The Cleaner is an interesting take on the we’re-not-quite-a-procedural-but-we-are drama for A&E who have come up from the reality wasteland with another try at a scripted series. Benjamin Bratt stars as William Banks a former addict who hit rock bottom and now helps others when they need to kick their addictions. Banks has a team and will use any means necessary to get you into a program, whether you want it or not, meaning the program comes booted with gritty nature to it, although there are some issues.

From the very beginning it’s hard to notice that this might turn into a procedural over the course of its run with a few family bits thrown in to break up the stories, but the pilot episode lent itself as a mix between CSI and the personal lives of a low-key drama thrown into the mix as well. Blend that up with unique subject matter, the intoxicating presence of Grace Park and you have yourself another cable show where you can say the s-word a lot. In fact, the pilot episodes big twist comes straight out of the CSI pilot episode as well, although there is room to evolve and grow here.

While it’s hard to base an entire series on its pilot, there are parts that work and parts that don’t in The Cleaner. Bratt’s screen presence has been missed since his days on Law & Order ended, and aside from passable made-for movies his lack of steady TV work has been disappointing. He’s a great actor and can carry a show very well. Banks gives off a vibe somewhere between Gregory House and Gil Grissom, while being sarcastic, he always means well, plus he talks to God. God doesn’t manifest herself as Alanis Morissette, random people, or inanimate objects, Banks just responds to events with fleeting questions, proclamations, and commentary directed towards the sky with no acknowledgement. If God were truly all around us, why does everyone talk to the clouds? Why not that happy little tree over there, or this large sheepdog?

Banks’ team is composed of the aforementioned Grace as Akani, joining her Cylon compatriot Tricia Helfer (Burn Notice) on another cable series, Arnie (Esteban Powell) who doesn’t really want to be here today, and newcomer Darnell (Kevin Michael Richardson) who joins the team at the end of the pilot episode. The opening case and the team get second billing to Banks and his family life in the pilot episode, but as the season goes on a good dynamic looks to form.

The Cleaner has the potential to be something fresh and exciting with its subject matter and take-no-prisoners attitude to helping people, almost to the point of the team becoming mercenaries or vigilantes. Yet, the too-safe moments and structure of the show could certainly use some mold breaking to keep it from competing with the big boys on network TV, where CSI, Law & Order, and their spawn still run strong.

More so than its predecessor, Hellboy II: The Golden Army is an arresting visual experience with a loose story centered on the titular character and the army of paranormal investigators at the BRPD. The influence of Guillermo del Toro on the franchise, lifted from the pages of Dark Horse comics, has brought it to a more mainstream audience and amplified what it is to be different. The original film was a modest success for Sony and the ailing Revolution Studios, after passing on the sequel, Universal picked up the rights and brings us one of the top comic book movies of the year, so far.

Hellboy II manages to surpass its original installment, something that’s not easy to do, but becoming more common recently, in nearly all aspects. While the plot is still a prime excuse to link together fight scenes, the background story still has some muster and a mythological base treats fans of two different genres.

Long ago an elf king commissioned goblins to create an indestructible army commanded by a crown. The Golden Army was so destructive and indestructible that it nearly annihilated all of mankind and led to a truce between the two parties, the humans taking the cities, the elves taking the forests. While most of the elf population took this truce to heart for each generation, the king’s son Price Nuada (Luke Goss) drifted into exile only to turn up in the present day with the urge to command the army for himself and destroy the humans.

The antagonist is a bit weak, although its hard to top the terrorizing effects of undead Nazi’s from the first film. What really shines here is the character development of Hellboy (Ron Perlman) and Liz (Selma Blair) and their struggling relationship. The writing has been tightened significantly with Perlman delivering one-liners like any leading man and making them count. Both Liz and Abe (Doug Jones) receive expanded parts in relation to the original, new character Johann Kraus (voiced by Seth MacFarlane) really brings a bit of freshness to the film.

