'Moon Knight' shines brightly, 'The Bubble' deflates

I did not attend the premiere of Marvel/Sony's "Morbius," because however long or convoluted my reviews are, I actually don't believe in wasting your time or mine. Check out the other reviews online, and you'll see you're not missing much. "Morbius" is no "Venom."

'MOON KNIGHT'

Instead, I took in a mixed bag of streaming selections, starting with the surreal first episode of "Moon Knight" on Disney+. While the Marvel Cinematic Universe owes its existence to the Wesley Snipes "Blade" films, "Moon Knight" is the MCU's first foray into the horror genre, albeit heavily interlaced with pitch-black absurdist humor.

London museum gift shop worker Steven Grant - Oscar Isaac, aka Duke Leto Atreides in Denis Villeneuve's "Dune" and Poe Dameron in the "Star Wars" sequel trilogy - has restless nights and blackouts. Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke) leads a cult devoted to worshiping the Egyptian goddess Ammit, who is portrayed here as wanting to punish people for the sins they will commit in the future. The two men come to blows over possession of a golden scarab that Steven's other identities refuse to relinquish to Harrow.

Because in addition to being extremely knowledgeable about Egyptian mythology, Steven also has symptoms of dissociative identity disorder (previously known as "multiple personality disorder"), which means he's sharing his body with one personality called "Marc," whom Harrow condemns as a "mercenary," and another identity who supersedes both Marc and Steven.

In case you're thinking this sounds super-confusing, you're absolutely right, but that's what makes it such a thrillingly scary funhouse ride, because we experience the story from Steven's point of view, as he's confronted by manifestations of cryptically inhuman deities, and those who want to do him harm for things he can't remember doing, all while his uncontrollable gaps of "missing time" play havoc with the meager pittance of a personal life that he's afforded himself.

One episode in, we've only glancingly encountered Marc, who takes the wheel whenever Steven is in too much danger, but even though we have yet to see Marc in combat, it's clear whenever Steven recovers from his blackouts that Marc is disturbingly good at killing people.

But Oscar Isaac and the rest of this show have made Steven Grant a deeply sympathetic figure, constantly exhausted and haunted by suspicions that things are profoundly wrong with his life that he can't even explain to himself, as he leaves extended voicemail messages for a mother who never answers the phone, and he discovers a hidden cell phone in his apartment with countless calls from a woman named "Layla," who knows him as Marc.

I'm not just a Marvel Comics and MCU nerd, but I also wrote an entire profile of Moon Knight's multiple identities for the site /Film, and yet, even more than was the case with "WandaVision" or "Loki," I don't have the first clue how the "Moon Knight" streaming series will proceed, especially because it lacks any references to other MCU characters or plot developments.

This is Marvel doing a high-wire act without a net, and I am here for it.

'THE BUBBLE'

A less successful effort that comes tantalizingly close to being good is Judd Apatow's topical Netflix comedy "The Bubble," which recruited a dynamite cast of witty actors, and armed them with a remarkably promising premise for some sharp satire, only to make a hash of their talents.

In the wake of her star-making stint on "Doctor Who," Karen Gillan has excelled at capturing the authentic artificiality of a lot of Hollywood celebrities, and she brings this to bear in playing Carol Cobb, a washed-up actress who's part of the ensemble cast of the "Cliff Beasts" franchise.

"The Bubble" kicks off in England in October 2020, where the movie studio has reassembled the franchise's cast to make "Cliff Beasts 6" in COVID-safe conditions. That cast of narcissistic actors includes David Duchovny of "The X-Files" and Leslie Mann (Apatow's wife and frequent costar of his films) as a self-absorbed divorcing power couple, Keegan-Michael Key of "Key & Peele" as an action hero who's become a shady self-actualization and "wellness" guru, Pedro Pascal of "The Mandalorian" as a slumming "serious actor" who's nursing equally serious addictions to hard drugs and sex, and Iris Apatow (Judd Apatow and Leslie Mann's daughter) as a social media personality who was hired because of her popularity on TikTok.

Kate McKinnon of "Saturday Night Live" is hilarious as the studio executive overseeing the "Cliff Beasts" franchise, with a subtle running gag being that all of her Zoom calls are from different parts of the world, back when COVID had imposed a global travel lockdown on everyone who wasn't rich and powerful.

Likewise, Karen Gillan is such a finely honed comic actress that she can portray Carol Cobb as a catastrophically terrible actress, especially when we see her in a scene from a devastatingly misconceived sci-fi film called "Jerusalem Rising," about Israelis and Palestinians uniting to fight alien invaders, with Cobb cast as the half-Israeli, half-Palestinian lead character, in spite of Cobb being neither Israeli nor Palestinian.

I can't even begrudge Judd Apatow his nepotism, because Leslie Mann and David Duchovny's characters transmit on such similarly narrow bandwidths of vaingloriousness that their on-set reconciliation (and quickly ensuing second breakup) is inevitable, while Iris Apatow leads the cast in a couple of TikTok-style lip-sync videos that are virtually flawless recreations of what you'd expect to see from a teen "influencer."

But for all the jokes hidden in the margins, and all the reliably on-point performances by the supporting players, including Peter Serafinowicz of "The Tick" and stand-up comedian Maria Bamford, the central narrative of "The Bubble" feels flabby - at least half an hour could have been trimmed from its two-hour running time - and yet, also filled with missed opportunities.

The cast clearly had the time of their lives making this film, but I wish I could have had as much fun watching it. This was no "Tropic Thunder."

I continue to wait for a vehicle that can capture Karen Gillan's razor-thin irony, but I'll admit, I chuckled at the cameos of John Cena and James McAvoy in "The Bubble" in the meantime.

Author Bio

Kirk Boxleitner, Reporter

Shelton-Mason County Journal & Belfair Herald
[email protected]