It's the end of the year as we know it

I always get terribly nostalgic and moody around New Year's Eve. I expect this year to get worse than usual.

I was going to write a substantial blog about something important, but I just don't have the energy, so I figured instead the last post of the year should be a great scene from a great film.

This one makes me cry on a regular day, around New Year's it's almost fatal.

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A scene from When Harry Met Sally (1989)

Sally is alone at a party, Harry arrives out of the blue, just as the clock strikes 12.

Harry: I've been doing a lot of thinking, and the thing is, I love you.

Sally: What?!

Harry: I love you!

Sally: How do you expect me to respond to this?

Harry: How about, you love me too?

Sally: How about, I'm leaving?

Harry: Doesn't what I said mean anything to you?

Sally: I'm sorry Harry, I know it's New Year's Eve, I know you're feeling lonely, but you just can't show up here, tell me you love me and expect that to make everything all right. It doesn't work this way!

Harry: Well, how does it work?

Sally: I don't know, but not this way!

Harry: How about this way? I love that you get cold when it's 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night.
And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

DISSOLVE TO:

FINAL THOUGHTS

That's it for 2010.

Have a great New Year's! Stay safe, stay beautiful, and I'll be seeing you on the flipside.

FADE OUT.

CREDITS.

Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010)

THIS IS A SPOILER REVIEW

I have a question to the floor: Does anybody remember what happened at the end of Resident Evil 3?

No? Too bad... But perhaps it's not such a big issue, since I'm not really sure what happens at the beginning of Resident Evil 4 either.

So you'll recall that the general plot of the previous films was something along the lines of: Insane powerful company called The Umbrella Corporation creates a powerful virus that turns people into flesh eating zombies. The virus gets out. Mayhem and chaos ensues. A small band of survivors make it through each film, with M.A.W. Milla Jovovich leading the bunch as Alice, who was also the victim of some very nasty Umbrella experiments... There, now you're caught up. Oh, and by the way the fourth entry also sees the return of original director Paul W.S. Anderson (who's Milla's husband in real life, at least at the time of writing), a man who has some serious duds on his CV.

The story begins when Alice attacks an underground Umbrella facility in a noisy, but unimpressive manner, and kills a whole lot of guards. Suddenly she's shot. She falls to the ground. Dead. But wait, what's this? Another Alice appears. Soon several dozen Alices take over the place, but the bad guy escapes and blows up everything behind him.

No, I don't know what that means either.

Enter the (presumably) real Alice, who's flying around in a plane looking for survivors, alas the world is all but empty, since the virus killed everybody. Then she picks up a radio signal from Arcadia, apparently this is a safe haven, free of infection and with plenty of food. When she arrives at the correct coordinates, however, all she finds is an empty beach and an abandoned helicopter. Then she's attacked by a deranged woman, who's got a spider-looking metal thing attached to her chest.

No, I also don't know what that means.

The woman turns out to be Claire (Ali Larter, hotness!). You'll remember her from the previous films, and if you don't we'll show you some clips to remind you. The two of them take off in Alice's plane.

They soon find a small bunch of survivors holding up in an abandoned prison. The place is surrounded by a crowd of starving zombies, numbering several thousand. They also find out that Arcadia is not a place... It's a ship, and right now it's located off the coast, very close to the prison. They figure they have to get out there, and thus attempt to hatch a plan to accomplish this, ignoring the fact that nobody on the ship seems to react to their emergency flares, or that the last transmission from the ship ended in a scream.

Then they stand around and do nothing for about an hour. They talk a bit. Nothing happens. No one attacks them.

Then the zombies suddenly manage to break into the prison and kill some people, which puts a bit of pressure on those escape plans. Since we're at the fourth film we need to spice things up a bit, so now the zombies have a huge tentacle mouth, with which they can bite off an entire head! (Again, this might also have been the case in the third film, but I have no recollection of it. It was definitely the case in Blade II, I remember that for sure.) The survivors must also go against a gigantic hooded guy with a big ax! (Him I remember as well... from Silent Hill.)

Finally the last survivors manage to make their way to Arcadia. The ship is empty, but they go into the basement and find huge white hangars filled with people in hypersleep and some choppers. Alice makes her way to the final room, where she meets the bad guy again - this was based on a computergame, I did mention that, right? He has glowing red eyes and two CGI zombie dogs, which split open and turn into a giant mouth. The bad guy has some issues, because he's turning into a creature, but he believes he'll get better if he eats Alice, because she's cool.

