BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode 3 – Revenge of the Sith

Hello :-)

So, here we are, the last one before the new one. You join me at the sixth and penultimate instalment of The Incredible Suit’s #BlogAlongAStarWars where I try to turn my previously Star Wars ambivalent self into a fan of this beloved franchise whilst simultaneously distracting myself from the crushing inevitability of death.

I won’t lie, last month was a struggle. I feel this is evident from the fact that, reading it back, my last post reads like a woman having some kind of pop-culture induced breakdown. Let’s hope this month’s a bit better then…

Revenge of the Sith opens three years after the events of Attack of the Clones. The Jedi are leading the clone army in the war against the Separatists during which Obi-Wan (Ewan McGregor) is sent to kill General Grievous (presumably Major Machiavellian was already taken?), leader of the Separatist movement. Meanwhile Anakin (Hayden Christensen) is appointed to the High Council as Senator/Chancellor/Emperor/Whatever he’s called this week Palpatine’s (Ian McDiarmid) representative with their growing relationship threatening the very core of the Jedi order.

Let’s start with a massive positive, the opening to Revenge of the Sith is great. It’s a lovely, continuous shot (I’m a sucker for continuous takes and sustained shots, see also: Birdman, first 20 minutes of Gravity and the work of Steve McQueen e.g. Hunger & Shame) of Anakin and Obi-Wan flying around Grievous’s ship in which Palpatine is being held captive. Things take a slight downturn when we actually get on to the Ship; R2D2 now has the ability to fly and shoot fire (did he get them at the same place Kitty Pride got her ‘send people back in time’ powers in Days of Future Past?) and Palpatine is now Anakin’s confidante in a way that was never built up or shown to us and thus is a tad hard to swallow, but other than that the sequence on the ship is actually, dare I say, kind of fun.

Alas, the fun cannot last because this is a Star Wars prequel and the universe is a place indifferent to our suffering. After the events of the opening Anakin is reunited with Padmé and so resumes the clunkiest romance ever to play out on the silver screen. Honestly, that balcony scene was so horrendous I don’t even want to think about it, not least because Padmé is stood brushing her curly hair for the duration and anyone with naturally or even unnaturally curly hair knows that you never go near it with a brush, not unless you want to look like Crystal Tipps…

This is also the prequel with the least shit performances in it. Hayden Christensen is not completely irredeemable, I kind of like the way he plays the conflicted double agent it’s just a shame he’s lumbered with some of the worst dialogue in the film.

This is definitely a film for the Mc’s; Ewan McGregor and Ian McDiarmid are on good form. Gone is all the whingey rubbish and Ewan McGregor is really given a chance to garner some sympathy for his character. He goes through the whole film being a proper good guy so when it rolls round in the final showdown and he says “I have failed you Anakin” it gets you. This is what happens when you write half decent characters Mr Lucas, people end up caring about them.

McDiarmid is the real stand out though. On full sugar, full fat, dialled up to 11 form, he cackles and camps his way to maximum panto villain. It’s perfect for a trilogy in dire need of a dose of daftness.

As well as occasional panto brilliance, Revenge of the Sith also goes darker than either of the previous episodes. Order 66 is genuinely horrible to watch. Admittedly if we’d have known these Jedi a little more it would have had even more of an impact but it’s accompanied by a haunting bit of music and shot in such a stark way that it’s hard not to be a little bit winded by it.

Whilst we’re on the subject, a quick word about the score. It’s par for the course now that the the score is awesome but it really, really is. John Williams you are a wizard. Even in the shonkey-est, most piss poor dialogued moments of the prequels, the score shimmers like a lush Oasis in a desert of crap. Stick that on the poster…

Finally we head into the third act and the infamous killing of the younglings. I get it, you want to show us that Anakin has gone completely evil and that is just about the most evil thing an individual can do. The trouble is Vader is supposed to be simultaneously ruthless as fuck and tragically sympathetic. At the end of Return of the Jedi we feel for him because he’s a fallen man, an impressionable soul gone wrong, yes he’s invisible chokehold-ed countless Imperial Commanders and reduced Alderaan to atoms but he’s simply been led astray. The whole Vader arc depends on that sympathy but when he’s committed mass child murder in such an up close, intimate way, it’s really hard to feel anything other than contempt for him.

Following on from this we get the Palpatine/Yoda and Anakin/Obi-Wan final showdowns one of which one almost works and the other has no redeeming qualities. The fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan is probably a bit too long and it’s certainly a bit too ridiculous. Why exactly this needed to take place on a Lava planet I will never know and all the jumping and swinging gets a bit too physics defying for my liking but on the whole it’s not half bad. For the Palpatine/Yoda fight I’ll take a direct quote from my notes “Yoda Palpatine fight = straight up bullshit”. I’ve already made my feelings known about when Yoda picks up a lightsabre but this fight is pure Yoda leaping, platform flinging bullshit.

So Anakin is defeated and left for dead, Padmé is in labour and appears to be dying of a broken heart. Then we have the parallel scenes of Leia and Luke being born and Anakin going ‘full Vader’. There was something about this scene, the birth scenes and subsequent chatter between Obi-Wan and Jimmy Smits that I really loved but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then it dawned on me; they were filmed on a physical set. Yes, the effects of Revenge of the Sith are the best of the Prequels, it absolutely looks the nicest, but I don’t care how good your effects are, it’s not the same. You can have the sheen of artifice in other things but having a physical set where the actors can react to their surroundings is always going to yield better results.

And that’s it. Leia heads off to Alderaan with an entirely new identity and Luke goes to Tatooine where he keeps the same name as his child murdering father, erm…

Now I can’t vouch for how much of this goodwill is genuine praise and how much has come as a result of some kind of Stockholm syndrome that’s kicked in after Attack of the Clones, but from where I’m sitting this is definitely the best of the prequels. It’s still not great (they absolutely don’t need to have the Wookies in there but George can’t resist a bit of fan service), but, if I was in a kidnap/interrogation situation and I was forced to watch it as some form of torture, it wouldn’t break me.

So that’s it. I started #BlogAlongAStarWars thinking that this exercise was going to severely lower my expectations for Episode 7 but it actually hasn’t. I’ll admit the low point of Attack of the Clones was pretty bad, but now, looking back on the whole thing, I’m pretty optimistic about The Force Awakens. It’s done what I sent out to do, it’s turned me into a Star Wars fan (I bought a T-Shirt and everything) and I’ve really enjoyed it :-)

So, in the immortal words of RuPaul, JJ “don’t fuck it up”.

