“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.

“Dead Reckoning” is a noir crime film released in 1947 and stars the incomparable Humphrey Bogart alongside Lizabeth Scott, Morris Carnovsky, and William Prince.  John Cromwell is the director of this film which was written for the screen by Steve Fisher and Oliver H.P. Garrett.  The idea for the story is credited to Gerald Drayson Adams and Sidney Biddell.

The film starts off with Bogart, as Captain Warren “Rip” Murdock, stumbling into a church to meet with a former fellow World War II paratrooper who has donned the robes and collar of clergy.  Murdock has a story to tell in case the enemies he has made since returning from war catch up to him.

The flashback begins with Murdock’s friend disappears after learning he is to be awarded the Medal of Honor.  Murdock decides to conduct his own investigation and learned that his friend entered the military under an assumed name after being suspected of murder stemming from a love triangle involving a wealthy old man and his much younger  wife.  Lizabeth Scott plays the sultry, smoky-voiced blonde at the center of this mess. Of course, there is a crime boss in the mix as well. That role is taken on by Morris Carnovsky, who is fairly menacing in a campy sort of way.  He even has a psychopathic henchman to handle the familiar beatings given to so many of Bogart characters.

This kind of film is familiar territory for Bogart and he delivers his lines in that classic Bogart way.  Scott was okay as the femme fatale but some of the contemporaries of her time such as Rita Hayworth or Lauren Bacall could have sold it a little better.

This seemed to be standard Bogart fare.  I love the guy, but I am not sure he had that much of a range as an actor. I did get a kick out of the name of his character though.  Maybe I can name my hypothetical son Rip Murdock Kanelis.

The narration from the good captain became sort of intrusive as the story unfolds.  I am not sure that the whole business with the priest was all that necessary.  I found the overall cinematic viewing to be fairly average and just a bit disappointing.  Bogart himself is still the best ingredient in this particular concoction, but there is not much that felt all that unique.

“Yesterday” is a film that does not seem to fit easily into one common genre, but I suppose a romantic comedy with some fantasy sprinkled in would be an apt description. Danny Boyle is the director of this piece which was written by Richard Curtis.  Himesh Patel plays struggling songwriter Jack Malik as he tries to break into the music scene with his own material, however he can’t seem to find his break as he strums and sings his way through the pub scene and local festivals. Lily James and Kate McKinnon are part of the cast as they are also joined by Ed Sheeran and James Corden.  Robert Carlyle is also in this, but his role is a bit too much of a spoiler so I will hang on to that one.

Jack Malik is riding his bike one evening after a tough gig and is hit by a bus at the same time the world is inflicted with a brief global blackout.  During that time, something most peculiar has happened.  He finds that he is the only one who remembers the music of the Beatles along with other cultural institutions that seem to have been erased from the minds of those around him.  Malik makes the dubious decision to release the music he remembers as his own, and the fame and fortune start to tear him away from the one woman who believed in him.

I am not terribly familiar with Himesh Patel, but he seemed to be a good fit for this part. He puts forth quite a bit of sincerity to his tortured indecision at times.  He seemed to work well with Lily James.  Kate McKinnon was a little over the top, but that’s sort of what she does.  She was pretty good as the ruthless manager who steps in to bring Malik’s newfound talent into the limelight.

The movie does require a little patience at times, but it’s rather charming.  It was fun to see Malik stumble on to all of these cultural icons that the rest of humanity have forgotten.  In this movie, Coca-Cola never came to be, which is a shame.  It has an appropriate amount of eccentric and obnoxious characters.

It’s a pretty quirky movie that hits all the rights emotional chords of nostalgia.  The soundtrack was well chosen, although they’re basically celebrating the Beatles, so it’s hard to go wrong there.  There was a bit Ed Sheeran music as well. Sheeran was there playing himself, so that was not much of a stretch.  It was an amusing inclusion that worked well enough.

Fans of the Beatles should be largely pleased with this homage, but I think most movie goers will enjoy it.  It turned out to be a pretty good if occasionally perplexing movie.

“My Sister, the Serial Killer” is a novel by Nigerian author, Oyinkan Braithwaite.  It is told from the perspective of a young nurse named Korede, who has a prettier sister with a fatal method of ending relationships.  Family loyalty compels Korede to protect her sister by hiding the bodies and cleaning the scene.  Ayoola is the name of the killer beauty.

Braithwaite is a competent writer, but I felt that not much was resolved when the book ended.  I did have some sympathy for the hapless Korede and her predicament.  It was interesting when the comatose patient she was confiding in wakes up.  Ayoola is pretty spoiled and does not seem to appreciate the risks Korede takes to protect her gruesome extracurricular activities.

The book ended up being mildly interesting but a little unsatisfying.  Maybe Braithwaite tends to visit these people again. Anyway, it was still pretty cool to read a novel taking place in a locale that I have yet to see or study.  There did seem to be a lack of revelation concerning Nigerian culture though. The book works well enough as a diversion, but it could have used either a more definitive resolution or a better stated promise of a continuation.

Cristopher L. Bennett has come out with a new Star Trek novel that explores the early days of James Kirk’s command before he took the chair on the USS Enterprise.  “The Captain’s Oath” is up next on the literary trek through life.