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Entertainment Editor (1988 KP) created a video about Detectorists in TV

Oct 13, 2017  
Video

What you got? - Detectorists: Episode 1 Preview - BBC Four

Lance may have found something… or maybe not.

  
Hard Target (1993)
Hard Target (1993)
1993 | Action
7
7.4 (7 Ratings)
Movie Rating
One of Van Damme's best (1 more)
Lance Henriksen as the baddie
Hunt this down
A simple yet effective plot. Safari hunters who pay to hunt down people instead of big game...may have bitten off more than they can chew this time round.
  
The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)
The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)
2019 | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
The Sword in the Stone.

Excalibur.

I always thought they were two different blades, but not according to this movie, which transplants the action from ye-olde medieval England to modern-day times, with young Alex discovering the sword and setting off on a quest (alongside his best friend Badders, and two of his former bullies Lance and Kay) to stop the evil Sorceress Morgana from reawakening.

So, yes, it does follow pretty much the standard quest trope, complete with enemies who become friends and the battle against evil. I also found it to drag somewhat, and was sitting - for large portions - watching it with my mouth hanging open.

Unfortunately, that's not in a good way - just at the sheer plain ridiculousness of it all!

Then again, that may be simply because I'm not really it's target audience ... ?
  
The House
The House
Eden Darry | 2019
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Sadie, Fin, and their two children were a perfectly ordinary family. Even if Fin felt taken for granted sometimes. Even if their introverted son, Liam, had terrible nightmares and knew things he shouldn't.
But everything changes the night Sadie is viciously assaulted by former client Lance Sherry. Sherry knows where they live, and when the police fail to catch him, Sadie and Fin are forced to run. They think they've found the perfect place to start over. The house is everything Fin dreamed of, but as they settle in, Sadie discovers their home may not be what it seems, and daughter Lucy's imaginary friend might not be imaginary at all. Or even a friend. With Lance Sherry hunting them, the house could be the least of their problems. He's coming to finish what he started. And he won't stop until he finds Sadie.

This is the kind of book that is not easy to review because you don’t want to give anything away.
There is a paranormal element to this, but it’s almost more evil than what you think about a “normal” haunting with ghosts. And there is also a real life evil person the characters have to deal with so it’s a lot on their plates.
The combination of the real and the paranormal was a nice touch.
For the most part, the story is told from both heroines point of view, but at times the reader is also privy to what’s going on in little Liam’s head as well as the villains.
This was a great read to me and I really enjoyed it.
Recommend reading.

Copy provided by the publisher, Bold Strokes Books, via NetGalley.
  
Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge
Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge
Laura Levine | 2018 | Mystery
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Bah Humbug Murder
Thanks to her neighbor Lance, freelance writer Jaine Austen is spending Christmas at a Bel Air mansion. It's not all luxury, however, when Jaine gets roped into helping her temporary neighbor polish his script. Scotty Parker is a former child actor best known for playing Tiny Tim in a movie version of A Christmas Carol, but now he'd be a shoe in to play Scrooge, complete with penny pinching ways and fights with neighbors. Someone has had enough, and Jaine finds Scotty's body on Christmas morning. With the police focusing on her, Jaine begins her own investigation. But which of the many suspects actually killed Scotty?

Those familiar with the series know exactly what to expect here, and they won't be disappointed. The murder may take place a little later in the book than in some series I read, but we are busy meeting suspects and getting motives, so when Scotty does die, we can jump right in. Jaine once again brings the case to a satisfactory conclusion. We also have a couple of fun sub-plots involving Jaine's on-line dating misadventures and a cruise her parents are taking with their neighbors. There are plenty of laughs, chuckles, and grins. The characters lean toward caricature, but it works for this series. The pages fly by all too quickly as always.
  
Spies in Disguise (2019)
Spies in Disguise (2019)
2019 | Action, Adventure, Animation
As my last cinema visit of 2019 I was just hoping for something passable to watch, animation his year has had a few hard knocks so I wasn't optimistic.

Lance is the world's greatest spy, catlike reflexes, excellent deduction skills as well as suave and sophisticated... all the things you'd expect. He's the golden boy of the agency and is ready for another pat on the back and some admiration. But it isn't his lucky day, the device he retrieved is missing from the case and now he's under investigation. He knows that he's innocent but there's damning evidence against him, his only hope is to clear his name, and the only way to do that is to escape the agency and track the real culprit down. His next problem, who can he trust?

This really is Bond for kids, everything is fantastically reminiscent of it, from his slightly too cocky demeanour to the brilliant opening credits. It's a pretty solid film, there's nothing much to dislike. It's essentially Bond mixed with Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs... what's not to love about that?!

I have to wonder about opening kids films this way, it seems to be very common at the moment. The lead needs to have a tragedy to get through the movie and have their moment of realisation. Playmobil did it in a much less subtle way, as did Wonder Park to some extent.