The film also maintains aspects of the comic book’s back-story and mythology including more and more allusions that Hellboy will be the destructor of our world, and when the pregnant Liz hears this as a choice between Hellboy living and dying she understandably choices his life over, what may be, everyone else’s. While a common theme of the character, del Toro again tries to play up the fact that the world will never accept Hellboy, even when he, Abe, and the BRPD are ousted into the public eye. The red-skinned one once again contemplates his position within human society and if he can ever survive and be accepted.

Perlman loses himself in the role and makes the doubters who initially opposed him for the role eat a good sized helping of crow as he further evolves the character down new paths. He’s able to make a giant red demon into a humanized character, naïve in relationships, and sticking it to authority figures much to the dismay of his overseer Manning (Jeffrey Tambor).

As mentioned previously, the visual imagery of the film is stunning with some major holdovers from del Toro’s Oscar-nominated Pan’s Labyrinth including the creepy, yet enticing Angel of Death near the climax of the film. The battle between our heroes and the Golden Army is also very well choreographed and a visual masterpiece.

When it’s all said and done, the Hellboy series continues on its high road (as long as we don’t count videogames) and manages to outdo the original film in a planned trilogy in nearly every category from writing to action to character development. One can only hope that the next film capitalizes on this one’s success and high points and continues to climb upwards.

Ever since Apple introduced video to the iPod, the portal media player market has really taken off. Sure it existed prior to the 5G iPods, but with iTunes integration and TV shows on demand, everything has been about your media, anywhere you want it. Several smaller companies have also stepped into the game (including behemoth Sony with the PSP) and started to release low-cost, high functionality media players. The T30 from Nextar is one such player, a $100 unit boasting the ability to play videos, music, FM radio, e-Books, display pictures, and even voice record, but with the old adage of “you get what you pay for” firmly in place, the T30 has some definite room to grow.

The basic design of the unit is small, compact, thin, and easily hidden in a pocket for use just about anywhere. The 4GB unit (expandable to 6GB using a SD or MMC card) boasts a 3.5” 320×240 LCD screen, USB 2.0 transfer speeds, and 1000 mAH Lithium-Ion Battery. The face of the unit is clean, just slightly bigger than the screen with a stereo emulated speaker to the right, all encased in glossy black plastic. All the buttons are located around the edge (accented in orange). On the top you have the power, record, next, previous, and return buttons, all used for navigating the main menu. Along the right side are two volume control buttons with the play/pause button nestled in-between them. Finally, on the left side are the I/O jacks featuring the USB hook up, headphone jack, 5V DC input, and hardware reset button.

The USB plug has considerable problems as the shallow receptacle on the unit itself causes the computer to detect the media player, but at the slightest touch, the connectors can lose connection, dropping it off. The only way we could find to successfully establish and keep a USB connection was to turn the unit on its side and continually apply light pressure to the USB connector, making sure it was snug. The instant we would let go, the computer would drop the USB device.

The T30 comes with all the attachments you’d need to get yourself started. A printed manual, felt carrying bag, headphone adapter (to use with standard headphones), a set of earbud headphones, power adapter, USB cable, and CD containing the AVI converter program and other manuals all come with the $100 unit.

USA Network’s Burn Notice took the summer by storm last year combining the elements of a procedural, with the snark of Gil Grissom on CSI, and a comedic bite rolled into serious stories. The show excelled at making a name for itself with its overall mythology on why Michael Westen was burned and how he was going to save himself from being trapped in Miami forever. In the final episodes of season one we are introduced to bigger players in the game, including the unseen Carla (Tricia Helfer) who beings manipulating Michael from the very start of this episode. Her motives aren’t known beyond Michael driving into the back of a trailer and emerging with two dead bodies and a tied up security consultant to work with.

While it looked like the season finale was going to change up the show’s formula, season two eventually finds Michael back in Miami performing a job for Carla in order to meet her and find out what is going on. Carla, as we’ve known for some time, is played by Tricia Helfer, assuming yet another villainous role after her run as Six on the Peabody-winning Battlestar Galactica. Although she is in the episode for less than a minute, her presence (and beauty) alone make her stand out and give a face to the previously ambiguous element behind the show’s burn notice.

