Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3

I'm really curious how close this game is to what it would have been had Jason West and Vince Zampella not been fired by Activision and taken a lot of the higher level talent at Infinity Ward with them. Was the plan for the game already in place, or did the people left behind have to come up with the whole thing? If there was a plan, how detailed was it? I'm curious because I had fun with the game, but it doesn't do much besides meet the standards of the previous ones without bringing much new to the table. This is the fifth Call of Duty game in this style in as many years, and both the formula and the graphics engine are feeling a little old at this point. At full capacity, might Infinity Ward have brought their A game and raised modern military shooters to a new level? Or was Modern Warfare 3 always destined to be yet another solid Call of Duty game?

There's nothing really wrong with that, I'm just not sure that I need to play many more of them. Modern Warfare 3 has everything you'd expect and little you wouldn't. There's a campaign that will last you five to six hours which features lots of dramatic explosions and firefights. The Spec-Ops mode returns with plenty of new missions and a survival mode, because every multiplayer shooter needs a survival mode. And there's the traditional online which feels basically the same with a few tweaks and additions. If it's worth it to you, there's nothing really wrong with the package. It's just that it's a very familiar package by now.

One thing in the campaign's favor is that it actually manages to bring the overloaded plot of the Modern Warfare sub-series to a mostly satisfying conclusion, as long as you're okay with the series' practice of resolving story threads by killing off every character involved in them. It seems like shooters are always trying to outdo each other now, and MW3 definitely tries to build that excitement by going as big as possible, essentially portraying what a modern World War III would look like. On one hand you'll be playing alongside familiar characters from the first couple games, chasing down the series' biggest villain, but on the other you'll be hopping all over the place, fighting battles in familiar locations and very extreme conditions. You'll start by saving New York City's harbor from a Russian naval fleet, and then hop to various hotspots all over Europe with your squad of celebrity voice acted comrades. At times the plot justifications for each new location will seem thin, but when all you really want is to shoot bad guys and see exciting stuff happen all around you, it tends to work really well. I don't really buy that Russia would be able to cause this much trouble for the US and Europe all by themselves, but it's an easy thing to let slide. The series' ability to create unique, memorable moments is certainly a boon, as it makes the campaign seem a lot more noteworthy than the one in Battlefield 3, despite featuring similar gameplay and a less technically advanced presentation. The Uncharted series might be the only one that pulls off huge spectacle better in the world of action games.

Not everything is great, though. In what might have been a constraint due to the labor issue surrounding the game's creation, you sure spend an awful lot of time in the campaign driving or riding in vehicles instead of moving on your own. It's not that these sequences are boring, but most shooters use vehicles as a way to occasionally change the pace a bit, and here it seems like a design crutch for when they needed you to kill a lot of guys without finding a more clever way to do it. They did manage to avoid the sort of frustrating choke points that have frequently plagued the series in the past, but instead the game seemed almost too easy on regular, until the final mission which ended up being pretty annoying. You gotta get the bad guy! You only have three minutes! But there's a ton of guys between you and him and they can all shoot you with deadly accuracy the second you leave cover! Go faster! No, slow down and let yourself heal! There are better ways to make a conclusion dramatic than the way they handled it. It seemed odd that some of the biggest twists in the story involved a new character that we didn't have time to really learn much about, and it's hard to be shocked by anything the series does anymore. In the past the series has effectively used the deaths of characters to create memorable moments, but when you get the point where you basically assume everyone is a goner, it stops seeming special.

Also, I'll be honest - I haven't tried the other modes. Battlefield's larger, objective-based multiplayer is more interesting to me, and most of my time is being taken up by other games anyway. Some of the things they've added like ways to get bonuses in multiplayer without being skilled enough to earn a kill streak seem neat, and Spec-Ops was pretty fun from what I played before. I know some people only care about Call of Duty for the online, but I bought it because I wanted to see the end of the Modern Warfare story, and I'm pretty sure I got that. It wasn't exactly a unique or inspirational game, but it was a fun one, packing plenty of interesting moments and enjoyable gunfights into the amount of time it lasted. I'd like to see the series do something really different before I try picking it up again, but it's hard to complain about this as a temporary send-off.

