Mini Media Reviews February 1st-28th
Lark Rise to Candleford
Seasons 2 & 3
2009-2010
British Period Drama
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LRtC has nice enough production values, costuming, and acting, but for some reason I just can't like it as much as I feel I should. The protagonist Laura is smug and self-absorbed under her girl-next-door surface. Her cousin the fiercely independent and quirky postmistress Dorcas Lane was interesting in the first season. However second season rewards Dorcas' poor decisions and self-righteous behavior in ways that frustrate me. There are too many proud characters whose worst faults are constantly condoned no matter who they make trouble for. Nothing TERRIBLE happens, all problems are more or less sorted out by the end of each episode. The main problem of LRtC is the message is confused. Each episode begins with a message or moral narrated by an older Laura, but it just never seems to ring really true. The script seems busy trying to shoehorn the message as an afterthought rather than an organic part of the narrative.
Dorcas Lane went from being my favorite character to one of my least favorite. Miss Pearl Pratt gets a lot of character development in these seasons which is wonderful to watch. Zillah's replacement Minnie is a delight.
4/10 for Season Two, too many storylines pissed me off
5/10 for Season Three, I'd rewatch Miss Pearl's F/F rabu-rabu romance episode again and again
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The Last Detective
Seasons 3 & 4
2005-2007
British Crime Drama
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The mysteries continue to be interesting and make the most of the 75 minute run time to be complex and thoughtful. Everyone continues to be a jerk to Dangerous and his marriage is essentially over. That is until the writers decide that Dangerous and his wife should get back together despite the fact that she neither loves nor respects him. All I know is that I ship Dangerous x Mod even harder than the previous seasons because their bond continues to deepen and solidify. So anticipate a ship manifesto because I love these characters so much. Or not because there is no fandom.
7.5/10, the extra half point is for Mod's biscuit tasting evening
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Jeeves and Wooster
Season 2
1991
British Period Drama
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Some secondary characters get recast, but the writing remains top-notch and the pacing improves. Love the characters, love the high jinks, and love the period language.
9/10
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Mirror, Mirror
Fantasy Movie
2012
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This isn't a subpar retelling of Snow White. This is an awful retelling of Snow White. Clearly there were creative people working on this film. The castle set design is sumptuous, the costumes are decadent, and the evil queen has her own MYST island of evil magic. Then people open their mouths and the writing is less believable than a CW teen drama. The dwarves get no characterization, Snow & the Prince commit the ultimate crime of being boring, and the worldbuilding makes no sense. For a 100 minute movie there are about 15 interesting minutes and 85 painful minutes. I recommend watching the scenes of Julia Roberts being an over-the-top crazy queen then fast forward through the rest of the movie until you get to the Bollywood inspired music video at the end.
Also what was the demograph for this film? It pays too much attention to the queen for it to really appeal to the pre-teen and teen crowd. But there isn't enough queen to be interesting to adult viewers. Instead we're left with something that wishes it were as charming Ever After, but is too busy preening to notice its flaws.
This would probably have been a much better film if it was about a witch queen's midlife crisis and had nothing to do with Snow White.
-15/10, for the 85minutes of my life I'll never get back
10/10 for 15 minutes of crazy queen witch ballsiness and Nathan Lane