The entertainingly familiar

Many directors have a style that accompanies most, if not all, of their work but no modern voice in cinema has as distinct or consistent a style as Wes Anderson. From The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou forward, Anderson's films have inhabited a slightly off-kilter fantasy world that is alternately charming, bemusing, and fascinating but never boring. His latest, Asteroid City, is no different in this respect. Set in the 1950s, the ideally kitschy age for an Anderson story, the film takes us through a science fair, some midlife crises, teenage discovery, postmortem grief, and first contact with at least semi-intelligent extraterrestrial life. Any one of those themes could have been central to an Anderson film and would doubtlessly have turned into an interesting story full of sly witticisms and quirky moments that you'd rarely see in most other directors' work. The fact that all of them were crammed into one story might be what makes this one feel slightly lacking when one lists the better films of his oeuvre.

It's at least mildly reassuring to know that it's not just Anderson fans who respect his work, as the list of actors that are piling into the tiniest of parts in his last two films (the previous being The French Dispatch) is beginning to become a story in and of itself. While City had a collection of those who are now Anderson regulars, like Scarlett Johansson, Adrien Brody, and Ed Norton, it also includes Tom Hanks, Matt Dillon, Hong Chau, and Willem Defoe, among many others. Some of those marquee names had screen time in the range of two minutes or less. But this was apparently the chance to be "in an Anderson" and they took it, no matter how ephemeral the role. It's a fair question to ask at this point whether their popping up for a few seconds and being noticed by the audience is the entertainment of the moment or whether what they're saying and doing onscreen is supposed to be the focus in the traditional manner. When I think back to what I still regard as the pinnacle of his career, Moonrise Kingdom, I remember a film where virtually every character had an important role to play in the story and wasn't just a moving part of the scenery or a lever to move a scene from one spot to the next with a famous face attached. That latter state leaves many of them as not very memorable parts of the overall story. Indeed, among the most memorable characters are the trio of girls who are Augie's (Jason Schwartzman) daughters, Andromeda, Cassiopeia, and Pandora (the Faris triplets: Ella, Willan, and Gracie, respectively) none of whom received star credit but all of whom had more comedic and dramatic impact than many much more hallowed names.

All of that said, the star of the piece was definitely Johansson, who delivered what was probably her best performance since Lost in Translation. In the lighthearted world of Anderson, Midge was the character who was dryly poking holes in everything and getting everyone to admit that they knew there was more to the story and the world than what was being told to them. The fact that her daughter, Dinah (Grace Edwards) develops a relationship with Woodrow (Jake Ryan) at the same time that Midge and Augie are hooking up is just part of the symmetry that Anderson tends to embed in the worlds where it seems like random events are the order of the day. In a way, that's part of the point, in that all of those events, while symmetrical, are still random. That's, again, part of what gives his films their charm, because nothing seems planned, even though all of it is, meticulously. It's also worth noting Jeffrey Wright as General Grif Gibson and Bryan Cranston as the TV Host for lending the artificial gravitas that the rest of the cast spends their time orbiting around and often inadvertently defying. That, too, is part of the whimsy of Anderson's worlds and it's still an appreciable thing.

But in a way it's also the weakness of the film in that it's kinda the same thing that's been happening for 25 years now. It's still a treat for those of us that are fans, but it's the same treat that we've been getting for a long time and not nearly as delightful as it was at its height in films like Moonrise and The Grand Budapest Hotel. I don't think the formula has gotten tired, per se, but it also no longer carries the weight that it once did. Moonrise, while in that same vein of whimsy, was also a deeply emotional story of emotional discovery between two inhibited teenagers and the rediscovery of same by many inhibited adults. That kind of discovery story had a small part in City, but it was a very minor note in an otherwise patchwork quilt of themes. The impression that I walked out with wasn't the fascinating story of a place and population just slightly askew, but a director recycling his old material in an attempt to do something new which really wasn't. I don't want to say that it was tired because I didn't become bored or impatient or disinterested. I was chuckling basically the whole way through. But it felt almost too familiar; as if I'd seen it all before. That's not to say that it's a bad film or not worth seeing. It absolutely is. But in the same way as with Dispatch, I didn't walk out of the theater thinking that I'd seen something magical. It was just more Wes Anderson.

