Godzilla (1998) movie review

Here's what you need to know; a series of mysterious attacks in the pacific has the world spooked, and NRC biologist Nick Tatopoulus has been called in to study the culprit, believed to be a massive mutated reptile. When said massive reptile goes on a rampage in New York, Tatopoulus, the French secret service and the US Army go to war, determined to save the city from destruction.

Back when I was a kid I liked this film, I preferred any Japanese Godzilla film over this one, but I didn't mind this one, and while thinking of reviewing it, I was considering being a complete dick and tearing the film apart. But instead I decided to be fair, who knows, maybe in my years of loving Godzilla, having not watched this film for several years, I'd formed a warped image of it in my head, having just watched it again, I now know what to do.

So let's be fair and reasonable, or at least try to be, I do like this film's opening scene, when a Japanese fishing boat is attacked, I think it's a fairly good introduction. Unfortunately it's brief, and we are then introduced to Nick totopobopoulus, who's difficult to pronounce name is a running joke throughout the film. This guy is annoying, not tear your eyes out of their sockets annoying, but he's not particularly bearable, funnily enough though he's actually the easiest character to tolerate. His girlfriend on the other hand, played by Maria Pitillo, oh my fucking god, she is tear your eyes out of their sockets level annoying, as are her co-workers, maybe not so much Hank Azaria, but that other bitch, without a doubt, I hope New Yorkers don't actually talk like that. The French secret service guys are actually pretty funny, because I don't think it's possible to be more French than these guys, there is admittedly fun to be had with these guys, but like the New York news crew, I don't think they accurately represent your average Frenchman. It's also worth noting that these actors don't exactly seem to be giving their all, and they are working with material that is god awful, I'm sure we're all familiar with "that's a lot of fish", but the shit writing doesn't stop there, there's an unbearable love story here, mostly because of how annoying Maria Pitillo is, and they have stupid dialogue that is at least less cringe worthy than a Stephanie Meyer novel. This film's plot also makes no sense, a reason is given for Godzilla being in New York, but it's not a good one, and we are supposed to believe that this monster can go completely undetected in a major population centre like New York, there are numerous plot holes like this, and it only gets worse with other little details that make my head hurt to think about, for example who writes top secret on a video tape and then leaves it lying around, this film's plot is a mess.

Godzilla also suffers from pacing issues, it opens with an admittedly cool scene, then the film grinds to a halt between Godzilla attacks, focusing instead on Topobolopous, and lots of talking with the Army trying to kill Godzilla and the French secret service trying to find and destroy his nest, these slower dialogue driven sections are fucked by the shifty writing and annoying characters, and makes the film's lengthy run time of 139 minutes almost unbearable, I say almost because of the scenes where things are actually happening, but I'll go into them later. Let's talk about Godzilla himself, for this film Sony pictures did away with the suitmation of the classic Toho films in favour of CG, this in itself isn't a bad thing, if the special effects are done well. Unfortunately, this film was made in a period when Hollywood had learned that anything was possible with CG, and just pumped out epic CG blockbuster after epic CG blockbuster, not giving a damn about how well the effects will hold up after time, which is to say the CG is for the most part pretty bad. Where practical effects are used they are decent, but nothing incredible, these instances are very infrequent though, and the dated CG leaves much more of an impact. The monster in this film is an interesting one to me, while I agree that it is a travesty, and to name it Godzilla is utterly shameful, I think the design of the monster itself is decent, if perhaps rather lazy, it lacks the charm of the real Godzilla, but it isn't in itself horrible. I do however hate that it eats fish, and that it has babies.

The scenes where Godzilla isn't having his way with New York are boring and slow, that said, this is a Roland Emmerich movie, which means for all the flaws it has, if you turn your brain off you might be able to squeeze some fun out of it's big action sequences. Most of which consist of either the Army chasing Godzilla through the city, or Godzilla chasing the humans through the city. There is fun to be had in these scenes, as Godzilla tears through the city either on the tail of our humans or with the army on his tail, but it's only for the part of your brain that can just sit back and enjoy destruction, without pesky inhibitors like standards in the way. But here's a problem with these scenes, when they end, and your brain comes back online, you start to think about it, and then you start to go deeper, and deeper, and you slowly begin to mine away every little lump of enjoyment left, this is never worse than in the film's ending, where Godzilla goes down like a complete bitch, it's amazing that the army failed a few times to kill him with everything they had and then a missile is all it took to kill him. The film does try to mix thing up with a scene in Godzilla's nest where an army of Godzilla babies are hunting the humans, but this scene is more comical than it is scary, which is clearly what they were going for, it looked like they were trying their luck at stealing the kitchen scene in Jurassic Park, but they fail, hard, give me raptors over these big rubber hand puppets any day of the week.

The 1998 Godzilla is a failure, it fails to capture the spirit of the Japanese films, it fails to please fans of those films, and most importantly it fails to be a good movie on it's own, with a nonsensical plot, infuriating characters, shit writing, dated special effects and awful pacing, it drops the ball in almost every way. There is enjoyment to be found in it's action sequences, but they still offer very little to wash the taste of the film's numerous other flaws out of your mouth. Even if it weren't called Godzilla it would be a bad movie, but it's name is just the last nail in the coffin for this mess of a movie.

sciency fictiony things

There's a reason I used a picture of a Halo ring in this post, and not just because I was at one point a complete Halo freak and still have an undeniable soft spot for it now, but because while watching the new series of Thunderbirds for my reviews, I've been thinking about one very specific piece of technology that is used in the new series. In Thunderbirds Are Go Thunderbird 5 has a gravity ring, there are various forms of artificial gravity used in science fiction, but I m most interested by what is possibly the simplest, Gravity rings. The idea is actually pretty fun, when an object in an environment without gravity spins, anything inside the object will travel away from the centre of the spin because of centrifugal force, in that sense what the object is experiencing isn't gravity, but the centrifugal force pushing them away to the centre of the rotation, like when a hamster is going nuts on his wheel, and he loses his footing and just spins around and around on the inside of the wheel. I started to think about this idea, and where else it's been used in science fiction that I like, and naturally I thought big, and at 6000 miles wide, they don't come bigger than a Halo ring. As cool as I thought the idea of the Halo rings was, I never really thought about things like gravity, but this is very probably how Halo has gravity, Halo, a franchise with hollow planets and faster than light travel, and yet the Halo rings themselves are pretty easy to understand, or at least their gravity. For the unaware, a Halo is a machine built by an ancient race called the Forerunners in the final days of a war with a parasite called the flood, realising they couldn't beat the flood, they decided to kill it's food and starve it to death, by annihilating every living thing in the galaxy with sufficient biomass to feed the parasite. This was the function of the Halo's, when fired they would kill everything in their effective range. I am way off topic, this was supposed to be a random brief post about gravity rings, but the Halo universe is huge, and there's so much fun to be had exploring the history of the universe, but for now, gravity rings, they're cool.

Doctor Who series 1 The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances review

Here's what you need to know; the Doctor and Rose follow a mysterious war machine which crash lands in London, an easy search becomes a nightmare when they learn that they've landed right at the height of the Blitz. Things get even worse when a mysterious child shows up carrying a bizarre plague that the Doctor, Rose, and their new friend Captain Jack have to contain.

