Reasons to love and watch the Flash

On October 4, 2016, the Flash is coming back on our screens with the third season of a quite well-designed TV Show. I will never make a mystery of my passion towards this superhero, therefore I tell you right now that I'm not going to be objective in what follows.

The Flash is a TV show narrating the origin and the story of Barry Allen, CSI that acquires super speed by being struck by a lightning and become, as you may guess, the Flash. The episodes generally have the structure of a comic book: there is a bad guy, it is hard to take him down but eventually we succeed. This aspect gives a bright tone and a nice pace to the show. Alongside with that, we have the main plot that runs for the entire season (20 something episodes) and, with its twists, is the best aspect of the series.

As one may expect, everything in the show is inspired by the comic books. However, and this is something that I absolutely love about the show, there is quite a dose of originality both in the characters and in the primary or secondary story lines. This is nontrivial for this kind of shows, often scared of pissing the comic book fans off or too reverential to the original material. The final effect is a very enjoyable and entertaining show both for old time fans and those approaching this amazing superhero for the first time. 

The tone is kept bright, among other things, by a good comedy, extraordinary references to old and new popular shows, and by the comic book structure of the episodes itself. To be fair, keep this tone is a necessity to soften up the tragedy constantly happening in the main plot. 

To explain why I associate Barry Allen to a tragedy, I have to dig deep into my memories of 20 years ago, when I started reading the comic books.

In the DC universe, there have been many Flashes, but Barry Allen is surely the most important one. The reason is not only that he has more exposure than everyone else, but also because his storyline is by far the more involving, in my opinion. Barry Allen is constantly brought into a path of pain and loneliness, no matter how hard he tries. The tragedy begins (not chronologically, in comic issues) when his archenemy, Professor Zoom (the Reverse-Flash), comes back from the future and kills his wife, Iris West. A homicide that drives him insane and makes him violent for several issues. Years after, when he is going to get married again, the Reverse-Flash makes his appearance with the same purpose: kill his future wife on their wedding day. In the attempt of stopping him (in an excruciating sequence), Barry kills his enemy by breaking his neck.

From The Flash Vol.1 #324

Since Barry never showed up at the wedding, his future wife loses her mind. During the trial for murder, his lawyer gets bombed, the replacement risks her life too, the jury gets brainwashed, he has to leave his own identity for good, and he is finally found guilty. A man with no identity, alone, Barry escapes to the future to clear his name. There he finds Iris (yes, it is confusing, she wasn't really dead), the love of his life, and they can live happily ever after... for 6 months. Indeed, the universe starts to explode, leaving him with nothing again. This time (Crisis on Infinite Earths #8), he has nothing to lose and sacrifices himself to save the multiverse in an another painful sequence. It is 1986, the heroic end of Barry Allen. 

Crisis on Infinite Earths #8

Some Flashes and 23 years later, DC makes him come back to life with Rebirth. This time, Barry is infected by the Reverse-Flash, transforming him into a weapon to kill his loved ones by touching them. Here Barry learns that the Reverse-Flash was responsible for everything bad ever happened to him and finds himself helpless in front of such evilness. A revenge from an enemy he didn't even meet yet, a theme that will emerge again in Flashpoint (that will probably be the inspiration story for the upcoming season of The Flash).

You got the drill; it is hard to not feel for this character. The spirit of sacrifice, the constant tragedy, a hero steadily looking for friends, for people that could fill the empty places of his life. All these themes are nicely represented in the TV Series. Yes, so far the events are different than the original material, but it is not hard to find the same kind of emotions and challenges of the comic books (without the deja vu feeling we don't like).

The Flash: Rebirth #5

The Flash is the story of an extraordinary man, facing an extraordinary villain, and walking in a world of pain to find something to run to instead of run from. What we saw in the first two seasons was designed to transmit us the internal conflict of Barry Allen. We saw our beloved hero reaching the peak of this conflict and doing the most egoistic move of his life: coming back to time and fix everything bad the Reverse-Flash did (thus virtually erasing everything happened on screen so far). 

Since this is exactly the premise of Flashpoint, I'm looking forward to see how the authors will apply the originality shown in the past two seasons. Some people on the internet is very excited by seeing Flashpoint on screen, but I think they will not use the original material more than before: it would be difficult to introduce a Batman or a Brasil ruled by the Nazis...

