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Syfylis's Alice
Review cut for length.
So, Alice. I went into it without many expectations (other than, y'know, Wonderland is wacky and insane and should be so in a knew version). I knew that Alice was apparently a black belt, and I'd heard there was something about a romance angle, but I was hopeful that the former and not the latter would be the focus. Too often, female characters are there to have a romance rather than just be their own self because writers don't think audiences can handle an independent woman on her own.
Tin Man didn't have a romance, it just had DG and Az and wacky adventures. And it worked.
Unfortunately for me, within minutes, Alice was all about her boyfriend (not to mention some really lame dialog, and her daddy having abandoned them some time prior. What a pity that wasn't just a footnote). Sure, when he whips out a ring, she's like, "omgno." And she kicks him out. I was pleased with that, to be honest. I was hopeful it meant that Alice could now go gallivanting off through Wonderland (wherever it was), and have Adventures.
And Alice did go rushing after Jack with the ring, and was smart enough to keep the ring. Unfortunately, that was about where her agency ended. From then on, she was merely a parcel passed from person to person, despite her constantly saying she needed to rescue Jack.
The padded room gave me hope, as I'd seen a shot from the previews. That hope was dashed fairly quickly, since it was just a form of transport and not some wacky "this woman is insane and locked up" plot (Yes, I have watched Return to Oz one too many times. Electro-shock therapy could have only improved this miniseries).
Though, I will admit, Alice escaping all on her own was nice, even if I'm not sure any hair-pin is going to be that strong. (pulling the latch over, with her weight pressing down on it seems a little... difficult).
I liked the tea house. I liked that this city is so very gray. But what didn't really work for me was the emptiness. There's no sense that there are any people in Wonderland--Hatter talks of there being lots, and there must be many who get a thrill from the casino, but we never see them. The few crowds there are tend to be either suits/cards or the people in the tea shop or the crowd of 'oysters' in the casino. There's no common-people, and there's no sense that they even exist.
The city is silent. Do they all live underground? Are they all holed up in the library with a badly-mis-cast Tim Curry? (seriously, you have Tim Curry, and you don't make him the Cheshire Cat? What is WRONG with you people?)
And there's the empty countryside, too. No farms, no homesteads, nothing for miles other than one lone white knight.
Is the real tragedy of Wonderland that there are so few people left? We will never know, nor will we ever know where the Red Queen's armies are, the ones who took out the knights and destroyed the old order. Because the plot was more interested in less fun things, like a love triangle and pointless Daddy Angst.
And what about that great city, eh? The chess pieces which are slowly falling into ruin that had absolutely nothing to do with the plot? Might as well've just had it some ramshackle, uninteresting buildings, for all the good they did.
Speaking of the old order, however, good job on that, show. Men ruling = AWESOME. Women ruling = despotic, hysterical tyrants. Is this meta on the old adage of "if women ruled the world..."?
The mini glosses over the idea of free will and trafficking in human emotions, and never really asks the questions that Hatter and the resistance raise: namely, "why does anyone think the system is wrong?" Hatter's a slimy opportunist, the resistance seem to be useless peaceniks who are only in it to be 'rebellious' and possibly fashionable--and, in the end, to put a man on the throne, rather than changing a worthless system of government.
Women in the show seem to be there to be damsels, pawns, or a queen who must be constantly cosseted (and is obviously not very useful or good at her job). The queen isn't even crazy and insane, the way she should be (she does lop a few heads off, but, really, where's the weirdness?????)
Alice, who is a black belt appears almost ineffectual. Every time there's danger, she stands behind a man. It got grating and annoying very quickly. Even worse, one of the early moments where she fights, she doesn't even get to knock the guy out--the manly KNIGHT does it. And then there's her torture. Sure, she doesn't die, and her escape is pretty flashy--but Hatter didn't need anyone's help to escape.
The sad thing is that they could have made her a perfectly normal girl who knew 'some' karate moves, and it would have been fine. But it's like they had a checklist of "what makes a strong female character" and went all out without bothering to make the narrative (or the actress) fit their ideal.
