"Now or Never"

"Now or Never" (short), 1921. A boy is an awkward babysitter, on a train.

Directed by Hal Roach & Fred C. Newmeyer. Written by Sam Taylor, with H.M. Walker. Starring Harold Lloyd.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 4/10 (Eh, 2/4). Not funny. It's never outright boring, but after it was over I felt like I'd wasted my time watching it. There are about 2 or 3 worthwhile minutes out of 35.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.8/4 (Eh)

"Whoa, Be-Gone!"

"Whoa, Be-Gone!" (short), 1958. 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: 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). The Road Runner series seems to be hit and miss by the late 50s, but when they hit, they're as great as ever. This is one of the best cartoons in the entire series.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.9/4 (Good)

"Show Biz Bugs"

"Show Biz Bugs" (short), 1957. Daffy Duck vs. Bugs Bunny on stage.

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

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). Great ending, mediocre everything else. Even the musical numbers (usually Freleng's strength) are unmemorable.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.2/4 (Okay)

"Zoom and Bored"

"Zoom and Bored" (short), 1957. 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: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 4/4 (Great)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent). This is the cartoon that had its production time cut short to make room for "What's Opera, Doc?" and it shows. The quality, on a technical level, is worse than any Looney Tunes of this era that I've seen.
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). A couple gags are amusingly quirky, with nearly Bob Clampett levels of weird. There's also some filler, but the timing's good enough to keep it funny. It's a shame, though. There are some unique ideas in here. If they'd taken the time to do it right, this could have been really great.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.5/4 (Okay)

Seven Psychopaths

Seven Psychopaths, 2012. A screenwriter's friend causes trouble with the mafia.

Written & directed by Martin McDonagh. Starring Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell & Christopher Walken.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent). I'm sure it was really clever back in the 90s. Oh, wait, this movie's from 2012? Really? Because I'm pretty sure it's from c. 1998.
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 4/4 (Great)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good).
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). A perfectly good movie, but never much more than that.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.0/4 (Good)

Star Trek: Voyager: Season One

Star Trek: Voyager: Season One, 1995. A spaceship pulled to the other side of the galaxy makes its way home.

Created by Rick Berman, Michael Piller & Jeri Taylor. Directed by Winrich Kolbe (5 episodes), Kim Friedman (3), Les Landau (3), David Livingston (3), LeVar Burton (1) & Robert Scheerer (1). Written by Michael Piller (5 episodes), Brannon Braga (5), Jeri Taylor (3), Kenneth Biller (2), David Kemper (1), Skye Dent (1), Tom Szollosi (1), Bill Dial (1), Evan Carlos Somers (1), Michael Perricone (1), George Elliot (1), Chris Abbott (1), Naren Shankar (1), Jack Klein (1), Karen Klein (1), Ronald Wilkerson (1), Jean Louise Matthias (1), Rick Berman (1), Jim Trombetta (1), Timothy De Haas (1), Hilary Bader (1), David R. George III (1), Eric A. Stillwell (1), Paul Robert Coyle (1), Joe Menosky (1), Jonathan Glassner (1), James Thornton (1) & Scott Nimerfro (1). Starring Kate Mulgrew.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 3/4 (Good). Hands down the best-acted first season of a Star Trek spin-off series. (So far - I haven't seen Enterprise yet.) That's not exactly an impressive feat, but still. Unexpected. It's a damn shame the writers don't give Mulgrew anything to work with.
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). So damn refreshing. For the first time since the seventies (or the sixties if you don't count the animated series), Star Trek is about what the famous theme song monologue says it's about - which basically boils down to science fiction adventures.  The writing might not actually be any better than Deep Space Nine, but when you're an adventure show, you can get away with a lot more.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.2/4 (Okay)

"What's Opera, Doc?"

"What's Opera, Doc?" (short), 1957. Bugs Bunny vs. Elmer Fudd in a Wagnerian opera.

Directed by Chuck Jones. Written by Michael Maltese. Starring Mel Blanc & Arthur Q. Bryan.

Concept: 3/4 (Good)
Story: 3/4 (Good)
Characters: 3/4 (Good)
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 4/4 (Great)
Cinematography: 4/4 (Great)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 9/10 (One of my favorites, 4/4 5/4). There are a few cartoons that I like more than this (for instance, "The Great Piggy Bank Robbery," Pixar's "Boundin'," several Don Hertzfeldt films). But I wouldn't care to argue that any of them are better than this.
Objective Rating (Average): 3.6/4 3.7/4 (Great)

The Master

The Master, 2012. A violent ex-sailor befriends a cult leader.

Written & directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Starring Joaquin Phoenix.