Final Thoughts 1: It’s established here that Anakin lives with Padmé, but does no one ever question that? I fail to see how no one in the past 3 years has asked Anakin about where he lives. Do they have a spare apartment somewhere that they’re fobbing off as his?

Final Thoughts 2: After Padmé informs Anakin she’s pregnant “I doubt the Queen will continue to allow me to serve on the Senate”. Good to see that institutionalised sexism is still thriving in a galaxy far, far away…

Surprise discovery: Ewan McGregor is Denis ‘Wedge Antilles’ Lawson’s nephew!  All together now… “Iiiiiiit’s a small world aaaafter all!”

Goodbye till next time :-)

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BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode 2 – Attack of the Clones

Hello :-)

We’re here at my fifth entry for The Incredible Suit’s BlogAlongAStarWars. Join me in this increasingly ridiculous exercise as I learn to appreciate this hallowed series and distract myself from the slow trickle of time working its way through my own personal hourglass.

So after the bitter disappointment that was Phantom Menace, let’s crack on with Attack of the Clones shall we?

Set 10 years after the events of Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones opens with rumours of a separatist movement threatening to break up the Senate. Meanwhile a plot is underway to assassinate former Queen and current Senator Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman). Anakin (Hayden Christensen) is given an assignment to protect her whilst Obi-Wan goes searching for a mysterious bounty hunter.

I realise these reviews are now going to start resembling the story of a failed relationship; the kind where it all starts off wonderfully and then half way through something awful happens and you should have ended it but you carry on because you thought maybe it was a one off and eventually it all goes horribly wrong and you’re left alone, crying, sitting in your pyjamas for an entire weekend, surviving off wine and Cookie Dough Ice Cream eaten straight from the tub… or at least that’s how I imagine that relationships break down, because that’s obviously never happened to me…

I went into Attack of the Clones thinking that maybe it would be better than the last one. How foolish I was.

It’s actually fitting that there’s a protracted scene on a factory conveyor belt towards the end because that’s exactly how this films feels like it was put together; on an assembly line. I can practically see them with a list of stuff they have to include; forced friendship, tedious romance, obligatory space fight and a metric fuck tonne of lightsabres.

In the entire 2 hours 20 minutes of the movie, evidence of Obi-Wan and Anakin’s friendship never materialises. All they have is that scene in the lift where they joke (I use the term in it’s loosest sense…) about falling in “a nest of Gundarks” and from then on all they do is bitch about each other for the duration of the movie. How is this helping to engross us in their plight when all they do is whinge about each other for the whole film?!

The cast are, again, on universal poor form. At least Ewan McGregor is marginally less dick-ish than last time and when he is he has a reason to because Anakin’s a prick. The casting of Samuel L Jackson was a ridiculous decision, whoever thought of casting the man who excels in OTT, borderline batshit roles as the calm, collected Mace Windu clearly owes everyone an apology.

In the spirit of fairness I must admit I enjoyed some of the action scenes. The flying chase around Coruscant, the coliseum scene, they’re fun. The coliseum in particular, where Padmé, Obi-Wan and Anakin are handcuffed and chained to columns, I really liked.  Padmé got to show that she can handle herself and the Jedi’s were forced to evade beasties without the use of their lightsabres. I like that, I wish there was more of that, that’s what makes it such a shame when they bottle it and turn the remainder of the scene into a lightsabre orgy.

And now onto the ill-fated romance on which so much of the Vader lore hangs. I struggle to think of a less convincing screen couple than Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen, if it was possible to have minus screen chemistry these guys would be at about -273.15°c. Absolute fucking zero. But they’re two attractive humans frolicking in a beautiful green-screen field, so in Lucas’s mind that passes for love.

Aside from the fact they both look like Topshop models why exactly are they ‘in love’? Anakin gives off nothing but creeper vibes from the start of the film. “I don’t think she liked me watching her” OF COURSE SHE DIDN’T! YOU’RE CREEPY AS FUCK! Then there’s his constant bitching about his mentor, undermining of Amidala’s plans for her own security, endorsement of fascist dictatorships, batshit Tuskan murder sprees and all-round general twattery.

But she’s equally weird, what’s with her protestations that she can’t be with him because she’s a Senator? Are Senators celibate in this universe too? Is ANYONE allowed to have sex in this galaxy?!?! And lest we forget Padmé’s stone cold delivery of “I truly deeply love you”… actually, he’s a sociopath and she’s human beige, maybe Lucas was right, they belong together.

Not to get too first-world-problemsey on you but I really struggled to write this one. It took me three sittings to watch the film (I’ve done all the others in 1) and when it came down to it I couldn’t bring myself to write it up, hence why this is almost two weeks late. I’m not one of those people who delight in tearing a film to shreds; movies make me happier than any other art form. If I’m at the pictures or at home I love the ritual of getting your sundries, sitting down and devoting yourself to a film for two hours. I couldn’t do that with Attack of the Clones. I’d start with the best of intentions but it felt like it was draining me, like a cinematic Dementor.

One more to go before The Force Awakens. I find it difficult to see how you could disappoint me Abrams, if all you have to do is be better than the prequels, the bar is so very, very low…

Final Thoughts 1: Have I missed something or was it ever established why Jedi’s can’t have a love life? I always thought they were all like mediaeval knights (you know, because Jedi KNIGHTS) rather than monks…

Final Thoughts 2: How, after the events of episode 1, is Nute Gunray not in prision, let alone in charge of important senate shit?!?!

Surprise Discovery: It’s ok Rose Byrne, don’t worry Joel Edgerton, you’ll both go on to do far better things.

Goodbye till next time :-)

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BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace

Hello :-)

Here we are again for the fourth instalment of my attempt at The Incredible Suit’s BlogAlongAStarWars; My ongoing quest to become a Star Wars fan and distract myself from the realisation that with every second I am edging closer towards oblivion.

I'm not going to pretend that I don’t know the prequels have a reputation; of course I do, I'm a human who has spent time on the internet. However, as with the original trilogy, I haven’t seen these films for years, so I don’t properly understand why there’s such disdain for them.

The story centres around tax disputes between the Galactic republic and the Trade federation. Jedi Qui-Gon-Jinn (Liam Neeson) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) are sent in to negotiate with both parties but things soon take a turn for the worse and they’re on the run. The Jedi hot tail it to Naboo, save Queen Amidala (Natalie Portman) from kidnap then, after they’re attacked trying to leave the planet, end up on Tatooine where they meet young slave Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd) who may be the answer to all of their problems.

