Category Archives: 2018 Reviews

Movie Review – Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms (Sayonara no Asa ni Yakusoku no Hana o Kazarō, さよならの朝に約束の花をかざろう)

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TL;DR – While it can be frustrating at times, it is a beautifully created animated film with an emotionally resonate heart that will punch you right in the feels at times.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is a final frame after the credits

Maquia banner

Review –

‘Animation’ is a genre that does not get the credit it deserves, for many it is just the purview of children and as such it is not something of quality. However, this is a real shame because we have seen with films like Coco (see review), Moana (see review) and Studio Ghibli that even when aimed at children, they can still be works of art. As well as this, there are more and more fascinating animated films that are targeted at adults and today we are looking at one such with Maquia.

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TV Review – Sense8: Amor Vincit Omnia

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TL;DR – The Series Finale brings closure in a way only Sense8 could by focusing on family and the power of love. If you have liked the show up until this point you will want to see how it ends, if you haven’t I don’t think this will change your mind.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Sense8 banner

Review –

Endings, no one wants their favourite show to end, lest of all when it is not ending on their own terms. The television landscape is filled with shows that I have deeply loved and we will never know how they ended, and while every now and again we get a Brooklyn Nine-Nine or Farscape many more shows have left the world on a cliffhanger never to be seen again. For a long time, it looked like Sense8 was going to join the long list of shows that never got to say goodbye properly, which was a real shame. While it didn’t always work, the show was always fascinating and it had a level of detail you don’t normally see as the show gallivanted across the globe. However a show like this was expensive, and while I was disappointed I understood when it was announced that it would not be picked up for a third season. However, if it is one thing you should never underestimate that is the power of fans, and in this case, that power has used for good, and today we get to see the outcome of that with a special final episode Amor Vincit Omnia or Love Conquers All.

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Movie Review – Ocean’s 8

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TL;DR – It is not doing anything revolutionary with the genre, but I had fun from start to end in this well-acted and constructed film.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Ocean's 8

Review –

Okay right from the start I am going to preface this with the fact that I do really love the Ocean’s 11 film series, well at least Eleven and Thirteen, not so much Twelve. But when I heard they were doing 8 I was mostly ambivalent, it hitting at the moment when I was really getting tired of the spin-off machine. However, then the cast list was announced I was very intrigued because it became clear that they were not phoning this one in. Now that I have had the chance to see it, it is clear that they were not messing around with this spin-off, and they come out of the gates swinging.

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TV Review – Westworld: Les Ecorches

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TL;DR – As we move towards the end of the season the different timelines have started to fall into place and I can see the heart of the story it wants to tell, but I don’t know if I am in for the ride to the end.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

 

Les Ecorches banner

 

Review –

At the end of last week’s Phase Space (see review) I was beginning to wonder how all the timelines crashing together was going to work given what we knew already this season and I postulated that there must be either multiple copies of some of the hosts or that the timelines were not adding up. Well today in Les Ecorches we discover that I was both wrong and right, as we find out that there were two different occupations of the Mesa that included Charlotte (Tessa Thompson) and Ashley (Luke Hemsworth) that had been spliced together, however we do discover that someone has had a couple of clones made, so part marks? And as always a reminder that we will be looking at the episode as a whole so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

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TV Review – Mystery Road: Season One

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TL;DR – Mystery Road is a mystery ‘who done it’ where every reveal has weight and you have to watch every episode just to see what happened next.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

Mystery Road

Review –

Australian TV is kind of going through a period of uncertainty, how does it adapt to a changing global marketplace where streaming services are the new norm, or to governments that do not feel like supporting the arts is a good thing any more. Indeed, when you look at the list of currently running drama series in Australia it is almost anaemic compared to even ten years ago. Within this world, it is an unfortunate reality that you have to make each chance count, and with today’s Mystery Road we have a show that does just that. Now before we move onto the review proper just a couple of points. Firstly, this is based off a series of films created by Ivan Sen that I have unfortunately not seen, however, if you are like me in this regard, don’t worry because anything you do need to know about them is told in the show so you are not missing out. As well as this, we will be looking at the series as a whole so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead, but we will leave discussions about the final episode to a paragraph all to itself so you can skip that if you don’t want to find out the conclusion.