I must admit, when I was younger, this episode creeped me out, I know what it is that creeped me out, it's the idea of something constantly chasing you, never rushing, never hiding, just walking after you, everywhere you go. You'd be lying if you said you've never had a nightmare where some inescapable threat was constantly pursuing you, I remember, I was on the playground of my primary school being chased by a giant bug, I've had many nightmares like this, but that's what springs to mind. Enough about my dreams, what I'm saying is this episode will get under your skin, only instead of a giant bug it's a kid in a gas mask. This episode is reasonably reliant on its mystery; what is this kid in the gas mask, why is he following this particular girl so relentlessly, how does it relate to the war machine? I personally love the direction the mystery takes, and it is interesting to watch it all play out, though the ending is perhaps a bit too happy in my opinion, maybe I'm just a twisted fucker, but an ending needs a consequence, and I feel that this ending lacks that consequence, it's all just wrapped up very nicely with a bow. That said though, the science of the plague is really interesting to me, it's some nano-machine nonsense, but that stuff really interests me, and the way this plague works and why it does what it does is really cool. Something else I like is the setting, I rarely bring it up, but history interests me greatly regarding certain subjects, mainly technology, politics and war, obviously then World War 2 is a good place to look, and this setting makes for a very awesome scene with Rose that, ignoring the dated CG, is a pleasure to watch. This episode has a big new addition that I actually have mixed feelings on, and that is John Barrowman as Captain Jack. Let's start with what I like about this character, he's cool, he's just cool, he has all the charm and mystery of a classic secret agent, but he isn't a black and white good or bad guy, which is something I always love, because reality isn't black and white. But something I don't like about him; and that's sexuality, and now is when I must explain myself, people can be into whatever they want to be into, but when I'm watching a film or TV show, I care about what's going on, I don't care about the characters' sexuality, Jack would have been just as cool anyway, so it doesn't ruin what I think of the character, it just bugs me that they give it any time when it doesn't and shouldn't matter. Aside from Jack we have Nancy, a character who quickly becomes the sympathetic centre of the mystery, and also a character I really like, she's someone who does good things not for the benefit of others, but to ameliorate a guilt, this is a very good piece of development, as her motives can be understood. Rose has a really good scene with Jack and a piece of psychic paper, and the Doctor is witty and funny as ever, even more so a few times in these episodes, this episode also has a lot of the Doctor's more emotional side, and Eccleston does a great job with both, it may not be as complex as Dalek, but here we see more of the sympathetic Doctor, I personally prefer his funnier side though.

The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances are 2 more great episodes of Doctor who, I love the setting, I am interested by the story and by the plague, and I like the characters, even if certain aspects of Jack bug me a bit. The story may have a bit too happy of an ending in my opinion, but the story itself is something I really enjoyed for the most part, I find the kid with the gas mask less creepy now I'm older, but it's still very creepy from time to time. So all in all this is a good pair of episode that is worth a watch.

Thunderbirds Are Go Skyhook review

Here's what you need to know; things go wrong for a research team aboard a high altitude weather station when a malfunction sends them rising into space,  International Rescue dive in to save the day, but they may have finally met their match with this rescue.

I got a similar feeling watching Skyhook to when I watched Runaway, after a disappointing episode, we get this, an episode that's good. First off this episode actually is interesting, rather than the typical tomb raiding of Tunnels in Time, the weather station is gaining altitude and cannot be stopped, this episode has some sciency stuff going on, and it makes for some of the best moments in the entire series so far, one in particular with Thunderbird 2 that is just entirely awesome. All 3 of the main Thunderbird machines are used in this episode, and each one runs into complications that make for said awesome moments, and Thunderbird 5 plays a very important role in this episode, as does it's gravity ring, a technology that I'd do an idiocy post about if I had anything worth writing about it. This episode's finale is brilliant, as Thunderbird 5 goes into uncharted territory as a makeshift rescue vehicle, and things literally start to get heavy. The character of Fischler is an interesting character, but perhaps not in the same positive way I usually use that word, I like some things about his character, I like his insane recklessness and complete lack of responsibility and awareness, but it is somewhat extreme, even for a kids show, the guy is a cartoon, and it's impossible take him seriously. Also there's a reasonably important plot point that is brought up and then completely forgotten, this could be minor if it wasn't important, but it was, and it was just dropped, which makes no sense.

I really like this episode, it's easily as good as Space Race or Runaway, it's sciency and it has some really awesome moments with the Thunderbird machines. The episode isn't perfect, it has a plot point that goes nowhere and makes no sense, and one of it's main characters is a cartoon that can't be taken seriously, but that is more than made up for with some awesome Thunderbirds action and a brilliant finale, I'd say this episode is worth a watch.

Photography, Seagull edition

I found something funny while in Wales, when at home I have a special hatred of Pigeons, yet in Wales, pigeons are funny to me and I have a special hatred of Seagulls, regardless, I got photography and some of my photos have the buggers in, so rather than complaining, I decided to touch them up a tiny bit and put them here, enjoy.

Gears of War Ultimate Edition game review (singleplayer)

Here's what you need to know; Mankind is facing extinction after a vicious 14 year war with an army of subterranean monsters called the Locust. As humanity mounts a desperate offensive to push the Locust back, legendary soldier Marcus Fenix is broken out of prison to aid in the mission that will decide the fate of the human race.

Gears of War Ultimate Edition is a remaster of a game that came out 9 years ago, that said it holds up really well; while the graphics have obviously seen a huge upgrade, the game's sound is almost identical, with the original music that I personally love in the game, the weapons that still sound mean and meaty after 9 years; with the exception of the Hammer of Dawn, which sounds noticably different, and is by far the most mean sounding weapon in the game, really earning it's name. The Locust still sound like monsters, and Boomers still growl "BOOM" before firing their weapon, always loved. The gameplay is unchanged, and it still plays really well, but more on the later. What I absolutely adored is in addition to upgrading the graphics, developer the Coalition completely re-did all the cutscenes, and they are stunning, not Halo 2 Blur cutscenes good but still absolutely amazing, and even though I'd seen them all before, it was awesome to watch these new re-done cutscenes. Also something of note is that the upgraded graphics also look really nice, I personally didn't find them jaw dropping, but they are still very high end graphics. Admitely some things let it down, little details that you'll only notice when you look really close, but if you really have to dig for them, that's hardly a serious criticism. Something new to this remaster is content previously unavailable on the xbox 360 version was included in the singleplayer, adding a few more chapters of story and gameplay, that's hard to complain about, and it too has been touched up with the new graphics and cutscenes, it blends in very nicely.

Gears of War tells the story of a band of friends who save the day and kill countless monsters, obviously there's more going on, but if you have played Gears before you know this already and if you don't I'd rather not spoil it, don't expect a story like Bioshock Infinite or The Last of Us that will leave you emotionally exhausted or pondering the meaning of it all, but expect a narrative that will have you gripped from start to finish over this campaign that will take between 8 and 12 hours to beat. What I actually forgot, having not played Gears since Judgement came out was how much I love the characters in this game, Marcus and Dom have really enjoyable dialogue together, and the 4 characters have some really entertaining back and forth with each other, there is a believable friendship with them. But the 2 characters I like most are Cole and Baird, Cole is a former sports star who is a great example of how gleefully dumb and big and loud this game can be, and Baird is very open with his opinion and actually a bit of a wimp, he always says the funniest thing that can be said in the situation. Something that the game has is an absence of a real antagonist, there's technically a bad guy with General Ramm, who appears in the first act only to make a very brief appearance later on and be the game's big final boss at the end, and the game is narrated at times by the Locust queen, who never appears in the story, making a very brief appearance at the end that I personally thought the game didn't need, just keep her as the narrator, she'll become the bad guy later. This game's style has to be mentioned, because it does not hold back; Marcus and his squad are the most manliest men who ever lived, with arms like tree trunks and bulky armour that looks as heavy as they are. Their guns have chainsaws on them that tear most enemies into bloody chunks, heads explode in glorious sprays of meat and blood and bodies are blown apart into red puddles and the odd surviving lump of flesh. This game isn't for a family audience, it is insane, and that is a huge piece of it's charm, there's nothing more hilariously violent than watching a Locust's head take off like a rocket after hitting him with the torque bow, or blasting him out of existence with the gnasher at point blank range.