Rango

I had heard that Rango was a good animated movie for people besides little kids, but I didn't expect to like it as much as I did. It's probably the best non-Pixar American animated movie I've seen since The Iron Giant, which is a lot of qualifications, but it's still a solid accomplishment. It's definitely not a movie designed to appeal directly to children; I'm sure plenty would like it, but the story and characters have enough maturity and older-skewing references built into them to make it probably appeal more directly to someone with at least more knowledge of the history of film. There's a lot of Western character archetypes and homages to a bunch of different sources, the stuff that's supposed to be fun for parents who brought their kid to the theater. It goes beyond that here, though. The whole movie seems more designed with the parent in mind than the kid.

Again, not that I don't think kids would like it at all. It's a pretty silly movie in places, and not very difficult to follow. I just thought it was aimed at me more than I expected it to be. The cast is pretty outstanding and varied, with the right idea being used when the voices were picked - they do use celebrities you've heard of, but they're cast to play characters, not to be famous and recognizable. I know Johnny Depp at least was moving around on a set to help create the character, and his Rango is pretty loveable. He's a pet iguana who ends up stranded in the desert and meets up with a small community of wild animals who are struggling to find water. There's a love interest played by Isla Fisher, and a cute little girl played by Abigail Breslin, and a wise but suspicious authority figure played by Ned Beatty. It could pretty much have been a live action Western with the same general characters and worked the same, and that's what's interesting about it. The animation enhances the movie though, providing great opportunities for little moments of humor and some pretty spectacular action sequences. There's just something about complete freedom and control of moments of excitement that really brings out the potential of the form. It's kind of a simple and predictable story, but it works because of the solid humor and charming cast. I certainly wouldn't mind seeing it dethroning Pixar in the Best Animated Feature race early next year.

Justified - Season 2

The first season of Justified was a very good cop show, often ignoring an overarching story in favor of occasionally familiar stand-alone cases for Tim Olyphant's Raylan Givens to solve, but loaded with good acting, great dialogue, and a ton of culturual flavor specific to the southern region it takes place in, and finished strong with a bloody, multi-episode conflict between Walton Goggins' Boyd Crowder and his father. The second season looked like it might do the same thing at first, though the early cases connected much more directly to the grander story threads that begin in the first episode and it wasn't very long at all before the plot kicked into high gear. Tangential subplots still sprang up, but everything felt much tighter this time, like the writers sat down and hammered out a full story before they even thought of doing anything else, and it resulted in a deeper, better show this time around. It wasn't perfect, but I fully expect it to end up as one of my five favorite TV dramas of this year. And if it doesn't... well, I can't wait to see what could possibly be in store from the rest of the medium.

Raylan was a big reason the show was so fun in the first place, bringing a thrilling sense of old fashioned justice to some otherwise ordinary story ideas. What's remarkable is that the show hardly even needed him to be like that this year to be great. Of course Raylan doesn't hurt anything, and he's still a very interesting guy. But he became much more just a part of the series' incredibly rich tapestry of interwoven, unfriendly families, and I would say he's probably only the third most intriguing guy on his own show at best. Boyd spends a good amount of time not sure what he wants as the season starts, but he eventually gets back in the game and is as fascinating as ever. And most impressive was Margo Martindale as Mags Bennet, a woman who at first seems to be a friendly, motherly shopkeeper, but turns out to run illegal activities in her county with a frightening verve and keen intellect. We see how Raylan wasn't the only person to grow up there with that old sense of right and wrong and how things should be dealt with, and the exploration of the history of the Givens, Bennet, and Crowder clans while those rivalries reignite in the modern day is exciting and compelling every step of the way.

