bad looking broad, but too skinny for his tastes. She had the air of a frightened, but scrappy, kitten, complete with flyaway tawny hair cut short around her face. Her denim jacket was too big and worn to have originally been hers, and her long skirt wasn’t much better. 

“My assistant, Jenny, gentlemen. Shall we go to the back room and discuss the formalities?” The owner stood up straight. “Your men stay out here though, and they keep their hands to themselves.”

“No problem.” Mike nodded to his bodyguards, and they took up a more relaxed stance further into the shop.

“Follow me, sir. Jenny, business as usual. Holler if you need me.”

Jenny pulled off the lid to her hot latte, letting the steam out. She nodded to the owner, then took a sip.

Mike followed the owner past the beaded curtain and through a dimly lit hallway into an office. It was rather spartan, especially in comparison to the front room. A large wall safe, a standing lamp, and a wooden desk and chair were the only furniture to be seen. The owner opened a drawer in the desk and pulled out a black velvet-colored box, about twice the size of a ring box.

“You just keep it in your desk?” Mike asked.

The woman smiled as she held the box out to him. “I had a tip someone would be asking about it today.”

Mike opened the box. Inside was a diamond about the size of his fist, a rare golden diamond, with a strange black slit in the center of the jewel. It earned its name of the Tiger’s Eye. He smiled in satisfaction. They spent some time haggling over a price; while it would seem astronomical to any passersby, it was a paltry amount compared to what usually made its way through Mike Kaiser’s hands.

However, in exchange for the lesser payment, he was required to sign a contract with unusual clauses. “What is this?” he asked, pointing to the words.

“It’s quite simple. You are allowed to keep the Tiger’s Eye for one month on a provisional basis. The provisions being keeping these rules for that time being. In one month from today, I will visit you and inquire. If you have kept these rules, then you keep the Tiger’s Eye. If not, I will repossess it, and return all but $1,000 of your payment. Do we have an agreement?”

“I’ve never seen anything like this contract,” Mike protested. “Most sales like this are cut and dried.”

“Ah,” the woman said, smiling again. “But most sales are not for the Eye of the Tiger Demon. You know as well as I do the rumors surrounding it. You know the cost of something precious. Therefore, unusual circumstances require unusual conditions. So again I ask, do we have an agreement? If you don’t want to, all you have to do is leave. The jewel will remain here for someone else to purchase, for the same conditions. It’s up to you.”

“I’ll take it.” Nothing else would do now that he had seen and held the jewel. What had originally been a desire to obtain a rare treasure had morphed into a desire to be the only one who would ever hold the jewel again. It would go in the private safe in his private office, and be looked at by only him until his death.

Jenny had almost finished her latte and sandwich by the time Ceici and the customer had come back out. The two bodyguards had stood there quietly and scarcely moved in that entire time. Normally, Jenny would have offered seats and drinks to customers, but these men reeked an aura of “Don’t come near us or you die painfully.” So she stayed behind the counter. 

“It was very nice doing business with you,” Ceici said as she came back through the beaded curtain. “I’ll see you one month from now, on December 24th.”

“I don’t suppose you could forget that part of the contract?” Mike said, fastening the buttons on his coat.

“Oh, Mr. Kaiser, I never forget any part of a contract.” Ceici smiled and waved as the men left. She then eagerly turned to Jenny.

“Your frappe is mostly melted. And the fries are cold.”

Ceici pouted as she accepted the bag and cup. Her eyes turned from brown to golden for a brief moment, and the ice crystals reformed in the cup. She took a long sip through the straw and sighed in satisfaction.

“Why you can’t just magically make one yourself, instead of sending me, is something I don’t understand.” Jenny chewed on the last bite of her sandwich. 

“It doesn’t taste as good.”

“Then just have regular coffee.”

“The Count has his sweets,Yūko has her alcohol, and I have my frappe. It’s allowed.”

Jenny shrugged. She was slowly getting used to Ceici’s pop culture references, even if she didn’t understand them all of the time. “So why do you have to go visit that guy in a month? Do you mean you’re actually leaving the shop for once?”

“Yes indeed.” Ceici sank down into an overstuffed recliner behind the counter. “For a bit. On Christmas Eve.”

“Oh yeah. That’s coming up soon, isn’t it?” Jenny sighed and tossed her trash into the bin. “We just finally got Thanksgiving over with. Will we have people crowding in here?”

“Sometimes. It’s difficult to predict.” Ceici popped another steaming hot waffle fry into her mouth, then mumbled around it, “There’s something else you’re dying to ask me, isn’t there?”

“Yeah. What were the conditions for that guy’s contract? You had some, right?”

“You know the Ten Commandments?”

“I know of them, vaguely.”

“I told him he has to keep the last five for one month. ‘You shall not murder, commit adultery, steal, or bear false witness.’ That’s ‘lie’, in modern parlance. And ‘you shall not covet.”

“Why?”

“Oh Jenny. Sweet, sweet Jenny. You have no idea who Mike Kaiser is, do you?” When Jenny shook her head, Ceici continued, “Or of the rumors surrounding the Eye of the Tiger Demon?”

“Should I?”

