Cameron's colorful spectacular has been on top of the worldwide movie charts for the last 11 weeks, before this weekend's release of Disney's new Alice In Wonderland, which wasn't just the most successful opening weekend of a movie so far this year but, domestically, beat Avatar's opening weekend by more than $30 million. The movie grossed $210.3 million internationally, $116.3 million of which came from domestic audiences — despite poor reviews. Whether it'll end up having the legs to give Avatar's longevity a run for its money depends to be seen but, for now, consider this another victory for spectacle over substance.

The movie, packed with whimsical effects (though nothing that takes advantage of 3D) and great acting, begins on a high note. Indeed, Alice in Wonderland is one of those tragic movies whose frame story is actually more interesting than the story itself. Our heroine has just turned 20, and has lost all her memories of visiting Wonderland as a child - though she hasn't lost her penchant for flights of fancy. ("I was imagining all the ladies dressed in suits and the gentlemen dressed in gowns!" she tells a suitor at a party, who tells her to keep her thoughts to herself.) Unfortunately, her mother has planned a very unimaginative future for her. A Lord of Bad Digestion is to propose to her, in front of dozens of high class people, and she's expected to accept gratefully.

Just as the dull-minded Lord gets on his knees, Alice catches sight of the White Rabbit, pointing urgently at his watch. She flees the proposal scene, and tumbles down the rabbit hole into her adventure. The idea of reimagining Alice as a young woman - as Syfy did in its recent miniseries - is a good one, and emphasizes the adult side of a story that was always as much for grownups as kids. Burton's reboot of Wonderland, which is known to its denizens as Underland, is likewise terrific. As Entertainment Weekly's Owen Gleiberman put it, the place looks post-apocalyptic now. Oppressed by the Red Queen, the world's magical creatures are in bondage and the psychedelic fauna seem to be covered in ash.

During our first few moments in Underland, as Burton deftly builds the world around us, you'll feel genuinely enchanted. This is Wonderland for the early twenty-first century: war-torn, dark, and full of monsters who actually bite. But the ugliness and horror evaporate quickly, leaving behind one of those saccharine stories where everybody urges the heroine to do something brave by standing around smiling encouragingly at her.

In the case of this film, the brave thing Alice must do is retrieve a vorpal sword from the Red Queen's palace and slay the deadly Jabberwock (yes, there really is a vorpal sword in Carroll's original poem, "The Jabberwocky," which appears in Through The Looking Glass). In the process she must also rescue the Mat Hatter, played weirdly with a Scottish accent by Johnny Depp. Unfortunately all the weird characters, including the Jabberwock itself, have got accents or CGI enhancements instead of personalities.

Even the Cheshire Cat, who at first is a disturbing trickster, quickly morphs into a smiley friend like those birds who help Disney's Cinderella get dressed for the ball. And the Red Queen? Don't get me started. First of all, she's a bewildering mish-mash of the Queen of Hearts (from Carroll's first Alice novel) and the Red Queen (from his second), which leads to many mixed metaphors since the Queen of Hearts is from a game of cards and the Red Queen is from a chess game.

Still, when the Red Queen first sweeps into our field of vision, screaming psychotically about somebody eating her tarts and interrogating her frog footmen, she's an awesomely bizarre creation. But she quickly becomes nothing more than the swollen-headed CGI cartoon she is. We really could have used some scenes of her actually beheading people instead of listening to her screech about it. She's as unconvincing a villain as Alice is an unconvincing hero. Plus the story is rather self-undermining, since Alice's fight with the Jabberwock is intended to unseat the Red Queen in favor of the White Queen, whose main recommendation seems to be that she has a head of the proper size. And she doesn't scream as much.

Alice in Wonderland is based mostly on Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, with a healthy dose of Through The Looking Glass too. Another major influence on the film also seems to be American McGee's videogame Alice, whose crazy, sword-wielding heroine returns to Wonderland when the rabbit comes looking for help.

