At first I thought The Lego Movie was going to be like the Lego series of video games where you’re basically watching characters from Star Wars or Harry Potter re-enact their adventures using simulated Lego pieces and minifigs instead of their normal selves and environments. The Lego Movie definitely has a big action-adventure storyline where…
Category: (4 out of 5)
Cramming: 2013’s leftover Movie reviews
Over the course of the year, I wrote a few movie reviews on this blog (though not as many as I had hoped). However, I also watched a few other movies that I didn’t get around to reviewing. So, as 2013 closes, I still want to give my two cents on each of them (though…
Downton and The Doctor: Christmas Specials 2013
For a TV fan like myself, the Brits have really given us a wonderful (long-running) tradition in the delivering of special Christmas episodes (aired on Christmas day) to both Doctor Who and Downton Abbey. (If you have been waiting for the North American airing of Downton season 4, I will tread lightly on spoilers, but…
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug – Movie Review
Despite a prologue scene that tries to fill in some backstory (and remind viewers about this big quest that the main characters are on), there’s no fooling anyone about The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug being the middle segment of a movie trilogy. Still trying to live down comparisons to its more-epic older brother, The…
The World’s End – Movie Review
It’s not hard to see how The World’s End is meant to be an unofficial sequel to 2004’s Shaun of the Dead. Featuring the same lead actors (Simon Pegg and Nick Frost) and the same writer/director (Edgar Wright), The World’s End also features the pub as a backdrop for a bunch of ordinary British blokes…
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke – Book Review
I consider it a miracle in itself that I finished reading Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. After all, the book is almost 800 pages long (and since I listened to the audiobook, it was also over 30 hours long)! While it deals with magic and is set in an England where magic…
Monsters University – Movie Review
Being a huge Pixar fan, I’ll pretty much go see anything they put on screen. Nevertheless, I had really enjoyed Monsters Inc. so I was excited to see this prequel — Mike and Sulley: the College Years. Now, it’s no stretch to the imagination that there was going to be some element of Revenge of…
Redshirts by John Scalzi – Capsule Book Review
Redshirts has got to be one of the most geek-friendly book titles I have encountered. The uninformed might guess that it’s about wearing a certain colour of clothing, and they might be wondering why it’s a single compound word. However, any sci-fi fan worth his salt knows that it actually refers to the laughable tendency…
Argo – Capsule Review
With its other awards this year, I knew Argo was likely to win the Best Picture Oscar. The distribution company probably felt the same way so they released it on disc (and iTunes) with enough time for us all to see it before the Oscars ceremony. I think I skipped seeing this movie in the…
Alvin's Adventures in Pop Culture 