Books:
Every Dead Thing (Charlie Parker #1) by John Connolly
This is the first in a mystery series centering around an ex-cop PI who, in this book, is tracking down the serial killer who murdered his wife and child while also dealing with his grief over that event. I actually started this book when it first came out earlier in this millennium then put it down because, post-Silence of the Lambs (a series and movie that BLEW MY MIND back in the gogo 80s/90s when I saw/read it/them), I find serial killer books in general to be somewhat repetitive because their psychology and whatnot are all iterations on the same theme, and unraveling the mind of a serial killer feels like the same thing over and over because it's all kind of the same mind. I mean, yeah, there are differences but in the end, not really. However, given that there are now like 20 books in this series, and, having skimmed a few plot descriptions and seen that the books branch out into other types of murders down the road, I figured maybe I’d give it a go again and tl;dr: this was the right decision. Look this is by no means a perfect book. It somewhat feels like two books in that there's the personal investigation on one track which (kind of) dovetails with a seemingly unrelated investigation on some other track and I wouldn't say they exactly glued themselves together. The are a LOT of people in this book and in all honesty I began to lose track of who was who. But none of that mattered - no I did not DNF - because there's a nice strength to the writing that keeps it all moving forward even when not much is happening. In this sense, the writer reminds me of another mystery author I love (but I know many people find to be boring) - Tana French who similarly writes well-crafted mysteries but where the main meat of the book is about the characters and their lives and their interior states rather than the specifics of the plots, i.e. the plots are there to drive character and not the other way around. I'd say this book has something similar in that you could see the author's writing facility on display with some interesting undercurrent of darkness and a somewhat messy lead who sits in a self-serving macho moral pocket in which, were he not on the side of hunting down a serial killer, his actions could just as easily be seen as those of a killer himself. I think this is why I liked the book. The lead is broken, perhaps due to the deaths of his wife and daughter, though perhaps not as the backstory hints he was a drunk before any of that happened, and the case - finding the killer - felt mostly like a current obsession to avoid the depression that's going to follow as, when the case is solved, he'll be empty and have nothing once again. I have no idea if that's how the character turns out in the next book btw as I haven't read it yet, but the fact that I could imagine it says something about the writing and the possibilities it presented. Like I said the plot was fine if somewhat trapped in serial-killer genericism and split between two stories, but there’s enough promise here that I’ll be continuing the series.
TV/Streaming:
The Afterparty (Season 1):
It is, once again (not surprisingly given it’s Apple (like here, here, or here chosen at random from my prior brilliance)), utterly baffling to me how this unbelievably awful piece of garbahge was ordered to series. I 100% understand how writers, especially in a comedy room, could convince themselves that their script is HI-LARIOUS but it's inconceivable how anyone outside of that room (read: the executives) could think this show was anything other than completely awful. The basic conceit - and by basic I mean "barely there" - is a locked room mystery in which the host of a high school reunion afterparty is found murdered and each episode focuses on (kind of not really) the POV of one of the attendees via, in the show's mind though completely not at all, a different genre overlay, i.e. - and again, this was barely present - one POV is done like a rom-com, one like a movie musical, etc. etc. all horrific. The awfulness wasn't merely the atrociously unfunny quote unquote comedy - think: "we need to get everyone at the party to write down the word 'diarrhea' but not let them know why because it's secretly a clue to the killer" DIARRHEA IS SO FUNNY - but the abject laziness around crafting even a vaguely credible mystery. After all, we're supposed to watch this thing for multiple episodes with multiple POVs so what do you think about the fact that the only reason the crime isn't solved in episode 2 is that the bumbling cops accidentally erase all the video footage before watching it? Like that's the caliber of the - quote unquote again! - mystery component. As a result it's all just dead air in which there are OTT one-note characters - the weird one, the asshole, etc. whatever - and setups for a sequence of jokes with no payoff framed by the device of using different film genres but actually not doing that at all. Look, I thought Knives Out, this show's genre cousin kind of, was a total snooze but at least it had a construct to it. This is just go-nowhere slop followed by more slop. Though no one handed me the pilot script, I'm gonna take a flier here and say it was as bad as the first episode itself and all subsequent episodes I watched before DNFing. Surely someone at Apple noticed, even if they deluded themselves into thinking this thing was actually funny (and fine - humor is subjective so perhaps someone did), that it didn't have any sustaining mystery structure whatsover nor anything resembling characters or character plots, like there's a thing where two of the characters flirted in high school then one got married to another high schooler and now they're divorced and there's some mess in the threesome which could be an actual plot but is instead just background noise to generate more OTT behavior. There's just nothing here and it's not subtly not there, like I'm not nitpicking, there's actually nothing. Let me put it this way: if you've watched The Pink Panther movies (or cartoon even), you know there's a way to make bumbling cops work in the context of an actual plot. With this show, the bumbling cops don't investigate ANYTHING - the one just sits and interviews and quips (I guess) and that's it. I'd say: if the police of your studio's investigative comedy are too bored to do anything other than sit in an Aeron chair and be mere recipients of other people's (boring) narratives rather than be investigative plot drivers themselves, maybe it's time to send some notes back to the writers. I made it through 3 episodes but really I challenge you to survive the pilot let alone hit play on episode 2. Gauntlet thrown down!
