The Dark Heart Of America, Pumping Putrefied Pastels (Miami Vice) [Part 2]

(Continued from Part 1)

As mentioned previously, we are in precipitous territory when it comes to Seasons 3 to 5. It can be tempting and reductive to put everything that is to come at the feet of Dick Wolf, he of Law and Order superfame. This would be incorrect, but it's not hard to see how the correlation was made: Dick Wolf joins the show, and then slowly everything begins to change. The aesthetic of the show changes as the mid-1980s become the late 1980s, and the famous "no earth tones" rule for the color palette and fashion is broken. In addition, there's just a general darkening of the proceedings that can be felt, and it gets worse and worse as time goes on. All of these things are correct, but one is not the cause of the other and I'll prove it to you. To do so, it's important to quantify just what gets emphasized in these years. Grab your shovel, because we're about to unearth some real putrefied shit from the ground here.

The Dark Heart Of America, Pumping Putrefied Pastels (Miami Vice) [Part 1]

Last summer, when I did my 10th anniversary post discussing the history of this blog, I described the period from 2022 to the present day as "The Mellowed Out Brevity Years". That was and is a fitting term for them, but with the completion of the show we're discussing today I have another name for this period of personal growth and critical analysis. For now, we can call it "The Dark Heart Of America Arc". In Quantum Leap, our hero Sam Beckett plunged through time and space and encountered countless ordinary American lives, but also all the evils within the history of the country: bigotry and racism and sexism and so many other untold horrors. In Twin Peaks, what seems like an ordinary murder mystery where the most popular girl in school is killed transmutes into this pan-dimensional oddity where time and space are nonlinear and the evil of the world crossed through a crack in the split of the atom. One's a coincidence and two's a mirroring, but three's a pattern. Let's talk about the pattern. Let's talk about Miami Vice.

New Doctor Who Season 1 First Impressions: Episode 2 (The Devil's Chord)

So! The shoe's on the other foot now, as we got a double header over the weekend for the new Doctor Who. 90 minutes of time and space adventure, and it's good to boot. Amazing, right? Having made sure that all the gen alphas and people with Disney+ subscriptions curiously clicking understand what this whole Doctor Who thing is all about, the show can now go absolutely wild again. Make no mistake, The Devil's Chord is completely wild and barmy in all the right ways. I absolutely want to launch into it and get out of this introductory paragraph, but I am once again stalling for time just long enough to give the opener some body. It's one of my reliable gimmicks from my writing bag of tricks, and it worked because we're here now. Let's talk about this shit.

New Doctor Who Season 1 First Impressions: Episode 1 (Space Babies)

We're back, folks. We are so back. But then, we already knew that. It's hard to recall the hazy memories of late 2023, when Doctor Who returned in its 60th blitz and was actually pretty damn good. It was, though. Then Christmas happened, I had a bunch of chocolate, and I got to watch Ncuti Gatwa embrace fantasy and magic with a smile. It was also pretty damn good. Well, here we are. It's May and we have begun the first series of the New Doctor Who. Call it whatever you like. Season 14, Season 40 for all I care, but I'm going to call it New Doctor Who Season 1. It's back, it's airing, and we even get a double treat as we got two at once. Isn't that nice? Sure, it means a little extra work for me, but the hell with it. I'll enjoy myself. We can talk about that second one tomorrow, but for now let's plunge into this new refreshed era with some good old fashioned critique. Let's talk about Space Babies.

Frezno's Comics Challenge: April 2024 (The Many Deaths Of Laila Starr)

God damn. These comics just keep getting better and better, and we're only a third of the way through the year. There's a real kinetic energy to these books, and even though I'm still an amateur comics critic I can still see it. I haven't been delving into things like panel composition on the page, unless it's been especially chaotic like with Of Thunder And Lightning, but I am just out here living and vibing. Living and vibing is as good a way as any to segue into The Many Deaths Of Laila Starr, so let us just stop stalling and dive right into it because this book did impress me a great deal based on its vibes and its musings.

