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Arts
Tuesday, December 1, 2015 — 5
TV REVIEW
‘Dead’ disappoints
Mid-season finale
of AMC series is its
worst yet
By BEN ROSENSTOCK
Daily Arts Writer
The concept of a “mid-season
finale” has traditionally been
helpful for “The Walking Dead,”
a show primar-
ily made up of
eight-episode
arcs.
Each
mid-season
finale since the
third
season
has featured a
game-changing
moment; while
the third sea-
son left us won-
dering whether
Darryl
(Nor-
man
Reedus,
“Sky”) or Merle (Michael Rook-
er, “Henry: Portrait of a Serial
Killer”) would survive their bat-
tle to the death, the fourth and
fifth mid-season finales killed
off main characters and scat-
tered the show’s characters to
the wind, with no destination in
sight.
As this season began to
unfold, it quickly became clear
that
the
entire
half-season
would take place over a com-
pressed time rate, only a few
days. That was an appeal-
ing idea, especially because it
would allow the show to tell a
self-contained arc with a great-
er sense of immediacy. Unfor-
tunately, there’s hardly any
urgency to be found in “Start
to Finish,” the show’s weakest
mid-season finale yet. There’s
no real cliffhanger in the end;
the story simply stops in the
middle of what it’s doing, letting
us wonder for a couple months
what the outcome of the cur-
rent big zombie battle will be.
As a structural experiment, the
time compression of the sixth
season has failed, resulting in a
four-episode stretch of boring
episodes without even a finale
to coax the season back to life.
The episode either delays or
entirely eschews all the big out-
comes viewers were waiting for:
a fatal confrontation between
Carl (Chandler Riggs, “Mercy”)
and
Ron
(Austin
Abrams,
“Paper Towns”), the emotional
reunion of Glenn (Steven Yeun,
“I Origins”) and Maggie (Lauren
Cohan, “The Vampire Diaries”),
the reveal of the identity of the
person pleading for help over the
radio and the arrival of Darryl,
Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green,
“Once Upon A Time”) and Abra-
ham (Michael Cudlitz, “South-
land”). Most notably, though, the
massive zombie attack, instead
of delivering a surge of action
and high stakes, is presented as
a minor background nuisance
throughout the episode.
The episode, at least, isn’t as
bad as the season’s worst install-
ment, “Now.” There are inter-
esting threads here. Deanna’s
(Tovah Feldshuh, “Holocaust”)
death is appropriately heroic as
she finally musters up the cour-
age to fight back against the
walkers, and her final conver-
sation with Michonne (Danai
Gurira, “Mother of George”)
hopefully promises a bigger
role for the latter after a half-
season that has largely ignored
her. Carol (Melissa McBride,
“The Reconstruction of Wil-
liam Zero”) and Morgan (Len-
nie James, “Low Winter Sun”),
the most compelling characters
of the show, have a fun fight
based on their disagreement
over whether to keep their mur-
derous prisoner alive.
Still, even these two theo-
retically compelling subplots
are marred by old issues and
new frustrating developments.
Deanna’s death doesn’t have
nearly as much impact as it
would last season, since she has
spent most of this season in a dull
PTSD-induced stupor, staring
blankly at the walkers threat-
ening to kill her and repeatedly
being saved by Rick (Andrew
Lincoln, “Love Actually”). And
while Carol and Morgan’s fight
would typically be fascinat-
ing, it feels petty amid a mas-
sive zombie attack. Their fight
also ends in a painfully predict-
able manner, with the prisoner
escaping. This development in
particular is frustrating because
it proves Carol right in her mer-
ciless attitude toward prisoners.
“The Walking Dead” is a show
too often bogged down by pes-
simism and ruthlessness, which
is why Morgan’s optimistic no-
killing policy is so refreshing
this season. A character being
justifiably merciful for a change
would give the show a neces-
sary shock to the system, but the
prisoner proving Morgan wrong
only serves as another unneces-
sary reminder that the only way
to survive is by being merciless.
The rest of the episode fea-
tures boring scenes of little
consequence. Tara (Alanna Mas-
terson, “Men at Work”), Eugene
(Josh McDermitt, “Retired at
35”) and Rosita (Christian Ser-
ratos, “Ned’s Declassified School
Survival Guide”) hide from the
zombies for a while, then break
out and fail to save Denise (Mer-
ritt Wever, “Nurse Jackie”) from
being abducted by the escaped
prisoner. There’s also a fight
between Carl and Ron, foreshad-
owed by last episode’s falsely
intense cliffhanger. If there was
ever a real risk of Ron killing
Carl, this fight could be thrill-
ing, but the pacing of the scene
is listless and obligatory, as if
everyone involved knows both
annoying kids are going to make
it out alive. Besides, in the wake
of the kerfuffle with Glenn sur-
viving, the odds are against the
main character’s son dying any-
time soon.
