“Spider’s Web” was originally a play written by Agatha Christie and was adapted into a novel by Charles Osborne in 2000.  I don’t think this is one of Christie’s better known plays until I saw the novel on the shelves years ago.  I finally got to read it after all these years.

The wife of foreign office diplomat has a habit of teasing and messing with people’s heads a little and finds herself in a predicament when a man who was trying to blackmail her for the custody of her step-daughter ends up dead in her home.  She enlists the aid of her three dapper British gentlemen friends to help hide the inconvenient murder.  However, the police come calling much sooner than she anticipated, and her beloved husband is going to return with a very important visitor to their shores.  It does not help that the body is not where it not where it was left.

It was fun to read a Christie novel that was essentially new to me, but I wouldn’t call this one of her more noticeable contributions.  It could be that Osborne’s prose style just failed to pop for me.   None of the characters felt all that fresh.  I sort of liked the Inspector who turned up after a mysterious phone call was made to the police.  He seemed surprisingly astute at times.  I probably would have enjoyed the stage presentation more.  It’s not without some charm and hits some of the right notes of literary nostalgia for a Christie fan, but I can’t count this as one of the better presentations from the Queen of Crime.  She probably shouldn’t the shoulder the blame alone since Osborne’s prose is not that compelling.

And so coming up next to the reading lamp is James Lee Burke’s “Wayfaring Stranger”.

“Lost in Space” was released in 2018 as a remake of the science fiction series from 1965 about a family that end being….well, lost in space.  The series was first created by Irwin Allen.  This version was developed by Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless.

The Robinson family are part of a group sent to Alpha Centauri to colonize a new world, however an attack on the spacecraft forces them and many of the colonists onto another planet where they face many dangers, or it would be a pretty boring series.  This version of the family is a little more dysfunctional than their 1960’s counterparts, however the main cast of characters all end up being likeable and important to the story. Yes, even the robot gets an upgrade and is there to lend a hand sometimes.  Of course, the dastardly Dr. Smith is around to cause confusion and mayhem.

The parents are played by Toby Stephens and Molly Parker, whose marriage is a bit on the ropes.  Parker’s version of Maureen Robinson is quite the engineering marvel and is head of the family mission.  Stephens’ version of Jonathan Robinson is a tough dude but is trying to be a better father.  It seems that his frequent military deployments has brought some tension and distance among his family, but he has the chance to salvage his relationship with his three children.

About the children, they are also quite nicely cast.  Taylor Russell plays the 18 year old mission doctor, Judy Robinson.  It was not clear as to what kind of medical program allowed her to have a degree at such a young age, but I was able to end up going with it. Also, Judy is the offspring of Maureen and a prior relationship which of course makes the biracial step-daughter of Jonathan.  However, Jonathan certainly loves her as if she was his own biological child, and that unquestionably is something to cheer on.  Judy has a traumatic episode near the beginning of the series, but she shows plenty of grit regardless when the family needs her.  Russell does it make it fairly easy to not sweat the business of her being an 18 year old kid with a medical degree.

Mina Sundwell plays the 15 year old mechanical whiz, Penny Robinson, who has quite the sardonic, cynical streak but is still likeable.  She also has good chemistry with Russell so that they have a pretty believable sisterly relationship that fluctuates between exasperation and genuine affection.

Then, we get to young Will Robinson, who is frequently in danger, as the Robot likes to warns us. Maxwell Jenkins has that role and carries it well.  Even though Will was at times the cause of some of the troubles that plague the Robinsons, one can’t help but have sympathy for his insecurities and anxiety.  Will has also had his moments where he was of help.  There is a pretty cool development in the relationship between Will and his father that was well played and kind of touching.

Ignacio Serrichio plays the roguish and charming Don West.  Don West is a gifted mechanic with a side business as a smuggler.  He is a little cliché in his unreliability at times, but he comes through in a pinch.  He also kind of bonds with young Judy but in a pretty platonic manner so it manages to not come off as creepy.  Judy sort of ends up being the one to stir West’s conscience at times, and their chemistry also works.

Finally, we get to the mysterious and psychopathic Dr. Smith, who is played by Parker Posey.  In this version, Smith is revealed to have stolen her sister’s identity and stowed away aboard the spaceship.  This version of Smith is a bit more subtle in her wickedness at times. She also has a clever and uncanny knack for convincing others to act against their better instincts.  Posey is quite good and seems to relish her role as the bad guy.

The producers of this particular iteration of the series managed to find a pretty compelling blend between introducing something new to the concept and paying proper homage to the preceding series.  The cast was well chosen.  The special effects were pretty good.  The Robot was well constructed and performed quite effectively by Brian Steele.

