Category Archives: Reviews

At Home With Julia – Citizens’ Assembly Review

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‘It’s like any relationship. Who walks the dog? Who puts the bins out? Who sends the troops to Afghanistan? These are just some of the questions facing PM Julia Gillard and boyfriend Tim Mathieson.‘

At Home With Julia

At Home With Julia has been rating fairly well for the ABC, and has certainly sparked some discussion, but as a show it never really worked. The controversy created by the show’s marketing team has been the main selling point, and it is debatable whether anyone will remember in a year that it was anything more than the first satire of a Prime Minister at home on Australian TV.

After last week’s improvement with the show’s political one-liners, it seemed odd Continue reading →

Terra Nova

Terra Nova – Genesis Review

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‘In the year 2149, the planet Earth is a disaster, and most of the plant and animal life has become extinct. Scientists can’t reverse the damage, but have found a way to travel back to prehistoric times to save the human race.‘

Terra Nova

There’s been a lot of buzz building about Fox’s new sci-fi show Terra Nova. Take Steven Spielberg and several other sci-fi veterans, add time travel and dinosaurs, and you seem to have the recipe for a sure-fire hit. Unfortunately, after the disappointment of Falling Skies earlier this year, Spielberg’s name in the EP slot doesn’t do that much for me anymore. There’s a whole bunch of things that need to come together to make a compelling series; dinosaurs aren’t going to keep people around forever.

Thankfully, the team behind Terra Nova seem to have made Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire

Boardwalk Empire – 21 Review

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‘Nucky faces a lot of insurrection among some of his most trusted people. Chalky’s own life is threatened when the Ku Klux Klan launch an attack too close to home. Margaret must deal with her son’s disciplinary behavior. Angela asks Gillian’s advice over Jimmy’s affections at home. And Van Alden decides to show his wife, Rose, around the town for her anniversary.‘

Boardwalk Empire

Boardwalk Empire was one of my favourite shows from 2010. It was great to see a period drama that was willing to take its time setting up all the various plot threads, and allow the show to rest entirely on its characters without relying on gratuitous nudity to keep audiences interested (not that there wasn’t plenty of skin on show, it just wasn’t the focus of the show). Now, nearly a year later, it’s time to dive back in to the seedy underworld of prohibition era Atlantic City.

We left the first season with a montage of our characters reflecting on Continue reading →

At Home With Julia – The Leaker Review

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‘It’s like any relationship. Who walks the dog? Who puts the bins out? Who sends the troops to Afghanistan? These are just some of the questions facing PM Julia Gillard and boyfriend Tim Mathieson.‘

At Home With Julia

The controversy that has been brewing about this week’s episode of At Home With Julia gave me some hope that the show would lift itself out of the hole it’s been digging and deliver some of the outrageous comedy that you generally only see on the ABC. Unfortunately, the supposedly offensive scene was merely a throwaway gag in the middle of an episode that while better than Code Ranga, was completely mediocre.

One improvement over last week is with the political Continue reading →

Age of Conan – Unchained Review

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‘Age of Conan: Unchained is an award-winning and critically acclaimed massively multiplayer online game set in the sexy, savage and brutal world of Conan the Barbarian.’

Age of Conan - Unchained

The Free to Play model seems to be gaining a lot of momentum in the MMO market lately; while it was once only seen in the Asian market, more and more big name games are switching to the model with a great deal of success. Games like Dungeons and Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online have shown that with the right balance of free and pay content it’s possible to make more money than with subscriptions alone.

Age of Conan is a relatively recent member of the F2P club, and I thought Continue reading →

At Home With Julia – Code Ranga Review

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‘It’s like any relationship. Who walks the dog? Who puts the bins out? Who sends the troops to Afghanistan? These are just some of the questions facing PM Julia Gillard and boyfriend Tim Mathieson.‘

At Home With Julia

At Home With Julia‘s first episode had its share of problems, but it was far better than I had expected. I was hoping that the second episode might do away with the obvious humour and build on the show’s strengths, but was sadly disappointed.

I don’t think that I really laughed Continue reading →

Web Review – JourneyQuest Season 1

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‘Following a group of dysfunctional adventurers on a quest to discover and destroy the mythical Sword of Fighting, JourneyQuest is a comedic adventure through the fantasy world of Fartherall, where intellectual orcs, incompetent wizards, and holy zombies form the living (and not-so-living) backdrop to an epic story of unrequited love, burning passions, and severely reluctant heroism. And running away. Lots of running away…’

JourneyQuest

I’ve always been a big supporter of web delivered content, but with the huge number of web series popping up around the Internet lately it is often hard to find the diamonds in the rough. Given that so many bad web series choose to focus on geeky things as an excuse to avoid creativity, I must admit that I was dubious when I first heard about the D&D based JourneyQuest.

Within the first minute of watching, all of my doubts were Continue reading →

Priest Review

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Director: Scott Charles Stewart

Writers: Cory Goodman, Min-Woo Hyung

Starring: Paul Bettany, Cam Gigandet, Maggie Q

Year: 2011

When, exactly, did Paul Bettany become an action star?

He is, on the surface, the least threatening guy I’ve ever seen – he looks like the kind of guy who’d enjoy a good night’s easy listening to Kenny G. But at some point in the past few years he really got into the idea of tackling spiritual issues with extreme prejudice.

Anyhoo, Priest is an apocalyptic-sci-fi-horror-action-comic-book-western (and I’ve probably missed one or two genre mash-ups there). An impressive animated Continue reading →

Heaven’s Devils Review

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‘For the poor, hardworking citizens of the Confederacy’s fringe worlds, the Guild Wars have exacted a huge toll. Swayed by the promise of financial rewards, a new batch of recruits joins the fight alongside a slew of mysteriously docile criminals — and a few dubious military leaders.‘

Cover

Tie-in fiction is often looked down upon with distaste, but I generally enjoy them as a break from reading massive sagas. They are usually short, fun stories that appeal to the lore nerd in me, as Feist would put it: ‘a ripping good yarn’. The history of StarCraft tie-in fiction is a mixed bag; while there are many excellent novels such as the Dark Templar Saga and Speed of Darkness, there are also very disappointing novels like Shadow of the Xel’Naga to remind us that just because the StarCraft Universe is a fascinating place, not all the stories that take place there are worth being told.

Heaven’s Devils falls somewhere between Continue reading →

At Home With Julia – Date Night Review

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‘It’s like any relationship. Who walks the dog? Who puts the bins out? Who sends the troops to Afghanistan? These are just some of the questions facing PM Julia Gillard and boyfriend Tim Mathieson.‘

At Home With Julia

There has been a lot of talk surrounding ABC’s new political comedy; some have questioned whether a politician’s personal life is off-limits, while others have felt that everything is fair game. The real question was how nasty the comedy was going to be, Julia Gillard is far from the most popular prime minister and many people would use an opportunity like this to get on their soapbox about every political decision they disagreed with.

Happily, At Home With Julia avoids stepping into this trap and Continue reading →