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Digital Giza: Visualizing the Pyramids

Peter der Manuelian

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Book

The Pyramids on the Giza Plateau represent perhaps the most famous archaeological site in the world,...

Programming iOS 8: Dive Deep into Views, View Controllers, and Frameworks

Matt Neuberg

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Book

Start building apps for iOS 8 with Apple's Swift programming language. If you're grounded in the...

Erika (17789 KP) rated Trese in TV

Jun 22, 2021

Trese

2021 | Action, Adventure, Animation, Crime, Fantasy

8.5

(2 Ratings)

TV Show Rating

Trese is the newest Netflix Original Anime, based upon a Filipino comic by the same name. The show follows Alexandra Trese, who is a paranormal detective, and assists the police with paranormal crimes. The series is set in Manila, and creatures from the lore of the Philippines co-exist alongside the humans. Trese is known as the ‘Lakan’, and her father facilitated an accords agreement with the different groups of creatures to keep the peace.
I haven’t read the source material, so I can’t say how close it was to the original work. I really liked Alexandra as a character, she was interesting, and strong. One of the coolest things, for me, was that she carried a Kris, which is a really cool looking knife. One of my favorite things, that made me laugh the first time, is that there is a Fire god that she calls by hitting a button on a Nokia phone. There were also the twins, or ‘kambal’, Crisipin and Basilio, who provided a little comic relief.
The series is a short watch, six episodes that are around 20 minutes each. Each episode was a self-contained, separate case, then dove into Trese’s background and family. It was definitely for a mature audience, it was bloody and gory, and the animation was fantastic. I completely loved this series, because of the cool blend of mythology with a detective show. I hope that Netflix opts to make a second season, because I want to know how the story continues.

Kudos

LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated Ratchet & Clank (2016) in Movies

Sep 21, 2020

Ratchet & Clank (2016)

2016 | Action, Animation, Comedy

5.4

(5 Ratings)

Movie Rating

The accompanying ps4 game sucked but this somehow sucks way more. Absolutely guts the video games of their charisma, nuance, wit, humor, lively visuals, world-building, sense of wonderment, good characters, memorability, fun, and solid writing until it eventually whittles away and lays waste to nearly everything which made them what they were in the first place - leaving behind a shallow, barren husk of another throwaway film for babies with no sense of object permanence yet. Can't say it's completely laugh free, and it is cool to see Jim Ward's lovable doofus Captain Qwark (albeit a watered-down version) sharing the screen with cinematic heavyweights like Sylvester Stallone and Paul Giamatti - but otherwise it's a profoundly nothing experience. Also pretty ironic that they attempted to reboot a story where capital ran rampant and turned everybody into selfish, greedy assholes into one of the most bastardized corporate attempts at appealing to a broader demographic by shucking away all its personality and slapping on the most overused trite template that all of these dumbass cash-grab children's dumps which do little more than insult kids' intelligence use. If I have to see one more movie about a bland wide-eyed dreamer who dreams of being something more and they get it for no reason I'm going to sue. For the record I also do not side with the people complimenting this cold, soulless, chintzy animation. The new characters reek and it's boring as fuck. Even the weaker games are miles better than this dirt.

Kudos

LeftSideCut (3776 KP) rated Inside Out (2015) in Movies

Sep 25, 2020

Inside Out (2015)

2015 | Animation, Comedy, Drama

8.0

(109 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Standard Pixar affair - easy to look at, appealing to a younger audience whilst simultaneously bludgeoning adults with relatable emotional moments that make you want to curl up in a corner somewhere and weep.
Inside Out ticks all these boxes without a shadow of a doubt.

The animation is wonderful as usual and is arguably Pixar's most colourful film to date. The concept of emotions can be complex at the best of times. It's a concept that most people will struggle with for their whole lives and is something that will truly never be understood. Inside Out tackles this with aplomb, using colour coding to make it accessible to kids, and exploring just how complicated feelings can become especially as puberty begins to hit. It's very clever in its execution as well.

The majority of the story takes place in Riley's head, as her emotions Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger, and Disgust all struggle to keep everything balanced as she starts to hit roadblocks in her life. One thing leads to another before Joy and Sadness are ejected out of the "control centre" and desperately try to find their way back, leaving the other emotions to handle the pains of growing up.
It's one part emotional family drama, and one part bonkers sci-fi adventure, and it works really well with the help of a great voice cast.

Inside Out doesn't quite hit the lofty heights of the best Pixar efforts for me, but it's still damn good and surely will appeal to everyone in some way, no matter what age your are.