CRRRRS 558 Happy Deewalloween

By Roy Mathur, on 2024-10-09, at 03:42:30 to 04:23:23 GMT, for Captain Roy's Rusty Rocket Radio Show

Happy Divali and Halloween

'Twas the night/morning after Deewalloween...

A thoroughly wizard Divali and Halloween, to all my weirdos! Two of four of my most important holidays fell on the same day yesterday; Divali and Halloween, hurrah! Though I have no wish to speed up time (who does at my age?) roll on Christmas, then Chinese New Year.

I was premature in saying archive.org was back in the last episode, which will account for that, this, and perhaps later episodes' lateness on Apple Podcasts and other audio-only podcasting platforms. Rest assured, however, the podcast survives and new episodes, like this one, are being produced. When you get them through the usual channels is an entirely different question, but since the last episode, I have been making them at least temporarily available on YouTube (youtube.com/@roymathur) until normal services resume. I sincerely hope the imbeciles behind the various archive.org hacks are enjoying the tsunami of negative press they have justly earned.

Deadpool and Wolverine

2024. Deadpool is recruited by rogue TVA boss Mr Paradox to destroy his corrupted timeline, but instead Deadpool goes his own way, recruiting the worst Wolverine in all the multiverse to help and then they head off to the Phantom Zone, or whatever the hell Marvel calls its version.

From the moment it started, I hated the meta voiceover, then continued to hate the constant breaking of the forth wall, and though Deadpool's homoerotic attraction to Wolverine is emphasised, the gayness was as trivialised as it was in the previous films. On the plus side, the action was great, we finally Wolverine's yellow X-Men uniform and forgotten MCU heroes came back to life. We saw Electra, Blade, X-23, etc., all played by the original actors, and that even included Chris Evans, not as Captain America as both Deadpool and the audience expected, but as FF's Human Torch. To surmise: not bad, but I hated it anyway.

Salem's Lot

Yet another Stephen King re-adaptation, this time from 2024 and on Max.

I told you my history with the Stephen King novel and adaptations in 556, so it should come as no great surprise that I wanted to watch this latest film, but I was very disappointed. The credits gave away the entire story before the film even began, the staid direction, cinematography, lighting, makeup, FX, and the boring creature design of Kurt killed any sense of mystery. Pilou Asbaek (Overlord, GoT) overacts, as does his comedy moustache, and is nowhere near in the same league as James Mason's Richard Straaker. The rest of the cast is largely forgettable, apart from the nerdy kid, Mark Petrie (Jordan Preston Carter) and the girlfriend love-interest, Susan Norton (Makenzie Leigh).

I'm too much of a fan of SFFH to be a critic who enjoys criticising, or punishing myself, so I jumped off the train before the wreck. Watch the David Soul version.

Alien: Romulus

This is Ridley Scott's 2024 9th film of the franchise. It is about youthful indentured labourers on a distant mining colony trying to steal suspended animation capsules from a derelict space station swarming with facehuggers for their onward journey to a colony world.

As others have reported, I also had a little trouble hearing all the dialogue. I loved Andy, played by Industry's David Jonsson, the planetary ring FX were great, but I didn't like that it seemed so much like a rehash of older films. I liked it, but I think Alien: Covenant was better and Alien is the best.

Was that a Puch Maxi moped on the mining colony? Cockroaches and Puch Maxis forever.

Smile

Currently available on iPlayer is the breakout cult 2022 Paramount horror movie, written and directed by Parker Finn and based on his earlier short, Laura Hasn't Slept, about an infectious smile which will drive you to violent, bloody suicide unless...

I enjoyed it, found it lightly disturbing, reminiscent of It Follows and influenced by K/J horror movies.

The Devil's Hour

I finished watching Amazon Prime Video's 2024 season 2 of the closed timelike curve (CTC) sci-fi horror thriller. Peter Capaldi is Gideon Shepherd, a man continuing to right the wrongs of his loop; a beneficent killer, not the amoral one of John Barne's novel Kaleidoscope Century.

However, unlike Kaleidoscope Century, which proposes a hard sci-fi CTC, the Devil's Hour's looping mechanism is unexplained. What is even more galling is that we now have a British Asian Desi copper taking the third lead role, but absolutely no mention or philosophising about karma or reincarnation, etc. in the script. What a wasted opportunity.

Kaos

I said in 555:

If it is cancelled, I'll start being far more discriminating in choosing what to watch. These creatives need to stop taking it for granted that their baby will last more than one season and come to a logical end we can enjoy, even if that is all there is.
Guess what? Netflix cancelled it.

Nova

I was perusing Samuel R. Delany's backcatalogue recently and to my surprise, recalled that as a weird teen I read a chunk of his output: Babel-17, Nova, Dhalgren, Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, and Driftglass, in roughly in that order.

Apparently, Neil Gaiman had been working of adapting Delany's insane space opera, Nova. Amazing, except now that I no longer do geek celeb obits or tittle-tattle I missed that Gaiman is not, shall we say, flavour of the month. So that's probably gone, but how about...

Dead Boy Detectives

Cancelled, but what about...

Good Omens

We get a film, which Gaiman is uninvolved in, to tie up looses-ends and that is it, except...

Anansi Boys

...there are other Gaiman content you might have missed, like Anansi Boys, which I might also give a try, though I bowed out of both the related American Gods novel and series. Try also Neverwhere.

The Old Man

The second season ends grimmer and less exciting than the first, as our two old deadly duffers set about their wobbly arthritic path to bloody vengeance.

Slow Horses

What can one do about dear old Dad anyway?

Wiggins from Sherlock is fun...

Sherlock and Co.

...BTW, anyone listening to this pod? It's very Sherlock the TV show influenced, perhaps too much so, though it is very entertaining and their contemporary take on the stories are more true to the originals.

One last criticism is that as a neuro-interesting chap myself, I don't feel the need to personally identify with Sherlock Holmes on any particular spectrum other than mild eccentricity. It does not help me feel seen.

Culture or Federation

To amuse myself, while CRRRRS took involuntary leave thanks to that big DDOS, I posted a Twitter poll on October the 17th asking which science fiction political system people would prefer. The choices were Iain M. Bank's anarchistic, party-mad Culture or the socialist utopia of Star Trek's United Federation of Planets.

There was only one vote, and that was for the Federation. I would have chosen the former.

Deewalloween Celebrations

On the eve of Divali, Mum placed an elaborate lamp to guide Kuber, Laxsmi's coachman, past our home, thus bringing good fortune. On the day, I ate a some rasmalai, which was about the only remaining Divali sweet available in Tesco when I went shopping on Divali eve, and we lit the traditional lamps.

For Hallowween, we made and lit a jack o'lantern and Mum swept up the leaves with a witch-type DIY broomstick (no, I'm actually serious and have photographs to prove it). I watched WandaVision and had Agatha All Along and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice stacked on the player too. But, as is always the way with my overly-ambitious holiday playlist, I only got as far as episode 5 of WandaVision before zonking out.

I'm getting older and shoving so many activities into one day is too tiring and in any case, why not spread the holiday cheer to encompass several days? So our traditional homemade Mathur family recipe savoury pumpkin pie is scheduled for later today (admittedly, also because we forgot to defrost the pastry yesterday). I don't know when the two holidays will coincide again so, happy Deewalloween, my weirdos.