Gameplay holds up really well after 9 years, shooting and aiming is still smooth, melee attacks with the lancer are awesome when you pull them off, and though the game isn't nightmarishly hard, it's not forgiving either, thanks to it's competent enemy AI. The Locust come in many forms, from the tiny and annoying Wretch to the lumbering and intimidating Brumak and anything in between, but the majority of what you fight are standard foot soldiers, these guys are tactical, taking up opportunities to flank you, taking cover to avoid your attacks, and sometimes just charging straight at you, this unpredictable nature forces you to stay on your toes, and this game's firefights do tend to benefit from a more tactical approach. While in combat you have a wheel of 4 weapon options; 2 primaries, 1 side arm and grenades, all the guns have a clever little active reload system, meaning if you tap the reload button at the right time, you can drastically speed up reloading or even get a damage boost, though it does get easy to memorise when to hit the active reload, taking away the challenge of successfully pulling it off, and making you really hate yourself when you mess up and jam your gun. The campaign has some very interesting sequences that mix up the standard shooting gameplay, example, there's a level at night where you have to stay in the light or be torn apart by a swarm of flying monsters, there are boss fights where the boss can only be hurt by the Hammer of Dawn, and making too much noise causes it to go into a rage and charge at you, there's a section where enemies explode after death. These sections again force you to try new tactics, and they mix up the shooting sections very well. Unfortunately here's where I have some issues, I encountered bugs frequently in my campaign, some minor and somewhat funny like the team mate AI walking in circles in a corner, others forced me to reload the checkpoint, for example one instance during a vehicle section when the vehicle just stopped and froze on the spot, or when the team mate AI somehow managed to kill itself, which happened a few times during the first boss fight. Also there were a few occasions where the enemy AI just seemed to turn off and I had to search the level for a few minutes to find the last enemy, who had usually taken cover somewhere and just sat there doing nothing. These bugs really are bad, but they weren't frequent enough to ruin my experience, but it annoyed me a great deal when I didn't know what to do and I wasn't sure if I was the one messing up or the game, and I was forced to restart from the checkpoint because I just didn't know.

Gears of War ultimate Edition is a solid game, for fans of the original game there's enough new stuff and fancy upgrades to warrant the reasonable asking price of just £30, and if you've never played the first Gears, this is a good way to experience it for the first time, I say good and not great because the game has a few really bothersome bugs from time to time, but get past them and you've got a very excellent game that is definitely worth trying out.

The Strain season 2 BK, NY review

Here's what you need to know; picking up where season 1 left off, New York city has been cut off from the outside world, and is being taken over by a deadly virus that turns people into night dwelling, blood sucking zombies controlled by the Master, the ancient foe of Eph and his team of vampire hunters, who have sworn to save the city from it's vampire infestation. Spoilers for season 1 and 2 of The Strain ahead.

Admittedly my memory of the first season of The Strain is a bit rusty, but I remember mostly enjoying it, and I remember enough to not be completely lost in this first episode of season 2. So let's begin with the prologue, directed by Guillermo del Toro, this prologue was good shit, it's in 1932 and it shows a very young Abraham being told a story that is basically the origin story of the Master, I won't spoil it here but I like the story being told, though I think the master's 'birth' was a bit needlessly gross, but there's a brilliant shot through a kid's bedroom window that was just spine chilling, I loved it. Back in the present interesting things are going on, and the "join your enemy or die alone" line makes sense, to cut a long story short there is a rogue faction of vampires out to kill the Master, and while I think this sub plot has the potential to really go places, I think what's more likely is they'll take a backseat, which I really hope won't be the case, because they're cool as hell. In the first episode a lot of things are just speculation, but I hope more interesting things are done with Abraham, played by David Bradley, not that I didn't like him in season 1, but aside from that heart in a jar and those flashbacks he was just the crazy old guy who is also a badass vampire hunter, and I hope his character becomes more developed in season 2, especially with the rogue vampires. What I really liked is Eph, played by Corey Stoll, who in the first episode of season 2 has turned to drinking, while he and Nora, played by Mia Maestro try to find a more scientific way of killing the vampires, I don't remember finding him very funny in season 1, but there were times in this episode where he made me laugh. His family though, they've recast his son for season 2, and I'm not sure how it will go, the kid from season 1 wasn't annoying, but I don't know if this new kid will be annoying, something kid actors so often are. But now, not to anyone's surprise they've made his ex wife a bad guy, I think this could really work, giving Eph some real adversity, though the blind kid minions is a bit odd, and I don't really know what to think about them. Just like in season 1, I like Fet, played by Kevin Durand, I just think he's a cool character, he's an exterminator, but he's a natural at killing vampires and he inexplicably carries dynamite on him just in case. Richard Samuel is still awesome, and one of my favourite things about the series, he plays Eichorst, a former Nazi turned vampire henchman who is just awesome, he's cool and he's creepy, just what every vampire should be. Finally there was a cool scene at the end in a storage lock up which, while brief, had some cool vampire killing and a very nice application of muzzle flash.

At this point there isn't a lot to go on, and there's a lot of speculation, but I did like this episode a lot, I hope that some interesting story lines don't get wasted or turned to crap, and more is done with the characters, but I liked the characters in this episode and it had some sweet vampire killing at the end and some creepy imagery, specifically in the prologue, I'd like to end season 2 saying I enjoyed it, and that's looking likely based on this first episode.

back in time

As fun as it is to use the photos from the pit and from Tenby, I feel that more variety would be nice, and I have literally 1000's of photos, while not all of them are good, scratch that, while the majority are not good, there are some that I do like. So here we have Master Chief at the National Media Museum, I thought he'd like seeing the Games Lounge, and he did. Next we have a cropped image of Steve's pickaxe dropped on the ground, this is supposed to have sad connotations, but it probably fails. A very cropped photo of a UNSC Warthog at dusk, it's a bit blurry, but I still like it, it's cropped that way because you see the blur a lot easier with the full photo and I actually used this photo in my Photography course, and I cropped it like this in my project. Finally we have Godzilla looming large, I think the reason I like this photo is pretty apparent. So here is 4 more examples of my toy photography, enjoy.

 

 

3:10 to Yuma movie review

Here's what you need to know; Dan Evans and his family are feeling the hurt after a long drought has left them desperate for money, a solution arises for Dan when Ben Wade, the villainous leader of a gang of outlaws, is captured, and help is needed escorting him to the 3:10 train to Yuma prison, all the while Wade's gang are hot on their tail. But is Ben Wade as evil as the legends claim?

