[TV] Killjoys: Season 2 Review

It should be expected that when I get around to reviewing Dark Matter, reviewing Killjoys won't be too far behind as the shows have enjoyed a similar release schedule through SyFy. And to be fair, the main thing that tied them together for me was just their initial release and how they were both science fiction themed.

But Killjoys always tried to be the wittier one as you do follow a group of rogues flying around the galaxy as they pursue their bounties. But of course there was more to their story than just being bounty hunters and the first season did a good job of giving them a bit more substance as characters.

Then they also tacked on this big conspiracy sub-plot that tried to come to more of a head in the later half of the first season and this time around they try to explore that story a lot further in order to really push things along. The end result is a pretty distinct science fiction television experience with a decent enough crew camaraderie vibe.

[TV] Dark Matter: Season 2 Review

When you rely on streaming services to gain access to various shows, it means that you'll end up watching them at least a season behind the current one and certain aspects of the game can totally slip by you. And that's been my relationship with Dark Matter as of late as I've relied on iFlix to keep me more or less up-to-date.

This show was oddly memorable for me when it came out as SyFy pretty much paired it with another science fiction series called Killjoys. Both came across to me as being okay but not amazing but at the same time it was just refreshing to see SyFy investing in actual science fiction shows instead of some of the stranger stuff they've thrown money at, even if only just for distribution.

This second season continues to build on the larger mystery of the show and really bringing everyone into conflict with their forgotten pasts with some rather violent results. All that and some larger conspiracy mystery meta-plot? Cool beans.

[TV] The Expanse: Season 1 Review

Adaptations are all the rage in the entertainment world and it seems that the industry is actively working to remind me of the many books that I still haven't read. I've always been the sort of person who wants to read the source material before enjoying the adaptation, but that's really not feasible in the current landscape.

And thus we come to shows like The Expanse, which is based on a series of highly-rated science fiction books. The premise of the story is definitely in the realm of the sort of book that I'd want to get into but time is a fickle thing and there's so many forms of content to juggle. And so the books remain unread in my never-ending reading queue.

But that didn't stop me from diving into this series head-first without the advantage of advanced book knowledge. And in some ways that probably helped me appreciate the show as a separate creative venture and not just an adaptation.

But it's certainly a heavy show that's not at all for the faint-of-heart in terms of overall worldbuilding and concepts involved.

[TV] The Magicians: Season 3 Review

The second season of The Magicians was certainly a lot stronger than the first and did a lot to rather deepen the mystery of things within the show and its many characters. When you get down to it the show has a fair number of characters to juggle but they do manage to decently develop all the different storylines in a manner that remains fulfilling.

The second season also introduced new challenges like the weakening of magic and the involvement of the elves in the affairs of Fillory add a lot of interesting players and new power dynamics in the greater plot.

But I totally couldn't have anticipated how the second season would end and the new status quo it would establish for this third season. It feels like things really get real in this third venture and everyone has to deal with the higher stakes despite seemingly having less to work with.

Just another day for our Brakebills crew, I suppose.

[TV] The Magicians: Season 2 Review

So the first season of The Magicians was interesting but far from perfect and not an immediate favorite for me. The second season of the show helped elevate things to a new level and did a great job of deepening our understanding of the characters and pushing the story forward.

The show naturally has a lot going for it as it is based on a book series and has some great stories to draw from. As much as the show isn't a perfect adaptation of the books, a lot of book plot elements have made their way into the series and helped expand on things.

And then you have the acting talent brought together for this show. A lot of them were rather unlikable in the first season for various reasons (at least for me). But by the time you get to this second season, it becomes easier to appreciate their more grating traits as more like quirks or defensive mechanisms versus all that they've had to deal with in life. And this second season has a lot more in store for our protagonists.

[TV] The Magicians: Season 1 Review

We had watched the pilot episode of The Magicians some time back and we were more amused by it than fascinated and parked it for later viewing in favor of those shows we had a stronger interest in.

Eventually I doubled back and figured that I might as well trying watching it as iflix had a content deal with included the three seasons of the show. The irony was that when I started watching then series the app started flashing that the first season was going to be removed from the library in about a week so I really had to rush going through it.

