Spider-Man: Homecoming - Liked It For The Most Part But There Are A Few Nit-Picks

Spider-Man: Homecoming

*** SPOILER ALERT ***

Since it was announced several months ago, I have been looking forward to seeing the Marvel Studios Spider-Man Homecoming film. I did get the opportunity to do so recently and after seeing it and thinking about it, I have some mixed feelings about it.

Homecoming is the story of young Peter Parker and his struggle to come into his own as a superhero. During the day, mild-mannered Parker is a student at a science and technology school, but as soon as the bell rings, he dons the Spidey suit he received from Tony Stark and swings into action locating and working to stop a few petty crimes, and at times, manages to make little more than a nuisance of himself.  In one funny scene, Parker tries to stop a car theft, but the would be thief turns out to be the owner of the vehicle trying to break in to retrieve his keys. However, on one fateful evening, Parker finally gets what he thinks might be his big break as he foils an ATM theft being perpetrated by a group of thugs using some high tech equipment and weapons.

It turns out that the weapons are being supplied by one Adrian Toomes, a former salvage company owner who learned about the weapons when he was assigned to help cleanup New York following the Battle of New York from the 2012 film, The Avengers. Unfortunately, Toomes company was replaced by Stark’s U.S. Department of Damage control, which launched Toomes into his life of crime building and selling high tech equipment on the black market.

While as Spider-Man, Parker is a formidable foe for Toomes and his henchmen, but he is not quite up to the task of taking him down alone, at least not at first. Stark, who has been mentoring Parker since he was recruited to help Team Iron Man in the 2016 film Captain America: Civil War.  In an incident in which Parker thought he had an opportunity to take Toomes down while making a weapons deal, hundreds of lives are put in danger when the Staten Island Ferry was split in half by one of Toomes weapons that malfunctioned, and it took Iron Man stepping in to cleanup the mess and save the ferry from sinking. It was at that point that Stark Determined that Parker was just not mature enough to handle the big problems, so he takes the Spidey suit back.

More determined than ever, Parker uses his old suit, made from a conglomeration of street clothes, to continue to pursue Toomes. Again, Toomes proves just way too tough and winds up trapped under a pile of rubble and left to die while Toomes hijacks a plane full of the technology salvaged from the destroyed Avengers Tower. While trapped, Parker realizes that what stark has told him is true and when he finally manages to free himself, he intercepts the plane and crash-lands it near Coney Island. When Toomes’ Vulture suit malfunctions, Parker steps in and saves Toomes’ life leaving him and the plane to be confiscated by police.

There is a lot that I liked about this film. While I am not a huge Spider-Man fan, I do like the way that Tom Holland portrays Parker and how he is written. Most of his quips as he thinks out loud and his banter as he does battle are awesome and just as I remember them from the comics, but are up to date to fit today’s lingo. Peter Parker is a neat kid that I wouldn’t mind having in my classroom and I enjoy his quick wit. I also liked Aunt May, who is way more savvy than her comic book counterpart (as I remember her). It was neat seeing Michael Keaton on the screen again, a bit aged, but just the same. I have always enjoyed the way he seems to be calm and cool on the outside, but still there is a sense that something is boiling underneath, and when he goes off, watch out!

The main story is good, but in a discussion I had with my son about this movie, he helped me realize that there are some departures in the script that don’t seem to make sense or are not completely necessary for the story. It is also quite predictable and would seem to suffer a bit from lazy writing and directing, as well as what in my mind are some attempts at some cheap laughs.

One of the major things I did not like was seeing Tony Stark fall back into his stand-up routine of one cheeky remark after another. After seeing the three Iron Man films, I was hoping that I would see some maturity in the character. I was pleased when it finally started happening in Age of Ultron and how the trend continued in Civil War, but it was short lived and we have the old Stark back, a character that I am having a lot of trouble finding respect for.

