Category Archives: Reviews

Book Review – Ready Player One (Guest Review)

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‘At once wildly original and stuffed with irresistible nostalgia, Ready Player One is a spectacularly genre-busting, ambitious, and charming debut—part quest novel, part love story, and part virtual space opera set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant Japanese robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.‘

What are you doing right now? Whatever game you are playing; whatever comic you are reading; whatever T.V. show you are watching… drop it! Continue reading →

TV Review – Comic Book Men – Con Gone Wrong / Ink

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‘AMC’s new unscripted one hour series, Comic Book Men, dives deep into fanboy culture by following the antics in and around master fanboy Kevin Smith’s New Jersey comic shop, Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash.‘

Year: 2012

Starring: Kevin Smith, Walt Flanagan, Bryan Johnson, Ming Chen, Mike Zapcic

Network: AMC

Well, there we go.

There’s not a great deal left to say now that we’ve reached the end of AMC’s niche show Comic Book Men. Comics & collectibles were bought and sold; people talked about superheroes; geeks made fun of each other. If there had been a splash of pornography it would be like someone filming the internet. Continue reading →

Film Review – John Carter

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‘Transplanted to Mars, a Civil War vet discovers a lush planet inhabited by 12-foot tall barbarians. Finding himself a prisoner of these creatures, he escapes, only to encounter a princess who is in desperate need of a savior.‘

John Carter

Given the ridiculous number of Tarzan adaptations to grace the big screen over the last century, it’s amazing that there hasn’t been a big screen adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ other epic series until now (apparently there was a direct to DVD movie in 2009). There have been many attempts over the years to bring this project to life by various studios, but the story always remained the same: ‘the technology isn’t advanced enough to do it justice.’ It’s curious that an animated version never made it off the ground, but now we have the next best thing, a CGI filled blockbuster directed by Pixar’s Andrew Stanton. Continue reading →

Game Review – Mass Effect 3

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‘Mass Effect 3 plunges you into an all-out galactic war to take Earth back from a nearly unstoppable foe – and how you fight that war is entirely up to you.‘

Mass Effect 3

Around 7 years ago I remember talking to a friend in the industry about the possibility of a Knights of the Old Republic 3 from Bioware; continuing the fantastic franchise and making up for the terrible ending of KotOR 2. ‘Not going to happen,’ he said. ‘They’re working on their own sci-fi IP instead.‘ We talked for a while about what a stupid idea this was. Why start something completely new when you have such a fantastic established universe to play with? In 2007, we learned why. Continue reading →

Film Review – Wing Commander

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‘In the mid-27th century, the Terran Confederation is at war with the felinoid Kilrathi Empire. After destroying a Terran base, the Kilrathi have seized a NAVCOM unit with the hyperspace jump coordinates to Earth. With Terran reinforcements scheduled to arrive two hours after the Kilrathi hit Earth, it falls upon the starfighter carrier TCS Tiger Claw to keep the Kilrathi busy.‘

Wing Commander

Year: 1999

Writer/Director: Chris Roberts

Writer: Kevin Dromey

Starring: Freddie Michelle Gellar…oh, sorry, Freddy Prinze Jr., Saffron Burrows, Matthew Lillard…were they serious?

When a sci-fi movie made in 1999 clearly intended for a broad youth market (given the casting of the two guys who would go into the dizzying heights of…the Scooby Doo movies) is measured against a PC game made in 1994 and comes off as wanting in the story, characters, costumes and visual effects department it’s time for Hollywood to think hard about their standards. Oh, wait… Continue reading →

TV Review – Comic Book Men – Zombies

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‘AMC’s new unscripted one hour series, Comic Book Men, dives deep into fanboy culture by following the antics in and around master fanboy Kevin Smith’s New Jersey comic shop, Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash.‘

Year: 2012

Starring: Kevin Smith, Walt Flanagan, Bryan Johnson, Ming Chen, David Zapcic & Jason Mewes

Network: AMC

I think maybe we’ve run our course with this one.