There aren't any real issues with the voice acting, though I do wonder about the choice of Ben Mendelsohn paired with his animated character, the two don't really match as well as the others. But that's not a deal-breaker.

The animation style is very clean and easy to watch. There are before and after shots of some scenes that show what the lighting guy does, it's really interesting to see. After having brought this topic up after seeing Klaus it was nice to see some of the "hidden" parts of animated films. The effort is immense.

Music is used well in parts of the film, and my favourite has to be the "romantic" portion towards the end, very amusingly set up and clearly well thought out.

Walter, our inventor, really does have the sort of imagination that would get him hired by Chester V. My favourite invention was probably the glitter distraction, I believe this may already exist though as it appears to have been deployed in my home over Christmas. This may be the only major continuity note... once Lance brushes the glitter off we don't see any little specks again, completely unrealistic!


There are a lot of great sequences during the film and the action moves it along quickly, add in the humour from the pigeons and all the gadgets and you get something really fun. I will definitely watch this again when it hits streaming. My score may seem a little off considering I didn't hate anything, the reason for this is that it's essentially a lot of other films mixed together. As I said, we've got Bond and Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs with an assortment of action movies and Home Alone 2 thrown in for good measure, which made it enjoyable but not instantly rewatchable.

Originally posted on: https://emmaatthemovies.blogspot.com/2020/01/spies-in-disguise-movie-review.html
  
Aliens (1986)
Aliens (1986)
1986 | Action, Horror, Sci-Fi
An absolute screamer of a sequel
Aliens may very well be the best sequel of all time, if not it's certainly up there!
The original Alien is about as perfect as sci-fi horror can get, so it was a smart move on James Cameron's part to not recycle that again, and take Alien in a different direction.
The slow burning, claustrophobic high tension of the original is replaced here with all out war.
The simple idea of multiple Xenomorphs is effective and terrifying, and packs the runtime of Aliens with top tier action.

Sigourney Weaver returns as Ellen Ripley, and whilst she was a tough yet vulnerable survivor first time around, here we get to see her vulnerability crumble away. By the time the final act kicks in and Ripley is decked out in a mech...she just a badass from here on out.
She's is joined by a group of gun toting, 80s as fuck mercenaries, including the likes of Michael Biehn (fresh from the recently released, first Terminator movie), Bill Paxton, Al Matthews, Jenette Goldstein, and of course Lance Henriksen as Android, Bishop. It's a fantastic cast, who all end up mattering one way or another, even the ones who don't last very long.

The Xenomorphs themselves look as horrifying as ever, still practically achieved, and have an urgent sense of visceral danger whenever they're on screen.
Aliens is also the debut if the Alien Queen, a classic staple of the series since.

No matter how much time goes by, Aliens never fails to be entertaining, and still looks great. It's James Cameron at the top of his game.
  
Alpha's Fake Wife by Maria Warren
Alpha's Fake Wife by Maria Warren
Maria Warren | 2022 | Paranormal, Romance
4
4.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
ALPHA'S FAKE WIFE is the first book in a series that really does show potential but, unfortunately for me, I just didn't feel as though it lived up to that potential as it stands right now.

It is a slow-burn Reverse Harem romance with a mystery/romantic suspense element to it as someone is drugging and assaulting females in Drew's pack.

Our main female, Laura, is brought to a party by her not-so-likeable best friend, Brandon, before he abandons her for other women. After he leaves her, she is handed a drink, drinks it, is immediately drugged, and starts to be led away. She is able to free herself but feels ill - which is how she meets Drew. Lance is Drew's half-brother who acts completely out of character when he throws a party for the pack to celebrate the new Luna - even though he is only tolerated by most of them, and actually prefers to stay out of the limelight. Lance meets Laura the same night and mistakes her for one of Drew's usual floozies. We don't meet Xavier until about halfway through (or so it felt) although he is supposed to be Drew's bodyguard! I am told about these four having a connection - or rather, three having a connection to Laura, and her to the three - but I never see or feel it.

There are situations and circumstances left unexplained in here that, although may be explained in future books, could have done with at least something to be going on with. For example, what is with the intense dislike of cherries? There are some fruits I don't like, but hers is crazy. And seriously, if you've got someone going around assaulting women, stop going out by yourself when you've been asked not to (unless it's for a bloody good reason which none of hers were). And how many times are you going to be on the receiving end of a drugged drink and be able to pass it off as a mistake?

There are a couple of Not-So-Big Bads here that didn't come as a surprise at all, but there are clues given to a Big Bad called The Alchemist who I guess will be the overall story arc going forward.

If this book went through a severe editing process, dropped a few thousand unnecessary words, tightened up the story as a whole, made a connection between the characters, and made said characters more relatable, then I would continue with it, but as it stands, I won't be reading this series any further.

** same worded review will appear elsewhere **

* A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book, and the comments here are my honest opinion. *

Merissa
Archaeolibrarian - I Dig Good Books!
  