Over the years, I have been enjoying the Marvel movies and have come to trust them as something I can take my daughter to without having to worry about questionable content. There were several moments in this film that I felt were inappropriate to the story and displayed blatant bad taste. At one point in the film, Parker is on the phone with Aunt May while Stark is present. Stark talks to her saying “Hey May! How ya’ doin’? What are ya wearin’? Something Skimpy I hope…” which he follows up with “okay, that’s inappropriate.”  Yeah, no kidding it’s inappropriate, and also bordering on sexual harassment.

In another couple of scenes, there are scenes of bullying by one of Parker’s classmates as he continues to refer to Parker as “Penis” Parker instead of Peter. In this day when schools are working to minimize this sort of behavior, there is no place for it in a superhero film that will most likely be viewed by many younger children despite the PG-13 rating. In one scene, the bullying character is acting as DJ at a party and using a sound system to get everyone at the party to join in by yelling “When I say penis, you say Parker!” and then leads the party-goers in repeatedly trying to humiliate Parker.

In yet another scene during the Homecoming dance, Ned is in the school’s computer lab helping Parker track Toomes weapons. When a teacher enters the room and asks Ned what he is doing, he responds, “Oh I was just, um… Looking at… Porn.”  How would you enjoy explaining that to your pre-teen child?

Once again, Stark weighs in when he chews Parker out for his failure on the Ferry by telling him, “You screwed the pooch hard, big time. But then you did the right thing. You took the dog to the free clinic, you raised the hybrid puppies.” and then he once again finishes with “alright, not my best analogy.” No it isn’t, and it is also not necessary.

In the final scene of the film, after Parker gets his Spider suit back from Stark, he is standing in his room with the suit on as Aunt May breaks into the room and exclaims “What the F---!” although the scene is cut off before May is able to finish the word, everyone knows what she was going to say.

There are several other instances of language in this film that one may or may not feel are appropriate to the characters or the story, but really Marvel, is this what we are going to stoop to in future films? Cheap laughs? Bathroom humor?  It hasn't been necessary in the past and I hope it doesn’t become a part of the future in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I am by no means a prude, I’ve been around the block and know the ropes, but as far as I am concerned, some of what I saw and heard in this film is simply gratuitous and over the top.

But there are also some real gems of scenes that are absolutely very cool.  While I have spoiled a lot here, I will not spoil the final scene at the end of the credits, if you see this film, do not leave early, it will be worth it.

Well, there it is…

Qapla’!

The Rain Never Came By Lachlan Walter - Outstanding Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi From Down Under!

The Rain Never Came by Lachlan Walter

To be completely honest, I honestly cannot remember how I heard about this book. I think it might have appeared on my Facebook feed at some point while I was in the middle of another book for the new podcast I am involved with, The Orbital Sword. In any case, I had no idea what to expect other than knowing that it is a post apocalyptic Sci-Fi novel by an author from Australia. Being I love this kind of story, I thought I would give it a go.

The Rain Never Came is set in the state of Victoria, Australia, near the town of Newstead, apparently some time in the future where there is limited supplies of food and water to sustain life. While there is no reason given for this situation, one can only assume that it has something to do with climate change because the drought has apparently lasted for decades according to the main character, Bill.

The story begins innocently enough as Bill watches a football match being held in a stadium that is falling to ruin. Bill is soon joined by his best mate Tobe. They talk for a while and then there is a post-game gathering at the local pub. Sometime that night, the people at the pub, including Bill and Tobe, see some strange lights off in the distance and many hope beyond hope that it is a sign that rain is on the way. There is no rain and Bill gets so inebriated that Tobe has to take him home.

The mood of the book darkens a bit when the story turns to describing how Bill goes about his daily chores on the property that has been in his family for many years. All of his efforts go toward gathering food and water in traps he has set on the land. There is nothing growing on the property with the exception of a single rose standing in tribute to someone that has passed on and is buried on the property. Bill makes sure that the rose gets plenty of water every day whether he has enough for himself or not.

