The Avengers: The Cybernauts

The Cybernauts (1965)
Starring: Patrick Macnee, Diana Rigg, Michael Gough, John Hollis, Frederick Jaeger, Burt Kwouk, and Ronald Lee-Hunt
Director: Sidney Hayers
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars

When corporates executives from firms competing to purchase the manufacturing rights to a revolutionary micro-circuit are murdered one after another, secret agents John Steed (Macnee) and Emma Peel (Rigg) are assigned to catch the killer.

With a story that's part murder mystery, part sci-fi, and industrial espionage caper, "The Cybernauts" is one of the best episodes of the Macnee/Rigg era of "The Avengers". It's got a suspenseful storyline where it feels as though the main characters are in serious danger--and this sense of danger grows right up until the episode's resolution.

The writing on this episode is also excellent in every way. The camaraderie between Steed and Peel is again highlighted by some great banter; the way the investigation into the murders and espionage is portrayed is sensible and logical within the comic-book universe rules that apply to "The Avengers"; and Emma Peel going undercover always adds an interesting aspect to the show--and here, she gets to show off her martial arts skills against an arrogant sensei and his students. The way each of the firms and their executives are portrayed as being distinctly different was also a nice touch--and one that I've found lacking in a couple modern shows I've been watching recently. Were the executives all stereotypes on this episode? Sure. But they were each a different stereotype.

"The Cybernauts" also benefits greatly from the presence of Michael Gough who plays a wheelchair-bound computer genius turned tech mogul. He plays the character with just right mix of excitement over the new world that technology can usher in, arrogance, and outright crazy that he steals every scene he's in. He's so good that I found myself wanting to see more of this character in the future. 

Picture Perfect Wednesday: Alien Can-Can

 Will someone put us in touch with Charles Band? We have a film we want to pitch...

'Her Boy Friend' falters at the end

Her Boy Friend (1924)
Starring: Larry Semon, Oliver Hardy, Dorothy Dwan, Frank Alexander, Alma Bennett, and Fred Spencer
Directors: Larry Semon and Noel M. Smith
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

After one of their colleagues (Dwan) is kidnapped by the dangerous gang of bootleggers run by Slim Chance (Hardy), a pair of plain-clothes police officers (Semon and Spencer) set out to save her by busting it and the speakeasy it operates through.

"Her Boy Friend" is a fun action/comedy that presages and boils down all the elements of the buddy cop genre into a fun, fast-moving 12-minute film. There's a fight scene that's very amusing and an extended back-and-forth escape-and-chase scene aboard a ship that serves as the film's climax that's got even more laughs, as well as some impressive stunts. Along the way there are some prop gags and other routines that work to varying degrees, but the action scenes are where this film is at its best.

This film would have gotten an Eight-star rating if not for it completely falling apart at the end. I think they were going to a meta-gag that breaks the fourth wall and pokes fun at the way so many of the short comedies from a few years earlier ended, but I also think they failed. An actual resolution to the story we just watched would have been preferable to the out-of-left-field twist to the character relationships and the clumsily and lamely executed pratfall.

But why don't you take a few minutes out of your day to check the film out yourself, since it's embedded below via YouTube? I'm pretty sure you'll find it to be time well spent (since you're here, reading posts on this blog).

Musical Monday with Marc Cohn

This month, it's 30 years since singer/songwriter Marc Cohn's "Walking in Memphis" was released. It was the first track on his self-titled album from 1991, and it went onto becoming a world-wide hit, it remains Cohn's signature song to this day, and it is a handful of songs that I believe all Americans can forever rally around.

It's a great way to kick off the first work-week of February 2021.

When Bernie Met Charlie

It's the crossover no one demanded and the love story no one expected, but it's perfect for Shades of Gray!

via GIPHY

(In January 2021, the Meme of the Moment was a mitten-wearing, tired-looking Bernie Sanders being tricked into all sorts of photos. This one seemed perfect for immortalization on this blog. Sanders, for those who are unaware, was a U.S. politician who declares himself a Democrat when convenient, such as during his failed attempts to be nominated as a presidential candidate.)

Richard Sala has a warning for us all

 This first month of the new year is almost over... and there are few indications that 2021 will be a better year than the one we left behind. But you can still keep things from being worse than they have to be. Cartoonist Richard Sala wants you stay on your guard, because creeps and killers may still make things hard!