This turned out to be a pretty compelling and fun series.  Although I tend to be a bit leery of remakes of this sort, I don’t swear then off, and I am looking forward to the promised second season from Netflix.

“Stuber” is the action comedy film written by Tripper Clancy and directed by Michael Dowse.  Dave Bautista and Kumail Nanjiani are paired up as the leads.  Mira Sorvino and Karen Gillan are also part of the cast with Natalie Morales, and Iko Uwairs rounding out as the lead villain.

Bautista plays the most intense cinematic cop ever after his partner is murdered by a super drug trafficker or something.  He has a strained relationship with his artistic daughter, bad eyesight, which explains all the squinting, and a generally poor disposition.  Bautista’s Vic Manning as a hot lead six months after his partner’s death and is recovering from Lasik surgery, hampering his ability to take his dastardly drug dealer into custody.  He ends up with an insecure, over-sensitive Uber driver as his reluctant sidekick in this one.  Nanjiani plays a part-time Uber driver who has been friend zoned by his supposedly true love.  His name is Stu, which explains the unfortunate title. Anyway, it’s toxic masculinity versus the new sensitive man of today as the chase ensues through the Los Angeles highways and alleys.

There are a few laughs to be found in this one, but not enough to make this one more than mildly entertaining.  Neither of the leads are particularly bad, but the writing could use some fine tuning.  Some of the fight scenes were pretty good in spite of the suspension of disbelief required.  The movie is pretty stupid overall but somehow has a few charming and amusing scenes that make it acceptable has a diverting matinee, but only barely so.

“The Black Box” is a crime novel from the prolific Michael Connelly and features LAPD Homicide Detective Harry Bosch.  This particular installment was first published in 2012.

The novel starts off in 1992 as Harry Bosch is on patrol doing initial investigations of the homicides which occurred during the Los Angeles riots that had broken out after the acquittal of police officers who were tried for excessive force. Of course, this is referring to the whole Rodney King saga, although Connelly avoids that specific name in this story.

Bosch is haunted by the discovery of a young reporter from Denmark who was there on an unknown assignment and killed in the midst of the chaos.  He is not able to give the attention the victim deserved during that time, however twenty year later, he gets another shot at it as he works in the Open/Unsolved Unit.

A “black box” is a term referring to a piece of evidence discovered in an investigation that pulls a case together.  Twenty years later, Bosch finds the black box that will lead to a long-delayed justice for Anneke Jesperson, a reporter whose assignment was far more personal than chronicling a riot.

Bosch, as usual, finds himself at odds with the brass where his own career is threatened…as usual.  Of course, a mere kerfuffle with an ambitious superior isn’t going to keep Bosch from doing what he does best when he is hunting for justice.

Some of the leads and directions Bosch finds himself tracking in this case don’t seem all that believable sometimes, but the story still holds together quite well.  Bosch himself remains a compelling character, so I find it quite easy to suspend my disbelief to enjoy this novel.  Connelly has a talent for often not going down an obvious path in his stories, and some twists I didn’t predict as easily as I often do.  This novel also touches on a fascinating and tumultuous time in our country’s history and culture without it turning into the main plot.

“The Black Box” is a solid and at times profound entry into the Bosch canon.  Even if the main plot is just a little hard to buy into, Bosch as a character is still admirable and compelling enough to make that irrelevant.  And he also makes it where the reader wants to stick with him regardless of a few implausible scenes.  Bosch is flawed and compassionate enough to make it easy to root for him.  It is also easy to see why Connelly has become so popular in crime fiction for the past several years.

Next up on the journey of literary indulgences is an Agatha Christie play that was adapted into a novel several years ago by Charles Osborne, “Spider’s Web”.

“The Wanderer” is a Doctor Who audio play from Big Finish Productions and is written by Richard Dinnick. This episode is one of the Companions Chronicles in which one of the actors from the early days of Doctor Who presents a story where there is usually another character played by a guest performer.  This time, William Russell returns to the mic reprising his role as Ian Chesterton and delivering dialogue that would have been spoken by the late William Hartnell. Mr. Russell is joined by Tim Chipping who plays a character named Grigory, who is revealed to be one Grigori Rasputin, a Russian mystic who would gain some influence during the era of Tsar Nicholas II.  Rasputin has made numerous appearances in various films over the years.  He was dubbed the “Mad Monk:, and Chipping certainly goes all out in this one.

The Doctor, Ian, Susan, and Barbara arrive in Siberia somewhere toward the end of the nineteenth century where they soon feel the effects of an alien influence.  With the Doctor taken ill and Susan and Barbara missing, Ian Chesterton is the one left able to start the efforts to reunite the crew.  He also has a chance to win the way home for himself and Barbara if he can find the source of potential cataclysm.  Of course, he has who will be later known as the Mad Monk to pitch in to assist.  Nothing can go wrong there, right?

