Loki: The Variant

3.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

So, the second episode of Loki is good, there is no doubting that, however it does slump a bit when compared to last weeks mostly stellar opener. Mainly this is due to what I would argue is a rushed story decision on the part of the episode’s ending, but I can see why with a limited six episode run they chose to do it this way.

I am of course talking about Loki’s decision to chase after his evil variant and effectively leave the TVA. Like I said plot wise it makes sense, but I would have liked more time with the Loki and Mobius buddy cop dynamic, Owen Wilson and Tom Hiddleston have great chemistry together- hopefully they will still get to share a lot of scenes together.

As for the who the internet have dubbed prematurely Lady Loki, who is more likely Enchantress, it is far to early to cast any kind of judgement on her: though I will say it was a neat development to have it be her that truly begins the destruction of the Sacred Timeline it makes her vital to the narrative going forward.

Overall, a solid episode though one that is slightly in the shadow of its better predecessor.

Pros.

Loki and Mobius

A few very funny scenes

The destruction of the timeline

The things it sets up

Cons.

The plot feels a little rushed

It underwhelms after a strong first episode

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Loki Episode 1 : Glorious Purpose

4.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Though I enjoyed Wandavison’s first episode more so than most, I think this is easily the best first episode of a Marvel Disney + series to date; the reason I did not mention, Falcon And The Winter Soldiers first episode is because it wasn’t very good and proved no real competition to this.

This episode had everything you would want out of a Loki series and then more on top. It has humour, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki and Owen Wilson’s Mobius have great on screen chemistry together and provide us with quite a few strong comedic scenes. It has heart and depth, such as when variant Loki, who had never seen the events of Thor The Dark World, saw his adoptive mother die for the first time. It also has a promising mystery, and pits Loki against himself.

I thought one of the best things about this episode was the introduction to the Time Variants Authority and the widening of the MCU as this fills in some blanks and also changes how we see the events of the MCU as a whole. The one thing I didn’t like in this respect is that they basically confirm that Agents Of Shield is non-cannon: there is a moment where one additional line of dialogue would have confirmed the shows place in universe, but we never get that conformation.

Finally, outside of Loki and Mobius the rest of the characters are sparse and only really seem to exist to facilitate one purpose and are quite one dimensional: hopefully this will be fixed later in the show and these characters might get to see more exploration.

Overall, a very promising first episode.

Pros.

Widening the MCU

Owen Wilson

Tom Hiddleston, particularly during the more emotion scenes.

Cons.

A few annoying side characters

Even more signs pointing to AOS being non-cannon

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The Bad Batch: Decommissioned

3/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Baring the first episode of The Bad Batch this may be the best yet. Though Decommissioned doesn’t live up to some of the best episodes of Rebels or Clone Wars it does start to show the promise of this show and lay some much needed ground work; I am hoping from here on out the series can begin to turn around.

The episode is helped by not feeling villain of the week style self-contained and by progressing things from previous adventures. I thought it was nice to see the group get a base beyond the ship, and also presenting them as basically mercenaries or bounty hunters makes for some nice questions around what a soldiers purpose is.

Furthermore, I enjoyed that the show is starting to show the effects of Order 66 on the rest of the Bad Batch, with Wrecker almost giving into the conditioning after being hit on the head. I think the show desperately needs to go back to the Crosshair storyline and address it, as the group seems to have moved on from him and basically left him behind, which makes viewing them as heroes harder.

Moreover, Omega continues to be an issue with this series and one that is not seemingly getting better. The show clearly wants to mimic the parent-child style bond of the Mandalorian yet comes off as lacking and disingenuous. Nothing so far in this series has made me warm to Omega, and whenever an episode cuts to whatever she is up to, you know it is going to slow down to a boring degree.
Finally the ending tease is fine if a little obvious and baity. We don’t need constant cliff hangers to keep coming back.

Overall, better than the last few episodes, but the series still needs a lot of improvements

Pros.

Wrecker

More stability

The wider world

Cons.

Omega

The ending

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The Bad Batch: Rampage

2/5

This episode was yet another example of how this show is starting to lose me: the drama and stakes of the first episode have seemingly been ignored and now it is just week after week of pointless villain of the week sort of episodes with the wider mysteries that the series teased out just sort of existing in the either.

