TV Retrospective - The Sarah Jane Adventures Series 3 Part 1 - Prisoner of the Judoon/The Mad Woman in the Attic

OK, it’s been a few weeks since our last retrospective. But we’re back, now it’s time to look at the show’s third season.

Nothing’s really happened between seasons so let’s just get right to it.

Sequel Month - Mini Review - Jack Reacher: Never Go Back

Well, sequel month is drawing to a close

And since we started with Tom Cruise, let’s finish with him too, this is Jack Reacher: Never Go Back

Released in the summer season of 2016, this movie made a modest $160m on its 60m budget but has not been critically favoured, with only a 37% rating on rotten tomatoes and a 6.7 on IMDb. Here are my thoughts

Doctor Who Series 10 episodes 10-11 review - The eaters of light/World enough and time

We return for another double-dose of Doctor Who, with the final episode so very close, spoilers will follow for it.

Guilty Pleasures #38 - Sequel Month - Now You See Me 2

Now You See Me was my first Guilty Pleasures review and of course in June of last year a sequel came out. Do I like it as much as I did the first one, in many ways, actually kinda more but I will explain that later.

Now You See Me was a dumb movie, dumb but extremely fun to watch because of character dynamics and spectacle. Now You See Me 2 was not as successful either critically or commercially as the original. So, what does the sequel have in store? Let’s take a look

Sequel Month - Mini Review - X-men Apocalypse

Last year I did X-men month where I looked at all the X-men movies that had come out, except for this one, which hadn’t come out on DVD yet. I will get to Logan eventually, but know that it’s a great movie, so is Deadpool, but that is not the movie I’m here to talk about today. X-men Apocalypse came out in July of 2016 to a very mixed reception. It made $544 million on a $185m budget, this is not as good as Fox were hoping for, but enough to justify another sequel coming out next year.

Sequel Month - Editorial - What makes a good sequel?

Yeah, I know this was supposed to be a Doctor Who review but I was kinda busy so I'm just chucking something together to get something out in the morning

It's sequel month

And whilst the Nostalgia Critic asked why sequels are bad, I'm going to go against type and ask a different question, what makes a sequel good? Because this is rushed, I'm going to talk mostly about this in general rather than referring to lots of examples.

Sequel Month - Mini Review - Captain America: Civil War

It's sequel month

Captain America: Civil War came out in May 2016 and did what Batman v Superman didn’t do, get critical acclaim whilst making over $1bn in the box office. So, here to analyse why, is me, about a year after everyone else.

I know I haven’t reviewed Winter Soldier but this is essentially an Avengers movie with Cap in a more leading role, so I’m counting it as a sequel to Age of Ultron which I reviewed last year.

This might be a little different to my other reviews in that contains no plot summary of such, it will bring up certain plot details so spoilers will still follow. 

Sequel Month - Ratchetrospective - Ratchet and Clank (2016)

I know this isn’t really a sequel but a reboot/movie tie-in game but it’s the next entry in the Ratchet and Clank series, and that’s enough for it to count for sequel month

Ratchet and Clank came out in April 2016 to positive reviews and decent sales, a polar opposite story to the movie it was tying into. Insomniac games are pros at this point but they were really up against the wall on this one, 8 months is the time they had to develop the core game, bearing in mind the Ratchet and Clank Movie debuted at a film festival in May 2015 and it could’ve gone to cinema at any point. The extra time had only a skeleton crew and was used to polish things up. The result is we have a budget title that, whilst more expensive than Insomniac’s previous budget titles, does feel more like a full game.

But, how does Ratchet and Clank hold up as a game? Well, let’s give it the Ratchetrospective treatment

Doctor Who Series 10 episodes 8-9 review - The Lie of the Land/The Empress of Mars

Sorry this episode ended up late. Congratulations Tokio Meyers, and my condolences to everyone in London affected by the attack. Now I’ve officially made this review dated, let’s get to the matter at hand. I'll add the images

#47 - Sequel Month - Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Please Note: This review was written before the announcement of Zack and Deborah Snyder stepping away from Justice League to cope with the loss of their daughter. I wish them all the best, however, I'm commenting on a product, and this product sucks!

It’s Sequel Month!

And enough of the mediocrity, let’s get into the pure sh*t. This is Batman v Superman – Dawn of Depression.

Released in March last year, this movie fell short of expectations for a movie that combines DC’s 2 most popular characters, arguably the two most popular characters in comics overall. If Iron Man 3 could reach a billion dollars in the box office, what stopped this? That’s not to say it did poorly exactly, it made over $800m but the scathing reviews, but holding only a 28% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the fact a lot was spent on marketing this movie to the point where this movie only barely made a profit, and considering the enormous $250m spent on the movie anyway.

Zack Snyder original tease for this movie had me exceptionally worried. The Dark Knight Returns is a good story, from a time when Frank Miller could actually write coherent stories. But to take inspiration from this for Batman and Superman’s first meeting struck me as odd, especially given the themes of that book.

Because I’m a glutton for punishment, I’ll be going over the Ultimate edition of the movie, which is around 3 hours long. This is purportedly the one with the most complete story but I will say now, 3 hours is too long for a movie, whether it be Titanic, Avatar or Batman v. Superman; apparently, it got an R Rating in the US too, even though in the UK, it sits still at the equivalent of PG-13.

Lets dive in

Sequel Month - Mini Review: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens

And now we’re doing a sequel to one of my earliest franchise reviews, Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Released at the end of 2015, this movie received great reviews and surpassed expectations, making $2bn at the box office, a tidy profit for Disney’s investment into the film (although with the merchandise they've probably made their money back on buying LucasFilm many times over) however time has divided fans on certain aspects of this movie which I’ll get to. Do these critiques break this movie? Well, here are my thoughts.

Sequel Month - Mini Review - Spectre

It’s Sequel Month

Ah James Bond, it’s been around for so long that it’s a part of British Culture but I have a dark secret. Skyfall was my first Bond and even now, over 2 years after my review of Skyfall, I’ve only watched the Craig movies in full. I’ve caught snippets of the other movies whilst on television but I’m usually not hovering around long enough to see it entirely.

But yes, I’ve seen Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace now, if you want my thoughts, they’re on my Facebook page. But it’s interesting leading into Spectre, the one that tries to connect them all.

Made on a spectacularly high $250m budget, the movie made over $800m, the second highest bond gross but for the movie immediately after Skyfall’s $1bn performance. Whilst it was at least successful commercially, critics were not as kind to this one, with a 64% Rotten Tomatoes rating compared to Skyfall’s 93%. Is that fair? Well here are my thoughts

Sequel Month - Mini Review - Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation

It’s June, and you know what that means!

SEQUEL MONTH!

And FYI, I had this planned since before the Nostalgia critic announced his sequel month. But there’s a difference in that I’m only spotlighting sequels to recent high profile movies and games, sequels that came out from 2015 onwards. We’ll go through the good, the bad and the awful and let’s start with Mission Impossible.

Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation came out in July 2015 (we’ll be doing these in chronological order) to a great financial performance and favourable reviews. My reviews of the previous entries came under Cruise Month, 1 was ok, 2 was terrible and 3 and 4 were marked improvements, will the 5^th instalment carry on this escalation of quality? Let’s take a look