On the morning after the football match, Tobe arrives at Bill’s place and convinces him to go on a little adventure to find out what the lights in the distance were about. It is going to be a long trek across the bush where there are potentially many dangers including being caught by the “Creeps,” better known as the Compulsory Relocation Police, or CRP for short. Being caught by the Creeps means that one loses his freedom for sure, but there are also many unknowns which would make getting caught an undesirable thing indeed.

Bill and Tobe do learn what the lights were about and it isn’t good.

There is a lot that I liked about The Rain Never Came, but I particularly enjoyed the banter between the two main characters. The story is told from Bill’s point of view. He and Toby are Mates, which in Australia seems to mean far more than friendship. In spite of what Bill thinks or wants, or actually has the desire to do, he has been called upon to help his mate, and does so, but not without complaint. The back and forth between him and Tobe is mostly in jest and good nature, that is until Tobe reveals a long held secret.

Tobe is quite the fascinating character in his own right. He is a tough character, bushman through and through. Very little seems to bother him as he leads the way through the adventure. I sure wouldn’t want him against me.

Another thing I really enjoyed about this story is how Walter sets the mood of the piece. After the football match, we get a picture of people that are hoping against hope that things will get better. They want to hang on to what little they have, but everyone has a breaking point, except for Tobe, of course. Then there is the ever present threat of the Creeps coming in to mop up stragglers and take them off to the camps.

The pacing of the story starts off quite slowly, adding to the mood of the work. While it isn’t a very long book, it seems to take longer than it actually does to read because of the setting. I am not saying that it is slow or boring, but rather that it helps to illustrate just how difficult it is to survive in that world, and how the people have accepted their situation and learned to adapt and survive.

I give my highest recommendations for giving The Rain Never Came a look. It is a heck of a story by an author who can communicate ideas clearly and hold a reader’s attention.

Dr. Walter tells about himself on his blog…

“I am a writer, science-fiction critic and nursery-hand (the garden kind, not the baby kind), and have completed a PhD that critically and creatively explored the relationship between Australian post-apocalyptic fiction and Australian notions of national identity. My debut novel Bone Dry is coming out soon from Odyssey Books, and I also write criticism for Aurealis magazine and review for the independent ‘weird music’ website Cyclic Defrost. I am currently writing both a post-apocalyptic western and a book-length story cycle that aims to take giant monsters seriously. I love all things music-related, the Australian environment, overlooked genres and playing in the garden.”

Well, there it is…

Qapla’!

Edited By Benjamin Arrowood

Star Trek: Section 31: Control by David Mack - Scary Orwellian Star Trek Fiction, Or Is It Fiction?

Star Trek: Section 31: Control by David Mack

Fans of Deep Space 9 know all about the relationship between the clandestine organization called Section 31 and the relationship it has with Dr. Julian Bashir. During the television series, it was not good and in the books, it has only grown worse as time goes on. Well, due to some shady business that Bashir got himself into while working to save the Andorian race, he finds himself defrocked, demoted, and disavowed by Starfleet, but he still has one goal, to once and for all bring Section 31 down and expose all of it’s illegal and immoral activities for all to see.

Control opens with Bashir, beaten and battered, trying to insert a chip into a console at Memory Alpha for as yet some unknown reason. What follows is an incredibly fast paced story that is so Orwellian in nature that it can be quite disturbing if one thinks about it too long.

In April of 2141, Dr. Aaron Ikerson introduces his invention that he calls Uraei, a computer program that is designed to monitor and record activity; everyone’s activity. It does this by inserting itself into devices that have become part of everyday life in homes, on starships, or anywhere it happens to touch. The purpose of Uraei is to ensure the safety of the people by watching activity and making analyses of the activity to determine a threat level. It isn’t designed to take any action, but as time goes on Uraei becomes more and more intelligent and begins making decisions that include some very bad things.

In the meantime, Bashir, Sarina Douglas and a reporter are on the run from Section 31. They meet up with Data and Lal who agree to help them in their fight to stop the clandestine agency from continuing their own terrible activities. The story winds through several locations, including a meeting with the now leader of the Cardassian Government, Elim Garak. The only problem is that it seems that no matter where they go, or how careful they are to cover their tracks, Section 31 is always a step ahead of Bashir and his group.