Likewise the character development has seemingly stalled, with neither the Bad Batch nor Echo receiving anything even close to development. It is the same beats and ideas over and over again; I also think it is odd how the band have seemingly just forgotten about Crosshair, other than a slight mention here they have not mentioned any thought to saving or rescuing their friend. An oversight of the writing perhaps.

The only real pro I can give this episode is that they build on the Fennec Shand stuff from the last episode. Proving that perhaps the character wasn’t just forced in and that maybe the series does have bigger plans for her.

Overall, I am starting to lose faith in this show.

Pros.

Building Fennec Shand

The end of the episode teases better stories to come

Cons.

Villain of the week

Forgetting Crosshair

The character arcs are trapped in a status

Written by Luke Barnes

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Friends Reunion: A Desperate Attempt To Save HBO Max

2/5

Written by Luke Barnes

It is a sad state of affairs when a show has to tarnish what would otherwise be a rather solid reputation, for a desperate attempt at regaining relevancy and propping up a hard hit streaming service- yet here we are. The writing was on the wall, for this being nothing more than a blatant, vain attempt to milk nostalgia to get a few more sign ups for HBO Max, the second they announced the guest stars.

Said guest stars mostly have nothing to do with the show, a few of them are old faces coming back: they are pleasing. The rest, however, are whoever a group of clearly aging studio executives think ‘the youths’ like- insert BTS. To me I found this grating, and as I was actually looking forward to this reunion I found it to be disappointing as well.

Moreover, and perhaps worst of all, this flips into somewhat of a quasi-interview/audience interaction thing midway through, and who do they get to host it? Why every writers least favourite person James Corden. I understand the Americans have yet to find out what an insufferable person Corden is, so they have to put him in everything, but it is just frustrating.

Despite my negativity thus far, there are still some nice moments and interesting behind the scenes titbits thrown in, and that is why this show does not get a lower score.

Overall, I think it is sad that the creatives and the actors would allow their show, the thing that made a lot of them famous, to be brought back as a means to hollowly push a struggling streaming service and further the constant attention of those deemed trendy by fifty year old white men in boardrooms and focus groups.

Pros.

A few funny moments

The behind the scenes stuff is fascinating

Cons.

James Corden

The celebrity guest stars

The asides to ‘regular people’ talking about how much Friends means to them

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Real Rob: Netflix Is Just Giving Money Away These Days, Stop Giving The Sand-Pack Money

0.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

So you might know Rob Schneider as one of Adam Sandler’s lesser entourage members, or as a vocal anti-vax figure. Regardless he was given his own Netflix series and rather unsurprisingly it is bad.

I won’t get into all the ways it is troubling, the vague racism, the rather overt sexism and slut shaming, the ableist comments- the list is long and dripping in bad taste. However, I will say that the character or version of himself that Schneider is playing is deeply unlikable, and only serves to lose him any potential fans the series would have won him. There are moments in this series when it genuinely seems like Schneider actively wants people not to like him.

The jokes don’t land, and as this is a comedy series that is a pretty big issue. Not only do they not land they rely on the same old, used and often incorrect cliches and stereotypes that mare the Sand-Pack’s work.

The one bright spot of the series is Schneider’s wife Patricia who actually manages to be funny a few times over the series run, which for this series is nothing short of a miracle. Patricia easily manages to out-do her husband at nearly every opportunity, but sadly the show side-lines her either using her as the butt of the joke or as something to ogle.

Overall, Netflix needs to be more choosey in who they give a series to.

Pros.

Patricia Schneider

Cons.

Rob Schneider

The jokes don’t land

It feels lazy, and is overly reliant on his Hollywood friends and outdated cliches

A lot of the episodes go nowhere and send you to sleep

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Space Force: The War For The Moon Has Already Begun

Written by Luke Barnes

3/5

There is definitely shades of The Office here: American not British.

I think if anything this show is a testament to the likeability and the warmth of Steve Carell, the other characters in this show are quite underdeveloped, yet luckily the entire focus is on Carell and he sells it and makes the series as good as it is.

