Tag Archives: Greek Mythology

Percy Jackson and the Olympians: I Become Supreme Lord of the Bathroom – TV Review

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TL;DR – We build on the foundation and enter the fun world of Camp Half-Blood.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

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

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene.

Percy sits in front of a fire.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians Review –

Well, our first episode, I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher, was all about dipping our toes into the universe of Percy Jackson (Walker Scobell) and the world of hurt that is coming for him. In the follow-up, it is time to rip off that Band-Aid because we are diving into the deep end with the gusto of a charging Minotaur.

So to set the scene, Percy wakes up from a dream with his mother (Virginia Kull) gone and Grover (Aryan Simhadri) looking down on him. He is not in the city anymore, for he is in Camp Half-Blood, a place that is safe for people like him. It might be the only safe place on Earth. Well, as long as he can survive a beat down from Clarisse La Rue (Dior Goodjohn), the daughter of Aries. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.    

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Percy Jackson and the Olympians: I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher – TV Review

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TL;DR – This is a fantastic introduction to the character and the world.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

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

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene.

Percy in the rain.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians Review –

Can you hit lightning a second time with the first strike? It was a bit of a whiff. That is the question that we are looking at today with the second bite at the apple with a Percy Jackson adaptation. I had found the first Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief movie to be okay, nothing to write home about, though very famously, it has a terse relationship with the original author. The Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters worked even less. I didn’t think much more about this until one day, I came across the novels and thought I would give it a go, and well, I got hooked. But can they learn from their mistakes with this second adaptation? This is what we are going to look at today.

So to set the scene, Percy Jackson (Walker Scobell) has had a difficult life. He struggles to focus at school, he is always daydreaming and seeing things that are not there, he never knew his father, and while his mother Sally (Virginia Kull) loves him dearly, her partners tend to suck. The only things working in his life are his friend Grover (Aryan Simhadri) and Mr Brunner (Glynn Turman), the one teacher who believes in him. Well, when he is on a trip to the history museum, he wanders through the rooms full of statues of Greek Gods when he is attacked by one of his teachers, Ms Dodds (Megan Mullally), and his life forever changes. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.    

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Shazam! Fury of the Gods – Movie Review

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TL;DR – When it is working, it is a delightful blast of a film   

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid and post-credit scene

Disclosure – I was invited to a press screening of this film

The whole family in super form.

Shazam! Fury of the Gods Review –

When the first Shazam! film came out. It was at this odd moment for the DCEU. There had been a hard pivot away from the dark and brooding movies like Batman v Superman towards something a little lighter. And I, for one, liked the change. While Shazam! and Aquaman were not perfect films, there were at least supremely entertaining. But I wondered if lightning could strike twice because, much like last time, Shazam has to do some repair work after a string of failures.

So to set the scene, since Billy (Asher Angel) was given the powers of Shazam (Zachary Levi) by the last council of the wizards, also called Shazam (Djimon Hounsou), he has tried to be a superhero. However, he is still just a kid; if ever there is an imposter syndrome, it is this. However, life does not give him the time and space to process this change because the two daughters of Atlas, Kalypso (Lucy Liu) and Hespera (Helen Mirren), have returned to Earth. They are there to rectify their position and see Billy and his family as a threat and an affront to everything they stand for.  

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Hades – Video Game Review

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TL;DR – A game where the mechanics, story, music, and design all pulls you in, so you keep trying to escape your captivity run after run after run

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Disclosure – I paid for the game

Hades. Image Credit: Supergiant Games

Hades Review –

At the start of this year, I thought I would take some time to catch up on some of the things I might have missed last year, and I also wanted a bit of an escape from the current world around. With this in mind, several people I respect had Hades on their ‘Best Video Game of 2020’ lists so I thought that might be an excellent place to dive in and I was right.

So to set the scene, you are Zagreus (Darren Korb) the son of Hades (Logan Cunningham) and Prince of the Underworld.  However, a prince he may be, but in reality, he is trapped, a prisoner to his father’s wishes and demands. When he discovers that Nyx (Jamie Landrum) The God of Night is not his birth mother, Zagreus takes on himself to escape from the Underworld, even if that means fighting his way through Tartarus, Asphodel, and Elysium to get there.

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Wonder Woman 1984 – Movie Review

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TL;DR – In many respects, this is a messy film, but it is also engaging and entertaining from start to finish   

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene

Wonder Woman 1984. Image Credit: Warner Brothers.

Wonder Woman 1984 Review –

Of all the film franchises that have had a rough go of it in recent years, the top of that list would have to be the DC Extended Universe. For a long time, it felt like it was trying to find an identity after the first attempt fell flat and it kept swinging wildly trying to compensate. The first Wonder Women film came out, and for the first time in the franchise’s history, it actually stuck the landing. The question then becomes ‘can they do it again?’ and the answer is apparently yes, yes they can.

So to set the scene, we open back on Themyscira when Diana (Lilly Aspell) was a young girl. It is a festival day where the warriors of the land compete in a grand obstacle course, and of course, Diana wants to join in. It is here where she learns the important lesson that there are no shortcuts in life. As time goes on, we see little snippets of Diana’s (Gal Gadot) life as she hides among the humans but every now and again she dons the mantle of Wonder Women to fight some crime. What she didn’t expect is this crime would unearth something that should have stayed buried.

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Movie Review – Wonder Woman (2017)

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TL;DR – While not revolutionary per se, DC finally found a formula that works, and realised that there is no point moving a universe ahead if the individual movies don’t work.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

P.S. – There is NO mid/post credit sequence

Wonder Woman (2017). Image Credit: Warner Bros.

Review –

So if you have read my reviews for Suicide Squad or Batman v Superman you would probably know that unfortunately, I have not had the best time with the DC Expanded Universe so far. Now when it comes to DC v Marvel I have no skin in the game, I want both to succeed, and I only care about if the movie is good or not, and so far DC just has not made a compelling entry into this expanded universe of theirs. Well, that is until now. Is Wonder Woman a perfect film, no of course not, but it is logically structured, emotionally resonant, and filled with fascinating characters, which is a huge step in the right direction. Now as we go one we will keep this as spoiler free as possible, however, we do need to discuss the ending, but we will clearly mark them so that you can avoid them it if you want.

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