On top of which, she spends the whole thing in a really ugly blue dress, with perfect hair that's never tangled. I guess the knight had a nice salon in his derelict city, complete with shampoo and brushes. (she started out in jeans, with her hair in a pony tail. Far more useful and practical)
Alice spends a large amount of time going "I don't know what's going on, tell me what to do, we have to save Jack!" which segues into "I don't know what's going on, tell me what to do, MY DADDY LEFT ME O WOE IS ME. I can't decide between Hatter or Jack."
I wonder a bit if they couldn't decide what to put the queen in. Unfortunately, shapeless muumuus aren't flattering or helpful in conveying grandeur. They would have been better off sticking with something Elizabethan, with a massive collar and lots of skirts. Her hair was generally lovely, though.
Speaking of hair, how about Duchess, who didn't even rate a name outside her rank? Her hair was pretty damned awesome, even if that first costume was ridiculously pointless. She was another character who reacted as the plot dictated rather than being her own person. Sure. She looooves Jack. Though what there is of him to love, I don't know.
Jack. Boring, flat, stereotypical 'prince' even before the Big Reveal. I find it hard to like a guy who basically was a creepy stalker and lied about shit to get some chick to go away with him.
Hatter. Stole all the best lines, quite obviously. Smarmy git with a ridiculously stupid accent. Looked boring by the end, sadly.
Charlie. Highly entertaining. Then again, it was Matt Frewer chewing the scenery, so I wasn't surprised. Sort of reminded me a bit of John Quixote. Yes. The Farscape episode. also, I missed the entire conversation between him and Alice about how he was a fake the first time through. Oops. I thought it was going to be about her Daddy Left Me, WAH issues.
Colm Meaney. Also eating the scenery like it was going out of style. But still mostly amusing. I was a bit surprised that apparently he did the whole casino and everything just for his wife. Oh, devotion. =D
Daddy dearest. LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMmme. Boring. Trite. A waste of time. The best thing was him getting shot. The red blood on all that black and white was so esthetically striking.
Mad March. FRICKING HILARIOUS. I want that stupid cookie dish, too. If there'd been more of this kind of insanity in the show... sigh.
AND THE CLUBS. Oh, Alessandro, NEVER STOP BEING AWESOME. He was so adorable in that outfit. Also, I want one of those hats!
The sad thing is, I wanted something ridiculous, weird, enchanting and above all, about Alice. What I got was a Lifetime movie of the week with very little emphasis on Alice outside of her being a Damsel who wasn't too bright. I'm fairly certain the Disney movie is more empowering not to mention more fun.
One other plot-thing that really didn't work for me: Charlie's skeleton army did not move. I don't care how stupid her staff is, those suit dudes should have been like "wtf, there is no army, you crazy woman." otoh, it would have been AWESOME, if Charlie really had brought them to life.
On a final note, Wonderland is also very pale. Towards the end, I get the impression someone on staff went, "Fuck, all the black people will whine, let's get some black extras in!" so there's a little more variety of color in the last crowd scenes. Not very helpful, really. It just made it all the more obvious earlier on.
ALSO. I forgot that Wanda from Corner Gas was in it as the Doormouse. She was fricking hilarious.
Quick list of what I did like:
1. JANET. She has the best O.O expressions EVER.
2. I loved the casino set. There was a very definite Farscape feel to the design, though it did get boring after a while.
3. Alice/Hatter. I've always had a thing for people who do the adventuring together, even it was flawed. also, he kills people.
4. The mob scene in the casino, with Alice shooting the place up. I'm only disappointed she didn't kill someone. That would have caused some awful feelings, right there.
5. Alice having her own plan and giving herself up to find the Casino (how can someone miss it, one wonders)
6. The ruined city, despite it just being so much set dressing.
7. ...um. Kathy Bates was pretty awesome.