If anything will dazzle you about this movie - and make no mistake, there are dazzling moments - it's going to be the idea of Alice growing up and becoming an armored warrior instead of a pretty moppet. Though her swordfight with the Jabberwock is lackluster and occasionally quite irritating, Alice's character transformation is not. Unlike the Alice of Carroll's novels, whose body grows to all sizes while her personality remains trapped in childhood, this Alice grows up by learning to kick ass.

As I said earlier, what frustrates about this film is that its frame story is so intriguing - when Alice leaves the rabbit hole we want to know what happens next. Especially when we see what she decides to do with her newly-armored self in the world of the 19th century. As the movie ends, her real adventure is about to begin. I wish we could have seen that adventure, instead of the annoying dream that preceded it.

Though there have been many movie and cartoon versions of Carroll's mid-19th century novel of nonsense, it seems to me that perhaps the best adaptations and transformations of it didn't break until the mid-20th century with Jefferson Airplane's iconic song "White Rabbit." This song is, among other things, a terrific entry in the fantasy genre. It evokes the foolish/horrific mood that permeates Carroll's original tale, and updates the story to reflect the 1960s countercultural fascination with psychedelics.

Just as they do today, neo-Victorian fashions flourished during the 1960s in America - especially if those fashions had an Old West flair. Hippies in America were fleeing West to California, and many bands that emerged from the Haight Ashbury scene referenced that idea with 19th century "cowboys and Indians" garb.

I would call this kind of imagery, which you can see here in album cover art for Haight Ashbury bands The Charlatans and Quicksilver Messenger Service, among the first stirrings of steampunk sensibilities in the United States. Of course we could argue for a year about what steampunk means, so let me say that I'm borrowing heavily from the definitions of steampunk as an artistic movement in Ann and Jeff VanderMeer's Steampunk anthology.

In that anthology, the VanderMeers refer to steampunk as "dark pseudo-Victorian fun." They emphasize the DiY artistic styles that have given rise to steampunk culture and aesthetics, as well as steampunk literature.

Many authors, including those in the VanderMeers' anthology, cite Jules Verne, H.P. Lovecraft, and H.G. Wells' work as obvious precursors to today's massive crop of steampunk novels. And pulp historian Jess Nevins says the dynamo-driven, monstery tales of today have their origins in the "Edisonade," a subgenre of tales from the nineteenth century where an intrepid inventor makes a steampunk gadget and has an adventure with it.

So where does Alice's Adventures In Wonderland come into all this? The novel is certainly not a gadgety Edisonade, nor does it have the epic scope of a Jules Verne adventure. And yet its vision of a Victorian girl gone mad among even madder humanoids, her body an uncontrollable mass of growing and shrinking limbs, is as much a part of the steampunk tradition as any manly adventurer with his rational machine.

Instead of the madness of engineering and pistons, Carroll's novel explored the glorious madness of human psychology. As his protagonist Alice moves from dreamy encounter to dreamy encounter, watching nursery rhymes coming to life and fighting bloodthirsty monarchs made of cards, we witness something that for the Victorians was just as stunning as a giant dynamo. Psychiatry was in its infancy in the 19th century, and this brave new science suggested there was a method in madness. The muddle of our dreams might illuminate the truth about human consciousness; the murmurings of madwomen could shed light on how so-called sane people think.

Carroll, a lifelong fan of wordplay and logic games, reflected a Victorian fascination with the inner workings of the human mind. Especially when it was at its most nonsensical. One of the other truly great adaptations of Carroll's work, the 21st century videogame Alice from American McGee, foregrounds this idea. In that game, which takes place many years after the events of Alice's Adventures Through the Looking Glass, Alice has been incarcerated in an insane asylum for nearly a decade. She escapes back to a very dark version of Wonderland when the white rabbit comes asking for help. Here's an unofficial teaser for the Alice videogame sequel, due out next year, which captures the madness.

