At some point, Super 8 went from being a top-secret J.J. Abrams movie to being
the J.J. Abrams / Steven Spielberg project.
Photo: François Duhamel © 2011 Paramount Pictures.
I’d say it’s an apt descriptor even though Spielberg “only” served as a producer on
the film, which Abrams wrote and directed. Much as Cloverfield — a previous “top-secret J.J. Abrams movie” — was “only” produced by Abrams yet has Abrams’ fingerprints all over it, Super 8 is so redolent of what you think of when you think of
A Steven Spielberg Film that if Abrams and Spielberg weren’t known to have kicked around the project together for years it would fall almost unnervingly between homage and thematic plagiarism. The movie features precocious kids with deep bonds, distracted but ultimately devoted parents, the government stepping in to contain a mysterious alien phenomenon…
And the end of Fringe Season Three, including what may be the final showdown in
the series’ Two-Worlds War, begins.
I’m not sure how much there is to say about the events of...
... that won’t be rendered moot by next Friday. So while I can’t help but ask a few burning questions, I won’t really try to answer them, either, instead sticking to some random reactions and tangential tidbits. Here they are in the order of their prompts throughout the episode.
J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon each premiered a new series on Fox last season, to considerable anticipation from genre buffs and admirers of quality television in general. Fringe, created by Abrams with his Star Trek screenwriting team of Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci, has just gone on midwinter hiatus. Whedon’s Dollhouse ended its erratic run of just over two dozen episodes last week.
I began writing this post an entire year ago — the same month this blog launched.
J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek was released on home video this past Tuesday.
I look forward to sitting down on a cold, dark night during the post-sweeps/holiday
lull in new television and digging into its special features. The Abrams commentaries
on the pilot episodes of Lost and Fringe — the latter with Trek screenwriting duo Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci — were top-notch. I’m almost glad that I don’t have a Blu-Ray player since the regular 2-disc edition looks just right in terms of my level of interest in extras.
Here at last, on the heels of the brief Star Trek review I put up the other day, are
some expanded thoughts on the franchise and the film...
I suppose I’m a Trekkie.
Or at least a solid B, if not B+.
I’m talking about the new Star Trek film, of course.
