TV: IS NEW SCI-FI DRAMA SERIES "THE 100" THE DUMBEST DRAMA SERIES ON TV?

Answer: probably not but it has to come close and I'll tell you why after the obligatory picture.

I'm halfway through watching the first series and it's been renewed for a second so it's obviously popular. Hell, I keep watching it even though it annoys the piss out of me so it has to have something. Intelligence and logic, however, aren't among its dubious virtues.

It's nearly a hundred years since a nuclear war ruined the planet. Humanity -all 2,400 of it- lives in the Ark, a merged conglomeration of space stations called the ark and systems are failing.

Notable Stupidity 1: There is only one child  allowed per family which means every succeeding generation is half the size of the previous one which would pretty much lead to the extinction of the human race in a couple of hundred years.

However in order to control the population growth, not that it's necessary as we've established that that wouldn't happen, any crime is punishable by death -thrown out of the airlock- for adults 18 and over.

Notable Stupidity 2-4: As systems are failing they need to establish if it's possible to survive on Earth so they send down one hundred under 18's who have committed crimes. Rather than send down a small trained crew, well-armed with lots of devices to check radiation levels, etc, they send down the most inexperienced people possible, with no weapons or other means of survival, and only the location of a place where they could find stuff they need to survive. These are also mostly the dumbest people as they've committed crimes in a tightly controlled system where it's hardly possible to get away with any infraction. They have no radio, only wrist bands which transmit a signal that the wearer is still alive.

Something to consider: given that there are thousands of spy satellites currently orbiting the planet, you'd imagine that some could still be working, or that the habitat would have some of its own -toss it out of the airlock with a small propulsion system to get it to the right altitude and there you go.It really is hard to believe that being so close to the Earth (see below) they've no way of telling what it's like.

Something else to consider: given that systems are failing and that within a relatively short space of time life on the Ark will be impossible, it might not be a bad idea to tell people and give them the short of going to Earth. If it can't sustain life then the humanity is finished anyway.

No matter, down to Earth the 100 go and find themselves crashed some distance from the safe place but, surprise surprise, life seems to be thriving even if they do see a deer with two faces, one of them deformed. The kids themselves act stupidly, selfishly, thoughtlessly, and only a handful seem to be intelligent and sensible with the ability to think more than five minutes ahead. This also means that the title should change from episode to episode as there aren't even a hundred left by the end of the first one.

Anyway, our gang of 100, counting down, 99, is dominated by a bad kid (who'll probably be redeemed eventually) who declares there are no rules and no leaders, not even him, though of course he is, so they can all do anything they like (unless he doesn't like it). He also decides to smash the wrist bands (whether the wearer likes it or not) so everybody on the Ark thinks they've died. Our hero, sorry heroine, sets off with a handful of not so stupid kids to try and get to the haven only to find there are people (? -we haven't actually seen any yet) who will shoot arrows into strangers.

In this week's episode, for reasons I can't be arsed to go into, our 93, 92, counting down, have to fire rockets so as to let the Ark know that they aren't dead. Conveniently the Ark is either in a geosynchronous orbit right above where the kids went down and can't be more than a couple of hundred miles above the surface (in which case, why does it take hours to reach ground?) or is conveniently right above the spot where the rockets are fired from.

I'm sure there's more stupidity to come so, as I continue to keep watching the show, I may do an update or a sequel. But for now, having just watched Veronica Mars: the Movie, I'm resuming watching Veronica Mars Seasons 1-3 where I find plenty of intelligence, wit, and interesting characters, plus really good acting for a teen drama.

PS. What does the post-holocaust Earth look like? Answer: a Canadian rain forest as seen in countless other American TV series (but not Veronica Mars).

FILM REVIEW: GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

So who needs a review of this movie from me? It's the summer blockbuster. It's been, mostly, glowingly reviewed all over the place. The only people who haven't heard of it are those completely uninterested in new films in the cinema. So what can I say about it that hasn't been said already? Probably nothing.

But that's never stopped me before.

First off, it's got all the depth of a blank sheet of cheap paper. It's a pure popcorn movie. It also happens to be a very well done superior popcorn movie which is pretty much what I expected. Director and co-writer James Gunn hasn't done a lot of stuff but I've seen most of it -Tromeo and Juliet (writer, for Troma, and head honcho Lloyd Kaufman gets a cameo in GOTG), Dawn of the Dead (writer, the surprisingly good remake of the classic George Romero film), Slither (writer/director, excellent horror-comedy), and Super (writer/director, a dark look at an ordinary but obsessed man who dresses up as a superhero to get his wife back)- so I was expecting him to come up with a really good movie and he did. He's now hero of the month just as Joss Whedon was with The Avengers a couple of years back and it's nice to see someone with real talent and a geek sensibility getting some deserved acclaim. But then I would because his stuff touches so many of my cultural and movie bases.

So what's good and what's less good about it? 

First let's skip all the action scenes, particularly the space battles, of which there too many, if well done, and also the rather frenetic pace which can be a little hard going at times.

The good guys get all the good dialogue, especially the witty lines. the bad guys are very bad and very humourless. The women tend to get short-changed. While Karen Gillan proves she can be an effective bad guy/girl she's largely wasted. Zoe Saldana is okay but not as interesting as her other heroes. Yes, even less interesting than a walking plant with a three word vocabulary but then it's not what he says as how Groot says it and he delivers the film's most poignant line when he changes a personal pronoun near the end. Rocket, the angry furry experimented-on bipedal creature is great and, like Groot, you forget he's a cgi creation. Wrestler Dave Bautista has won a lot of fans with his portrayal of the revenge-obsessed Drax who completely fails to understand the concept of metaphor. Chris Pratt has vaulted to the status of superstar with his layered witty Peter Quill aka Starlord ("Who calls him that?" "He does."). 

All the heroes (except Groot unless I missed it) get their back stories slotted in albeit often rapidly or info-dumped.

The film is also packed with excellent actors in either supporting or cameo roles including Michael Rooker, Benicio Del Toro, British character actor Christopher Fairbank (who's in it for more than the one scene I was expecting) and many more including Nathan Fillion as the voice of a one-scene cgi character who gets two of Groot's fingers up his nose. It's the sort of film that, on DVD, film buffs and geeks (like myself) will be pausing to check the background details for in-jokes, esoteric references, and easter eggs, and replaying scenes.

So I've got minor quibbles but I enjoyed it a lot and I'll probably like it even more when I can follow all the dialogue on the DVD (hooray for subtitles) as, because of the frequencies used for cinema viewing, I tend to miss odd bits.