They fight - actually they mostly jump around in slow-motion - and Alice wins. All the frozen people are released, and everyone's happy. But then, what's this? Oh, it's the setup for a sequel... A gazillion Umbrella planes arrive to kill everybody. Cut to black. Roll credits.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I don't know why it surprised me that this film is SO much worse than the mediocre third entry. Maybe it's because it seemed as if the film makers were actually trying to get the series back on track, but the question remains: How do you create a horror film, without a single horific moment? Actually, there's not even a mildly interesting moment in the film. The brain-numbingly simple story - evil company releases virus, our heroes must survive - has actually gotten away from the filmmakers, who would have thought that was possibly?

So for the creators of the inevitable sequel, here's my two cents:

Look to the first film, because that worked. Keep the story simple and create some characters we care about losing. Show some zombies getting slaughtered, and make sure Milla runs around in as little clothes as possible. Finally come up with one, just one, original idea we haven't seen before. You can do that, can't you?

Can't you?

She Shoulda Been A Contender, Part II

INT. LOCAL VIDEO STORE - BOTTOM SHELF - DUSK

Christmas is drawing ever nearer, and anyone working in retail (me for example) will find it considerably harder to maintain a steady update rate on their blog. However, just before the holiday madness truly takes over, we've got time to check in with our ongoing list of hot actresses who should have had bigger careers.

Welcome to part II. (oh, and remember part I, right here.)

We'll begin with royalty...

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Carrie Fisher

Carrie never stood a chance, when she became an overnight sensation after appearing as Princess Leia in Star Wars (1977). And sure enough, three years later during the shooting of The Empire Strikes Back (1980) she was doing coke on a daily basis. She was 23 at the time. And then things really got out of hand.

Later in her life Carrie got back on the straight and narrow. She started writing, she clawed her way back to the real world, but by that time she wasn't in her twenties any more, and the career she could have had, was long gone. Still, she was fairly spunky when she turned up in Fanboys (2008).

High point: The Empire Strikes Back (or Fanboys).
Low point: The Star Wars Holiday Special, but that goes for everyone who was involved.
Should have been in: Some completely ordinary dramas, without any spaceships.

Peta Wilson

Despite sharing a name with that animal terrorist group Peta is all style, class and sexiness. She got to explore this fact in her most memorable performance, playing the lead in La Femme Nikita (1997), the TV-series based on the French action movie. That gig lasted for four years, and though the show was never huge, and admittedly quite silly at times, she was perfect in it. But that was almost 10 years ago. In the intervening years, her turn as Mina Parker on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003) is the only thing worth mentioning.

Peta is best used when she can look like a model, and kick ass like an East European terrorist. Are you telling me Hollywood can't use that? Really?

High point: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (yes, I love it, leave me alone)
Low point: I'm gonna go ahead and assume it's Malibu Shark Attack (2009), sight unseen.
Should have been in: Mission: Impossible III (2006).

Traylor Howard

The weirdness of the name notwithstanding, Traylor is the classic combination of the quintessential Girl Next Door, and the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. In the TV show Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place (1998) she showed great comic timing, but also a tender dramatic side, when her character found herself torn between a boyfriend and a longtime friend. For a while after the show ended I kept checking her IMDb page for cool new projects, but there was nothing there. Just a few scattered TV appearances and multi-season appearance on the Monk (2005) series. Where did Traylor go, and why?

High point: Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place.
Low point: Son of the Mask (I assume).
Should have been in: Trayler could step into any flavorless comedy in lieu of any TV-star-turned-film-star and improve it!

Jennifer Esposito

There's a scene in Spin City (1997) where Stacey (played by Jennifer) is checking out an apartment for rent with her boss Mike (Michael J. Fox). Through the walls they can clearly hear a couple having sex in the next apartment. Mike comments that it sounds loud. Stacey looks at him with a crooked smile, and replies: "You think that's loud? Poor Mike..."

That simple throwaway moment in a random episode of a TV show contains more pizzazz than the whole rest of Jennifer's career. Don't get me wrong, she's done a ton of work, plenty of TV shows and movies, but her appearance is always completely and utterly forgettable. Spunk has an expiration date too. Jennifer has left hers in the fridge too long.