What I've Done
What I've Done
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Contains spoilers, click to show
As with the previous books in the Morgan Dane series, we are able to see the romance grow between Lance and Morgan, have the suspense of the case and the ever lying danger that awaits our characters as they investigate for the truth. I found that it was enjoyable to see some more of Sharp's past as well. After all, he is the one character you don't see a whole lot about and to have a case that gives you some insight to the man behind a lot of support to Morgan and Lance is always a bonus. I enjoyed how characters in the book, though creepy, gave off how some people think and act in times of chaos. To see how everything plays out when you have psychopaths and innocents involved is always interesting.



In this particular book, I enjoyed how technology, though doesn't always help, was used to manipulate people's images and how some people react. Though, Haley, the woman being convicted for murder, was ill and traumatized, I enjoyed the strength she was given to protect herself and those who are close to her. To watch her struggle through discovering the guy she liked to be dead, while she slept and have no recollection how it happened, was truly heart wrenching. Then to watch her have nightmares about it because she couldn't remember what happened was able to show how post-traumatic stress disorder can affect after a traumatic event, made it harder but kept you wondering if her nightmares were memories resurfacing in an unpleasant way. With so many potential suspects coming and going in the book, you can't help but to continuously wonder what is causing the nightmares and if they are memories or not. It definitely kept you question until the very end.



It was also made clear how easy it is to cause people to doubt someone's skill or distort their image through social media. I thoroughly enjoyed, seeing this aspect. After all, though it isn't nice or even ethical, it happens all the time to people who do what they are good, and sometimes bad, at for a living. Though meme's and gifs are made to amuse and create laughter and joy, too often is it used to hurt someone without a whole lot of people truly understanding the whole meaning behind it. To have something aimed at Morgan, to make a threat and humiliate her, caused me to get angry. I enjoyed it in the aspect it raises the issue of gifs and memes being used to hurt and humiliate other, rather than spread joy. This particular piece, though not extremely important, had indeed stuck with me through out the whole book, I couldn't shake the feeling that it happens to us all at some point, even if we never see it. It had also brought up how hard it was to contain something once it goes viral. To track down the source can be impossible when everyone is sharing it on their social medias.



To get away with a crime doesn't mean to repeat it, but it you are never caught, wouldn't you be tempted to do it again? That was a question raised about some characters in this book. The crime doesn't have to illegal to be a crime. Disrespecting people's privacy, trust, and tampering with drinks are just a few crimes that aren't always caught, or even punishable. However, What I've Done, highlighted how people who may have gotten away with a crime once (whether punishable or not), they often feel they can repeat it and never get caught. Even though we all know eventually you will get caught, it was quite nice to see it highlighted in the fictional world as well. It was just a nice surprise that some of the characters thought and felt that way.



However, my absolute favorite thing was the ending. This I will not even attempt to spoil, but I will say that this ending left me wanting so much more. I expect the next book to give us some juicy information about our favorite characters, Lance, Sharp, and Morgan. I do look forward to it. I would definitely rate this book 5 stars out of 5 stars. It was entertaining, highlighted things that not everyone pay attention to, and kept me turning the pages.
  
The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)
The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)
2019 | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
Alex Elliott (Louis Ashbourne Serkis), is a 12 year old boy that isn’t afraid to stand up to bullies and defend his friends. As noble as his deeds are, he ends up becoming the school bullies Lance (Tom Taylor) and Kaye’s (Rhianna Dorris) target. They chase him to an abandoned construction site where he falls off a ledge and encounters the notorious sword in the stone. As many are aware of King Arthur’s sword in the stone story, the person that pulls the sword from the stone shall become King of England. To his and his best friend Bedders’s (Dean Chaumoo) surprise, Alex draws the sword (aka Excalibur) from the stone and moments later Merlin appears (Angus Imrie) and warns Alex and Bedders of the danger that lies ahead. Morgana (Rebecca Ferguson), King Arthur’s half-sister, and her army of fire burning dead soldiers are on a mission to get Excalibur and take over Earth. Merlin encourages Alex, Bedders and the two bullies, they must put their differences aside to beat Morgana and save the world.

 

A clever modern day continuation to the story of the Sword in the Stone with a Lord of the Rings spin to it that’s appropriate for kids. All our main characters are children/teenagers, including Merlin, who at random climactic moments in the film transforms into an elder version of himself and is played by the legendary Patrick Stewart. Bedders’s role is similar to that of loyal and dopey, but brave Samwise Gamgee. He helps Alex recruit soldiers to help fight Morgana’s army and never leaves his best friend’s side.

  

A unique story about loyalty and working together to do what’s best to defeat evil and save Earth. Glad to see family friendly movies dabbling into the genre of medieval fantasy again. There are moments in the film that drag on. They should have omitted several scenes and the long run time of 2 hours and 12 minutes could have been shortened. Very much geared towards kids ages 8 and up, there are some dark moments that may not be suitable for the younger ages. Prepare for lots of adventure, laughter, and good vs evil story, one the whole family can enjoy.