Doi Boy – Movie Review

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TL;DR –  A difficult but also fascinating look at the pressures of Thai life through those who sit at the bottom of the hierarchy.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Doi Boy Review –

One of my goals this year was to hit one hundred films reviewed and expand the cinematic landscape I have explored. Well, we ticked off the one hundred films goal earlier this week, but the goal of increasing my cinema still marches on. Today, we look at our first film from Thailand that drops us into a world on the cusp of rapid change.

So to set the scene, Sorn (Awat Ratanapintha) is an ethnic Shan man who was a former Monk who was pressganged into the military. They had to escape from Myanmar because of the violence. In Thailand, all he wants is the best for himself and his girlfriend Bee (Panisara Rikulsurakan), but there are few opportunities for someone without the right documentation. One industry that did pay well was adult entertainment; that is how he and Korn (Noomsang) ended up working for Madame M (Teerawat Mulvilai) in Chiang Mai. A world of money but also a world of danger.

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NCIS: Sydney – Brother In Arms – TV Review

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TL;DR – There is nothing quite like a shark to ratchet up the tension in the water.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Paramount+ service that viewed this series.

Waves crashing into the rocks.

NCIS: Sydney Review –

If you ask someone about Australia, the first thing they will likely mention is the wildlife and how it wants to kill you all. In reality, as long as you take some sensible precautions, you’ll be fine in nearly every case, bar drop bears. Oh, and sharks, because they are apex predators for a reason.

So to set the scene, it is a beautiful day down at the Malabar Ocean Pool, that is, until the swimmers discover a shark has made it into the pool from the ocean, even more so when a bloody hand drops out of its mouth. But what happens when you have a missing Navy SEAL but you have no missing SEALs? We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.    

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Jones Family Christmas – Movie Review

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TL;DR – A fun, delightful romp through something we have all experienced, a big family Christmas dinner where nothing goes right.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

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

Disclosure – I paid for the Stan service that viewed this film.

Warning – contains scenes that may cause distress.

The Australian countryside.

Jones Family Christmas Review –

It is getting to the end of the year, and one of the many constants is that Stan is going to release a Christmas movie. It is one of those odd Australian traditions that have started over the last few years, and they all tend to be charming in their own way. Well, it is time for 2023’s entry, where we end up in rural Victoria.
 
So to set the scene, it is coming close to Christmas time, and Heather Jones (Heather Mitchell) is rejoicing for the first time in the age all of her children Christina (Ella Scott Lynch), Danny (Nicholas Denton), and Alex (Max McKenna) are all coming home. There is tension because it is not good timing for many reasons. For some, it is their first time home from London. For others, they just got dumped, and others are just acting odd. But as all the usual family tensions arrive, the heat, the dryness, and the breeze bring the threat of bushfires to every rural location.

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Monarch: Legacy of Monsters – Secrets and Lies – TV Review

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TL;DR – After grounding our story, we start escalating this week.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Apple TV+ service that viewed this series.

a cammera lens

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Review –

While I did not attend this to happen, this week has been very MonsterVerse-focused, with us exploring the first episodes of Monarch, as well as a dive back to the original 2014 Godzilla film that set this universe off (only this cinematic universe, I know Godzilla has had several of them in its lifetime). Well, all good things have to come to an end, well, an end till we come back next week, but it is time to look at the third episode of this opening bunch when things start unravelling fast.  

So to set the scene, at the end of Departure, Cate Randa (Anna Sawai), Kentaro Randa (Ren Watabe), and May (Kiersey Clemons) found an old Lee Shaw (Kurt Russell) living in a retirement home. However, it was not just an average home for the elderly. It was also a Monarch prison facility. Well, a short tour and a cut ankle monitor later and Shaw escapes, and well, if Monarch was not after them before, they sure are now. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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Godzilla (2014) Review – Exploring the Past

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TL;DR – It’s a bit rough around the edges, but it hits hard when it hits. 

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

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

Disclosure – I paid for the Stan service that viewed this film.

San Francisco in flames.

Godzilla Review –

With Monarch: Legacy of Monsters starting to air, my thoughts have been brought back to the MonsterVerse. It was a series of films that never got the easy ride that some others did but could still chart out their cinematic universe one monster battle at a time. There is one film in the series that I have never really engaged with: the film that started it all. Well, given how chiefly it fits into the happening in Monarch, I knew now was the time to fix that oversite finally.   
 
 So to set the scene, after exploring the history around nuclear weapons, we find ourselves in the Philippines in 1999. They were about to start a mine when the ground fell out from underneath, taking 40 miners with them. They didn’t find any uranium but a mammoth skeleton of a long-dead creature and an egg. Worse, it looks like there were meant to be two eggs, and one has been opened. Meanwhile, in Janjira, Japan. Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) is concerned about seismic activity near the nuclear power plant when they have a breach as something crashes into the reactor.

