3.5 Razors

Stargirl – Summer School: Chapter Twelve

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Stargirl – Summer School: Chapter Twelve
  • wiki: link

The penultimate episode of Stargirl‘s sophomore season works mainly to set the stage for next week’s finale and the big showdown with Eclipso. Returned from the Shadowlands, Courtney (Brec Bassinger) reluctantly accepts the help of Cindy Burman (Meg DeLacy) while trying to put the rest of the new JSA back together. Cindy’s involvement proves to be the one thing to tempt Yolanda (Yvette Monreal) back into action. Meanwhile Mike (Trae Romano) tracks down Thunderbolt, and Pat (Luke Wilson) makes a (somewhat scary) trip to the hospital to get the other member of the team out of prison. The episode ends with the heroes reunited but with looming trouble as Eclipso eyes his new host foreshadowed by Jennie (Ysa Penarejo) vision.

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Leverage: Redemption – The Jackal Job

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Leverage: Redemption – The Jackal Job
  • wiki: link

The team gets their newest client when Sophie (Gina Bellman) and Breanna (Aleyse Shannon) cross paths with a legendary grifter (Joanna Cassidy) fighting early-onset Alzheimer’s who a crooked guardian (Kraig Dane) and an unscrupulous judge (Bill Kelly) are taking advantage of. Somewhat similar to “The Van Gogh Job,” the episode includes a flashback story with one of the cast taking on the role of the main character as the team work with the legendary grifter to remember her biggest score and find what they need to free her from her current predicament.

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Corridor of Mirrors

/ / Home Video
  • Title: Corridor of Mirrors
  • IMDb: link

The film debut of both director Terrence Young (From Russia with Love, Thunderball) and actor Christopher Lee (albeit in a minor role), 1948’s Corridor of Mirrors is an atmospheric thriller involving an eccentric bachelor (Eric Portman) who falls in love with a young woman (Edana Romney) who eerily resembles a Renaissance painting he keeps in his home. Their relationship mostly involves Mangin (Portman) dressing Mifanwy (Romney) in a variety of dresses and jewelry that fit her perfectly. As she struggles against his control, and the warnings of an older woman (Barbara Mullen) in the house suggesting dangerous ulterior motives in Mangin’s actions, their relationship ends disastrously, and, years later, tragically.

Although it may feel a bit dated in places, the tone and tension of the story hold up well as does Young’s direction and the cinematography of André Thomas. Re-released on Blu-ray and DVD as part of the Cohen Film Collection, Corridor of Mirrors is worth visiting for fans of the era or the genre. …

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NCIS: Hawai’i – Gaijin

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: NCIS: Hawai’i – Gaijin
  • wiki: link

The death of a Japanese sailor on Hawaii calls the attention of NCIS to a related murder from years before in Okinawa. Madeline Zima guest-stars as the prime suspect in both crimes, as psychopath who was the original victim’s roommate and met with the second victim on the day of his death. The other guest-appearance of note is Toshiji Takeshima as the officer who was unable to solve the original murder. It’s not often you see s procedural introduce a psychopath as a suspect only to use them as a red herring, but “Gaijin” takes some interesting turns as NCIS is able to solve two murders with the help of the woman originally suspected of both. 

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Foundation – The Emperor’s Peace

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Foundation – The Emperor’s Peace
  • IMDb: link

Originally written as short stories for Astounding Magazine more than 70 years ago, Isaac Asimov‘s idea of examining something akin to the fall of the Roman Empire on a galactic scale would result in a series of stories and novels, some written decades apart, spanning thousands of years, where the fate of humanity weighed in the balance. Using the concept of predictive models taken to the nth degree, Asimov offered the mathematics of psychohistory which was capable of predicting the future of large populations, even if those populations don’t like what those predictions might be.

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