Tag Archives: Science Fiction

Five Great Alan Tudyk Performances

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Alan Tudyk has, for years, been the working man’s character actor. He’s pulled in performances from all sorts of mediums, voicing characters in animated series, and animated movies, he’s played side characters in comedies like “Dodgeball,” did a bang up job as a supporting character in the sitcom “Suburgatory” and is still going strong today, beginning his new show “Conman” and continuing to work on various modern hit films. Though you may not know he’s there, he’s been in many hit films, playing the Duke in the monster hit “Frozen,” the weasel in the monster hit “Zootopia,” and oh yes, he played one of more interesting rebel heroes in 2016’s “Rogue One,” yet another monster hit movie.

Here are five great performances from Tudyk’s large resume. If you haven’t seen these, be sure to give them a shot. If you have, check them out again, since Tudyk is scary talented and very funny.

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Max Steel (2016)

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I wish Mattel would stop forcing Max Steel on the unsuspecting American public. After many years, the company insists on introducing this action figure line in its new forms, and it’s exhausting to say the least. Back in 2000, Mattel re-introduced Max Steel in a very entertaining CGI cartoon with the main character as a cybernetic spy–because CGI and spies were big in the early aughts. When trends shifted, Mattel re-re-introduced the character in 2013 in to a younger character and in the mold of a pseudo-Iron Man since Iron Man has changed how movie studios approach science fiction now. After that failed, Mattel has given us Max Steel once again, and turned him in to a cybernetic superhero with an enigmatic past. This Max Steel is an amalgam of Guyver, Iron Man, and Star Kid, and is an infinitely grating, and ugly kids film.

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Justice League Action

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After the horrendous reboots of “Powerpuff Girls” and “Teen Titans,” I had zero expectations for “Justice League Action.” Thankfully after sitting through its hour long premiere that combines various eleven minute episodes in to one small movie, I’m happy that it ends up being an entertaining series. It has potential to be a really great reboot that plays well in its eleven minute format, and all in one big marathon. After the bleak and dark material DC and Warner has embraced over the last five years, “Justice League Action” is aimed toward kids and it’s so much brighter and lighter in tone than the previous “Justice League” series by Bruce Timm. That show will always have a place in my heart, but “Action” is strictly for kids, continuing the tradition of “Batman: Brave and the Bold” by adhering to an aesthetic that’s fast paced, bright, fun, and bereft of the bigger complexities.

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Dreamscape (1984): Collector’s Edition [Blu-Ray]

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Between Joseph Ruben’s “Dreamscape” and Wes Craven’s “A Nightmare on Elm Street” arriving at just about the same time, 1984 had a keen insight in to dreams and transforming it in to compelling entertainment. Whereas the latter film is a dark horror masterpiece, “Dreamscape” is its own kind of cinematic offering. It’s an entertaining and often intelligent look in to dreams that opts more for dark fantasy with a hint of adventure. It also sparks allusions, however coincidental, Craven’s film featuring dream demons and a villain who in one instance conjures up blades from his fingers to attack hero Alex Gardner. Despite the coincidence, it’s fun to imagine these films are kind of working within the same universe.

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Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn (1983) [Blu-Ray/Blu-Ray 3D]

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“Metalstorm” is another one of the Not Brand X movies from the eighties where fans of “Mad Max” were treated to a long list of movies that desperately emulated its formula and aesthetic. If you survey most of the late seventies and eighties, you could probably build a whole sub-genre of post-apocalyptic movies that emulate “Mad Max” and “Escape from New York.” There’s a whole library from various studios who aimed to capture the same success and pop culture momentum as the aforementioned. “Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared Syn” is by no means a bad movie. It is a hokey but fun movie, though. It has all the hallmarks with films of this ilk including a desert wasteland, a hot rod driving “road warrior,” and his blonde babe.

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Curse of the Man Who Sees UFOs (2016)

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Christo Roppolo is a former filmmaker who now sees UFOs.  Through interviews with him and people around him and videos he took of what he claims to be UFOs, this documentary explores his history of UFO sightings, how it has affected his life, how he almost preaches about them, and how he is seen as he basically obsesses over these sightings and what they may mean. Roppolo reached out to director Justin Gear by sending him hours and hours of video from his sightings and investigations of them.  Gear takes this footage and mixes it with interviews of Roppolo and his neighbors, friends, and people of his town to show what he sees or claims to see with experiences from others and feelings directly from the source.

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Independence Day: Resurgence (2016)

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id4-resOne thing you can always count on with aliens, that no matter how advanced or sentient they are, their primary form of security is always two huge closing doors that slide together and seal as gradually as possible. You assume in their world they’d have laser doors that seal up in a matter of milliseconds, but no. It’s always very slow closing doors that never quite close fast to stop our heroes. But of course they always murder the alien pilots because–they’re obviously not trained to zip through the doors I assume. “Independence Day: Resurgence” is a sequel with such an obvious mission to launch an “ID4” cinematic universe that it’s almost not really worth watching “Resurgence” at all, when you get down to it.

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