Though the sixth season of
“The Walking Dead” started
strong and featured some stand-
out episodes, the past four have
seen it backsliding into stag-
nancy, recalling the weak early
seasons. Hopefully the upcom-
ing second half of the season
will use the comics’ deep well
of story for some more consis-
tently fun episodes. But if the
mid-season finale is any indica-
tor, there’s a long way to go to
rebuild.
C+
The
Walking
Dead
Season 6 Mid-
season Finale
AMC
Sundays at 9 p.m.
GENDER AND MEDIA COLUMN
Hamilton, Ruth & I
I
’ve been thinking a lot
recently about history.
How stories are told and
repeated. How people become
figures and figures become
idols. How
others are
forgot-
ten, their
lives only
lived once
in their
own bod-
ies rather
than in the
memories of
generations.
This newfound, morbid pre-
occupation with legacy? All due
to one man: our least-appreci-
ated founding father, Alexan-
der Hamilton. Good ol’ Alex is
the subject of a new Broadway
musical that is breaking rev-
enue records and taking over
Spotify accounts. “Hamilton” is
a hip-hop opera composed by,
written and starring buoyant
auteur Lin-Manuel Miranda,
creator of Tony-award-winning
“In the Heights.” It tells Ham-
ilton’s incredible unsung story,
from a young orphan living
in the Caribbean, as George
Washington’s aide de camp in
the revolution, the creator of
the Federalist Papers, the first
Secretary of the Treasury (and
creator of big bad Wall Street
as we know it), to millions of
other accomplishments, so
much that Miranda has to rap
in order to get them all out. It’s
really, really good.
The final song of the musi-
cal, taking place after Hamil-
ton’s death, is a soft, wandering
ballad sung by his ever-patient
wife Eliza. “Who Lives, Who
Dies, Who Tells Your Story,”
is Eliza’s promise to continue
working in her husband’s
honor, so that he is never for-
gotten; it’s also Lin-Manuel’s
attempt to remember the
female voices in Hamilton’s
life, those that Hamilton him-
self seemed to often forget.
“Hamilton” is unapolo-
getically the story of a man
— a man who is brilliant, rash,
tireless, selfish and ultimately
vulnerable. And he is a man
in a world ruled by men, sur-
rounded by male compatriots
and adversaries. The women in
his life are love interests; one a
confidant, one a supporter, one
a temptress. Lin-Manuel does
what he can with the little his-
tory recorded of the women in
Hamilton’s life, but ultimately
what we know of them is only
in reference to Hamilton. His-
tory doesn’t tell their story.
***
As I obsessively listened to
“Hamilton,” I was also read-
ing Irin Carmon and Shana
Knizhnik’s recent biography of
Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Fueled
by Tumblr public policy nerds,
82-year-old Supreme Court
Justice Ginsberg has become
something of a celebrity over
the past few years, most sig-
nificantly after a few blister-
ing dissents in conservative
decisions made by the court.
Notorious RBG, as the Internet
calls her, is Millennial-famous
now, but this octogenarian was
badass long before we all were
born.
This — this — was a story
that needed to be told.
A woman who passed
groundbreaking cases in equal
rights for women and men
when it came to family leave
and employment discrimina-
tion, who intelligently (and
presciently) argued against
Roe v. Wade, believing that a
woman’s right to choose was
only secure when there wasn’t
an opportunity for loopholes
in the law. A woman who was
only one of two other women
in her class at Columbia Law,
yet who graduated first in her
class. A woman of whom her
daughter once fondly spoke:
“Mommy does the thinking,
and daddy does the cooking.”
A modern marvel, a winged
herald.
It was thrilling to read about
a woman who had shaped the
country during my own life-
time. In the constant rebirth
of a nation, she is in some ways
a founding mother, helping
develop a new system to foster
our diverse, complex country.
It was refreshing to read of
her husband Marty’s constant
support and deference to her
intelligence and industrious-
ness. It was refreshing too, to
see Marty, a wildly successful
tax attorney in his own right,
be discussed only in reference
to Ruth. Because this was her
story.
***
I sat in the movie theater,
tears pooling into my woolen
scarf, Mom holding my hand
tight. “Brooklyn,” about a
young Irish girl immigrating to
the United States in the 1950s
and starring the luminous
Saorise Ronan, wasn’t an espe-
cially tragic movie. I wasn’t
crying because of a great death
or misfortune that had fallen
upon Eilis, who was smart and
scrappy and thriving.
I was crying because I was
able to see myself in her story.
While there have been many
films created about those
immigrating to the United
States, this one is different.