Before concluding this too long post, a few words on the criticalities of this series. The biggest one is surely an excessive amount of the so-called filler episodes. I understand the necessity of covering several months with a season, but the feeling is that every season could have been 3/4 episodes shorter. 

I also think that the comic book structure does not work ideally in the mentioned filler episodes. By resolving the arc of tension within 40 minutes, the plot looks very rushed if it is not necessary to the development of the main storyline: it works in a comic book, not on the screen.

At last, one slip in the otherwise brilliant TV adaptation of the original material. We met the Reverse-Flash, the perfect villain driving the comic book story, but we never saw a glimpse of his motivations. We were told that he hates the Flash, but we never had a chance of seeing how or why he does it. I believe that his jealousy, his obsession, and his anger deserve to be on screen to give us a tridimensional image of a villain so important to be often compared to the Joker in the comic books. This is both a flaw of the show and the main reason why I'm so excited for the new season: if the source material is Flashpoint, there will be plenty of opportunities to give Eobard Thwane the deepness he deserves.

I wrote too much, it always happens when I like something too much. For other considerations on the Flash as a TV series, you can read this post. Otherwise, let me know in the comment section how do you like this show.

Why can't critics stand Suicide Squad?

I don't really like writing bad reviews and this movie has its bright spots (listed in my other review). However, from Rotten Tomatoes to almost everyone else, the judgment of the critics is unanimous: it is as bad as Batman v Superman. At the same time, twitter is full of fans that are so happy to define Suicide Squad the best movie ever. This post is to explore the reasons for this discrepancy, that in my opinion is due to the fact that critics and fans are looking to different aspects of the movie. Before you start making your blood boiling with anger, I am not judging which approach is better. Since my spoiler-free review was mostly focused on the great aspects of the movie (that are what fans like to search in a movie like this), here I will develop the critical points of it.

Spoiler alert: I wrote a spoiler-free review here. Everything on this post will refer specifically to the events of the movie.

Weak plot. The premise is good, you need something against a hypothetical new evil Superman. We also need someone to throw under the bus if something goes sideways, so let's make a team of bad guys. Then we realize that crazy people with bats and bullets are not going to win against an evil Superman, so let's throw in someone with magic too. The transition of the Enchantress from controlled in captivity to I want to destroy the world is not smooth, it happens way too easily. For this reason, the mission to stop her looks like a warm-up, a Peter-Parker-saves-the-kitten kind of story. When you then realize that there will not be anything more than that, here starts the disappointment about the main plot. On top of that, the messages are not so well displayed and when they are, they are not the good one. There is something dangerously close to the glorification of an abusive relationship, never addressed as abusive as it is. The redemption of the inmates is blurred as every other theme that pops out at random moments.

The Joker is irrelevant. I appreciated the performance of Leto, showing great braveness in giving a different look to a character so loved by the fans (and therefore a very polarizing topic of discussion). However, it is a fact that his presence is irrelevant to the plot. He is a disruptive force, appearing from now and then, and not really doing anything to move the plot along. The only event that affects the main characters is when he frees Harley Quinn, but such arc is resolved literally 3 minutes later when he fails. So I suspect that the Joker was introduced only to justify the flashbacks regarding the true star of the movie (Harley Quinn) or, even worse, to have cool shots for the trailers. That brings me to the next point.

Too many scenes were there only for the trailers or to set up Justice League. If the plot is weak, if the message is not clear or even absent, if (as we see in a moment) the characters are badly presented, then the risk to be a big commercial spot for a movie coming out the next year is concrete. Nowadays it is a trending habit to send the viewer somewhere else outside of the movie. I think they want to ride the success of the TV Shows' golden age we are living in. Maybe the evolution of the cinematographic techniques is to get closer and closer to what a TV series is. I still think that the difference should be very well defined or, if not, should go in the other way. For example, Stranger Things is great because it is very close to being an 8 hours movie. Since we already had a set-up movie with Batman v Superman a few months ago, every anticipation looks redundant and too much a commercial move. 

All that being said, at the Flash' cameo I jumped on my seat. Because the Flash is cool.

