Author: Robert Greenberger

Interestingly, Fox licensed DC Comics’ interpretation of Lucifer, made remarkable first in the Sandman series and then in his own six year eponymous ongoing series. The First of the Fallen, he has abandoned his role as ruler of Hell and has come to Earth to run a piano bar, which is where the ongoing series opened. The series explored the themes of free will and individual willpower while challenging the “tyranny of predestination”. Under writer Mike Carey, it was a moody and fascinating study of humanity.

The network series, which debuted as a midseason replacement in spring 2016, ignored all of the trappings and set him up as a police consultant who saw a shrink, and was annoyed by his brother. Somehow, it clicked with audiences and came back for a full eighteen episode run. Now, Warner Home Entertainment has released Lucifer: The Complete Second Season in separate Blu-ray and DVD packages.

Much of the show’s success rests on Tom Ellis’ winning performance as Lucifer Morningstar. Largely unknown in America, Ellis is a huge British star thanks to his run on the famous EastEnders prime time soap. He clearly delights in playing the devil and enlivens his scenes going from good fellow to very dangerous within a blink.

He has found himself working with LAPD Detective Chloe Decker (Lauren German), who suspects something is off about this annoying man but is stuck with him. And much as Castle and Beckett fell in love, this season brings the two together. German’s slow acceptance of this is strong and as she discussed in the special features, they complement one another, each learning something new about themselves in the process. The season is bookended with Lucifer’s attempts to reveal his true nature to her without success/

Complicating the new season is the arrival of Lucifer’s mother, who has escaped from her hellish prison. She is feared and discussed for most of the season opener before we finally meet her and she is, ahem, hot in the form of Tricia Helfer. “Mom” has come to Earth and is inhabiting the body of the recently deceased lawyer Charlotte.  Like her son, she too fell from Grace and she is hunting him down, considering her son a traitor in need of a lesson. Of course, he has a flaming sword so there’s that.

Also arriving this season is forensic scientist Ella Lopez (Aimee Garcia), who is brilliant, quirky, and works without a filter, making her highly amusing.

As with similar shows, the case of the week tends to be less interesting than the character arcs, especially Lucifer as he deepens his relationship with Chloe and continues to receive arch advice from Dr. Linda (Rachel Harris), who seems either delighted or nonplussed to be counseling angels and demons. That is, with the exception of Charlotte who threatens her for information.

Among her clients is Mazekeen (Lesley-Ann Brandt), seeking a purpose now that she is stuck on Earth. She becomes a bounty hunter, not letting her friendship with Lucifer interfere with her charging him for her services when asked to track Amenadiel (D. B. Woodside) and Charlotte. Ah, brother Amenadiel. He still doesn’t grok humanity. He loves Lucifer and feels obligated to clean up after him, starting with telling Chloe that he’s nuts, to protect his true nature. Over the season, he loves his wings and power and feels punished and directionless on Earth. Complicating matters is the revelation that he was God’s favorite and what that means. Chloe thinks that means God’s a manipulative, bad parent, which is refreshing.

Charlotte, though, is a wild card all season, increasingly a threat to the fragile status quo which builds to a nice season conclusion, setting up the third season. Interestingly, the final four episodes from this season were created but held off until this fall.

The show is engaging and lightweight fun, one of a type. It could have been something really interesting; atmospheric, gothic and edgy and far more distinctive. As a result, this is perfectly fine, eminently disposal fare.

The DVD set comes with all the episodes complete with deleted scenes, some of which are quite good and worth a look, notably some scenes with D. B. Woodside. There are additional special features including Lucifer: 2016 Comic-Con Panel, the requisite Gag Reel, and Reinventing Lucifer in the City of Angels, where the cast and producers talk about how LA is the perfect setting for a fallen angel, and the rest of humanity, to come and start afresh.

Originally, Archie Andrews and his pals at Riverdale High reflected the codification of teenage life, as they had more leisure time and disposable income. Once it hit big, the comic series and its infinite number of spinoffs, became stuck in amber, barely trying to keep up with changing trends (other than fashion) or concerns for teens. By the 2000s, the entire company was on the ropes, increasingly irrelevant in a rapidly changing world.

In comics, they threw a Hail Mary, revamping the writing and art, making the characters look and act in contemporary ways. Thanks to Mark Waid, Adam Hughes, Chip Zdarsky, and a few others, the characters were suddenly cool once more. The company’s product mix suddenly had the classic digest reprints, the new look, some Zombie title and they were saved.