Westen finds himself needing to help a security consultant who the syndicate (a cool name we’re giving to the people manipulating Westen) has taken his family hostage. The target is a private security firm (aka mercenaries) with data the syndicate wants. When we finally get to see the data it makes no sense to any of our main characters, but its obvious there’s a lot of wheels turning here. There’s a grand aura behind this season with many of the cogs in the wheel beginning to sync up into something bigger, which should make the next few months fun avoiding the heat on Thursday nights.

The season does start a little low key, especially with the return to form no more than five minutes into the season premiere. Not that this is a bad thing, as previously stated Burn Notice‘s biggest advantage over other procedurals is that you forget it IS a procedural at heart, with each episode focusing on the relationship between Michael and Fiona, Michael and Sam, Michael and his mom, throwing in a client, a bad guy, Michael with a funny accent, and ending with the bad guy getting his due in a clever manner. While some shows have strived to change up the formula each and every season, My Name is Earl comes to mind, to mixed results, Burn Notice stays true to what made it fun in the first place.

It seems Martin Lawrence has finally realized where the money is in Hollywood: producing. Anytime are Lawrence is involved in a project, it’s hit or miss as to whether or not it’ll be a winner. In this case, Martin Lawrence’s First Amendment Stand Up has a lot of the same qualities as a Premium Blend, or Friday Night Standup, but it’s refreshing to see him take such risks on putting so many relatively green comics on such a show.

In the premiere episode of the show’s second season, Doug Williams, host of the show, has the obligatory job of warming the crowd up with a short bit, and unlike the usually underwhelming dusted off material of once greats like Tommy Davidson or Damon Wayans when they have MC duties, Doug hits some great notes with a bit about how relationships are like a football game, with you as starting QB, your girl as head coach, and a guy sittin’ on the bench ready to get into the game. Funny stuff, and he seems to get the ball rolling.

The first comic up is Don “D.C.” Curry; an older comic who’s been a staple in black comedy circles and mainstream clubs for decades. He shows a real understanding of the crowd he’s playing to (which in this case is a 98% black Washington D.C. audience, fitting with his D.C. nickname). He’s able to get some weird mix of topical humor, including pop culture references like when Alec Baldwin cussed out his kid a year or so ago, and put it in the normal “here’s how white people act, and here’s how black folk would handle it” motif.

The second of the two comics showcased for this episode is Rickey Smiley, someone who seems like a relative newcomer, but doesn’t cater to the lowest common denominator that a lot of the younger generation of black comics seem to. His delivery is stories, but interesting in that they are tragedy laden and he delivers them with a relatively serious delivery, admonishing the crowd jokingly for some of their reactions to stories that shouldn’t be funny, but are. It’s an interesting, unique and fresh twist on story telling comedy, and works pretty successfully.

The show itself isn’t going to be groundbreaking. As an outlet for black comics, it’s good that Martin Lawrence is taking risks with putting some relatively unseen talent outside of the black community on a big stage, and he has made some pretty intelligent choices for the show. For one, he’s at each of these episodes in the balcony, so he’s able to really show support for what this program is about. He also only has a few comics in each episode, so unlike other mainstream comedy “specials” on Comedy Central and the like, these comics are able to actually show you more than a two minute snippet of their material.

As a white guy who has watched standup my whole life, I’m able to watch niche comics like black or Hispanic comics, older, younger, etc., and be able to appreciate the whole spectrum of material. If they want a largely black audience, I think that’s what they’re going to get and they should be happy that they’ve nailed the demo. However, if they’re wanting to encourage a large demographic for the show, they have to either have some more diverse comics on the program, or at least encourage material that’s going to translate to wide audiences.

There hasn’t been a movie like Hancock in a long while with the ability to polarize audiences to such a degree as this. From the very onset of the film, when a drunken, languishing superhero (Will Smith) awakens to perform the not-so-daunting task of stopping a SUV full of guys with guns, you know you are in for something different, or at least you think you are. Truth be told, Columbia Picture’s marketing department accurately marketed about 20% of this movie before its release, a few one-liners, some boozing super powers, and a guy saving the day for all mankind. All that stuff ends about 25 minutes into the film and after the true perspective of the film is revealed.

