I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a five-minute film review of Black Adam, which is in cinemas now.
Filed under: Movies | Tagged: Black Adam, Dwayne Johnson, film, Movie, review, superheroes, the escapist, the rock | Leave a comment »
I am doing weekly reviews of Andor at The Escapist. They’ll be dropping every Wednesday evening while the show is on, looking at the Rogue One prequel as it progresses from one episode to the next.
The first six episodes of Andor comprised two three-episode arcs, which seemed like a logic structure for the show going forward. However, the seventh episode of the season is a mostly standalone episode, one that seems largely dedicated to the fallout from the previous adventure. However, it’s also a showcase of what Andor does well, particular when compared to so much modern franchise media. It is a cleverly written and thoughtful episode that advances the show’s characters and themes in interesting and compelling ways.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: Television | Tagged: andor, escapist, reaction, rebellion, revolution, rogue one, star wars, the escapist | Leave a comment »
We’re thrilled to be launching a fortnightly video companion piece to In the Frame at The Escapist. The video will typically launch every second Monday, and be released on the magazine’s YouTube channel. And the video will typically be separate from the written content. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.
This week, we took a look at Andor, the new Star Wars streaming show. There are a lot of interesting things about Andor, including how good it is. However, the show also feels like a meditation on Star Wars as a cultural phenomenon. Showrunner Tony Gilroy has talked candidly about how he was never a particular fan of Star Wars, and ended up working on the franchise almost by accident. As such, Andor feels like it is, in some small way, about learning to love Star Wars and to understand what Star Wars is capable of.
Filed under: Television | Tagged: andor, escapist, fandom, in the frame, star wars, streaming, the escapist, Tony Gilroy | Leave a comment »
I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a five-minute film review of Werewolf by Night, which is on Disney+ from tomorrow.
Filed under: Movies | Tagged: escapist, marvel, review, the escapist, werewolf by night | Leave a comment »
We’re thrilled to be launching a weekly multimedia podcast at The Escapist, called The Recap. I’m hoping to be a regular fixture of it, stremaing live every Tuesday evening. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.
This week, we took a look at the splurge of recent news from Marvel Studios, including new trailers, new writer announcements, the first big reveals about Deadpool 3, directorial departures, and streaming shows that are becoming movies. We also caught up with our opinions on Rings of Power, House of the Dragon and Andor. It’s a fun discussion. Check it out.
Filed under: Movies, Podcasts!, Television | Tagged: andor, Blade, deadpool 3, house of the dragon, marty silva, Movies, nick calandra, podcast, rings of power, Television, the escapist | Leave a comment »
I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute television review of The Sandman, which is streaming on Netflix now.
Filed under: Television | Tagged: adaptation, dc comics, escapist, fantasy, neil gaiman, netflix, the escapist, the sandman, tom sturridge, vertigo | Leave a comment »
I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute film review of Prey, which is streaming on Hulu from tomorrow.
Filed under: Movies | Tagged: amber midthunder, dan trachtenberg, escapist, film, Movie, predator, prey, review, the escapist | Leave a comment »
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the looming release of Thor: Love and Thunder, it seemed like as good an excuse as any to take a look back at the character of Thor within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and what makes him unique within the shared universe.
Interestingly, Thor is perhaps the only major character within the shared universe who feels like an old-fashioned superhero rather than a product of the military industrial complex. This is particularly apparent within Kenneth Branagh’s Thor and Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok, both of which are essentially stories about Thor being exiled from or rejecting the structures of Asgardian society. The result of all this is interesting. In a universe where so many heroes are defined by their relationship to the armed forces, Thor actually feels like a superhero.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: 9/11, escapist, in the frame, militarism, military, superheroes, the escapist, thor, thor: ragnarok | Leave a comment »
I published a new piece at The Escapist this evening. We’re doing a series of recaps and reviews of The Boys, which is streaming weekly on Amazon Prime. The third season’s penultimate episode released this week, and it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the series.
Herogasm is a show that the production team have wanted to make since the show premiered, and it represents an interesting acknowledgement of the show’s success: the series has been successful enough for Amazon to trust the creatives to build an episode around a superhero orgy. That said, it also demonstrates one of the key strengths of The Boys. Underneath the show’s cras and vulgar exterior, it is a show that loves being a superhero show. It is a deconstruction of the genre’s uncritical power fantasies, but a celebration of the genre’s pulpy potential.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: Television | Tagged: escapist, herogasm, the boys, the escapist | Leave a comment »
I published a new piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Jurassic World Dominion, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look back at the best sequel to Jurassic Park, The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
The Lost World was somewhat maligned on initial release, with much of the criticism hinging on how dark and how cynical the movie was perceive to be. This was seen as something of a betrayal of the audience, with Spielberg sacrificing wonder and majesty for terror and horror. However, this is the most interesting thing about the movie. It is Spielberg playing with horror in a very deliberate and conscious way. If the original Jurassic Park was a movie about the majesty and spectacle of blockbuster filmmaking, The Lost World can feel like a horror movie about turning such a project into a sequel.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: dinosaurs, escapist, in the frame, jurassic park, steven spielberg, the escapist, the lost world | Leave a comment »
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