During all this, Greg Berlanti brought his magic touch, bringing the comic to the CW, working with Archie’s Chief Creative Officer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, to reimagine the gals and pals. What we got was the thirteen episode Riverdale series which twisted the classic figures beyond recognition as they largely avoided the real issues teens confront today in favor of the tried-and-true murder mystery arc.

I’ve taught sophomores so I can say with some assurance the 10^th graders on the show do not look, speak, or act like the ones in my classroom. They are worried about grades, college, money, sports, social media, video games, and each other. On this show, the students apparently never have homework or test pressure nor did the looming PSATs cause a single one to break a sweat. The thread about the jocks’ notebook keeping score on the girls was good but its consequences never were seen.

Also, the casting brings a new bevy of attractive men and women to the network, asking them to play teenagers and, like Smallville, it doesn’t work. KJ Apa is way too old to plausibly play a 15 year old. Most of his peers look younger and are (mostly) more believable.

It also must be a network rule that no one on the series can be older than 50 so you have an overly youthful faculty and administration – no variety and no wisdom to be shared. That, apparently, has to come from the parents and they’re a sorry, messy lot. Most grew up in Riverdale so the rivalries and unrequited loves remain simmering beneath the surface but with the exception of Fred Andrews (Luke Perry), not appear good at parenting.

Tonally, the series is flat without vibrant doses of teenage humor mixed in with the angst of puberty as they grow into their adult selves. Archie is the everyman, kind hearted and good-natured, but a royal klutz that you can’t help but adore. At least he’s like that in print.  Here, he’s a buff athlete with the heart of a songwriter, who eagerly engages in an affair with Miss Grundy (Sarah Habel), who, of course, was not really Miss Grundy.

Spoiled rich girl Veronica (Camila Mendes) arrives in Riverdale, our focal point to learn about her new home, but she’s out to reinvent herself as a better person. Thankfully, her steel hasn’t melted entirely as she comes to the aid of her new friends time and again. Along the way, she has bonded with Betty Cooper (Lili Reinhart), the girl next door. However, she’s on Adderall and under pressure to be perfect, being strangled by her over-protective mother (Mädchen Amick), who is petrified of losing her as she has lost her oldest girl, Polly (Tiera Skovbye), now in a “facility”.

Polly, it seems, had a romance with the now-dead Jason Blossom (Trevor Stines), something that shattered her, or so we’re told through most of the season. Who kiiled Jason? The investigation, which could have been used to shed a light on the underside of the town, is an intermittent thread with way too many other soap elements added. About the one person who seems aware of it all is Jughead Jones (Cole Sprouse), who has gone from hamburger munching slacker to budding novelist and professional cynic. Often it is Jughead who carries the meandering plots from one set of characters to another, leading Betty and then the gang on the investigation.

The final two episodes wrap up the murder of poor, creepy Jason and shift to new threads, setting up the second season and then, because Berlanti can’t seem to help himself, ends on a cliffhanger with poor Fred shot.

It is not remotely similar to the comics – new or old – and seems designed to let Berlanti retread his first hits with Dawson’s Creek and Everwood. Now, those themes and issues from these shows are frozen in time, robbing Riverdale from being a successful adaptation of the comic or an updated look at today’s teens.

The three-disc set includes all thirteen episodes and most come with a handful of deleted scenes, some of which are missed from making the characters more interesting. There are a number of special features including the Riverdale: 2016 Comic-Con Panel; Riverdale: The New Normal, a chance for the producers to justify their choices; Riverdale: The Ultimate Sin, “I Got You” and “These Are Moments I Remember” musical videos; and a Gag Reel.

While fully aware of Japan’s Ghost in the Shell and its impact as a Manga and Anime, I never experienced any version of it. As a result, I watched the recent live-action film version without preconceived notions. I knew all about the casting controversy but until there’s an actress of Japanese descent who can open a movie wide, casting decisions, such as this, will continue. So get over it.

Masamune Shirow created an interesting meditation on where humanity is going as he, like Ray Kurzweil, foresees the day when man and machine blend into a singular being. It won’t be overnight, nor will it be neat and easy. As a result, the question of what does it mean to be human permeates the film as written by Jamie Moss, William Wheeler, and Ehren Kruger and directed by Rupert Sanders.

