"Broom-Stick Bunny"

"Broom-Stick Bunny" (short), 1956. Bugs Bunny goes trick-or-treating at a witch's house.

Directed by Chuck Jones. Written by Tedd Pierce. Starring Mel Blanc.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). Pleasantly entertaining. It only got a laugh out of me once, but it was a pretty big laugh.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.5/4 (Okay)

Star Trek: Generations

Star Trek: Generations, 1994. A desperate man is willing to kill millions in order to return to a magical timeless joy vortex.

Directed by David Carson. Written by Ronald D. Moore & Brannon Braga; story by Rick Berman, Moore & Braga, based on a TV show by Gene Roddenberry. Starring Patrick Stewart.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 1/4 (Bad). Some plot holes, and lots of half-assed writing. But at least it's a type of story that hadn't already been done in a Star Trek movie.
Characters: 1/4 (Bad). The biggest problem with this movie (and that's really saying something - there are some huge problems with this movie) is the gross mishandling of the characters. They introduce at least a dozen characters in the movie (not counting the three original series characters), as if it were the pilot to a new TV show. If they had done all of those introductions right, the movie would have been two hours long before it even got started. Even as it is, there's no time left for what might otherwise have been an interesting villain to do anything more than push the occasional Destroy Solar System button. Meanwhile Kirk shows up just for the sake of being in the movie, doing nothing relevant to the story. And then there's Data... In a lot of ways his character is the heart and soul of TNG, but this movie takes seven years of development and wedges it, along with a neat-and-tidy resolution to his entire character arc, into less than 10 minutes of gratuitous comic relief.
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good). There are some valiant attempts (mostly involving turning off all of the Enterprise's interior lights) to make a 1980's TV set not look awful on film.
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). It's made of disappointment. The control and writing was in the hands of television producers, and they clearly treated it with the same weight as an episode of one their shows. But if you go in with low expectations, it's still reasonably entertaining. Better than a lot of TNG episodes, worse than the average TOS/TNG cross-over episode.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.0/4 (Indifferent)

MythBusters: 2003 Season

MythBusters: 2003 Season* [year one]. A couple special effects guys test whether various urban legends are possible.

Created by Peter Rees. Directed by Rees (5 episodes) & ? (6). Starring Jamie Hyneman & Adam Savage.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: n/a
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). After having seen some more recent episodes, I was starting to wonder what I was thinking years ago, when I gave some of the "collection" sets an 8 out of 10. I am surprised and delighted to find that (even having seen all these episodes before) the early days of MythBusters are indeed completely awesome. There's something about watching these two figuring stuff out (usually stuff you'd genuinely like to know the answer to), and often creating destruction in the process, that is just plain entertaining.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.6/4 (Good)

(quasi-update of previous posts - originals are here and here)

*There doesn't seem to be any standard for what constitutes a season of MythBusters. No two sources I can find agree with each other. So I'm going with Wikipedia's arbitrary but conveniently simple method of dividing the show by broadcast year.

Conan the Barbarian

Conan the Barbarian, 1982. Badass antihero vs. evil snake cult.

Directed by John Milius. Written by Milius & Oliver Stone, based on stories by Robert E. Howard. Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 3/4 (Good)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good). A lot of it is surprisingly great. Then again, a lot of it is standard 80s action movie crap.
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 4/4 (Great)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). The first half hour or so of this movie is brilliant. There's huge cinematic potential for Conan, and for that brief moment at the beginning of it all, they get it right. As for the rest of the movie, there's nothing particularly wrong with it - just a perfectly good but unremarkable action movie, with a handful of memorable scenes.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.7/4 (Good)

Doctor Who #47: The Krotons

Doctor Who: "The Krotons," 1968-1969 (the fourth story of seven from season six). Unseen aliens/machines need strong minds and destroy what they can't use.

Created by Sydney Newman, C.E. Webber & Donald Wilson. Directed by David Maloney. Written by Robert Holmes. Starring Patrick Troughton, Frazer Hines & Wendy Padbury.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent). Good writing for the regulars. The guests are all crap.
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent). Some nice funny lines. Some terrible dramatic lines.
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent). Great sets. Terrible monsters.
Acting: 1/4 (Bad)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). Sometimes it's very good, sometimes it's pretty bad - in just about every aspect of the show. There's more good than bad, but the bad is bad enough that I can't bring myself to give it any "good" scores. I enjoyed watching it well enough. Zoe's very mini miniskirt doesn't hurt.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.9/4 (Eh)

"High and Dizzy"

"High and Dizzy" (short), 1920. A boy meets a girl who sleepwalks; then he gets very drunk.

