4.5 Razors

Usagi Yojimbo #4

/ / Comics

Usagi Yojimbo #4 comic reviewUsagi Yojimbo #4 begins a new arc when Miyamoto Usagi encounters Lady Mura on the road. A talented writer whose work captures Usagi’s attention, even causing the ronin to imagine himself as a character in her story, Usagi decides to walk a ways with Mura who is on her way to see her father after a dust-up with her abusive husband the night before.

Hearing of her arranged marriage, and her husband’s anger that her prestige has now outshines his own, inspires Usagi to offer his services as bodyguard to Mura on the road, which turns out to be a fateful decision when her husbands thugs show up to forcibly return her home (and are sent back without Usagi removing the blade from its sheath).

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Official Secrets

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Official Secrets
  • IMDb: link

Official Secrets movie review

The world could use a few more people like Katherine Gun. Based on the true story of a British Intelligence officer discovering her government’s willingness to assist the United States in moving forward with an invasion of Iraq regardless of actual facts, director Gavin Hood‘s film stays focused on the personal cost to whistleblower Katherine Gun (Keira Knightley) as the film takes us through her discovery of a memo from the NSA asking for help blackmailing nations on the United Nations Security Council in order to rubber stamp the 2003 Iraq invasion through to her day in court a year later.

Knightley is terrific in the role of the defiant but terrified woman whose actions cause ramifications not just for herself but for her husband (Adam Bakri) who is nearly deported by a spiteful government that leaves her twisting in the wind for the better part of a year. Her supporting cast isn’t too shabby either including Matt Smith as the reporter who broke the story (but who only shares a single scene with Knightley on-screen), Rhys Ifans as another reporter on the scent, and Ralph Fiennes and Matthew Goode who emerge when the case moves to trial.

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Spenser: For Hire – A Day’s Wages

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Spenser: For Hire – A Day’s Wages
  • IMDb: link

Spenser: For Hire - A Day's Wages TV review

Throwback Tuesday takes us back to the mean streets of Boston and the travails of a smart ass private detective. What starts out as a relatively simple job for Spenser (Robert Urich), looking into who is stealing from a local dress manufacturer (Edward Binns), becomes far more complicated by thief’s death and the business owner’s underworld connections. “A Day’s Wages” returns one of Robert B. Parker’s most notorious characters in crime boss Joe Broz (Raymond Serra) who is slowly squeezing the life out of the business in able to turn a profit with his own scams of selling knock-off merchandise to high-end clientele. The story ties in Hawk (Avery Brooks) by having him perform protection for the victim (Erik King), although it turns out not that well before being sidelined for most of the episode by a deal with Spenser. And with Belson (Ron McLarty) and Quirk (Richard Jaeckel) receiving little more than last-second cameos, the story stays centered on Spenser for nearly the entire episode.

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Elementary – Their Last Bow

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Elementary – Their Last Bow
  • wiki: link

Elementary - Their Last Bow television review

After seven years on CBS, Elementary concludes with a series finale that focuses not on a case to solve but on the core relationship of the show’s two primary characters. Set years after “Reichenbach Falls,” with Odin Reichenbach (James Frain) now sentenced to hundreds of years behind bars, Watson (Lucy Liu) brings back her partner who has traveled the globe in recent years solving crimes under a slew of different pseudonyms while the world has believed Sherlock (Jonny Lee Miller) to be dead. Initially it appears Holmes’ old flame has lured him out of hiding, but further investigation reveals that Jamie Moriarty (who sadly doesn’t make an appearance here) has known about Holmes’ survival for some time.

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A Nero Wolfe Mystery – Over My Dead Body

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: A Nero Wolfe Mystery – Over My Dead Body
  • IMDb: link

A Nero Wolfe Mystery - Over My Dead Body television review

Flashback Friday us back to mid 20th Century New York and the private detective offices located at 454 W. 35th Street. “Over My Dead Body” is a complicated affair that involves the theft of diamonds, two murders, world politics, lies and deception, the FBI, a lucrative land deal, and a client claiming to be Nero Wolfe‘s (Maury Chaykin) daughter (Francie Swift). While investigating the theft of jewels, Archie (Timothy Hutton) stumbles onto a murder that evidence points to Neya Tormic (Swift), the woman claiming to be Wolfe’s daughter, and her associate (Kari Matchett) who hired Wolfe on Neya’s behalf. The fact that Wolfe is unable to get straight answers from either of them only complicates matters as does a document one of them decides to hide in the brownstone rather than see it fall into the wrong hands.

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