Let’s not mince our words, any way you slice it Phantom Menace isn’t great. As a standalone film it’s boring and when compared to the original trilogy it fails on almost every level. It is not, however, completely without merit.

The trouble is we get off on the wrong foot and the film never really recovers from there. The iconic scrolling text is babbling on about taxation which no one, especially the children in the audience, gives a shit about. Then, in the first scene of the movie, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan whip their lightsabres out quicker than a flasher with his wang. As exciting as that is (the lightsabres not the wang), you can’t escape the fact that this is the opposite to everything we’ve been taught about being a Jedi up to this point.

One of the biggest issues in Phantom Menace is the absence of a main character. This is talked about far better than I could in the infamous Red Letter Media reviews and by the brilliant Michael Barryte at Belated Media; all logic indicates that our lead should be Obi-Wan because that character is the bridge between trilogies. However I’m kind of glad it isn’t because in Phantom he’s an absolute prick. I have an awful lot of time for Ewan McGregor but his character was written terribly, he’s mean with a complete lack of humour. “Why do I sense we’ve picked up another pathetic lifeform?” WHAT?! You’re talking about a child! Stop being a knobhead Obi-Wan!

In fact all of the characters are pitched so weirdly. The acting is uniformly terrible. It’s almost like a weird absurdist art piece because no one reacts to anything in the way and normal person would. Every plot point is met with nothing but solemnity with the exception of the very end where they have a party and Amidala gives Brian Blessed Gungan one of those Plasma Balls you get from gadget shops or Argos.

Qui-Gon has got to be the most un-Jedi Jedi in the history of Jedis. He’s a compulsive gambler and has the oddest way of setting peoples mind at ease. When Anakin asks him about his “laser sword” (fuck off Lucas, you’ve made enough money off their bastard merchandising you can at least take the time to remember they’re called Lightsabres) he says “maybe I killed a Jedi and took it from him” which is such a bizarre statement to make on so many different levels it would take a whole other blog post to adequately explain it.

Please bear in mind, I’m not levelling this criticism at the actors themselves, they have all gone on to prove themselves as exceptional performers in other films more deserving of their talents (except poor Jake Lloyd who, by his own admission, had such an awful time with Phantom Menace that, save for one film in 2005, he hasn’t been lured back to the silver screen since). No, the fault lies at the door of the atrocious script, piss poor directorial choices and the fact that there were many creative professionals in this team who just sat back and watched the proverbial car crash unfold without doing a thing to stop it.

One genuinely positive moment is the podrace. Gleefully lifted from Ben Hur it’s shiny and fun, it looks and sounds great; it feels like it’s accidentally been spliced in from some other movie, one that has a sense of adventure. It’s hard to justify such an extensive use of greenscreen but the Pod race nearly does… nearly.

It’s always fun to explore new worlds and we’re given that opportunity in Phantom Menace. Obviously we’ve seen Tatooine before but Naboo is the first city civilisation we get to seen and, although I’m not a fan of the wall to wall greenscreen, I like the idea. I particularly like the Gungan underwater city. I’m not a fan of the Gungans, especially not Jar Jar, but it’s in keeping with the extreme terrain that inspired the likes of Tatooine and Hoth and it looks good. It struck me as odd that Amidala wasn’t set up to be the ruler of Alderaan though, I mean we all know who her daughter is and it might have made sense to make us care about a planet and it’s inhabitants if you’re going to blow it up in a later episode but I realise this is a tiny niggle in a film with far bigger problems.

Speaking of Naboo, where are all these dying Nabooians (Nabooeans? Nabooese? Nabooish?). Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to see bodies in the street or anything but there’s just very little evidence that this is a life or death situation. You've managed to get on and off that planet several times so what exactly is this blockade doing? You appear to have plenty of water and land to grow your own food so what is it that that you need to trade so desperately? I don’t want to get all ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ on you but it seems like you could sustain yourselves quite well if you really wanted to.

If there was ever going to be a character to rival Vader in terms of pure aesthetic awesome it’s Darth Maul. The character design of Darth Maul is perfect. The robes, the face, the double ended lightsabre. With Ray Park’s physicality and Peter Serafinowicz’s awesomely creepy vocal performance, he was all set up to be this imposing force across the prequels with his and Sidious’s relationship mirroring that of Vader and Palpatine.

So why oh why did he have to die?!?!

This is, for me, the biggest mistake Lucas makes in Phantom, maybe even across all of the prequels. So much wasted potential, it almost hurts me to think about it. The lovely Ryan Lambie explains it better than I ever could so just read that and pretend I was clever enough to write it, yeah? Cheers.

The fatal flaw in all of this is just how much the film takes for granted. It takes it for granted that you’re so excited to see lightsabres again you won’t care that what the characters are doing directly contradicts what we’ve previously been told, it takes it for granted that we know who Anakin will become and assumes this will automatically make us care about him, it takes it for granted that we love R2D2 and C3PO so much that we’ll ignore that they have no reason to be here,  it takes for granted that our fondness for Obi Wan means we’ll ignore his dickish behaviour, it takes it for granted that we’ll accept toys and computer trickery over actual substance.

It’s hard to separate out feelings of disappointment from legitimate criticism which is why I think some people are so harsh on Phantom Menace, but it really isn’t all bad. Having said that, what it is is a predominantly soulless, lightsabre happy, beige wall of a film. It has it’s redeeming qualities in the shape of the Pod race and (up until the point he’s sliced in twain) Darth Maul but by and large it’s just too dull to care about and from the poor choices that plague the film, it’s evident that the film makers certainly don’t care either.

I am really, really not looking forward to next month…

Final Thoughts 1: “A communications disruption can mean only one thing… invasion”. Or you’ve ran out of data, or you haven’t paid the phone bill, or someone knocked the plug out. I mean on this occasion it does mean invasion but frankly that was a lucky guess.

Final Thoughts 2: Padmé’s decoy is a bit ballsy isn't she? I mean she orders real Padmé to go and clean R2D2, I wouldn’t order my boss to clean a jumped up pedal bin, even if I was pretending to be her…

Final Thoughts 3: I'm just going to sit here and point out the MASSIVE ANAKIN/JESUS PARALLEL that crops up and then is NEVER SPOKEN OF AGAIN (like so many other things… COUGHmidichloriansCOUGH).