“You’re better off not knowing the details, but suffice to say, Mike Kaiser is a gangster of the highest order. And the Eye of the Tiger Demon… Well, let’s just say there are some veeeery unsavory rumors about the previous owners and their fates.”

“I still don’t see the connection between those and the conditions.” Jenny picked up the duster from under the counter and started wiping down the nearby shelves.

“You don’t necessarily need to. But consider… how likely is a gangster going to be able to keep those rules?” Ceici tossed her trash into the bin like she was dunking a basketball. “Ah well. Nothing to worry about, young Jenny. You’re safe with me.”

~end part 1~

Hey, all. I usually try to write a Christmas story every year. And since I have a blog now, I figured why not post it? I want to put up my fiction anyhow. So I’ll put up the second half next week. Let me know what you think. Till then, catch you on the flip side.

Analysis of 1964’s “The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao”

Hey, all. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2022 late. I hope it was good for you. I have returned this week with another installment, this time an analysis of “The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao,” from 1964, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer. I had originally planned on just reviewing it, but as I re-watched it for the first time in a while, my English major instincts kicked in and I started analyzing. So, brace yourselves as I take a deep dive in. Spoiler warning in place, for what it’s worth.

To try to summarize the movie: a mysterious circus comes to the old western town of Abalone. The citizens of Abalone are faced with the news that their town will soon run out of water due to decaying water pipers from another town, and wealthy rancher Clinton Stark is willing to buy the town. He says it will help the people and calls himself a philanthropist, but newspaper man Edward Cunningham believes there’s a hidden reason, and opposes him publicly and in the newspaper. When Dr. Lao’s circus arrives, his six sideshows cause the people in the town to confront themselves in different ways and rethink their lives. The sideshows are the magician Merlin, the mythical Medusa, the fortune-teller Appolonius of Tyana, the Abominable Snowman, the Great Serpent, and the Greek god Pan.

So, the first thing that must be acknowledged is that Dr. Lao, an elderly Chinese man, is played by Tony Randall, who was white. Hollywood has had a history of whitewashing. That can’t be easily denied. However, I’m not gonna dive too deep into that, because I don’t have a lot of knowledge in that area yet. For all I know, they may have chosen Tony Randall because he was willing to play seven different characters and they were thinking of saving money. So, having acknowledged that, I’m going to move on to explore this a little more.

When Dr. Lao first shows up, he seems painfully like a stereotypical Hollywood Chinese man, with broken English and an accent that almost grates on your nerves. But once he stops to talk to Ed (John Ericson) and Michael (Kevin Tate), his accent abruptly disappears and he speaks in a dignified and eloquent manner, and you can recognize he is Tony Randall. Later, he switches back and forth between accents and styles, going from a carnival barker to a Scottish accent to his broken English to his eloquent English. So this really hammers home the theme of looking beyond appearances.

For those who are sensitive to derogatory language, there is some, although somewhat mild. The minor character of George G. George (Eddie Little Sky) is attacked and threatened by hoodlums, who say the old saying “The only good Indian is a dead Indian.” The same hoodlums rant later about the “dirty foreigner” who hypnotized the town and ruined their plans. Three old men in town talk near the beginning of the movie about whether Lao is Japanese or Chinese, and when Lao sits down at the town meeting, Mrs. Cassan (Lee Patrick) gets up and flounces away, showing her racism. Ed Cunningham demands to know “What kind of Oriental hocus-pocus is going on around here?” which could hark back to the idea that Asian people are prone to strange magic, which I suppose the whole movie is based on.

Ageism is also examined in the movie, as the three old men mock Merlin for his magic tricks. It’s shown that Merlin is very old and possibly battling dementia, but the way that almost everyone turns away from him and call him a fake… unpleasantly reminds me of how older people are treated even today. Even Merlin’s magic in restoring Mrs. Lindquist to normal from her petrification is unnoticed by almost everyone. It’s interesting that the only person who really treats Merlin kindly is the young boy Michael, who accepts everything with equanimity.

One of the main townspeople in the movie is Angela Benedict (Barbara Eden), the widowed mother of Michael. Ed Cunningham is in love with her and flirts often, but she continually turns him down. Ed tells her that she needs to remember that she isn’t just a mother and daughter-in-law, but a woman. In the circus, Barbara is tricked into going to the sideshow with Pan “The God of Love”. Although she originally sees Pan as just a regular man, he spins around and his face changes to Ed’s face. Seeing Pan as Ed, Barbara is forced to face the reality that she is falling in love with him. She tries to hold herself aloof and cold, but Pan reminds her that she is a woman with desires, that she’s simply very lonely without her husband. You get the idea as he dances and spins wildly that he is dangerous, his music getting wilder and louder. She gets jolted back to reality at the end, but the music still plays at a few crucial junctures, reminding her that she can’t run away from her reality. Because of this, she eventually opens up to Ed and they both acknowledge that they’re in love, and it’s implied that they will marry in the near future.