Betty (Season 2):
This is the second (and final I think) season of a meandering but very charming verite comedy about female skateboarders. I guess you could say it's plottier than the first season but really the plots are just there to get the leads into situations the showrunner wants to talk about (like inviting a third woman into your lesbian coupledom or selling out your genuine hipster coolness in order to become Insta famous). I'm going to reiterate the charming part because it really is. In fact the show is little more than charming characters, some snappy dialogue in very current social situations (#MeToo issues around consent and stuff like that), and people skateboarding to really good music. And that's it. Yeah there's some dramatic character stuff like an exploration of what I'm gathering is a real thing (?) where women get into non-prostitute but kinda prostitute situations with rich guys where two hot girls agree to go out with a guy for dinner and he pays them for that in the hopes that he can convince them to go back to his place after and apparently being hot and dining with rich dudes can actually get you a sweet NYC apartment (note to future self). So basically your enjoyment of this show will be entirely based on whether or not you like the meandering pace combined with all the skateboarding with some modernity tossed in and all from a completely female POV (all the leads identify as women as far as I could tell). I liked it in the same way I liked the first season - it's a specific flavor of 6 20ish minute episodes and I enjoyed dropping into it for that short timeframe though in all honesty I'm okay it was cancelled though I'll probably keep an eye on the showrunner to see what she does next.
Lupin (Season 2 or maybe Season 1 Part 2 I can't tell):
However good or bad you thought the first season (or first half of the first season - unclear) was is precisely how you'll feel about this second half, though honestly it's even dumber. Without spoilering anything, which of the following two would you say is the more significant crime, i.e. the one that should grab all your focus and attention: stolen diamonds or child kidnapping? The series chooses the former and if your mindset is that you can go along with that just like in, basically, a Tintin comic book then, well honestly even then I'm not sure you'll like this show. The plot - which I’m not going to explain due to spoiler reasons - picks up exactly where it left off and continues in the exact same vein as the first - Lupin’s always a smirky step ahead of the bad guys; any seeming real danger is magically dissolved into gentle nothing which is the same thing that’s at stake here (nothing); everyone who's against Lupin is a buffoon; and I don't know. I mean I watched the whole thing like I did last time because a hot lead and the episodes being around 40 minutes made it vaguely doable, but really it's such a children's show, like for kids under 10, even though it doesn't bill itself that way, that I found it tough to focus on, which, for background noise, is a pretty low blow I know (rhyme!). This show is an empty void and I think I might need to take a few moments of contemplation to sort out why I watched at all. Phew, that’s over with! If you considered those last two sentences to be deep, plotty, and engaging, you will totally love this show.
Movies:
Thor: Ragnarok (Marvel Universe #17) - By far the best of the Thors (though I'm not sure that's saying much given the caliber of prior ones (here and here)) primarily because, at some point in the movie, the writers decided to have Thor stop being a Sassy Sigvalde dismissive of all danger at all times - pet peeve yeah but it's a character trait in so many action movies that's SO BORING because a character being unconcerned about his/her/their fate, while perhaps perfectly fine for children's movies where you don't want to scare them (see Lupin above), is crazy dull and predictable in a movie for anyone over age 10 as characters caring about their lives and trying to survive is, you know, more interesting. Where was I? Oh yeah, Thor eventually taking the situation seriously combined with Cate Blanchett playing pure evil (and why hasn't she always been playing pure evil?) made for a much more entertaining deep dive into Norse mythology or whatever anyone's claiming this is. And by "much more entertaining" I'm referring solely to the latter half as several times during the first 250,000 hours of this film, "much more entertaining" was the dreams I slipped into, like I know Gods live for eternity and therefore can afford to yammer at each other about plot for that long, but I got a ticking clock here, Marvel!
