NCIS: Origins – Touchstones

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: NCIS: Origins – Touchstones
  • wiki: link

A break-in of the evidence room and the theft of $41,000 dollars allows the show to explore the backstory of one of the show’s recurring characters in property master Kowalski (Michael Harney) as events bring old memories and feelings to the surface that cause him to resign (although he’s back with NIS by the end of the episode). The Kowalski situation is also notable for exploring his relationship with Granville (Daniel Bellomy) while the search for the missing money implicates a member of NIS and also allows for another appearance by Special Agent Gary Callahan and ends up being tied to events in “All’s Not Lost” as well.

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You’re Cordially Invited

/ / Home Video
  • Title: You’re Cordially Invited
  • IMDb: link

There’s a concept at the heart of You’re Cordially Invited which could have produced an okay film. This is not that film. Through the first, of many, contrivances, two families book the same small wedding venue on the same weekend. Oddly, it’s neither the bride nor groom of either side as the main characters but the father (Will Ferrell) of one of the brides (Geraldine Viswanathan) and the sister (Reese Witherspoon) of the other bride (Meredith Hagner).

While at first agreeing to work together to make the best of a bad situation and share the venue, conflicts arise (mostly through more contrivances rather than reasonable actions by any character) leading to each actively trying to destroy the other wedding (but in mostly lame ways as anything truly bad that happens is always accidental).

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What If…? Galactus Transformed Spider-Gwen

/ / Comics

The latest of these What If…? Galactus one-shots each featuring Galactus turning a random member of the Marvel Universe into his new herald ask the question: What If…? Galactus Transformed Spider-Gwen. Aside from the concept being flawed, the whole point of Norrin Radd becoming the Silver Surfer was that he was a normal man beforehand. It’s the granting of almost unlimited power to a good man and then forcing him into a shitty job. If the individual is already super-powered, and you don’t deal with the crushing moral dilemmas of the job, then the concept falls apart.

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Shifting Gears – Grief

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Shifting Gears – Grief
  • IMDb: link

I’ve watched a couple episodes of the new Hulu sitcom Shifting Gears starring Tim Allen and Kat Dennings as bickering father and daughter who are forced to reconnect after she moves back home with her son following the disillusion of her marriage. The set up allows both to quip, and, at times, do a small bit of introspection. “Grief,” which focuses on Riley’s (Dennings) attempts to get her father to deal with the grief of her mother’s death, is the best of the episodes I watched ,while still firmly nested in the sitcom trappings of the show, which allows the walls between the two characters to come down long enough for some honest discussion of loss.

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