Ohh I can’t believe I’ve been missing these! I remember liking Archive 81, and I am nearing the end of the X-Files but I’m hung up on the cross-over and movie content.

This week my friend showed me Smiling Friends, which is very uncomfortable but also wholesomely chilling. We then watched the 2 episode premier of Percy Jackson which I was very pleased with, they really got right into it which is a good sign. On my own I started and finished Bookie which I was pleasantly surprised by. I grew up with Two and a Half men but really was not a fan of Big Bang Theory, and Chuck Lorre is quite a tropey guy. This show hit the perfect stride between camp and conscience. I also started Twisted Metal with my partner, but we need to keep watching past the first episode!

As part of my desire to watch all the references to my favorite show, It’s Always Sunny, I for the first time watched both the Rambo and Rocky films, Rambo 1-3 and Rocky 1-4 (5 tonight I think). I was also pleasantly surprised by both of them, though I think they were definitely initially made more enjoyable by the way Sunny took their own inspirations, music, actions and angles. But both, mostly Rocky, really grabbed me from the execution.

For Rambo, I hadn’t realized that First Blood was 100% attributed to police brutality. I also found it funny that Frank Reynolds so violently and slowly says “THEY DREW FIRST BLOOOD!”, but in the actual movie it goes nothing like that. Rambo is on the walkie with his Colonel and he just kind of weakly and quickly goes, “They drew first blood not me,” (Colonel responds) and Rambo with the last of his energy “they drew first blood”. 2 and 3, eh, the only thing I can really say about them is I’m glad that the people of Afghanistan were recognized for 3 and that the villains in both for the most part were the Russians, although 2 kinda not entirely. In the future I may watch the returning films, but I know they’ll just be for a gruesome night so I stopped at Rambo III.

For Rocky, hot damn! Carl Weathers as Apollo Creed, Rocky’s training montage, the penultimate act culminating in the one and only fight of the movie! Woo! But wow, Rocky really takes those punches to the face! Why doesn’t he just move! Again and again, and after 15 rounds he did it! With the rising theme song! And then Rocky II, reliving the last 10 minutes of the film to introduce it, something I almost miss about contemporary movies. I really appreciated just how much it works as an anthology with the silly growing themes of each movie but also the compelling ones, like Mickey Goldmill’s development in 2 and his arc in 3 as a driving motivator. Speaking of arcs, the friendship that develops between Apollo and Rocky, each villain being badder than the last - really just thoroughly surprised at how hooked these ones got me. I’m interested to see what’s in store for Rocky V which will likely finish off my week of the 24th!

Also, like Rambo I’ll likely wait on the returning series, give it some time to let the originals gestate and cement themselves as the classics they’re known for.

I also watched Serpico (1973) which felt apt after the events of First Blood. I wish I had more to say on this one, unfortunately I was interrupted a number of times and so I didn’t get much out of my viewing other than the references.

At the beginning of the week I watched The Departed, then Body of Lies. The Departed made me feel like Scorsese really likes to do a lot of showing, so many of the scenes were cutbacks between faces and actions. A closeup of a face, a closeup of a phone texting from a pocket, back to the face. Like, come on. You’re a hack, Scorsese! (I kid, lightly.) Body of Lies wasn’t much better, it just felt like the Ridley Scott version of what I had just seen. Conceptually different but in action the differences were minimal. I will say, good cinematography from this one, horrible, horrible messaging. The only thing I really have to say about these two is I liked seeing Oscar Isaac and DiCaprio does play a good drugged out paranoid person.

I wanted to set a different tone so the next day I put on Do the Right Thing (1989), a Spike Lee commentary on Brooklyn. It felt like home, it was disappointing to hear about the falling out between Rosie Perez and Spike Lee, and all in all it’s simply sad how so many of the themes in the movie still feel present today. Yeah, it’s only been about 35 years but still, it’s just disheartening. Radio Raheem didn’t have to die, shouldn’t have, just like so many other young black Americans. It’s just a reminder to continue standing up and doing what’s right.