Admittedly there are a few films I've seen that I can say I love, when it comes to these movies sometimes I can still have a reasonably easy time being critical of flaws, but then there are other films where flaws are much harder to find, the 2007 remake of 3:10 to Yuma is, at least for me, one of these movies. Let's begin with what I like about this film, something I like is the characters, specifically the main 2; Dan Evans played by Christian Bale and Ben Wade played by Russell Crowe. Christian Bale is a good actor, and he does a good job in the role of the one legged civil war veteran, Dan is a character who is struggling to keep his family fed, and has to deal with the railroad relentlessly trying to bully him off his land. His motives are understandable and relatable, and he has a very interesting similarity with Ben Wade, who is frankly the best thing in this film by a mile. While Glenn Ford's Wade in the original was all charm, Russell Crowe's Wade is still charming, yet much more human, I'll try to avoid spoilers, but this film explores both Dan and Wade's pasts in a way I don't remember the 1957 version doing. In this film Wade is also much more cruel, he stabs a guy in the neck with a fork for god's sake, but this doesn't detract from Crowe's very human Wade, you get the sense that he is so cruel only because he needs to to stay alive. What connects these 2 characters is a very subtle theme of the film, religion. Dan and Wade have both lost their faith in God, my beliefs aside, I find this to be really interesting, and it really grounds both the characters and the film. Supporting characters are as usual a mixed bag, while I like the crew that accompanies Dan and Wade, there are some that are better than others, and they don't really stand out from other westerns; for example the tough Pinkerton who doesn't talk much, and the rich business man with the moustache. William, Dan's son is an interesting character though, he has an admiration for Ben Wade that is at times entertaining to watch. Wade's gang is largely unremarkable too, except for Charlie Prince, played by Ben Foster, who is awesome in my opinion, he serves as the film's main antagonist, is loyal to the death, he's a badass gunslinger, and he is insane, he will get under your skin a few times in this film.

3:10 to Yuma has some cool moments, there is an awesome action scene right at the beginning of the film with a gatling gun, and a shootout which serves as the finale of the film. But this isn't a straight up action film, aside from the gatling gun scene and the end shootout this film only has a couple of notably actiony scenes, which are part of my main criticism, but more on that later. What is there between the 2 big action scenes is serviceable, but it's not the point, the point is the characters, and there again there are a few great scenes, most of which are spearheaded by Ben Wade, these are scenes where really all that happens is people talking, but it works, and it is never boring. And now for my criticism, as I said there are 2 big actions scenes, one at the beginning and one at the end, and in between there are a few pepperings of action, mainly a brief shootout with Indians and a brief chase through a railway site that happen nearly back to back. These scenes do a good job of keeping the film moving, and sufficiently stop the majority of the film from being all dialogue. While there isn't anything wrong with these scenes, they do feel a tiny bit like filler, because that's really what they are, what with the compulsory Indians and the Coolies working on the railroad. I stress, these scenes don't bring the movie down, they just seem like filler content, and don't really add anything to the film. A final thing I actually like about 3:10 to Yuma is it's ending, no spoilers here, but the film did not end the way I thought it would, and the ending itself is somewhat interpretive, which I personally like, don't worry, it's not the Inception ending, it's just open ended enough to provide closure while also leaving the aftermath of the film's events nebulous.

While some things that happen throughout the film feel too much like filler, and the roster of support characters is a mixed bag, this film has 1 good main character and 1 brilliant main character,  a few memorable support characters, mainly Charlie Prince, 2 awesome actions scenes and a couple serviceable ones thrown in as extra, and a couple of subtle things like the 2 mains losing faith in God, probably things you'd only really see if you studied this film as closely as I did in college. But even without them this is a film I'd highly recommend, it's just a good film, and it's worth the 2 hours you'll spend watching it.

On video game re releases and remakes

everyone has their own thoughts on things. Something you've no doubt noticed in the past few years is a high numbers of re-mastered games being released on current generation systems. With Gears of War getting a remake in a few days, I think it's interesting to talk about this matter.

This can easily be broken up into to 2 groups; remakes and re releases, lets begin with remakes. I generally have no problem with remakes of games, but what I may have a problem with is the motive of the remake. Let's take Halo as an example, 10 years after being released on the Xbox in 2001, Halo Combat Evolved got a remake, the original Halo being one of my favourite games ever, I was pumped. I bring up that I was excited because I think that was the main propose of CE Anniversary, it was fan service, a product created for fans of the original Halo. The game was practically identical the original, while the updated graphics were hardly jaw dropping, they weren't bad either, and the option to switch between classic and updated graphics was awesome. The motive of the anniversary of Halo was fan service, which can not be said as plainly of Halo 2 anniversary. While there was demand for it, the sequel's 10th anniversary is not as big a deal as the original, but what really bugs me about Halo 2 anniversary is the MCC; it was a cash grab, and I say this for a few reasons.

I don't like games that get HD re releases on current gen after not even being on last gen for that long, games like Tomb Raider and Sleeping Dogs, Though admittedly I love Metro Redux. What matters here is demand, Games like The Last of Us on PS4 were highly demanded, same for the Uncharted trilogy, but who wants to relive the glory of Darksiders 2 or Prototype in shiny HD, especially Prototype, since Darksiders 2 was decent. Halo MCC was like this, the inclusion of Halo 1, 3 and 4 looked very cash grabby, and then the game was broken at launch, in my opinion crushing any argument the MCC was fan service, because how many fans were left when they finally got the game working, my reasons for thinking MCC was a cash grab and nothing more. Taking it back to remakes though, Gears of War is a game franchise I love all 4 instalments of, I'm cautious about Gears 4, but I'd like a remake of Gears of War, demand is important, but so is your taste.

A problem for re releases now though is backwards compatibility, with the Xbox One adopting backwards compatibility, this trend will certainly die quickly. because now say Sleeping Dogs is backwards compatible, people who rebought it on current gen are screwed over, but it won't be, because it's been re released already, so now people with the last gen version are screwed over. This is what will kill the trend, at least on Xbox, now there is no need for re releases, but the ones already out there are a hindrance to people who have the last gen versions of those games. Maybe how long those games are not backwards compatible will depend on the age of the re release, and maybe this will apply to games released on both generations, though this obviously won't last, as the older systems are eventually forgotten by developers and publishers.

Motive matters to remakes and re releases, a remake for the fans is fine, a cash grab is not, the same applies to re releases with games like The Last of Us and Uncharted, 4 games I myself love, but games that aren't as highly demanded are a bit more greedy, and should really be left alone, especially when the re release is broken at launch, 343 Industries, I was talking about you there. Expect a review of Gears of War sometime either this week or next week.

Doctor Who series 1 Father's Day review

Here's what you need to know; the Doctor and Rose go to 1987, the year Rose's father was killed, and Rose saves his life, while at first it seems to be a miracle, the Doctor's fears are quickly confirmed when a terrible and opportunistic enemy descends and begins its hunt.

I like this episode, I really like this episode, were it not for Dalek this would be my favourite episode of series 1 so far. This is a smart episode, and while it's certainly a slower episode, this is all about the characters. For the majority of the episode the Doctor, Rose, and Pete are holed up I church while the  reapers tear the world part outside. In the church is couple of stories, The Doctor trying to save the world and Pete and Rose coming to terms with what must happen being the main two. The story with Rose and Pete is by far my favourite part of the episode, as Rose learns the truth about her dad, and Pete realises what  he and Rose must do to stop the reapers. This is a very dark episode in terms of tone, and that is something I really like. The story going on with Pete and young Jackie is a bit of a drag, but I understand why they did it, as Rose learns that her idealistic super dad isn't what her mum raised her to think. And the story of the Doctor trying to save the world doesn't really go anywhere or make any sense. But back to the good. The character of Pete is extremely good, both in his emotional interactions with Rose, and in his brave yet tragic final moments, his selflessness makes him a very admirable character. On the subject of cool, we have the Reapers, I kind of have mixed feelings on them. I say cool because the idea is both cool and creepy, but their appearance isn't on the same level as their chilling idea, at one point in development they apparently more closely resembled the Grim Reaper, and that is something I'd like to see, I just think they could have looked much scarier. Finally, while this is far from a criticism, the ending doesn't make a lot of sense, but it's minor and doesn't steal the spotlight from Rose and Pete. 

