Chris Lackner
“You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows,” Bob Dylan sang. But these days, a guide through the seemingly endless flurry of pop culture offerings is just what we need. With that in mind, here is what’s on the radar screen in TV, music and film for the coming week.
• MOVIES
Big Releases on March 24: Power Rangers; Life
Big Picture: Three lines say it all. “None of us really know each other. We’re all screw-ups. But somehow we were all in the same place at the same time.” Yup, Power Rangers is basically The Breakfast Club meets The Last Starfighter. Five “ordinary” slacker teens get handed a lot more than detention. After discovering strange alien coins, they inherit the mantle (and super powers) of an ancient order of intergalactic guardians with no idea how to colour co-ordinate. Their new responsibility comes with a buried alien ship (kind of their own Fortress of Solitude); an obligatory cute robot sidekick; and a body-less ancient mentor named Zordon (who sounds like Kal-El’s sleepier, long-winded brother: the guy no one wanted to sit next to at Kryptonian dinner parties). Before too long, “it’s morphing time,” and the team is fighting what look like monster rejects from Kong: Skull Island.
Meanwhile, Life should not be confused with the BBC nature documentaries. This space thriller launches with the crew of the International Space Station discovering the first evidence of alien life on Mars — a single-cell organism that starts to grow cute little mushroom-like appendages (cue: Red Planet red alert!) in its test tube. It’s just like The Martian only with a real Martian instead of a one-man Matt Damon refugee crisis. Of course, Life’s E.T. quickly proves to be more intelligent, and more deadly, than the astronauts bargained for.
Forecast: Both films will plot a course to success; it’s a big week for extraterrestrials. I can’t be the only one who would’ve liked to see a crossover in which the test-tube alien grows into a mammoth beastie, and descends to Earth on a mission to wipe out the Power Rangers, and all traces of their franchise.
Honourable Mention: CHiPs. This buddy-cop action comedy brings back the late ‘70s TV series (because, umm, Hollywood could sense how much you missed it?). Jon Baker (Dax Shepard) and Frank “Ponch” Poncherello (Michael Peña) join the California Highway Patrol (CHP) — the former is a one-time daredevil pro motorcyclist, and the latter is undercover FBI agent sniffing out dirty cops on the squad. It’s basically Lethal Weapon on a highway with less manic depression, and kamikaze missions — but way more juvenile jokes involving male genitalia.
Medard des Groseilliers, left, and Pierre Esprit Raddison in Canada: The Story of Us [CBC]
Big Events: Canada: The Story of Us (March 26, CBC); Shots Fired (March 22, Fox/City)
Big Picture: Canadian taxpayers chip in for their own 150th birthday present in this ambitious 10-part CBC docudrama. The Story of Us bleeds red, white, and maple syrup. The multimedia series showcases “extraordinary moments and people that helped forge a nation” and includes appearances by such notable Canucks as Susan Aglukark, Eugene Levy, Christopher Plummer and David Suzuki. From indigenous peoples to immigrants, and scientists to entrepreneurs, famous and untold stories are brought to life through re-enactments, CGI sequences, and 360-degree online videos. (After its two-hour premiere, the series moves to a Sunday night time slot). Sure, the CBC effort deserves accolades for its vision and historical research, but we live in an age of “alternative facts” and “truthiness.” One (meaning yours truly) could argue the CBC missed out on a chance to do some real mythmaking and revisionism. Maybe our country needed a docu-series about how the nation was secretly founded by an ancient society of Mounties (who also invented the secret recipe for a Tim Hortons coffee), a Sasquatch (big reveal in series finale: he’s Don Cherry’s great, great grandfather) and a talking beaver named Eh (who forged the first Canadian hockey stick with his magical teeth). We could have learned about how that mythical stick lies embedded somewhere in the Canadian Rockies awaiting “the chosen one” to pull it free and be anointed both King of Canada, and King of Hockey (thus finally severing Canada’s ties to Great Britain).
Meanwhile, the drama Shots Fired borrows from the headlines with a tight-nit serialized drama about raciallycharged police shootings in a small Tennessee town. The top-notch cast includes Helen Hunt and Richard Dreyfuss, and Toronto’s Stephan James.
Forecast: The Story of Us provided a generous 150th birthday party loot bag. For those who like their alternative facts, I predict that someday soon Connor McDavid will find that mythical stick-in-stone, and become our new liege over land and ice.
Honourable Mention: The Most Hated Woman in America (March 21, Netflix). No, its not a Hillary Clinton biopic. This Netflix original biopic tells the tale of controversial atheist activist Madalyn Murray O’Hair. As usual, actress Melissa Leo captures lighting in a bottle in her electric portrayal.
James Blunt [Montreal Gazette]
• MUSIC
Big Releases on March 24: The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer (Apocalipstick); James Blunt (The Afterlove)
Big Picture: One of the best-named bands in the business comes up with one of the best album titles — and also introduces a shade of lipstick we should all be wearing to pucker up for the end of our ever-crazier little world. As for what to expect from The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer, imagine psychedelic jams meeting blues grooves cushioned by soulful pop rock. (If the end is nigh, this rising Vancouver band will ensure you go out listening to good tunes.)
Meanwhile, James Blunt’s fifth studio album continues to search for his next You’re Beautiful. Expect some serious contenders, given the English singer-songwriter had some help this time around; Ed Sheeran is one of many talented co-writers on The Afterlove. (I’m hoping a romping ballad called You’re Satisfactory Looking.)
Forecast: The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer will find their targets, and plunge their career to new depths (of success). I predict their band name will also inspire a new odd couple roommate sitcom.
