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Dean (6926 KP) rated Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) in Movies

Apr 2, 2022 (Updated Apr 2, 2022)  
Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
2020 | Action, Adventure, Animation
Good cast (1 more)
SFX
I feel the need for...
Well I still remember getting my Sega Megadrive in the early 90's and Sonic the Hedgehog came with it. It was a truly fast, fun colourful game. Not exactly the type of game you'd expect a live action film version of. Glad they redesigned the look of Sonic to suit the game more.
It's a pretty fun, light family action film. The friendship between Sonic and Doughnut Lord (James Marsden) was done nicely. It's fairly amusing at times and even has some big budget effects that look cool. Jim Carrey was made for this type of role of Dr Robotnik.
Whether you played the games back in the day or just need a fun family film this is one everyone should enjoy. The sequel out soon looks pretty good as well.
  
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ClareR (5711 KP) rated New Boy in Books

Jul 16, 2018  
New Boy
New Boy
Tracy Chevalier | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
An intriguing retelling.
A modern reimagining of Shakespeare's Othello, this sees a Ghanaian diplomats son, Osei, on his first day at a new school in an American suburb of Washington DC in the 1970's. Dee quickly befriends him, and Ian decides that he doesn't like this. He decides to undermine this friendship and dispose of O. Yes, racism comes in to play here. Both the learnt racism of the children (from their parents), and that of the teachers.
This is all squeezed in to a very Shakespearian time frame of a day: we all know that in a Shakespearian play, people fall in and out of love, get marries and murder one another within 24 hours. For this reason, I can forgive the more mature behaviour and plotting of the 11 year old children. It seems unlikely to me as a mother of an 11 year old, that real 11 year olds would necessarily behave in this way; but this is literature and an author can bend their story and their characters to however they want them to behave. The changeability of the children's affections ARE more realistic, however.
I think this would probably be a great book for students to read at school before they access the original Othello. It would have made a great 'compare and contrast' exercise for me when I studied Othello (many years ago!).
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and the ending is a real 'heart in mouth' moment!
Many thanks to NetGalley and Hogarth for my copy of this book.
  
The Advent Killer (Antonia Hawkins #1)
The Advent Killer (Antonia Hawkins #1)
Alastair Gunn | 2013 | Crime, Thriller
6
7.7 (3 Ratings)
Book Rating
Quite satisfying
Alastair Gunn is a new author for me but "The Advent Killer" won't be the last work I read of his as I found this book quite satisfying. Please be aware that this isn't a cosy Christmas story in any way, shape or form but definitely one to curl up with on a cold winter's day.

DCI Antonia Hawkins is lead officer in her first murder case and it couldn't be a worse first case ... a serial killer is on the loose - they know when he/she is going to strike next but not who or where and there are virtually no clues left behind. Can DCI Hawkins and her team track the killer down before the next victim is brutally murdered?

Written at a good pace with interesting characters and intriguing story line, which although might not be the most complex or unpredictable, it did hold my interest to the end and I am looking forward to reading more from Mr Gunn and getting to know DCI Hawkins and her team a little more.

Thank you goes to Penguin UK - Michael Joseph via NetGalley for my copy in return for an honest and unbiased review.
  
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Lee (2222 KP) rated Happy Death Day 2U (2019) in Movies

Feb 18, 2019 (Updated Feb 21, 2019)  
Happy Death Day 2U (2019)
Happy Death Day 2U (2019)
2019 | Horror, Mystery
A worthy sequel
Contains spoilers, click to show
The original Happy Death Day was a real pleasant surprise. A cross between Groundhog Day and Scream, with our heroine being killed by a baby face mask wearing killer every day, only to wake up again at the start of the same day. With a long list of potential suspects, and slowly feeling the effects of dying repeatedly, she set about trying to find the killers identity. Much of what made the first movie so enjoyable was largely down to lead character Tree, played by Jessica Rothe and the intensely hilarious way that she approached the whole situation. It wasn't exactly a horror movie, more of a comedy thriller.

In Happy Death Day 2U, we begin by following Ryan. Ryan was also in the first movie, bursting into his campus room each morning, interrupting roommate Carter and Tree after she'd spent the night there. As he makes his way to the room from the car he'd spent the night in - avoiding a barking dog, dodging a man asking for money and a boy riding a skateboard - it's pretty clear that we're setting up a series of events likely to be repeated time and again in a similar way that Tree experienced a very specific series of events each day in the first movie. During his morning at university, we discover that Ryan has been working on a Quantum mechanics experiment along with a bunch of nerdy students - a machine dubbed 'Sissy'. Turns out Sissy has been causing some very high power fluctuations and generated some very high readings the day before, the day in which Tree experienced her loop. Soon after, Ryan is killed by the baby face killer and wakes up in his car once again, experiencing the same events we've just seen encounter on the way to his room. When he explains what just happened to Tree and Carter, Tree sets about trying to help him figure out how Sissy caused the time-loop in the first place, and how it has now transferred to Ryan.

At this point you'd think you've got the rest of the movie pretty much figured out - with Ryan repeating his day, aided by experienced looper Tree. But surprisingly, the movie largely abandons its slasher story-line. Instead, we get a more sc-fi story with a varied mix of slapstick comedy and emotional drama. An accident involving Sissy opens up a portal to the multiverse and Tree finds herself caught up in her original loop once more. Only this time, it's in a slightly different universe to the one she's used to - her mum is now alive, and her boyfriend is dating her best friend. Not only does she need to work with Ryan and his nerd friends each day in order to determine how to put things right, she needs to once again work out who the killer is in this particular universe and, more importantly, make the difficult decision to either stay in the universe where her mum is still alive, or return to the one she knows and has lived in all her life.

Once again, Jessica Rothe as Tree is what makes this movie so enjoyable. From the emotional scenes with her mum, to the frustration of the loop, to the bad ass fighting back against it all, she pulls it all off wonderfully. We even get time to enjoy some very funny death scenes too - a particularly enjoyable one being a sky-dive out of an aeroplane, wearing only a bikini and then landing horizontally in slow motion while giving the finger to the camera!

It's difficult for me to say whether or not I enjoyed this movie more or less than the first. A lot of what made the original so enjoyable is present in this sequel. But there are also a lot of new elements introduced, some that work and some that don't. Overall I had a great time watching with this though - definitely a worthy sequel.
  
Show all 4 comments.
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Dean (6926 KP) Feb 21, 2019

Doesn't show her Mum in the trailer

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Lee (2222 KP) Feb 21, 2019

Not really a spoiler as such but take your point onboard. Have marked it as a spoiler just in case anyone else thinks it is