The story centers on Major (Scarlett Johansson), an accident victim who awakes to find her brain has been wired to an android body. She now serves Section 9, a counter-terrorism operation, currently tasked with hunting down the killer known only as Kuze (Michael Carmen Pitt). Along the way, she is seeing images making her question not only her humanity but her memories. While searching for the killer, she searches for her own identity.

This is a brilliantly designed and realized world so I wish we were more fully immersed in it rather than seeing it as colorful window dressing. The Section 9 agents operate in and around an urban society but we have no real feel for how this world works nor how the general populace feels about these cyborgs and androids living among them. What is real and what is acceptable? We’re given merely hints.

Instead, sadly, we have running, jumping, fighting, and way too much shooting. Additionally, Sanders has everyone underplay their parts, muting the emotions and robbing the characters of range. The movie is drab and dull, perfunctory, wasting the grand themes raised and world built in favor of the same old.

Johansson has certainly proved herself capable of both acting and action thanks to her Marvel work and Lucy so she shines here. While everyone else is robbed of color, she shimmers as she comes to realize she was the first successful ghost placed in a machine, but far from the first. Her confrontations with her designer, Dr. Ouelet should have crackled but are instead downplayed. Juliette Binoche, in a change of role, brings warmth and humanity to the character but doesn’t get to do enough with it.

Similarly, the Section 9 team is made up of an interesting variety of international actors but other than Pilou Asbæk as her partner Batou, none of them are seen enough for the audience to care.

By the time the Major gets answers, Kuze’s predictable rationale is revealed, and things are settled, we’re long passed caring, preferring a nap or the source material.

Ghost in the Shell comes in a variety of formats including the standard Combo Pack of Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital HD code. The film’s high definition transfer to Blu-ray is stunning, capturing the colors and shadows perfectly for home viewing. The Dolby Atmos soundtrack is a solid match for the visuals.

There are just three interesting Special Features: Hard-Wired Humanity: Making Ghost in the Shell, a multi-part Making Of feature that properly credits the set designers and WETA’s visual effects team for bringing the original to life. We look at the under-utilized Section 9: Cyber Defenders and then you finish with the Man & Machine: The Ghost Philosophy that talks a more interesting game than the film manages to deliver.

Cleopatra in Space Book Four: The Golden Lion
By Mike Maihack
Scholastic Graphix, 204 pages, $22.99

Mike Maihack has been receiving glowing notices with every release in his Cleopatra in Space series of graphic novels from Graphix. When the first was released in 2014, I was highly critical of it since it had no bearing on the historic Cleopatra. I found the second outing better but still not as great as others thought.

For some reason, the third book, Secret of the Time Tablets came out last year and we missed it. As a result, I approached book four, The Golden Lion with some trepidation. Graphix has a bad habit of releasing subsequent volumes in a series without a recap and given the year between releases, this is unforgivable.

We open some time after the events in book three and clearly, things went badly since Cleopatra did something she shouldn’t have and this time her classmate Zaid died as a result. One would think she would be learning her lesson but instead, we see her training hard, punishing herself for whatever went sideways. However, the moment she is summoned, and told of the fabled Golden Lion being located, she foolishly heads to an alien world ill-prepared and alone meaning she has learned nothing.

This makes her less likable and undermines the light tone and fast pace of this book. Maihack is a talented artist who can move thins along nicely although there are entire sequences that are bloated so when we need to open up others, such as some of her later confrontations with a bounty hunter, everything is crammed and hard to figure out what’s going on. Some art direction would have helped immensely.

The Golden Lion is a shooting star with a long tail that is part legend and part of another prophecy that seems to involve Cleopatra, who is clearly not the Egyptian queen-to-be, but instead some other person. Anyway, evidence now points to a moon orbiting a world Cada’Duun. Since this star is considered a source of immeasurable energy, getting to control it before evil forces get to it becomes a priority.

But Cleopatra races ahead of everyone, landing on the frigid world completely unprepared for the cold and how it saps the life from her equipment. Thankfully, before she can freeze to death, her frequent companion Antony turns up, there for secret reasons of his own. Together they discover the underground (and warm) civilization that apparently speaks in algebraic equations. Antony can speak it while Cleopatra can only cuddle with her new pet, a snow otter named Mihos.

Of course a new agent, Ophois, has been dispatched to get the Golden Lion first and a confrontation with our plucky (and empty-headed) heroine is coming. There are agendas, schemes, and plans whirling in the background of this series. We’re four books in and clearly it’ll be four more before anything gets resolved. As a result, this is more an episode than a graphic novel and for the price, it should be far more self-contained. But Maihack isn’t entirely to blame for this since Graphix does this with most of their series which is a disservice to their young, enthusiastic readership.