The character of Apollonius (Tony Randall) is rather a tragic figure, in a way like Cassandra of Greek mythology: cursed to speak the absolute truth of the past and future, but he is not believed. Mrs. Cassan sort of acknowledges that Apollonius tells the truth about her past, that she was never married (unlike what she tells the townspeople), but refuses to listen when he warns her that she will remain alone for the rest of her life. Her silly and flirtatious behavior is obviously annoying to the men she talks to, but she refuses to believe that she won’t be able to snag a husband. She claims that Apollonius is a mean, ugly man for saying things that she doesn’t want to hear (believing him to be a fortune-teller), but he replies, “Mirrors are often ugly and mean. When you die, you will be buried and forgotten, and that is all. And for all the good or evil, creation or destruction, your living might have accomplished, you might just as well never have lived at all.” Mrs. Cassan cries hysterically and runs out, and Apollonius simply sits there in silence, looking as though he grieves the fact that she will not listen and change.

Apollonius also interacts with Clinton Stark (Arthur O’Connell), reminding him of Stark’s great conundrum. He had originally believed in the decency of man and had great compassion for humanity, but learned early in his life that man was broken, ignoble and greedy. He readily admits at various times in the movie that he would gratefully accept a loss in his business dealings (implying he has done this many times before), because a loss would prove him wrong by showing that humans can be noble and make the right choice.

Stark’s conversation with the Great Serpent also reveals some truths in the story of the movie. The Serpent, enclosed in a thorny cage, tells him,”You live in a cage too. You test your bars as often as I do, kiddo.” The Serpent also explains about the circus, that it works like a mirror: “Sometimes you see yourself in it. Sometimes someone else.” So it explains Angela seeing Pan as Ed Cunningham, and Stark seeing the Serpent’s face as his own face.

Greed is a recurring theme in the movie, shown not just in the talks about selling the town, but also in money. Dr. Lao spills coins all over the newspaper office when he’s paying for the newspaper advertisement. Merlin’s magic trick turns Ed’s paper to money. The townspeople must pay to enter the circus, but Michael gets in for free. The coins paid to Appolonius. The cost of 5 cents for peanuts, versus free popcorn. Just some things I noticed.

I’ve analyzed pretty much all of the movie now. I won’t totally spoil the ending for anyone who wants to watch it, as it’s rather interesting, if somewhat deus ex machina. So instead, I’ll just end this with something that Dr. Lao tells Michael, as I rather like it. And catch you on the flip side.

“Mike, let me tell you something. The whole world is a circus if you know how to look at it. The way the sun goes down when you’re tired, comes up when you want to be on the move. That’s real magic. The way a leaf grows. The song of the birds. The way the desert looks at night, with the moon embracing it. Oh, my boy, that’s… that’s circus enough for anyone. Every time you watch a rainbow and feel wonder in your heart. Every time you pick up a handful of dust, and see not the dust, but a mystery, a marvel, there in your hand. Every time you stop and think, “I’m alive, and being alive is fantastic!” Every time such a thing happens, you’re part of the Circus of Dr. Lao.”

(Thanks goes to IMDB, as I could just copy and paste the quotes from the movie here, instead of having to type it all out myself.)

Review of MSW “Appointment in Athens”

Howdy, y’all. We are back this week with “Murder, She Wrote” season 6, episode 1: “Appointment in Athens.” This is not a bookend episode, so we have the lovely JB Fletcher being shoved out of her comfort zone yet again by Michael Hagarty, MI6 agent. Spoilers ahead!

(Speaking of lovely, JB’s outfits are fantastic in this episode, and I do not say it sarcastically when I say that the ’80s matching trends are great for her. Like seriously, she has earrings that match the golden buttons on her blue linen jacket. Who does that nowadays? I wish I had the focus of those stylists on MSW. I love her party outfit, Pamela’s outfit, and Madge Scofield’s hair and jewelry.)

But to get back on track: To summarize the episode is difficult, because more shenanigans than usual crop up here. Michael is in Paris on a mission, natch, but does not have a fake wife because she has come down with appendicitis. Coincidentally, JB is leaving the hotel at the same time, and her plane to Cairo is delayed. Michael convinces her to go to Athens with him, since he has an extra ticket, and she can take a short flight from there to Cairo, and they can catch up on old times (never mind that she should have hightailed it when she saw him). Once in Athens, the reservation that should have been made for JB is nowhere to be found, and abruptly, so is Michael. Coincidentally, Harold Baines from a huge company, also coincidentally a huge fan of hers, happens to be there and offers to let her use a room at the hotel because his company keeps a hotel room saved for whoever in the company needs it (side note: he mentions first class hotel rooms. Do hotel rooms actually work that way? I know planes and trains do, with first and second class, but hotels?) Regardless, JB quickly learns that she has been flim-flammed, once again, into posing as Mrs. Reardon, Michael’s wife, in order to free Laddie Fairchild, a fellow agent, from Greek kidnappers. In order to provide more confusion, Pamela, the actress who was supposed to pose as Michael’s wife, only has gastritis (or a failed audition), and flew 36 hours to get to Athens. We have a very awkward scene with Mr. Popadopalous, the middleman for the kidnappers, who tries seducing JB while ascertaining that she is wealthy enough to pay the ransom. She manages to fool him, while looking so awkward that anyone with a brain should have been able to figure out she was lying. Then Michael and JB get back to the hotel to find that Pamela has been murdered, thus providing the requisite murder for the episode.