This is precisely the kind of "dark pseudo-Victorian fun" that steampunk celebrates.

Another way Carroll's novel has influenced steampunk is through the often-imitated original drawings of John Tenniel. The image of Alice with that trippy caterpillar, which appears in the Jefferson Airplane song as well as countless works of concept art, has become visual shorthand for glorious Victorian madness. Tenniel-inspired garb is not uncommon among steampunks and steamgoths.


To return to the question I raised earlier: Why has Alice's Adventures In Wonderland inspired so many artistic rebels, including steampunks? Perhaps because she, unlike the stalwart inventors of the Edisonades, embodies the spirit of contrariness. And her adventures unmask the industrious, logical Victorian era for what it also was: A time of insanity and nonsense; a time of absurd power executed arbitrarily over the helpless. ("Off with her head!")

Carroll's novel belongs at the heart of the steampunk tradition because it represents a perfect wedding of escapism and protest. And that, in the end, could sum up steampunk too.

Steampunk caterpillar and windup Alice by Guillaume Dubois.

Alice vs. snails from concept art for the videogame Alice via American McGee.

Alice and Mad Hatter by Jasmine Beckett-Griffith

First off, the movie looked great. The 1960s inspiration was fantastic, and the all of the landscapes were extremely impressive for the seemingly small budget. I especially enjoyed the House of Cards Casino.

The modernized plot, in which the Red Queen was kidnapping humans and sucking them dry of their emotions for profit, was just gonzo enough, and had that dark twist that kept us present in a modern day wonderland.

I stand by my standing ovation for the hopelessly charming and impossible to forget Andrew Lee Potts' Hatter. He was the heart and soul of this film. Even when the plot dragged on and the pacing died down it was consistently Potts who helped the cast pick up the pace. Plus he's exceedingly easy on the eyes.

But here's the rub. The chemistry between Alice and Hatter is great, not amazing, but I believe it even when the plot fumbles around with the characters. At the same time, I'm not really sure why these two like each other, besides the fact that Potts is charming and saved Alice's life a few times. But it's hard to understand what's going on in the Hatter's head. First Hatter wants to sell her ring, then he wants to use it to get to the other side and start over, and finally he wants to use it to lead the resistance. Sure characters can change their minds, but this happens so quickly and jerkily, the feelings behind these exceedingly strong sentiments are lost in the shuffle.

The same goes for Hatter's growing emotions for Alice, in the first half he mutters under his breath that Jack is a lucky guy and that later acts jealous when he finds out that Jack is the Prince of Wonderland. But we still never really understand the motivations or reasons why he fancies her. And it started so well, with the half-pervy half-sweet line, "Can't I be nice to a girl in a very wet dress?" We never really knew what his intentions were, at any time. Still we knew he wanted to be with Alice, based on the puppy-dog eyes he kept giving her.

The rest of the star cameos came and went rather quickly. Tim Curry yelled a lot and was gone forever, Colm Meaney managed to eke out some strange remorse for loving his heartless Queen Kathy Bates for so long, so much so that he stayed behind and died in the collapse of the casino while the Queen didn't even bat an eye. Very odd. I would have hoped that this would make her care a bit, but no dice. Matt Frewer was a loveable old Knight, until he dug up a bunch of his old companions to act as scarecrows. This moment was totally lost on me and I didn't understand why these skeletons were intimidating at all, if they couldn't fight.

The Father and the Carpenter plot line also made only the tiniest bit of sense, and rang dangerously close to The Tenth Kingdom, especially when Alice was pleading with her mind-wiped Daddy to save her life, so I was fine when he was axed in the end.

The heart of the story is the love story between Hatter and Alice, and while I hated not really understanding why things were so dangerously slow in some places, I adored the little moments here and there, like when you piece it together in the end that Hatter must have jumped through the looking glass moments after Alice left. I'll watch it again, if only to try and wrap my head around a few of the editing and plot decisions, like making Mad March from Long Island. But all in all I had fun, developed a new crush and enjoyed the gorgeous scenery. Horrible truth room CG background, flying flamingos and all.