A few flat stories and  mildly confusing ending aside, this is a very enjoyable episode, spearheaded by Pete and Rose, and with added unease from the reapers, who while not so scary to look at, are a very cool and unnerving concept, I like this episode, not as much as Dalek, but still a lot, and it's easily my second favourite episode of series 1 so far.

From the Pit

today I went back down to 'the pit'. Unfortunately I didn't find anything about it online, I'm still banking on mine though, having gone inside and taken a peek, and over 100 photos. Inside was very interesting, the part of the building I was able to get into was divided into 2 rooms; one that was empty and showed signs of a fire, and another that had an elevated platform in the centre and a tree growing out of the floor. I'm guessing the room with the platform was some kind of engine room, again, assuming it's a mine, around the platform was a moat of rubble, old beer cans and bottles and thick weeds. There was a larger room around the back of the building, but I couldn't get to it, one door was blocked off with barbed wire and the other was just a blockade of weeds and nettles. Speaking of nettles, while I was there I noticed that clouds of spores were rising up out of the plants, I'd never seen it before and I looked awesome, but I couldn't take a photo, as much as I wish I could. These nettles were between me and what I'm guessing  is the tunnel entrance, I couldn't tell because it's either been sealed up or flooded, the whole building was under at least a foot of stagnant black water, I threw in a rock to try and see how deep it was, it didn't tell me much, a stick would have been more useful but I couldn't reach it anyway. That's enough babble about the pit though. I plan to go back there in the winter, and do more digging to try and find out more about it. in the meantime, the fruits:

Thunderbirds Are Go Tunnels in Time review

Here's what you need to know; while rescuing a group of trapped miners high in the mountains, International Rescue unwittingly unearth the entrance to an ancient tomb. Gordon, Penelope and Parker join the team set to explore the tomb, but things don't go according to plan.

I'll just get it out of the way, this episode isn't a high point of the series, in the same way that episodes like Unplugged and Fireflash aren't high points. While this episode certainly had the potential to be excellent, it doesn't fulfil that potential. Let's start with what I like, I like what they did with Parker in this episode, he is afraid of the tomb, to the point of incompetence, this does get a bit too silly from time to time, overall I think it works. And I like the pseudo villainy of professor Harold, something I didn't think I would like, as he obsesses over the buried treasure. As usual with these less action packed episodes however, this episode is lacking in action, something this new Thunderbirds series has come to rely on, while this is a good idea to build the characters, focusing episodes on this rather than on the rescue isn't a good idea, and the suggestion of Gordon and Penelope just comes across as completely forced. I do like the Thunderbirds action in this episode, even if it's 3 minutes at the beginning and 2 minutes at the end, I like seeing Thunderbird 2 in action, always have, and the snake cam they use in this episode is cool as hell, even if it doesn't seem to know where it's own tail is. Overall there are  things I like and things that I think work, but this episode is lacking, in the place of action is a focus on characters that is, as ever, clumsy and uninteresting, and in this case out of place and forced. This is one of those episodes that fails to reach the bar this series deserves to be held at.

stuff and stuff

It's been a slow week this week, not a lot going on, apart from the awesome Rogue Nation. But the past few days has seen some goings on.
First and most interesting is a film that I caught a few minutes of while my Mum and Dad were watching it; it's a film called Girl House, and while I overlooked it at first, having glimpsed a few minutes of it, I think maybe I should give it a chance, at first glance it's a porno slasher flick, nothing interesting there, but from what I saw, I don't think I'm giving it enough credit, maybe I'm wrong, and it is just a run of the mill slasher film, but what's to lose, I guess.

Meanwhile I think I've found somewhere interesting to do some photography, I couldn't get much about it from my brother's girlfriend, who lives literally a 2 minute walk away, but she calls it the pit, according to her it's an old mine entrance, and I went down there a few days ago. While I didn't take my camera with me, I snapped a few photos on my phone, I couldn't get into either of the buildings, one of them being under water and the other surrounded by a 4 foot wall of nettles, but I will go back there, and I will go prepared, I'll take my camera, and I'll get some photos, not before doing some research and finding out what 'the pit' is, if it's a mine entrance I'm sure I'll find something online.

I'm getting creative again, long ago I made guns out of cardboard, they're what you'd expect from cardboard, crap, but, if only by a little, my ability did improve over time. A few months ago I made one for my nephew, I really put in the effort, doing all the calculations and planning, all that was different was the scale, it was scaled down. I actually really liked building the smaller models, so here we go again. I'm building a scaled down DMR from Halo, I'd made the gun I made for my nephew before, the Assault rifle from Halo, but DMR is new, so this will be interesting. Next week will hopefully be more eventful, I mean, Gears of War is coming out next week, meanwhile I've devised a new system for movie reviews to insure I do 1 every week, and finally The Strain starts again next week, I think, too late to review season 1, but expect weekly Strain reviews. Also, the photos on the post should have been cropped, but today I upgraded to windows 10, and it has been a fucking nightmare, thank god my mum is a wiz with computers, because I'd be a Luddite if she wasn't. And now I can't download anything  from cloud servers, so these photos have been uploaded directly from my phone. That advert for widow 10; "she won't  have to worry about security, she'll log in with her smile," that advert is bullshit, 'she' will have torn all her hair out and smashed her computer to pieces and snorted the dust if she had to put up with what we've put up with today.

from small beginnings

And to think my blu-ray collection was once Pacific Rim on it's own with my Xbox One games, now look at it, my has it grown. Yes, this is absolutely bragging, but this morning I got 5 new blu-rays, so I put them all together and just had to take a picture. This is obviously not a collection of masterpieces, these are films that I either like very much or thought looked interesting when I bought them, minus the anomaly, but we'll get to that.

From left to right on the top row we have Paddington, a kids film that I went to see in cinemas on a whim, and fell in love with. A film that we went to see because Transformers 4 was getting poor reviews; Planet of the Apes, no regrets there. Edge of Tomorrow, a film I bought on blu-ray on a whim, again, no regrets, it's awesome. Godzilla, I feel I don't need to explain. Guardians of the Galaxy, as someone who isn't really fussed about the Marvel movies, I bought this on a whim, you'll be seeing that word a lot; whim. Halo Nightfall, I like Halo, but oddly I hadn't seen Halo Nightfall, probably because Halo Channel and Halo Network both suck and I couldn't watch it, or play MCC online, or Halo 4 campaign, or Halo 5 beta, hey 343 Industries, fuck you. Here are 2 of the new ones, Inception, my personal favourite Nolan film, and Man of Steel, because I guess I'm one of the weirdo's that thinks it's an alright film. On the second  row we have another new one, Mission Impossible 3, since I plan to get all of them on Blu-ray after really liking Rogue Nation, I'm no 3/5's of the way there, another one I bought on a whim when I saw it really. My first Bly-ray, Pacific Rim, it has a story behind it, but I'd rather not talk about it. Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, an anomaly for sure, and looking back, I don't really know why I bought it, not that it's a bad film. Less anomalous, we have Skyfall, a film that is just awesome. Source Code, you may not have heard of Source Code, and if I told you what it was about you'd probably lose interest, but it really is worth watching. The J.J. Abrams Star Treks, 2 films I love, and I'm not all that much for Star Trek, it's just that these movies are cool as shit. And of course, The Dark Knight, my second favourite Nolan film, funnily enough though, this was bought on a whim at a car boot, I was going to get it o Blu-ray anyway, but I didn't expect to get it on a car bot.