Okay, so let me start off the review part, so to speak, by saying that I have a love-hate relationship with the Michael Hagarty episodes. The first two, “Widow Weep for Me” and “One White Rose for Murder,” are good. In the first, Michael is retired, and meets JB by chance. The second, again by chance, but it’s less madcap spy story than he’s shoved into a bad situation and needs her help. In the third, “JB is for Jailbird,” he deliberately gives her a ride while completing part of a mission, thereby putting her in danger, landing her in jail, and then hauling her into shenanigans by his own highhandedness at assuming that she’ll be okay with it eventually. This one, he again meets her by chance, but he doesn’t even give her the dignity of explaining the situation and asking her to help. He simply take advantage of her flight situation, shoves her into danger with no warning, and expects her to float and be okay. I’m sorry, but the more episodes I see with him, the more I want to scream at the TV for JB to run, cut off ties with this dude, and never look back. He understands her enough to know that she’ll help in the middle of a situation, but doesn’t respect her enough to give her information ahead of time so maybe, you know, she doesn’t wind up dead. Like Pamela does. He cares enough to regret involving her after something happens, but doesn’t think through his actions before. Alec Scofield claims that a sense of humanity is “a liability in our profession.” How then is Michael so successful? I don’t understand. At all. This is why it irks me so much when JB tells him that he can’t blame himself for Pamela’s death. I’m like “Yes. Yes, he can. And maybe think a little harder next time.”

Moving on, the cast is pretty good. Mr. “My friend, I can assure you” Henryk Stuyvesant (Peter van Norden) does well as a weaselly informant, while not overselling it and making the character downright sneaky. He makes me think of Sydney Greenstreet in Casablanca, for some reason. (BTW, did anyone else notice that when he showed up at the party, he was next to a Greek (?) statue/bust that looked like him with a beard?) JB’s usual information-gathering tactics have no effect on such a professional. My only other notes for this are simply that Steve Inwood, as Sergeant Petrakas, has some eyebrow game.

The main problem that I have with this episode is that it doesn’t really work as a spy story or as a murder mystery story. The spy story doesn’t feel very convincing, as no one knows that Laddie Fairchild doesn’t have a wealthy sister. Maybe I’m looking at this from the perspective of someone in the Information Age. But this whole scheme wouldn’t work today, and I can’t see as how it would have succeeded back then, especially since Popadopalous is supposed to be an international criminal of sorts, and is so dense that he can’t realize JB is not who she’s pretending to be, much less that she doesn’t want any of his attentions. And why was there this whole kerfuffle over the time and ocation of the swap being changed, and how did Popadopalous learn about the Reardons’ trickery? This scene leads down a dead end, in my opinion, and seems more like trying to up the tension instead of aiding the story.

The murder part of the story is slightly better. Baines killed Pamela to keep her quiet, when she found him in the hotel room, looking for an incriminating cablegram. (not to mention, her reaction to an intruder was SUPER lackluster) So motive-wise, I can understand it. But the reveal… *sigh* The cablegram has information that Baines was… not involved with the kidnappers. Was in places where he MIGHT have been in contact with the kidnappers. So that’s very flimsy, which they admit. And there was a smudge on his white dinner jacket that JB originally thought was cigarette ash, but turns out to have been lipstick. (Do they look anything alike, color-wise?) So the forensic evidence points that out. But Pamela didn’t scratch or struggle with him at all? He’s such a super spy that he strangles a woman to death without crumpling his pristine white jacket, and only somehow get a lipstick smudge. He’s better than Michael! But they have to trap Baines in order to bring the case to a conclusion. Were they worried that him being a British agent might mean that they couldn’t get a conviction with just the lipstick smudge? I don’t know.

There is very little use for Madge Scofield. There’s a hint that she and Laddie Fairchild were in a relationship long ago, but why? To set her up as a red herring? There’s no point! The murder doesn’t happen until later, and she’s not involved at all. So they could have kept her out and trimmed the story better. Do they keep her just to help point out that Alec Scofield is a jerk, by making remarks about his manhood and courage? This is ostensibly a spy story, not Macbeth.

Also speaking of the plot holes, does JB just reek of a small-town tourist that the writers just have her accepting a stranger (Baines)’s offer to stay at his company’s hotel room? She tries to say no, but then just accepts. I can’t help but feel like this is too convenient for the plot, but maybe I’m just carrying my distrust of Michael over to this. And also, them in the taxi and walking around at the party while talking about a SECRET MISSION to save a kidnapped man, while Michael is a spy (!!), just seems like the height of folly. How do they think people actually get information? Taxi drivers and concierges and valets have ears, ya dingbats.

Lastly, my notes:

Lovely shot of Athens, if it actually is.

Michael’s Paris room has a beautiful telephone.

Baines has such a dismissive view of JB’s “potboilers.” How dare you.

Scofield [says] “I want you to stay on this like fog on Tower Bridge.” This sounds so made up.

Why so many menorahs in Stuyvesant’s shop?

Jess- you’re barely staying afloat as it is. Why are you sticking your nose into the “murder by a jewel thief” and stirring up trouble??? Especially with the other “Mrs. Reardon.”

Favorite quote from the episode: by Jessica Beatrice Fletcher. “Be assured, Mr. Baines, that I will do everything in my power to ensure [Michael’s] safe return… so that I can get my hands on him.”

