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Lee (2222 KP) rated Final Space Season One in TV
Aug 18, 2018
An epic comedy space drama
Final Space flashed up a few times for me as a recommended show on Netflix. As the trailer automatically played, it came across as some kind of Futurama/Rick and Morty wannabee, with annoying characters. So I ignored it, until one day I just decided to give it a go. And, it was slightly annoying for a while. But, it was also slightly funny at times too, and I remember feeling a bit like that about the first episode of Rick and Morty, so I stuck with it a little bit longer. I'm so glad I did.
Final Space is a sprawling, epic space adventure. Set across 10 episodes, each one continuing the story, starting with a teaser of the final episode, and ending with a cliffhanger. Huge space battles, tonnes of action, drama, sadness, and even some romance. There's an evil bad guy, plenty of hilarious characters, and a cute little planet destroying alien, who now has his own plush toy (added to my Christmas list...). And it all builds to ask incredible, tension filled finale with an even bigger cliffhanger. I freakin loved this show...
Final Space is a sprawling, epic space adventure. Set across 10 episodes, each one continuing the story, starting with a teaser of the final episode, and ending with a cliffhanger. Huge space battles, tonnes of action, drama, sadness, and even some romance. There's an evil bad guy, plenty of hilarious characters, and a cute little planet destroying alien, who now has his own plush toy (added to my Christmas list...). And it all builds to ask incredible, tension filled finale with an even bigger cliffhanger. I freakin loved this show...

Awix (3310 KP) rated Venom (2018) in Movies
Oct 11, 2018
It doesn't make a lot of sense to make a film about a Spider-Man baddie that doesn't even mention Spider-Man, but then it doesn't strike me as an especially good move to make a superhero movie where the protagonist is a cannibalistic blob with teeth, and Venom manages to be both; welcome to 2018. TV reporter torches his own career, decides to investigate dodgy tycoon, ends up sharing his body with bad-tempered man-eating alien blob with teeth - looking on the bright side he can now shoot tentacles out of his armpits.
Generally a very good reminder of all the reasons why Sony were so wise to hand the actual creative side of the Spider-Man movies back to Marvel, because the script of this movie goes clunk-clunk-clunk from beginning to end; character motivations change in the twinkling of an eye and key plot points are merrily ignored when they become inconvenient. The only reason to watch the movie is Tom Hardy, who finds unexpected reserves of comedy in rather unlikely places. Still a bit of a mess though, certainly compared to the main sequence Marvel films.
Generally a very good reminder of all the reasons why Sony were so wise to hand the actual creative side of the Spider-Man movies back to Marvel, because the script of this movie goes clunk-clunk-clunk from beginning to end; character motivations change in the twinkling of an eye and key plot points are merrily ignored when they become inconvenient. The only reason to watch the movie is Tom Hardy, who finds unexpected reserves of comedy in rather unlikely places. Still a bit of a mess though, certainly compared to the main sequence Marvel films.

Tim McGuire (301 KP) rated Harbinger Down (2015) in Movies
Nov 13, 2019
Old Movie Revisited: Harbinger Down. Now if you're anything like me, you've spent a fair amount of time thinking, Man, they should remake The Thing with Lance Henriksen. Well those dreams have been answered in the form of Harbinger Down. Now sure there are differences, Instead of an Arctic outpost, they are on a cargo ship in the arctic... Instead of a ufo crashing to earth with a nasty alien on board, this one has a russian space capsule, crashing to earth contaminated with a space virus... And from there its pretty much the same... including the mimicking of the host... Shit even the ending is the same, sorta, a lone survivor stranded in the arctic. Now all that aside, it wasn't a bad little low budget flick, and c'mon it has the low budget movie God in it, Mr Lance Henrikson, remember how he wowed us all in Close Encounters of the Third Kind as the guy standing in the background. Its almost as incredible as Cliff Clavin being part of the Rebel Alliance, its true!! But that was a long, long time ago, in what seems like a galaxy far far away... Filmbufftim on FB

