Smashbomb

Search

Search results

All (2843)

Content

Louise (64 KP) rated The Dreadful Fate of Jonathan York: A Yarn for the Strange at Heart in Books

Jul 2, 2018

"When you’re old and gray like me, and someone asks you for your story, what would you rather have – nothing at all or the story you lived through tonight?"

I really enjoyed this book, but found it somewhat predictable as I knew how the book was going to end . The artwork to this book was really good and I felt that it suited the story very well with limited colours being used. I found the font quite spooky but also difficult to see what words were written in parts.

There are 3 separate short stories that were intertwined within the book , two were written in verse and one was silent which I think I understood but it’s just pictures for you to interpret in your own way.

There were important messages throughout the book, such as being out of your comfort zone, bullies,sticking up for yourself and confidence.The different monsters in the book were very creepy and all shapes and sizes. This is definitely targeted for middle graders (8-12yrs), however can be enjoyed by all ages as there were references to Sean Connery and I don’t think there are going to be many kids knowing who he is (I may be worng)

This is the first book by Kory Merritt and would be interested in reading others.

Overall I rated this 3.5 stars out of 5.

For more check out louiselovesbooks.wordpress.com

Kudos

David McK (3600 KP) rated The Maze Runner in Books

Jan 28, 2019

The Maze Runner

James Dashner | 2011 | Children

8.0

(55 Ratings)

Book Rating

I decided to read this after watching the film of the same name based on it, in both cases more out of a sense of curiosity than out of any real desire to watch/read it.

In both cases, if I was asked for one word to sum it up, that word would probably be 'M'eh'.

Bleak in nature, this (IMO) is definitely one of - if not the - weakest of the Young Adult genre books I have read recently, that seem to have experienced a surge in popularity of late. In a break from what seems to be the norm, however, the main protagonists in this are predominantly male.

For anyone who doesn't know: the central character (Thomas) wakes up in a lift, with no memory of his previous life, to find himself deposited in what seems to be a glade surrounded by a massive maze which reconfigures itself every night, and in which monsters roam. He finds himself driven to become a Runner - i.e. a maze explorer - just as events start to unfold that will mark the end of their way of life (or the experiment in which the kids are all unwilling participants).

Reading that back, it's almost as if this is experiments done on mice told from the mice's point of view!

I've read it, but currently have no real desire to read any of the others in the series.

Kudos

Otway93 (580 KP) rated Doctor Who in TV

Oct 28, 2019

Doctor Who

1963 | Adventure, Family, Sci-Fi

8.1

(100 Ratings)

TV Show Rating Watch

Stories (3 more)

Educational

Casting

Imagination

Some Casting Choices (1 more)

Can rely too much on nostalgia

All round fun, from the newest to the oldest bubblewrap monsters!

Doctor Who will always be my favourite show of all time, but it has had its ups and downs, just like every show.

The original run of Doctor Who from 1963-1989 was 95% brilliant, an almost constant flow of imagination from some incredibly talents writers. From the more you educational episodes of the first two series to the somewhat difficult days of the late 80s, fun was always there, but at the same time teaching morality and kindness. The show also created some of the most notorious villains in science fiction history, with such enemies as the Daleks, the Cybermen and not forgetting one of the greatest nemesis of all time, The Master! The older stories, family fun for all!

Then in 2005 after a 16 year hiatus it returned to a new audience and its original audience. With shorter stories and fewer episodes, the show continues to attract fans worldwide and keep (most of) the original fans happy.

The only real downsides I can think of are some poor writing in Season 22 and 24 of the original run, and 8 and 11 of the new run, and a few poor casting choices, mainly being Bonnie Langford in the original run, and Tosin Cole in the most recent series, but plenty of other perfect casting choices to make up for it!

Kudos

LeftSideCut (3776 KP) rated Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018) in Movies

Nov 20, 2019 (Updated Jan 31, 2020)

In short, Pacific Rim: Uprising is one of those sequels that does more of the same, but manages to take away something from what came before.

The first PR film is dumb silly fun - the movie equivalent of a kid getting his toys out and smashing them together.
Uprising is more or less the same, but a bit more on the boring side, with characters that aren't very likeable.

John Boyega heads up the cast, and he's ok enough, everyone surrounding him is a gallery of bland characters, I honestly can't remember any of their names, and I saw it earlier today!
There's no sense of urgency this time around. Del Toros first movie was silly for sure, but had a high stakes feeling to it.
Uprising feels like it was geared more towards children this time out, and it shows.

The plot is Hollywood sci-fi nonsense - something about the guy from Always Sunny being possessed by a Kaiju and infecting drones to attack the world and unleash a mega Kaiju - honestly, my attention wobbled more than once as you can probably tell. I could probably do with watching it again but I really don't want to.
Some of the action scenes were pretty fun soooo, yay, I guess?

Pacific Rim: Uprising is a film about monsters and robots kicking the crap out of each other - it shouldn't be this boring and forgettable, but here we are.

Kudos

Matthew Krueger (10051 KP) Nov 20, 2019

Its just not the same without Guillmero De Toro directing, i know he is a producer on this movie, just its not the same. Plus were is the oringal cast???? Forgotten thats right and same with everything else forgotten.

Great review @LeftSideCut

Kudos