Final scores:

Plot: 5/10. It was too split into madcap adventure and serious murder. It had potential, but I think it fell flat.

Guest Stars: 9/10. Everyone did a great job with what they were given.

General Enjoyability: Eh….. 3/10. Sorry to Michael Hagarty fans.

Solveability: On my first watch, I was going to say -3/10. After rewatching, I have to up that to 1/10. The camera had to ZOOM IN to the smudge on the jacket, and never drew attention to it. Not playing fair with that, or telling us what Michael’s conversation with London revealed.

Sorry for the long-winded rants. Have nothing else to add, other than I should have another MSW episode in two weeks, and maybe something else next week, if my schedule works. Until then, catch you on the flip side.

#murdershewrote

Recommended Christmas Viewing

Howdy, y’all. For this week’s post, as we head into the Christmas season (and hear countless versions of “Last Christmas” and “All I Want for Christmas is You” *shudder*), I thought I’d bring up some of my favorite Christmas movies. Watching Christmas movies and TV specials, many of which were recorded on VHS tapes from TV viewings, was my family’s preferred method of preparing for Christmas. There are far too many to fit into one post, so if I’m still doing this blog next year, perhaps there will be a sequel. Some of these may be hard to find, some are streaming and some you may never have heard of. So I’ll start in more or less chronological order. I suppose this is where I say to get your popcorn, hot chocolate and gingerbread cookies ready for some great/debatably great movies.

These are two Rankin and Bass claymation TV specials from the 1960s. My parents grew up watching them, so they’re from my childhood as well. The Rankin-Bass catalogue is well known, whether claymation or regular animation. And I believe that these are two of the more well-known ones. They air them on TV at times, or sell them on DVD. If you’ve never watched them, I recommend them.
Okay, if you want a REALLY bad, cheesy, makes-you-laugh-because-it’s-so-bad Christmas movie, this is it. In 1964, Martian children are raised without joy, and are super depressed. The Martian parents decide to kidnap Santa Claus (after seeing him on a TV news report, because Santa is always down for press conferences) and bring him to Mars, to make their children happy. Two American children wind up coming too, and together with Santa and some friendly Martians, defeat the Martians who want to kill Santa because they don’t want joy. Santa makes a toy factory on Mars, laughs way too much, and is delighted to share the spirit of Christmas, especially when he appoints a Martian as the new Mars version of Santa. You can find this online or on DVD. But be prepared for campy cringe and laughing way too hard.
“A Charlie Brown Christmas” is a classic Christmas TV special, first aired in 1965. Charlie Brown is depressed because everyone around him just wants everything for Christmas. Even his dog Snoopy is trying to win a Christmas decorating contest! Charlie Brown and Linus just want a simple Christmas, but everyone tells them it must be bigger and better. It’s a very simple story, but very sweet and enjoyable every year. They air it on some TV channels every year, but college meant I had no access to cable (expenses), so I finally caved and got it on DVD.
This is a 1985 movie about Santa Claus’ origins and how he helps two children in 1980s New York. I’ll be honest- the first half(?) of the movie is a fairly well-done origin story for Santa and the myths surrounding him. Once they move into the 1980s, it gets very cheesy. John Lithgow as a smirking villain running a toy factory does not help that fact. Candy that makes people fly, an oblivious Patch the Elf (Dudley Moore), and child actors who do their best but often go overboard… Thankfully, it’s that fun kind of cheesy that’s mostly enjoyable to watch. I think you might be able to find it on DVD.
A 1987 animated TV special. Garfield, his owner Jon, and Odie the dog, go to Jon’s family’s farm for Christmas. It’s a pretty simple story, with food, presents, and songs. In spite of the jokes and simplicity, it has a very heartwarming vibe that gets me every time. But my favorite part has to be the song Garfield and Jon sing in the car; while Jon sings about the greatness of childhood Christmases, Garfield cuts in with snarky comments about how awful it is. Thankfully, this is available to watch on YouTube!!
This is a 1996 TV movie that might be hard to find.
Mrs. Santa Claus (Anna, Santa’s wife) is worried about her husband, as he is growing more and more busy every year, as Christmas 1910 increases his workload of letters and presents. He is so busy, that he has no time to listen to Anna’s suggestion of a new, time-saving Christmas Eve flying route. Anna decides, a week before Christmas, that she will take the reindeer and sleigh to test out the route. Bad weather forces her to hastily land in New York, where she must stay until the reindeer are well enough to fly. As Mrs. North, she makes friends with the suffragettes, the Italian stableman, her Jewish landlady, and her young Irish friend who works at a horrible toy factory. Anna gets caught up in matters of voting rights, immigrant fears, child labor laws, and loving everyone (even the villain!). It’s a beautiful, if sentimental, musical, with plenty of dancing and singing by the incomparable Dame Angela Lansbury. Some people might recognize the elf foreman Arvo as Mr. Noodle from Sesame Street, Michael Jeter.

And no list of Christmas movies is complete without the requisite “A Christmas Carol.” This is an absolute classic. The original story was written and published Charles Dickens in 1843. A greedy man named Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future. They show him how he has changed since childhood, how the people around him see him, and how his future is horrible, because everyone will be really glad when he’s dead. He then decides to change his life and become a better person, and starts on Christmas Day.