Concept: 1/4 (Bad)
Story: 0/4 (Terrible). I have no idea what Anderson was trying to do with this story. I wonder if he even had any idea himself.
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent). Potentially great characters, wasted in a story that doesn't do anything interesting with them.
Dialog: 3/4 (Good)
Pacing: 1/4 (Bad)
Cinematography: 4/4 (Great)
Special effects/design: 4/4 (Great)
Acting: 4/4 (Great)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 3/10 (Bad, 1/4). It doesn't really matter that this movie has crazy-great acting and cinematography. It basically amounts to a lot of interesting-looking people, sitting around in pretty photographs for 2½ hours. I had low expectations (thanks to the reviews - critics apparently didn't get anything more out of it than I did), but never would have suspected that a Paul Thomas Anderson movie could be this boring.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.4/4 (Okay)

"Scrambled Aches"

"Scrambled Aches" (short), 1957. 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: 2/4 (Indifferent)
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). Oh! They're back in form. What a pleasant surprise.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.8/4 (Good)

"Number, Please?"

"Number, Please?" (short), 1920. A boy and his rival both want to go on a carnival ride with a girl.

Directed by Hal Roach & Fred C. Newmeyer. Written by H.M. Walker. Starring Harold Lloyd.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). It continues with what is apparently the norm for Harold Lloyd films circa 1920: unmemorable but pleasant. No slapstick, no stunts - just antics.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.1/4 (Indifferent)

"Three Little Bops"

"Three Little Bops" (short), 1957. The Big Bad Wolf wants to play in the Three Little Pigs' band.

Directed by Friz Freleng. Written by Warren Foster. Starring Stan Freberg.

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: 3/4 (Good)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). I should have loved something with this much overt mid-century style, but it didn't do much for me. The rhyming narration is tedious (although it's performed well), and doesn't leave much space for things to actually happen. The result is more like moving illustrations for a storybook than a cartoon.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.4/4 (Okay)

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season Three

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season Three, 1994-1995. Imperialists maintain a defensive posture to defend their interests... in space!

Created by Rick Berman & Michael Piller. Directed by Cliff Bole (4 episodes), Reza Badiyi (4), Jonathan Frakes (3), Les Landau (3), Avery Brooks (3), Alexander Singer (3), René Auberjonois (2), Kim Friedman (1), Winrich Kolbe (1), David Livingston (1) & Jonathan West (1). Written by Ira Steven Behr (11 episodes), Robert Hewitt Wolfe (11), Ronald D. Moore (5), René Echevarria (5), Hilary J. Bader (2), Tom Benko (1), Christopher Teague (1), D. Thomas Maio (1), Steve Warnek (1), Mike Krohn (1), Mark Gehred-O'Connell (1), Evan Carlos Somers (1), Philip Lazebnik (1), James Crocker (1), Christian Ford (1), Roger Soffer (1), David S. Cohen (1), Martin A. Winer (1), John Shirley (1), Ethan H. Calk (1), Joe Menosky (1), Robert Lederman (1), David R. Long (1) & Gordon Dawson (1). Starring Avery Brooks.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent). The concept of the show is bad, but some of the episodes have some great ideas in them.
Story: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Characters: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 0/4 (Terrible)
Special effects/design: 1/4 (Bad)
Acting: 1/4 (Bad)
Music: 1/4 (Bad)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). I'm delighted, and a little shocked, by the sudden shift in quality of this show. Back in the 90s I had given up on Deep Space Nine after the awful first two seasons, switched over to Voyager, and never imagined I was missing anything. And for all these years I just assumed it was a bad show. I guess it's about time I found out I was wrong. While nothing here is as good as the best Next Generation episodes, on an episode-by-episode average, it's nearly as fun to watch as TNG's best seasons.
Objective Rating (Average): 1.6/4 (Eh)

"There They Go-Go-Go!"

"There They Go-Go-Go!" (short), 1956. 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: 1/4 (Bad)
Pacing: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). Well. I guess that answers my question about whether the Road Runner cartoons would start to decline. The humor here is primarily from the ridiculous extravagance of Coyote's plans. Most of the gags themselves just seem to be filling space. And the timing isn't even good. A Road Runner cartoon without great timing is like one of the characters is missing.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.1/4 (Okay)

"Get Out and Get Under"

"Get Out and Get Under" (short), 1920. A boy has car problems.

Directed by Hal Roach. Written by H.M. Walker. Starring Harold Lloyd.

Concept: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Story: 1/4 (Bad)
Characters: 1/4 (Bad)
Dialog: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Pacing: 3/4 (Good)
Cinematography: 3/4 (Good)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Music: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Subjective Rating: 6/10 (Okay, 2/4). It rarely goes for laughs, instead just maintaining a steady level of Mildly Amusing. Unmemorable, but pleasant.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.1/4 (Okay)

"Gee Whiz-z-z-z-z-z-z"

"Gee Whiz-z-z-z-z-z-z" (short), 1956. 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)
Pacing: 4/4 (Great)
Cinematography: 2/4 (Indifferent)
Special effects/design: 3/4 (Good)
Acting: 3/4 (Good)
Music: 4/4 (Great)
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, 3/4). Very good, but not as funny as the other Road Runner cartoons I've watched lately. Hopefully it's a fluke and not the beginning of a decline.
Objective Rating (Average): 2.8/4 (Good)