Movie Review – Someone Great

TL;DR – While it is not anything new, the film focuses on women supporting women and that helps elevate it.    

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

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

Someone Great. Image Credit: Netflix

Review – There is nothing quite like the pain of something lost, time might heal all wounds but it also makes the deepest cuts. This is especially true when the thing that is lost is a romantic relationship. What do you do when nine years of your life disappears overnight, how do you process that pain. Well, today we look at a film that explores all of that.   

So to set the scene, we open with Jenny (Gina Rodriguez) alone sitting in the subway obviously in a state of distress. She had finally gotten the job of her dreams after years of hard work, but it involves moving from New York to San Francisco and her partner of nine years Nate (Lakeith Stanfield) decided that he was not prepared to even try a long distance relationship. Everything is changing in her life but there is still one constant and that is her best friends Blair (Brittany Snow) and Erin (DeWanda Wise) still have her back. So as a way of helping to cope and to celebrate her new life and commiserate her moving away the three decide to go to Neon Classic a concert from their youths and have one last crazy adventure.   

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Movie Review – Stuck

TL;DR – When it gets to the emotional core of music Stuck has some real emotional weight, but it has issues getting between those moments.       

Score – 2.5 out of 5 stars

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

Stuck. Image Credit: MJW Films.

Review

There are many things that can make a bad day and I can tell you that being stuck in a train carriage with a bunch of strangers for an indeterminate amount of time would be very high on that list. With this in mind, I was captivated with the idea of setting a musical in that setting and where you could go with the pressures and opportunity of keeping everyone in that one space. What we get in the final film is a story with two halves, however, unfortunately, they don’t quite work together.

So to set the scene, it is a day in New York and disconnected strangers are running around in their day trying to get from one place to another. You have Lloyd (Giancarlo Esposito) a homeless gentleman who is getting ready for the day in the actual train carriage. Alica (Arden Cho) a dancer trying to get home and avoid her stalker Ramon (Omar Chaparro), Caleb (Gerard Canonico) who is running between his many jobs, then Eve (Ashanti) and Sue (Amy Madigan) who are just trying to get home on a difficult day. Fate is a precarious thing at times, and this day as they board the train everything grinds to a halt as a police incident closes the train lines trapping the train in-between stations, and as the carriages are locked there is the realisation that they are trapped and the only thing you can do is sing.

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TV Review – Daredevil: Resurrection

TL;DR – This is a more quiet character driven episode than pilot episodes of the past, but all that means is that the actors get a platform to shine.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Daredevil. Image Credit: ABC Studios/Netflix

 

Review

Well, we are back to where it all started, the very first entry into the Marvel world on Netflix was the first season of Daredevil all the way back in 2015. For many people, me included, that the first season is still the high water mark for the Netflix project, so there is both a hope and a trepidation when you start that first episode. Also, it felt like just last week we got a new Iron Fist, and I am wondering is it all getting a bit too much. Well, today we explore if Daredevil Season Three can be the touchstone that it was.

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Map-It: Chef’s Table

TL;DR – With Volume 5 just released and Volume 6 just around the corner we take a moment to map out all of Chef’s Table

 

Chef's Table. Image Credit: Netflix

 

Map-It –

 

If you have been reading my reviews for a long time then you will undoubtedly know that I have a deep love for David Gelb’s striking food documentary series Chef’s Table on Netflix. It is a world full of beautiful food, fascinating stories, and a deep exploration into a world that I don’t really get to visit. Well today the fifth volume (six if you add in France which we do) has dropped and I wanted to take a moment to combine my love of both food and cartography and thus chart out every restaurant visited throughout the series so far (and even into the next volume since the names of the chefs have already been announced). With the maps, if a chef had more than one location featured, we picked the central place explored in the episode.

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TV Review – Iron Fist: The Fury of Iron Fist

TL;DR – A good first episode that has me quietly optimistic for the rest of the season.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

 

Iron Fist. Image Credit Marvel/Netflix

 

Review

The first season of Iron Fist was … well, it was a bit of a disappointment, to say the least. You can read all about in our past review (see here), but the TL;DR, and we are all about the TL;DR here, is that every part of the production felt rushed. It was clear to anyone watching that Finn Jones had not enough time to prep the action sequences which were the hooks that the show was using to propel everything forward. Were there moments when the season got interesting? Yes, but not enough to really recommend it. Well since then we have had The Defenders (see review) which was a step in the right direction, and Finn popped up in Luke Cage and was actually engaging for a change. All of this had me hoping that they had learnt their lessons and would take their time with pre-production this time around, and from the first episode, I think they have.

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TV Review – Luke Cage: Soul Brother #1

TL;DR – This does everything you need the first episode of a new season to do.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Soul Brother #1. Image Credit: Marvel/Netflix

Review

The first season of Luke Cage (see review) started off so strong, with such an amazing cast, and the first big dive into African culture for Marvel in the lead up to Black Panther (see review). However, like many of the Netflix/Marvel TV Shows it lagged in the middle, but unlike the other shows, it just could not stick the landing, with one of the most underwhelming season finales so far. However, while there were real issues, there was also such an amazing potential which we got to see a bit of in The Defenders (see review). So today we take our first steps in the follow-up season as a new player enters the scene in Harlem.

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Movie Review – Ocean’s 8

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 – Safe House: How Brooklyn Nine-Nine is Finding New Heights in Season 5

TL;DR Safe House shows that five seasons in Brooklyn Nine-Nine is getting better and better, blending humour and emotion into an amazing episode.

Score – 5 out of 5 stars

Brooklyn Nine-Nine banner

 

Review

Now, I have to say that Brooklyn Nine-Nine might be one of the best gems out there on TV at the moment, and one of the few shows that I actively seek out these days. It is created by Dan Goor & Michael Schur who have been the creative minds behind The Daily Show, Saturday Night Live, Parks and Recreation, The Good Place, and more. So right from the start, you have an amazing creative team that extends out to all the writing staff. As well as this, you have an amazing and diverse cast that is committed to working together as a team. They all have an amazing rapport with each other, which feels effortless. It is from this platform that they keep getting better each season.

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TV Review – Jessica Jones: Season 2

TL;DR – Season Two has some moments of great introspection, and deals with some interesting themes like contrasting motherhood, but ultimately it feels like we’ve been here before.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

Jessica Jones

Review

Motherhood, it is a concept that is woefully analysed in cinema, and yes you can easily point to numerous roles in film and TV where characters are mothers. However, very few really analysis the role, the ramifications, the drives in a really in-depth way. I open on this because if you could distil Season Two of Jessica Jones into one theme it would be the role of mothers and the legacy they leave. So today we are going to break down Season Two of Jessica Jones, looking at the things that did work and the things that didn’t.

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TV Review – Ugly Delicious: Season One

TL;DR – A fascinating documentary dissecting every facet of food, from its history, its traditions, and the future.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Ugly Delicious banner

 

Review

As a food culture, we have really started to focus on tradition, authenticity, style and presentation, but have we lost something in the process? This is something that chef David Chang is trying to get to the heart off in his new series Ugly Delicious which he hosts with food writer Peter Meehan. Chang who is known from his Momofuku restaurants is pulling apart what makes food the way it is, what makes something traditional and something rebellious, and what is the soul of the food we may eat on a daily basis.

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