Frayed Branches

Ozark Season 2: The Web of Crime Grows Ever Wider Note: This review will contain spoilers for Ozark season 1. If you haven’t seen the first season of this show, I highly implore you to do so before looking at this review. It’s a fantastic, suspenseful thriller that I would be remiss to purposefully spoil for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet. If I had to describe it using pre-existing shows, it’s like Breaking Bad meets Twin Peaks (minus the supernatural elements of the latter). Go watch it if that sounds interesting to you. You have been warned. One of the things I enjoy about Ozark is that it never seems to let up on the number of events that are happening throughout. It’s impressive to see how many different storylines can impact one another. The first season indicated how this was possible through the interweaving narratives of Ruth’s familial loyalty and Agent Roy Petty’s plan to catch Marty Byrde, as well as the conflits Marty finds himself between regarding the ruthless Snell famil...

The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot : Probably Not What You’re Expecting, But Great Nonetheless Yes, this is a real movie, but it’s also not what you’d expect. There are a lot of films out there that may try and hook people with their titles into anticipating a certain type of story once they sit down to experience it. Whether or not the quality of the film is on par with said title varies, as does the content of the story itself. Something can have a wacky, interesting title, but not be as wacky or interesting as the title itself seems. And while Robert D. Krzykowski’s feature-film directorial debut The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot isn’t as insane of a film as the title would suggest, it was also a very heartfelt film that I would recommend to anyone who thinks the title looks interesting. It’s difficult to say much about this movie because the title says all you really need to know. Starring Sam Elliott as World War II veteran Calvin Barr, the film focuses o...

Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story : A Scattered Tale of Lies and Betrayal Note: Dirty John is a crime anthology series. The name of the series comes from the subject of its first season, John Meehan, and does not correlate with anything that transpires in its second season which focuses on Betty Broderick. The title is just a title and nothing more. I also have not seen the first season, and so this season acted as my initial impression of the production and vision behind the true crime anthology aspect of the show. This is a review of Season 2 only. The dramatization of true crime has resulted in popular media that has not only educated the public on real-world events that have transpired, but have also brought a level of analysis to the true crime world through this “edutainment” medium. This ranges from films like Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas , to television series like FX’s American Crime Story: The People v. OJ Simpson , to non-fiction psychoanalyses of criminals as seen in po...

Ozark Season 1: A Twisted Crime Thriller One of the most unique elements of streaming services is that they can get away with presenting darker, edgier stories to their audiences, creating fresh and unique series. Often these series invoke a level of stress in the viewer if presented in the right way. While dark, horrible, are unfolding onscreen, the level of stress in the viewer is heightened because the show is able to portray its characters so well in the dark world it’s created. A show that does this very well is Ozark , a series whose final season is set to go up on Netflix likely within the next year or so. In tandem with it soon ending, I’ve decided to sit down and watch its first three seasons to see what the show is about and how it holds up quality-wise alongside the dark atmosphere it’s known for. Set in 2017, the story follows financial advisor Marty Byrde—played by Jason Bateman—and his family as Marty finds himself in trouble with a Mexican drug cartel. Marty works for t...

Scarlet Nexus Demo: An Interesting, Chaotic Action RPG Video games are great because they offer endless opportunities to explore different worlds people have created, but in a way that is exclusive to you. Sometimes these worlds can be simplistic and require little interaction, while others lean toward being experiences players need to expert to succeed and move on to the next level. And sometimes you end up playing a game that manages to balance high-strung chaos with an intriguing, mysterious story to the point where—despite some admitted flaws—the game still grabs your attention and challenges you to improve your skill as you move through the level. The demo version for Bandai Namco’s upcoming action role-playing game, Scarlet Nexus , is that last one. And despite some flaws, the free, hour-long demo version that I played on the PlayStation 4 was a worthwhile experience that has me at least interested in the full product. Scarlet Nexus takes place in a dystopian future, centering ...

Big Sky : A Crime Thriller Seeking Direction Warning: Unlike a lot of the other media I review for this blog, this entry will contain significant spoilers from the first season of Big Sky. There’s just no conceivable way for me to talk about my thoughts on the show without spoiling it. You have been warned. Crime thrillers that encompass an ensemble cast have a lot of work to do and ground to cover, especially when trying to tell a larger story while giving the audience smaller mysteries to keep them occupied as bigger ones build in the background. This is the case for long-running shows like The Blacklist (or at least what I’ve seen of its first two seasons), Grimm , or any program that has a larger “big bad” in the background while dealing with smaller trifles in the center of that week’s action. But there are some shows that simply focus on one case at a time, delving into a specific crime or conflict for many weeks in order to better develop the mystery in question. It also gives ...