American Horror Story: Season 1 (2011)

American Horror Story is in an anthology format, with the first season focusing on a haunted house while later seasons are focused on an asylum and then a witch coven.

The Harmon family, a father-mother-daughter combo, moves from Boston to Los Angeles on the heels of a family scandal. Ben Harmon (Dylan McDermott) has cheated on his wife, Vivien (Connie Britton) and they hope to reconcile things by moving to a new house in a new part of the country. However, things are not what they seem at their new home – it is a dark place full of tragedies and past murders and lurid secrets, and the Harmons soon discover that they may not have the house all to themselves.

The show has an interesting format. I didn’t expect there to be a different focus for each season, which is a nice touch. I thought for sure that they couldn’t go on with the same premise for more than one season so I’m glad of the focus switch. It really allows for some flexibility with later seasons.

The show is sexy, violent and pretty terrifying at times and seems to blend all of the urban legends and horror stories we’ve all heard over the years into a compelling drama.

Sometimes, it can be a bit over-dramatic and somewhat like a soap opera, so I had to look past that at times but overall it was really enjoyable. The acting was solid, especially from veterans like Jessica Lange and Frances Conroy. Some of the characters are likable but most are pretty damaged and only likable because of their quirks as opposed to any humanity they might have.

JOE Rating: ★★★★

Hell On Wheels: Season 1 (2011)

Cullen Bohannon (Anson Mount) is a former Confederate soldier in a country that’s healing after the American Civil War and the assassination of president Abraham Lincoln – and he’s searching for his wife’s killers, most of whom were Union soldiers during the war. Leaving a bunch of corpses in his wake, Cullen finds himself one of the individuals living in Hell On Wheels – the temporary, mobile town following the progress of the Transcontinental Railroad as it spreads west.

When I first saw the description of this show on Netflix, I thought it might be some sort of cheesy programming reserved for late nights at home. I was wrong on that count.

Hell On Wheels, at least the first season, was pretty enjoyable overall. The main character, Cullen, shrugs off traditional southern “Rebel” stereotypes and in a way flips it so that the Union has a few bad eggs in it, too. Cullen has his low points but overall seems to use his own code of honor.

One thing I have to say is that for a man searching for his wife’s killers, he seems to take a while to really get into the hunt. We have a few instances early on in the season where he really digs in but then it almost seems as if he forgets his mission while he’s moving on down the rails.

Since Deadwood hasn’t been on the air, I’ve been looking for similar programming and while this show isn’t as great as Deadwood, it has some of the same, dusty, late 1800’s flavoring that made Deadwood so cool. I’ll definitely be checking out the second season. Hell On Wheels, like many of its characters, is likable even if it has some flaws.

JOE Rating: ★★★★

Wilfred: Season 1 (2011)

Original Air Date: June 23, 2011
Stations Airing: FX
Number Of Episodes In Season: 13

Ryan Newman (Elijah Wood) has had enough of life and decides to take the easy way out. However, when he swallows a bunch of pills and he doesn’t die, he ends up seeing his neighbor’s dog, Wilfred (Jason Gann), as a man in a dog costume…complete with Australian accent. What’s real and what’s not begins to blur as Ryan struggles to regain his sanity.

For the record, I have not seen the original series from the U.K. but I think this American version is great. Not knowing what to expect when I first started watching this, I was pleasantly surprised.

Elijah Wood – I can take him or leave him usually. He’s always just good enough but I have never been a huge fan of his. He was okay in films like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind where he portrayed a creeper, or even in Sin City…but he’s painfully average, in my opinion. He works well for this show, however. His sensibilities come through as genuine and it plays off Jason Gann’s Wilfred very well, who is almost the exact opposite of Ryan…his dark half. Jason Gann is great as the dog and is consistently hilarious.

I found myself laughing out loud as I watched some of the episodes, and I can honestly say that I’ve now witnessed a slow-motion graphic sex scene between a man in a dog costume and a stuffed giraffe. Yup. Also, there are a lot of guest appearances as well like Nestor Carbonell from Lost and Jane Kaczmarek from Malcolm In The Middle, and there are lots of others, too.

This is one of the funniest shows out there right now, so give it a shot.

JOE Rating: ★★★★★

Trailer For Wilfred: Season 1 (Promo)

Breaking Bad: Season 1 (2008)

Original Air Date: January 20, 2008
Stations Airing: AMC
Number Of Episodes In Season: 7

Walter White (Bryan Cranston) is a high school chemistry teacher who discovers that he only has two more years left to live because of his unexpected stage III cancer. With nothing left to lose, and no other means to provide for his family, he enlists the aid of Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), a bright but broken junkie and former student to help him distribute some crystal meth, which “Walt” is very proficient at creating. Soon, the duo find themselves not only at odds with each other but also crossing paths with heavy-duty drug dealers like the insane and violent Tuco (Raymond Cruz) as Walt and Jesse shoulder in on the meth-dealing business.

I had been extremely excited for this show upon seeing the original trailers on AMC back when I had cable. When it finally came on, I was not disappointed. I missed most of the original airing, but recently caught up on all the episodes using Netflix.

Right off the bat, the series and season one starts off at a decent pace, and you really get to both fear and love Walt by the end. I would say that the beginning half of the season is a nice segway into the dark, frenetic and chaotic second half with episodes like Crazy Handful of Nothin’ where Walt shaves his head and begins to really embrace his inner gangster. The dichotomy of Walter White, chemistry teacher with an extreme illness and Heisenberg, the meth-producing hard-ass is amazing and I can think of no better-written show in memory that could stand up to this series.

The relationship between Walt and Jesse is really, extremely well-done and is the subject of discussion even now among some of my friends. One of my friends, actually, (if you’re interested at all) has many theories about the show, especially when it comes to color symbolism. Check her out, but be careful because there might be spoilers if you haven’t seen the entire series yet. She makes some good points and observations, for sure, though. Her name is Erin Enberg and her website is HERE.

Breaking Bad has inspired so much conversation, between things like plot and characters, to other things like color symbolism. It’s that good. Do yourself a favor and check it out if you haven’t already. Just be prepared to become addicted to the show and not see the light of day until the series is over.

And even if you’ve already followed the show through to its satisfying conclusion, I found that it’s best to re-watch the series again right away from the beginning. You’ll really see how the characters have changed, mostly for the worse. Now get out of here and go watch it.

JOE Rating: ★★★★★

Trailer For Season One Of Breaking Bad 

This is what I look like when I’m blogging my reviews

I just wanted to take some time, and a breather, and say that this new blog is fun and I’m enjoying writing these reviews of (so far) games, movies and books.

I truly appreciate the time everyone takes to read, like or share the reviews because I know there are a million other blogs out there that do the same thing.

I have lots more Wii game reviews coming up soon, seeing as how I let my cousin borrow my X Box 360 so he could play the new Resident Evil game. There will be vintage games (like Super Mario Brothers and Chrono Trigger) because those are all available on the Wii so HELL YEAH I’m going to be playing them.

You can also count on other movie reviews soon, including some old Sword-And-Sorcery 80’s films, some newer stuff like The Avengers and Dark Knight Rising…and some older stuff, too, like Stand By Me and Suicide Kings.

On the book end (ha!) of things, I will have a review on The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers and also Aristotle’s Poetics for Screenwriters coming up fairly soon, too.

I plan on getting into some more comic book and graphic novel reviews as well, but I have no idea when. Music and television shows are on the list, too.

Keep on keepin’ on!

-Joe