Final Thoughts 4: All Hyperdrives are bollocks. They all break all the time, the people in charge of travel in the Star Wars universe need to come up with something more dependable because it’s getting ridiculous.

Surprise Discovery: Is that..? IT IS! It IS Celia Imrie!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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PS: I didn’t want to write about this with the rest of my waffle, but as a result of watching the Red Letter Media review I watched The Beginning: Making Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace. Watching it after the event is a strangely eerie experience. I realise it might be painful for some but I think it’s well worth a watch, if only to see exactly where the train derailed.

Straight Outta Compton Review

Hello :-)

Biopics are an interesting beast. They’ll always have an audience so long as their subject does and, unlike a documentary, they have license to embellish the truth or omit some less than savoury incidents. Most recently I went to see the NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton.

Straight Outta Compton is the story of the formation of and subsequent demise of NWA in the late 80’s/early 90’s. With the combined forces of Eazy-E (Jason Mitchell), Dr Dre (Corey Hawkins), Ice Cube (played by Ice Cube’s real life son, O’Shea Jackson Jr) and the management of Jerry Heller (Paul Giamatti), the collective soon achieve fame and notoriety across the US.

I’m fairly familiar with the goings on of NWA, even so I was surprised by just how much was packed into the 10 year span of the film. So much ground is covered there’s very little time to go into detail about anything meaning Straight Outta Compton feels more like an abridged revision guide rather than a comprehensive study, nonetheless it is highly entertaining.

The film is clearly divisible into three acts, all of which vary in quality. The first chronicles the formation, recording of the titular album and the band going on tour; this is where the film is at its finest. The scene setting of life in late 80’s Compton is really effective and the pervasive subjugation of African American communities is more than a little resonant in light of recent events in the US. An encounter with the LAPD prompting Ice Cube to pen the infamous protest song Fuck tha Police and the unsanctioned performance of the song at a gig in Detroit carry the illicit thrill of defiance coupled with shots of hotel room parties and the band mucking about in the recording studio makes for some wonderful stuff. It’s so difficult to capture the joy of music on screen and make it feel authentic but this first section does just that.

The second act of the film, post-Ice Cube’s departure from NWA, is where things shift down a gear. The focus moves from the music to contract disputes and bitterness at members leaving the band. There are some moments that recapture some of that first act energy, most of which feature Jackson Jr’s Ice Cube; the recording of the blistering diss track No Vaseline and the scene where Cube takes a baseball bat to one of the offices of Priority Records are both pulse raisers but they’re nearly buried in the dull and vague legal back and forth that dominates the middle of the film.

The final section focuses partly on the deterioration of Eazy-E, his tragic diagnosis of AIDs and also on Dr Dre’s increasingly fraught relationship with Suge Knight and Death Row Records. There is an element of Where’s Wally that creeps into this final act when Dr Dre collaborators start popping up like Snoop Dogg and Tupac (Keith Stanfield and Marcc Rose doing great jobs of looking like and, particularly in Stanfield’s case, sounding like, their respective artists) but that fun is brought to a swift end thanks to R. Marcos Taylor’s Suge Knight. He cuts a terrifying shape and his scenes of brutality and intimidation and legitimately hard to watch.

However the bulk of the last act narrative is handed over to the decline of Eazy-E, the scenes of which have been accused of being overly sentimental. I’m not sure when sentimental became a dirty word but I’m not convinced it should be. Jason Mitchell does wonderful work as Eazy-E and there’s nothing wrong with feeling sad when such a well realised character faces such tragedy. There is a palpable sense of regret and loss in these scenes that I think is really well handled.

What’s a little disappointing is how much of a hagiography Straight Outta Compton turns into. The band are never depicted as totally saintly but some of the more pernicious aspects of the group’s history are glossed over or omitted entirely. Even some of the less controversial but more interesting events are left out to make way for more scenes of contract litigation, which is a shame.

It looks brilliantly stylish. I’ve never been a particular fan of F Gary Gray’s work but it's a confidently helmed picture. For the most part Gray balances humour, drama and a good dose of action. It's a credit to him that he's been able to make someone rapping in a recording booth such an engaging thing to watch.

The film’s cast is one of it’s great strengths. Paul Giamatti adds to his repertoire of arsehole music managers with Jerry Heller. He could have played Heller with a striped top, mask and swag bag but his staunch defence of NWA and seemingly genuine appreciation of their music adds real intrigue and WTF-ness to his character’s motives.

DJ Yella, MC Ren and The D.O.C are somewhat side-lined from proceedings but Neil Brown Jr, Aldis Hodge and Marlon Yates Jr all make the most of the screen time they have. The central trio of Hawkins, Mitchell and Jackson are the ones that do the most heavy lifting. The camera loves Corey Hawkins and his performance as Dr Dre has charisma by the bucket load. Aside from looking uncannily like his Father, O’Shea Jackson Jr channels the requisite energy, frustration and creativity of someone who undeniably changed the musical landscape of the late 20th Century.

I am a fan of NWA so I realise that this film was engineered for me to like it but the story is such that Straight Outta Compton could easily be enjoyed by someone who isn’t as well versed in their work. It’s a unashamed celebration of everything NWA stood for and although the film sags in the middle it pulls it back for a genuinely tender finale. Straight Outta Compton may not be a warts and all exposé but it has at it’s heart a love of the music NWA made and for that I loved it.

Goodbye till next time!
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BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi

Hello :-)

I’m back again for The Incredible Suit’s BlogAlongAStarWars part trois. My own account of the ongoing quest to become a proper Star Wars fan and crush the oncoming tidal wave of adult life by revisiting all the Star Wars movies in the run up to Episode 7, this most recent of posts which is absolutely definitely not late and absolutely didn’t need to have been posted by the end of August…

So here ends my look back at the original trilogy. Again, I haven’t re-watched episodes IV – VI for years but thus far I’ve thoroughly enjoyed getting to know these much loved films as an adult and letting them batter down my snarky and jaded defences.

In episode VI we discover that the Galactic Empire, under orders from Human Mole-Rat Emperor Palpatine, are building a second Death Star so they can crush the Rebel Alliance once and for all. Meanwhile Luke Skywalker, C3PO and R2D2 set in motion a plan to rescue Han Solo who is still encased in carbonite and hanging on the wall at Jabba the Hutt’s lair.

