No longer just a channel that plays cartoons non-stop, the Cartoon Network here in America now only really airs series that make returns on their investments. When not buying cheap animated shows from Canada, the Cartoon Network looks for shows that will garner profits from merchandise only. After their entertaining “Green Lantern” series and the critically acclaimed “Young Justice” failed to show a profit, the Network cancelled both series and replaced them with two substitutes guaranteed to make money. The first was a watered down version of their aught hit “Teen Titans,” and the next is yet another animated series starring Batman.
Tag Archives: Science Fiction
Laserblast (1978)
Charles Band’s “Laserblast” is one of the many, many, many productions from Band that garners an interesting nugget of an idea, but has little resources of budget to pull it off. I guess Band is one of the many filmmakers who’d rather make it themselves than sell it to another studio, it’s just a shame that “Laserblast” is so god awful. Even its remake and sequel “Deadly Weapon” is bad. Tonally uneven, terribly written, and poorly trying to pass of Eddie Deezen as a bully, “Laserblast” is a nigh unwatchable science fiction film that has endure the wrath of many movie geeks. Including the group from the Satellite of Love.
Night of the Comet (1984)
I’m often surprised at how great “Night of the Comet” holds up. Watching it years after I saw it back in the mid-nineties, I was pleasantly entertained by it, and how it unfolded as that perfect post-apocalyptic tale. It garnered comedy, horror, suspense, and valid villains, all the while reveling in its eighties kitsch. “Night of the Comet” remains an influential apocalyptic horror film, and for good reason. It manages to touch upon the doldrums of the apocalypse while also setting down on some truly entertaining characters.
The Twilight Zone: The Complete Third Season (DVD)
Carol Burnett, Cliff Robertson, Leonard Nimoy, Robert Redford, Charles Bronson, Elizabeth Montgomery, and Dean Stockwell appearing in some truly noteworthy installments, this is a season set absolutely worth owning.
Taken (2002)
The 2002 Spielberg fueled mini-series “Taken” is one of the few mini-series I’ve ever watched two times in a row. It’s at least fourteen hours in length. And I watched it two times in a row. “Taken” is just that good. The epic mini-series aired in the summer of 2002 on the Sci Fi Channel here in America, and on the 25th anniversary of “Close Encounters of The Third Kind.” While Science fiction was never really my niche as a pop culture fan, “Taken” is a whole new level of the genre that defies any and all conventions. It’s a mini-series that doesn’t just build up to something humongous, but it leads somewhere pretty incredible.
Independence Day (1996)
Roland Emmerich’s “Independence Day” is one quarter of a very decent albeit cliche alien invasion film, and three quarters an unwatchable adventure film. What opens with looming shadows and hovering space ships devolves in to a buddy comedy with catchy one-liners and plot twists much too convenient to buy. Even for a science fiction film about huge alien space ships. Apparently the government can see asteroids coming from miles away and predict when one will pass, but they can’t see space ships the size of two continents enter the atmosphere.
Lifeforce (Collector's Edition) [Blu-Ray/DVD Combo] (1985)
Occasionally silly, but still unique and very entertaining, director Tobe Hooper’s “Life Force” is a great contrast to his penultimate “Texas Chainsaw Massare” which relied on muted colors and grimey shades of brown and black to depict his world of vicious violence. “Life Force” is a vibrant and brilliantly filmed horror science fiction film filled with bold shades of bright blues and reds, with a premise that’s all too entertaining to ignore. Hooper doesn’t just create a vampire or alien film, but collides them to form a demented amalgam of a horror classic.