This turned out to be a pretty good one.  Russell still sounds clear and in command of the story in spite of his age.  He does a pretty decent impression of the First Doctor.  Chipping also is quite convincing as the wildly unpredictable Grigory.  There is a great moment where he is able to see the future and the Doctor’s role in what’s to come for Earth.  Chipping basically goes a bit nuts and does it brilliantly.

I doubt I would call the episode as a whole brilliant, but I do find it to be a better than average contribution to the range in many ways.

“Impact” is a 1949 film noir written by Jay Dratler and Dorothy Davenport and directed by Arthur Lubin.  The cast includes Brian Donlevy, Ella Raines, Charles Coburn, and Helen Walker.

A millionaire industrialist named Walter Williams is a decent fellow, but he has a little trouble picking the right women to marry.  His wife, played by Walker, sets up a plan to kill her not so beloved husband with her lover.  Walter survives the attempt but circumstances allow him to assume another identity and take up a job as a mechanic working for a widow in a nearby town.  Of course, a romance begins to develop there, but Walter still has the little matter of his murderous wife to deal with.  The wife actually does end up being on the hook for his murder until he is convinced to reemerge. Then Walter has his own murder charge to resolve since the guy who tried to whack him ended up killed in a bizarre road accident.

Raines plays the widow in the unlikely career of running her deceased husband’s garage.  Coburn has the role of an interesting detective who is a bit sharper than he appears even though he is on the verge of retirement.

It’s a fairly interesting movie in spite of the implausible dialogue and character development that riddles it.  Donlevy’s Walter Williams is rather likeable and easy to sympathize with.  There seems to be some effort to give him some depth as a character. Sure, the movie has some cheesy moments and moves at a slower pace sometimes than I prefer, but it’s not too bad.

 

“Midsommar” is described as a folk horror film written and directed by Ari Aster.  I always like blogging about films that are written and directed by one person. That is so handy since I feel somewhat compelled to acknowledge the main creative forces behind these movies when I come up with these little reviews.  The main cast includes Florence Pugh, Jack Reynor, and Will Poulter. This is a collaboration between mainly American and Swedish filmmakers, which is kind of cool.

Pugh plays a young woman named Dani who lost her family to a murder/suicide committed by her crazy sister.  She is in a somewhat problematic relationship with Christian, played by Reynor, who is somewhat reluctant to remain in the union considering all of the emotional upheavals that such trauma can bring.  However, enter the Swedish visitor Pelle, he invites Christian and two other graduate students to his home commune out in the middle of the rolling green hills of well….Sweden, obviously. Dani decides to join the boys for this little venture thinking this could help her take her mind off of the small matter of losing her entire family.  Then Pelle, played by Vilhelm Blomgren,  plays host to the hapless Americans.  Oh yes, the ninety years in the title of this review….the commune is about to launch a celebration that comes about every ninety years in which they have to purify their community or something.  They kill off a couple of old people and ingest a few potions and concoctions along the way.  There’s one kid on this little trip who wants to work on his thesis, making the commune the subject, so leaving is not a decision to be taken lightly, although I would have made tracks quite enthusiastically once the old people threw themselves off a cliff.

Anyway, there is some effort on some creativity in the setting.  The troubled relationship between Christian and Dani was actually presented quite convincingly.  The performances weren’t bad.  Some of the folklore and legends in this commune weren’t presented all that clearly.  I had some trouble making connections that I think I was supposed to pick up on.  The main problem here is this thing is just too long.  It dragged quite a bit in between those moments of interesting developments.  Also, it got to be at times a little too bizarrely grotesque.  I have a pretty strong stomach and a solid sense of reality where I don’t get overly affected by cinematic disembowelments or whatever, but sometimes I am not sure all of what I saw was completely necessary.  Although other characters just flat out disappeared and I didn’t know what happened to them until the climax of the movie.

My other problem with this movie is that I ended up not caring all that much about the characters.  I didn’t miss anyone once they were gone.  I got to a point where I just wanted to see the end credits and go on with my day.  I didn’t actively dislike any of the main characters, but I didn’t find anyone all that interesting.

I don’t think Aster is a terrible writer or director, however this just did not seem to be the type of film that could hold most people’s interest for two and a half hours.  I just wish I was able to like it more than I did for the amount of time I invested in it.

“The Moons of Vulpana” is a Doctor Who audio drama written by Emma Reeves and stars Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor.  This is the second adventure in a trilogy where he is accompanied by star-crossing werewolf known as Mags, played once again by Jessica Martin.  Beth Goddard and Peter Bankole are part of the guest cast. Of course, Big Finish Productions are the distributors with a vast and still growing collection of these adventures.