I’ll maintain what I’ve been saying for the past couple of weeks: this isn’t a bad show; it just sort of exists. It tickles the funny bone a little; appeals to the inner geek a little – but it hardly has any deep essence that makes it sustainable. I’ll hang in there until episode 6, but I don’t have the interest in collecting necessary to sustain much interest. Continue reading →

Film Review – Zombieland

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‘A shy student trying to reach his family in Ohio, and a gun-toting tough guy trying to find the Last Twinkie and a pair of sisters trying to get to an amusement park join forces to travel across a zombie-filled America.‘

Zombieland

Year: 2009

Director: Ruben Fleischer

Writers: Rhett Reese, Paul Werrick

Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin

I’m sure there’s some kind of research devoted to understanding why, when an idea hits a creative medium, it must then be milked until its dry and desiccated husk crumbles and is blown to the four winds. Does the onus lie with the creative types, or with the audience who laps it up? This is no dig at creators in a field of work – if they are a professional then they can create whatever the hell they please. But surely most of us can admit it when there is overexposure of an idea. George Romero made zombies cool once upon a time with Night of the Living Dead, but this was back in the days when making movies was really, really hard work. If someone saw that film, and then wanted to make an homage or a spoof or anything involving the prefix “re”, it would cost them thousands of dollars and years of their life. Nowadays, Edgar Wright makes zombies modernly cool with Shaun of the Dead, and subsequently the shelves at Blockbuster are filled with insanely titled diversions like All You Need is Brains, Bong of the Dead, Zombie Strippers and Zombie Honeymoon. Continue reading →

TV Review – Comic Book Men – Commercial

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‘AMC’s new unscripted one hour series, Comic Book Men, dives deep into fanboy culture by following the antics in and around master fanboy Kevin Smith’s New Jersey comic shop, Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash.‘

Year: 2012

Starring: Kevin Smith, Walt Flanagan, Bryan Johnson, Ming Chen, David Zapcic.

Network: AMC

I’m not going to suggest that the show’s turned any kind of creative corner, being that this week is more of the same; I do think, however, that everyone’s really comfortable with what they’re doing at this point, and that makes for some relaxed viewing. I don’t know how you can distinguish that these guys aren’t trying so hard now but… well, maybe Bryan Johnson still is. Continue reading →

Comic Book Men – Life After Clerks Review

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‘AMC’s new unscripted one hour series, Comic Book Men, dives deep into fanboy culture by following the antics in and around master fanboy Kevin Smith’s New Jersey comic shop, Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash.‘

Year: 2012

Starring: Kevin Smith, Walt Flanagan, Bryan Johnson, Ming Chen, David Zapcic & Jason Mewes

Network: AMC

After but one episode the amount of vitriol spewed forth against Messer’s Smith, Flanagan, Johnson, Chen and Zapcic rather astounded me. It seems that there is no sense of proportion when examining certain aspects of pop culture. Comic Book Men is apparently not simply bad television, it is the worst kind of insult to true comic fans everywhere; further evidence that Kevin Smith has always, in fact, been worthless; exposes his previous filmmaking efforts to be crap; and is proof that Jesus died in vain. Continue reading →

District 9

District 9 Review

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‘An extraterrestrial race forced to live in slum-like conditions on Earth suddenly finds a kindred spirit in a government agent who is exposed to their biotechnology.‘

Year: 2009

Director: Neil Blomkamp

Writers: Neil Blomkamp, Teri Tatchell

Starring: Sharlto Copely, Jason Cope, Nathalie Boltt

Transformers and the likes of Skyline or Battle: Los Angeles thunder into cinemas with all the force of…well, an alien invasion. These flicks wage a publicity assault of such magnitude that there’s no chance the movie-going public can avoid the countless posters, billboards and repeated trailers everywhere we go. Obviously this is how movies like this make their money, by over-saturating the mind so much that people can’t stand to let the movie pass them by. I, for one, am very glad of this; I’m glad Independence Day hit it so big in its time; I’m glad Cloverfield and Super 8 pull in the crowds they do; I’m even glad that Michael Bay get’s to keep cranking out Transformers over and over to a public that eats that business right up.

Because that’s how we get gold…like this: Continue reading →