Movieline Online

THE DESCENT: With enough time passed to differentiate director Neil Marshall’s grueling experience from the other “monsters-in-a-cave” movie released that year, audiences can finally view the film without the urge to compare and contrast. That is if you even bothered to see 2005’s The Cave starring Cole Hauser...which very few did. But The Descent didn’t fare much better, which was surprising considering the overseas buzz that was building before the Stateside release by horror specialists Lionsgate. As horror fans are prone to do, they overpraised the film to the point of hailing it “as good as Alien” (which it’s not) and then didn’t show-up in theaters, possibly because the film had already been out on DVD in Region 2 for close to a year. So The Descent was left hanging, ignored as a “been-there done-that” afterthought of a film that no one saw in the first place. Well, here’s your chance to make amends. The truth is, despite being a marked improvement over Marshall’s last film, Dog ...

STAR TREK: THE ANIMATED SERIES – Once the original show went off the air in 1969, Trekkies were in a pretty sad state. Attempts to relaunch the series were going nowhere and the motion picture was still ten years off. But for a brief 22-episode run Kirk, Spock and the crew of the starship Enterprise were allowed to continue their voyage in animated form (don’t you dare call it a cartoon!) which featured most of the original cast members voices and scripts from frequent Trek contributors. Although the animation is shoddy Saturday morning stuff, the tone of the show is completely in keeping with Trek lore, featuring many crossover characters and galactic landmarks. Decidedly adult in its execution, the show wasn’t dumbed down for a mass audience. If anything Star Trek: The Animated Series is a more legitimate continuation of Gene Roddenberry’s creation than several of the latter TV spin-offs. Episodes like Yesteryear (which delves into Spock’s childhood) and One of Our Planets is Missing...