Another great season of “The Last of Us” tops our roundup this week, as well as a series featuring another fantastic performance from Jon Hamm.
Here’s roundup.
“The Last of Us Season 2”: Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann concocted a magical formula for turning a massively popular, intricately plotted video game like Naughty Dog’s “The Last of Us” into a massively popular, intricately plotted series. The trick was both simple and yet nearly impossible to pull off since the creators needed to win over both fans of the video game as well as those who had never played it. How did they do this? They created compelling, distinctive characters and found the right actors to portray them (starting with Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey). Then they thrust these characters into dire, dystopian situations full of moving, intimate and ethically challenging dilemmas that arose in a pandemic caused by a massive fungal infection and populated by zombies clamoring for flesh and bone.
Somehow, they’ve done it again with this seven-episode follow-up Season 2 (after a long two-year wait) by replicating the magic of Season 1, even pulling off a real tearjerker — the 6th episode — that echoes the emotional heft of Season 1’s “Bill and Frank” segment. The Season 1 finale left us speculating if the feisty, Infected-immune Ellie (Ramsey) bought her surrogate dad Joel’s (Pascal) big lie. That remains one of the big question marks dominating this season, which takes place five years after the first season. The story moves to Seattle but spends its first episodes around the Old West-like Wisconsin settlement where Joel, Ellie, Joel’s brother Tommy (Gabriel Luna) and Tommy’s wife Maria (“True Blood’s” Rutina Wesley) live with others. The Infected are nearby, of course, and might not be all that stupid anymore.
The season also expands on just how chilly the relationship’s gotten between Ellie and Joel and it’s heartbreaking at times. It also introduces us to new characters, including the smart, direct and flirtatious Dina (Isabela Merced, a welcome addition to the cast), who thoroughly captivates Ellie; hard-drinking psychologist Gail (Catherine O’Hara, also most welcome); a vengeance-seeking Abby (“Apple Cider Vinegar’s” Kaitlyn Dever, who’s knocking one performance out of the park after another these days); and do-gooder Jesse (Young Mazino of “Beef,” upping the hunk factor here). There are others, including Jeffrey Wright’s intense turn as Isaac — a pivotal role he voiced in the game as well. How do the newbies figure in? Can’t tell you that, particularly if you’ve never played the game. Rest assured, your expectations will get met in Season 2. So just let it unfold naturally and savor how it stands out from the pack of dystopian fiction by so depicting how actions have moral consequences and have the power to change us forever. This season offers even a bigger cliffhanger than the last. Details: 3½ stars; first episode drops April 13, with one episode dropping every week afterward.
“Your Friends and Neighbors”: Few roles fit as snug as a Tom Ford suit on a male model than the one Jon Hamm wears in Apple TV+’s series. The “Mad Men” actor’s role in this rich-people-behaving-badly show plays to all his strengths. Hamm grouses. He struts. He caves and surrenders to having hot sex with someone he probably shouldn’t. And does he ever lament and put down the hollowness embedded inside of the rich, privileged and unhappy friends and neighbors that reside in an affluent country club community outside of New York where he lives. Creator Jonathan Tropper frames all this dissatisfaction from the glib and gone-soured perspective of Andrew “Coop” Cooper (Hamm) whose narration is one of the highlights along with an ingenious opening sequence of this intriguing series.
Coop is a true antihero, a cocky guy who’s gotten knocked down from his perch, first by losing his psychologist wife and mother of his two teen kids (Amanda Peet) to his best friend (Mark Tallman), an image-conscious ex-basketball star, and then after losing his lucrative hedge fund job. Desperate for some cash flow, he starts to rob his friends and neighbors who are so rich they don’t notice if a few of their Rolexes go missing. Tropper’s series carts out a cast of mostly wealthy neurotics — a jilted ex-wife (Olivia Munn) who’s in a love-hate hookup relationship with Coop and another friend (Hoon Lee) facing his own financial Waterloo. Tropper’s series does meander, but even if it’s not run as tightly as a ship as it could be, its original premise and its ability to make many of these characters interesting as they show flickers of humanity and then do something appalling keep you watching. The primary reason remains Hamm, so good at acting bothered in the face of gnarly situations that would make most of us have one panic attack after another. We’ll get to see how Coop manages to get out of the pickle he’s in since Apple TV+’s so jazzed about this one they’ve renewed it for a second season. Details: 3 stars; two episodes drop April 11 followed by one new episode weekly through May 30.