But what did you think?

metoometoo

We were sent an extremely early edit of the film, so I'm not making a final judgment on the two-day mini movie until it airs, but what I did watch I got a excited about.

Here's the premise: Alice is a no-nonsense commitment-phobe and karate instructor. So yeah she kicks ass, and a lot, for better or worse. Strong armed Alice falls for one of her students who sneaks her some sort of magical ring and is promptly kidnapped. Alice follows her boytoy through the looking glass and is transported to Wonderland. But Wonderland has changed. It's now a dirty world that looks strangely like Vancouver. Alice soon learns that the Queen of Hearts is kidnapping humans and imprisoning them in her casino, siphoning off their happy emotions and selling them to the inhabitants of Wonderland. Thus making her beloved, for providing the quick fix, as well as rich.

Alice meets the Hatter in one of these emotion dens and the two strike a deal to go and save her boyfriend, who has presumably been kidnapped by the Queen for emotion harvesting. If I tell you more we'll get into spoiler territory, but there are plenty more twists and turns. It also gets pretty heavy with the family issues and inner love turmoil for poor Alice. In fact it really reminded me of a shorter and less in-depth version of the TV movie The 10th Kingdom, which I adored. So even coming close to that is a good thing.

Plus the cast is just bafflingly great. Tim Curry plays the Dodo, Kathy Bates is the Queen of Hearts, Harry Dean Stanton is the Caterpillar, and Colm Meaney is the King of Hearts. Those names alone are worth tuning in for. You won't want to miss watch Tim Curry walk around with his stomach forward, Dodo-style. Sure, I could mention that Curry really pushes the level of running and screaming that I can take from him, and that Kathy Bates seemed like she was sporting dead face for most of the movie, but they're are small issues.

But the real standout was Andrew Lee Potts' Hatter. Call me a sucker for British heroes who wear funny suits and like to throw their weight around, but I couldn't rip my eyes off of the Hatter when he was on screen. Almost to the detriment of Alice. Potts is familiar with the scifi world, having starred in the BBC's Primeval, but he really hits his stride here. And while I was watching him on a version that needed copious edits and tweaks, I still really enjoyed watching him try to elevate the story and dialogue he was handed. Yes, making the Hatter a cute hipster is a little eye rolling, but he made it work. Potts really attempted to sell some of his totally implausible actions he was taken in by the script. You heard it here first: If Matt Smith the new Doctor crashes and burns, certainly wouldn't be any worse off with Potts. But that's just hopeful projecting on my part.

So the bottom line: I'm tuning in. I'm anxious to see what the home of Matt Frewer's dimwitted White Knight looks like, as it's merely described as a chessboard forest kingdom. Along with the flying jetski-like flamingo sky cars, and the Queen's casino once the FX are all finished. Plus I wouldn't miss the opportunity to watch Andrew Lee Potts make me reassess my staunch views on men who wear guyliner.

Even though some of the story did feel a bit pushed here and there, and the plot was in an eternal loop of running to the casino and escaping, then running back, and escaping, the characters, settings, costumes and actors make this worth your time. And for those of you worried it's a Tim Burton rip, fear not: This contemporary Wonderland has a strange feel all on it's own.

Here's the trailer:

The first part begins December 6th, 8 PM.

Monday

It's the usual Monday evening decision between Fox's House, wherein the West Wing's Joshua Malina guests as a former patient of Wilson's who's now a little bit too close to dying for everyone's comfort, and NBC's Heroes, which promises an "unexpected destination" for Claire and Peter, who are struggling to come to terms with the truth. Both of them air at 8pm, so feel free to choose House and read our Heroes recap, instead. You know it'll be easier on everyone.

