HowlingSnail

Was it perfect? No. A lot of stuff very much strained credibility, and one can't help but wonder what would have happened if they'd just unplugged the SBC right at the start.

But I was gripped. I watched this as it aired on BBC One, rather than just binging the whole show, and I was hooked from the beginning to the end, and that's honestly all I require.

I'm pleased to say that most of my predictions went nowhere, and that's a good thing. That would be boring, and if there's one thing this show didn't do, it's bore me.

Give it a watch. It's not like you're locked on a train, unable to stop.

I've watched this whole show today, which isn't something I expected, but it had me hooked the entire time.

The plot is simple. A woman is reunited with her best friend from school, someone she's not spoken to in a decade. And it seems that she's in need of help, having just gotten divorced, and having nowhere to go.

What follows is a masterclass of manipulation that Friedrich Dürrenmatt would be proud of, as Himeno bends everyone around her to her will, with no-one safe from her games.

Yamaya Kasumi is great as always, having come a long way from her days of fighting Youkai as Momoninger. She always seems to be acting, and I'm happy for her, since she clearly deserves it.

The rest of the cast are also good, but it's absolutely Kasumi in the title role that steals the show.

Starfield is everything I was hoping for. I've got about 100 hours in it right now, and I'm sure I'll get many more in. The game is essentially Skyrim in space, which is exactly what I wanted. Some people seem to be disappointed by that fact, and I honestly don't know why. They seem to have gone in expecting something else, without any indication why.

Bugs wise, I've only had one major one, and even then it wasn't really "major". Certainly compared to Elder Scrolls games, it's bug-free.

If you like Skyrim, you'll probably like this. But if you go into it expecting GTA 6, as some people seem to have done, you'll be disappointed.

The rating here is mainly for the colour. The colourisation was well-done. While it doesn't look like it was shot in colour originally, it's a good substitute.

However, the edit here was not good. 175 minutes have been cut down to 75, and that is simply not enough time. The story feels incredibly rushed, with entire scenes cut down to only a montage of a few seconds in places, it genuinely gets hard to follow what's happening at times. There's no opportunity for tension to build up, everything is over before it has a chance to really begin.

And the music just ruins it. They've tried to make it seem like a modern blockbuster, but that's simply not what the footage was shot for. The music is overbearing, dominating every single scene it's in.

If you want to watch The Daleks, watch the original. Watch it in multiple sittings if you must, as it's 3 hours long. And if you want a shorter, more colourful version, watch the 1965 movie adaptation, "Dr Who and the Daleks". I see no reason at all to bother with this version.

I say mostly fine because I enjoyed 5/6 episodes. I thought in general the show was well-written, with good jokes that fit the overall tone of the series. The cast were good, I really thought Betty was a good successor to Bernard and Curtis before her, and everyone else did a good job overall.

Now, what I didn't like. The 1 episode I object to is episode 5. In this, it's revealed that Scott Calvin is, despite what the previous 3 movies led us to believe, not the latest in a long line of humans who took up the role of Santa Claus. He is the first human Santa (what the previous ones were is never properly addressed), and was chosen specifically for some arbitrary reason of them wanting to raise human kids at the North Pole.

This of course raises plenty of plot-related questions, such as "If Mrs Claus is so important and specifically planned by Bernard, why did Bernard wait 8 years before mentioning it?". Questions such as why the Escape Clause exists at all, and why Jack Frost was able to trigger the Santa Clause. Where did all those snow globes come from in the 3rd film?

And of course, the fact is kind of ruins the themes of the movies, that Scott was a grumpy guy who randomly stumbles into this enormous responsibility, and uses it to turn his life around and that of his family. It's much better than the "chosen one" nature that this series wants to portray. I'm reminded of the Timeless Child twist in Doctor Who, where decades of continuity are retconned for the sake of a plot twist.

Personally, until something proves otherwise, I'm gonna go with the explanation that Bernard and the previous Santa were lying in order to give Scott a pep-talk, and that no, he's not the first human Santa.

I'm someone who backed the crowdfunding campaign for this movie all the way back in 2018, so I'm very glad to have finally been able to see the movie!