It falls short in the building up of the characters. I am well aware that the characters are the strong suit of Suicide Squad, in the other review I glorify Harley Quinn and friends. What I didn't like was the structure of the movie in presenting them. We spent too much time listening to someone talking about the main characters rather than seeing them. I know that all of them were never presented on screen, but this is a poor and lazy choice. For example, in Guardian of the Galaxy, we had a bunch of new characters and they presented them to us by making them do something useful for the plot. The first thirty minutes were essentially a list of names, telling us characteristic that not always were then developed. Like the difficulty of working with other of Captain Boomerang is addressed once in the bar scene (when he leaves) and resolved in the next one without any evolution or reason. I'm sorry but characterizing someone almost exclusively with flashbacks and not giving any development to the character is just poor, lazy writing. 

The more I think about it, the more I realize that the movie is holding up only because of the amazing performances of some actors (and the amazing soundtrack), that is something that fans love, but critics usually don't.

Or it can simply be that the hype for the movie was too high to be fulfilled. In any case, I found fascinating how the public is divided on this particular topic, so please share with me your thoughts in the comment section.

Reasons to see (or not) Suicide Squad

I waited for this movie since the very first teaser, then the best trailers of the decade came out, the hype was real. I went to the movie theater for the first show of the day. Thus enjoy a spoiler-free review, hoping that you will find your own reasons to see it or not. If you want a spoiler review, click here.

Synopsis: The US Government is worried that the next Superman is going to be a terrorist or, god saves us, a vegan and decide to have a backup plan. Since they have some criminal doing nothing in their jails, why don't use them and their extraordinary abilities? Best idea ever, what can possibly go wrong? Well, something does and we can make a movie about it. (Yes, I have to improve my spoiler-free synopsis).

The first thought I had as soon as the movie ended was: a lot of flesh and no bones.

The acting is great. Margot Robbie is perfect as Harley Quinn and way out of reach of all the others. She is a driving force, she has good jokes, her character is explored with more attention than the others and it was a great choice. Will Smith is good in being Will Smith, his Deadshot has his own deepness, is human and funny. In a movie where everyone is potentially the star of the show, these two are great casting choices because they catch your attention and maintain the harmony with the rest of the cast.

The most anticipated character, however, was the Joker. The internet got wild when they leaked the first pictures, and even wilder when he appeared in the trailer. I appreciated the Jared Leto's courage to bring on screen a new Joker. The heritage of Heat Ledger and Jack Nicholson is pretty heavy and it takes a great actor to transform the role and himself yet again. I believe it is pretty pointless to say if one is better than the others since they belong to different movies with different tones. In fact, I think that his performance is somehow obscured by the little amount of screen time and by the presence of other great performances. The Dark Knight was a movie about the Joker, here is more like a disruptive force that appears here and then. The attention is more focused on Harley Quinn and friends.

Another positive note is the soundtrack. As we saw in the trailers, the production was well oriented in combining great songs with great action scenes. I can't say that they live up the level of the trailer, but they surely go close enough.

All of this is what I call "Flesh".

What is missing (the bones) is a solid story. In a movie where the main characters are bad guys, you need a really good antagonist and the movie fails in that. We spend the first part to introduce the characters and then jump into the main plot, that is so weak to be confused to a warm up mission.

I didn't feel any tension, nor the movie made me care about what was happening on the screen. Yes, great characters, funny, but without a story to support them the risk to be a pointless movie, another expensive set up for the Justice League, is real. The structure of the movie is more unstable than other productions of the same kind. To sum up, everything in the movie is great, except the movie itself, and this makes it even more disappointing to me.

In conclusion, I don't really know if recommend it or not. I had fun but I walked out of there disappointed, I appreciated the cameos but I recognize them as a set up for what is coming the next year. Thus please let me know how did you like it or which of these aspects you care more about.

TV Series you will like to watch in the fall of 2016

For how much we may love Summer, TV Shows fits perfectly in our routine only in the Fall. Therefore I thought it could be a good idea to present a list of shows that I am expecting, with release dates, comments, etc. Of course, it is a product of my limited time to actually watch such shows, it is not expected to be a comprehensive list. 

Running shows

Let's begin with the easy part, shows that are known and I recommend because they triggered something in me in the past.

