Under the Dome- Season 2 episode 4

Rebecca and Jim (now on his way back to the darkside) are deciding who of the townsfolk are not work the resources. I repeat. This is less than 3 weeks in. Everyone’s just hysterical because they can’t check facebook.

Melanie gets a name. Norrie acts more civilized towards her now that she might be a person, Norrie teases Barbie when he shows up in last night’s outfit. The kids tell Barbie about the emails they received. They head back to where they got the signal so that Barbie can try to contact the outside world (unlike Norrie; who checked twitter).

Junior breaks out Lyle, but cuffs him.

Barbie is not impressed that Melanie knows the combo to Angie’s locker or that she thinks she went there in 1988.

All of this seems kind of moot since Rebecca is jumping over the hypothetical need to “thin the herd” and is planning to infect the town with swine flu.

Barbie and the kids go through microfiche, Junior presses Lyle for info about his mom. Why he went to her funeral, how she knew about the pink stars. Lyle says she thought the dome would follow her and spare Junior.

All of this pales in comparison with the fact that Rebecca is about to poison the town to see who survives.

Even Big Jim thinks that she’s nuts but she’s so damn type A that I don’t think he can handle it. Why is the science woman so crazy and Julia who quickly falls for the woo woo is seen as pure and good? Religion good, science bad? Well, there have been bad religious freaks; the Rev and Lyle. (Lyle who is helping Junior sort through what Junior’s mom said would happen next.

The kids and Barbie go to the spot where they had previously found the mini dome. Melanie flashes back to the 80s (where she kisses Sam, who obviously know who she was, then) they had found a “meteorite,” Melanie had picked up the mini dome egg and some one pushed her, she got knocked out. And died.

Rebecca projects that everyone in town will be starving to death in 2 weeks and resorting to cannibalism, which seems swift… but whatever.

Barbie finds the meteorite and Melanie’s story is validated.

Big Jim is really going to kill all these fuckers.

But Julia and Sam stop him. Then he calls the a slut and a drunk (respectively).

But he doesn’t even have the virus, Rebecca does.

Julia and Sam run off in pursuit and Lyle gets the drop on Junior and escapes. Honestly that pair up was the insane leading the crazy, so it’s probably for the best.

Rebecca’s plan is to poison the Holy Water, but she reconsiders (maybe seeing baby Alice, maybe that the virus mutated) Julia jumps Rebecca from behind, Rebecca responds to her  like she’s a bothersome dog… which was pretty funny. Sam and Julia lock away Big Jim and Rebecca saying that they will let the town decide their fate.

Dome kids and Barbie find Junior knocked out cold and speculate that Lyle killed Angie and maybe Melanie. Barbie shows up at Julia’s to warn her but Julia says “not tonight” and slams the door on him. Barbie sees Sam and retreats. Sam tries to kiss Julia bet she pushes him away. Smart move since we see scratches on his shoulder consistent with marks that a dying Angie would have left.

Julia’s “I thought I knew you!” attitude towards Barbie (who killed her husband) is dumb. I’m glad that she took some space over starting a romance with Sam. A rare moment where I liked Julia.

Joe ditching Norrie to hold hands with Melanie is terrible. Norrie reminds me a lot of myself. Maybe not, maybe just as more of a “real teenager.” She doesn’t know how to express what she’s going through, she’s had to grow up too fast, she wants to be a good friend but doesn’t know what to say. Someone with a sweet disposition and kind words looks more appealing then the more caustic teen. But I like Norrie, I like that she’s trying to make friends with Barbie rather than seeing him as a random adult who helps them and I like that she’s purposefully distrustful. 

I don’t get Rebecca. I wish she’d find a happy medium because they could use someone more practical than Julia to help out. Julia is living in a dream world. And staying with a murderer. I bet Barbie saves her and they hook up again. 

31 Horrifying Days- Day 16: Quarantine (2008)

I haven’t watched a zombie movie in a while and I’d never seen this one. Well, no one ever says the Z word. But it features humans affected by a rage-virus much in the same style as 28 Days Later and affected animals like in Resident Evil that fall ill and then try to eat your freaking face off, the afflicted are unhindered by pain, unable to speak and without reason. They are sensitive to light and hard to kill.

The modern interpretation of a zombie.

Jennifer Carpenter (“Dexter”, Exorcism of Emily Rose) stars as Angela Vidal, a television reporter working on a fluff piece about LA’s Bravest. She, along with cameraman Scott (played by Steve Harris, “Awake” and the voice of Clayface on “The Batman”) hang out with the firefighters at the station: shoot hoops, eat chilli, make small talk, then they head out on a call.

The call is medical and they arrive at an apartment building along with the police before the EMTs. When they get there they head upstairs and find an addled looking woman with blood around her collar and then the bodies start dropping. Sometimes literally. One of the firemen gets thrown down 3 floors straight onto the tile. They try to get outside, but the police (and later National Guard and CDC) have them locked in. Even with an injured officer and firefighter. Those inside search for alternate routes and are met with assault rifles and ordered to back away from windows. The police won’t tell them anything and soon they are without cell reception and electricity (this one’s weird. The elevator is on “auxiliary power” and a resident’s TV still works, but there’s no lights. Doesn’t add up except to add to the atmosphere). Angela tells Scott to keep rolling, that people won’t believe this. 

And he does. Of course, one of the things I dislike about mockumentary/found footage films is the implausibility of someone lugging a camera around with rage zombies actively trying to eat their face. He does bash one of the turned over the head with it. The lens gets bloodied. Slightly off camera Scott falls apart while cleaning the blood. Some of the camera angles don’t work. He’d be taping an infected chasing them right till they were face to face but then be first through the door to get the shot of everyone coming in. That’s a nitpick, though. At one point the camera is actually integral because conditions are pitch dark and it has night vision.