Control is one great story, but it is also a very dark and foreboding story, for sure the darkest Trek story I have read or watched since the DS-9 episode “In The Pale Moonlight.” It is not only dark, but it is also quite disturbing as what Mack has composed seems all too plausible given the current technology that we have available. I can only but wonder if there is an Ikerson out there somewhere right now, working on a project to monitor us through the devices we take for granted. Am I paranoid? Perhaps. But read this story and remember that as the imagination of humans reaches into the future with more and more fantastic fictitious ideas, it always seems that reality is just a few steps behind the fiction.

This is a fast-paced story, the action starts with the opening pages and moves at a breakneck pace to the end with almost no time to catch one’s breath between scenes. It is really two stories under one cover and has a sense of futility for the hero, who finds success at the end of his journey, but it comes with a very, very high price. On the surface, Control is just a yarn spun by a great author, but under the surface, he gives a lot to think about and contemplate as technology continues to advance.

At the same time, there is a lot here that any Trekkie will enjoy. There are numerous references to familiar stories that, when I read them, made me smile and remember fondly, but there was also a sense of foreboding as I thought back on the adventures of the past being observed and even influenced by Uraei. I cannot help but admire how cleverly Mack wove his invention so neatly into the stories of the past, going back even before the launching of the Enterprise, or the founding of the Federation for that matter. Simply brilliant!

I give this book my highest recommendations and can honestly say that it is one of the best Star Trek books I have ever read.

Well, there it is…

Qapla!

To Fire Called: A Seeker's Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper By Nathan Lowell - Exploring New Frontiers!

To Fire Called: A Seeker’s Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper by Nathan Lowell

Fans of Nathan Lowell’s Golden Age of the Solar Clipper series (including me) await each and every book with anticipation for another great story, and we are never disappointed when there is a new release, and often, we immediately begin badgering the author for more. This latest installment in the ongoing story of Captain Ishmael Wang, To Fire Called, takes our favorite freighter captain and his crew into unfamiliar surroundings, or at least they are to him.

For those of you that are not familiar with Dr. Lowell’s work, it is the story of Ishmael Wang, a young man of seventeen who knew where he was going until a tragic accident left him alone on a planet where he was not wanted. Ordered to leave because he had no way to support himself, he signed onto a freight hauler as a cook’s mate. He had few skills and less knowledge of what he had gotten himself into, but he had one talent that made him an almost instant celebrity on board the first ship he worked on; he knew how to make good coffee. But being able to make great coffee, the lifeblood of a happy ship, is not the only talent that Ish possesses though; he is also very good at working with and handling people.

As the years went on, he found that he was well suited for life in space and learned everything he could about ships and what makes them work. Finally went to the academy to learn to be an officer. After graduating, Ish had some rough postings, but always managed to leave a ship better than he found it. In this newest story, Ishmael is once again entering unfamiliar territory.

Ishmael, his friend Pip Carstairs, and a few other investors have started the Phoenix Freight Company with Ishmael as the captain of the only ship in the fleet, the Chernyakova. The ship is in drydock undergoing a complete refit after being discovered derelict with all hands dead onboard. As a matter of fact, Ishmael is the one who discovered and arranged for towing the ship back into port. After gathering his crew it is time to make some money to replace the large sums it took for the Chernyakova’s refit. Pip suggests that there is a lot of money to be made if they would start running in Toe Hold space.

Ishmael is used to running cargo in Confederated space where ships, officers, and stations are operated on a set of rules and regulations designed to keep everyone safe and to keep piracy out of the picture. In contrast, Toe Hold space is a place where there basically very few rules, and those rules are different at every port of call. There are some shady characters out there, and some that are not to be trusted, but there is big money to be made and Phoenix Freight needs to raise funds.

As To Fire Called is a Seeker’s Tale, everyone is looking for something, and all is not what it seems, and some are not who they seem to be on board the Chernyakova, so there are a lot of twists and turns in this story that make things quite interesting.