Directed by Hal Roach. Written by Frank Terry. Starring Harold Lloyd.

Concept: 3/4 (Good). A slapstick-oriented idea for a slapstick film - surprisingly rare.
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good). I could be wrong, but I think this is the first of Harold's signature top-of-a-building shots.
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). The drunk stuff is very funny, featuring a lot of Harold just being an ass. It's been a while since I watched Safety Last, but I'd say the building-scaling stuff in this film is better than that one - the focus here is on being funny, rather than impressing with stunts.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.5/4 (Okay)

Breaking Bad: Season Three

Breaking Bad: Season Three, 2010. Everyone's favorite meth-cooking science teacher goes to work for a powerful boss.

Created by Vince Gilligan. Directed by Michelle MacLaren (3 episodes), Adam Bernstein (2), Bryan Cranston (1), Scott Winant (1), Johan Renck (1), John Shiban (1), Colin Bucksey (1), Michael Slovis (1), Rian Johnson (1) & Gilligan (1). Written by Peter Gould (3 episodes), Sam Catlin (3), Gilligan (2), George Mastras (2), Moira Walley-Beckett (2), John Shiban (2), Thomas Schnauz (2) & Gennifer Hutchison (1). Starring Bryan Cranston.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 3/4 (Good)
Characters: 4/4 (Great)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). When I think about it, it's a little hard to judge this season, thanks to the frustrating cliff hanger ending. I feel like I just watched the first two acts of a movie. But at least I won't have to wait a year for season four like the poor bastards who watched the show when it aired did.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.4/4 (Very good)

Midnight Cowboy

From my Best Picture Marathon, part 2 of 6.



Midnight Cowboy, 1969. A Texan moves to New York to become a male prostitute.

Directed by John Schlesinger. Written by Waldo Salt, based on a book by James Leo Herlihy. Starring Jon Voight & Dustin Hoffman.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 4/4 (Great)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). It has its moments. When its about Joe and Rico's relationship, it's pretty good. Most of the Naive Texan stuff is not particularly interesting. And I found the many dream/memory/fantasy sequences to be quite dull, and a lazy way to establish characters.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.8/4 (Good)

Sesame Street: Old School, Volume Three

Sesame Street: Old School Volume Three, 1979-1984 (one episode each from seasons 11 through 15, plus bonus segments). Big Bird learns about the world.

Created by Joan Ganz Cooney. Directed by Lisa Simon (seasons 13-15), Robert Myhrum (11), Jon Stone (12) & Emily Squires (14). Written by Norman Stiles (seasons 11-15), Sara Compton (11-15), Judy Freudberg (11-15), Tony Geiss (11-15), Emily Perl Kingsley (11-15), Luis Santeiro (11-15), Ray Sipherd (11-14), John Glines (11-13), Joseph A. Bailey (13-15), Tom Dunsmuir (13-15), David Korr (13-15), Peter Swet (11-12), Jeffrey Moss (14-15) & Gary Belkin (15). Starring Caroll Spinney.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 0/4 (Terrible)
Characters: 3/4 (Good). Sesame Street has some of my favorite characters of all time, but you don't see much of them here.
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 3/4 (Good). Weirdly, they cut out the theme song. Did they not want to pay royalties or something?
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). I'm hugely disappointed in this DVD set. The Muppets featured in the story segments of these episodes are limited to Big Bird, Snuffleupagus and Oscar - and 90% of it is just Big Bird. Meanwhile, there are only five bonus sketches included per season. In all, there are probably only about 25 Muppet sketches total in the entire set, including a few that were already in volumes one and two. Those volumes had something like three times as much Muppet. Still, it's classic Sesame Street, and I love classic Sesame Street, so even a small cross section of it is better than nothing.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.3/4 (Okay)

Thunderball

Thunderball, 1965. The world is held for ransom with stolen nuclear bombs.

Directed by Terence Young. Written by Richard Maibaum & John Hopkins, based on a screenplay by Jack Whittingham; story by Kevin McClory, Whittingham & Ian Fleming. Starring Sean Connery.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). My wife tells me that this isn't meant to be a comedy. I didn't believe her, until I read online just now that the jetpack was a real working jetpack. So... I guess it's just a bad movie. I still enjoyed it, though, as an Adam-West's-Batman-style campy comedy.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.8/4 (Eh)

Titanic

From my Best Picture Marathon, part 1 of 6.



Titanic, 1997. An engaged woman's fiance doesn't like her new boyfriend.

