A.V. Club

Film: Newswire: Denzel Washington may take a break from being an agent or cop or something to play Thelonious Monk

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 13:54:00 -0600

Perhaps sensing that his career choices of late had lapsed into self-parody, Denzel Washington has begun considering projects that could find him briefly stepping away from being an agent or cop or something who plays by his own rules and butts heads with a younger guy. For starters, there’s the upcoming Robert Zemeckis drama Flight, in which Washington puts on a different kind of uniform and breaks some different kinds of rules by playing a Sully-like hero pilot who's revealed to also have a drinking problem. Now he tells The Observer—shortly after insisting that he would be ...

Film: Newswire: Ben Stiller hires people who are not Ben Stiller to help Ben Stiller remake The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 13:25:00 -0600

Ben Stiller is making some serious progress on his remake of 1947’s The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty—with director Ben Stiller workshopping daily with star Ben Stiller, giving him honest advice, Stiller to Stiller, and offering the sort of constructive criticism that Ben Stiller knows will get the best performance out of Ben Stiller. But as there are limits even to the capacity of Stiller, Ben Stiller has hired some non-Ben Stillers to join the story of a nebbishy man who slips into a fantasy life where he can do anything, and also co-star in The Secret Life ...

Film: Newswire: Rambo 5 might be happening after all

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:42:00 -0600

In 2010, Sylvester Stallone said that he was “99 percent sure” that he was done hiding the graying Rambo franchise behind an increasingly musty headband of contrived mercenary subplots, despite rumors that Rambo might once again be called from retirement to dispense mumbly justice to human traffickers or even genetically engineered mutants. But as recent protests have shown us, we are ruled by the 1 percent, and thus Rambo 5 is still apparently a possibility—at least, according to self-pitying Conan The Barbarian writer Sean Hood, who recently tweeted that he’s working on a Rambo 5 screenplay that is ...

Features: For Our Consideration: Why is TV scheduling so terrible for viewers and networks alike?

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:00:00 -0600

On Tuesday night at 10 p.m. Eastern, you might settle into your easy chair to watch FX’s Justified, one of TV’s best dramas. Or maybe you’re in the mood for a more traditional cop show, in which case, you can flip over to Southland on TNT, which is another of TV’s best dramas. Or maybe you don’t want cops at all. Well, then there’s NBC’s Parenthood, yet another of TV’s best dramas. Is it possible you’re in the mood for sketch comedy? At 10:30, there’s one of the ...

Games: Sawbuck Gamer: February 13, 2012

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:00:00 -0600

Puzzlejuice Creator: Colaboratory Platforms: iPhone/iPad (Universal Binary) Played on: iPad Price: $1.99 There are people who are good at Tetris and there are people who are good at Boggle. Those who are in the middle of that Venn diagram can count themselves lucky when playing Puzzlejuice, which tests—nay, taxes—players’ spatial dexterity à la Tetris and their jumble-y discovery abilities à la Boggle at the same time. The game starts off like Tetris. Various shapes fall, and you fit them into one another. The shapes are also color-coded, though, and lining up three blocks of the same color transforms ...

TV: Batman: The Animated Series: “Sideshow”

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:00:00 -0600

“Sideshow” (season 2, episode 1; originally aired 5/3/1994) What better way to kick off the second season of Batman: The Animated Series than with one of only two episodes that is set completely outside of Gotham City? Batman has to navigate the treacherous terrain surrounding Gotham when Killer Croc escapes while being transported to a new prison, and the change in environment fits for one of Batman’s most primal rogues. Killer Croc’s first episode, “Vendetta,” was more of a Harvey Bullock story, but with “Sideshow,” Croc gets his own classic B:TAS episode in the vein ...