Another pair of films I think are alright, The Amazing Spiderman 1 and 2. My film studies teacher won't be surprised that I got 3:10 to Yuma on Blu-ray, not only did I  like it more than the original, I fell in love with it. Kingsman, a film that had the misfortune of coming out in the same week as Fifty Shades of Dogshit, yet still kicked ass at the box office, pun intended. Oculus, a film I haven't actually watched, but to get the 5 for £30 deal on Blu-rays, you need 5 Blu-rays, Oculus it is. Olympus Has Fallen, a film me and a friend watched only recently, and after joking about the bad CGI a lot, we did genuinely enjoy the film. the 2 last new ones, Mission Impossible 1 and 2, it's been so long, last time I saw either of them it was on VHS. Pan's Labyrinth, it's Guillermo del Toro, so yeah, I think it's cool. Run All Night, while not a masterpiece, read my review, it's still a fun movie. Under The Skin, one day me and my friends are going to join forces and, just like with Fight Club, analyse the shit out of it, that reminds me, Fight Club. And finally, the Cornetto trilogy, 3 films that are just awesome, while Shaun of the Dead hasn't aged terribly well in my opinion, there's of course Hot Fuzz, an finally The World's End, everyone else in my family thinks it's crap, and I may not be any kind of Arbiter of films, but they are wrong, objectively wrong, The World's End is in fact my favourite of the trilogy.

rocky doom and sexy lions

Here I bringeth more from the library of photos, here we have another photo of the lionesses, this time cropped, a flowering plant I don't know the name of that I found on the coastal, another from the coastal, of something I never expected to see in dense forest on top of a cliff, but it looked cool, and finally a photo I got from Caldey island that I really like, a much as I wanted to know what was on the other side, I didn't want to try my luck with the tide coming in and a bad storm on it's way, but I do like this photo.

Mission Impossible Rogue Nation movie review

Here's what you need to know; Ethan Hunt and his fellow IMF agents are out of the job after the IMF is dissolved, but Hunt, unwilling to let business be unfinished, goes on a rogue mission to hunt down and expose the Syndicate, a secret organisation who's existence is denied by the CAI, but who Hunt thinks is responsible for a long list of unfortunately influential disasters.

There's a lot of things about Rogue Nation that I really like, let's start with the cast, everyone does a really good job in their roles, Tom Cruise is awesome as Hunt, Simon Pegg of course is cool as Benji, Rebecca Ferguson is a badass in this film, Jeremy Renner does a good job, as does Alec Baldwin. Something this film does really well is the friendship these characters have with one another. Also, Simon Pegg is hilarious in the film, but at the same time he gives a surprisingly dramatic performance, there is one scene near the end of the film with Simon Pegg that reminded me of the pool scene from episode 3 of Sherlock, it was very tense. This movie in general has some tense moments, one in particular; an underwater sequence had me holding my breath, I would certainly have drowned, in addition to that there is a tense scene at the Opera near the start of the film, which I really liked, and it allowed for some funny dialogue between Cruise and Pegg. Did I mention this film has funny dialogue, because it does, not only does that make it a very fun watch on addition to the action, but it builds the relationship between the characters in a very believable and amusing way. Rogue Nation has a much more prominent focus on espionage than action, it being a spy film, that's something I like, but a spy film would be crap if the story wasn't interesting, fortunately it is, I wanted to know more about this Syndicate and their ghostly leader, though I personally think the film would have been more interesting if the existence of the Syndicate was less obvious, making the answer to 'does the Syndicate exist?' more nebulous would have made Renner's and Baldwin's side of the story more interesting, since Baldwin doesn't believe in the Syndicate.

Rogue Nation is a spy film, so you'd expect some spy stuff, gadgets, espionage, etc. Ferguson's connection to the Syndicate is an interesting part of the story, as you never really know where her loyalty lies, Alec Baldwin's hunt for Hunt starts off really interesting, but it kind of drops off not long into the film, I suppose that's a good thing, since it probably would have bloated the film, what we're meant to care about is Ethan Hunt's mission to expose the Syndicate. The film has some cool scenes with the spy theme, example; the underwater scene. But this film isn't just a spy film, it's an action film, and it's a good one, Tom Cruise hangs onto a plane in this film, god damn. Rogue Nation is peppered with some really cool action scenes, some fun hand to hand combat, an insane car chase, while the film doesn't really end with an action scene, the smattering of shootouts and an awesome knife fight at the end was fun to watch. More on this car chase though, not only is it one of the funniest parts of the film, but it's just awesome to watch, as they race through the streets and bad guys on bikes are shooting them and shooting Ferguson and Cruise is taking out the guys on bikes, the car chase turns into a bike chase, and while I prefer the car chase, the bike chase was still awesome to watch. My only problem with the action is during the car chase Cruise reverses the car over a gap and lands in a car park, but rather than stopping like a car would, their car keeps going, doing about a dozen flips across the car park before stopping, it really was stupid, and it didn't look very good. While we're on criticism I need to talk about the villain, played by Sean Harris. He was a very serviceable villain, he does bad things like a villain does and he does look like he has a few screws loose, he reminds me in some ways of Moriarty or Magnussen from Sherlock, or Silva from Skyfall, but he doesn't get under your skin as much as Moriarty or Magnussen and he lacks the drive or spine chilling charm of Silva. He is aslo not very present in the film, and this wouldn't be a problem if he made any discernable impact, but other than being a little creepy, he doesn't make an impact, I would have to say he's the weakest part of the film.

But when the biggest criticisms you have is a serviceable but not incredible villain and a physics defying car wreck, you know what you have is a good movie. The cast, particularly Rebecca Ferguson and Simon Pegg do a great job, the film has some great spy sequences and some awesome action sequences, funny comedy and an engaging and interesting story with fun and likable characters, I did enjoy Rogue Nation a lot, and I would recommend it.

And now, some idiocy.
*the kid who sat next to me during Jurassic World talked less than these dicks behind us, at random times in the film they would literally make funny noises and laugh for no reason, and by funny noises I actually mean like buzzing and humming, and at one point one of them had what sounded like an asthma attack, then it was back to the stupid noises. and if that wasn't bad enough, they got louder during the quieter moments of the film, so, obnoxious pricks in the screening of Rogue Nation I was lucky enough to share with you, I fucking hate you.
*This one is more stupid, they showed a trailer for Vacation, and in the trailer there is a bit where the family go swimming in a pool in the woods, as the camera zooms out to reveal a sign reading human waste, to be fair I'd have laughed at that when I was 5, haha, poo poo, but how is that funny? apparently I didn't get the joke, because everyone in the screening started laughing at that, including my Dad, that's it; he calls The World's End a piece of shit, he laughs at people swimming in shit, I've given up all faith in him, and in humanity for that matter, I may not be the sole arbiter of comedy, only a fool would claim he is, but that isn't funny, that is the absolute bottom level of comedy, haha poo poo, Humanity is fucked if that is funny.

A weird day

So today was a weird day. Today we had to rescue a fish, god that is a funny thing to type. I spotted one of the loaches in Dad's fish tank in a funny position and not moving, on closer inspection he was moving, the moron had got himself stuck in a log. What ensued was a daring rescue effort to save the stricken fish. It began with my Dad, the fool that he is, trying to push and pull the fish out, obviously he stopped that fairly quickly and tried a new tactic. We brought in the heavy equipment, a steak knife, and tried to cut through the log, the steak knife failed, so we went for a new tactic, at this point the fish was thrashing in the log. We ended up sawing the log with a saw, prying it open with a screwdriver, and he was free, it was an extreme tactic, but he got out in the end, and he is still alive, albeit pretty badly hurt from the thrashing, and with a big mark on his back where the skin's been damaged, just thank the lord he's actually alive. so today was an unusual day, but we saved a fish, so all's good.