Frezno's Comics Challenge: March 2024 (The Hard Switch)

Here we are once again, for the third go-around! It's time once again to talk about a comic, as I have decided to sporadically do here in 2024 for some reason. They say the third time is a charm, and goddamn is the comic I read for March one hell of a charm. I am going to call it my new favorite comic I've read for this thing, and it actually has a fun synthesis of the two in a way. It has all the signifiers which resonate with my personal aesthetic like Of Thunder And Lightning, and all the poignant resistance against malfeasance in a world that's moved on like in Pulp. It's a nice blend of those two, while also remaining its own thing. Let me dive in and try to tell you a little about it.

There's no one singular color that rules The Hard Switch, but there is one that hits you immediately. I'm about to get very tactile here, but in order to read the thing in your hands you must first remove the dust jacket. Do people read books with those on? I never do. Either way, when you do that, you are greeted with a vibrant yellow. Yellow is also present in the opening pages, an expanse of craggy canyons across a desolate alien world awash in them against a green sky. The book, being a sci-fi adventure crossing multiple worlds, does the comics equivalent of what something like (and I'm sorry to be so basic here) Star Wars does with alien settings. Every planet gets a different color to evoke a different mood, using cinematography or color grading. The desert browns of Tatooine, the stark greys of the Death Star, the frigid blues and whites of Hoth. You get the idea. The Hard Switch does much the same, the yellow and green of the canyons of planet Dakhos giving way to yellow and red of civilization, to the dark blues of an abandoned ship in deep space and finally vibrant blues for the climax on Pathasta'non.

Yellow remains, however, a constant. Not just in the canyons which open the book, but the living space of our protagonists' ship is awash in warm and comfy yellows. This also goes for the living spaces of Dakhos, yellow mixed with red. It's an odd contrast, giving both the warmth of home amongst the stars while also representing this alien desolation. Paired with the plot of the book, this conflict is complimentary to it. The story of The Hard Switch evokes a lot of media I am fond of: Dirty Pair, Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind, and even esoteric things like Dragon's Heaven. The titular hard switch refers to the magic space rock which makes FTL travel possible in this world being all but exhausted, and what the scattered life across the galaxy will do in the wake of that. Times are rough, as piracy and pillaging are rampant while the cost of living increases and betrayals can happen at any moment. Our protagonist women are not immune, having to kill to survive and debating difficult choices made out of practicality instead of empathy. This is not a world that has moved on, but a world that is moving on, and there's a question of what that means.

Of course, those at the top of the food chain will cling to their status quo by any means necessary. The climax of the book is like something out of Miami Vice (oh, did I give away what's next?) in which the very heart of imperialism and capitalism is confronted by two brave souls trying to do the right thing and keep their souls on the line. The rich and powerful in this galaxy have alien tablets which could potentially bring about a world of post-scarcity when it comes to FTL travel, but they don't want to. Best to hoard it, to kill whoever gets in their way, and to keep the world as it is as much as possible. Fuck that. The finale of The Hard Switch is a ballet of violence, of resistance, of doing the right thing and trying to change the world in the right way as everything around you crumbles. It resonates with me and everything I believe in, and is told wonderfully in an engaging art style, the blue serenity of this capitalist world mixed with the sudden reds of violent resistance against it. It's a lovely book, and I'm glad I read it. A quarter of the way there, folks. Let's voyage on with what we have left.

Frezno's Comics Challenge: February 2024 (Pulp)

Hello again, and welcome back to Frezno's Comics Challenge! In case you missed last time, and also to bolster my intro out to a nice and solid paragraph before I actually begin my work here, I am doing monthly comics criticism as curated by my pal and professional comics critic Sean Dillon. Last month was in my wheelhouse, a story about battling magical girls who tried to kill each other while in love for the good of their corporate masters. It was a very good book, and if you click that link in this paragraph you can read all about how I turned it into one corner of a Bermuda Triangle which began to define my 2024. Having completed that, it's time to talk about the book I read in February. Saddle up, partner, because we are entering the world of the Western, sort of. Let's talk about Pulp.

When my grandpa drank, he fell and broke his face in two

When the cops arrived, he exclaimed, "I fought in World War II"

And then they carried him to a darkened hospital room

And said, "No modern person here remembers you"