War Machine – Movie Review

TL;DR – A solid military/sci-fi action romp.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

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

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service to view this film.

A military car driving with explosions behind it.

War Machine Review Introduction

Back in 2025, I didn’t get to see enough Australian films to put together a best of at the end of the year. As an Australian-based reviewer, that felt a little embarrassing, well, I am not going to let that happen in 2026, and today we start with our first entry with a military/sci-fi romp where many pine trees do not survive first contact.

So, to set the scene, we open with a convoy of Humvees leaving the protection of their home base in Kandahar, Afghanistan. They are off to provide support to another convoy broken down in a communications‑dead zone. Where a Staff Sergeant (Alan Ritchson) catches up with his younger brother (Jai Courtney) in the other convoy, it was all going well until an ambush takes them all out. Two years later, that same staff sergeant is in Colorado for Ranger training like he promised his brother. But here he has no name, just a number 81. Here it is time for eight weeks of the most gruelling training known, and this is his last chance before he ages out. But as they finish the end of their training with the famous ‘Death March’, the extra-solar asteroid RX-505-Polemas heading towards Earth makes its closest approach and starts breaking up for no reason.       

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Escape From Pretoria – Movie Review

TL;DR – A exploration of tension when one wrong step can be fatal.    

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

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

Escape From Pretoria. Image Credit: Universal Pictures.

Review

One of the things I like the most about cinema is when they let me know of stories that I have previously been unaware of. As well as this, I have seen a lot of prison break films in my time, some fictional, some real, some ‘we think this is how they did it’, and I have always found them fascinating. Well, today we get to explore both of these with Escape From Pretoria.

So to set the scene, we open in the heart of apartheid South Africa with accrual footage of the time. It is here where we are introduced to Tim Jenkin (Daniel Radcliffe) and Stephen Lee (Daniel Webber) who work setting up leaflet bombs for the African National Congress or ANC. One day after a successful campaign, they are captured by the police and sentenced to twelve and eight years in the all-white political prisoner’s prison in Pretoria. While in Pretoria jail they meet Denis Goldberg (Ian Hart) who was put on trial with Nelson Mandela and fellow prisoner Leonard Fontaine (Mark Leonard Winter). They dream of escaping, but how do you do that when you are locked behind several feet of steel?    

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TV Review – The Punisher: Season One

TL;DR – This is a show that works just because of the charisma of its lead, however, it would have been better if it was more condensed

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Punisher

Review

Without a doubt, The Punisher might be the most difficult character to get right in the Netflix TV Marvel Universe. How do you make a man who murders a lot of people, a lot of people, yet still keep him a relatable character. Revenge driven storylines are thus really hard to make work because of this and for every Punisher or John Wick you have a plethora of others that don’t stick the landing. So the Punisher or Frank Castle first appeared in Season Two of Daredevil (see review) where he was one of the best parts of the entire season. However, the question is can a character like Frank work in a series all by himself? Well, that is what we will be looking at today.

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