And that might be because of my overall perspective at the moment and not from any marked failing on the part of the film. I've been writing about this stuff for a long time, in the same way that I've been writing here and here for a long time. Lately, none of them are giving me the kind of return that I've always been hoping for. Well, honestly, none of them have turned into what I'd vaguely hoped for, which is landing a regular gig writing somewhere. But even doing it in the hopes that something might happen has begun to be less than what I'd usually expect. In other words, I'm not really enjoying it anymore and am giving serious thought to giving up on the idea of writing on a regular basis. I don't think I'm running out of things to say. I just feel like not enough people are particularly interested anymore, if they ever were. In a way, I'm kind of doing the same thing and it feels like only the usual suspects are paying attention; kinda like Wes Anderson's fans. So, I've been giving some serious thought to simply shutting down and moving on to something else. What that might be, I have no idea, but it certainly seems that writing for a living is not in my future after almost 40 years of trying. We'll see what happens next, I guess.

The limits of expectations

There hasn't been much traffic here lately. A combination of other activities (vacations, etc.) and a lack of compelling films at the Michigan/State Theaters has led to a similar void at this blog as currently occupies extratime.blog (which is a result of it being the off-season for Euro football.) But we have been watching new things. They've just been on the small screen. Back in the day of cable bundles, there were often complaints about how one might be paying insane fees for some channels simply to gain access to the smaller ones that you really wanted. This was frequently from people paying ESPN's fees as part of their cable bill when they weren't sports fans at all. Given the variety of my interests, I never had that issue, but still found myself bemoaning the fact that I had access to 300 channels and actually watched less than a tenth of those. The idea of splitting everything into distinct networks so that one could actually get what you were paying for was seen as the ideal transformation. Of course, now we have the (predictable) opposite problem, in that there's so much fragmentation among streaming networks and show producers that in order to see everything you'd like, you're paying basically the same amount you would have for that cable bundle, but in eight different directions, instead of just one. This was a long preamble to get around to the fact that we've engaged yet another streaming network, in the form of Apple TV+, because Tricia recently replaced her iPhone and was given three months' access to the network for free. Given that Apple is the home of such heralded shows as Ted Lasso, I was half-excited and half-cringing at the idea of paying for yet another streaming service, if we found that what was on offer was actually worthwhile. The results have been... mixed, to be diplomatic about it, so there may be no need to be concerned about another bill when our free time runs out. But let's start at the top.

Ted Lasso. This was the show that put Apple TV on the map, coming as it did during the dark days of the initial COVID lockdown in 2020 and giving people at least one ray of severe positivity in their lives. That circumstance of timing is what I would suspect is one of the main drivers of its popularity. At that time when people were actively concerned about leaving their homes or associating with their friends and relatives, it must have been awfully reassuring having Jason Sudeikis on the screen on a regular basis to remind you that there was still some sunshine in the world. And that's all well and good, except that it doesn't really replace the rather average quality of both plot and writing. The basis of the show- that the vengeful new owner of Premier League club, AFC Richmond, somehow hires a Div. II American football coach to be the club's manager in the hopes of driving it into the ground (or at least to relegation) -is essentially the plot of Major League (and, indirectly, Slapshot) so we're not really seeing anything new here. This involves completely ignoring the ridiculous media firestorm and likely outright revolt by the club's members and supporters that would accompany any such move, to say nothing of inquiries by the PL wondering why one of their clubs is seemingly sabotaging its own- and, thus, the league's -product. But let's put all that real world stuff aside, accept our absurd premise, and get down to the meat of what the show is. Or, more accurately, isn't.

The main problem I had with Ted Lasso is that it wasn't funny. It's not that it wasn't cerebrally funny or didn't really appeal to my often obscure sense of humor. Those are both difficult paths to walk and I've watched (and laughed at) more than one show that didn't really hit the nail on the head in the same way that, say, Rick and Morty does. But this show wasn't funny at all. It was really just pedestrian. Characters did obvious things with motivations planted in front of them to do so. The joke was already right there before the dialogue came from their mouths, making it akin to already having heard all the jokes even before we watched the show. Certainly, I'm probably very far from the target audience, having watched English football for 45 years and having fully acquainted myself with the George Bernard Shawisms ("Two people separated by a common language.") of the dialectical differences between the States and the mother country. It's not particularly interesting (or funny) to me to see people wondering about calling cleats "boots" and comparing them to the trunk of a car. Indeed, the only time I laughed out loud during the entire first season was when the staff were talking about other managers getting in touch in the face of Ted's obvious failures and started listing names of those who'd contacted the club: "Tony Pulis, Alan Curbishley; Harry Redknapp has called three times." Now, if you know anything about English football over the last decade-and-a-half, that line is hilarious. But it was also utterly lost on probably 99% (at least) of the American audience who were otherwise apparently intended to be amused by the "aw shucks!" approach of Sudeikis and Co.