The big “twist,” that has been marketed more than Smith flying under the influence, isn’t that big at all as Peter Berg’s direction makes everything so blatantly obvious with close to two dozen shots of Charlize Theron’s face that you just know she’s mentally projecting into your brain, “Hi, I’m Academy Award winner Charlize Theron, and I know something more than I let on!” The obviousness of the “twist” when it finally happens has no punch to it, it simply happens and some hair-brained explanation is supposed to make everything better. Granted the premise is unique, the execution is severely lacking.

Smith is his usual charismatic self, borrowing elements from all the previous characters that he’s played and combining it into another great role. Hancock eventually saves Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman) who puts him through the paces of changing his image in the public eye, even going to jail for a month to make the public miss him, but Ray’s connection to Hancock, through his wife, complicates things as the film goes on into its dramatic climax.

Theron as Mary Embrey seems to have lost all the muster that gave her the aforementioned Oscar, whether it be from a lack of material, or just a general lack of talent, but Mary comes off as flat and even more so when her secret is revealed.

Oh the hell with it, Mary is a superhero too, she has super powers, and when pairs of the ancient race of beings come close to each other they become mortal, something that plays out near the end of the film. Fate always brings them back together, and she’s always escaping away from Hancock to save both of them. See, hair-brained.

Realistically this is the main antagonist in the film, there isn’t a super villain created by a super-secret experiment, there isn’t a mole-man drilling up from the ground or anything like that, it’s a character piece, and while the character of Hancock is developed enough for us to care, the rest of the script, save for Bateman’s usually wonderful performance, really leaves a lot to be desired.

Again, Hancock is a polarizing film, you either like it, or you don’t, based on what the filmmakers were trying to accomplish there is a lot to like here, but where it all counts, the script, is where the film falls flat. In a world where we give accolades for participation and trying, Hancock wins a handful of awards, but where execution gets you results, this superhero film fails to live up to the expectations set up by its first 20 minutes of runtime.

Reviewing the debut album, Madeline, from Tickle Me Pink is overshadowed by the sudden death of bassist Johnny Schou on the day of the album’s release, however from a perspective of the music presented by the formerly indie band, Madeline aims for the fences and delivers a thought provoking, sometimes hard, sometimes soft, look into the demons of life. Produced by Lee Miles (Red Jumpsuit Apparatus) the disc screams about the terrors of drugs, love, loss, and addiction which radiate through nearly every track within.

The band put it best in Entertainmentopia‘s interview with them last week that, “A lot of the songs on the record are incredibly personal and others may be extremely superficial, however they all manage to maintain a truthfulness to them. I think collectively we could all agree that “Madeline” (our self titled track) holds the most significance to us. “

The title track does indeed stand out as the most poignant cut on the album as lead singer Sean Kennedy belts (presumably about the title girl), “Only girls who would ever compromise / Strike a deal with the devil to save the night“; and later “Oh oh oh oh I couldn’t hear her cries / As she filled her veins with lies / Till she saw the light“;. The song radiates the regret of overlooking someone’s problem before it’s too late, never taking a stand to correct something that they may never be able to see. Nestled comfortably between the slow starting “The Lush Life”; and followed by the mediocre “We Still Dance“; it holds the album together, exemplifying its themes.

Several of the tracks diverge away from the more pop punk aura and strike pretty hard. “We’re Not Alone“; starts off slow with an acoustic guitar introduction before pumping in hard. “I Can’t Breathe“; roars out of the game as the hardest track on the disc and speaks of a doomed relationship only held together by “painful pleasures”; and the thought of change that will not happen. Unfortunately the album doesn’t finish as strongly as it starts with the more single ready tracks, like the strong hook-packed “Typical“; and the aforementioned “Madeline.”;

Madeline is a fine album from the indie darlings who have been propelled to the commercial stage. Working with a producer for the first time posed challenges to the band; however, as evident by their music throughout the disc, it’s clear that they were able to overcome it. While the latter half doesn’t compare to earlier tracks on the album, as a complete package you could do a lot worse in today’s musical environment.