The Big Bang Theory, season 10, premiere on September 19, 2016. It has lost a lot of its brightness, but still remains a nice source of fun for 30 minutes a week. It is a show that hooked me up in my early university years, giving me characters to identify myself with, or anyway similar to what my friends are. Thus the affection to the show is strong, even after all these years. The almost complete absence of a main plot, as a sit-com requires, guarantees that until they can make nice jokes and stay away from too many repetitions (harder and harder after so many years), we can have fun with our favorite nerds.

Gotham, Season 3, premiere on September 19, 2016. It is a Series centered on villains, telling the story of commissioner Gordon years before the existence of Batman. It has great cameo, brand new origin stories, a dark, brutal atmosphere mixed with the cartoonesque tone. It moves the plot with decision and good paste, all supported by a good credible acting. If you are not a comic books nazi, this is your show.

The Flash, Season 3, premiere on October 4, 2016. I love the superhero since I was a kid, therefore I am pretty damn biased. Nevertheless, the tone of the show is funny and entertaining, forget about the modern dark comic books, The Flash will not use those shades, without avoiding to deal with tragedy. It has its own epic moments, the first two seasons had a good climax and I have no reason to expect otherwise from this one. If you can survive to a few first episodes usually not so great, you will enjoy it.

The Walking Dead, Season 7, premiere on October 23, 2016. I spent the last 6 months thinking about if it was fitting in such a list, that is remarkable since this blog didn't even exist. It is true that every season AMC is giving us a show substantially made of 3 or 4 breathtaking scenes in an ocean of filler hours where people is essentially walking around for no reason. However, if you got this far, you want to see it, you secretly hate yourself for that, but you want to see this new world that Negan is bringing to the show that, to be honest and considering all the problems mentioned above, still looks pretty fresh to be in its seventh year. We have the ultimate bad guy (he stole the show in only 11 minutes), that just killed one of the main characters (and we don't know who is yet), and we have a group that became really cocky in the last 3 years literally on their knees. And then there is Lucille. 

And.She.Is.Awesome.

New Shows

Now the most difficult (and interesting) part. Shows that will be aired for the first time. It is very difficult to keep up with all the new shows, these are just a few of them that had a trailer that evoked the right emotions in me or captured my attention for the plot. I try to cover both comedy and drama and these are the titles that stepped out.


Better Things, premiere on September 8, 2016. A comedy show on a divorced actress raising her three daughters by herself. It captured my attention mostly because Louis CK, that based a lot of his material on his own similar situation, is one of the creators. Here is the trailer, I am looking forward to this show.

Quarry, premiere on September 9, 2016. The trailer of this series is great, it hooked me up instantly. It is the story of a marine who returns from Vietnam and find himself not accepted by the society and not ready to accept the society as well, therefore we will see his life falling apart on a very bad path.

Kevin Can Wait, premiere on September 19, 2016. It's a sit-com about a retired cop, it is meant to be light and funny, the trailer shows this two aspects so it ended up on this list. I can see myself giving a shot to this series as well as abandoning it because too similar to the dozen of other shows.

The Good Place, premiere on September 19, 2016. As you can see from the trailer, it is a comedy show about a young woman that dies and ends up by mistake in The Good Place, therefore she is now trapped in a world full of good people that cannot curse. It is a premise promising enough for me to give it a shot.

Speechless, premiere on September 21, 2016. A comedy show that will be focused on disability. The trailer is very promising, we have a family full of different personalities that will just collide with the rest of the world, it looks an explosive show addressing in a smart way the difficulty that the society has with respect to dealing with a disability.

Pitch, premiere on September 22, 2016. It tells the story of the first woman in the major league. The trailer reveals that the fictional main character will have, as you may expect, to face the skepticism of the public, and the expectations of her father. Therefore I am curious to see how they will develop the story, how she will deal with such pressure and how they are going to execute all of it.

Marvel's Luke Cage, available on Netflix on September 30, 2016. Introduced in the first season of Jessica Jones, he is another component of the soon-to-be-aired The Defenders TV Series. Netflix has proven itself to be a major player in the Marvel universe, presenting an innovative crossover techniques better explained in this post. I don't know much about him, except what I saw in the trailer and in Jessica Jones, but I have no reason to expect anything less than another good quality product, with the action of superheroes coming from comic books, and the deepness that Netflix usually introduces in its shows. It can also be a good methadone while we wait for the new The Punisher show, coming next year.