Eilis’ freckled face fills every
frame of the film, as she says
goodbye to her family, becomes
seasick on the boat over and
homesick once there, as she
speaks in her meek brogue at
the department store where she
works. As she falls in love, and
as she makes achingly difficult
decisions. This is not a fam-
ily saga, nor even a two-sided
romance. This is purely Eilis’s
story.
Based on Colm Tóibín’s novel
of the same name, “Brooklyn”
is complete fiction. Eilis isn’t
a Ruth, nor is she a Hamilton,
real figures with real impacts
on American history. In a
world where the stories of the
powerful are told most often,
and men’s a large percentage
of those, Eilis’s story is small.
But as another young Irish girl
(admittedly a few generations
removed), who is soon moving
thousands of miles away from
her family, Eilis’s story beat
more powerfully in my chest
than Hamilton or Ginsburg’s
triumphs ever could. And I’m
goddamn grateful someone told
it, because stories like Eilis’s
are usually the ones we never
get to hear.
Gadbois is waiting for a
Notorious R.B.G. musicial.
To pitch her, e-mail
gadbnat@umich.edu.
NATALIE
GADBOIS
‘10 Bullets’ shows
empathy for subjects
By SOPHIA KAUFMAN
Daily Arts Writer
After Michael Dunn, a white
man, shot and killed Jordan Davis,
a Black 17-year-old boy, in a gas
station parking
lot in Florida,
Jordan’s father
Ron
received
a
text
from
Trayvon Mar-
tin’s
father,
welcoming
him to a “club”
that none of
them
wanted
to be in.
The documentary “3 ½ Min-
utes, 10 Bullets,” directed by Marc
Silver, (“Who is Dayani Cristal?”)
chronicles the trial of Michael
Dunn in 2012. Unlike the sev-
eral other recent cases involv-
ing young Black people killed by
whites, there was no dispute over
whether Dunn was guilty of kill-
ing Davis — which he did after
asking Davis to turn that “thug
music” down. Dunn’s defense
relies on his insistence that under
Florida’s stand-your-ground laws:
He was in the right, as he thought
Davis had a shotgun. But when
Dunn’s then-fiancé Rhonda Rouer
is cross-examined, she says, in a
wavery voice, that Dunn had never
told her anything about Davis hav-
ing a gun. No weapons of any kind
were found in Davis’s car. At one
point, we hear Dunn complaining
to Rouer that he feels he’s being
victim-blamed in the same way a
scantily-clad woman might be.
Names like Trayvon Martin
and Michael Brown are whis-
pered or shouted throughout
this documentary as it rightly
puts the trial in context of the
exploding outrage over racial
biases (whether conscious or
subconscious) that play a part
in the killings of Black people
in America. For example, the
documentary adds context by
focusing on both the news cov-
erage of this trial as well as the
trial itself. In light of recent
events, this documentary feels
more subtle and controlled in its
representation of Dunn, when it
could have very harshly thrown
him into sharp relief. The doc-
umentary,
though
focusing
heavily on how racial prejudice
played into this tragic event and
the subsequent trials, also dedi-
cates a substantial amount of
time to the second-amendment
rhetoric and discourse on gun
laws that surrounded this case.
The documentary pulls on
our emotions without cheapen-
ing its story; we see Jordan’s par-
ents crying at their table, trying
to figure out how this could have
happened five minutes from their
home, when he was with a group
of “good” boys.
Aside from the interviews
with Jordan’s parents, the most
riveting moments of the docu-
mentary are the interviews with
Jordan’s friends, all young Black
teenagers. They’re fully aware
of the camera and the context
in which they’re being inter-
viewed. They’re sad, but they’re
not confused. They know why
Dunn pulled out his gun, and
why the first jury didn’t agree
on a first-degree murder charge.
They talk about the racial over-
tones of the shooting and the
trial more than anyone else in
the documentary does. One of
Jordan’s friends says, shaking
his head, “ ‘Thug’ is the new
n-word.”
The documentary is uneven in
its coverage of the first and sec-
ond trials, focusing more on the
first, but the courtroom scenes
are captivating. It ends with
the fact that Dunn was given a
life sentence without parole for
murdering Jordan Davis and an
additional 90 years for attempt-
ed murder of Leland Brunson,
Tevin Thompson and Tommie
Stornes, Jordan’s friends who
were also in the car.
“3 ½ Minutes, 10 Bullets”
isn’t exceptional in terms of
aesthetic
cinematography
or
directorial choices. The music
sometimes feels out of place, and
often the interview audio bites
or recordings of phone calls are
played over extraneous shots of
cars driving on highways. But
you get the feeling that the peo-
ple involved in making it really
couldn’t care less about that.
They know that what is impor-
tant is the story and the context
in which this story unfortunate-
ly unfolded.