Features: Feature: Dear Michael Ian Black

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:00:00 -0600

In his excellent new book, You’re Not Doing It Right: Tales Of Marriage, Sex, Death, And Other Humiliations, actor/comedian/writer/podcaster Michael Ian Black offers a funny, startlingly honest appraisal of parenthood (Chapter 10: “I Hate My Baby”) and marriage, where he and his wife daydream about divorce. “One of the unexpected joys of being married is the hours of fantasizing it allows me to do about how much better my life would be if I got divorced,” Black writes in Chapter 12, “A Little Hard Work.” But You’re Not Doing It Right isn’t as bleak ...

Film: Newswire: Saoirse Ronan to play non-Snow White in Disney's Snow White movie that isn't a Snow White movie, it swears

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 11:45:00 -0600

The great Snow White war of 2012 has yet to begin, but it already claimed its first casualty (besides all of those production assistants that Julia Roberts strangled for kicks): Back in August, Disney officially modified its long-gestating Snow And The Seven—a kung fu-inflected version of the tale in which the dwarfs were also Shaolin monks—into the less-obvious Order Of The Seven, dropping the dwarfs entirely and remaking it as a standalone action film about an Englishwoman in 19th-century Hong Kong who seeks the protection of a group of seven warriors turned outlaws. (A group that also bears ...

Music: Newswire: The Grammys draw largest television audience since 1984

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 11:17:00 -0600

Whether it was due to curiosity seekers drawn in by Whitney Houston's death the night before, or the fact that Adele's 21 is the first genuine music-industry blockbuster in years, Sunday's Grammy telecast drew huge ratings, attracting the show's largest audience since 1984 and its second biggest overall. In all, 39 million people tuned in, which is actually more people than watched the Oscars last year. Score one for Team Music. [via The Hollywood Reporter]

Coming Distractions: Trailer: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 11:07:00 -0600

Everyone knows that Abraham Lincoln was not an expertly trained martial artist who pulled double duty as our sixteenth president and a slayer of the undead, but what Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter asks is, “What if… he was?” Adapted from the monster mash-up novel from Seth Grahame-Smith, the forthcoming film from Wanted director Timur Bekmambetov and producer Tim Burton obviously gets fairly tongue-in-cheek with its alternate U.S. history—the kind the liberal-run schools are too afraid to teach you—but it's not like you’d necessarily know it from this teaser. It’s mostly a dialogue-free procession ...

Books: Newswire: The Walking Dead's Robert Kirkman being sued by original illustrator and former best friend

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:34:00 -0600

Last week was an unusually contentious one in the world of comics (even for the normally contentious world of comics), and Friday evening brought news of one more legal battle that we saw but were like, “Damn, not another one. Let’s just talk about it on Monday.” And that’s today, so: The Walking Dead’s Robert Kirkman is being sued by original series illustrator Tony Moore, who claims that he has not received his appropriate share of royalties, thanks to being duped by Kirkman into signing away his rights to the now very lucrative franchise. Compared to the ...

Film: Newswire: The BAFTA Awards give everything to The Artist, proving that British people are aware it's a silent film

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:11:00 -0600

Still mortified by the actions of certain Liverpool ruffians, the BAFTA Awards went out of their way to celebrate The Artist last night, allowing the film to sweep more than half of the dozen categories in which it was nominated, even when it faced exceedingly British competitors such as Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and The Iron Lady. Through pursed lips and punctuated by plenty of embarrassed harrumphing, the red-faced presenters awarded Michel Hazanavicius’ ode to silent films best picture, director, actor, screenplay, music, cinematography, and costume design—thus proving that one is well aware that The Artist is a silent ...

Film: Newswire: Weekend Box Office: Valentine's Day belongs to the hunks

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 09:05:00 -0600

Apparently, mid-February is the new summer. There was enough audience to go around for all four of the week’s top openers, despite a spate of negative reviews for each of them. Having already coughed up $30.5 million to boost the opening weekend of his last big romantic drama, the Nicholas Sparks adaptation Dear John, viewers were powerless to resist the leaden charms of Channing “The Big Brisket” Tatum in The Vow, as he wrapped his beefy arms around Rachel McAdams and $41.7 million. And with a modest $30 million budget, massive profits are assured, especially in the ...