High point: Spin City.
Low point: Everyone forgetting that she actually starred in an Oscar winning film. It was Crash (2004).
Should have been in: A cool thriller ala Backflash (2001), or perhaps playing a levelheaded cop in something like Don't Say A Word (2001) or maybe an action/comedy like Taxi (2004)... What? You're kidding! She was? In ALL of them? Are you sure?

Neve Campbell

At the height of her career she had a successful TV show AND an unbeatable horror franchise on her hands. That was 15 years ago. Neve made a name for herself in the fantastic and touching family drama Party of Five (1994), she was cast as the lead in Scream (1996) a few years later, which she completed, while she was on the TV-series! She was a busy girl.

Scream 2 (1997) and Wild Things (1998) followed, and it seemed like the sky was the limit. It wasn't. Neve was flooded with offers, but she turned them all down. She didn't want to be the next scream queen, so instead she turned her attention to small independent films and the theater stage in London. Too bad.

High point: Wild Things.
Low point: The barely watchable When Will I Be Loved (2004).
Should have been in: Save the Last Dance (2001), instead of The Company (2003).

Leelee Sobieski

What the hell happened to Leelee Sobieski? No, seriously, what the HELL happened? Leelee first caught my eye in the big budget disaster flick Deep Impact (1998), she was surprisingly good (far better than Milla) in the miniseries Joan of Arc (1999). A small, but nonetheless saucy, appearance in the Stanley Kubrick film Eyes Wide Shut (1999) really raised some eyebrows, and she was perfect in My First Mister (2001). Then... it all went downhill. Her performances in 88 Minutes (2007) and In the Name of the King (2007) were awful, to put it nicely.

She's still doing great work now and then, but being great in Walk All Over Me (2007) ("A small town girl runs into big time trouble as she takes on her roommates identity as a dominatrix to pay the bills") is less impressive than being great in a Kubrick film. Come back to the A-list Leelee! And if Uwe calls, just say no.

High point: My First Mister.
Low point: 88 Minutes, no In the Name of the King, no 88 Minutes, no...
Should have been in: My Second Mister? Eyes Wider Open? I dunno, anything but 89 Minutes and In the Name of the King II (by the way, the first one was a joke, the second isn't).

CUT TO:

FINAL THOUGHTS

Like I mentioned in part I, it's hard to figure out why some of these actresses disappear, despite having great potential. Often the reason is quite mundane or just plain sad.

Here's the thing, though. Once you put something on the Internet, it's everywhere. So maybe, just maybe, a producer or a casting agent somewhere will come across one of these lists one day, and decide to bring back one of the girls from the semi-dead. And then we'll have done our part.

So add your suggestions to the comments, so they can be included in the inevitable part III.

FADE TO BLACK.

The Coolest Movie Hardware Ever

- The Emergency Destruct System of The Nostromo

So I was watching Alien (1979) the other day to prepare for my weekly podcast, when a certain special scene came up. Every time this scene comes up, I always tune out a little bit. It's the one where Ripley must activate the Nostromo's self-destruct.

In the midst of Alien attacks and people dying left and right, I always pause for a moment here, fascinated by the hardware at the center of the scene: The Emergency Destruct System. The only thing more fascinating than the design of this device is how insanely complicated it is to activate! Really! It's a miracle anybody ever blows up a ship! Then again, perhaps that's the desired effect, these ships are rather expensive, you know.

As my good friend and fellow podcaster Dennis Rosenfeld points out, it's also rather disturbing that a spaceship would even need this function. If catastrophic disasters happen often enough to build such a device into every ships, I sure hope there's some decent hazard pay involved.

But I digress.

To help you in case you find yourself on an M-Class star-freighter and need to activate the self-destruct, and because I have no serious articles ready, let's look at how you operate this cool piece of hardware.

Emergency Destruct System Activation Procedure

1. First you have to punch the big red knob. A hatch will spring open. Pull the lever behind it.

2. Then you need to unscrew two screws that hold a cover in place. Remove the cover, and pull both levers you find there. They will give you resistance, put some muscle into it. This will make the primary activation panel pop up. For your convenience this has been located in the floor, in case you're bleeding so much you can't stand.

3. Read the instructions carefully before proceeding. I'm gonna say that again. Read. The. Instructions. Carefully.

At this point it's assumed that you've already warned your shipmates (the ones who aren't dead), who should be located in the ship's emergency escape shuttle. Also, any pets should be secured in a company approved carry-case and placed on the shuttle, but wait until the last moment to do this.

