Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Virtuality Review

Virtuality is the television movie made by Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor, which aired on Fox last Friday. This movie is about the crew of the Phaeton, which is on a crucial mission to do something or other around some far away star. Virtuality joins their story as they reach their go/no go point - the point where the commander of the Phaeton must decide whether to go ahead with a ten year mission, or to turn around and go back to Earth. However, this is not a straight up all-or-nothing mission - the crew is also being filmed, and their journey being broadcast on Earth as a reality tv show, entitled The Edge of Never. Virtual realities - or virt mods, or modules - are available to all of the members of the mission, and these modules allow them to escape the confines of the ship into their own fantasy. Originally intended to be a television series, it was squashed into an 87 minute movie.

And boy, does it show.

I'm not saying that Virtuality is a bad movie, especially if placed within the context of the original intent of the writers: for this story to be a full fledged television series. But for an hour and a half movie, especially a science fiction movie, Virtuality is just too full of subplots and characters that would have been better serviced by twelve or thirteen full length episodes.When I watched Virtuality, the main problem I had with it was the amount of major characters. The Phaeton has twelve crew members, and none of them are bit players. The creators did attempt to solve this problem by introducing Big Brother style interviews, with little captions with the names and positions of the characters underneath, but I still struggled to remember who everyone was, and what their identifying character trait was.

Our supposed main character is Frank Pike(played by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), the commander of the Phaeton. Pike is actually the character I had the biggest problem with. Pike is apparently "the one man who can hold everything together," the leader of a very important mission. And yet he lacks a personality, more defined by his wild mood fluctuations than by anything else. I felt little sympathy for him, and he didn't really seem like someone who could lead very well, although there is one rather nice scene where he lifts the spirits of his subordinates.

Out of the whole lot, there are only a few characters who stand out at all. The first of those is Billie Kashmiri (Kerry Bishe), the reality show's host and a computer scientist. Billie's kind of a twitchy, nervous girl who's the second in command of the reality tv show being broadcast from the Phaeton. She , unlike the others, is almost immediatly likeable because of her somewhat nervous air and outsider status in an otherwise tightly knit group. The other character that really makes an impression is Dr. Rodger Fallon (James D'Arcy), the ship's psychiatrist and the producer of the reality tv show, whose slavish devotion to the show casts him in an unseemly and questionable light. All the other members of the Phaeton are just too bland or too quickly characterized for much comment - there's Alice, who wants a baby . . . and that's pretty much it. There's the gay guys, who cook . . . and that's pretty much it. There's the dude with the beard who has a dead son . . . and that's pretty much it. Everyone's likeable enough, they're just not very noticeable.

Another issue I had with Virtuality - and I may be overstepping my bounds here - is the visual effects. In the different virtual realities that the characters inhabit, the background stands out, looks way too artificial. This was most likely intentional, but the look is jarring. Also out of place were the shots of space which, unlike most visualizations of the Great Beyond, were hazy and much graininer and blurrier that any other shots. This, again, could be purposeful, but I was ticked off about it anyway. I live in the suburbs, man, and the only way I get to see stars is when people make cgi effects with them.

As for the story itself, the plot moves at a strange pace and has no clear conclusion, at least for a movie. I can see that the creators really were backed into a corner here. There's really two distinct strata to the plot, 1) whether the Phaeton will continue on its mission past the go/no go point and 2) the increasingly obvious problems with the virtual realities. The first plot dominates the first forty or so minutes of the program, and the second covers the rest, with a twist that's supposed to be surprising, but instead is cryptic and unsatisfying.

I don't want to sound like I didn't enjoy Virtuality, because it certainly had its moments - there's an encounter between Billie and the woman pilot Sue Parsons (played by Clea DuVall) near the end that's fairly poignant, as well as a few truly surprising moments that I won't reveal here. The concept is ultimately a sound one, but not done justice here. If ever a tv show was made for Virtuality, I would certainly tune in, if only to see how the writers managed to play out a long, claustrophobic journey and keep it interesting.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

TV Guide for the Week of June 28

Here's a listing of Science Fiction and Fantasy programming for the week ahead. All show listings were taken from tvguide.com


Sunday
  • X-Men is on HBOe at 1:30 p.m.
  • Life After People is on from 2:00 - 6:00 p.m. on the History Channel.
  • H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds is on SciFi at 1:00 p.m.

    Doctor Who Christmas Special 2008 "The Ne...Image by Ballistik Coffee Boy via Flickr