The show's still violent (in the surprising and poetic way that only the best shows are), but the shootouts don't carry the stories quite the way they did last time. Mags has three sons who help her business (the standout being Dickie who's played by Jeremy Davies, and who you never quite get a handle on the true nature of), Boyd has a new relationship with Ava and a new crew to run with, Raylan has a relationship with his coworkers that continues to develop in fits and starts (Rachel and Tim still hardly count as characters, but Art is great) and an ex-wife with husband issues and a continued uneasy alliance with Boyd, and the way the show lets all of these little pieces get thrown into a blender and come out in unexpected patterns and combinations never stops being fun to watch. Throw in a nefarious mining company looking to get rich off their home turf, and there's a lot to juggle in just 13 episodes, but the cast and crew were definitely up to the task. The plot they cooked up came to a satisfying resolution without forgetting to leave a few threads ready for the third season to pick up and run with next year, a season I am now early in the process of being unable to wait for. I'm not sure I really care about Raylan's home life as much as they wanted us to, but otherwise Justified is as entertaining a cop show as you're ever likely to see.

Justified - Season 1

The only reason I didn't watch Justified when it premiered early last year was that I wanted to see Walton Goggins' acclaimed work there before moving on to the new show he was in. Sort of silly, but I'm glad I did in anyway so my impressions of Shane remained uncolored. The DVD came out in time to catch up before season two begins in a couple weeks, so there's nothing really lost anyway. Justified is a hybrid of police procedurals and serialized drama, set in the deep South of Kentucky and starring Timothy Olyphant as author Elmore Leonard's Raylan Givens, an old-fashioned lawman living in a modern age. The style is sort of a mix of elements from westerns and detective novels, with Givens having both the keen wit and lightning trigger finger necessary to work as the protagonist of either. He doesn't quite fit in to today's world, shown in the premiere when he's shipped from Miami back to his hometown after he kills a man in broad daylight, and put on the low end of the totem pole in the Marshall's office. There's something dark hidden under his cool exterior, and the first season does a good job of exploring that a bit while leaving some mystery intact, and establishing him as one of the most interesting and entertaining protagonists on TV.

There's more to the show than just him though, as he has to deal with his estranged father, the criminal network and family of old friend Boyd played by Goggins, and a multitude of other issues that arise from week to week. The show juggles stand-alone cases with the more long-term elements pretty deftly, especially as the season goes on and the two become more integrated. Only the premiere and maybe the last three episodes don't have any elements unrelated to the central story, but you hardly notice one way or the other just because the weekly stuff is so generally strong. Not every one is a grand mystery, but even the most obvious ones are amazingly enjoyable thanks to near-universally great writing and casting, and when things tie back into larger goings-on it feels like a bonus rather than a relief. The dialogue is sharp, the whole cast is interesting enough with Olyphant and Goggins at the center, and the violence is remarkably bloody and well-filmed for a cable show.

Really, there's not much about the show not to like. Maybe if it was more focused on a story and the main characters rather than having fun with a bunch of different one-offs, it could have pulled off something even greater in the end. But even with the divided attention, they managed to complete a really entertaining and satisfying arc through these first thirteen episodes, basically having their cake and eating it too. There's enough left open to keep the possibilities of the next season exciting, especially with some of the choices a couple characters make by the end, and it's just a well-produced, funny show that you can check out once in a while or watch every week. It makes you wonder why networks can't get this stuff right - so often you either get a serialized show that doesn't go anywhere or an episodic one with highly fluctuating levels of quality from one episode to the next, and Justified handles both aspects with ease. I guess it just comes down to the quality of the source material, the writing, and the casting - Justified is filled to the brim with talented character actors who just aren't famous enough to be on movie posters. It's not perfect, but it's as solid as shows with its somewhat modest aspirations can get.