4. After reading the instructions, press a series of random buttons with odd symbols. (Avoid the one looking like an umbrella. It will activate the sprinkler system.) The four nuclear bolts will pop up.

5. Activate the nuclear heads. Take bolt 1, screw it into hole 1, and pull up nuclear head 1. Activate, by flipping the little switch, located behind the little hatch. Repeat this procedure with bolts 2 through 4.

Note that at this point a detached female voice will begin an annoying countdown. Also, flashing graphics will appear on every monitor in sight. Don't panic, this is normal.

The self-destruct is now activated. (Actually, the self-destruct will activate BEFORE you're finished with all four bolts. This is being worked on. Version 2.0 will not have this problem.)

6. That's it, you're all done. Now run.

THE FINE PRINT

The overload will take exactly 10 minutes. After 5 minutes you will no longer be able to stop the destruct mechanism. This is rather inconvenient since it will take you exactly 5 minutes and 3 seconds to run to the escape shuttle, realize you've made a mistake, run back and deactivate the self-destruct.

So once again, you REALLY have to be sure, before you turn it on.

Also, please note that screaming at the computer will not help anybody.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Is it just me, or does it seem rather silly to have to go through such an elaborate process to blow up a ship? I mean, if it comes to that, you must be in quite a hurry to get the hell out of there. I would also like to point out that the activation requires no codes or identification. Anybody can basically turn this thing on!

Also notice that even though this is obviously an English-speaking crew, the arming instructions are also presented in French!

In fact, Ripley appears to read off the French version when she attempts to deactivate the device. Could this be the reason she fails?

Anyway, the practical applications of this device notwithstanding, this is still the coolest piece of movie hardware ever, and now you know exactly how to operate it next time you need to blow up a spaceship.

You're welcome.

Gigantic Star Wars Related Movie Geek Books

INT. BOOKSTORE - STAR WARS ISLE - DAY

Take a big gulp of the nostalgia cup with me.

A few weeks back a book landed on my doorstep with a clunk. It was The Making of The Empire Strikes Back, by J. W. Rinzler. This could quite possibly be the best book ever made.

Flipping casually through the pages, I'm taken back to a more simple time. Back when I lived and breathed Star Wars every day. Back then I wanted nothing more than a speeder bike, so I could impress everyone at school, and I thought Princess Leia was the most beautiful woman in the world.

Sigh.

As I sit here and gush over this book, I can't help but look over at my bookshelf, which is struggling to carry the weight of a dozen similar, wonderful books. So I figured, why not write a blog about the best of them?

Now, full disclosure, I haven't read all of these, not cover to cover, I mean. I bring them out every now and then, to look at the pictures and read selected parts of the text, but people do that with the Bible as well, so I'm good, right?

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MY ALL TIME FAVORITE BIG A** FILM BOOKS

The Making of Star Wars

By J. W. Rinzler

This is the prequel (NO! Sorry, I used the bad word). Scratch that. This is the predecessor to the book that spawned this blog.

In this day and and age, with The Google and The Wiki only a click away, it's great to see that some people still value a hardcover brick tome such as this. Author J. W. Rinzler had unprecedented access to the Lucasfilm Archives, which seems to contain every single scrap of paper Lucas every wrote. He also had access to hours of interviews conducted in the late 70's, which has never been released before.

I would literally have killed for this book when I was a kid.

The Art of The Empire Strikes Back

Edited by Deborah Call, text by Vil Bulluck and Valerie Hoffman

This one has a special place in my heart. It was the first REAL movie geek book I ever got. I checked with my mum, and she said I was twelve. It was the first time I got an appreciation for the development of a design. It was the first time I realized that what ends up on the screen is developed through a process.

The book does contain some text, but otherwise it mostly consists of images and sketches. I could look at these for hours, and I have! I guess the new Empire book has made this redundant, but flipping through the pages still brings me back. (On an odd note, this book is far better than the ones for Star Wars and Return of the Jedi, which both include the screenplay for the films, at the expense of some explanatory text.)

The Star Wars Vault

by Stephen J. Sansweet and Peter Vilmur

This is a geeky as it gets. You have to see this book to believe it. You have to actually touch it. The cover claims it contains "thirty years of treasures from the Lucasfilm Archives, with removable memorabilia and two audio CDs"!