Nnewts: The battle for Amphibopolis
By Doug TenNapel
215 pages, Scholastic Graphix, $19.99/$9.99

Doug TenNapel concludes his most ambitious work yet, the fanciful, energetic world of the Nnewts in this final volume, As with every other series from Scholastic’s Graphix imprint, it provides no synopsis so one hopes readers can keep track of the sprawling story with volumes coming a year apart.

And that’s the biggest concern with this book aimed at 8-12 year olds: it is so large and complex a tale, with so many characters, and a complicated mythology and internal logic that on the surface it’s a confusing mess of kinetic energy.

As introduced in Escape of the Lizzarks, we are introduced to the residents of Nnewtown and its wide assortment of characters. They are being threatened and it falls to young Herk to embark on a journey to save everyone.  The Rise of Herk raised the stakes as the Snake Lord is back and is the Big Bad.

Now, the players are in position for the finale as we find Herk slowly turning into a Lizzark and abandoning his Nnewt friends. His siblings, Sissy and Zerk, have also been corrupted by evil and the Lizzark army is still threatening Amphibopolis with total destruction. Along with the action, we get Orion, the god of creation, arriving and dealing with the jealous Anthigar, the Snake Lord. Things grow in scale and get very cosmic and metaphysical before the dust clears and peace is, of course, restored to the people.

Peel away the slapstick, the running, jumping, mythmaking, and other noise, and this is a story about family. Herk was separated from his family at the outset and here, he cannot complete his quest without the help of his siblings. He makes a huge sacrifice but it’s a knowing one, with appropriate consequences as a result. Launa, robbed of mobility and confined to wheelchair, also is an excellent role model for readers as she does not let her handicap define or restrict her so her arc is a satisfying one.

TenNapel has a good handle on page design and pacing, ably assisted by Katherine Garner’s superb colors. His dialogue is also age appropriate with enough silly stuff to amuse the younger end of his readership while introducing strong themes for all. If anything, I wish his frenetic storytelling would slow down a bit for more character but he has a winning formula so who am I to complain.

If you’ve enjoyed any of his other work, this is sure to satisfy.

Fun
By Paolo Bacilieri
SelfMadeHero/Abrams, 296 pages, $24.95

Life is never perfectly sequential, with one event cleanly leading to another. There are interruptions, asides, flashbacks, diversions, and the like. In some ways, it is not dissimilar to the crossword with its black spots, horizontal and vertical intersections, and clues that are either easy or confoundingly complex.

Turned into a graphic novel, it would resemble something close to Paolo Bacilieri’s Fun. The work is his American debut although the 52-year old creator from Milan has a large European following. This ambitious work is an interesting but flawed volume for all the reasons above.

Ostensibly about Professor Pippo Quester, an Italian celebrity novelist, and his work-in-progress, a history of the crossword puzzle, it is about so much more. The linear and most “American” aspects of the work are all the sections about Quester and his meticulous tracing of the crossword, introduced in the New York World, in 1913 and how it quickly spread around the globe by World War II. Along the way, we get snapshots of the key creators of the daily puzzles from its inventor, Arthur Wynne, through the Italian Giorgio Sisini.

When Quester seeks someone to do additional research, he turns to his former colleague, Zeno Porno, a Disney comics writer. Apparently Zeno is a recurring player in Bacilieri’s work and is seen as the artist’s alter ego. Either way, he seems a sad, almost pathetic figure, who is also never seen actually working. It is through Zeno we get many tangential anecdotes and stories that spin off from the book’s axis. One such digression focuses on Spider-Man foe Hammerhead (properly crediting it to Gerry Conway and John Romita) and leaves you (and Quester) confused. Some of these are done in color while the remainder of the book is in black and white—make of that what you will.

Things turn tragic, though, when young Mafalda Citicillo stalks the pair and shoots them. As Quester recovers, Zeno tracks her down once she’s out of prison to ask the big question: why? Her response sends him close-reading one of Quester’s previous novels in search of answers that do not come easily. In fact, once the reader is told the answer, it is almost immediately undermined leaving readers to wonder where the truth lay.