The show is in a broad sense an adult version of Harry Potter as you have people with magical potential being invited to a post-graduate program where they can learn magic. So it's not simply a school for magic but it is a university dedicated to it. And so their problems can still sort of like Harry Potter but with a more adult flavor to things and thus much bigger stakes without needing to resort to a big bad without a nose.

[Videos] The Ships of The Expanse

The book-to-television-series, The Expanse is a fascinating franchise with some pretty distinct technology. Some science fiction stories stay light on the science part at times when it comes to things like how their spacecraft work or how combat is structured, but not this series. The Expanse is definitely distinctly harder science fiction that depicts possible developments in the not too distant future.

YouTube channel Spacedock (they're on Patreon) has a unique partnership of sorts with the team behind The Expanse and have been steadily releasing unique content about the technical details of their ships and other aspects of their technology. Spacedock does more than just videos on The Expanse and I particularly appreciate their discussions of Star Wars and Star Trek vessels.

You can view the full playlist of videos here, but I've embedded a few videos as well to give you a taste of the joys of these videos. If you're the type to geek out over the theoretical technical aspects of fictional ships from a possible future, then you totally have to be watching this channel.


The Expanse: MCRN Donnager Class Battleship - Spacedock


The Expanse: MCRN Corvette (Tachi/Rocinante) - Spacedock


The Expanse: Truman Class Dreadnought - Official Breakdown

[TV] Killjoys: Season 1

Canada continues to kick some serious science fiction television butt with the release of Killjoys, and I'm not just saying that because it's a show about bounty hunters. Beyond that, it's just nice to see someone is trying to come up with decent genre entertainment and you have the likes of SyFy offering to co-produce shows like this since they recognize good ideas when they see them.

And while shows like Killjoys and Dark Matter aren't necessarily the most amazing or universally appealing shows on the planet, they're still good fun and they definitely have an audience. And we rather expect channels like SyFy and Space to help foster such shows and ensure that we continue to get decent science fiction entertainment.

And this show isn't too shabby and it has a charm of its own. It's still a little rough around the edges, but what show isn't during its first season, right? And the point of networks like SyFy should be to give these shows more of a chance than standard networks would in order to see things through and allow them to grow. And we all know how things tend to get even better as you get deeper into a show.

[TV] Dark Matter: Season 1

Science fiction is a tricky genre these days. Without the excitement of the space race back in the 1960's, interest in the sciences and related speculative stories is somewhat limited in comparison. And so we've seen a good number of science fiction themed shows step up to the plate of network television only to disappear before they can really make a mark on the world.

And then you have SyFy, which may be better known for its monster movies like Sharknado versus actually, well, science fiction content (hence the strange rebranding effort). We haven't really seen them back a major science fiction show since the Battlestar Galactica days, and that has been quite some time already.

Dark Matter seems to be a step in the right direction, or at least a modest effort to put something together that might hold water. It's not a big epic space opera, but it remains to be a interesting enough concept to hook you in and some fairly interesting characters that hold the potential for some interesting stories as well.

[Movies] Sharknado 2: The Second One

Oh man, I wish I had remembered to post this review last week as part of a lead-up to Halloween or something. Not that I think these movies are scary, but they do try to draw inspiration from B-movie culture, which has historically involved a lot of cheesy horror movies. And you can't get much campier than with SyFy's various movies that have pit giant octopuses versus sharks and squids and who else knows what. And given SyFy's rather close ties with The Asylum, there are some deliciously bad movies out there.

Sharknado 2: The Second One was pretty much inevitable given the social media success that was Sharknado. The success of the first movie was pretty much based in its ridiculousness. As unrealistic as the plot was, it still oddly worked and it was automatically ripe for indulgent campiness.

The sequel tries to capitalize on that "it's so bad, it's good" formula and continued to try and amp up the fun with even more mayhem. And I really can't definitively say whether or not this was better than the first movie or not.

[TV] Defiance: Season 2

I recognize that I've been too generous with many TV shows. If I start a show and somewhat like it, I try to finish the season in order to give it a decent chance to mature a bit and generally prove itself. But then once I've finished a season, I'm more likely to watch the next one out of sheer habit. And thus the vicious cycle goes on and on until I've reached this point where I seem to be flooded with a lot of bad TV choices.