Doctor Who series 1 The Long Game review

Here's what you need to know; the Doctor, Rose and Adam travel to the distant future and land aboard Satellite 5, a city sized news broadcasting station broadcasting all over the Human empire, but something is wrong, and mysterious goings on seem to be happening upstairs that the Doctor becomes determined to uncover.

At least this episode doesn't try as hard as The End of the world to shock the audience. Though this episode is a much more on the mystery; what exactly is going on up on floor 500? And that is indeed interesting, as is the idea of not asking questions, which is admittedly a fascinating idea to me, as the implications of it, as seen in this episode, are actually really scary, and is something I actually really like in this episode. Something else I really like is Simon Pegg, who's plays the kind of villain of the episode, maybe it's just because I love every film I've watched that has Simon Pegg in it, but he plays a fun character, and it looked like he had fun in the role, he too is really interesting, as it looks at first like he is the one pulling the strings. What is actually pulling the strings I have mixed feelings on though, it's an awesome idea that gets somewhat tarnished by the big reveal near the end, especially given how bizarre the villain actually looks, it's kind of dumb, and he only speaks in growls and roars, which is also kind of dumb. And, to be honest, coming off of Dalek, where the bad guy was a Dalek, the real bad guy in this episode is poor. The technology used aboard Satellite 5 is kind of cool, with people with microchips in their heads, literal doors in their heads that expose their brains and allow compressed knowledge to stream through, it's a creative use of the human brain really. A returning character from Dalek, Adam is also something I have mixed feelings on. On one hand, I think I understand why he goes about doing what he does in this episode, but on the other hand, why would you want a literal door in your head that exposes your brain? his motivations are very human, but they aren't very relatable, and you end up with the same idea of him that the Doctor does. There's little to say about the 2 mains, since not a lot is done with them in this episode, leaving the supporting characters, speared headed of course by Simon Pegg, but then there's Adam, and a journalist whose name I don't even remember, which is either down to her weird name or her only discernable character trait being bitchy and jealous, and possibly smart enough to start asking questions, with a little prodding from the Doctor.

The spine of this episode's story is brilliant, I really like the idea of people not asking questions and how dangerous that can be, but the rest of the episode teeters between cool, and fun but forgettable, with little development of character, a disappointing reveal near the end, I can say I thought Simon Pegg played a fun character. Coming off Dalek, this episode is a bit underwhelming, while not a down right bad episode, it's a step down overall from the bar the series has already set for itself.

Thunderbirds Are Go Slingshot review

Here's what you need to know; Thunderbird 3 is called into action when an asteroid mining machine and it's lone operator end up on a collision course with the sun, but things go very wrong when Thunderbird 3 is hit by a solar flare, leaving Alan and Kayo isolated and soon to share the same fate as the asteroid mine.

This episode bears a strong resemblance to the episode Sun Probe from the original series, though with some slight differences, enough to be less blatant than Fireflash. What I like about this episode is that it goes in a different direction without trying too hard to homage the original. This time Ned and his plant are barrelling towards the sun on a giant rock, far from the scenario of Sun Probe. However, something Sun Probe did miles better was tension, and in this episode, a more prominent sense of tension would have made it much more enjoyable. Slingshot has plenty of Thunderbird 3 in it, and while it's less involved than Space Race, it's still cool to see Thunderbird 3 doing stuff. Slingshot has some fun sciency stuff thrown in, as Alan and Kayo are forced to get creative to escape and return to Earth. This episode tries to get serious with the characters, but as usual it isn't all that interesting, especially given that Ned and his plant aren't very pleasant to Alan and Kayo, making the attempt at emotion far from heart wrenching, this is made worse by the disappointing absence of any serious tension. Still, this episode has some fun moments, some sciency stuff, and from a story perspective it isn't dumb, it is certainly as smart the best of this new series, if maybe a little preachy in the same way as Unplugged, something I didn't like in that episode, and didn't like here either. So while Slingshot is a good episode to watch, and has some fun in it, all in all I'd actually call this episode forgettable, not disappointing, just fun to watch but not going to make any sort of impact on you, and that maybe unfair, it being a show for children, but this episode could have been better. At least I can't fault it for being fun and sciency.

more frightfully interesting

if it isn't obvious, I like Five Nights at Freddy's quite a bit, in addition to being a very unique and fun horror game, it's fascinating in it's subtle story telling and deep lore, but that's not why we're here today, I used a picture of Bonnie because he's a brilliant example of an idea I had. This is Bonnie as he appears in FNAF4, and his new look includes several rows of long, sharp teeth, glowing eyes and long, needle like claws. In a previous post I argued that some behaviours and emotions are evolutionary, focusing on fear. Spiders are a good example, and so is the dark; something that I am scared of myself, but I think there are certain things humans fear that are evolutionary. Bonnie has sharp teeth and long claws, these are things that are pretty standard on monsters, but why is that? Think back a few thousand years, put yourself in the situation that you are out hunting for food, now think what has long claws and sharp teeth; predators, animals that are bigger and meaner than us and that have these characteristics, that could be why so many monsters today have these characteristics, because these are the characteristics of a predator. In the dark there maybe hiding predators which is a possible reason for humans being scared of the dark, and spiders are venomous, these fears could have evolved to keep us safe from these animals. what's more crucial with Bonnie here is that in FNAF4 he and the other animatronics are hallucinations, the nightmares of a traumatised child, which maybe be the reason they look so monstrous, and why they now have these predatory characteristics, the scared kid's nightmares are only limited by his imagination. Ever noticed that? say you're watching a horror film, and something happens off screen, you don't see it, so your mind starts going nuts, concocting the most terrifying possibility that is could possibly be, you've heard people say they thought it would be scarier than it was, but that's because they imagined something far fouler than what the monster in the film actually was. It's possible that this is evolution too; you're out hunting and suddenly you hear a noise behind you, you can't see it, so you're brain processes all the possibilities. At that point there are 2 options; fight or flight, this is something that still exists in us, and it's from a time where we weren't top of the food chain and the decision to fight or flee might have meant life or death.

Not entirely sure, but this might not be the last of these posts, there's a lot of scary things in the world, hell, I could write a dozen of these of FNAF alone, but there's so much more overthinking to be done and of all the emotions humans feel, by far the most interesting is fear. but for now, so far humans associate predatory characteristics to scary monsters because of thousands of years of human nature and a need to survive, and this is aided by our overdrive brains dreaming up terrible things in the absence of information, or as a result of trauma, fear is fascinating.

trees that glow

A few evenings ago I was out with the dog and the sun was setting, the fiery orange light was shining through the trees, and it looked awesome, so, naturally, I got some photos. This is another random post, but I thought this was cool, so here you go.

Good news: I didn't fail

I got my A level results, and I didn't fail, which is good, my actual results aren't so good though. What doesn't surprise me is that I got good results in practical but bombed in the exams, no offence to my media and film teacher, but in film and media what I cared about was nuts and bolts; technique, language, technology, history, not representation of women and Arabs. In all honesty I just don't think the 'potentially harmful' messages in TV and film matter nearly as much as the art of film making AKA what I cared about, what I wanted to learn about. As for photography, an E, seriously? Did I not do enough research and editing, in photography, did I focus too much on photography, in photography, sod off you snobs. I could rant about the stupidity of photography for hours, but it would bore the shit out of you. I expected these for the most part, especially the bombing in the exams and photography being fucked and stupid.