And, of course, a lot of people were amused. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. (see above about "obscure sense of humor.") But I'm always far more interested in shows or movies that are going to make me think. I received much advice about "turning my brain off" and just being entertained by what Ted and others were doing and that's never, ever going to happen. If I'm going to spend an hour watching something, I want to get something out of it other than just having spent an hour not having to think. There has to be a story that interests me. Or at least a character that's compelling. Or even a couple lines that I'd find interesting enough to repeat or remember or even try to swipe for something I'm working on. Ted Lasso had none of that. The characters were all very obvious and mostly quite simple. The story is, as noted, reprocessed from previous efforts and/or so unrealistic as to make me think that the writers didn't even bother to research their setting. And the dialogue is simply routine. There's nothing there that's memorable outside of a an offhand joke that an extreme minority of viewers would appreciate. My reaction to the show has drawn all kinds of negative reactions from my friends; ranging from disbelief to disdain that I wasn't able to appreciate something that was universally-praised. This is not a new phenomenon (see: Titanic among many, many others.) So, yeah, it could be "just me", but it was also a really poor start for Apple TV if I tuned into their hallmark (ahem) property and came away completely detached. We watched the first season and I have no interest in pursuing it any further.

Foundation. So then we moved on to something that is actually rooted in the familiar (e.g. not an obvious outsider's take on something like English football.), in that I've read all of the novels by Isaac Asimov upon which the show is based. The problem that has followed the books around for decades in terms of trying to adapt them to other media is that they're far more Glengarry Glen Ross than Star Wars. In other words, Asimov's work was often about two people in a room holding a conversation on high-end topics (cultural, political, scientific), instead of going through events or initiating actions that tell a story about how the galactic empire is dying. There's a lot more talkin' than there is actin' and that's occasionally a difficult problem when trying to adapt said prose to a visual medium. It's not insurmountable. As GGR displays, it's quite possible to tell a great story about people talking about doing stuff, rather than actually showing them doing it. It's just a different approach and Asimov's books are cornerstones of modern science fiction for taking that approach and showing just how cerebral that kind of storytelling can be; even when not considered "hard" science fiction (e.g. sticking to the actual physical constraints of the universe and embedding those principles in the storytelling approach.) But the problem is that Asimov's rather distant relationship with most of his characters burdens the story with the problems that everyone predicted (Psychohistory!) over the many, many years of thinking about how to adapt the Foundation series to film or TV.

The first problem is that the story is huge. This is a tale that is almost required to take place over decades and centuries in order to come to its conclusion. So, unless you're willing to markedly deviate from Asimov's work and introduce things like suspended animation or time-shifting (not something I would advise unless you want to be accused of ripping off Star Trek's worst excesses), you're going to need to do one of two things: 1. Simply carry forward with multiple actors filling the roles of the books, such that few characters are seen for longer than a couple episodes, giving the audience no chance to develop familiarity and, thus, relate to them. 2. Tell your story in a non-linear fashion so that multiple, concurrent storylines are running simultaneously in "show time", even if they're at different stages in story time. They chose #2, which is clearly the wiser choice if you expect to get renewed for multiple seasons. Now, don't get me wrong. I love non-linear storytelling. Among many standout elements to Pulp Fiction, one of its strongest is that non-linear approach that sets up the story to work and then later blend together in ways that simply going from point A to point B would not have allowed. But that approach works well in a film because you're telling your whole story in two hours. I've found it to be less viable in TV series because, unless you're binge-watching the whole thing, it's quite easy for the average audience member to lose track of- and, thus, lose interest in -what's happening when you're shifting between characters, their children, and their grandchildren, all ostensibly pursuing the same goal. Having to do so much setup of those characters, their surroundings, and their motivations only adds to that potential confusion. In watching the show, I'm OK with it because I read the books and I know what's going on. I know that Tricia tuned out almost instantly, not only because of its slow pace but also because, unless she was riveted to the screen, she probably lost track of what was happening pretty quickly.

Visually, it is impressive, which is what you'd hope for given the massive scope of the story and the modern techniques we have for conveying that majesty. I've only watched the first four episodes and I've been able to appreciate what they're trying to do here. Of course, they also never fully escaped the problem that has dogged attempts at the "unfilmable" series in the past in that, in many ways, it is kinda unfilmable and they've had to make alterations to the story already that many purists would reject and which deviate not only from the narrative but from Asimov's thematic intent. The Star Bridge and its destruction? Doesn't even exist in the books. The cloned emperors? Nope. Both of those are seemingly attempts to add compelling narratives to the story (unrest in the galaxy leading to the dissolution of the empire; said unrest perhaps arising from the "same" man/men being in power for so long, but also struggling with their own preprogrammed roles) but neither are present in Asimov's work because the story he was trying to tell was about the loss of knowledge from one generation to the next and Harry Seldon's attempt to forestall that. Having a ruler who is cyclically cloned from his predecessors and is, thus, infused with their knowledge and history from birth is directly contradicting Asimov's entire premise. It's seemingly become a story of rejecting history, rather than forgetting it. The former is a great premise, too (witness Ron DeSantis' fervent attempts to almost literally whitewash history and education in the state of Florida), but it's not the story Asimov was trying to tell. But in doing so, they again haven't escaped the essential problem, but have instead simply presented another version of a slow, difficult story in a visual medium. Will it be worth it? I don't know. Like I said, I've watched four. I'm not fervently compelled to go back to it and Tricia has no interest whatsoever.