Since this is an older story, there have been tons and tons of adaptations made over the decades, like stage plays, radio plays, movies and parodies. So I tried to narrow it down to my top 3 favorites. I cannot rank these in order of favorite, because I love them all. So I’ll stick them in order of year they came out:

This is a 1983 TV special, only  about 25 minutes long. It tells the basic story of A Christmas Carol while squeezing in as many characters from classic Disney movies as possible. It’s very sweet and heartwarming. Since it is a Disney special, you can only really watch it nowadays on Disney+ or DVD. But it’s worth watching if you can.
A 1984 high quality TV movie. It’s a mostly faithful adaptation of the book, and manages to capture the bleak and hard life of the poor while not being too dramatic. George C. Scott plays an angry, bitter Scrooge, managing to melt into a softer version of himself by the end of his ghostly visits. My absolute favorite serious version.
I don’t know if you know the Muppets, but they’re a pretty famous American puppet company. They tell a pretty faithful version of the story, while adding lots of songs and sillness to balance out what is sometimes a depressing and sad story. Michael Caine plaays Scrooge in this 1992 version, balancing a gruffness and tenderness that stands out amidst the heartwarming zaniness of his Muppet co-stars. My family has to watch this at least one time before Christmas because we love it so much.

So that’s it. There are plenty of other movies we watch, such as “White Christmas,” “It’s a Wonderful Life,” and the requisite VeggieTales Christmas movies. But I chose these because they are my favorites (“Santa Claus Conquers the Martians” is not so much a favorite as it is an experience). And like I said, if I still continue this blog next year, there’ll probably be a sequel to this post. But for now, I’ll see you on the flip side.

Review of MSW “Murder in a Minor Key”

So I had talked about reviewing “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” in my last post, but honestly… I wasn’t a fan of the book. I read it for the novelty and to say I’ve read it, but I’m not a fan of zombies in the first place. Suffice to say, the original book was better, although I do admire the innovative idea. I’d only give it 3 out of 5 though, because it would have been much better as a book of its own, rather than a parody that borrows almost the entirety of “P&P.”

In lieu of that, I decided to review a bookend episode of “Murder, She Wrote” from season 3. Episode 14 is entitled “Murder in a Minor Key.” There will definitely be spoilers involved, so please be advised. And although I’d like to provide a play-by-play, this is not the podcasts that I like, and space is (in my mind at least) limited. I grew up watching this episode repeatedly, but watching it for the purpose of reviewing makes several failings apparent.

A brief-ish summary of the episode is as follows: Chad, Jenny and Mike are college friends out for fun at a bar, when they hear a song being played by the pianist there. Mike recognizes the tune as one he wrote for a composition class, and finds that it’s being used for a Broadway musical, and the composer is someone called Alden Gilbert. Mike confirms that it’s his tune, charges off to campus and confronts Professor Stoneham, who does all but admit that he’s stolen Mike’s songs. Stoneham tells Mike that he can’t prove that the songs were originally Mike’s, and he won’t give them back. Mike gets angry and threatens Stoneham, grabbing a tuning fork to prove his point (I guess), and is witnessed by Professor Papazian coming in. Mike later tries to break in at night and steal his assignments back, but is discovered by the security guard, who also discovers a very-much dead Professor Stoneham at his desk, tuning fork plunged into his chest. In true MSW fashion, Mike is presumed guilty, and Chad and Jenny must prove his innocence.

Now, as is evidenced by the fact that Jessica Fletcher was not mentioned in the previous paragraph, this is a bookend episode. JB (Jessica Beatrice for the uninitiated) appears at the beginning, end and at the commercial breaks. She is narrating, for the viewer, her newest novel during a cozy evening at home, in what she claims are comfortable fluffy heels that were a gift from Grady. I’m sorry, Jessica. As much as I admire you, those shoes are ugly.

The actors in the episode, for the most part, do the best they can with a script that lags sometimes. Mike, played by Paul Clemens, is overacted in my mind. He seems uselessly on edge most of the time, but truth be told, as lovey-dovey as Jenny and Chad are all the time, maybe he’s got a reason. People being all flirty around me irritate me too. Professor Stoneham, played by George Grizzard, is second in possible overacting, being so smugly superior to everyone as to be a classic villain of the piece. Karen Grassle, playing Christine Stoneham, is mostly known as Caroline “Ma” Ingalls from “Little House on the Prairie”, and I find it interesting that her first line in the episode is a curse word. (side eye) Rene Auberjonois is very good as Professor Papazian, as he has been in every thing I’ve ever seen him in. Dinah Manoff manages to make a somewhat annoying character likable (sorry, but Jenny is the type of person I would probably maintain a superficial relationship with). But wearing shoulder pads with (I think) every outfit only makes her look like some type of hunchback. Shaun Cassidy steals the show as Chad, being a younger Southerner version of Jessica Fletcher who has yet to perfect his interrogation technique.

There are plot holes that I have to pick at. The first is simply, as a recent student myself, why does Mike not have rough drafts of his compositions that he can use as evidence? What kind of dingbat professor makes you turn in rough drafts and keeps them, instead of returning them to you with critiques and red marks?? Although this was in the 80s, and someone might think there was less technology available for copying and stuff, this makes no sense to me.