A slightly revised version of "Beware! Beware!" in included "The Ghastly Ones & Other Fiendish Frolics", a collection of several of Richard Sala's spoofs of illustrated children's books. Click here to read more about it, in a previous post at this blog.

The Avengers Dossier, Page Two

Here's another quick look at a supporting player from an episode of "The Avengers".


JULIET HARMER

Juliet Harmer played Jill Manson, a school teacher with a secret in "The Town of No Return".

Born in 1941, Juliet Harmer was a busy television actress during the 1960s and 1970s, with leading roles in the sci-fi flavored series "Adam Adamant Lives!" (1966-1967) and "Slim John" (1969 - 1970), and recurring parts in "The Persuaders!" and "The Marriage Line."

In 1979, Harmer retired from acting and turned to a career as a writer and illustrator of children's books.

Tom & Jerry engage in 'Barnyard Bunk'

Barnyard Bunk (1932)
Starring: Anonymous Voice Actors (but there are no sensible lines of dialog)

Directors: John Forster and George Rufle

Rating: Six of Ten Stars

Tom & Jerry show that music not only soothes the savage beasts, but it also fixes the failing farm.

"Barnyard Bunk" is one of those Tom & Jerry cartoons that's just about plot free, but is just a series of strange visual gags strung together and connected by music. The music isn't bad--not great like it's been in some of the "Tom & Jerry" episodes, but it's pleasant enough.

The most interesting, as well as mystifying thing about "Barnyard Bunk" are the villainous mice that are actively demolishing the farm as the cartoon starts and who later appear to be the only animals who aren't impacted by Tom & Jerry's magic saxophones. While all the other animals either become the best farm animals they can be, or, in the case of woodpeckers, start pitching in with random chores around the farm just because they can, the mice continue their mischievous, destructive ways unabated. Maybe the Pied Piper had been through recently and all the weak-willed mice followed him and all that remained were the super-evil, super-destructive ones? Or maybe I should stop trying to apply story logic to what is just a bunch of loosely connected gags--just a bunch of barnyard bunk?

As "Tom & Jerry" fare goes, "Barnyard Bunk" is neither among the worst of their excursions, nor is it among their best. As mentioned, the music is passable. The jokes are also consistently amusing. The surreal bits are okay. The problem is that it all feels directionless. In the best Tom & Jerry cartoons, the gags and the action build to a climax of some sort, and you can feel that build taking place, even in plot-free exercises in chaos like "Pencil Mania" there's a sense of momentum that builds straight up to the cartoon's finale. You never get that feeling from "Barnyard Bunk" and it suffers for it.

As always with my comments on "Tom & Jerry", I invite you to check out the subject of review for yourself, right here from the post. I also invite you to leave your own comments in the section below. Let me (and the world) know if you think I'm right or wrong in my estimation while sharing your opinion with us!

Wonder Woman Wednesday

It's the Furious Fists of Wonder Woman!

Krazy Kat in motion

Krazy Kat Goes A Wooing (1916)

Starring: N/A

Director: Leon Searl

Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

Krazy Kat goes to serenade Ignatz Mouse. 

If there ever was a cartoon that needed a better musical score, it's "Krazy Kat Goes A-Wooing". I would love to hear what Krazy Kat is playing on his banjo or even hear what it sounds like when he or she (I have no idea what sex Krazy is, even after all these years) sings. I know this was originally a silent film, but it really needs someone to put together a score that more accurately reflects what's happening on the screen. (All versions I've come across feature piano music, and, with the exception of the one hosted by the Library of Congress--which I've embedded below via YouTube--they all seem to be randomly selected pieces. A score using a banjo, a mouth harp, or maybe just a person humming through an electric fan would be far better, especially if created specifically for this.)

If you've read and enjoyed any of George Herriman's "Krazy Kat" comic strips, I think you'll like this animated trip to the "heppy land that is fur, fur away". Unlike later Krazy Kat animated entries--of which there were well over 250 between the years of 1915 and 1947--this one is close to Herriman's strips in feel and look and overall execution. The odd, yet very cool (or maybe kool) flying car that Krazy Kat travels around in not something I remember seeing before. It's the perfect addition to the animated version, however.