TV REVIEW
A-
3 1/2
Minutes,
10 Bullets
HBO
Pulling emotions
without
cheapening the
story.
TV NOTEBOOK
Memories of Macy’s
By HAILEY MIDDLEBROOK
Daily Arts Writer
For 89 years, Thanksgiving
morning has meant one thing:
Macy’s
Thanksgiving
Day
parade.
Rain or shine, it’s a tradition
as holy as turkey, cranberry
sauce, football and your drunk
uncle’s political rants. Because
whether you’re a 10-year-old kid
or a senior home from college,
watching the balloons in person
on New York City’s Sixth Avenue
or streaming it from NBC on
a favorite sofa at home, you’re
guaranteed to get a bit emotional
when Santa Claus floats by for
the grand finale.
And when Mariah Carey
sings “All I Want for Christmas
Is You” from atop a stack of
Christmas presents, wearing a
cherry-red ball gown and a fur
shawl, you might just burst out
in tears.
Needless to say, the parade
is a Thanksgiving tradition that
millions of Americans have
adopted as their own. Though
the famed march to Macy’s
flagship store in New York City
has shortened, condensed to
just two and a half miles from
the five-mile route of previous
years, the parade continues to
blow up bigger every year — no
pun intended — and 2015 was no
exception.
Hosted
by
Matt
Lauer,
Savannah Guthrie and Al Roker
of NBC’s “Today” show, this
year’s march brought the usual
favorites: the long-legged New
York City Rockettes, Snoopy and
Woodstock,
600
plus-person
dance crews, marching bands and
that group of old geezers with
bagpipes, all snaking through a
crowd of three million spectators.
Different from previous years,
however, was the not-so-subtle
hint of heavy surveillance, a
precaution taken in response to
the recent bombings in Paris.
The New York Times reported
that close to 2,500 police officers
lined the streets, both in uniform
and undercover, watching for
any suspicious activity amongst
the crowd. Thankfully, like the
unseasonably warm weather, the
parade proceeded as perfectly as
everyone hoped. The only glitch,
according to the Times, was a
41-year-old man who violated
city code by flying a drone near
Central Park.
Drone aside, the air was filled
with whimsy. Along with Snoopy,
the oldest recurring balloon on
display (appearing 38 times since
being introduced in 1968), familiar
friendly giants included Hello
Kitty (introduced in 1976), Ronald
McDonald
(1987),
Pokemon’s
Pikachu
(2001),
Spongebob
Squarepants (2004), “Adventure
Time” ’s Finn and Jake (2013)
and the Red Power Ranger (2014).
New to the crew this year was
Scrat, the lovable and frantic
squirrel from “Ice Age,” who
floated through the air clutching
— what else? — his precious acorn.
Red from the “Angry Birds” video
game also flew for the first time,
in anticipation of “The Angry
Birds Movie” coming to theaters
in May.
Hovering below the balloons
was the real action: the musical
performances and dance acts. For
as much as I love a giant inflatable
Spongebob,
watching
Panic!
At the Disco (“I Write Sins Not
Tragedies”) on a Teenage Mutant
Ninja Turtles float is a bit more
exciting.
In
the
past,
Macy’s
has
attracted artists from across the
country and across generations
— from Hilary Duff (2003) and
the Kidz Bop Kids (2012), to the
Beach Boys (2005) and KISS
(2014). Though almost everyone
lip syncs, wearing microphones
for show — parade acoustics are
pretty terrible — the singing’s not
the focal point.
Really, we’re all watching to
see what float the stars arrive
on and what holiday-chic outfit
they’re sporting.
This year, Mariah Carey, the
queen
of
Christmas
herself,
won
best-dressed
and
best
performance hands down. (I’m
biased, I know, but it’s officially
the holiday season after all!)
Other strong showings were
Jordin Sparks, who sang “Right
Here Right Now” dressed in an
on-point cranberry pea coat;
Shawn Mendes, who performed
“Stitches”
while
adorably
steering a ship of kiddy pirates;
and the “610 Stompers,” posing in
short shorts and sweat bands like
an army of “Juno”-era Michael
Ceras, who killed a hilariously
impressive step routine. Along
with Panic! at the Disco, the
Plain White T’s also appeared,
giving us all some nostalgia for
the 2000s.
But most deserving of praise
was the troupe of spirited high
school cheerleaders, dancers and
marching band members who
never stopped smiling, though
they’d probably been locked
in tight formation since 6 a.m.
Props for doing your thing while
the rest of us were in college-
induced comas.
For me, Macy’s Thanksgiving
Day
parade
isn’t
so
much
entertainment as it is therapy, a
nostalgic relief from the stress
of the semester and a tradition
that the whole family — drunk
uncle included — can agree
on. And that’s something to be
thankful for.
The show is
backsliding into
stagnancy.