This film had me from the off. Bad-ass music *tick* iconic scrolling opening *tick* and then a ruddy excellent rescue *tick tick tick*. I love a good heist but (puts on M&S advert voice) this isn’t just a heist, this a bonkers Space Opera heist. The whole sequence is tremendous fun, the call back to “I Love you/I know” was super cute, I love that this is the first time Luke seems like a proper Jedi, it’s just an all-round good time.

Here’s a potentially controversial statement: I don’t understand the appeal of Boba Fett. I know he’s supposed to be this great man of mystery and intrigue but I’m just not seeing it. To me he hasn’t done enough to justify the esteem in which his character is held and when he’s accidentally knocked into the giant sand vagina I gave zero shits.

For a film series that has thus far stayed away from massive exposition dumps it is a little disappointing that when we get back to Dagobah, after Yoda sadly shuffles off this mortal coil, the ghost of Obi Wan has to show up and explain everything. This isn’t the worst offender I’ve ever seen but it did feel as though Lucas wrote himself into a corner and then decided to Force feed the audience (Geddit?!?! FORCE feed… because it’s Star Wars… and the Force… oh fine be like that…) some piffle, albeit piffle delivered by the legendary Alec Guinness, in order to work his way out of it. I’m not saying that this is an omen of things to come but it absolutely is.

Then we move to Endor. I don’t hate the Ewoks as much as most (they gave us Warwick Davis and he is a goddamn legend) but I will concede that they are narratively unnecessary and conspicuously commercially lucrative. We’ve already established that this is a David and Goliath space parable; you don’t need a physical representation in the form of tiny bears fighting massive Stormtroopers.  Also, I know everyone says Ewoks are just children’s toys but let’s not forget they did want to eat Han Solo. Like actually EAT him…

Then everything comes to a head in the final act and it’s glorious. The rebel strike team try and take the Endor base, the X-Wings are sent to take down the Death Star, Luke goes mano a mano with his Daddy and Admiral Ackbar utters the line that spawned a thousand memes. Each of these showdowns matter and the cutting between the three of them is done really nicely, enough to keep us engaged but not manic enough to confuse us.

Each individual finale fight matters but the battle between Vader and Luke is the one with the biggest emotional heft and brilliantly done it is too. We all know that Luke isn’t really going to turn but when he lets rip on Vader he proper goes for it and it has all the drama you’d expect from such an anticipated fight.

Maybe it all wraps itself up rather fluffily and a bit too nicely but by this point I don’t really mind. The redemption of Vader, Luke’s transition to fully fledged Jedi, Leia and Han’s happily ever after, it’s full on fairytale ending stuff which , as a life-long Disney fan, I am not one to shy away from.

So everyone is happy, we’ve got fireworks and dancing Ewoks; but then, looking like the creepiest creeper who ever creeped, Hayden Christensen’s ghostly figure appears like the Ghost of Special Editions Present. Aside from the fact that this makes no sense (I’m not accepting Lucas’s retcon bullshit about how he’s “returned to his inner persona”, how would Luke even know who he is? He’s only ever seen his Father as an old man?! Poor Sebastian Shaw…), it is a painful reminder of what I have in store over the next three months.

George Lucas’s ridiculous changes aside, I get Star Wars now. I understand the affection; the characters are joyous, I agree with the consensus that Episode V is the best one and if Lightsabers were real I would absolutely want one. So let us soldier on dear reader and you can watch as the prequels shit all over my new found love... *sigh*

Final Thoughts: (This is pretty much exactly what I did at the end of Return of the Jedi) 

‘I wonder if there’s any other original trilogy stuff I can look at before I have to start on the prequels…’

*takes to the interwebs*

‘Ooooh ‘Star Wars Holiday Special’ that might be worth a look...’

*10 minutes later*

‘What the actual FUCK…’

Surprise Discovery: I completely forgot about the suggestion that Leia has powers too. Fingers crossed that’s something we get to see in Episode VII!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back

Hello :-)

Here we are for round 2 of The Incredible Suit’s BlogAlongAStarWars and my own personal quest to become a proper fan of this hallowed film series (read as ‘quest to procrastinate as much as is humanly possible’).

As previously discussed I haven’t seen the original Star Wars trilogy in a long time and even in my formative years, I didn’t watch them often. The Empire Strikes Back is the film that suffered most from my Star Wars indifference because it’s the one I’ve seen the least.

Three years have passed since the events of A New Hope and everyone is a little war weary. Our heroic rebels led by Princess Leia have been chased across the galaxy and set up a base on the Ice planet Hoth. Darth Vader is hell bent on finding Luke Skywalker and scatters thousands of probe droids across the galaxy with a view to finding him and turning him to the dark side.

I’m glad to report that everything is present and correct from the last film; stirring score, fun space chase scenes (say “space chase” five times fast), awesome action; but Empire is giving us a bit more than we got before. This feels like classic ‘second episode in a trilogy’ stuff; the stakes are higher and everything’s gone darker. It sounds cliché but it’s undeniably effective and by the end of Empire Strikes Back the audience is totally on board for Episode VI.

I love that things have progressed; it’s never spelled out for us but we’re clearly a few years on from A New Hope, not just because the locations have changed but because our characters have. Everyone seems a bit more mature and the relationships feel like these guys have been living together for ages, like genuine friends.

It’s really nice to be back in the company of our central trio. Luke’s still a bit of a whiney bitch but his little brother/ big brother relationship with Han is so cute I’ll forgive him. Han and Leia’s back and forth is lovely. Of course she’s in love with him, she was never not going to be in love with him, LOOK AT HIS BEAUTIFUL FACE. But seriously, their moments have just the right balance of wit and vulnerability to convince us that these two are destined for each other.

This is the Two Towers of the series where our central team spin off into their own mini adventures. Han, Leia and Chewie are trying to evade capture in the Millennium Falcon (what’s a girl got to do to get a Hyperdrive fixed in that Galaxy?!?!) meanwhile Luke has swanned off to the Dagobah system because Obi Wan’s disembodied voice told him to. You really can’t underestimate how ridiculous that statement is until you write it down but on screen it works. When they introduce this psychic Jedi Voice messaging system in A New Hope I thought it was a bit odd, but I went with it because the film had earned my goodwill by that point. Here it works because we discover Yoda can hear it too and we get a lovely explanation of what being a Jedi means. It’s a really nice way to expand on that mythology and the idea that the fastest or strongest are not necessarily the best is a sweet little take away.