Originally published as two volumes – Fun and More Fun – they are presented to American readers on one thick volume which makes for a more satisfying experience. Bacilieri worked on this between 2009 and 2014 based on his occasional signature and the artwork itself is exquisite, detailed illustrations that bring different eras and locales to life. His pages are filled with things to look at and while I can quibble with some of the word balloon placement, the page design and storytelling is varied and never dull.

We’re more accustomed to stories with a clear beginning, middle, and ending so some of the narrative ambiguity undercuts the novel’s strength but there is still plenty to like here. I suspect the core story, on its own, would not have been anywhere near as interesting.

I fondly recall the purity of Lego, refusing to license media properties, preferring to keep their toys pristine and unique. Eventually, the opportunity for expanding their line was too tempting and they introduce first one, then another, and now a flood of media properties to their toys allowing you build everything from the Batcave to the Black Pearl. It was only a matter of time before they migrated from the playroom to the computer screen in a series of games that morphed into direct-to-DVD features. And now we have a whole subset of children’s films featuring the Lego version of popular heroes and villains.

One reason this explosion has been sustained is that the producers and writers have been freed to go wild, tongues firmly in cheeks, offering kinetic mayhem for the younger viewers and tons of pop culture references for the parents forced to endure repeated viewings. No doubt inspired by the Zucker Brothers’ Airplane!, these films apparently are a delight.

I wouldn’t know because until recently, I have never really paid attention to one. When The Lego Batman Movie landed on my doorstep, I was intrigued because the 2017 release was a well-reviewed, box office success. Parents of the tiny tot brigade told me it was really fun so I indulged.

I watched and was largely entertained in this film from writers Seth Grahame-Smith, Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Jared Stern and John Whittington, and director Chris McKay. The main reason is that it focused on the less desirable parts of Batman’s persona amped up in a way to make it appear truly unpleasant. We open with Batman (Will Arnett) single-handedly saving Gotham City (again) from a mob go costumed criminals led by the Joker (Zach Galifianakis). Once the adulation fades away, he returns to Wayne Manor on Wayne Island (where’d that come from?) alone. After eating by himself, he watches Jerry Maguire, one of a ton of relationship films he uses to mask his pain.  His isolation from friends, family, and foes is magnified here, even refusing to acknowledge having any connection with his polar opposite, the Clown Prince of Crime, telling him, “I don’t ‘ship.”

Alone and lonely, he finds himself pushed and shoved into interacting with others by Alfred (Ralph Finnes) at Commissioner Gordon’s retirement party, where daughter Barbara (Rosario Dawson) is introduced as the new police chief. Bruce is so smitten with her that he absently agrees to adopt an orphan, Dick Grayson (Michael Cera).

Meanwhile, the Joker apparently wanted to be imprisoned as part of his latest mad scheme to destroy Gotham and make Batman notice him. For reason that don’t really make a lot of sense, Batman decides the Joker and his ilk, need to go to the Phantom Zone and he brings along his youthful ward, now dressed as Robin despite a lack of training. There, he sees the JLA (complete with the Kenner-only heroes) having a party without him, cementing the sense of isolation.

The Joker goes to the Zone where he recruits Voldemort, the Eye of Sauron, the Daleks, King Kong, the Gremlins, a faux-Godzilla, and others to help him wreck Earth. He does, Batman pays a price for his distance, recognizes he can’t possibly do his job alone and grudgingly comes to accept he needs allies; more he needs family. Alfred is hilariously attired in the Batman outfit from the 1960s and Babs debuts as Batgirl for the climactic battle.

The themes owe tons to the comics but the continuity is an illogical thing unto itself, undermining the connections to the source material and possibly creating a confusing entry point for future comics readers. Name a Batmobile, and you will see it somewhere in this film. Heck, even the reviled Bat-Shark Repellent becomes a plot device. I laughed out loud at the secret password to enter the Batcave and the Fortress of Solitude’s door chime.

For the adults and comic aficionados, though, the film is chockablock full of references, both verbal and visual, to tons of comic lore including references to every film, cartoon, and comic incarnation of the Dark Knight.

There are so many villains, gadgets, vehicles, and the like that it can be a bit overwhelming, no doubt demanding repeated watching just to identify everyone and everything. As a result, a topnotch vocal cast – Jenny Slate, Hector Elizondo, Mariah Carey, Eddie Izzard, Seth Green, Billy Dee Williams (once more as Harvey Dent), Conan O’Brien, Zoë Kravitz, Kate Micucci, Channing Tatum, Ellie Kemper,  Jonah Hill, Adam DeVine, and even Brent Musberger — is mostly wasted since they barely do anything other than grunt or say something innocuous. I do appreciate Siri being cast as the Batcomputer, though.