I really enjoyed this film. More so than the first Ashens film actually, and I definitely think this one is more friendly to people who aren't familiar with Ashens' Youtube channel. It's not for everyone, but if you like this particular style of humour, you'll definitely have an enjoyable hour and a half.

I'm not going to claim this movie is amazing, but I enjoyed it. The basic plot is 20 girls from Japanese idol groups are kidnapped and taken to a deserted island, where they're forced to compete for their lives against one-another, with the winner becoming the "Ultimate Idol", and essentially having their future career guaranteed.

One of the key themes of this movie is the idea that humans are evil. If you like movies with ideas like that, then you'll like this. Almost every character in the film is a scumbag in some way or another, and by the end I definitely found myself hating just about all the characters, which I suppose is the point.

I thought the cast did a decent job. Yamaya Kasumi portrayed the different emotions her character experiences quite well.

The film was quite obviously made on a very small budget. Basically the entire film takes place in either a forest, a beach area next to that forest, or a few specific and very sparsely-decorated locations. Not that this matters particularly, as the whole film is designed around it, but it's something worth mentioning.

Overall I'd say give this film a watch. There are certainly worse ways to spend your time.

Gameplay-wise the game is nigh-identical to the original, only with a third of the levels missing. This, combined with the fact that the game has been bled dry of the heart and soul of the original, and just turned into the most generic, by the book game imaginable (Hell, why did they replace all the music with generic action movie score?), means that this game is inferior in almost every way to the PS2 original. It only misses out on a 1/10 by making the hoverboard sections more fun and fleshed out, and by having some quality of life additions that aren't in the original.

Just play the original. You'll have a much better experience overall. The number of people I've seen praising this game I consider to be an insult to the franchise. Almost as big an insult as the fact Insomniac considered this to be an acceptable product. If this is what they consider Ratchet and Clank to be, then I sincerely hope they never touch the franchise again.

I'll admit, my experience with Jim Carrey movies isn't large, but of the ones I've seen, this is definitely my favourite of the bunch.

The film follows Bruce Nolan, a news reporter who's fed up with his life. He's stuck doing the boring stories, such as reporting on Buffalo's biggest cookie. What he really wants is the job as an anchor on the evening news. When the job opens up, and he doesn't get it, he vents his rage, which results in him losing his job, and getting beaten up by a gang of thugs.

Bruce blames God for his misfortune, so in response, God decides to teach him a lesson, by giving him all his powers, with his only two limitations being that he can't tell anyone about it, or affect free will.

What follows is about half an hour of Bruce indulging in his powers. Whether it's making his girlfriend orgasm from the sound of his voice, punishing the gang of thugs that beat him up, or messing with the man who stole his job to get him fired, if Bruce wants it, it happens.

The problem is what happens next. Bruce girlfriend Grace becomes disheartened with how much of a selfish dick he's become (Or rather, how much of a selfish dick he's always been, but now he can express it more), and leaves him. After that, the entire rest of the film becomes about Bruce moping around, and trying to get her back.

Now, I have no problem with having a little bit of romance in this movie. The problem is the mix. The movie spends just as much time, if not more, on Bruce's failing love life, as it does on the promised Godly antics. I watched his movie expecting a man to have fun being God, rather than it being about him losing his girlfriend and trying to win her back.

The thing is, it didn't have to be that way. Between the deleted scenes available on the DVD, and more scenes that are in the script (some of which were filmed, as revealed by production photos), there was plenty of content that could have been done to stretch out the "Bruce enjoys his powers" bit of the movie, so that the movie was closer to what was actually advertised.

Because that's my biggest gripe with the movie; it's unrealistic. Now, I can understand that, despite it being the most realistic situation, this movie can't be 90% sex, since age ratings and all, but I don't believe what we got was realistic even with that proviso. I've mentioned before that the entire last half hour of the movie is Bruce trying to win his girlfriend back. He can't just force her to take him back, due to his inability to edit free will, but did it never occur to him to just erase her memory of what he did? Or just re-wind time to stop it happening in the first place? Especially as Bruce himself said that God could just "clean everything up in 5 minutes if he wanted to".

It's these faults that ruin the movie for me, and prevent it from being perfect. Despite this, it's one of my favourite movies, and I do recommend it, if only so you, like me, can wish God would give you his powers too.