8. Alice/Duchess. C'mon, you know there's hatesex in their future. Or possibly not-so-hatesex.
9. Alessandor Juliani and HIS HAT. <3 <3 <3 <3
So, Alice. I went into it without many expectations (other than, y'know, Wonderland is wacky and insane and should be so in a knew version). I knew that Alice was apparently a black belt, and I'd heard there was something about a romance angle, but I was hopeful that the former and not the latter would be the focus. Too often, female characters are there to have a romance rather than just be their own self because writers don't think audiences can handle an independent woman on her own.
Tin Man didn't have a romance, it just had DG and Az and wacky adventures. And it worked.
Unfortunately for me, within minutes, Alice was all about her boyfriend (not to mention some really lame dialog, and her daddy having abandoned them some time prior. What a pity that wasn't just a footnote). Sure, when he whips out a ring, she's like, "omgno." And she kicks him out. I was pleased with that, to be honest. I was hopeful it meant that Alice could now go gallivanting off through Wonderland (wherever it was), and have Adventures.
And Alice did go rushing after Jack with the ring, and was smart enough to keep the ring. Unfortunately, that was about where her agency ended. From then on, she was merely a parcel passed from person to person, despite her constantly saying she needed to rescue Jack.
The padded room gave me hope, as I'd seen a shot from the previews. That hope was dashed fairly quickly, since it was just a form of transport and not some wacky "this woman is insane and locked up" plot (Yes, I have watched Return to Oz one too many times. Electro-shock therapy could have only improved this miniseries).
Though, I will admit, Alice escaping all on her own was nice, even if I'm not sure any hair-pin is going to be that strong. (pulling the latch over, with her weight pressing down on it seems a little... difficult).
I liked the tea house. I liked that this city is so very gray. But what didn't really work for me was the emptiness. There's no sense that there are any people in Wonderland--Hatter talks of there being lots, and there must be many who get a thrill from the casino, but we never see them. The few crowds there are tend to be either suits/cards or the people in the tea shop or the crowd of 'oysters' in the casino. There's no common-people, and there's no sense that they even exist.
The city is silent. Do they all live underground? Are they all holed up in the library with a badly-mis-cast Tim Curry? (seriously, you have Tim Curry, and you don't make him the Cheshire Cat? What is WRONG with you people?)
And there's the empty countryside, too. No farms, no homesteads, nothing for miles other than one lone white knight.
Is the real tragedy of Wonderland that there are so few people left? We will never know, nor will we ever know where the Red Queen's armies are, the ones who took out the knights and destroyed the old order. Because the plot was more interested in less fun things, like a love triangle and pointless Daddy Angst.
And what about that great city, eh? The chess pieces which are slowly falling into ruin that had absolutely nothing to do with the plot? Might as well've just had it some ramshackle, uninteresting buildings, for all the good they did.
Speaking of the old order, however, good job on that, show. Men ruling = AWESOME. Women ruling = despotic, hysterical tyrants. Is this meta on the old adage of "if women ruled the world..."?
The mini glosses over the idea of free will and trafficking in human emotions, and never really asks the questions that Hatter and the resistance raise: namely, "why does anyone think the system is wrong?" Hatter's a slimy opportunist, the resistance seem to be useless peaceniks who are only in it to be 'rebellious' and possibly fashionable--and, in the end, to put a man on the throne, rather than changing a worthless system of government.
Women in the show seem to be there to be damsels, pawns, or a queen who must be constantly cosseted (and is obviously not very useful or good at her job). The queen isn't even crazy and insane, the way she should be (she does lop a few heads off, but, really, where's the weirdness?????)
Alice, who is a black belt appears almost ineffectual. Every time there's danger, she stands behind a man. It got grating and annoying very quickly. Even worse, one of the early moments where she fights, she doesn't even get to knock the guy out--the manly KNIGHT does it. And then there's her torture. Sure, she doesn't die, and her escape is pretty flashy--but Hatter didn't need anyone's help to escape.
The sad thing is that they could have made her a perfectly normal girl who knew 'some' karate moves, and it would have been fine. But it's like they had a checklist of "what makes a strong female character" and went all out without bothering to make the narrative (or the actress) fit their ideal.