So as far as I could gather between nodding off, snacking, dreaming of snacking while nodding off, watching the movie but as it turned out actually nodding off, and taking a quick nap to refresh myself after all that exhausting sleeping, Thor starts off - sassily and unconcerned as noted above - trapped in some kind of harness situation by one of those big fire-and-exposition-spewing demons where the two of them go into some intensive and intimate verbal foreplay about what they're going to do to each all made 5000 Kelvins hotter than whatever fire the demon possesses by Thor being filmed entirely with his head tilted and thus allowing his locks to flow behind him like a luscious rough-dried blond waterfall scrunched into place by countless gel/creme/mud-filled hands, fingers shaping the strands into a careless cascade of beach waves, every head tilt ablaze as if Thor's skull were encased in upside-down flames more powerful and texturized than the fire any planet-destroying demon could ever dream of conjuring. At some point after 4000 hours of banter, the demon reveals, in a moment he really maybe should've thought about twice, that his plan to destroy Thor's home planet of Asgard - said destruction being the ragnarok of the title - requires that he be rejoined with his helmet at which point Thor, engaging in some exciting dom/sub power exchange, tops from the bottom by magically unraveling himself and snatching the helmet before fleeing, though why he stayed tied up for so long and didn't just grab the helmet to begin with is beyond me, and somehow thinking of any of that seemed to be beyond any of the writers or anyone at the studio.
So basically the plot revolves around one of those typical Norwegian family relationships, i.e. the one where the father creates an offworld prison for his wild hellcat eldest daughter who's going to be freed upon his death and, when that happens, because her power comes directly from the planet, she comes home and enslaves everybody. Though once again the "to what end" component is missing as it seems to be missing from all of these movies. Yeah yeah I get it (kind of): everyone wants to be in charge and have a bunch of fawning slaves - that, after all, was exactly Hela-the-hellcat's brother Loki's quote unquote motivation for bringing a bunch of alien lizard invaders to Earth in The Avengers - but maybe come to think of it I don't get it. I mean play this out: let's pretend, for the sake of argument plus my own delight in crafting the argument, that Hela - that would be Cate Blanchett - takes over Asgard and, as per her desire, gets some mega-sword called Bifrost (bi is a real thing, peoples! (though my personal thesis is you're really only bi if you're still bi in your 30s (and oh I’m already imagining/living for the Twitter venom from that statement!))) which will allow her to take over more planets I guess. Great, you've done that Hela, kudos! Now what? Really. You have a bajillion slaves, tons of planets, but are you happy? And what are you doing with all of them? I mean, yes, I loooooooooooooooooooooved watching Cate Blanchett is her big headdress, booming voice, and sweetie-pie/planet-murdering-enslaver intonation in every single scene she was in but, uh, nothing she did made any sense, as this motivation - the same motivation over and over and over in all of these movies I might add - makes absolutely no sense.
Though then again, maybe if you're a disempowered Hollywood writer being bossed around by an endless stream of executives, producers, megastars, and basically anyone who has a passing opinion about your script, taking over multiple planets and enslaving everyone might be the only way you can get them all to SHUT UP AND STOP GIVING YOU NOTES. So perhaps I'm rethinking my metaphor. This movie is actually a writer-revenge fantasy in which Cate Blanchett is a screenwriter imprisoned by "Odin" aka all Hollywood executives and their endless stream of terrible notes which you have to do no matter how dumb they are because the studio’s paying you and, upon Odin's death (read: the executive leaving to give dumb notes at another studio - probably Apple based on their current output), Cate Blanchett sees her one window of opportunity to exert her take on the movie before the new exec takes over and, empowered by the boxoffice of the prior movies, leaves her second home in Oregon and returns to Hollywood where she asserts her vision of the film and listens to no notes at all EVER AGAIN!
Though come to think of it… complete writer freedom combined with a lack of smart notes - which basically encapsulates Netflix's entire strategy (primarily the lack of smart notes part) - might be how the script wound up with 200 hours of dialogue, a motivationless plot, character traits drawn entirely from basically ever other action movie ever made - like my Sassy Sigvalde pet peeve above - with the laziness of repeating character themes from prior movies as in much like Spidey was told his power was him and not the suit, so is Thor told the power is him and not his hammer (to hardly mention the pile-on of "Asgard is the people not the place") - and crafting ostensible superheroes who actually murder (millions in this case) and destroy property (an entire planet in this case) all in the name of a greater good.
In which case, total plot twist! The ending, in which - no it’s so obviously coming I’m not counting this as a spoiler - Cate Blanchett and Asgard are totally wiped out by the demon I guess means Cate was, in my metaphor, replaced by another writer, a fire-breathing A-lister who, in order to wrest screenplay credit from the prior writers, performs a ragnarok on all the writing that came before before so, upon sending the drafts off to the WGA for arbitration, he/she/they will be given sole credit.
So I take back everything I said. This movie is an act of scathing genius using the tropes of Norse mythology to serve as a potent metaphor for modern-day Hollywood business strategies. Golf claps and godt gjort, all involved!