Tuesday

Prophets of Science Fiction on the Science Channel at 9pm is about it, now that V has slunk its way off-screen for a few months (And am I the only person who spent the last episode waiting for a big lizard reveal, only to be thwarted? They even talked about skinning an alien just to tease us, the bastards). But in many ways, this documentary about science fiction creators whose work predicted the future is likely to be less frustrating than ABC's alien drama, even if it may not be more entertaining.

Wednesday

While Mythbusters carries on Kari-less on Discovery at 9pm (Adam and Jamie look into whether you can escape from jail using antacids, while I continue to unfairly criticize newgirl Jessi Combs purely because of my love for the missing Ms. Byron), ABC's Eastwick begins to draw to a conclusion with new episode "Tasers and Mind Erasers."

Thursday

With the CW shows on reruns, your evening viewing is wide open for a helping of Flashforward at 8 pm on ABC and Fringe at 9 on Fox. This week's FF promises to reveal more about Demetri's future death, Zoey's flashforward and, most excitingly, what actually caused the flashforward itself. Meanwhile, Fringe gets out the Lovecraftian influence as "Snakehead" reveals a spooky squidlike creature burrowing into host bodies. Calamari will never be the same again.

Friday

If new episodes of Ghost Whisperer and Medium on CBS (at 8pm and 9, respectively) or Stargate Universe and Sanctuary on Syfy (at 9pm and 10, respectively) don't float your boat — Although, SGU sees Young handing over command of the Destiny to Camille when he's accused of murder aboard the ship, so maybe you should tune into that just in case — then there's only one thing that could take your attention (Well, beside Star Wars: The Clone Wars on Cartoon Network at 9).

And that's the return of Dollhouse, with two new episodes starting on Fox at 8pm. "The Public Eye/The Left Hand" sees Senator Wesley From Angel finally stop talking and start doing something in his so-far-useless campaign against the Dollhouse, while Topher and Adelle meet a programmer with a connection to Echo and - Oh, never mind. All you want to know is this: It's the episode with Summer Glau. See? Now you'll tune in.

Saturday

NBC is showing the best Fantastic Four movie ever made, The Incredibles at 8:30pm. I'm sure most of you already own it on DVD though, right?

Sunday

Sure, Sunday night still belongs to The Venture Bros (a new episode is on Cartoon Network at midnight), but we're still kind of tempted by Syfy's Alice revival, from the people who brought you Tin Man. Bringing the story up to date and adding in various contemporary re-readings of famous scenes, there's always the possibility of things going totally wrong and it turning out to be another Prisoner, but we have hope nonetheless...

I know we've been showing a lot of darker Stargate Universe trailers, but these brief moments give me hope that it will still be Stargate, and have witty banter. I especially like David Blue glaring down Shooter's daughter at the dinner table. Here are a few stills we grabbed just so you can get an even closer look at what's to come.

Caprica, meanwhile, looks like more of the same. But note the gorgeous detail shot of the city, which looks a bit CG-heavy but I'll take it, if skimping on the FX budget brought us Stoltz. Everything is looking pretty rosy for Syfy, who must be nervous as hell with the departure of BSG. I'm still not 100% sold that Caprica can fill that hole in my heart, but you never know.

The Riverworld books are set on an alien (but Earth-like) planet in the far future where, for some unknown reason, everybody who has ever lived is simultaneously resurrected as healthy, twenty-five year old versions of themselves. The various stories set in this universe explore both how famous historical figures interact with each other and their strange new surroundings, as well as the larger attempts by the thirty-six billion people on the planet to recreate human society.

Penikett plays Matt Ellman, a war correspondent who is killed and resurrected along with his fiancé, played by Smallville's Laura Vandervoort. The two characters, who as far as I can tell are being newly created for the miniseries, will serve as the protagonists and audience identification figures as they attempt to discover Riverworld's secrets and discover the sometimes surprising identities of the famous people they now meet. Joining them in the cast are Jeananne Goossen, Mark Delkin, and Alan Cumming as "The Caretaker."