Secondly, tiny but still– how did Chad recognize Max Hellinger (an excellent Herb Edelman) outside the police station? Did his coat draped over his shoulders somehow reek of Broadway and broadcast his identity to Chad?

The whole background of the riots caused by Transacom… what is that about? This is what galls me the most. If this was a typical MSW episode, I think that would have been addressed, even as a red herring type side plot. It would have had a purpose. As it is right now, it’s simply a reason for a lot of noise and a lot of people being on the campus. We have no information other than a well-liked professor was fired because of influence from Transacom. And it gives a reason for the newspaper reporter’s presence. However, this Walter Cronkite-wannabe looks like a parody of Bob Ross, and I can’t really take him seriously. Sorry. If this really was a novel of JB’s, there would have been a detailed explanation of this whole side plot; and if this is supposed to be an adaptation of her novel, it is sorely lacking.

Perhaps the most obvious plot hole in this episode (pointed out to me by the hosts of Cabot Cove Confidential) is the whole issue of time when Mike is hiding in the music storeroom. He keeps looking at his watch, and while this is useful for establishing a timeline for the murder, it makes no sense. Why is he obsessed with it? If we knew that he was in a hurry because he had to meet someone later, it would make sense. But it doesn’t. Also, there really isn’t enough time for Christine to have gone in unobserved and had an argument with Stoneham, kill him and leave. True, they have Mike go to the window and watch the protest, and I guess the noise was supposed to have covered up Stoneham and Christine arguing (seriously, WHY did they ever get married in the first place!?). But there is not enough time. I would imagine that Christine would be shocked and take a couple seconds to process what she had just done, then run out. This time discrepancy could have been explained away if Mike had dozed off in the storeroom (college students are notoriously exhausted all the time, even with noisy surroundings), and woken up when the office door had closed and Christine scurried off. But they had none of this, and it doesn’t make sense.

The last big complaint is that the Poirot-style reveal at the end really isn’t needed. Chad could have gone to the police and explained what he realized about the timeline, and the absence of Christine’s so-called phone call. Then the police, ya know, the ACTUAL detectives in charge of this case, could have questioned Christine again. Considering how quickly she cracked under Chad’s farce, it seems like she would have confessed to actual authority if questioned specifically about that. And JB, I’m sorry, dear lady, but I don’t see how it would have been possible for anyone watching this episode to solve the mystery that easily. When the solution revolves around such a small clue, even when reading the book, it’s difficult to solve.

Some last notes from my notebook:

The Stonehams’ have a horrible driveway.

Chad says “I don’t mean to make a pest of myself.” You sit on a throne of lies, Chad, and you know it.

Why does Chad have to peel off the police seal on the door?? “Oh, it seems like it’s peeling off.” Um, yeah. You know someone else broke in, so why do you have to put yourself down for “destruction of police property” (or whatever it’s called) in order to make a point. Use your brain, bro.

Final scores:

Plot: 6/10. Had potential. It’s a murder mystery written by JB Fletcher, for Pete’s sake! You could have made it so much better!!

Guest Stars: 8/10. Over-acted in some cases, but most of them do their best.

General Enjoyability: 8/10. Truthfully, as I mentioned, I grew up watching this, and I always enjoyed it. Reviewing it, I acknowledge the flaws, which are many. But I still like it. Sorry for those who dislike it.

Solveability: 4/10. If I hadn’t seen this episode before, I don’t think I could have solved it. It sets up the alibis, sets up the murderer, but it doesn’t do it in a way that particularly points out Christine as the murderer any more than anyone else. If anything, I can almost understand the police thinking that Mike was the murderer.

Use of JB Fletcher: I’m using this category for the bookend episodes to gauge how they use JB as a barely appearing presence. Ehhh, I had to go with 4/10. She pops up, and introduces the book and summarizes things. But I don’t like how she interacts with the audience. I would prefer her talking to a friend about the book, like maybe asking Seth his opinion on the novel.

So that’s my review altogether. A huge thank you has to go to the amazing Damien and Jennie of Cabot Cove Confidential. They were the first podcast I ever listened to, and they set a high standard. They ended their podcast after the fifth season of MSW (which I still grieve over), and were gracious enough to allow me to adapt their rating system for this blog. Their episodes are still up and ready to listen to, so give a listen!

I make no promises about the next blog post. I may have the 6th season of MSW available or may have to figure out something else. Until then, see ya on the flip side.

The Creature from the Black Lagoon

Greetings to all my (probably still nonexistent) readers. While I told you in my original post that I had planned on starting season 6 of “Murder, She Wrote,” these DVDs have somehow gone AWOL from my house. I have begun doubting their existence, truth be told, due to my hazy memory for anything not directly relating to cooking or stories. The life of a writer, apparently.

Due to Halloween having been recent, I was privy to a viewing of “The Creature from the Black Lagoon” from 1954. I had not seen it before, but as usual, my brain was analyzing it as I watched. So therefore, I decided to write about this movie for the blog, since I need practice anyhow. So without further ado:

There’s a very slow start to the movie, especially when compared to modern movies. However, I think that actually adds to the movie’s appeal. Much of the characterization is shown as the scientists discuss an expedition back to the jungle. When they do finally get back to the jungle and start digging, I appreciate that the filmmakers attempted to show how tedious archaeology can be. Lots of digging, note-taking, and physical exhaustion. If mental exhaustion was added in, it’d be a perfect picture of graduate school.