The Doctor brings Mags to her own planet of Vulpana in the distant past where the Four Great Wolf Packs each worship one of the four moons orbiting the civilizations.  Mags founds out that she is considered to be rather high born and worthy of embarrassing amount of respect, however there is a traitor in the midst, and the Doctor has his own plans as well.

This particular story takes a bit to get going.  There is also a good amount of time where the Doctor seems to get sidelined, which works well enough with some of the more established companions.  I am not sure I was that pleased with the decision since Mags is still quite new as a TARDIS crewmember.  Mags of course was first seen in the television story “The Greatest Show in the Galaxy”, and someone at Big Finish Productions came up with the idea of learning of whatever happened to the punkish werewolf the Doctor and Ace first met as they discovered the secrets of the Psychic Circus.  It’s an interesting idea to explore, I suppose.  I don’t dislike Mags, but I am not all that enthralled with finding out her backstory.

Of course, McCoy’s performance and energy does help me find some enjoyment in this even if I found the story itself hovering around the average level.  In spite of my misgivings about this particular, I did get a bit more interested in the final episode when the family drama among the guest characters come to a head.

Anyway, this particular episode is a reasonably good diversion but not one I will return to in a great hurry.

“The Captain’s Oath” is the latest Star Trek novel by Christopher L. Bennett which explores the earlier years of James Kirk’s starship command.  This novel postulates that before Kirk succeeded Captain Christopher Pike of the Starship Enterprise, he commanded the USS Sacagawea NCC-598 where he first met Dr. Leonard McCoy.

The premise here explores the growth of Kirk from an untried starship captain to the beginnings of the more familiar Starfleet legend.  The novel jumps between the periods just after Kirk accepts command of the Enterprise back to his tour aboard the Sacagawea.

This turned out to be a pretty intriguing read.  In his acknowledgements, Bennett seems to reference some throwaway line in the original television series which inspired this little saga.  Bennett comes up with some other characters from Kirk’s past that influences his command style, and they seem to work quite well.  This also explores the early days of the renowned friendship between Kirk and a certain Vulcan science officer who would come to be by his side for decades.

There have been a few other attempts to explore Kirk’s early days before audiences met him onscreen in previous novels and I would count this one of the better efforts.

My next literary port of call will be a return to the perilous streets of Los Angeles where LAPD Detective Harry Bosch discovers the secrets of “The Black Box” by Michael Connelly.

“Spider-Man: Far From Home” is the latest installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise and reunites Tom Holland, Zendaya, and several other familiar faces from the previous Spider-Man movie.  Jon Watts is the director with Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers credited as screenwriters.  Jake Gyllenhaal joins the cast as Quintin Beck, otherwise known as Mysterio.  Samuel L. Jackson returns as Nick Fury, which is as welcome here as in previous appearances.  It was also good to see Cobie Smulders return as Agent Maria Hill.

Anyway, Peter Parker wants to take a break from being New York’s friendly neighborhood Spider-Man and enjoy his school trip starting off in Venice, Italy.  But trouble predictably follows the web-slinging hero when a creature known as the Water Elemental splashes onto the scene.  Then, a new hero known as Mysterio emerges to help defeat the watery menace.  Parker is then reluctantly recruited by Nick Fury to help fight the other Elementals which have arrived from another dimension pursued by Mysterio, supposedly.  Parker has his own plans to enjoy the trip with his friends and find the most romantic setting to reveal his heart for Zendaya’s MJ.  Anyway, Spider-Man is either about the emerge as the heir to the legacy of the recently deceased Tony Stark or he has become enmeshed in a monumental deception that compels him into a catastrophic mistake he must correct while protecting his friends.

This film was not quite as good as the predecessor, “Spider-Man: Homecoming”, however it was still more then worthwhile.  Holland does overplay Peter Parker’s awkwardness a little, but he is still fun to watch.  He actually seems to have pretty good comedic chemisry with Zendaya and Jacob Batalon, who plays best friend Ned Leeds.  Zendaya has the potential to be a bit of a scene-stealer.  Sure, she is a little overly sarcastic, but I rather liked her.

I also like Marisa Tomei as Aunt May, although this depiction is a very significant departure from the original conception in the comic books.  She gets herself into an unlikely romance with Jon Favreau’s Happy Hogan.

The MCU films are known to have their more than fair share of humor, but this one loads up on the funnies, which was a nice reprieve from the emotional heaviness of the recent Avengers movies.

The coherence of the plot gets a little shaky at times, but the film still delivers a good time.  The visual effects are pretty convincing and do seem to match the images one would likely see on the comic pages.  Quite a few liberties are taken when compared to the original comic range canon, but enough of it is still recognizable to not be terribly upsetting.

The film has enough strengths in the performances and the humor to make the more questionable moments irrelevant.