Whilst we’re on the subject, I was utterly unprepared for how hilariously batshit Yoda is when we first meet him. Why have I never heard anyone talk about this?!?! Everyone is all “Do or not do, there is no try” and yes, it’s great when he gets his Jedi Master on and raises the X-Wing from the swamp but that introduction when he’s poking around Luke’s stuff and giggling his little green tits off is one of my new favourite things.

They’ve really ramped it up in terms of environments for this one which is great fun. We got a glimpse of the deserts of Tatooine in A New Hope but for the most part we’re in the Millennium Falcon or on a Star Destroyer or in an X-Wing, not that they aren’t joyous places to be, they’re just a tad samey. It’s probably a reflection of the increase in budget but Hoth and Cloud City look fantastic whilst simultaneously being a lovely way to add to the scope of the universe.

Let’s talk about Darth Vader for a minute because I completely forgot to do that last time. In terms of iconography, there is nothing more Star Wars than Vader.  The character design is epic, everything he says sounds badass and that voice is just fantastic (James Earl Jones = instant gravitas). However, why these Imperial Starships have so many staff on them remains a mystery to me. If you jump on that Galactic Corporate ladder you’re pretty much destined to end up with Vader doing his (occasionally comical) invisible chokehold on you.

The reveal of Vader’s paternity is so engrained in pop culture it feels like something I’ve always known; however this blogging malarkey has alerted me to the fact that I’ve never properly sat down and watched that scene. The reveal itself is iconic but that whole build up and aftermath makes a massive impact; it’s a demonstration of how powerful Vader is, how seductive the Dark side can be, it shows far Luke has come, how much he still has to learn and the fact he’d rather jump into the abyss than join his Father says so much more than just dialogue. Despite the slightly awkward getaway (how EXACTLY does he manage to get sucked up by that air vent?), it’s the definitive turning point of the series.

Without having rewatched Return of the Jedi I can’t say if this is the best of the trilogy, it’s not as uncomplicatedly fun as A New Hope, but it feels like Empire Strikes Back is the reason the series is as revered as it is.  This is the heart of the franchise; everything we care about is expanded on, building a bigger universe with a vim and vigour that makes wide eyed children of us all.

Final Thoughts: I’m not being funny but the Empire should have had the battle of Hoth sewn up. That energy shield was more of a hindrance than a help to the Rebels’ escape, they could only get out through a bottleneck made by that Ion Cannon so why not position your ships over it and blast everyone to pieces on their way out? FFS Vader!

Surprise Discovery: Hello Grand Maester Pycelle! Fancy seeing you here!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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BlogAlongAStarWars: Episode IV – A New Hope

Hello :-)

So I’ve decided to take part in The Incredible Suit’s BlogAlongAStarWars because I can’t think of a better way to distract myself from the impending responsibilities of my own adulthood.

Also because I don’t think I’m a Star Wars fan.

Hang on! Put those flaming torches and pitchforks away! When I say I’m not a Star Wars fan, that doesn’t mean I don’t like Star Wars. It’s fine, it’s a perfectly pleasant way to pass the time, I just don’t emotionally connect to it. I haven’t seen the original trilogy for years, I can’t quote it, I can’t remember what happens in each film (I’ve seen them all but they blur together in my mind); basically I’m a bit vague on the whole thing.

So I’m going to see if this little project can turn me into a proper fan. Or at the very least help me remember the difference between a Jawa and a Sandperson…

It would be extremely easy to be cynical about Star Wars, they’ve got to be the most parodied movies in modern cinema so sitting there, eye-rolling my way through every iconic shot or line sounds about right, especially for someone as bitter and jaded as me. However, I press play and I can’t do it. I’m totally engaged because of that score. That score is fucking majestic. There’s no way you can be arch and glib when you’re listening to that, it’s too awesome.

So straight away my defences are down and we get into the story. I could’ve sworn it was more complicated than this but here we go; Princess Leia, sporting a parallel cinnamon bun hairstyle, is captured by The Empire because she’s stolen their secret plans, she sends a SOS message to Obi Wan Kenobi via robots R2D2 and C3PO who make a quick getaway via an escape pod. We land on a desert planet where some Jawa traders (Ahhhh! So THEY’RE the Jawas…) kidnap our droids and sell them on to Owen Lars and his nephew Luke Skywalker. Luke comes across Leia’s message and sets out to find Obi Wan.

What’s weird about taking A New Hope out of it’s fandom context is that on viewing, it’s refreshingly unpretentious. I’d never criticise anyone for reading into the philosophy behind these films, art is made for the viewer, not the artist and if you get a deeper message out of them then more power to you, but A New Hope makes no bones about the fact that it’s here to be a super fun space romp and to that end it’s a total success. It feels a little like we’re moving from one set piece to another sometimes but it’s all so good natured and perky you get dragged along for the ride with a huge smile on your face.

Luke is a perfect central character because he is basically every teenager who ever existed; a bit stroppy, naïve and desperate to experience what life has to offer, his character arc basically writes itself. He comes off as a little beige in the beginning of A New Hope, especially when he’s surrounded by such brilliant characters as Han and Leia, but by the time the credits roll you’re totally rooting for him.

Speaking of Han and Leia they have so much personality I want to bottle it and spread it around all the modern blockbusters that don’t imbue their characters with half as much as this did. Impractical hairstyle aside, Leia is wonderful. Carrie Fisher practically glows with wit and moxie. As for Harrison Ford… well he’s pretty much perfect. There’s no other way I can put it, it’s a perfect performance; charming, daring and cheeky before Nandos was even a thing.

The downside to this awakening of the potential Star Wars fan within me is that the only versions of the original trilogy I can find are the remastered ones. Now, when I watch Sci-fi from the pre-CGI age, as long as the story is good enough, I don’t have an issue with the effects. Particularly in the case of Star Wars because a lot of the effects are practical and as we all know the believability half-life of real effects is inordinately greater than that of CGI. However, in this remastered version, George Lucas or whichever clown is responsible, deemed in necessary to add in extra CGI creatures and a whole new scene featuring a CGI Jabba the Hutt. These scenes are massively jarring because the CGI clashes hideously with the original footage. What I really want to do is immerse myself in a world, what this is doing is pulling me straight back out of it. 

Despite the CGI retconning, A New Hope is an inordinate amount of fun. It’s full of characters you want to spend time with, action you care about and a style of storytelling that puts as much faith in the audience as the audience does in the film.

