Great news citizens of Hawkins, Indiana! Stranger Things will return to Netflix for Season 3!
Not sure of an official release date yet, but its great to know Mike, Dustin, Eleven, Lucas, Will and even newbie Max will be back to save us from what still remains in the upside down….
Goosebumps guys….goosebumps.
The trailer for Avengers: Infinity War is out if for some reason you haven’t seen it yet and it is awesome!
We all know my track record with Avenger films but this actually looks so tantalising and seemingly a fitting conclusion to the colossal series of the Avengers. Loving Cap’s new hair too 😉
See you May 2018 guys!
Starring: Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot, Henry Cavill, Jason Momoa, Ezra Miller, Ray Fisher, Jeremy Irons
Director: Zack Snyder
Running Time: 120mins
Cert: 12A
Rating: 6/10
It’s finally here! The Justice League is upon us and before we get into this, straight off the bat…its good. It’s not Winter Soldier (is anything?) good and nowhere near Dark Knight good but its good!
Its better than Man of Steel and most definitely better than Batman vs Superman (although that isn’t hard to do) and establishes itself as the new-ish direction of the DCEU.
While the dialogue is lacking, the story a little weak and the SFX still on the questionable side; JL makes up for in cool fight scenes, much needed humour and a pace that is much more desirable than its predecessors.
Justice League picks up where Batman vs Superman left off, with Bruce Wayne intent on putting together a team of gifted individuals to face an imminent threat; triggered by the death of Superman. Fueled by his renewed faith in humanity, Bruce sets out into various styles of recruitment to get a team together.
First up is Arthur Curry aka Aquaman – they like to put ‘The’ in front of Batman and Aquaman but I’m completely against this – the reluctant and isolated lone wolf living in the farthest reaches of Iceland. Here, he helps locals with their fish intake since fishing boats haven’t been able to get through in some time. After some light banter and mockery, Arthur establishes that he has no connection to this or any other problem and won’t be taking part in the festivities. When the threat is inevitably brought to his immediate attention – get ready ladies, this underwater scene with wife-to-be Mera is all kinds of PHWOAR – he decides to join the team.
In my heavily biased Jason Momoa loving opinion, there are not nearly enough Aquaman scenes. Considering his strength and speed and impressive skills with a quindent, you’d think he’d be used a bit more. Saying that, i appreciated the fact that there wasn’t an abundance of unnecessary water just so it would give him something to do. If they were suddenly fighting out at sea, id be looking for the bullshit.
Next up is Flash aka Barry Allen. Now, for the comic book aficionados no origin story is needed but in my case, I was a bit confused about Flash, where he came from and what he’s about. While I enjoyed his character immensely and he provided a sense of humour and humanity where the other heroes are somewhat lacking; I personally would’ve like to know the backstory with the father. Feel free to let me know whats up with that in the comments!
Flash is by no means the breakout star of the show but he definitely provides the Marvel-esque frivolity and lightheartedness that is seemingly making the MCU a success.
Now, Cyborg aka Victor Stone is a leaguer I know virtually nothing about outside of Teen Titans! Same issue with the origin story above would’ve liked more understanding but generally, he’s a viable member of the team. His intelligence and tech-savvy are all pivotal to the success of the mission and his broodiness is up there with Batman levels in his hay day.
Wonder Woman is doing it for the girls once again! Diana Prince is truly a force to be reckoned with both physically and mentally. She provides the heart of the team for sure but her growth from a naive, trigger-happy apprentice to a seasoned warrior and leader was great to see. I thoroughly enjoyed the inclusion of the Amazons again but would’ve liked them to be as badass as they were in Wonder Woman.
The newly beefed-up Ben Affleck makes his third outing as Batman/Bruce Wayne and I for one am loving it. While I am not a huge Affleck fan, I can appreciate the maturity that he has brought to the role. His mortality is made apparent throughout as well as his change in ideals, fuelled by the selfless act of Superman. Why he believes that he isn’t any better than Superman just because Superman made himself a celebrity/God while saving people is beyond me. Where his beef with Superman in BvS was completely unjustified; so it seems is his adulation of him now. The constant reiteration that they need Superman in order to win is ridiculous. Yes, I know he’s the strongest and the fastest etc etc but in this film arc, he’s also a bit of a dickhead. His self-righteousness really rubs me up the wrong way and relying on him to save the day, undermines the efforts of everyone involved who in my opinion did a whole lot more.
Outside of the characters, as mentioned above the pace of the film is much appreciated as I didn’t find myself thinking why I had been watching this for so long. On the flipside of that, however, is that it’s not very coherent; what with the constant jumps from the team to random meant-to-be-emotional-but-i-don’t-actually-care-about-her shots of Lois Lane.
Additionally, what the hell was going on with Superman’s face? Why so heavy on the CGI as though Mr Cavill’s jaw isn’t chiselled enough as it is! The dialogue was very basic with all the really entertaining lines reserved for Flash. The villain and by extension the story wasn’t very strong and I didn’t find him imposing enough. Considering how long they harped on about how dangerous he was; he was defeated fairly easily and admittedly I don’t think the JL did enough to keep the Mother Boxes away from him. And that’s another thing: wtf is a Mother Box?! It’s just not as catchy as Infinity Stone is it?
Despite the above though, I did not hate it.
I loved the costumes, I loved the fight scenes; I loved Bruce Wayne in all his Silver Fox splendour as well as the building relationships between the heroes (the first end credits scene being a testament to this).
Make sure to stay behind for the last end credit scene.
STARRING: Sonequa Martin-Green, Michelle Yeoh, Jason Isaacs
Today was the Netflix release of Star Trek: Discovery, the newest Star Trek series since Enterprise in 2005.
This series revolves around the Commander Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green), an intelligent and head strong young human woman who has been raised by Vulcans after her family were killed by Klingons. When their ship – USS Shenzhou – captained by Captain Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) comes across an unknown object floating around in space; Commander Burnham volunteers to go and see what it is.
What she discovers – see what I did there – is the presence of Klingons who in this setting haven’t been seen in over a century. The first two episodes are then a battle of wills between Burnham and Captain Georgiou who differ on how to deal with the possible threat of the warrior race.
This all sets up for an exciting opening episode but for me, I was lost for a while in how much Burnham annoyed me! It’s the same annoyance that one feels for Mr Spock and his supreme intelligence and sense of superiority. However, because I was so annoyed by her only went to prove how well she’d embodied the characteristics of Vulcans.
The appearance of another familiar race – the Klingons – is done well as they feature heavily in the episodes as does their language. Their guttural language reminds me a lot of Dothraki but that’s neither here nor there; I’m sure George R.R. Martin got his inspiration from somewhere! Their leader’s drive for unification amongst their race against what they view as a common enemy is definitely relevant to current events. Whether this was intentional remains to be seen but it doesn’t go unnoticed, especially within the inclusion of such a diverse cast.
An African- American woman as the protagonist of a sci-fi series is virtually unheard of but can definitely work. Martin-Green does well enough in the role for me to continue watching it.
My only negative with the show is the effects. While it is set roughly ten years prior to the original Star Trek series – I’m talking Captain Kirk original here people – it looks slightly dated. I realise this may be keeping in line with the original but watching with 2017 eyes makes me a bit picky. I’m used to Apple HD level viewing; felt like I was watching through SnapChat on an Android 😉
Either way, I’ll be watching this and see if it brings any surprises along the way.
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