On top of which, she spends the whole thing in a really ugly blue dress, with perfect hair that's never tangled. I guess the knight had a nice salon in his derelict city, complete with shampoo and brushes. (she started out in jeans, with her hair in a pony tail. Far more useful and practical)
Alice spends a large amount of time going "I don't know what's going on, tell me what to do, we have to save Jack!" which segues into "I don't know what's going on, tell me what to do, MY DADDY LEFT ME O WOE IS ME. I can't decide between Hatter or Jack."
I wonder a bit if they couldn't decide what to put the queen in. Unfortunately, shapeless muumuus aren't flattering or helpful in conveying grandeur. They would have been better off sticking with something Elizabethan, with a massive collar and lots of skirts. Her hair was generally lovely, though.
Speaking of hair, how about Duchess, who didn't even rate a name outside her rank? Her hair was pretty damned awesome, even if that first costume was ridiculously pointless. She was another character who reacted as the plot dictated rather than being her own person. Sure. She looooves Jack. Though what there is of him to love, I don't know.
Jack. Boring, flat, stereotypical 'prince' even before the Big Reveal. I find it hard to like a guy who basically was a creepy stalker and lied about shit to get some chick to go away with him.
Hatter. Stole all the best lines, quite obviously. Smarmy git with a ridiculously stupid accent. Looked boring by the end, sadly.
Charlie. Highly entertaining. Then again, it was Matt Frewer chewing the scenery, so I wasn't surprised. Sort of reminded me a bit of John Quixote. Yes. The Farscape episode. also, I missed the entire conversation between him and Alice about how he was a fake the first time through. Oops. I thought it was going to be about her Daddy Left Me, WAH issues.
Colm Meaney. Also eating the scenery like it was going out of style. But still mostly amusing. I was a bit surprised that apparently he did the whole casino and everything just for his wife. Oh, devotion. =D
Daddy dearest. LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMmme. Boring. Trite. A waste of time. The best thing was him getting shot. The red blood on all that black and white was so esthetically striking.
Mad March. FRICKING HILARIOUS. I want that stupid cookie dish, too. If there'd been more of this kind of insanity in the show... sigh.
AND THE CLUBS. Oh, Alessandro, NEVER STOP BEING AWESOME. He was so adorable in that outfit. Also, I want one of those hats!
The sad thing is, I wanted something ridiculous, weird, enchanting and above all, about Alice. What I got was a Lifetime movie of the week with very little emphasis on Alice outside of her being a Damsel who wasn't too bright. I'm fairly certain the Disney movie is more empowering not to mention more fun.
One other plot-thing that really didn't work for me: Charlie's skeleton army did not move. I don't care how stupid her staff is, those suit dudes should have been like "wtf, there is no army, you crazy woman." otoh, it would have been AWESOME, if Charlie really had brought them to life.
On a final note, Wonderland is also very pale. Towards the end, I get the impression someone on staff went, "Fuck, all the black people will whine, let's get some black extras in!" so there's a little more variety of color in the last crowd scenes. Not very helpful, really. It just made it all the more obvious earlier on.
ALSO. I forgot that Wanda from Corner Gas was in it as the Doormouse. She was fricking hilarious.
Quick list of what I did like:
1. JANET. She has the best O.O expressions EVER.
2. I loved the casino set. There was a very definite Farscape feel to the design, though it did get boring after a while.
3. Alice/Hatter. I've always had a thing for people who do the adventuring together, even it was flawed. also, he kills people.
4. The mob scene in the casino, with Alice shooting the place up. I'm only disappointed she didn't kill someone. That would have caused some awful feelings, right there.
5. Alice having her own plan and giving herself up to find the Casino (how can someone miss it, one wonders)
6. The ruined city, despite it just being so much set dressing.
7. ...um. Kathy Bates was pretty awesome.
8. Alice/Duchess. C'mon, you know there's hatesex in their future. Or possibly not-so-hatesex.
9. Alessandor Juliani and HIS HAT. <3 <3 <3 <3