Deadwood - Season 3

How about that Barack Obama? It's weird, while the country was making its final decision and getting ready to vote, I was watching Deadwood's third and final season, which featured a running side plot about the camp's elections for sheriff and mayor. They both culminated yesterday, as America elected their first black President in history and the votes were cast in Deadwood's last episode. Unfortunately, there won't be as much closure on the latter. There were plans to finish the series properly with two special movies, but they have yet to come to fruition and at this point probably never will, leaving an actual conclusion to the great show out of reach. Things weren't looking too good either, with the series' meanest villain yet sitting pretty at the expense of the rest of the town.

Overall, the third season was up to par with the first two as far as quality of production and writing. It was more of a departure plotwise, with the newly introduced characters playing a larger role than the new ones from the second season did. I wasn't a big fan of the thread involving a troupe of actors, but they provided a flowery change of pace from the usual hard-drinking rough-talking inhabitants of the place, and George Hearst was a pretty great antagonist most of the way. Race also played a bigger role, as a big dispute erupted over control of the stables. It's just unfortunate that things worked out the way they did, because while it was still good television, it doesn't really feel like it probably would if the creators knew it would be the last of Deadwood that people got to see. It didn't have the chance some other HBO shows got, but it's still one of the better ones.

Deadwood - Season 2

The second season of Deadwood continues the show admirably, keeping what makes it interesting while expanding the cast and preventing the story from getting stagnant. It begins a little crazier than the show ever was in its first run, with the arrival of Olyphant's family coinciding with a fight that turns into an all-out brawl leading to several characters in various states of recovery for quite a while. McShane in particular has a tough time, especially after another ailment hits even worse, which produced scenes with the most painful thing I've ever had to watch that didn't actually appear on screen. It's not that long though before he's back and as mean as ever.

There's plenty of drama to go around, with the arrival of new people whose business interests conflict with established personalities. Plenty of blood ends up getting spilt, but as it was before, those are momentary diversions from the show's real meat, the backroom deals and conversations laced with venom. It's impressive how they can make characters as slimy as EB Farnum likable just by making their choice of words so uniquely entertaining. The women get into it too, not as gruffly as or as vulgarly as the men, but in their own fun way. Deadwood doesn't have the family or social aspects that make it as relatable as HBO's other top shows, but it's still a good intellectual watch.

Deadwood - Season 1

Deadwood is similar to a few other great HBO shows. It has the deliberate pace and brilliant writing of The Wire, the period debauchery of Rome, and all of them owe something to The Sopranos' high watermark of quality and willingness to show anything. They're all the definition of entertainment for adults, and I wish other networks were able to match their high level of production. Deadwood is a somewhat historically based drama about a camp that springs up in the 1870's and eventually turns into a town in the Dakota Territory. It's pretty much the quintessential Western, with plenty of lawlessness and tough sons of bitches. The cast is great, especially with Ian McShane and Powers Boothe as two rival businessmen and Tim Olyphant, who looks kinda doofy as a bald guy but fits the role of a rough hardware man-turned sheriff quite well. McShane's really the star though. Everything bad in the town revolves around him, and he owns every scene he's in.

The show was created and a lot of it was written by David Milch, who's been in the game for a while. He knows what he's doing, and the dialogue is always entertaining and sometimes masterful. There was some stuff made of the anachronistic swearing, but I think it works as intended. We know they didn't use these words, but it achieves the effect of conveying the intended mood of a line and doesn't sound out of place, unless years of cowboys never cussing in movies has affected your thoughts on what they sound like. When doing something in the past, it's hard to keep it sounding authentic without it getting hokey and still managing to make it interesting to the modern ear, and the writers nail it. When you have a great cast and just seeing and hearing the characters speak is so intrinsically interesting, you don't have to do much more to have a good show. As I mentioned before, the show moves kind of slow, with episodes only covering about a day's worth of events. There's still enough backstabbing and shifting alliances to keep things moving, and you're always curious to see what's next. I know the series doesn't have a real ending, but unlike a lot of shows that rely on the carrot on a stick of seeing where it's all leading, the fun of Deadwood is just watching it.