I’m starting to wonder why I didn’t watch Star Wars more as a child because I would have absolutely loved it, in fact I love it now. Maybe the Force is turning me into a fan after all…

Final Thoughts: George Lucas gives zero shits about scientific accuracy. He’s gonna stick “PEW PEW!” noises all over the space battles and there’s not a god damn thing you can do about it.

Surprise Discovery: I had no idea Debbie Reynolds was Carrie Fisher’s Mum, cheers Google!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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Inside Out Review

Hello :-)

Pixar have been the leading light in modern children’s animation since the release of the seminal Toy Story in 1995. However, when the studio turned out Cars 2 in 2011 it was seen as a move towards more cynical, toyetic releases and the movie going public feared the worst. With a perceived reliance on sequels and the recent resurgence in quality from Disney Studios, Pixar’s position as the best in the CG game was looking shaky; can they turn it around with their newest offering Inside Out?

Inside Out is about the emotions in our heads, specifically the emotions in the head of a young girl, Riley (Kaitlyn Dias). Riley is governed by Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Bill Hader), Anger (Lewis Black) and Disgust (Mindy Kaling). The emotions help Riley make decisions, navigating her way from childhood to adolescence, forming glowing memory marbles along the way. When Joy and Sadness are cut off from the other emotions they get lost in Riley’s Long Term Memory. Joy and Sadness must find their way back to Headquarters or Riley may never be happy again.

Forgive my pre-amble, I hate talking Pixar down but it must be said, Cars 2 is a Turkey. Thankfully it looks like it’s going to be consigned to the history pages as a blip on Pixar’s record because Inside Out is back up there with some of the studio’s best.

There’s an inbuilt quality that we’ve come to expect from Pixar and it’s time we stopped taking that for granted and appreciated the artistry they produce. The animation on Inside Out is gorgeous. The inner and outer worlds are clearly defined and the mind-machinations are fleshed out in bright, shiny visuals that literally give shape to the abstract.

In terms of story it’s the most ambitious concept Pixar have attempted so far, but the world of Inside Out is so beautifully realised you won’t struggle to engage with it. There’s a lot of detail in the film and it’s a testament to the writing team (Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve and Josh Cooley) that it all feels effortless and natural.

Some have said the ideas might be too much for very young viewers but I disagree. There are just as many layers here as there are in the Toy Story movies; younger viewers can enjoy the jokes and glorious visuals, adults can have their heartstrings tugged by the truths about letting go of childhood and everyone can shed a tear when [REDACTED FOR SPOILERS AND MY OWN SANITY BECAUSE I’M STILL NOT OVER IT].

Pete Docter previously directed Up and with that film’s infamous opening it’s no surprise that some tears will be jerked here. What’s so special is how that’s balanced with humour and moments of levity. There are some lovely gags peppered throughout and Pixar still remain the masters of encorporating cultural references that everyone will get something out of. The pacing allows for all of this without ever feeling like it’s dragging you from one emotion to the other, more letting you experience each one as it guides you through the film.

The voice cast is unsurprisingly excellent. It reads as a who’s who of Hollywood comedy but it’s Amy Poehler’s Joy and Phyllis Smith’s Sadness that lead the charge. Poehler and Smith make a great mis-matched pairing and, whilst neither of them are covering ground they haven’t already broached in other projects, they fit perfectly into the world.

The seeming refusal to end on an unequivocally happy note is an indication of how sophisticated this storytelling is. The acceptance and understanding that all emotions are valid and that we need to embrace the whole spectrum of our complex inner lives is one of the most profound take-aways I’ve seen in a film in a long time, let alone in one aimed at children.

I can’t think of anyone else that could have made Inside Out. It’s the perfect marriage of technical skill, adventurous writing and spot on performances that earned Pixar their reputation as the best in the business. Sweet, poignant and fun, Inside Out is a joy.

Inside Out is on general UK release on Friday 24th July.

That's all from me for today. 

Goodbye till next time :-)

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It Follows Review

Hello :-)

If you’ve read any of my Horror reviews before you’ll know I have a history of actively avoiding the genre until recently when I decided to rehabilitate myself and get on board with scary films. This has proved an excellent decision and I’ve seen a whole load of great stuff I otherwise wouldn’t have, most recently I went to see low budget Horror flick It Follows.

Jay is a 19 year old girl dating the seemingly lovely Hugh. They have what she believes to be an innocent sexual encounter, but afterwards she seems to hallucinate figures walking towards her and can’t shake the feeling that something is out to get her. With the help of her friends Jay tries to get to the bottom of these strange visions and avoid becoming its next victim.

Anyone that’s been on Facebook, owned a mobile phone or had an e-mail address has probably seen a chain message of some kind. They usually tell some kind of horrific story and then end by saying “if you don’t forward this message to 10 people the same fate will befall you!” This is the concept behind It Follows and the results are scarier than you’d think.

It Follows revels in suburban gothic imagery, using Detroit’s indigenous dilapidated buildings to great effect. The result is a striking mix of decaying infrastructure, and the unnerving leafy quiet of residential purlieu that really puts the audience on edge. The camera work further aids the atmosphere with the inclusion of a number of 360° pans that whip round just fast enough to make you question everything you see.

In order to set themselves apart from the crowd, the subversion and omission of genre tropes has become a necessity for Horror film makers recently. Happily, It Follows does both by simultaneously proving and disproving Randy Meeks’ theory that sex in Horror films is fatal. It’s a nice twist on an old trope and it’ll stay with you well after the scares have gone.

Having said that It Follows doesn’t rub it’s meta in your face. It’s a genre-literate film and, whilst the sexual spectre (or randy revenant, whichever you prefer) is refreshingly original, it has a definite lineage behind it. David Robert Mitchell is a Director who wears his influences on his sleeve and this film positively reeks of John Carpenter. The music, the shot composition, the growing sense of dread, the slow, linear momentum of the villain.  Carpenter has proved to be a huge influence on a number of filmmakers recently and I for one, wholeheartedly encourage this.


Maika Monroe is a stand out in a film from a genre not usually know for the quality of it's performances. She's sympathetic and stays on the side of distressed damsel rather than crossing over into being the maker of moronic decisions. The rest of the cast don't quite match her levels of nuance but none of them are irritating enough for the audience to wish them into cannon fodder.