It is really good. And the characters work well, the first responders are freaked out but ready for a fight and regular people like Angela and Scott are not built for this. After seeing a firefighter get up walking on a broken leg and a little girl rip out her mom’s throat… she’s done. “I’m done. I’m not moving.” There’s a wealthier white man who wants to exercise his god-given right to die in his own apartment, a young Indian-American couple with nice clothes and a bathroom full of prescription sedatives and narcotics, a pair of North Africans who don’t speak English, the tough cop who is at first reluctant to go against orders (Columbus Short, “Scandal”), the hot firefighter who lives the longest (Jay Hernandez, Hostel, “Gang Related”) and a veterinarian (Greg Germann, “NCIS”) who diagnoses the infected with a mutated form of rabies.

The CDC arrives. The CDC also tells them that a blood test will confirm if they are infected. The veterinarian tells them that they’d need a brain sample. Everyone freaks the hell out. The CDC ends up getting eaten and no one gets their brain sampled. 

As numbers dwindle, the search for a way out leads to an unnecessary plot point. The virus was cultivated by some freakshow in rats first in the name of some cult. It didn’t add much to the plot. It didn’t need it. Dark apartment complex full of relatable people search for a way out while on the run from hyper-rabid former friends.

There are a few females in the film but no girl-power to speak of. I feel as though Angela’s flailing and inability to find a weapon suited her TV diva character… but I wish that there had been an Officer Deb Morgan somewhere.

4.25/5 (I fucking love zombies)

But it should be noted: this movie is based on the Spanish horror film [REC] from 2007, the main character’s name is even the same. I’ll definitely be watching the original.

Sleepy Hollow Episode 5

A boy is playful teased by a young girl and he chases her through the woods, until he is chased him self by a man on the horse. He has a head and looks like Attila the Hun. The boy runs away and into modern day Sleepy Hollow. Lieutenant Mills, who has moved Ichabod into Corbin’s cabin, is called when they boy turns up unconscious, Ichabod invites himself along. The boy awakens briefly and begins speaking middle English.

Ichabod studied Middle English at Oxford (I mean, of course!) and tells Irving and Mills that the boy said “Evil Girl” The boy has “blackening veins” and the quarantine him. Ichabod goes and Skype’s in middle English. Abbie is still holding out the idea that the boy is modern and was being held by some freak show who taught him a dead language so he couldn’t ask for help.

They believe the boy is from Roanoke.. no no, not Virginia, the Lost colony. That’s a real thing by the way. First English Settlement in established in 1585. It vanished. BUT Middle English was only a thang until 1470… then they would have been speaking Early Modern English.. whatever.

Abbie: “Who was more sarcastic? Jefferson or Adams?”

The boy has never been vaccinated against anything, go figure. Others affected as a result of coming into contact with the contagion get black veins and die quickly complete with visions of the horseman (with the head).

Because he’s Pestilence, amirite?

Abbie and Ichabod hike through the woods and they find water deeper than it should be… so they walk on water… on a small island they find the colony. People are all sick with black veins, but they are well. It also has not changed at all in 400 years. On the island the illness is in stasis, but outside people become sick. They are protected by a spell. 

Ichabod become infected and on the brink of death, he sees Katrina. 

Morales (Abbie’s ex) is checking up on Ichabods credentials… which check out, somehow. What? Not that he should be checking, it’s none of your business, Morales!

Abbie prays to figure out what to do with Ichabod. And hides from Morales. Abbie decides that the spring water at the colony can save Crane and the boy… and, you know, the rest of the town. Abbie divulges the details to Irving and he gives her the go ahead to try it out.

Meanwhile Katrina is telling Ichabod that she is being held captive by Morlock. That she’s in purgatory. Tearful reunion and such. But Abbie wakes him (and Thomas) up and they are shaking and on the verge of collapse. Abbie says she won’t go without Ichabod and she gives him an adrenaline shot. Soon after they are on the run from Attila and they rush in just in time to submerge themselves in the spring and save the colony from the horseman and the afflicted from the illness. Then the colony disappears (Thomas was lured into their world by the “evil girl”) and everyone affected by the sickness returns to health… well, that doesn’t make that much sense… but sure.

The pacing in this episode was much better than it has been, the selective use of historical trivia is interesting, Abbie saved the day and Morales sets himself up to be the Doakes. I like it.

“I have officers retracing the trail as we speak” Is Ichabod an officer? umm….. no

in 3 weeks the horseman returns. Templar Knights, Walter Bishop, John Cho comes bach and Ichabod sacrificing himself?? Say what?! Can’t wait!

Red Sonja #2

Red Sonja, pitted against her rival in an unwinnable battle, the only soldiers at her back are a bunch of farmers and Katniss Everdeens. 

 

This one is even more stunning than the last. Red Sonja faces off against Dark Annisia, her sister from the pits, the only other to survive. They were set to battle to the death the day after they were rescued. Annisia said she wouldn’t fight Sonja, that she’d sooner be killed. 

So what lead to this? Annisia facing Sonja, accusing her of betrayal! Out for her blood!

MASSIVE SURVIVOR’S GUILT

Dark Annisia wears crazy well, but the story gets even more out of hand as it’s revealed that Sonja has contracted the plague and is marked for death. But… what?! How can this be? But she’s set off to wander again.

This one is bad ass and deep. Annisia feels betrayed by Sonja since apparently she’s not walking around haunted by an army of the dead. Can’t wait for the next one!! (But now I have to)