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Monarch: Legacy of Monsters – Departure – TV Review

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TL;DR – The mystery starts to catch up with people as enemies loom over the secrets of Monarch.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Apple TV+ service that viewed this series.

USS Lawton

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Review –

In the last episode with Aftermath, we got to dip our toes into this multi-generation mystery surrounding the Monarch organisation, the group behind monitoring/studying/controlling/exploiting the Kaiju of the MonsterVerse. It was enough to intrigue, but today’s episode needs to take it up a notch, which it does.

So to set the scene, we open in Manila, 1952, as Lt Shaw (Wyatt Russell) sporting a shiner on his left eye. When he is given a mission by General Puckett (Christopher Heyerdahl) to escort a Japanese scientist on a mission, some awkward introductions later, he and Keiko Miura (Mari Yamamoto) are crashing through the jungles of Mindoro hunting down odd radiation. Meanwhile, back in 2015 Tokyo, the revelations that Hiroshi Randa (Takehiro Hira) had two families echoed through the lives of Cate Randa (Anna Sawai) and Kentaro Randa (Ren Watabe). We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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Monarch: Legacy of Monsters – Aftermath – TV Review

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TL;DR – This was a fascinating start, jumping between timelines and preparing us for the approaching mystery.  

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Apple TV+ service that viewed this series.

The Monarch logo.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Review –

If you look out to the cinematic landscape, you can see a world full of cinematic universes, or at least the attempt to make cinematic universes that never get anywhere. But as my list of them keeps growing, there is one that has been intriguing me, the MonsterVerse. It always felt like it was holding on with the skin of its teeth, but when doing that, it provided some of the best entertainment that I have seen in a while. Today, we jump into its first attempt at episodic television exploring the aftermath of tragedy.  

So to set the scene, we open on Skull Island in 1973, where Bill Randa (John Goodman) gives a heartfelt goodbye before he thinks he will die from a giant spider. The spider met a crab, but still, his goodbye made it out, and in 2013, it was picked up in the Sea of Japan. In 2015, Cate Randa (Anna Sawai) is returning home to Tokyo to settle her late father’s affairs. She was in San Francisco when Godzilla attacked, and the memories run deep as she sees how Tokyo prepares for the next attack. But nothing equipped her for what she found when she entered her father’s Tokyo apartment. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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NCIS: Sydney – Snakes in the Grass – TV Review

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TL;DR – It is time for NCIS Down Under to discover our wildlife kills.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Paramount+ service that viewed this series.

Sydney.

NCIS: Sydney Review –

It would be best to amplify the oddnesses when you get into the weeds of collaborative work. It is here where the humour can be found, and why set something in Australia if you do not make the most of it? And I think we started to see some of that today.  

So to set the scene, along Cowen Creek in New South Wales, Australia, a couple of fishermen cast their lines until one catches a big one. A scuffle occurs until they land in the creek and discover a floating body under a tree branch. That body belonged to a staff sergeant running one of the most significant military depots in the southern hemisphere who found himself on the wrong side of a snake. But not a snake from this area. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.    

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Scrublands: Season 1 – TV Review

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TL;DR – This is a solid mystery that does not outstay its welcome. It hits hard at the start but does lose some energy throughout.  

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the Stan service that viewed this series.

Warning – Contains scenes that may cause distress.

A road in the outback.

Scrublands Review –

If there is one setting that Australian literature loves to explore, it is a small town. They litter the continent, becoming part of a country’s tapestry, but can also be insular places full of secrets. This juxtaposition creates the tension that can be mined for drama, which we see today.  

So to set the scene, one Sunday morning, Father Byron Swift (Jay Ryan) was greeting his parishioners at the end of a service when he dips back into the church only to return with a rifle and murders five people in front of the screaming masses fleeing the carnage. One year later, journalist Martin Scarsden (Luke Arnold) arrives at Riverside to discover why a man of the cloth became a mass murderer. But no one in town is talking, are they just upset about the torture porn, or is there something more going on. We will be looking at the series as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

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Gubbins – Video Game Review

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TL;DR – A genuinely delightful word game that charms while presenting you with a fascinating challenge that I am driven to master.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for this game.

opening titles.

Gubbins Review –

We live in the post-Wordle era, where we ditched the crossword goodbye and devilled into six letters that gave us grief for months. Once it and its many different variations concurred on the internet, I wondered who would be the first video game company to capture that vibe of loving words and bring it into an interactive experience. Today, we look at a small Australian company who have not only done this but also charmed me entirely in the process.

So to set the scene, Gubbins in a puzzle game where you are given a bunch of discordant letters at the bottom of the screen and a grid above, and you get points for how many words you can create before the black FIN appears. You get bonuses for chains of words, and some power-ups and traps can make placing the words difficult.

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