Severance. In a final attempt to see if Apple TV was going to work for us, I picked up a suggestion that came from friends on ThereWillBe.Games in the form of a dystopian version of Office Space. Now, anyone who knows me will know that I am all over dystopian and/or post-apocalyptic stories and will almost always stop to watch anything that carries one or both of those labels. I created an entire comic universe called "Dystopia" and wrote hundreds of pages of script about it so, yeah, I'm onboard for most of that stuff. Having watched the first three episodes in our first evening of trying it out, it's quite possible that the third attempt is, indeed, the charm. Tricia sat up and took notice in the first couple minutes it was on and we've both stayed fully involved in all three episodes. These are fully-formed characters, with human idiosyncrasies that they struggle with, and a premise that, while still firmly in the SF/Twilight Zone realm, isn't that far removed from the present day (in true, Twilight Zone fashion; RIP the genius that was Rod Serling.) Unlike Ted Lasso, I was instantly interested and familiar with what they were presenting. The production design (the austere, brightly-lit, maze-like corridors of the workplace; the dark and shadowy or bleak and gray depiction of home life) is excellent and the themes (the cult-like devotion to the founding CEO (at least mildly ironical in its presence on Apple TV...), the attempted division between work and home life but not for the benefit of the employees) resonate with what our world is like right now. On top of all that, the cast has multiple highlights in the form of Patricia Arquette, Christopher Walken, and John Turturro.

But the best work so far has been done by, appropriately, the lead, Adam Scott, as Mark S. He's the first "severed" person we meet and it's clear that he's struggling with many other issues above and beyond that from the moment we first see him, crying in his car outside Lumon Industries. His reason for being severed is a perfectly understandable one, if extreme and tragic (People are often like that.) And he provides both a perfect example of what Lumon expects their employees to be (chipper and constantly motivated and positive at the office), as well as what an actual emotional human can often endure outside (devastated by his wife's loss and his largely friendless existence.) Indeed, he's almost the case study for why Lumon would want to do this from a work-efficiency (and emotionally void) perspective, in that he's the model employee at work because the severing prevents him from bringing personal problems into the office. (Hearken back here to Gil's (Steve Martin) argument with his boss in Parenthood; the latter of whom chides Gil for constantly complaining about problems with his kids while his competitor for a partnership is always on the go ("I'm not even sure if he has kids!")) But Scott isn't alone here, as Jen Tullock does great work as his concerned sister, Devon, who nevertheless doesn't want to interfere in either Mark's grieving for his wife or his decisions as to how to handle it. Likewise, Tramell Tillman is excellent as the supervisor, Seth Milchick, who exudes an aura of chipperness and menace at all times; often simultaneously.

This is the one show among the three that instantly had me thinking: "Oh, yeah. I want to see more of this." That came from not only being interested in a story about actual, fully-formed humans, but also being interested in how those humans deal with a story that respects the viewer. This isn't simplistic like Ted Lasso or overly-burdened like Foundation. It is possible that, like many of these mystery premises, we could end up with an overly-elaborate justification for why all of this is happening (see: Lost, Battlestar Galactica, etc.) But it's also possible that we could end up with something more along the lines of True Detective, season 1, where the essential elements of the story aren't the genre itself (in this case, SF; in TD's case, crime), but the people involved in it. It's not like there haven't been a couple missteps. Britt Lower, as Helly R., provides a dynamic personality and a much more typical reaction to the circumstances of being essentially imprisoned on the "severed" level. But that immediately led me to question why she would have been accepted into the program in the first place. Considering the amount of psychological screening that takes place in major corporate hiring practices in the real world, it seems like something as drastic as the severing process and her reaction to it would have been flagged by Lumon long before Helly underwent the procedure. She's the one flame in the otherwise tepid existence, which is a great conflict element, but still seems quite out of place at the moment.

So, that's Apple TV. I'm still not certain that we'll hold onto it, since we have multiple other services to watch (and some that should probably be turned off by now), but Severance at least provides something of a compelling argument that was otherwise lacking to that point. We'll see how it develops.