Music: Newswire: No official cause of death after Whitney Houston's autopsy

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 08:50:00 -0600

Officials conducted an autopsy on Whitney Houston's remains Sunday, but the cause of death officially remains unknown, and won't be determined until toxicology results come back in several weeks. Houston's body was discovered in the bathtub of her Beverly Hills hotel room, and the singer had water in her lungs when she died, prompting initial reports that she drowned after taking Xanax and drinking alcohol to calm her nerves before a performance Saturday night at an event honoring record executive Clive Davis. TMZ is reporting that the L.A. coroner's office has already told Houston's ...

TV: American Dad: “Wheels & The Legman And The Case Of Grandpa’s Keys”

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 02:35:00 -0600

There are a few different types of comedy shows, but two are the most popular. One builds a general form of goodwill, a bunch of likable or at least charming characters interacting with each other. It’s warm and inviting. The other tends to aim for laughter, going for surprise, which often works better with less pleasant characters. At the top of the form currently, the former includes Parks & Recreation, the latter, Community, although there’s a lot of overlap. The typical American Dad episode (or Seth MacFarlane show generally) tends to string together a series of set pieces, vaguely ...

TV: Pan Am: “Romance Languages”

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:45:00 -0600

Following in the wake of Christina Ricci’s cheery recitation of DVR-assisted ratings and news that Mike Vogel has signed on to headline a Fox pilot from It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia’s Rob McElhenney and Rob Rosell, “Romance Languages” arrives as an obvious indicator that the upcoming season finale of Pan Am is really a series finale. At the very least, the episode’s out-of-order airing displays how little thought ABC is currently giving to the series: “Romance Languages” arrives more than three months after the episode it was intended to follow, the Maggie-centric, flashback-heavy “The Genuine Article ...

TV: Other Shows: The 54th Annual Grammy Awards

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:30:00 -0600

To the surprise of no one, Adele was the big winner at the 54th annual Grammy Awards, taking home trophies for the top three major awards—Album, Record, and Song Of The Year—and six overall. Also, LL Cool J invited us all to pray, Nicki Minaj was possessed by the devil, and Dave Grohl would not leave the stage already. As usual, it was a weird, weird night. Here are eight things I took away from it. 1. The “authenticity” narrative: When Adele was handed her Record Of The Year trophy for “Rolling In The Deep,” she said something ...

Games: Game Review: The Darkness II

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:02:00 -0600

The legend around the 2007 game The Darkness grew from a single, powerful scene. Cast in the role of demonically possessed mobster Jackie Estacado, players wound up immersed in an honest-to-God human moment: sitting on a couch with love interest Jenny, watching To Kill A Mockingbird. Meandering, overlong, and too married to its own mythos, The Darkness wound up being a better first-person relationship simulator than it was a game. The Darkness II feels like an attempt to stick to what worked and cut the fat. The game still plays like a shooter staring Doctor Octopus. In addition to two ...

Games: Game Review: Resident Evil: Revelations

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:01:00 -0600

Just as Resident Evil’s diseased monstrosities mutated from people, the series itself has continued to evolve in maddening, unpredictable ways. While early entries in the franchise were known for their delicate pace and cumbersome controls, later titles gave way to bombastic action. The newest entry, Resident Evil: Revelations, is an inspired culmination of what’s come before that splices the series’ DNA, hacks off some staid traditions, and sews on new legs for good measure. In broad terms, Revelations mixes Resident Evil 4’s manual aiming with earlier titles’ cramped corridors, limited ammo, and creeping sense of dread. You ...

TV: 100 Episodes: Everybody Loves Raymond

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:01:00 -0600

For most of the history of television, the barrier to syndication—and to profitability—has been 100 episodes. The shows that have made it to that mark are an unusual group. Many were big hits. Some found small cult audiences. Still others just hung on as best they could and never posted numbers quite low enough to be canceled. In 100 Episodes, we examine the shows that made it to that number, considering both how they advanced and reflected the medium and what contributed to their popularity. The multi-camera sitcom is over. If it had anything new to say, that ...