It's unbelievable. The book is stuffed with hundreds of unique photos celebrating the nerdiness that is Star Wars. We get reproductions of old programs, handwritten notes, stickers, cardboard model planes, and all kinds of glitter! You can flip through this book fifty times, and still discover new things. So epically cool!

Sculpting a Galaxy: Inside the Star Wars Model Shop

by Lorne Peterson

It's heartbreaking to flip through this book. Why? Because the shop that produced all these wonderful things doesn't exist anymore. The Industrial Light & Magic model shop closed in 2006, and ILM is now only a computer farm.

Anyway, back to the book.

All the famous star ships, vehicles, and creatures are covered here, with behind the scene photos of their creation, and text that explains the thinking that went into each design, but honestly, you'll be too fascinated by the pictures to care. Just look at those gorgeous images that lets us appreciate every inch of these beautiful models in close-up. The craftsmanship is mind-boggling.

Industrial Light & Magic: The Art of Special Effects

By Thomas G. Smith

I bought this book almost 20 years ago. As I have stated before on these pages I'm absolutely in love with old school, photo-chemical effects and this book is one of the reasons why.

Thomas G. Smith, who used to be general manager at Industrial Light & Magic, writes in a simple, fairly non-technical language. He carefully explains the complicated work that went into old school visual effects, taking each category of effects one by one. He gives the reader a great overview, but also goes into specific details about specific shots, which is really where you learn some interesting stuff.

Naturally every page is lavishly illustrated with tons of behind the scenes photos from ILM. Every film nerd should read this book, and fall in love with that old film magic too.

The Invisible Art: The Legends of Movie Matte Paintings

By Mark Cotta Vaz adn Craig Barron

And speaking of old school effects, here is the cream of the crop!

Focusing exclusively on "matte paintings" this book traces the history of this wonderful technique from the early days of film making to the modern digital age. It describes how the old masters worked under the studio system, how the technique became a mainstay in Hollywood, creating incredible images of places that didn't exist, or simply lending a helping hand to studios during the war, when they couldn't afford to build sets.

The book is full of large images, and plenty of "before and after" shots that really let's you appreciate the miracle of a good matte painting.

The Complete Making of Indiana Jones

By J. W. Rinzler

Finally we can't cover gigantic movie books without including this one, despite the fact that it's not Star Wars related at all.

J. W. Rinzler, who wrote both the Empire book and the Star Wars book, was once again given unlimited access to the Lucasfilm Archives (Gosh! That must be a wonderful place), resulting in an exhaustive book that covers all four Indy films in great detail, with interviews, behind the scene photos and plenty of trivia.

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FINAL THOUGHTS

When people talk about everything going digital, books disappearing, and everyone reading stuff on a .5 inch mobile phone screen I just shake my head. NOTHING can replace the experience of sitting with books like these, and I hope they NEVER stop making them.

And finally... Can I say it? No, I can't say it, it's too nerdy. Screw that, I'm gonna say it...

May The Force be with you!

FADE TO BLACK.

No Ordinary Family: Episode 1.01 & 1.02 (2010)

A family is transformed into superheroes after a freak accident. They try to forget their powers and live a normal life, only to find out that's not so easy (after all, with great powers comes great responsibility). Later they discover that there are superheroes everywhere, of course this means there are also super villains.

Now tell me, does this in any way sound familiar?

It should. ABC's new family drama is a mishmash of Fantastic Four, The Incredibles and Heroes, and let's be honest, none of those were all that original to begin with. They were all built on a legacy of superheroes stories - comic books in particular - going back nearly a century.

The very ordinary family at the center of No Ordinary Family is comprised of dad Jim Powell, played by Michael Chiklis, who previously had a massive hit with The Shield, and who starred as The Thing in Fantastic Four. He works as a police sketch artist, constantly bullied by the "real" cops. His wife is Stephanie, played by Julie Benz. We know her from Rambo and The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day. She's a successful scientist, and the one who brings home the cash, a source of tension and drama in the family. They have two kids, Daphne (Kay Panabaker) and JJ (Jimmy Bennett). That's right, you've entered a world where Michael Chiklis and Julie Benz can hook up and create Kay Panabaker. How's that for a fantastic setting?

Cue family vacation to reconnect, plane crash in a strange river in South America, and superhero powers for everyone. Jim is suddenly indestructible and can jump really high. Stephanie can run really fast. Daphne can hear other people's thoughts. And JJ gets really good at math. Jim quickly decides he wants to be an actual superhero, he enlists the help of a friend and soon he's out fighting crime. When Stephanie discovers her powers, she realizes that she can be a good mother again, something her career has prevented her from being, but now she's got more free time on her hands, since she can do everything faster. The kids mope around and have teenage angst... Cut to commercial.