I should have quit Defiance after the first season, but when the new episodes started appearing I figured it might not be too bad to at least check them out and see how things were shaping up. Maybe things were going to get better. And that is some pretty bad logic.

I admit this need to give TV more of a chance all stems from a bit of trauma involving the second season of LOST. I was ready to give up on the show early into that season but given how much Tobie loves the series, I pressed on. I honestly felt like I had underestimated the series somehow and thus I didn't want to make that same mistake again.

But then again, very few shows are like LOST.

[TV] Defiance: Season 1

As I go over my queue of TV shows that I committed to review, I feel like I've made a lot of bad TV choices. In a post-Firefly world, it feels essential to support science fiction and fantasy shows in order to help "protect" the genre from the hacking and slashing of narrow-minded television executives. But at the same time, recent years haven't been all that great in terms of the types genre television that has been created. And while I still don't want to lose another show before its time in a Firefly fashion, one also has to recognize that not all shows are Firefly either.

I really wanted to like Defiance. It has a lot going for it including a somewhat Firefly-like setting and a nice diversity of alien races that sort of reminds me of Babylon 5 or Farscape or something. And it had some tie-in with a video game franchise right off the bat. So the show had a lot going for it, right?

But then things just got mired down in rather shoddy storytelling and lackluster characters. Let's face it, SyFy hasn't been all that great in terms of bring out new science fiction shows of decent quality in recent years. Let's be shallow and blame the name change or something.

[TV] Face Off (SyFy)

I rarely indulge in "reality" television when it comes to figuring out what to watch. Don't get me wrong - I can understand the entertainment value these shows bring. I guess I just prefer my shows to be more open about the fact that they're scripted - and yes, I say this in jest.

The few shows that I do watch from time to time focus on actual merit or achievement more than anything else. And I guess that's why I was drawn to SyFy's Face Off, along with shows like Project Runway. They're not about a person looking good or managing to be on the winning team. They're (theoretically) about the quality of the creative output of the various contestants under fairly high pressure situations.

And the fact that we get to see a lot of geeky characters brought to life is pretty fun, too.

[Movies] Sharknado (2013)

Movies created by The Asylum are known for being bad. But this is the kind of bad that tries to go all the way to being somehow good, if you get what I mean. And this is not a bad thing - the realm of B-movies is a key part of our shared pop culture history and celebrates what one can come up with on a very limited budget.

Interesting enough, SyFy has long recognized this role that B-movies play in our lives and regularly features such movies much to our mixed glee and dismay. And even in these modern times with digital filmmaking and related CGI effects, it's still pretty easy to make cheesily bad movies.

 A part of me still misses the bad costumes and cardboard sets of the older film era, but then these movies are still pretty campy in their own right. And Sharknado certainly has a most special place given it takes "jumping the shark" to a whole new level of craziness.

[TV] Neverland (2011)

I'm not quite sure what the Syfy channel is trying to accomplish with its recent string of reimagined fairy tale inspired movies / mini-series. I think they had still managed something decent when they came out with Tinman, as inspired by The Wizard of Oz. But then Alice (obviously based on Alice in Wonderland) was a bit of a disappointment for me and not even the geek credibility of Felicia Day could quite save Red: Werewolf Hunter, as inspired by the classic Little Red Riding Hood story.

So yeah, clearly they haven't been keeping geeks like me happy. They start out with some pretty decent premises behind the show, but then the full implementation tends go into weird directions. And Neverland is about adapting the Peter Pan myth - so that's a pretty serious piece of children's literature to tackle.

Despite the past issues, my biggest reason for watching this mini-series was the fact that they had managed to get Bob Hoskins to play the role of Smee, just like what he did in the 1991 movie Hook. He was amazingly good in that role (and Dustin Hoffman wasn't all that bad either) and I was totally game to see him reprise the role, even if within a different creative universe, in a manner of speaking.

[TV] Being Human US: Season 1

When I first watched the original BBC version of Being Human, I had mistakenly expected some sort of a comedy since placing it in Cardiff seemed inherently funny to me. But despite initially watching the show for all the wrong reasons, the resulting series was gripping, intelligent and surprisingly fresh. And I was all the more glad for that kind of television.

