Friday Fiction: That Old Drum
Jul 4, 2025
Daredevil: Born Again Episodic Coverage: “Straight to Hell”
Jul 2, 2025
Ironheart Episodic Coverage: “Will the Real Natalie Please Stand Up?”
Jun 30, 2025
Friday Fiction: The Many Spaceships Of The Biggest City
Jun 27, 2025
Ironheart Episodic Coverage: “Take Me Home”
Jun 25, 2025
Continuing Impressions of Revival Ep2: “Keeping Up Appearances”
Jun 23, 2025
Friday Fiction: Ceiling Men’s Managers
Jun 20, 2025
First Impressions Of Revival Ep1: “Don’t Tell Dad”
Jun 18, 2025
Hello Tomorrow! Doesn’t Need Its Gimmick
Jun 16, 2025
Friday Fiction: The Grasshopper
Jun 13, 2025
Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld: Part 2 – Cad Bane
Jun 11, 2025
Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld: Part 1 – Asajj Ventress
Jun 9, 2025
Friday Fiction: I Don’t Know Where I’m Going Today
Jun 6, 2025
Daredevil: Born Again Episodic Coverage: “Isle of Joy”
Jun 4, 2025
Doctor Who Episodic Coverage: “The Reality War”
Jun 2, 2025
We’ve done a lot of high-concept stories on Friday Fiction. Ones where the technology or magic is very obvious, and part of the story in big ways.
But not every fantasy story has to have such flashy moments. Sometimes, it’s nice to settle into a more personal, quieter tale.
“Straight to Hell” is exactly the kind of finale I would want from this show if I had speculated one from the beginning. All the pieces of the puzzle slam together in a violent, intense, dramatic crescendo. And—amazingly—without absolutely ruining the storyline’s gravitas by wrapping things up too fast or forcing everything back into the status quo. I’ll say it again in the final paragraph, but this is quite the way to get people hyped for the next season. I am hyped for the next season. I cannot imagine how they’ll continue this storyline—or what it might do to the broader MCU canon.
“Will the Real Natalie Please Stand Up?” is a terrible continuation of Ironheart. It has a lot of fun moments. It highlights both the fun science fiction concepts it’s playing with—and, to a lesser extent, magical concepts—while giving us an action-packed, CGI-packed heist scene. But it also, jarringly, has the same “convenience” factor to its narrative that plagued “Bring Me Home,” but to a much, much, much worse degree.
Possibly, this is the furthest in the future we’ve ever done for a Friday Fiction. The technology in “The Many Spaceships Of The Biggest City” seems possible, eventually, but it could be hundreds, if not thousands, of years before it would be on this level.
Ironheart’s first episode, “Take Me Home,” is one of the best opening Marvel episodes I can recall in terms of engagement. You get basically everything you need to attach to the story and get excited to see where it goes. Unlike Daredevil: Born Again, the plot is starting right away, no slightly non-sequitur hook required. There’s superhero-type stuff happening from the jump.
“Keeping Up Appearances” Is Extremely Bleak TV Let’s go back into the powder keg of possible issues that is Revival with the next episode, “Keeping Up Appearances.” And I am happy to say that this episode doesn’t turn into what I expected. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have issues; it’s just not the episodic structure…
Just because we said the next story—this week’s story—would be even weirder than our last, doesn’t mean that it’s going to also be a funny story.
Because this is not. “Ceiling Men’s Managers” is very much not.
Revival has kind of a bad first episode in a lot of ways, but does reveal how a good premise can carry an audience through the initial setup. And that one big, showy premise can give rise to several core questions/concepts that are so intriguing, and open so many doors for seasons of storytelling that it’s hard not to want to see what could happen next.
Hello Tomorrow! is perhaps one of the most unique sci-fi shows to come out in a long time. It’s got such an odd combination of factors that somehow come together to deliver an engaging drama and mystery revolving around a big, central question. But, unlike a lot of other dramas, there’s no hero. This is a show where almost everyone is a scam artist—though some of them don’t actually know they’re running a scam.
What would you do if a grasshopper came to your door?
That’s the absurd question at the heart of this surreal short story from Brandon Scott.
Tales of the Underworld didn’t stick the landing. The second part—the Cad Bane part—is not nearly as good as Asajj’s section. The action isn’t as interesting, dynamic, or even as intense. Lightsaber fights are just way cooler than blaster standoffs unless you try really, really hard. And they clearly didn’t.
Like the previous “Tales” miniseries for Star Wars, Tales of the Underworld is not actually one narrative. It’s multiple stories bundled together under one theme. And because of that, I decided it would work better to review them separately. The first three episodes are for Asajj Ventress, and the last three episodes are for Cad Bane.