The Combo Pack comes with the Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital HD code along with a handful of special features. Notably, there are four short shorts that are more silly than entertaining, four deleted scenes that were thankfully left unused, and six featurettes that cover aspects of the Lego world and film production.

We’ve seen one man versus an army and a man who wants to retire only to be dragged back to the fight. It’s a staple of storytelling and modern cinema so it all comes to down the execution. In fall 2014, audiences were introduced to the latest character in this celebrated model: John Wick. A surprise hit for Lionsgate, it was fairly quickly decided to make a sequel, hoping to turn this into a series which can be a challenge when the main character just wants to be left alone.

In January, Wick’s return came with John Wick Chapter 2 which offered more of the same high-octane stunts, fights, shooting, punching, and martial arts. With a stoic performance from Keanu Reeves we find ourselves rooting for the antihero as the relentless pace is sustained over two hours.

Out now from Lionsgate Home Entertainment, the film can be seen on Digital HD, 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack, Blu-ray Combo Pack, and DVD. Any way you watch it, screenwriter Derek Kolstad and director Chad Stahelski raise the stakes and expand Wick’s world. And for me, it is this expanded look at the world of contract killers that is the most interesting aspect.

There are rules and codes these men follow and for Stahelski, this means honoring the influential spaghetti Westerns, notably The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Point Blank, Le Cercle Rouge, and The Killer. Wick is a man in mourning for his dead wife Helen (Bridget Moynahan) and he wants out of the business. In the first installment, he does this by slaughtering men in a single night, earning his freedom. However, there’s still the matter of his stolen car and here we open four days later as he arrives to retrieve it from the Russian mob, now led by Abram Tarasov (Peter Stormare), Viggo’s brother, Iosef’s uncle.

We also learn that to accomplish his impossible task, he received help from Santino D’Antonio (Riccardo Scamarcio), a powerful Italian crime lord, who shows up to call in his marker. When Wick refuses, Santino blows up his house, forcing Wick back to work, which is to kill Santino’s sister, Gianna D’Antonio (Claudia Gerini), so he can assume control of the New York arm of his family’s criminal operation.

And we’re off.

By far, my favorite parts of the story are set in the Continental, the Old World, old school hotel run by Winston (Ian McShane), a neutral hub for the underworld. When Wick arrives to be tailored and equipped it is a lovely satire of such a locale. There are rules and codes of conduct that are so timeless that we see switchboard operators and pneumatic tubes do the back office work.

There are some interesting characters opposing Wick along the way, notably Common’s Cassian, Gianna’s bodyguard, and Ruby Rose as the mute Ares, Santino’s enforcer. In both cases, I wish we had more with them beyond the endless fights. As with all such films, Wick and his opponents are incredibly accurate until the choreography says they’re not, amping up the implausibility of the action, which is required otherwise the film would be one-third the length.

After defeating them, there is $7 million contract on Wick’s life (up from the first film’s $2 million) and it feels like everyone in Manhattan is a freelance assassin as everyone hunts him. Clearly his rep as the Boogeyman scares off none of them. His reprieve comes in the unlikely form of the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), who has his own underground homeless world to rule.

Clearly, plenty has been established to sustain Wick’s exploits for several more films although the urge to top the previous effort may push the series to ridiculous lengths and one hopes Kolstad, Stahelski, and Reeves temper that.

The Blu-ray edition’s 1080p high definition 16×9 Widescreen 2.40:1 is terrific, letting you follow the action in the gloom of night or fluorescent brightness of the subway system. The Dolby Atmos soundtrack is an equal match making for a good home experience.

There are plenty of special features starting with Deleted Scenes, including one with John Leguizamo, that should have been retained. “RetroWick: Exploring the Unexpected Success of John Wick” looks at how surprised everyone was when the first film clicked with audiences around the world;  “Training John Wick”; “WICK-vizzed”; “Friends, Confidantes: The Keanu/Chad Partnership”, which can also be heard with the film’s Audio Commentary; “As Above, So Below: The Underworld of John Wick” Fear”; “Car Fu Ride-Along”; “Chamber Deck: Evolution of a Fight Scene”; “Wick’s Toolbox”; “Kill Count”;, and my favorite, the Dog Wick Short, a trailer for a spin-off that has to be seen.