“Devil May Cry”: Ask video-game aficionados what their impressions are of Capcom’s demon-themed dystopian adventure and you’ll likely get an enthusiastic response. The gore-drenched game wherein the underworld crawls out into our world has amassed a devoted following. Does Netflix’s eight-episode animated take do justice to original creator Hideki Kamiya’s vision? Does it also toss out a welcome mat for first-time visitors? A qualified yes on both counts, since it’s based on the game, but is not a flat-out translation. Showrunner Adi Shankar (“Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix”) takes time and care with the multi-layered world building while pumping it all up with adrenaline, heavy-metal-esque action sequences. They razzle dazzle. My favorite parts come when Shankar dips into the pasts of its main characters, the half demon/half human Dante (Johnny Yong Bosch), a vengeance-bound demon hunter with issues that would keep Freud up at nights; Mary – aka Lady (Scout Taylor-Compton) — a righteous demon hunter working for an organization called Darkcom that’s in cahoots with the American vice president and the evil White Rabbit (Hoon Lee), a demonic force with one wretched backstory. “Devil May Cry” primes itself for another season, leaving us with a cliffhanger that promises to move the story into further exciting directions. Hop aboard. You’re in for a good time. Details: 3 stars; now available on Netflix.
“Sacramento”: Road trip dramedies tend to be cut from the same narrative cloth, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it makes for a bad show, just a more predictable and comforting experience. Director, co-screenwriter and co-star Michael Angarano’s rambling, mumblecore-esque buddy picture follows two Millennial sorta-pals (Angarano and Michael Cera) who are not adjusting well to upcoming responsibilities, including pending parenthood. Both Glenn (Cera) and Rickey (Angarano) have some arrested development kinks they both need to work through. They embark on an impromptu road trip — a rare occurrence for the overly uptight and antsy Glenn — to Sacramento. But the plan takes various detours and sends them to alternate destinations where secrets get shared and false pretenses get exposed. While the two boy-men do get annoying you can’t help but like them. Yet it’s the two female characters — Kristen Stewart, a radiant lighthouse here as Glenn’s very understanding — and aware pregnant wife, and Maya Erskine as one of Rickey’s ex’s that you would prefer to hang out with in the end. “Sacramento” is wafer-thin material, even if it’s well-played by its cast. Details: 2½ stars; in theaters April 11.
“The King of Kings”: In this faith-based animated retelling of the story of Jesus Christ (loosely based on Charles Dickens’ “The Life of Our Lord”), you keep expecting Jesus or a nearby donkey to break out into song and maybe bust a move or two. Doesn’t happen, and we’re forever grateful that’s not the tack taken in this seasonally appropriate family film that does a solid job of following along through the Christ story, from birth to crucifixion (handled well, and not in a Mel Gibson way) and onto resurrection. The mystifying element to the Angel Studios production is that it relates the biblical story by having author Dickens (voice of Kenneth Branagh) tell it to his precocious, trouble-prone young son Walter (Roman Griffin Davis). A more contemporary setting and narrator might have made it more relatable to the children seeing it today. One part that doesn’t work is putting Walter on the sidelines of events in Christ’s life. It’s a bit jarring and serves as a distraction. Otherwise, the animation is first-rate with the voice cast (Oscar Isaac, Pierce Brosnan, Ben Kingsley, Uma Thurman, Forest Whitaker, Mark Hamill) doing some fine work. While a few choices do seem a bit odd, “The King of Kings” does a facile job of offering a crash course on Christ for a younger generation. Details: 2½ stars; in theaters April 11.
Contact Randy Myers at soitsrandy@gmail.com.
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