Frequency, premiere on October 5, 2016. It is the story of a detective that lost her father 20 years ago, however she ends up speaking with him through time via ham radio. This inevitably changes history, but not her memories, leaving the main character in a life that is not hers, mixing all of that with her professional career. I like the idea, but to be honest I suspect that it will be canceled at the end of the first season. In the meantime, here's the trailer.

Timeless, premiere on October 3, 2016. A series on a similar tone that it is probably going to last longer. A criminal steals a time machine and goes back in time to destroy the USA. As we can see from the trailer, a woman is sent back to save the day, there will be considerations about American history and race issues. If you like time travel stories it should be entertaining.


This is my list, I am well aware of how partial it could be, so please let me know in the comments what did I miss.

If Stephen King had written the Goonies 30 years ago: Stranger Things

I'm getting used to the good quality of the Netflix original series and, to be honest, I am still recovering from the punch in the stomach that Orange is the new black gave me. Nevertheless, the new series Stranger Things has managed to enter into my mind. To give you the taste of how surprised I was about how good it is, I have to confess that I watched it twice. Back to back.

Being a not famous series (yet) and being fairly recent, this review will be completely spoiler free.

It a story that takes place in the '80s and breathes '80s at every step. In a classic small quiet town, those where everyone knows everyone, where there is a school with bullies and romance, something happens and everything goes sideways. A kid goes missing, another kid with superpowers mysteriously appears and the show moves very straightforwardly from that (episode 1, scene 3) to the end. 

If you very much appreciate a simple story line (simple, not trivial) that without wasting any time leads you to the next turn, this is your show. It masterfully plays the citation game. There are continuous references to classic movies of the '80s, either in dialogues, situations or in random shots. In principle it is something that I don't like, especially when it is done so constantly. However, in Stranger Things it just works, since it maintains its identity, it has its own story. The effect is creating in the viewer an almost unconscious nostalgic feeling while seeing something new. I personally went back to my childhood, sitting on the couch on Saturday morning, raining outside and a VHS playing on the TV. 

The atmosphere is dark, I found brilliant the use of lights and absolutely functional to the story, as well as the soundtrack. It is undeniably a good quality product, Netflix is really stepping out. Some locations are common with the one in the first season of The Walking Dead and I liked the choice because some shots were familiar and yet way more terrifying.

The story is unraveled from 3 points of view: the kids, the teenagers and the adults. 

The kids are this new version of the Goonies, they face a dramatic situation as kids do: softening from time to time the atmosphere with some comedy or, you know, by being kids. The acting is credible, all of them are very well characterized. The trick is done by not trying to make them too tridimensional, but giving tridimensionality to the group. So we have Mike, that is the leader, the master in their D&D story, smart and cautious. Then there is Lucas, living next door, full of energy, more reckless and determinate. Dustin, being the comic component of the group that keeps the group together. And, there is Eleven, a mysterious girl with superpowers (remember, it is a spoiler free review).

The teenagers and the adults are less central and in them we find more sides in the same character, although we can't talk about an evolution of them. This makes sense since the all story takes place in a week or so. The result is a very natural acting and I think that when the characters manage to be transparent to the story that they are telling us, it's a big win for the show.

The three points of view give us a perspective broad enough to not need any further explanation since very often such explanation ruins the mystery. In Stranger Things we see just what the characters see and it is sufficient to make us understand bits of the plot at every episode, without spoiling the full story. 

One last consideration. The episodes very often end by opening an arc of tension, that is very annoying when it is done consistently by TV Shows since then you have to wait a week to see how it ends. For a Netflix show, again, it just works, you can simply watch the next episode and such tension is usually resolved in the first few minutes. I've personally appreciated having this kind of possibility, to have the freedom of choosing how to deal with such tension. Sometimes I decided to live with it for a day or two, let the tension grow for a bit, sometimes I just decided to sleep one hour less.

In conclusion, it is a TV Show that I fully recommend, it is entertaining, it has a good sci-fi story, it brings you 30 years back in a good way, it has lovable characters, great soundtrack and, generically, it is very well executed. The perfect summer gift.