Smashbomb

Search

Search results

All (4272)

Content

Ross (3284 KP) rated Better Call Saul - Season 4 in TV

Oct 31, 2018

Following his disbarment and the death of his brother Chuck, Jimmy (Saul) tries to come to terms with life after lawyering. He soon finds himself partaking in various scams to make ends meet or, more telling, to alleviate the boredom of working in the world's quietest cellphone store. Jimmy's activities, and Kim being dragged into them shows the human desire to take risk and seek excitement, the thrill of winning against unassailable odds by bending the rules. More and more Jimmy becomes Saul.
Meanwhile, Mike oversees the construction of Gus Fring's underground meth lab and we start to see how the former cop, who has dealt out street justice and used his skills against some low-lifes and druglords, also starts to break more rules and will go beyond in order to protect his own interests, and keep his own honour.
Brilliant, arty but engaging series telling two stories that for now are distinct, but will start to overlap more eventually.

Kudos

David McK (3623 KP) rated Night Watch (Discworld, #29; City Watch, #6) in Books

Jan 28, 2019

2018 update: "Truth! Justice! Reasonably-priced love! And a hard-boiled egg!"

2016 update: Following (Sir) Terry Pratchett's death in 2015 to his 'Embuggerance', I recently came across a blog where the author of said blog was reading all of the Discworld books in order from the first to the last. One of the last entries in the said blog was when he rated the books, from his most to least favourite, and then asked his readers to do the same and later published those responses.

In both cases, 'Night Watch' - which, I think, was one of the last before Pratchett was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's - was in the top 10, so I decided to go back and re-read it ...

<original thoughts below>

One of Terry Pratchett's more recent Discworld novel, in which he makes use of the good old time-travel sci-fi trope to move Commander Sam Vimes of the City Watch back in time to an earlier portion of his life-time.

Kudos

David McK (3623 KP) rated The Red Baron: The Graphic History of Richthofen's Flying Circus and the Air War in WWI in Books

Jan 30, 2019

Well, now, that was ... unusual.

Unusual in that I don't think I've ever come across history told in such a manner before.

And, I have to say: I think it worked.

This tells the life story of Manfred von Richtohofen, otherwise (and perhaps more famously) known as The Red Baron - a German ace during the infancy of flight, and of warfare in the air (during The Great War, or World War One as it would later become known).

While it does, perhaps, gloss over the more horrific aspects of the war in the air (no parachutes,with the planes being death-traps, and with Richtohofens policy of aiming for the pilot rather than the plane) I have to say that I did learn more from this than I was already aware of - and no, unlike some of my American counterparts, my knowledge of him did NOT come from the Peanuts (right? isn't that the one with Snoopy?) cartoon!

Kudos

LeftSideCut (3776 KP) rated Happy Death Day (2017) in Movies

Aug 12, 2019 (Updated Oct 25, 2019)

Happy Death Day (2017)

2017 | Horror, Mystery, Thriller

6.9

(81 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Happy Death Day is far more enjoyable than it has any right to be - a PG-13 rated horror version of Groundhog Day sounds pretty uninteresting on paper, but it absolutely doesn't take itself seriously, and that works in it's favour.

The basic plot premise is nothing new, and has been done better in films like Edge of Tomorrow, but it has fun with it.
Every side character is set up to have a motive, so the identity of the masked killer is well hidden, and keeps you guessing throughout.
The lead actress Jessica Rothe is really good fun, as her character goes through a personality shift as she learns to appreciate the people in her life instead of being a total douche. (This would usually be an eye rolling plot point, but the film genuinely lands some good emotional beats)

It's definitely a far cry from being a classic horror film (that PG-13 rating is a potential contributor) but it's honestly a fun movie.