Awix (3310 KP) rated Kin-dza-dza! (1986) in Movies
Apr 4, 2020
Soviet-era comedy-SF resembles a high-speed collision between Mad Max and The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy as directed by Terry Gilliam. Earthling Everymen are accidentally teleported to the post-apocalyptic dystopia of Pluk, where lower-caste citizens must wear bells in their noses, social status is determined by the colour of your trousers, and most of the local language translates as 'koo!' Can they persuade a couple of dodgy locals to help them get home?
Possibly a little bit slow and overlong, and many of the jokes are probably too understated, but the desolate alien world is well-realised on a low budget (special effects are sparingly used, but look good when they are) and the intricately ridiculous society of Pluk has been worked out in impressive detail. Hard to tell whether the satire is aimed at capitalist society or communist, but perhaps this is the point: life on Pluk may be unfair, arbitrary, and often unintelligible, but then isn't that true everywhere? Well-played, solidly scripted for the most part (end comes unravelled a bit), very watchable and entertaining.
Possibly a little bit slow and overlong, and many of the jokes are probably too understated, but the desolate alien world is well-realised on a low budget (special effects are sparingly used, but look good when they are) and the intricately ridiculous society of Pluk has been worked out in impressive detail. Hard to tell whether the satire is aimed at capitalist society or communist, but perhaps this is the point: life on Pluk may be unfair, arbitrary, and often unintelligible, but then isn't that true everywhere? Well-played, solidly scripted for the most part (end comes unravelled a bit), very watchable and entertaining.

Barry Newman (204 KP) rated Men in Black International (2019) in Movies
Apr 27, 2020
Meh In Black
A fourth instalment of the MIB series isn’t a film anyone was really crying out for but never the less here it is. Unfortunately its watchable but ultimately quite underwhelming. All though they aren’t a patch on Smith and Jones I thought Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson weren’t actually bad casting and they do successfully replicate the chemistry they had in ‘Thor – Ragnarok’ and certainly try their best but are sadly let down by some pretty weak writing. The plot is messy and convoluted and the humour feeling pretty forced where the original was sharp and snappily written , it’s certainly a job to have any real emotional investment in what is going on . The effects let it down a bit as well with the alien creatures looking as obviously CGI as they did in the over 20 year old original. It’s not terrible though , you can certainly get some enjoyment out of it if you are in the mood for something fast moving and undemanding but you might struggle to remember what it was all about a couple of hours later. Hopefully the franchise ends here.

Emily (1430 KP) rated Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth in Video Games
Feb 18, 2020
Same basic premise as the other games in the Civ series, except this is set on a strange new world that ships from earth have escaped to.
Uses the hex grid of the other newer versions of the game and also has indigenous alien life on land and in the sea. This can be quite tough to deal with early in the game, particularly the worms (think Dune-style enormous things) and the sea life, but is easily dealt with later on. It alternatively you can try and work with it so you kind of become allies, although it's not easy to achieve.
The best thing about the game is the tech tree. Every other version of Civ has a branched linear progression, this one has a web. The first few moves are relatively common to all play styles but then you can just go anywhere and what you pick changes what type of faction you end up as (which ends up like a combination of religion and ideology of the other versions of Civ).
If you're getting bored with normal Civ, this is definitely a fun alternative.
Uses the hex grid of the other newer versions of the game and also has indigenous alien life on land and in the sea. This can be quite tough to deal with early in the game, particularly the worms (think Dune-style enormous things) and the sea life, but is easily dealt with later on. It alternatively you can try and work with it so you kind of become allies, although it's not easy to achieve.
The best thing about the game is the tech tree. Every other version of Civ has a branched linear progression, this one has a web. The first few moves are relatively common to all play styles but then you can just go anywhere and what you pick changes what type of faction you end up as (which ends up like a combination of religion and ideology of the other versions of Civ).
If you're getting bored with normal Civ, this is definitely a fun alternative.
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Sawyer (231 KP) Aug 18, 2018