Riverworld is just one of three four-hour movies, along with new adaptations of The Phantom and Alice in Wonderland, that RHI Entertainment is producing for the Sci Fi channel; RHI was previously behind the Tin Man miniseries that aired in 2007. All three are being considered as backdoor pilots, in that they may become regular series if ratings and reviews are strong enough, similar to Battlestar Galactica. (It's particularly fitting Penikett would now be the star of such a movie, considering Helo was never even supposed to survive past the BSG miniseries.)

Of the three, Riverworld is considered the best candidate for a follow-up TV series, although the other two are not without potential. The Phantom adapts the long-running comic strip, which follows Kit Walker, the twenty-first member of his family to bear the mantle of the Phantom in a tradition that stretches back to the 1500s. Screenwriter Daniel Knauf explained the TV-movie's particular take on The Phantom story to Newsarama back in 2008:

"In our story, we have a break in the lineage. The 22nd Phantom, the one we all know and love, his wife and his son died in an automobile accident. So when he died, there was no one to take over…But it turns out the son survived and has been raised by a foster family and has no idea who he is. They find him through a fluke when he's arrested on a trespassing charge, and he ends up getting his DNA into CODIS [the national DNA database]. The people in Bangalla who are still part of the Jungle Patrol — which we call Bpaa-Thap (which literally translates to 'Jungle Patrol') — they find him and decide to bring him in and train him. So it's a whole new game for this kid. So he's very conflicted, as far as who he was and who he thinks he is."

Desperate Housewives actor Ryan Carnes is set to play the Phantom, with Isabella Rossellini guest-starring as Lithia, a mind-control experiment's evil director (but then, is there any other kind?). Cameron Goodman and Sandrine Holt have also joined the cast. Less is known about Alice, RHI's third project. (Although we found a scary-looking photo of Whoopi Goldberg as the Cheshire Cat on RHI's website.) As one could probably guess, it promises to be a darker, more adult revamp of Lewis Carroll's classic along the same lines of how Tin Man reworked The Wizard of Oz.

Of course, there's one question that hangs over any Tahmoh Penikett casting announcement - what does this mean for Dollhouse? The short answer is "not much." Riverworld and The Phantom started production yesterday, with planned air dates set for 2010. Considering the Syfy Channel's usual lag between miniseries and series (there were ten months separating the BSG miniseries and the first episode of the series proper), any regular series that would require a substantial time commitment from Penikett wouldn't likely materialize until 2011. As much as the latest wild Internet rumors are rather positive for Dollhouse's future, the show would have to make it all the way to a third season before there would be any potential conflict, and that's assuming Riverworld is successful enough to launch a series. In any event, this shouldn't be taken as an indication that the Dollhouse cast is already looking for other work.

So, for now, it's best to take this news at face value - that Tahmoh Penikett continues to get roles that he richly deserves. It only makes sense that you'd need a veteran of Battlestar Galactica to replace Battlestar Galactica.

['Battlestar' actor to star in 'Riverworld']
[Sci Fi orders 'Phantom,' 'Riverworld,' 'Alice']

io9: Are We Going To See An Army Of Alices?

Anderson: We're in very early discussions about all of it, so it's not a definite thing by any means. Mila would like to return, and I would certainly like to see the franchise continue. Last year there were, I think, eight 'threequels' got released. Rush Hour 3, Pirates 3, Spider-Man 3...but there was eight of them. Shrek 3. Six out of the eight, the third movie did worse business than the second movie. There were only two where the third movie did better than the second movie. That was Bourne Ultimatum and Resident Evil. So, you know, it is quite an achievement for a franchise to keep growing like that, and we all feel that the audience is excited to see another one clearly. We would like, if we could put it together, we would do it.

io9: Right, but hypothetically how would you go about using all of those Alices?

Anderson - I'm not going to tell you that. [laughs]... but we would

io9: You would?

Anderson: We would, yes. Absolutely.