One of the many aspects that make this a great and compelling story is following the life of Ishmael. Owing to an incident in an earlier segment, Ish seems to have lost something, namely himself. One of the most important places on the ship, second only to the galley, is the Cabin, specifically the captain’s cabin where all of the major decisions are made. As the Chernyakova begins doing business, the officers notice that Ishmael is absent while on board, and that the Cabin isn’t a reflection of Ishmael’s personality as it has been on previous billets. He seems to be simply going through the motions as captain. He spends a lot of time in the Cabin, only goes to the bridge to stare at the stars or supervise vital ship operations, and occasionally goes to the galley for meals. He has somewhat isolated himself and the reason is that he is suffering from depression due to a loss of someone he cared a great deal about.

Ishmael’s officers take on the task of helping Ishmael heal and begin the process of recovering himself by making him decorate the Cabin and get back to moving about the ship. One of Ish’s qualities is that he surrounds himself with competent officers and crew and he know enough to stay out of their way and let them do their jobs, while at the same time knowing when to intervene to help solve problems. Of course, his officers know this about him and they are also aware of what the problem is, so they take care of their captain, who is very willing to take the help for the good of the ship as well as his own good.

At any rate, To Fire Called beyond Ishmael’s story gives the reader a picture of what freight hauling is about on the frontier known as Toe Hold Space. Most of the procedures in Toe Hold are the same as in Confederated space and many of the rules change as one travels from station to station picking up and delivering cargo. It makes for an engaging story that adds a new dimension to the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper series that includes some action scenes that have not appeared in earlier stories.

As always, I highly recommend To Fire Called as well as all of the tales spun by Nathan Lowell. I would advise the reader to read them in order though, starting with the first book, Quarter Share.

Well, there it is…

Qapla!

Edited by Benjamin Arrowood

Alien: Covenant - Nothing New In This Film But Worth Seeing Anyway

Alien: Covenant

***Spoiler Alert***

Following on the heels of Prometheus, Ridley Scott brings us this second film in what is to be a trilogy of films that are slated to serve as prequels to the original Alien movie of 1979.

Following a prologue in which Peter Weyland speaks with the synthetic crewmember of the Prometheus, who promises that one day they will search for mankind’s creator together. The film moves on to a colonization ship called Covenant with over two thousand colonists and a thousand embryos aboard, all in stasis. They are bound for a remote planet known as Origae-6. All is proceeding as planned when Walter, the synthetic assigned to Covenant detects that she ship has been hit by a neutrino burst damaging the ship and killing some of the colonists. Walter orders the ship’s computer to wake the crew from stasis. During the awakening process, the captain’s stasis pod malfunctions killing him and leaving the first officer, Oram in charge.

While the crew makes repairs to the ship, a radio communication is picked up from a nearby planet. Against the protests of Daniels, the original captain’s widow, Captain Oram decides to investigate.

Leaving the Covenant, a team takes a lander down to the surface where they trace the radio transmission to an Engineer ship. While on the surface, two members of the team are infected with alien spores and become sick. Those two are then quarantined in the lander’s medical bay. It isn’t long before a creature, a Neomorph, bursts from one of the infected crew’s back and kills another member of the crew. Another crewmember attempts to shoot the Neomorph but misses and hits a tank of volatile gas causing an explosion that destroys the lander. The Neomorph survives the explosion and escapes to the planet’s surface while the other infected crewman has another such creature burst from his body.

Together, the Neomorphs attack the remaining crew of the lander and kill yet another member of the crew. The rest continue to fight until David, who has survived the failed Prometheus mission, arrives on the scene and rescues what is left of the lander’s crew. He leads them to a city full of Engineer corpses. David then explains that when he and Dr. Shaw from the Prometheus arrived in the Engineer ship they had commandeered, the black liquid bio weapon was accidentally released killing the native population, David further claimed that Shaw died when the ship crashed.