Fast forward to 2011 and a US version of the show finally airs via the oddly named Syfy channel. The news of this adaptation already had me nervous as to what might be done to the show. I know it seems like too much of a snobbish generalization when it comes to US adaptations of British shows tending to be bad, but then there are those times that they do work out rather well. Thus the only way to really find out for sure what the show is to be like, it requires one to suspend judgment.

And that's never an easy thing.

It's curious to think that this show still made an effort to follow the original series. While the British version only spanned 6-7 episodes (depending on how you count the pilot), its US counterpart lasted 13 episodes. Thus I leave it to you to figure out where all the extra material came from.

[Movies] Red: Werewolf Hunter (2010)

I love Felicia Day. As a geek, it's hard not to admire this darling of the social media age. Between her participation in the highly successful Whedon project Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog and her own home-grown geek web series The Guild, it's hard for the geek world not to know who she is by now.

And it's taken a while for Hollywood to figure this out as well, but they're certainly warming up to the idea. In their efforts to up their geek cred since that has somehow become "cool" in the entertainment industry, you can see various movie studies and pay-TV outfits trying to figure out how to respond to these kinds of trends and new celebrities of the modern age.

I have to admit I had some fairly high hopes for this movie. The premise alone seemed to have potential given the combination of hardcore supernatural elements paired with a classic tale that most of us learned as children seemed to be a great foundation for things. Then add in Felica Day and you'd think that you'd have had a winning formula right here.

So it wasn't quite that.

[TV] Caprica: Season 1

The 2003 "reimagining" of the campy 80's science fiction TV series Battlestar Galactica was definitely a high point in the post Star Trek era. With Enterprise failing to complete a "full" seven season run, it was quite the surprise to see that BSG (as it's more commonly known) managed to pick up the space opera torch.

At the end of show's 4-season run, the science fiction fan world (along with SyFy) was left wondering what would happen next. Four years seemed pretty short for a show for most fans (including me!), but what can we do right? The writers did make sure to wrap up the story well enough and it didn't feel too dragged out either. But for a show as lucrative as BSG, there had to be more. If anything, I'm sure the executives over at SyFy knew that the industry would think them stupid had they not made some sort of an attempt to capitalize on the fan base.

The first venture was the oddly-crafted, The Plan, which I felt was a horrible, confused mess. It was like a really long and nearly pointless DVD extra that a lot of us wish had been never made. In fact, it portrayed that the Cylons didn't actually have a plan that was worth talking about, depending on how you look at it.

So given that experience, I have to admit I was a bit nervous about this spin-off venture set as a prequel to the reimagined series. But then like most other fans, I took the plunge in the hopes of learning more about the "history" of BSG and perhaps the story of how the Cylons and their seemingly eternal conflict began.

[TV] The Phantom (2009)

I'm not sure how this particular TV movie stayed under the radar for me for so long, but it did. When I did finally get around to acquiring a copy, I wasn't all excited to see it. Let's face it - this TV miniseries manage to debut months ago with little fanfare and eventually little attention in the media sphere. Either that means the movie is so avant garde that people are still trying to figure it out , or it's just not as good as everyone had hoped and they decided to keep mum about it.

And a TV miniseries about a 1930's pulp comic book hero is a bit of a tricky subject for a revival / reimagination. I mean, it's not like I have anything against the Phantom as a character - I just don't quite understand the need to revisit his story and play around with his origins. It would have made more sense if there was some recent fan petition for its return to the screen but I don't recall anything of that nature in recent months.

Still, every show / movie deserves a chance to be watched in its entirety in order to be evaluated, right? And who knows, some reimaginations may not have made sense from a fan context, but became wild successes like Battlestar Galactica.

[Movies] Riverworld (2010)

I'm getting increasingly disappointed in SyFy's ability to release interesting movies under its brand. Sure, we know they partner with other movie makers to create these made-for-TV types of movies based on popular science fiction and fantasy tales, but something tends to go wrong and the ultimate result is odd.

I think the only SyFy movie I liked was Tin Man, then the others that followed were highly, well, "meh" for lack of a better term. Then others followed like Alice, which was highly disappointing.

And now this one.

It's weird to think that this was not the first time that SyFy tried to translate this book series into something more visual. Their last attempt, which was a full TV series, ended up being just a pilot episode and nothing more. Maybe this was one of those times when they should have left good well enough alone or something.