I noticed that it was quite a while into the movie before it showed much of the Creature beyond a claw pawing at the ground, and “seeing” the death of the assistants. Side note: I think that not showing the dead bodies was actually very nice (even though it was probably expected with this movie being made in the 50s). By not showing the carnage, you avoid upsetting the stomachs and mores of sensitive viewers, but you also get to focus on the reactions to the people seeing the bodies and the carnage. Not only does it help set the stage by getting the actors’ expressions, but you also save money on fake blood.

Regardless, I found myself wondering why there was such a build-up to the Creature’s full appearance. I have watched the other “Classic Monster Movies” (“Dracula”, “Invisible Man,” “Wolfman” and “Frankenstein”) but I’ll have to re-watch them again and pay attention to how soon the monster shows up in those movies. It makes me wonder if how much the monster appears to be human means that it shows up sooner. But this was mainly a rambling trail my brain took during a break in the movie watching. Which is truly more horrifying to viewers: a monster that appears to be human-like, or one that is not? The visual appearance of a non-human monster may elicit a more immediate reaction of fear, because it seems so different than what we are used to seeing. But I would think that seeing a human slowly revealing that they are not human and are a monster would be more of a deeper fear, because it’s like betraying everything that we had assumed and twisting it into something awful.

There are two advantages to setting a horror movie on a boat (primarily) in the middle of a jungle. Firstly, the gorgeous jungle set acts as a backdrop to the human(?) drama going on, highlighting the idea of danger in paradise. Secondly, there is a closed cast in this isolation, which allows the viewers to get attached to the characters, and there is more emotions involved when someone dies or is injured. Though to be fair, most of the people who die are those who are designed to be ignored or disliked, like the random scientist who I had forgotten about until he showed up, or Mark, who I was ready to see offed. (I appreciated that Lucas was willing to pull a knife on Mark to show him that the captain of the boat was not going against the will of the majority, especially where safety was concerned.)

The underwater fights were surprisingly well done, I thought. The filmmakers did a good job of highlighting the limitations of moving quickly in the water, and the obstacles of weeds and stuff. When the water was blurred because of dirt and the poisonous fog, it added to the uncertainty and risk. The fighting never seemed gratuitous or badly staged, like I’ve seen in a lot of black and white movies.

What follows is a transcript of my notes taken during the movie:

“So much underwater photography. So much.

“So many cigarettes.

“Water pollution! Throwing the poison out, and the cigarettes.

“Ah, yes. Mark is set up as the obsessed scientist. Seriously, people. He’s bad news. Go home, get another expedition, leave him at home.

“The Gill-Man being set on fire was pretty surprising, and impressive.

“Y’all are too focused on the winch and the logs. You’ve been attacked multiple times by the Creature. Shouldn’t somebody be keeping an eye out on the lagoon itself??”

But all in all, it was an enjoyable watch. It does suffer from Kay (the lone female character) being given too little to do other than serve as eye candy, monster bait, and the mediator in ego struggles between Mark and David. If you can ignore that long enough, you might like it.

Final Scores:

~~Plot: 7/10. Good, slow-paced but involved. Science vs. nature.

~~Cast: 8/10. Everyone did well with the parts they were given. It might have seem stilted occasionally, but I think that’s just a product of the times.

~~Location: 9/10. I think the inside of the boat was a little bigger on the inside than the outside (pre-TARDIS times!). But other than that, I never was in doubt of where I was. The outdoors scenes were good.

And that wraps up this blog post. I may continue in the horror reviewing for the next post, as I’m reading “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith. Eventually, “Murder, She Wrote” will appear! Till then, see ya on the flip side.

Preview of Coming Attractions (as they used to say)

Hey, all. So this is essentially a test post, to make sure this all works.

But consider it also a preview of what I hope to do in this blog. I used to be an English major in college, and got in the habit of analyzing EVERYTHING, especially movies and TV shows and literature. So now that I am “adulting” out of college, I still have that mindset. And I figured, eh, why not burden the internet with my random thoughts?

I’m going to start out with something possibly unexpected: the sixth season of the classic TV show “Murder, She Wrote.” I grew up watching this show on DVDs from my grandmother. A couple years ago, I got hooked on a podcast called “Cabot Cove Confidential,” where the hosts went over every episode and reviewed, analyzed and tangented. I thought, well golly, I can do that (probably; i mean, I can tangent with the best of them). CCC has ended (much sadness) at the end of season 5. Many people have complained about season 6, as it was mostly bookend episodes that barely featured Jessica Fletcher (played by the amazing Angela Lansbury), who was the main character of the whole show. Dame Lansbury had to take a break for the shooting of season 6, and most people say that the show suffered as a result. With the reluctance of various podcasters to review season 6, and CCC having ended just before it, I’ll give it the old college try.

In theory, I’ll be posting a review every other week. As time goes on, and I hopefully get something resembling free time, I hope to review/analyze movies, books, etc. Here’s hoping. So for the time being, I shall bid you all (probably nonexistent readers so far) adieu.