As the remaining crew tries to contact the Covenant, the remaining Neomorph attacks, killing another member of the crew. David tries to communicate with the creature and is appalled when Oram kills it. Oram then turns his weapon on David and forces him to explain that the aliens are actually the result of experiments he has been performing with the black liquid bio weapon to create a new species. David then takes Oram into an incubation chamber and tricks him into being grabbed by a facehugger and implanting an embryo in Oram. It isn’t long before a Xenomorph erupts from Oram’s chest.

While the remaining members of the lander’s crew go in search of Oram, Walter confronts David after learning that David had deliberately released the bio weapon on the Engineers. David tries to justify his actions by explaining that humans are an inferior race that should not be allowed to colonize the galaxy. Walter disagrees so David disables him and then captures crewmember Daniels and reveals that Shaw didn’t actually die from a crash, but was used by David as a test subject for his experiments. Walter manages to reactivate himself and engages David in combat while Daniels escapes and another member of the crew is attacked by a facehugger. Daniels, Walter, and the infected crewmember are rescued by another lander, but not before yet another crewmember is killed by the Xenomorph.

The crew of the second lander manages to kill the Xenomorph before they dock with the Covenant, but yet another Xenomorph bursts out of the chest of the infected crew member and kills two more crew. With Walter’s help, the ship’s pilot and Daniels corner the Xenomorph in the ship’s airlock and flush it into space.

The Covenant resumes its original course to Origae-6 and the remaining crew go back into stasis. As Walter is putting Daniels back under, she realizes that Walter is actually David, but falls asleep before she can do anything about it. David then regurgitates two alien embryos and places them in stasis with the human embryos.  Then, in Walter’s name, he records a log entry stating that all members of the crew, save Daniels and the ship’s pilot, were killed by the neutrino blast.

On the downside, I found the film wholly predictable. There was really nothing new to this film and it might fit into a “this has all been done before;” same song, different verse.  I knew as soon as the members of the crew headed for the planet that most of them would die, save one or two survivors, and one of those survivors would be infected with a Xenomorph embryo that would threaten the remaining crew of the Covenant itself. Later in the film, when the two artificial lifeforms came face to face, I also knew that Walter would be replaced by David which would be revealed at the very end of the film. It is pretty much the same trope that has taken place in all of the films in the franchise.

However, that is not to say that the film is not entertaining and worth a watch, if not in the theater, at least when it comes out on BluRay. I enjoyed the film because of the performances turned in by the main characters, especially those of Michael Fassbender as David/Walter and Katherine Waterston in her Ripley-like role as Daniels “Dany” Branson.

It is no secret that the synthetic people on missions in the Alien franchise have been somewhat problematic, mostly because they had some agenda that the humans were not aware of. In the original Alien films, it was known that the corporation wanted the Xenomorphs for their value as weapons. The ship’s computer (known usually as Mother) and the synthetic worked hard to try to make sure that a creature was captured to be returned to Earth for exploitation. Failing that, the corporation sent a human in Aliens. In the case of David, I am not positive on what his motivation is. Was he programmed by the corporation to look for dangerous life, or is it a project he took on because he could?  David was quite advanced and it is mentioned in the film that Walter has been dumbed down a bit. So we have two identical appearing characters with different behaviors. This would be a challenge for any actor; be the same, but different. Fassbender pulls it off quite well. Along with that, he becomes increasingly more sinister as the film unspools.

In this franchise, any strong female character is going to be compared to Ellen Ripley. So far, we have Dr. Elizabeth Shaw, the extremely tough character from Prometheus, and now Daniels Branson, the terraforming expert aboard the Covenant. Dany Daniels is another intelligent, tough, and driven character that deserves as much respect as Ripley, but they are not the same, they are indeed their own characters.

So, while there is really not a lot new in this film, I would recommend seeing it anyway, it does answer a few questions raised in Prometheus, and raises a few more questions that I hope will be answered in the next film in this long-lived franchise. Despite the predictability of the story, it is a very good Sci-Fi Thriller and will give you a scare every now and then.

Well, there it is…

Qapla’!

Edited By Benjamin Arrowood