  • Sleepy Hollow is on at 4:30 p.m. on SHO2e.
  • The Dark Knight is on HBOe at 5;45 p.m.
  • Transformers is on Cinemax at 5:50 p.m.
  • A new episode of Kings is on NBC at 8:00 p.m.
  • The Incredibles is on ABC Family at 8:00 p.m.
  • Independence Day is on A&E at 8:00 p.m.
  • The Doctor Who Special "The Next Doctor" is playing on BBC America at 9:00 p.m. (and again at 12:00 and 3:00 a.m.) This was the 2008 Christmas Special, just now airing in the US.
  • The Doctor Who episode "Aliens of London" is playing on PBS at 11:00 p.m.
Monday
  • A.I. is on at 5:30 a.m. on Cinemax.
  • Sweeney Todd is on at 9:30 a.m. on Cinemax.
  • Independence Day is again on A&E at 12:00 p.m.
  • A True Blood is on HBO2e at 2:00 p.m.
  • Doomsday is on Cinemax at 2:45 p.m.
  • Stardust is on SHO2e at 2:45 p.m.
  • Merlin, a British fantasy series based loosely on the stories of King Arthur's Court, is on at 8:00 and 9:00 p.m. on NBC.
  • Aliens is on AMC at 8:00 p.m.
  • Men in Black is on TBS at 8:00 p.m.
  • Impact is playing on ABC at 9:00 p.m.
  • Spaceballs is on ENC at 9:50 p.m.
  • A new episode of True Blood is showing on HBOe at 9:00 p.m.
Tuesday
  • The Fly is on AMC at 6:00 a.m.
  • Two Angel episodes are on TNT at 6: 00 and 7:00 a.m.
  • Aliens is on AMC at 2:00 p.m.
  • Three episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars are playing at 3:00, 3:30, and 4:00 p.m. on Cartoon Network.
  • Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is on Spike at 6:00 p.m.
  • Three episodes of Bones are on at 5:00, 6:00, and 7:00 p.m.
  • Four episodes of Star Trek: TNG are on at 7:00, 8:00, 9:00, and 10:00 p.m.
Wednesday
  • The Golden Compass is on HBO2e at 8:00 a.m.
  • Two episodes of Angel is on at 6:00 and 7:00 a.m. at TNT.
  • Hellboy II is on at 9:30 a.m. on Cinemax.
  • Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is on Spike at 3:00 p.m.
  • Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones is on Spike at 6:00 p.m.
  • Four episodes of Bones are on TNT at 5:00, 6:00, 7:00, and 8:00 p.m.
  • X-Men: The Last Stand is on FX at 7:30 p.m.
  • Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II are on AMC at 8:00 and 10:30 p.m.
Thursday
  • Two episodes of Angel are on at 6:00 and 7:00 a.m. on TNT.
  • Two episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars are on Cartoon Network at 1:00 and 1:30 p.m.
  • Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II are on AMC at 3:00 and 5:30 p.m.
  • Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is on HBOe at 4:00 p.m.
  • Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones is on Spike at 3:00 p.m.
  • X-Men: The Last Stand is on FX at 5:30 p.m.
  • Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is on Spike at 6:00 p.m.
  • Five episodes of Bones are on at 5:00, 6:00, 7:00, 8:00, and 9:00 p.m.
  • A rerun of the new True Blood episode is on HBOe at 10:00 p.m.
Friday

Star Wars Episode IV: A New HopeImage via Wikipedia

  • A Twilight Zone marathon is on SciFi from 8:00 a.m. to 5:30 a.m. Saturday.
  • Two episodes of Angel are on TNT at 6:00 and 7:00 a.m.
  • Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan is on HBO2e at 8:00 a.m.
  • The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) is on FMC at 11:30 a.m.
  • Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith is on Spike at 3:00 p.m.
  • The Golden Compass is on Cinemax at 6:20 p.m.
  • Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope is on Spike at 6:00 p.m.
  • Three episodes of Bones are on TNT at 5:00, 6:00, and 7:00 p.m.
  • Stardust is on TMCe at 8:00 p.m.
  • A rerun of the new episode of True Blood is on HBOe at 10:00 p.m.
  • The Matrix is on TNT at 9:00 and 11:30 p.m.
Saturday
  • A Twilight Zone marathon starts at 8:00 a.m. and ends 5:30 a.m. Sunday on SciFi
  • Two Angel episodes are on TNT at 6:00 and 7:00 p.m.
  • Lady in the Water is on Cinemax at 8:35 p.m.
  • Two episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars at 10:00 and 10:30
  • Three episodes of Bones are on TNT at 4:00, 5:00, and 6:00 p.m.
  • Van Helsing is on FX at 6:00 p.m.
  • Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is on Spike at 6:00 p.m.
  • Spiderman 3 is on ENC at 10:00 p.m.
  • Two True Blood episodes are on HBOe at 9:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Terminator 2: Judgement Day is on MTV at 10:00 p.m.
Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

Welcome

Welcome to the Collegiate Geek blog. The purpose of this blog is to cover all things geeky in college, mainly because I'm an undergrad who would love to share the geeky love.

I'll try to post something every day (yeah, we'll see how that goes) with something to do with science fiction or fantasy or fandom, and what they look like in college. There will be reviews of different programs occasionally (I'm working on one for Virtuality right now) and a podcast should be up in a few days.

Briefly, about me: I'm a long time science fiction and fantasy fan, with a particular love of Doctor Who, Fringe, Batman, and all things Joss Whedon. The first science fiction book I read was Enders Game (by Orson Scott Card) when I was eleven, and I haven't looked back since.

Let me know if there's anything you'd like to see on this blog. If you would like to contact me, please email me at nausicaa at mail dot org.

(For Technorati: kisrh9ecfg)