The Hobbit 3: The Battle to Stay Awake

As a die hard Lord of the Rings fan, the last gasps of the franchise in the form of the bloated Hobbit trilogy has been particularly excruciating. While I loved the first Hobbit movie, I now see that I was wearing the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia and was merely grateful to return to Middle Earth. Last year, after the crushing disappointment of The Desolation of Smaug, I said in my review that I would still see the third Hobbit movie in theaters. Sadly I couldn't even manage that. Nearly four months after its theatrical release, I finally got around to watching The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies at home, and it was every bit as disappointing as I had expected.

This is a movie on its last legs. After all the build up to the dragon, Smaug, in the last movie, he is killed off in the first fifteen minutes (oh what's that? Spoiler alert? Believe me, you don't want to watch this movie anyway) and the rest of the movie crawls to its inevitably dull conclusion. It is about The Battle of the Five Armies, an event that takes up all of six pages in my copy of The Hobbit and is mostly described as an afterthought because Bilbo is knocked unconscious halfway through and therefore experiences almost nothing of the battle. The CGI armies are in full force, people live and die, and Bilbo gets to home to the Shire with a bunch of treasure. 

There was much anticipation about how this movie would serve as a LOTR prequel and help set up the events that lead into the beginning of of The Fellowship of the Ring. If it did that, I didn't notice, probably because I wasn't paying attention. All I know is that Legolas was still inexplicably swanning around as the star of the piece, doing ridiculous stunts that inspires jeers rather than cheers, and Galadriel showed up for a fight sequence where they did the weird things to her voice and face that could be passed off as a random moment in FOTR but were now just painfully protracted and pointless. 

The dialogue felt like it was straight out of Days of our Lives. For the first time, I understood how non-fans must have felt when watching these films. It was so steeped in portentous Tolkien lore that even I couldn't stop rolling my eyes. The special effects continued to feel forced and the actors, while gamely trying to act their way through this morass, simply had no material to work with. This is a cast stacked to the brim with my all-time favorite actors and yet they had nothing to do. Attempts at levity were quickly smothered, and dramatic flourishes were drowned in awful dialogue or noisy action. The whole elf-dwarf love story was cause for further annoyance and overall, I cannot recall a single detail that I enjoyed about this experience. 

I was over the moon when I first heard they were making The Hobbit. I was happy when they said it would be two movies, slightly concerned when that got expanded to three. And now I am weary of the trilogy and ready to forget it ever happened. Farewell Hobbit. It was (not so) nice knowing you. 

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: A Cult Classic

If you were a fan of Tina Fey's last TV creation, 30 Rock, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is exactly what you need to fill the Liz Lemon-sized hole in your heat. All thirteen episodes were dumped on Netflix last week and I binged through them in a single day. It was an absurd, weird, fantastic six hours.

Ellie Kemper stars as the eponymous Kimmy Schmidt, a 29-year old Indiana woman who has just been rescued from the underground bunker she was living in for the past 15 years as part of a post-apocalyptic cult. She lived there with three other women who had been brainwashed by the cult leader, the Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne. It's a pretty dark premise, but told with the characteristic Tina Fey-Robert Carlock flair for the absurd so that you just start laughing immediately. One of Kimmy's first stops after the bunker is the Today show (because of course you become a minor celebrity after an event like that and have to do a press tour) and she decides to remain in New York City so that she can experience everything she has missed out on in life. She ends up in an apartment with Titus Andromedon (Tituss Burgess), a spectacular gay man who dresses up as Iron Man in Times Square to pay the bills but is forever aspiring to be on Broadway. Their landlady is the incredible Lillian Kaushtupper (Carol Kane) who is the obligatory crazy old New Yorker with a heart of gold. And Kimmy lands a job as a nanny in the household of Jacqueline Voorhees (Jane Krakowski), a typical rich Upper East Side clueless woman who eventually becomes something akin to Kimmy's friend.

It is impossible to describe everything that happens in the show but each episode is brimming with comedy gold. It's a non-stop deluge of jokes, sight gags, and pop culture deep dives. I'm sure I missed 50% of the references but I loved everything I did catch and was endlessly entertained from the first to the thirteenth episode. There are some amazing cameos (wait until you find out who the Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne is) and the writing is sharp, witty, and fantastic. Every episode is a candy-colored hyper-vivid vision of New York and its insane inhabitants and the bouncy, auto-tuned opening credits will worm their way into your head for days afterwards.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is a delightful confection of a show, a perfectly packaged comedy that is firing on all cylinders. The acting is stellar, the production design and music are memorable, and the writing is crazy brilliant. I'm ready for season 2. 

The Americans: Spies in Suburbia

Last month, I finally got around to watching The Americans, the much-lauded FX show about KGB spies in 1980's America. After devouring two seasons, I'm all caught up and currently watching the weekly installments of Season 3 on FX. I highly recommend you follow suit.

Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys star as Elizabeth and Philip Jennings, KGB spies who have been living undercover in America for years. They have the perfect cover as a quiet, unassuming suburban couple with two children. However, they are really spending their days engaged in deadly espionage, ruthlessly pursuing leads, killing people who threaten to expose them, sleeping with people who can get them information, and trying to help Mother Russia as Reagan takes office and keeps escalating the Cold War. 

While the spy stuff is obviously thrilling, the truly intense heart of the show is Elizabeth and Philip's marriage. We meet them at a crossroads, where it seems that Philip is much more invested in this relationship than Elizabeth, who views it more as her patriotic duty. Watching them fall in love after several years of living together is rather fascinating and creates many weird and intricate complications. Jealousy and betrayal are inevitable when your spouse is mandated to do whatever they can to get information from a source (to the point where Philip actually marries another woman who works for the FBI) and the delicate tightrope they walk as they try to reconcile their personal and professional lives is a marvel to behold. 

Back to the espionage though. Noah Emmerich plays Stan Beeman, an FBI counterespionage agent who just happens to be Philip and Elizabeth's neighbor. His relationship with Nina (Annet Mahendru), a KGB officer who he turns into a double agent for the FBI is utterly bewildering, and as it unfolds, the writers and Mahendru are doing such intricate work that it is impossible to tell what Nina's motivations are and who exactly she is working for. Trust is the cornerstone of The Americans - everyone is betraying everyone else in some way or the other and the extent of that betrayal is what drives each story arc to its explosive conclusion. Each episode is a complex and captivating piece of work, probably thanks in large part to show runner Joe Weisberg's former experience as a CIA officer.

The Americans is yet another prestige cable drama that boasts intricate plotting, astonishing acting, and brilliant production design. The show feels so authentic, and you are completely steeped in its world from the minute you hear the jarring notes of the piano and cello in the opening credits that announce another compelling installment of the show is on its way. There's a reason for all the critical acclaim - The Americans is a simply terrific show and it will keep you on the edge of your seat.