Well, the film has now opened the Cannes Film Festival – a feat in itself to be asked, and the first animated film to do so – and the first verdicts on Up are coming through. And the word is good. Very good indeed. The Hollywood Reporter is singing from the same song sheet, calling Up a “wonderful big picture”, noting that it’s “winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever” and “Chaplin-esque”....
As was pointed out in the comments on my last FlashForward review, having got this far I’m now duty-bound to follow this series to its inevitable bitter end. In an effort to make it a less painful experience I’ve taken to consuming multiple alcoholic beverages beforehand and this is helping me find the inner core of this show. It’s also one where the production team seem to have been told that they’ve got at least three seasons, possibly more, to progress the bigger story arc....
To me, Fringe is a conundrum wrapped in a mystery disguised as a mirage. Because, if I break down the components, it sounds like the plot for an especially obtuse episode of Futurama. But after the majority of two seasons, I’ve really warmed to its slightly moody personal and melancholy manner. I’ve stopped thinking about the similarities between it and The X Files, and just enjoy where they decide to take us emotionally each week....
This review contains spoilers. Just when you think the first clash of kings promised in the book of the same name is coming, something just has to get in the way. While the Starks and Lannisters war for the North and Greyjoy of the Iron Islands prepares his assault on Winterfell, Baratheon and Baratheon ends up being something of a dud. It’s hard for brother to fight brother when one brother ends up dead, a giant Tilda Swinton-alike bodyguard ends up on the run, and the Baratheon bannermen switching teams....
After four exemplary and expensive seasons, we’ve come to expect great things from HBO’s flagship as a matter of course. Impressive world-building, seamless special effects, forensically choreographed action, scares, laughs, pathos… The season five opener has it all, exactly as anticipated. Now though, the show is telling us that it’s time to stop taking all that accomplishment for granted. The Wars To Come arrives to shake us out of viewer-complacency and remind us that Game Of Thrones is finite and moving towards an endgame, whatever’s said in the press about ten-year plans, prequels and spin-offs....
When Standard Issue was founded in September 2014, it came from a place of concern about gender inequality and about how so much of the mainstream media panders to such a narrow definition of women, which is not just detrimental but dangerous to women. Research suggests that, while reasons for suicide in men are complex, a so-called ‘gold standard’ of masculinity, which values power, control and invincibility, played a massive part....
Good Kill isn’t a science fiction film, but its premise could easily come from a dystopian novel – or a darkly prophetic story by Philip K Dick. Egan works in one of dozens of windowless, air-conditioned units parked on an air base outside Las Vegas, where old fighter jets are parked up, no longer used. Egan once flew them himself; now, he’s a bird of prey with his wings clipped, sitting in a chair and zapping enemies with his joystick from the comfort of an office chair....
Gotham Season 2, Episode 13 Another day, another Arkham break-in. Tonight’s Gothamwas a bit of a snooze after the solid midseason premiere, but what the relationship drama between Victor and Nora and Jim and Lee lacked, the psychological intrigues of Dr. Strange and Ms. Peabody more than made up for… Rather than let Victor freeze her, Nora switched out the working formula for the freeze gun at the last minute. Her logic?...
Gotham Season 3, Episode 2 After a promising season three premiere, Gothamtakes some missteps with “Burn the Witch,” proof that it’s a lot easier to introduce intriguing new plot and character arcs than it is to follow-through on them. Gotham is still on the hunt for Fish. The main plot in “Burn the Witch” focuses around Gotham’s continued hunt for Fish, and Fish’s continued search for Hugo Strange and a cure for her condition....
4.17 Hibernaculum In the most part I’m referring to a scene where Nick, Hank, Monroe and Wu accidentally wake a pile of hibernating snake people, dressed only in their skivvies. They are then chased by the angry horde and trapped in a barn, a la a PG version of The Walking Dead. It was just… weird. The Wesen in the spotlight this week are Varme Tyv (“heat thief”), cold-blooded creatures that need human heat to survive....
4.8 Chupacabra There was the obligatory Wesen storyline involving the Chupacabra (or ‘goat-sucker’), a South American creature known for attacking and drinking the blood of livestock. In all honestly, the Chupacabra is only interesting really for two reasons: the beast on a killing spree in Portland is the result of an infection, rather than a malevolent nature, which is something we haven’t see before; also it’s while fighting the Chupacabra that Nick is finally forced to reveal the truth about Wesen to Wu....
6.13 The End Along with the obvious monsters and myths, there are some themes that have always run through the series, such as family, and in particular, strong women. The final episode was no different, and when Nick is in danger of making a very bad decision, it is the women in his life who step in to show him the way, and ultimately ensuring that goods wins out over evil....
Rose-tinted glasses can really be misleading. All those watery-eyed memories of your digitized halcyon days, when multiplayer games required all participants to be present, you didn’t pay for extra content, developers laughed while crafting their sadistic masterpieces, and shooters didn’t have ADS, can make you really nostalgic for the old games. Unfortunately, our next-gen eyes aren’t trained to see past the flaws of the days gone. Thankfully, 343 realized this when crafting The Master Chief Collection – the single greatest piece of fan service ever crafted by a video game developer....
Introducing the scene, Del Toro assured us that it was far from finished, with a poor sound mix and unfinished effects. Even so, what we saw was pretty spectacular. Following a (literally) explosive argument between HB and Liz, the couple are investigating a seemingly abandoned building with the help of their demon ally, Abe Sapien. As HB makes matters worse with Liz by way of miscommunication on his radio, the group are attacked by a swarm of ‘Tooth Fairies’....
In places the ‘Dual’ story is so dumb it made Plan 9 From Outer Space look like a Discovery Channel special on NASA. They don’t. There are three plot lines; Pinehhearst, The Company building and Suresh’s old lab (previously Isaac’s studio). What goes on in each of them is almost entirely unrelated, and often unrelated to the previous scene with that same location. At Pinehearst, it’s the aftermath of Arthur’s death where the Petrelli brothers aren’t getting on well....
The episode begins with a return to the world of Matt Parkman, who has been oddly absent for the last few episodes. In that time, apparently, Sylar has discovered that he can temporarily take control of Matt’s body. So far, so Fight Club. Matt only realises this when he wakes up to find his wife in a post-coital state of gratitude with no memory of having given her anything to be happy about....
Why can’t all marriages be like the Underwoods? Why can’t the average American husband watch a little porn, and then excitedly tell his wife about getting walked in on and get nothing but a laugh in return? I want that kind of love. Episode 10 of House of Cards Season 2 wants us to focus on big events like a bombing attempt outside the Underwood residence or the Wall Street Telegraph’s continued investigation into Raymond Tusk, but the scenes that have the biggest impact are the smaller, more intimate ones, like Frank and Claire’s pillow talk....
“Judging from the summer’s record-breaking box-office grosses,” one writer moaned, “audiences no longer care – or, more depressing, are incapable of detecting – that the plots of movies don’t track.” All the same, it’s taken an unusually long time for modern master of disaster Roland Emmerich to bring us a sequel to his 90s invasion opus. Independence Day hails from a bygone age of high-concept movies – a period when smashing up a city in glorious slow-motion still seemed like a vaguely new idea....
What can people expect from the show? Everybody knows the story of Galileo being persecuted and disbelieved, but the stories that we start with in the first episode are of the three fathers of rocket science, who are still very obscure figures. We wanted to bring those people in to the public consciousness, while at the same time making an entertainment programme. The second episode, we go into Wernher von Braun and John Whiteside Parsons, Satanist and Nazi, so it kind of writes itself....
