The Walking Dead: Season One

Lynn’s Druthers Marathon, part 4

Data
Title: The Walking Dead: Season One
Year: 2010
Network: AMC
Episodes: 6; 1 at 64 minutes, 5 at 45 minutes
Creators: Frank Darabont (developer); Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore & Charlie Adlard (graphic novels)
Directors: Frank Darabont (1 episode), Ernest Dickerson (1), Guy Ferland (1), Gwyneth Horder-Payton (1), Michelle MacLaren (1), Johan Renck (1)
Writers: Frank Darabont (4 episodes), Charles H. Eglee (1), Adam Fierro (1), Robert Kirkman (1), Jack LoGiudice (1), Glen Mazzara (1)
Starring: Andrew Lincoln, Jon Bernthal, Sarah Wayne Callies
Music: Bear McCreary (and non-original music)
I saw it: online (free VOD from Amazon), over the past few days
Synopsis: some self-important people survive the zombie apocalypse

My reaction
Concept:
Story:
Characters:
Dialog:
Pacing:
Cinematography:
Special effects/design:
Acting:
Music:
Subjective Rating: 3/10 (Bad, ). I was really expecting this to be awesome. Turns out it's just a bad soap opera. There's about ten or fifteen minutes of action/horror stuff in each episode, and those bits are really good, but otherwise it's terrible.
Objective Rating (Average):

Animal Kingdom

Data
Title: Animal Kingdom
Year: 2010
Length: 113 minutes
Director: David Michôd
Writer: David Michôd
Starring: Ben Mendelsohn, Joel Edgerton, Guy Pearce, Luke Ford, Jacki Weaver, Sullivan Stapleton, James Frecheville, Laura Wheelwright
Music: Antony Partos (and non-original music)
Oscars: nomination for Best Supporting Actress (Weaver)
I saw it: on video (rented from Netflix), yesterday
Synopsis: a teenager moves in with his bank-robbing uncles

My reaction
Concept:
Story:
Characters: You get a sense of some of these guys being really interesting characters, but they never really come through clearly. No one has any background or motivation beyond what's necessary for the plot. The protagonist, meanwhile, is hardly even a character at all. If the movie didn't start with a voice-over by him, you probably couldn't tell he's supposed to be the protagonist.
Dialog:
Pacing:
Cinematography:
Special effects/design:
Acting: There are moments of greatness. There's also a lot of just creepy stares or uncontrollable sobbing. In the end, though, I have to give the actors credit for creating the characters (because they certainly don't come from the writing).
Music:
Subjective Rating: 4/10 (Eh, ). Unpleasant people being unpleasant to each other. It's well made and fairly original - I just don't like this kind of movie (the humorless, cynical crime film) enough to like one that's anything less than amazing.
Objective Rating (Average):

Star Trek: "Arena"

Data
Title: Star Trek: “Arena”
Year: 1967
Network: NBC
Episode: the eighteenth (of twenty-nine) from season one; 50 minutes
Creator: Gene Roddenberry
Director: Joseph Pevney
Writers: Gene L. Coon, story by Fredric Brown
Starring: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley
Music: Alexander Courage
I saw it: on video and TV several times, most recently a few days ago (have on DVD)
Synopsis: the pursuit of hostile aliens is interrupted by a third, more powerful species

My reaction
Concept:
Story: It starts out so promising and exciting, but somehow ends up revolving around Kirk making gunpowder.
Characters:
Dialog:
Pacing: The first half is great. The second half is pretty dull.
Cinematography:
Special effects/design:
Acting:
Music:
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, ). It's got a lot wrong with it, especially with the script. The first half of the episode, with action and battles and strategizing, is really damn good. Then some god-like powers show up, and it falls apart.
Objective Rating (Average):

127 Hours

Data
Title: 127 Hours
Year: 2010
Length: 94 minutes
Director: Danny Boyle
Writers: Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy, based on a book by Aron Ralston
Starring: James Franco
Music: A.R. Rahman (and non-original music)
Oscars: nominations for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor (Franco), Best Score, Best Song ("If I Rise") and Best Editing
I saw it: in the theater, yesterday
Synopsis: a hiker's arm gets stuck under a boulder

My reaction
Concept: Reeeeally was not expecting to like this movie.
Story:
Characters: Yeah, that's right - it's the true story of a guy cutting his arm off, and it has great characters. What the hey?
Dialog:
Pacing: After watching it, I'd have guessed it to be about 2½ hours long. I don't know why that is, though, because it's exciting, fast and certainly never boring.
Cinematography:
Special effects/design:
Acting:
Music:
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, ). Just about as intense as a movie could possibly get. I don't know why that's enough to make me like it. Usually I don't care for these sorts of things that are hard to watch, but this one's different somehow. Maybe it's because when it's at its worst, ick-wise, is when the character is fighting hardest.
Objective Rating (Average):

Star Trek: "The Squire of Gothos"

Data
Title: Star Trek: “The Squire of Gothos”
Year: 1967
Network: NBC
Episode: the seventeenth (of twenty-nine) from season one; 50 minutes
Creator: Gene Roddenberry
Director: Don McDougall
Writers: Paul Schneider
Starring: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, William Campbell
Music: Alexander Courage
I saw it: on video and TV several times, most recently yesterday (have on DVD)
Synopsis: a childish being with god-like powers is interested in humans

My reaction
Concept: Here we go with the god-like powers again...
Story:
Characters:
Dialog:
Pacing:
Cinematography:
Special effects/design: Sound effects!
Acting:
Music:
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, ). Well, at least the god-like powers are the result of advanced technology, and not some ESP nonsense, so you can believe that the good guys might possibly win through their own agency. But of course they don't. It's just the same old waiting-for-the-deus-ex-machina bullshit again. One of my least favorite episodes.
Objective Rating (Average):