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Thread: Jordan Peele Rebbooting "Twilight Zone"

  1. #26
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    The first one is bad and so overlong, the second one is better but has some wacking internal logic and payoff that still doesn't make it exactly good. Hopefully the fourth episode oughts to be something though by its makers' pedigree, written by Glen Morgan and directed by Ana Lily Amirpour.
    Midnight Run (1988) - 9
    The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) - 8.5
    The Adventures of Robinhood (1938) - 8
    Sisters (1973) - 6.5
    Shin Godzilla (2016) - 7.5

  2. #27
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    Quote Quoting Peng (view post)
    Hopefully the fourth episode oughts to be something though by its makers' pedigree, written by Glen Morgan and directed by Ana Lily Amirpour.
    Ooooooooooo! Nice.

    Steven Yeun starring as well.
    Last edited by Spinal; 04-08-2019 at 05:51 PM.
    Coming to America (Landis, 1988) **
    The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) *1/2
    Us (Peele, 2019) ***1/2
    Fugue (Smoczynska, 2018) ***1/2
    Prisoners (Villeneuve, 2013) ***1/2
    Shadow (Zhang, 2018) ***
    Oslo, August 31st (J. Trier, 2011) ****
    Climax (Noé, 2018) **1/2
    Fighting With My Family (Merchant, 2019) **
    Upstream Color (Carruth, 2013) ***

  3. #28
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    The thing I really don't get about the first one is that his successful material isn't funny and doesn't even contain jokes.
    Coming to America (Landis, 1988) **
    The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) *1/2
    Us (Peele, 2019) ***1/2
    Fugue (Smoczynska, 2018) ***1/2
    Prisoners (Villeneuve, 2013) ***1/2
    Shadow (Zhang, 2018) ***
    Oslo, August 31st (J. Trier, 2011) ****
    Climax (Noé, 2018) **1/2
    Fighting With My Family (Merchant, 2019) **
    Upstream Color (Carruth, 2013) ***

  4. #29
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    Quote Quoting Spinal (view post)
    The thing I really don't get about the first one is that his successful material isn't funny and doesn't even contain jokes.
    Yes! I was confused about that as well. It isn't is funny and the audience still goes apeshit. Either that was a thematic point, somehow, or they just didn't care because it wasn't what the episode was really about ... I guess? The themes and moral were handled badly.

    Also, for a series that is regularly cheered for being "political," boy did they very carefully sidestep the chance to jab at some obvious public figures.

  5. #30
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    For the first 2/3 of "Replay", I was thinking, hey, this is much better. A simple, but captivating premise. A relentless villain reminiscent of Duel. Exploration of modern-day societal issues. But then the ending blasts apart any shred of subtlety in the episode's metaphor with overblown grandstanding. At its best, Twilight Zone is unsettling because it gives you something to chew on. It uncovers an ambiguity that holds no easy answer. This is the opposite of that. It's like Twilight Zone presented by Buzzfeed or something. I'm going to watch the Ana Lily Amirpour episode and then likely sign off from this series.
    Coming to America (Landis, 1988) **
    The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) *1/2
    Us (Peele, 2019) ***1/2
    Fugue (Smoczynska, 2018) ***1/2
    Prisoners (Villeneuve, 2013) ***1/2
    Shadow (Zhang, 2018) ***
    Oslo, August 31st (J. Trier, 2011) ****
    Climax (Noé, 2018) **1/2
    Fighting With My Family (Merchant, 2019) **
    Upstream Color (Carruth, 2013) ***

  6. #31
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    Yeah. Ugh.

    Most of the episode repeats the central conflict with small variations, and then at the end it literally states that conflict in dialogue ("no matter what we do, he's always there").

    The family's backstory had nothing to do with the premise and didn't advance the plot. Did they really need to just fill time? Because that's what it felt like.

    The ending was some serious /thathappened preaching and somehow manages to be both reductive and fantastical, in a way that's insulting to almost everybody watching.

    The mechanics were kinda off. Like, she never makes the obvious choice and hits the button multiple times in succession to see if she could reverse time to the point before she went into that diner. A line of dialogue implies that she's a lawyer but she never plays the typical TV lawyer showdown with the cop (instead, in one scene, she just freaks out on him). Nobody ever stops and wonders what's gonna happen to their kid at college once the parents go away and that cop is still there. Ultimately, this is another moral tale that simplifies racial issues to an idiotic degree, and mostly for cheap entertainment. It didn't make me think; it made me groan.

    ETA: Also, it would have been scarier or creepier if the cop was more of an anonymous and bland presence (think of the mirrorshades guard in "Cool Hand Luke.") They sorta went out of their way to make this dude an aggressive boogeyman to the point where I actually found him less threatening.
    Last edited by Irish; 04-16-2019 at 07:12 PM.

  7. #32
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    Quote Quoting Irish (view post)
    Most of the episode repeats the central conflict with small variations, and then at the end it literally states that conflict in dialogue ("no matter what we do, he's always there").
    Agree with everything but this most of all. I wouldn't have been too surprised if the next line was "It feels like we're in some kind of Twilight Zone."
    Coming to America (Landis, 1988) **
    The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) *1/2
    Us (Peele, 2019) ***1/2
    Fugue (Smoczynska, 2018) ***1/2
    Prisoners (Villeneuve, 2013) ***1/2
    Shadow (Zhang, 2018) ***
    Oslo, August 31st (J. Trier, 2011) ****
    Climax (Noé, 2018) **1/2
    Fighting With My Family (Merchant, 2019) **
    Upstream Color (Carruth, 2013) ***

  8. #33
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    Quote Quoting Spinal (view post)
    Agree with everything but this most of all. I wouldn't have been too surprised if the next line was "It feels like we're in some kind of Twilight Zone."
    LOL, holy shit dude, when she was trying to explain the situation and the camcorder to her brother, I swear she was this close to saying that exact line.

  9. #34
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    Just caught up with the third episode, and much, much better. While I think it was great, the mom's lecture at the end did drag it down from a potential classic. Just the visual of two-sided confrontation and cameras recording is evocative enough to stand in. Just have to say though this episode is so stressful/cathartic to watch as a PoC that I almost broke out in tears at various moments throughout.
    Midnight Run (1988) - 9
    The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) - 8.5
    The Adventures of Robinhood (1938) - 8
    Sisters (1973) - 6.5
    Shin Godzilla (2016) - 7.5

  10. #35
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    whelp.... Episode 4 is incoherent.

    [
    ]

    This is a bad show.
    Last edited by Irish; 04-20-2019 at 03:39 PM.

  11. #36
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    I would call Episode 4 the best of the bunch, but boy, the bar is not high. Steven Yeun's performance keeps it engaging and I think there's some interesting parallels to the current paranoia over Russian infiltration as well as resentment towards white male Christian leadership. They're still having trouble sticking the ending though. This one just gets silly instead of leading to deeper consequences and meaning.
    Coming to America (Landis, 1988) **
    The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) *1/2
    Us (Peele, 2019) ***1/2
    Fugue (Smoczynska, 2018) ***1/2
    Prisoners (Villeneuve, 2013) ***1/2
    Shadow (Zhang, 2018) ***
    Oslo, August 31st (J. Trier, 2011) ****
    Climax (Noé, 2018) **1/2
    Fighting With My Family (Merchant, 2019) **
    Upstream Color (Carruth, 2013) ***

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