The Good, the Bad, and the Funny

We were stuck in what seemed like an infinite loop, of trying to catch movies at the theater, and missing them. But thanks to some clever engineering and good timing we've managed to catch up. So without further ado, our short and sweet reviews of Alien: Covenant, Valerian and The City of 1,000 Planets, and The Orville.

Alien: Covenant was promised by some reviewers to finally close a lot of loose ends in the Alien universe...NOPE. We left wondering how that was supposed to answer anything other than why aren't there Engineers running around the galaxy anymore? And how many bad choices must a crew make in order to create danger in well thought out space thrillers? The whole thing left us feeling a little underwhelmed.

Valerian and The City of 1,000 Planets on the other hand was great fun to watch, visually speaking, and the opening sequence about the creation of space station Alpha hit us right in the feels. but (spoiler alert) we spent hours afterwards wondering how exactly the relationship between main characters blossomed from "I can barely stand you" to "sure let's get hitched" without any real romance or bonding in between...but the movie sure was pretty.

And last but certainly not least The Orville, has given us two decent offerings, a premier pilot and a second episode, both of which delivered good laughs at the sci-fi tomfoolery of an odd-couple divorced first and second in command, and plenty of strange alien types. Seth McFarlane is up to his usual sophomoric level of humor, but there's a few higher level laughs to be had. So far we are enjoying.

The Guardians are Back!

Oh what a weekend we had! A handful of great movies flashed over our screens this weekend, but we're here to talk about one in particular. The Guardians of The Galaxy: Volume 2 was an epic space romp! We were left breathless and sides hurting from the comedy, and were definitely star-struck by the glorious alien worlds and space travel this time around. Our heroes are joined by old frenemies Nebula, and Yondu (with ravagers in tow), as well as some new faces like Mantis an empathic alien with cute antennae and big doe eyes. This movie definitely breaks the trend of weaker sequels, the action is better, the comedy just keeps rolling, and the villain stirred a lot more emotions up than Ronan did in the first entry. Baby Groot comes close to stealing the show. several times, but every character ALMOST does this at some point in the movie. The only character who felt underserved was Gamora, who's only got enough time in the film to just barely start dropping her guard against Peter Quill, she's still out of his reach though nothing really happens with their relationship, but that's okay. Every other character has enough going on, and Peter in particular has some...personal issues to sort through in this movie so his focus isn't on romance.

What keeps popping up is the comedy though. From Baby Groot's Opening dance number, all the way to the last teaser in the credits the comedy just keeps coming. Where the first guardians would toss a joke and just leave it in our laps the second iteration throws the audience a joke, and just before it lands in our laps another character picks it up and runs with it; often managing a few lateral passes too. We can see these characters are really starting to build real relationships with each other due to this comedic snowballing. They jab at the members of their team with familiarity. Jokes that would've ended in a fist fight when they first met now just bring the crew closer together.

We give The Guardians of The Galaxy: Vol. 2 our seal of approval.

Taking a ride with Passengers

  We got to see the new space opera Passengers recently. We've had a bit of time to reflect and think on the film and the fact that we've done so often is a clear sign that we were impressed.

     The movie is visually stunning and the story is compelling, the main characters play out a spectacularly intricate dance of emotional turmoil on a wonderfully fleshed out sci-fi set piece. Our space-fairing humans are aboard a massive ship designed to take people to new habitable worlds, seed them with life and terraform them to create new homes for humanity, but our protagonists have woken up a little (lifespan) early. The rocket ark these people are "alone" aboard is an exquisitely detailed craft, it almost seems like someone found this spectacular ship design and wrote a story around it, with it as a character as powerful as the hotel in The Shining (and sporting a non-living bartender too!). Not to say the ship is haunted, this isn't another Event Horizon affair; the function and design have a clear impact on the story though. The set pieces were designed with a slight nod to sleek retro futurism and a bit of Art Deco for flavor. The classic sci-fi tropes of food dispensers in the cafeteria and little cleaner/fixer bots roaming the halls was a welcome sight as well. I always love a robot; good help is hard to find. To get to the meat and potatoes of our thoughts though we need to get to spoiler territory, where no man has gone before.

+ * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + Spoiler Zone * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + *

The concepts of this movie were an excellent way to pit man against environment with an entirely man-made environment. A cascading ship malfunction on a tightly designed ship is brilliant and realistic impetus for the plot to get moving. Some of the most interesting discussions this movie has sparked revolved around the access system which grants/restricts access to various parts of the ship using an automated ID system, and how this affects our protagonists' lives. But the part that we keep coming to, the point of contention, is the end, or if it even was one. After many conversations we started to realize that the ending of this movie, while poetic and beautiful has brought up a much larger question of the fate of those on-board. Here's the big one guys... the ship still doesn't arrive at it's destination by the end of the movie... this left us wondering, will there be a sequel? We hope not since that will probably just go poorly regardless of the talents attached, it's just the way it is in sci-fi, sometimes you have to leave questions unanswered. That being said. maybe a story of another one of these ships reaching its destination and what awaits travelers there. But I keep wondering if the things done on the ship during their time alive before the other passengers awoke, may have put the other passengers in a less than advantageous position. 2 people consuming a limited amount of food for years instead of days, creating a greenhouse garden of Eden in a concourse of a working flying space ship...it raises a lot of questions. Maybe they'll be answered someday, maybe they won't.

Arrival Review

We finally got to see Arrival. We were not disappointed.

We've been wanting to see the new Sci-fi flick "Arrival" since we first saw the trailers. The combination of a unique plot and some powerful alien imagery had us appropriately excited, but we still weren't sure where this film would dare to take us. The journey ended up being very cerebral and just a little bit surreal. Our greatest thrills in the film came from the aliens and their ship(s); the design work there was brilliant. The crux of the film which has been teased in the trailer, the hidden win for every xenobiologist and real space exploration geek, is that rather than reach for the easy plot fix and busting out the universal translation device, the main character is charged with translation. How do you start talking with a thing you share nothing in common with?

The film approaches this brilliantly with a beautifully complex alien written language. The movie has a timely message about the underpinnings of communication, and how the languages we speak can influence the way we see the world. The latter is a scientific theory that has been gaining tremendous steam in social sciences. While we would love to have gotten a glimpse of an alien home world, we were just as happy to experience an alien view of ours. While "Arrival" did a spectacular job of taking a harder look at how a first encounter could play out, we did have to take an insulin shot for the emotional aspect of the plot, that was just too sweet, but there has to be something for people who don't get excited for a pure science movie.

Introduction to Retro-Rockets

Retro Rockets’ Earth-Based design and production facility is located in the American Southwest, a land of pioneers. Nestled closely to the birth place and testing grounds of modern rocketry and the Atomic Bomb, and not far from the Famous Roswell crash site; we are always inspired to see the future through the eyes of explorers. Retro-Rockets aims to capture the excitement of the Golden Era of Science-Fiction, when space exploration was confined to the imagination, and brings you high-polish visions of the streamlined space ships from the past. Paying homage to every style from the cutesy cartoons and fan favorites, to the roaring real life rockets that broke the barriers to space; we have options for each. Our rockets are crafted from highest quality anti-tarnish sterling silver with Swarovski Crystal flames options on most designs. We also have some unique designs featuring other stones, such as the Abalone in our Warp Gate, or our Earrings or Pendants made from Meteorite chunks. We are confident that you will find a piece which makes you want to blast off with Retro-Rockets.

Let us know in the comments what rockets you would like to see and what Sci-fi you find absolutely inspiring!