Written & directed by James Cameron. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio & Kate Winslet.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 0/4 (Terrible)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 1/4 (Bad)
Subjective Rating: 1/10 (Eew get it away, 0/4). I hate this movie so much. At first, during the first hour or two, I was thinking it wasn't as bad as I'd remembered it. Terrible writing, but watchable. But then it keeps getting steadily worse. By the time we got to "I'll never let go," it was so awful it made me want to scream. I have watched many a bad movie, but I can't think of any others that are so bad they make me angry. Movies I don't like because they make me angry, sure, but movies that make me angry because I don't like them? It's a weird reaction. I mean, if it's a bad movie, why do I care enough to be angry with it?
Objective Rating (Average): 1.6/4 (Eh)

Tabletop: Season One

Tabletop: Season One, 2012-2013. Minor celebrities (and some not-so-celebrities) play board games.

Created by Wil Wheaton & Felicia Day. Directed by Jennifer Arnold. Starring Wheaton.

Concept: 4/4 (Great)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent). Every one of these episodes could be at least twice the length.
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: n/a
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 9/10 (One of my favorites, 4/4 5/4). Shoestring budget and slightly grating host be damned, this is the best non-fiction show I've ever seen. It's such a simple and great idea - entertaining people, hanging out and having fun. Also, board games. I love board games. If you don't love board games, then... you probably haven't watched Tabletop. This show can drastically change the way you use your free time and disposable income. There's an entire blog out there dedicated to sharing stories of how people's lives were changed by watching Tabletop.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.6/4 2.7/4 (Good)

"One Froggy Evening"

"One Froggy Evening" (short), 1955. A man finds a singing and dancing frog.

Directed by Chuck Jones. Written by Michael Maltese.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 3/4 (Good)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: n/a
Pacing: 4/4 (Great)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). Generally speaking, great Looney Tunes cartoons have lots of gags and a story that doesn't do much other than provide a framework for the gags. This one's the other way around: there aren't any gags that don't directly contribute to telling the story. Personally, I prefer Roadrunner cartoons over this one, although this approach clearly makes for a more artful end result. And it's funny besides.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.1/4 (Very good)

"Guided Muscle"

"Guided Muscle" (short), 1955. Coyote tries to catch Road Runner.

Directed by Chuck Jones. Written by Michael Maltese.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good). It ends with a rare "verbal" gag that's actually as funny as the visual gags.
Pacing: 4/4 (Great)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). I'm pleasantly surprised, half a dozen sequels in, to find that this series has yet to lose anything. If anything, it's improving.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.9/4 (Good)

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

Kaze no tani no Naushika, 1984. A toxic swamp is taking over the world.

Written & directed by Hayao Miyazaki, based on his comic book. Starring Sumi Shimamoto.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 4/4 (Great)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 1/4 (Bad)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). I didn't really care about the plot or characters, but I was happy to go along for the ride anyway. The artwork is amazing, the monsters are cool, and the world he's created is interesting enough to hold my attention for two hours.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.6/4 (Good)

Top Hat

Top Hat, 1935. Boy meets girl, girl mistakes boy for her friend's husband.

Directed by Mark Sandrich. Written by Dwight Taylor & Allan Scott; story by Taylor. Starring Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good). Great up until "The Piccolino."
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 3/4 (Good). Again, great up until "The Piccolino."
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). Only one of the dance numbers is as jaw-droppingly joy-inducing as the stuff in Swing Time, but it's pretty much all delightful. Fred and Ginger are charming, and the supporting cast performs miracles by making great comedy out of a script that might have been something you just sit through while waiting for the next dance number.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.7/4 (Good)

"Page Miss Glory"

"Page Miss Glory" (short), 1936. A bellhop needs to page "Miss Glory."

Directed by Tex Avery. Starring Tommy Bond.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 0/4 (Terrible)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). It uses Art Deco style as a storytelling device, which puts it in a completely different world, visually, from any other cartoon that I've seen from this era. So that's interesting. It also has some laughs (from the dance number pictured above), which also makes it stand out from other cartoons that I've seen from this era. It's still far from good, though. There's no story to speak of (just a lot of singing and dancing) and no real gags (at least not anything like what I think of as a Looney Tunes gag).
Objective Rating (Average): 1.8/4 (Eh)

"Watch the Birdie"

"Watch the Birdie" (short), 1935. A practical joker makes a bad impression on a girl's father.

Directed by Lloyd French. Written by Dolph Singer & Jack Henley. Starring Bob Hope.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 5/10 (Indifferent, 2/4). It has a few good laughs (interestingly, none of them coming from Bob Hope), but not nearly enough to make up for 20 minutes of lazy story and character writing.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.8/4 (Eh)

Blood Simple

Blood Simple, 1985. A husband gets murdery when his wife leaves him.

