HULU'S "11.22.63" BRINGS TIME TRAVEL TO A WHOLE NEW LEVEL!

🎥🎞️Mini-Series Review🎞️🎥 - 11.22.63 [2016] - HULU - Created by Stephen King & J. J. Abrams. Starring James Franco, Sarah Gadon, Daniel Webber, Chris Cooper, and George McKay. Directed by Kevin McDonald, Fred Toye, James Strong, James Franco, John David Coles, and James Kent.

This is a mini-series [8 episodes] based on a 2011 book by Stephen King under the same title. An English teacher named Jake Epping [played by James Franco], is friends with a diner owner named Al Templeton [Chris Cooper], who introduces him to a time portal hidden within the diner. The portal takes any traveler to the 1960s, where one can change events in history and reboot his mistakes by simply returning through the portal and entering back again. Jake is asked by his friend to enter the portal and do his best to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy  [JFK] on November 22, 1963; in order to prevent the assassination, Jake has to become close friends with Lee Harvey Oswald [played brilliantly by the talented Daniel Webber, who also portrayed Vince Neil in THE DIRT]. Jake's trip in time will equal minutes to years, so when he returns through the portal, no one will miss him while he's gone. The catch is, Jake has to live in the 1960's for over three years; find a job, make a life, and do his best to not interfere with events that could change other historical moments in time; as time has a way to make things hard for him to do so.

THE GOOD - The cinematography is simply breath taking and the layouts on the set locations are pristine to present the 1960s in their own unique style. Many of the locations used in Dallas, Texas are the real locations that exist today as a tourist attraction following the life of Oswald following the assassination of JFK. The props for the series are the best part; classic cars, wardrobe, and actual technology of the time. Episodes flow seamlessly from one scene to another, and the editing in each new episode is sharp, keeping the viewer in tune with the story and keeping the flow of the plots moving perfectly in order. There are some brilliant performances by the cast, and some very emotional "cultural diversity" moments that will leave some viewers stunned.

THE BAD - This series was under promoted and advertised, and I was shocked to only learn about this series after seeing a YouTube interview with Stephen King  over his love for the leading character; wanting to attempt writing a second season, however he just didn't have the heart to disrupt the perfect presentation of the current season, reflecting on the fact that many of his previous "book to movie" productions often fall short of their intended goal.

POST MORTEM - Totally binge-worthy, this is a great mini-series and I was floored with the amount of detail the producers provided to bring locations and performances together to make the series seem real. Even though Franco was on his top game bringing the character of Jake to life, I truly feel that it was Webber's stark portrayal of Oswald that brought a cold insight into the mind of politically confused man during the harsh and volatile atmosphere of the chaotic 1960s. In hindsight, I'm sure J. J. Abrams breathed a sigh of relief that this series closed with a solid ending; something that often eludes the plethora of movies he's associated with.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️[5 of 5 Stars]

"PREY" SETS A STANDARD FOR SCIFI STREAMING PLATFORMS

🎥 🎞 Movie Review 🎥 🎞  - PREY - Hulu - Rated R - No Soilers! Every once in a while a smaller movie production team releases a gem of a film that could of made for a full feature film to go world wide on the big screen, and this is one of them. PREY stars Amber Midthunder as Naru, a Comanche Native American woman who doesn't just want to be the standard female of a small tribe. She wants to be a hunter, a tracker, and also a healer; these positions in a tribe were mostly held by older, maturer males. Being a Native American myself, made it a little too hard  for me to swallow that the female lead was stronger and more intelligent than the males at first, but I let the movie play and this thing quickly started to burn in the right direction and at the right time. Case in point; if I can accept that in previous Hollywood films, a Caucasian woman killed two big ass aliens in two different films, another Caucasian woman destroyed a cyborg using a compactor, and another Caucasian woman killing a large St. Bernard infected with rabies, then a Native American woman can surely kill a Predator with a tomahawk!

Brilliantly directed by SciFi extraordinaire Dan Trachtenberg who also directed a Cloverfield spinoff and an episode of Black Mirror, he set off to make PREY a little bit more believable and give the Native Americans, who were considerably under armed and extremely vulnerable to an alien predators high tech weapons attacks, a very daring and brave bunch of warriors who faced their enemy without regard to their own safety and lives.

Rumor has surfaced that the Native American cast members of PREY were required to speak Comanche during their screening test, should the director had decided to film the entire production in the Native American tongue. The film presented the Comanche tribe in a pre-horse history, where the first French and anglo-saxon visitors entered their region of territory and introduced the natives to horseback riding, so English was not a native tongue in the region for many years, but I feel that the movie transitioned into the need for English very well.

The visual and special effects for the film were superb and sometimes a little too much for a few scenes. But there was fantastic detail presenting the Native American's, which I felt was pretty impressive and along the lines of the visual beauty not seen since Kevin Costner's Dances With Wolves was released. And I'd like to extend a few kudos to the designer of the Predator, as this was a prequel to the first film and they gave a clean restart to the alien hunter from that which was seen in the first and second Predator movies.

Make no mistake, this is a solid and horrifying look at the Predator series. I highly recommend you see this film without any interruption. One look off the movie to grab for your phone or a drink and you'll miss something important!

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️   [4 of 5 Stars]