In more interesting happenings, I don't talk much about my writing, but for the past few weeks I've been writing down ideas for a trilogy of sci fi action movies based on a series of English creative writing and film projects from high school, while I'm not going into detail here, people who know me know the name of this series, it has seen countless redrafts and reboots, and up until now has amounted to about 15 minutes of video and a 10'000 word series of short stories, not a lot for an idea I've had for about 7 years. What I like about the newest version is, for starters, it's a complete story, and the smartest draft I've ever written, dealing with topics I again won't go into detail on. I maintain secrecy on my film projects, sorry. What I will be open about is it's a trilogy, and the second one is shit, I think it's weak and lacks any kind of self contained story, something it really needs to save it from sequelitis, so I'm going back to 2 and redoing, and don't worry about continuity, I already know what I'm going to change. When it's done I'm going to write up all 3 films as feature length scripts. Finally something interesting is happening with one of my favourite ideas that I've had. As for new ideas, I have a new idea for a post apocalypse film and a new idea for a horror film based on Five Nights at Freddy's; I know they're already making a movie, but I have fun writing movies and I had a blast playing FNAF, and given all the theories about what it all meant, maybe it would be interesting.

In conclusion, I got my results, they're expected, they don't all suck, but photography sucks, I mean the grade and the subject. And I've got my brain cooking 5 movies for the sake of it, and one of them is a FNAF movie, for the sake of it, I am a boring person.

Run All Night movie review

Here's what you need to know; Jimmy is an ex mob enforcer who is now a dead beat old drunk haunted by the countless mistakes of his past, but on one very unfortunate night, he gets a last chance of redemption when his former boss and long time best friend Shawn brings down the full, vengeful force of the mob on Jimmy and his son.

I don't do many movie reviews on this blog, which bothers me, and I just got this film on Blu ray, so here we go.

Something this film does really well in it's opening act is establish the characters as characters with history, there is a believable friendship between Liam Neeson's Jimmy and Ed Harris' Shawn, and Neeson sells the man with nothing left in his life but regret in a tragically convincing way. Like wise Joel Kinnaman does a decent job as the man trying to escape the sins of his father and protect his family from the truth, these characters feel like people, which is something that is very good for the film, as these are people you can understand, you can get behind. Something else this film does is what I call guitar string tension, when not a lot is actually happening but you know it's coming, whatever it is, and the tension just winds up tighter and tighter until it finally snaps and shit hits the fan. this happens a couple of times in the film, and the film as a whole has a very tense feeling to it that rarely lets up. What also rarely lets up is the pace, this is a film that doesn't stop, While I do like this pace, I do have questions about some of the film's direction. In Run All Night the camera sometimes pauses and literally flies across the city to a different character, while this is something I personally haven't seen in a film before, it's also something I personally don't much care for. The film also sometimes has these weird out of place shots of New York, showing things like passing police cars and cabs and homeless people sleeping rough. neither of these are particularly frequent in the film, but they're something that's a bit of a head scratcher when they happen.

Run All Night has some fun action scenes, while it starts off with a not so amazing car chase, there is an awesome fight in an apartment building, and an awesome shootout in a forest near the end of the film, which has 1 shot in it that I love, I don't usually love individual shots, but this shot is awesome, and I love shots like it. The film's 2 biggest fight scenes, the Apartment fight and the forest Shootout, are really fun to watch, both of which do however involve a character I have mixed feelings on; a hitman played by Common. What I like I his cold, remorseless nature, stabbing a cop in the neck with no shits given, he's like a machine, that is also something I am not a huge fan of, the emotionless, hyper efficient hitman isn't something that this film really needed, and while he is certainly fun to watch in action, he has weird almost sci fi equipment, for example a night vision eye piece that looks like an eye piece from a Ghost Recon or something. It may not be too ludicrous, but it is odd. his distracting resemblance to the T800 aside, the fights are really fun to watch. Supporting characters are bearable, but forgettable for the most part. Vincent D'onofrio plays an antagonistic cop who is a serviceable addition to the line up, unlike in Jurassic World, where I couldn't stand him. And Boyd Holbrook gives a very un-nerving performance as Shawn's unstable drug addicted son. Kinnaman's family on the other hand are forgettable, and feel more like plot devices than characters, they don't really add anything to the film, especially in a film with people like Ed Harris and Liam Neeson.

Though some people may joke that this is just Taken 9, this is actually an enjoyable movie to watch. it's not brilliant, it has mostly forgettable side characters and some odd choices with cinematography and editing, it has very good main characters that are well established, some fun action scenes, a nonstop pace and excellent tension, it's not the smartest crime film ever, but it's not trying to be, it is what it is, which is a very enjoyable crime thriller that I do say is worth taking a look at.

Sci fi Legends: Doctor Who series 1 Dalek

Lets start with what a Dalek actually is, because there's more going on than simply a giant brass shuttlecock. Daleks come from the planet Skaro, and are the survivors of vicious war and mutation caused from radiation. Daleks were engineered to be the most hateful and remorseless killing machines in existence and encased in battle armour, in addition to armour, Daleks are armed with devastating energy weapons and genius level intelligence, the perfect soldier. Daleks are hateful, as the Doctor said, "anything different is wrong," the Daleks honestly believe that any living thing that isn't Dalek is inferior and the universe should be cleansed of these inferior life forms, and it's this hatred that drives their conquest. Go back to my Legends post about Godzilla where I claimed Godzilla is a metaphor, I could also argue that Daleks are a metaphor; think about it, they are hateful, believe the universe should be cleansed of anything that is inferior to them, and have advanced weapons and technology and a mighty army. I think the Daleks are a metaphor for Nazi Germany, who also had a believe that the world should be cleansed of inferior creatures, and had a mighty army and advanced technology, and a hatred for things that don't align with their master plan.

 

Spoilers ahead for Dalek.

What's special about the Dalek in Dalek is he is mutating. At the start of the episode he is chained up and very badly damaged, but at this point his perfectly engineered genes are uncontaminated, he is pure. When Rose touches him he extrapolates her genetic material and is able to regenerate himself. While this brings him back to life effectively, it has a very dire effect. He begins to mutate, he loses his remorseless urge to kill, failing to kill Rose, which results in the Dalek questioning why he can't kill her, and why he is changing. The episode ends with the Dalek deciding that his cause is no longer worth fighting for, calling his condition a sickness, and ultimately chooses to commit suicide, not wanting to be "like you" as he says to Rose. While the Dalek still felt the hatred of inferior life forms, his hatred of them drove his decision to die. What's really interesting in this episode is while the Dalek was becoming less Dalek, the Doctor was oddly becoming more Dalek. "The Daleks have failed, why don't you finish the job, and make the Daleks extinct, rid the universe of your filth, why don't you just die!" I love that line, but what's important in there is "rid the universe of your filth" Key word is Filth. It's ironic that while the Dalek mutates and becomes less remorseless and hateful, the Doctor goes in the opposite direction, becoming more remorseless and hateful, and letting that hatred consume him, to the point that he effectively becomes a Dalek himself. You can see this in the very first meeting of the Doctor and the Dalek, when he tries to kill it, the Dalek begs for pity and the Doctor refuses, continuing to torture it. At the very end when the Dalek is exposed and powerless, the Doctor still points the blaster at it, unable to control his hatred. This role reversal is one of the things I love most about the episode, as it explores an interesting part of the Doctor's character, and it's a fascinating grey area the creators of Doctor Who didn't need to explore. And they do end up showing the Dalek sympathetically, but it works, because you understand why the Dalek has made the decisions he has made, same with the Doctor.

 

I overthink things a lot, but I like overthinking things, it's how I think, and I love a good bit of food for the overthinking. This episode of Doctor who gives a good amount of food, in addition to being a  great piece of entertainment. I love the role reversal of the Doctor and the Dalek, as it means that Doctor Who isn't black and white, and good story telling is never black and white.