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At its heart, Doctor Who is a serial, and the standalone episodes this season have been by far the highlight. ‘Rosa’, the first with the Doctor back at full strength, has much of the feel of a 50s period piece as well as a sci-fi, and isn’t afraid to tackle heavy issues of race, through […]
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It’s not easy to produce a convincing Macbeth; what is simply breath-taking on the printed page may well come across on stage as simply breathless. Beginning with a semi-prologue that barely lasts a page and a half, I can’t help but always feel jolted into the play. The reading eye can pass over the suddenness […]
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Image: ‘The Muppet Christmas Carol’ Miss Piggy, Kermit the Frog © 1992 Jim Henson Productions Image Credit: Stephen F. Morley Christmas, that yuletide day of excessive eating approaches. With that in mind, I feel it’s essential to look back at some impressive Christmas dinner moments in cinema. Whether decadent or modest, the following examples are […]
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It’s almost Christmas, and you all know what that means. Time to grab a blanket, make some hot chocolate, and pull out the old A Charlie Brown Christmas DVD. That’s right folks- it’s holiday film season! But what really defines a ‘Christmas movie’? Is it simply the time of year, or does the genre go […]
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Image: Dick Whittington, The Oxford Playhouse. Credit: Geraint Lewis. Description: A Pantomime Dame. Acting, singing, dancing, and, perhaps most importantly, joking around; the Pantomime, a staple of the British festive theatre season, seemingly has it all. With that being said, I’ve always found myself wondering how the Pantomime got to become so popular, and why they […]
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For as long as I can remember, I have loved superhero movies. It is a love that has exhausted me and my wallet over recent years, and left me jaded despite films like Black Panther attempting to take the genre in new directions. Just a few days ago I would have been hesitant to say […]
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Image Credit: Junko Kimura, Getty Images While teaching marine biology in the mid-1980s at California’s Orange County Marine Institute, a teacher created a manual, ‘The Intertidal Zone’, to help his students. Its titular narrator, ‘Bob the Sponge’, was destined to become the inspiration for one of the most successful animations of all time, which would […]
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Image Credit: Pixabay After watching Damien Chazelle’s First Man recently, I felt it was important to revisit the film that introduced me to the glory of the genre at seven years old, and which remains one of my favourite science fiction films of all time. It’s clear that Silent Running was one of Chazelle’s primary […]
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Image Credit: Warner Bros. To begin this review, I should firstly admit to being a big fan of the Harry Potter Universe, or as it is now more commercially known, the Wizarding World. This is why I am saddened to admit that unlike many fans that have raged against this movie’s low critical reception, I […]
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Image Credit: Nickelodeon. Description: Spongebob Squarepants and Patrick Star. Just over 14 years ago, the golden age of a certain absorbent and yellow and porous sponge came to a tragic end. While it’s dangerous to use such a nostalgic term, Stephen Hillenburg’s departure following his directorial work on The Spongebob Movie (2004) undoubtedly led to […]
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Credit: Film4. Description: the poster for ‘Widows’. “Four armed robbers are killed in a failed heist attempt, only to have their widows step up to finish the job.” Initially, this Wikipedia summary of Widows says little to imply that it could be ground-breaking. Heist films have already reinvented themselves many times over (see: Ocean’s Eleven, […]
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Image credit: Netflix. Description: poster for Daredevil season 3. WARNING: Mild spoilers for Daredevil season 3. Although he is not king of a nation like Black Panther nor does he wield a magical hammer like Thor, Matthew Murdock, blind lawyer by day and vigilante Daredevil by night, can claim to be the most pious of […]
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Image Credit: Matt Crockett. Description: the central cast of The Band. Jukebox musicals, the idea of incorporating the music of an artist or a band into a show, has had a lot of success, from Mamma Mia to The Jersey Boys. However, The Band, using the music of Take That, is unlike these others, offering […]
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Image Credit: Universal Pictures. Description: Mike Myers’ mask in Halloween. The recently released Halloween is the eleventh film in the much-maligned franchise and the second reboot, so when production was first announced back in 2017, it is safe to say that I kept my expectations in check. For once though, such cynicism proved unnecessary. General […]
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Image Credit: Netflix. Description: poster for Better Call Saul season 4. Major spoilers for Better Call Saul Season 3. Although the ordinary Netflix formula of releasing an entire series in one go remains pretty satisfying, the company has made a wise choice to continue releasing one episode of Better Call Saul each week. Much as […]
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Image Credits: Netflix. Description: the poster for BoJack Horseman season 5. “How do you make something right when you’ve made it so wrong you can never go back?” This is a recurring line in the new season five of BoJack Horseman, an animated adult comedy show about a washed-up actor who struggles with addiction, childhood […]
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Image courtesy of the Oxford Playhouse. Adapted from the Oscar-winning original film, Shakespeare in Love took to the Oxford Playhouse stage for a comedic take on how one of the world’s most famous plays came to be. Utilizing how little is known about this famous writer, the story imagines William Shakespeare as he struggles to […]
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Image: CC Dids from Pexels. Description: a Nintendo DS. Glare at me, tut at me, judge me if you like. It won’t make any difference. Times were hard, and game developers needed to be taught a lesson. In the year of 2007, I strolled into my nearest GAME store and bought an Action Replay for […]
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Image Credit: Universal Pictures Before we begin this review, a major pinch of salt. As someone who once read every Apollo mission’s Wikipedia entry, I may be a little bit obsessed with the Space Race. Anyway, First Man is the latest from Ryan Gosling and Damien Chazelle, on the back of their success with La […]
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