There’s a lovely nod to 1942’s Cat People as the film gathers momentum towards the finish line, but things come to a crashing halt when an almost entirely unexplained final show down punctures the carefully constructed atmosphere. It Follows ends on a high with an utterly superb parting shot but it’s hard not to feel let down by a film that does brilliantly for three quarters of its run time but messes up its grand finale.

It Follows is probably one of the most interesting cinematic conversations about sex in recent years. The sub-textual discussion of the way youth imagines sex is fascinating but it’s packaged in such a way that you’ll be jumping out your seat and checking over your shoulder for the promiscuous poltergeist all the way home. It’s not as ground breaking as some would have you believe but what it is, is really good.

Ok, let’s have some…

Reasons to be Cheerful :-)

1. It’s been out for a little while now but there’s a teaser trailer for the new Fantastic Four film. Fantastic Four (or FantFourStic as I’m petulantly calling it) is an interesting one because it’s pretty much been deemed a lost cause already. After seeing the trailer though, I’m not so sure it should be. My ever-increasing crush on Miles Teller aside, I really think we should go into this one with an open mind.

The cast look great, they all have good track records, Josh Trank is an interesting,  young talent (in spite of the found-footage tag the relationships in Chronicle are one of its best assets) and nothing in this teaser gives us cause for alarm. I mean it’s not as if the existing films are masterpieces, let’s give it a chance :-)

2. You may or may not be aware that I’m a daughter of the Midlands and the lack of midlands based media is a constant thorn in my side. Enter my hero Caitlin Moran and her sister Caz who have put their heads together and penned Raised By Wolves, a Channel 4 show about girls from a poor family growing up in Wolverhampton. Needless to say it’s utterly brilliant. The first episode aired on Monday so if you missed it catch up on 4OD.

That’s it for today!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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P.S I’ve managed to sneak some of my ramblings on to Den of Geek again. This time I’ve been complaining about people telling me I can’t complain about things :-)

Kingsman: The Secret Service Review

Hello :-)

Spy films are a rather interesting breed. You’ve got your classics like The Ipcress File and North by Northwest then more modern fare like the Bourne Series, The Mission Impossible movies and finally the decades spanning stalwart of the Bond films. The latter in particular, is taken to task in the latest genre pastiche from Matthew Vaughn, Kingsman: The Secret Service (or just Kingsman because I’m lazy).

Kingsman follows Gary "Eggsy" Unwin (Taron Egerton), an underachiever who is wasting his vast potential on a life of crime. Eggsy is selected by Harry Hart aka Galahad (Colin Firth) to undergo a training programme to select the newest member of the Kingsmen, a British secret service who work independently of the government.

Meanwhile, the Kingsmen are investigating Internet billionaire Richmond Valentine, who has announced a world-wide giveaway of SIM cards that allow free phone calls and internet access. The Kingsmen suspect him of being involved in a number of disappearances of the rich, famous and influential, a case that Harry goes to investigate.

Just to set my stall out early, I totally loved this film. It takes the same sense of fun, charm and batshit craziness that made Kick Ass such a breath of fresh air and applies it effortlessly to the spy genre.

Kingsman is another adaptation from Vaughn of a Comic by Mark Millar and, as hesitant as I am to suggest that creatives should find a niche and stick to it, I would be perfectly happy if Vaughn and Millar kept this co-creative relationship for the rest of their careers. Millar’s stories seem to lend themselves perfectly to Vaughns genre bending tendencies and in turn, Vaughn is excellent at turning Millar’s comics into a cinematic experience.

This is definitely Vaughn’s vision and what a wonderfully violent, deliciously witty vision it is. It plays a little bit like a Matthew Vaughn greatest hits: it’s got the East End-eyness of Layer Cake, the mansion based training montage from X-Men: First Class, and ballsy violence we’ve seen from Kick Ass. Whilst this is all present and correct it’s remarkable how new those elements feel when you apply them to a spy movie making Kingsman simultaneously familiar and fresh.

The cast are excellent and really commit to Kingsman’s ‘dialled up to 11’ vibe. Colin Firth’s gentlemanly shtick fits perfectly in the world of Kingsman. He’s as reliable a screen presence as he ever was, slipping seamlessly from suave to sweary to lethal killing machine. Also enjoyable are Mark Strong as Merlin head of intelligence and training at Kingsman, Michael Caine as Arthur/Chester King (in a nod to the aforementioned The Ipcress File) and newcomer Sophie Cookson as fellow recruit Roxy. I feel a mention should also go to Jack Davenport who, for my money, is not in enough things, especially here…

Samuel L. Jackson’s Richmond Valentine is pretty enjoyable. Aside from the fact it’s Samuel L. Jackson doing Samuel L. Jackson, it’s a nice performance albeit with an occasionally distracting lisp. He hits an interesting balance between new money seeking acceptance from old money and full on cackling bay guy.

However, Taron Egerton’s Eggsy is the films focal point and a bang up job he does too. As an actor he seems to have that rare, universally likable appeal that, coupled with a flair for on screen action and a clear confidence in his craft, makes him eminently watchable. I’m hoping for big things from him in the future.

The film has had some criticism lobbied at it for a questionable joke about anal sex towards the end of the film. I can see what they were trying to do, but instead as coming off as a subversion of the double entendres synonymous with the Bond franchise it feels jarring and a tad inappropriate. That said, when a film delivers as much as this, a minor lapse of judgement is easily forgiven.

As with Vaughn’s previous films, Kingsman works because although it serves to send up the genre, at its heart lies a great affection for spy films. Boasting a game cast, plentiful gags and gloriously OTT action, Kingsman can talk the talk and walk the Oxford-clad walk.  

Kingsman: The Secret Service is in cinemas now.

Let’s have a look at some…

Reasons to be Cheerful :-)

1. So, unless you’ve been living on the Moon it can’t have escaped you attention that Sony and Marvel have reached an agreement to work together on future Spider-man ventures. What we know is that a new Spider-Man will be introduced in an unspecified MCU movie before 2017 (the smart money seems to be on Captain America: Civil War). Then, after 2017, Sony will release the next instalment in its own Spider-Man series using the same actor.

I don’t think I’m going out on a limb to say that this news has been universally well received. I’m sad that Andrew Garfield has been caught in the crossfire of all this, I’ve never made any bones about that fact that I prefer him to Tobey Maguire, but he’s a brilliant actor I’m sure he won’t be unemployed for too long. Aside from that every other outcome from this has the potential to be brilliant. Exciting times for Spidey fans:-)

That’s all for today!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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