No Ordinary Family is a family show. It's not just about a family, it's also for the family. The whole family. Everybody can join, because this show is so G-rated it'll make you vomit. Everything is clean and safe. Actually, to call it "safe" would be the same as describing Mount Everest as a "somewhat sizable pile of dirt". This world feels like those chocolate commercials where grandchildren run to their grandparent in soft focus, to tell them how important they are, or the airline commercials where the well-manicured dad watches the sunset above the clouds with longing in his eyes, while his children are down on the ground waiting for daddy to come home. This is a show where no argument is too big to be solved in the first scene after the break, and where every conversation ends with "I love you" or "I'm so proud of you".

The first and most obvious question is: Do we really need another superhero story? After watching the first two episodes of No Ordinary Family the answer would have to be a resounding "Hell no, and even if we did, this wouldn't be it." Now, don't get me wrong, this show has space to grow, but we know it's never going to mess up the family unit, and since we're stuck with that the show is already too limited for me to care. If we give the show the benefit of the doubt, and say it manages to develop an interesting superhero story, and perhaps even embrace some darkness, it will still be stuck in family-friendly land, and it will still only cover familiar ground. More likely we'll end up with something closer to Lois and Clark than Heroes, with cartoon villains and sanitized violence. From my couch this is a show about superheroes made by people who seem clueless about the subject, not to mention completely uninterested in exploring that aspect, beyond the simple, obvious conflicts.

No Ordinary Family is also troubled by the kind of lazy writing that plagues many primetime shows these days. The pilot episode, for example, is wrapped in the "interview" format, where the two leads talk directly to the camera about their experiences. At the end of the episode we learn that the couple is in therapy to "work out their issues" and the whole story has been told to the therapist. This person is not mentioned in the second episode, so maybe someone said, "wait a second, weren't they supposed to keep their powers a secret?" This is such a clumsy and uninspired storytelling device. But it's the little things that annoy me the most, like the scenes where two characters are walking through busy hallways talking loudly and openly about their top secret secrets! You do realize that even the delivery guy you just passed could pick up on this conversation, right?

The second episode centers around the ongoing struggle of "let's use our powers!" "let's not!" "Let's!" "No!" "Yes!" I think the two leads manage to change their position on this issue EIGHT times during the episode. I'm already bored with this. The show is called NO Ordinary Family, for crying out loud! I think it's safe to assume they're not going to pretend to be a regular family again.

There's real drama to be found in the setup, but you have to be fearless. Like Heroes was the first season. It was written as if every episode would be the last. The drama this kind of writing produced was unparalleled. No Ordinary Family is forced to glean its drama from thin air, and pump up the conflicts to laughable levels. "I could have lost you!" Jim yells, when Stephanie gets into an accident using her powers. The funny bit? She stumbled over a children's bicycle. That's all. Yup, when this is the level of drama, 42 minutes can seem like an eternity.

This is a gigantic step back for Michael Chiklis. This show belongs in the same box as The Commish, so far removed from his stunning performance in The Shield that it's not even funny. It makes his performance in Fantastic Four seem like award material. Julie Benz has problems of her own. Her character must be utterly offensive to women. Here is a successful, beautiful woman, and what does she do when she discovers her superpowers? Why, she uses the extra time she gains to make lunch for the kids, and then she vacuums really fast. As for the kids... Well, I got nothing. The first two episodes never get past the teen-angst, and since the writers have stuck the adults in the show with the "action powers" I can assume they'll never join the action at the same level as their parents.

Maybe they should have called the show No Ordinary Parents, and gotten some drama out of the tension between the kids and the adults, if the adults were living out the kids' fantasies. Just an idea.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Turns out that with great powers comes... more time for bake-sale.

Unsurprisingly No Ordinary Family has been deleted from my "Need To Watch" list.

This is the very definition of modern TV. Dumbed down and simplified until it's completely without taste, packaged in neat little boxes, with all the danger sucked out. So soft around the edges that you can look at it through squinting eyes, and it still looks the same.

These people may have the power to run at the speed of sound, or leap tall buildings in a single bound, but they seem unable to deflect mediocrity. Well, a good superhero needs his kryptonite, I guess.