Tag Archives: review

TV Review – Star Trek Short Treks: Runaway

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TL;DR – A beautiful character piece that makes the most of the short run time.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Star Trek Short Treks: Runaway. Image Credit CBS Studios.

Review –

Today we are going to be doing small mini-reviews for all the Star Trek Shorts, starting with an exploration of what it means to step forward and change your life.

So to set the scene, it is after Will You Take My Hand? and Sylvia Tilly (Mary Wiseman) has officially entered the Command Training Program, which is a huge achievement, which is completely lost on her mother Siobhan (Mimi Kuzyk). As this is going on a standard cargo run is interrupted by a stowaway and the two are about to crash together.

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TV Review – The Good Place: The Book of Dougs

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TL;DR – While it does not always quite get there, it was still an interesting ride.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Good Place: The Book of Dougs. Image Credit: NBC.

Review –

After three seasons of trying the gang is finally in the good place, and after all this, the emotional and social capital to get us here does it actually hold up? Well no, but then I think it does something a little more important, maybe.

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TV Review – Sex Education: Episode 1

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TL;DR – It a show where sex is very much front and centre, however, it is actually the relationships that actually shine through.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Sex Education: Episode 1. Image Credit: Netflix.

Review –

Sex, it is in the name of the show, and if there is any confusion the episode opens with a very explicit view of two people engaged in it. Pretty much there is no misunderstanding in the first five minutes as to what you are going to get with this show. However, as things went on, the one thing that struck me was how caring it all was.

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TV Review – The Orville: Home

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TL;DR – In Home, The Orville finally finds that balance between the absurd and the sincere and creates one of their best episodes so far.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

The Orville: Home. Image Credit: Fox

Review –

So far this season The Orville have continued on in its mission to highlight the juxtaposition between the absurd and the sincere. Now, this is something that you can completely do, but the show in both Season One and so far this season just couldn’t quite find that right balance. Well with Home I think they really are starting to head in that right direction and it doesn’t hurt when you throw in some great guest cast and beautiful art design help along the way.

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TV Review – Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Honeymoon

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TL;DR – Honeymoon brings everyone back together, hits all the right beats, and propels the show forward, so a great opening episode of a season.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Honeymoon. Image Credit NBC.

Review –

I have been around long enough that the list of shows that I love that got cancelled without closure is a decently long list. When it happens you always hear of trying to get it picked up by another network, but this barely ever happens. So when Brooklyn Nine-Nine got cancelled, I lamented the stupid decision, but I knew it was unlikely to change, and if there was ever a time I was happy to be wrong this is it. Well, now we are back and even more extraordinary we have a full season pick up, so let’s dive into the first episode of the season Honeymoon.  

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TV Review – Bloom: Season One

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TL;DR – This series explores the temptation and addiction that we can have with capturing the past. However, while it introduces a lot of important themes, it does not really have the space to digest them all.   

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

Bloom. Image Credit: Stan.

Review –

If you could be young again for a day or so, would you take that opportunity, would you try to fix some part of your life? However, what would you do to keep staying young, would you hurt people, would you kill, what if going back meant losing who you were? These are all really deep questions and I don’t know how I myself would answer, but today we are looking at a show that posits these exact questions and more.

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TV Review – Doctor Who: Resolution

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TL;DR – With the last episode for a year, we get the return of a villain past, and not really a whole lot else, which leads to an interesting if forgettable episode.  

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

Doctor Who: Resolution banner with the whole gang. Image Credit: BBC

Review –

The debut season for Jodie Whittaker and Chris Chibnall has come and gone, and while I generally enjoyed it, it has been divisive among the fans, and no not just because The Doctor is a woman now (though there are still those people, sigh). The show pretty much used this season as an opportunity as a soft-reboot and a good entry point for new people joining in without years of storylines to catch up on. All of this meant that we got some amazing episodes like Rosa and the Demons of the Punjab but there was also an awful lot of filler and constant use of ‘oh the bad guy is not the actual bad guy.’ All of this lead to many episodes feeling undercooked and the drive to have all new enemies for the series probably didn’t help. Well, today we look at the epilogue for the series and its first ever New Year’s special and see how well it does for the last Doctor Who episode for over a year.   

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TV Review – The Orville: Ja’loja

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TL;DR – This first episode was all about us getting back into the groove with The Orville and its juxtaposition of absurdity and sincerity, but not all of it works.  

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Orville: Ja'loja. Image Credit: Fox

Review –

I finally got the chance to see Season One of The Orville early this year when it finally got a release down under, and I was struck by how funny and also how many serious issues it tackled. It was not just a Star Trek parody with the first officer and captain being exs, okay it is totally that, but it is also a beautiful sincere look at the work, with some fantastic characters and alien races. Now that Season Two is about to start, I am really interested to see how the show evolves going forward, and can it keep this interesting juxtaposition going.

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Movie Review – The Favourite

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TL;DR – At times funny, at times perplexing, and at times very dark, it explores the world of immense power and those who want to obtain it, and the damage that can do.    

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

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

The Favourite. Image Credit: Fox Searchlight

Review –

We live in a world where thanks to technology we can explore galaxies far away, to fantasies imagined in every which way, but sometimes reality can be stranger than anything we can muster. Today we are exploring a film that is set around the power politics of last years of the House of Stuart as different people position themselves in an ever-shifting world. This would be interesting enough in itself, but in both a less and in some cases more dramatic way this is what really happened (or at least what was alleged to have happened) in real life. It is a snapshot of absolute power, but also of sadness, and regret.

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Movie Review – Holmes & Watson

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TL;DR – This is one of those films where you walk out thinking three things, 1) how dare you charge people money to see this, 2) I am embarrassed for everyone involved in the film & 3) how dare you charge people money to see this     

Score – 0 out of 5 stars

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

Watson and Holmes. Image Credit: Sony

Review –

Sometimes you see a film and you have to wonder ‘how did this get greenlit’, like people paid over 40 million dollars to put this together, agents recommended this movie to their clients, and they even got Alan Menken to write a story. However, instead of being excited when every big name cast member walked onto the film, you felt sad, like ‘oh no, they dragged Hugh Laurie into this mess too.’ Why is that, well this is because this is the worst film I have seen all year, and since I am writing this on the 31st of December, I doubt that will be surpassed because this is also the worst film I have ever reviewed. Hey good news Pixels, you are not on the bottom anymore.   

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