Directed by Joel Coen. Written by Joel & Ethan Coen. Starring John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya & M. Emmet Walsh.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 4/4 (Great)
Characters: 3/4 (Good)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). I was skeptical for the first half of the movie. It's slow to get going, and looks and feels very low budget. But once the suspense really starts to kick in, it's crazy great. The Coens hadn't got their voice yet (it feels more like a Hitchcock film than a Coen Brothers film, if Hitchcock had been an American in the 1980s), but none-the-less they sure knew what they were doing.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.2/4 (Very good)

VSM: Best Picture Winners

Next up: some Oscar winners we need to see, in no particular order.

Very Slow Marathon #14 - Best Picture Winners
-A Beautiful Mind, 2001
-Dances with Wolves, 1990
-The French Connection, 1971
-Midnight Cowboy, 1969
-Titanic, 1997
-You Can't Take It with You, 1938

Barbarella

From my 1960s Science Fiction Marathon, part 6 of 6.



Barbarella, 1968. A sexy space agent searches for a dangerous man on an alien planet.

Directed by Roger Vadim. Written by Terry Southern & Vadim, with Vittorio Bonicelli, Clement Biddle Wood, Brian Degas & Tudor Gates, based on a comic by Jean-Claude Forest. Starring Jane Fonda.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 1/4 (Bad)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good). Mostly great. Occasionally terrible.
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent). Fonda is good. She has the perfect delivery to turn bad lines into funny lines.
Music: 1/4 (Bad). I really want to love this soundtrack. Its heart is in the right place. It just happens to be awful.
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). The sole point of this movie is Jane Fonda in (and out of) a series of skimpy costumes. And in that they have succeeded. Otherwise, though, there's not much. There's some humor, but not enough. There's an attempt at campy space adventure, but it's not any fun. And there's even some action - some of the worst action scenes this side of Michael Bay.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.7/4 (Eh)

"Hyde and Hare"

"Hyde and Hare" (short), 1955. Bugs Bunny is adopted by Dr. Jekyll.

Directed by Friz Freleng. Written by Warren Foster. Starring Mel Blanc.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). Most of the cartoon is just the same joke repeated four or five times.  But there's a lot of stuff I like about it - particularly nice artwork, some funny acting from Bugs in the beginning, and one of Carl Stalling's better scores (which is saying something).
Objective Rating (Average): 2.7/4 (Good)

Breaking Bad: Season Two

Breaking Bad: Season Two, 2009. The meth-cooking odd couple tries to get their business running.

Created by Vince Gilligan. Directed by Terry McDonough (2 episodes), Adam Bernstein (2), Bryan Cranston (1), Charles Haid (1), John Dahl (1), Johan Renck (1), Peter Medak (1), Felix Alcala (1), Michelle MacLaren (1), Phil Abraham (1) & Colin Bucksey (1). Written by J. Roberts (2 episodes), George Mastras (2), Peter Gould (2), Sam Catlin (2), Moira Walley-Beckett (2), Gilligan (2) & John Shiban (2). Starring Bryan Cranston.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 3/4 (Good)
Characters: 4/4 (Great)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 8/10 (Great, 4/4). Intense and fun. The overarching plot doesn't have much direction; the story is basically a series of mechanisms to get the characters to develop the way they want. Not that there's anything wrong with that. That's just the kind of show they're making, and to say they excel at it is a huge understatement. Still, there are a lot of plot strands that seem to be building to something but are just left behind, and it's a much more episodic show than season one was.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.4/4 (Very good)

Doctor Who #151: Dragonfire

Doctor Who: "Dragonfire," 1987 (the final story of four from season twenty-four). An ice planet/grocery store has an evil mastermind and maybe a dragon.

Created by Sydney Newman, C.E. Webber & Donald Wilson. Directed by Chris Clough. Written by Ian Briggs. Starring Sylvester McCoy, Bonnie Langford & Sophie Aldred.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 0/4 (Terrible)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad). It has its moments, though.
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 1/4 (Bad)
Special effects/design: 1/4 (Bad)
Acting: 1/4 (Bad)
Music: 0/4 (Terrible)
Subjective Rating: 3/10 (Bad, 1/4). Horrible, horrible writing. Despite a simple plot, nothing about it makes any sense. There are some attempts at humor, but they're pretty bad and I wasn't always sure if something was meant to be funny or if it was just funny asinine because it was such crap. McCoy is always clowning regardless of the intended tone of a scene, which makes it feel like he's just not taking the role seriously, rather than that the character is silly. Not that you can really blame him considering the scripts they were giving him.
Objective Rating (Average): 0.9/4 (Very bad)