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Movie Review – Fahrenheit 451

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TL;DR – While it is wonderfully acted and beautifully filmed, unfortunately in the attempt to update the source material it loses some of the core parts of the narrative in the attempt to tell a more straightforward narrative.

Score – 2.5 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Fahrenheit 451 banner

Review –

Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 is one of those titan works of literature that kind of looms over narrative and speculative fiction genre. It was both miles ahead of its time but also very much a product of its time, making it a difficult work to adapt especially as time has gone on. It is one of those books that is weird and at times off-putting but entirely compelling as it sucks you into a world without books. When I heard that they were going to do a remake of it starring Michael B. Jordan I was really excited because it held such promise and now that I have seen it well, I don’t know, but somewhere along the way, it lost something. Today we are going to look at just what that might have been and yes I am writing this from the perspective of someone who has read the source material, and if you have not you might get something completely different from the film and that is completely fine. I am not someone who believes that you have to read the book before seeing it updated, but seeing that I have it shapes the way I experienced the film.

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TV Review – Westworld: Phase Space

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TL;DR – It is the second half of the season and finally the timelines are starting to crash into each other in interesting yet not completely clear ways

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Phase Space banner

 

Review –

One of the things Westworld is known for is its many intersecting storylines and timelines, and Season Two has been no exception up until now. We have the story of Dolores’ (Evan Rachel Wood) rebellion as she builds an army to possibly take over the world, also Maeve (Thandie Newton) and her hunt to find her missing daughter as she puts together a ratbag team to help her, we have the Man in Black (Ed Harris) trying to get to the heart of the final narrative Robert (Anthony Hopkins) planned for him, and then we also have Bernard (Jeffrey Wright) whose history database got messed up by the head shot and so we see him jumping across different timelines. Well in today’s episode we not only get all of these stories we get them just as timelines come crashing together … maybe.

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Movie Review – Solo (Solo: A Star Wars Story)

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TL;DR – It is okay, the story is okay, the acting is okay, the effects, okay well they are more than just okay, but overall it is just okay

Score – 3 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Solo

Review –

Hmm, okay, well this is an interesting film, it had a dramatic change of directors and tone during production, and it is charting the course for one of the most iconic characters in film history. All of this leads to some pretty big expectations, but also a lot of hesitation because a large course change mid-way through rarely leads to a great end product. However, the same was also said of Rouge One (see review) and that turned out to be really good, by the end. Well, today let’s see if they can capture that magic again, and give justice to the character of Han Solo.

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TV Review – Westworld: Akane No Mai

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TL;DR – In a return to form we finally get to visit Shogun World though it is a bit more familiar than we thought.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Akane No Mai

 

Review –
One of the things that have changed in the way I look at media since I have been making this site is that over the years I have become more and more adamant about not watching trailers until after seeing a movie or TV show. There is something that has happened in recent years, which we talked about in our end of year awards, where big reveal that could have worked better as surprises get revealed in trailers. Well avoiding the trailers or not, there was no way to get around the fact that at some point in Season Two of Westworld we were going to take a detour into Shogun World after that Easter Egg in the season finale last year. Well at our halfway point today we finally get that moment and it is perfectly fine.

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Movie Review – Cargo

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TL;DR – A beautiful, haunting, and often brutal look at what we do for those we love.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no end-credit scene

Cargo

Review –

There was a time not that long ago where zombies were this interesting subset of the horror genre. Now in a world where every second video game has them as an enemy and we have seen nearly every possible permutation of it on the big and small screen, it honestly feels like we have become saturated with the living dead. Now frankly, this is a great pity because out there in the world of media there are still very powerful works of art being made that deals with these issues, like The Last of Us and Train to Busan. Well, today we are looking at a film that is joining these lofty heights with Cargo.

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