The major issue with this series is that it will/has age horribly. There are a lot of references to then current American politics, which feel dated and stilted even now, and it has only been a year. Also a perhaps more importantly I didn’t find this series funny, charming yes, but funny no: most of the jokes didn’t land for me.

Though the characters were underdeveloped, I still ended up caring for them by the end of the series and am excited to see where next season takes them.

As far as the series ideas go, I think the premise has a lot of potential and the actual execution is also quite strong, I enjoyed the one-ups Manship between the US and Chinese Space Forces and thought it was well built during the series.

Overall, though the characters are a little thin you still end up caring about them, with a strong lead performance and an interesting idea that helps this series to get at least part of the way to the moon.

Pros.

Carell

You end up caring about the characters

The US Vs China storyline

Cons.

Dated references

The jokes don’t land

The Bad Batch: Cornered

2.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I am starting to become concerned now. This show has been going for four episode yet so little has happened and the direction this series is heading in seems even less clear now then it did a few episodes before.

Why was Fennec Shand brought into this episode/ storyline, when it would have made so much more sense to have Crosshair be the bounty hunter tracking down the Bad Batch? To answer my own question it was simply to act as fan service, to bait nostalgia and be like ‘remember her from the Mandalorian’. Now there is nothing wrong with fan service done right, but when it is done in such a way where it feels like it is stopping the development of the other characters in the show, Crosshair, then it becomes a problem for me.

Moreover, this episode, much like the last, felt very filler to me. It seems that maybe the series as a whole is having some pacing issues or maybe the fourteen episode order was a bit too much, but for whatever reason we are getting a lot of these little one off episodes where nothing of any real consequence happens and you are left feeling bored.

If I had to give the episode a pro it would be the action, specifically the sequence set in the hover traffic, I found that quite entertaining to watch and thought it was shot well.

Overall, I am starting to lose hope for this series, we need something big to happen soon.

Pros.

The action

The tease for more to come

Cons.

Nothing really happened

It feels like filler

The wrong kind of fan service

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Star Wars Rebels: Series Overview

4/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I enjoyed watching Clone Wars, so I thought I would give this series a go and I have to say it was even better. I think from being one complete narrative that plays in order and has a central group of characters to focus on this show manages to take all the best parts from Clone Wars an expand them.

If you remember from my series overview of Clone Wars the two things that bothered me about that show were, how it jumped around in time and in and out of episode order as well as how it would have multi episode asides focusing on characters no one really cared about, neither of these issues this show. There are a few droid episodes that are a little weak, but they still tie in and feel like they have a place within the wider story.

The best thing this show does is expanding the Star Wars universe outward, building on pre-existing characters and ideas whilst also adding new characters and ideas. When I first began watching the show I wasn’t a huge fan of Ezra, in fact I found the character annoying, but as the show went on he grew on me and the same was true of a lot of other characters to a point that by the end I was sad to say goodbye.

A personal highlight for me was seeing Rex, Ahsoka and Maul crossover into this show, I thought the series really came alive when they featured heavily in episodes.

Overall, a wonderful piece of Star Wars content for new and returning fans alike.

Pros.

The crossover characters

Expanding Star Wars cannon

Everything with the Inquisitors

The surprisingly emotional ending

Cons.

A few weaker episodes that were not focused on the main cast of characters

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The Bad Batch: Replacements

Star Wars The Bad Batch: Replacements

2.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I think of the 3 episodes so far this was the weakest. There was an air of filler to it. The main clone band find themselves trapped on a desolate planet and only Omega can save them: which is beyond dumb as these are expert soldiers and they can’t repair the ship and go and fight the creature at the same time. Moreover, this young child without any combat experience can not only survive a run in with this beast but best it- yeah the story telling is really clutching at straws trying to explain this.

They advance the Crosshair storyline, and it is this part of the episode that scores the points in this review. Crosshair becomes even more irredeemably bad, clearly he will turn back to the good side later, but for now they are really exploring the depths of what you can get away with in what is basically a kids show.

Overall, though I find this series watchable, and it is nice to see new Star Wars content, it really has yet to find its stride and has entered a period of stagnation after the first episode.

Pros

Crosshair

The darker moments

Cons.

The filler main story

Everything with Omega

It still feels directionless

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