MOVIE: Free Guy (2021)

Free Guy Year: 2021 Rating: PG-13 Length: 115 minutes / 1.92 hours This pandemic has messed with my sense of time. I could have sworn that Free Guy (2021) had already come out, but it had just been endlessly delayed until this year. As someone who enjoys video games, I was hesitant to watch this movie because it could be filled with too many references that would immediately date it. Fortunately, I was surprised by the few glimpses of a deeper plot hidden behind Free Guy's goofy exterior. Of course, Ryan Reynolds makes this movie work with his best PG-13 Deadpool impression. Within the first three minutes of this film, I thought to myself, "Oh, this is just The LEGO Movie (2014)." A non-player character (NPC) named Guy (Ryan Reynolds) breaks out of the mundanity of his existence to go on a great video game adventure. It wasn't until much later in the film that I realized the major plot points of The Truman Show...
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MOVIE: Ready Player One (2018)

Ready Player One Year: 2018 Rating: PG-13 Length: 140 minutes / 2.33 hours Ready Player One (2018) is a rare film for me, mostly because I had read the book well before the movie came out. In fact, I read the book shortly after it was released, and was impressed by the sheer volume of pop culture references. Consequently, I figured such a film could never be made. Just based on the incredible amount of coordination it would take to get rights approvals from so many different places, the legal side of such a film would be a nightmare. If it was made into a film, I imagined it would certainly be a fun and flashy romp through cyberspace. The film version, while not entirely faithful to its source material, certainly lives up to my imagination. While the book spends paragraphs describing all the pop culture references, the movie does it one better and gives quick, flashing glances of something that fans of pop culture will...
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BOOK: DreamLync (2015)

DreamLync Year: 2015 Author: K.A. Black Length: 122 pages I initially had my doubts about this book. There have been plenty of stories written about the challenges and cautions of a simulated society. From The Matrix (1999) to Sword Art Online, the blurred lines between the real world and a digital one are well within our reach as a global community. And while books like Ready Player One certainly have a nostalgic feel to their plotlines, DreamLync manages to flip the concept on its head and show how hard it is to pull oneself from a heavily digital social experience. While I would argue that the timeline for this book would be in the next 20-30 years, instead of more than 100 away (just look at Her (2013) for example), the same interpersonal problems will likely still exist. Told via the almost forgettable "everyman" John Adams (not to be confused with either U.S. President), DreamLync shows the reader a world that could easily be ours (without...
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BOOK: Armada (2015)

Armada Year: 2015 Author: Ernest Cline Length: 384 pages When I first heard about Ready Player One years ago, I was excited an author would even try to capture the spirit of the hardcore pop culture lover. After I received a hardcover copy of that book for Christmas, I devoured every word and loved every moment of it. This was why, when I saw Ernest Cline had written another book appearing to be in the same vein of Ready Player One, I had to buy it and give it a read. This book was Armada. Unfortunately, I was not nearly as impressed with Armada as I was with Ready Player One. In Armada, the pop culture references were there, but almost to the point of oversaturation. There were plenty of references I didn’t understand because I haven’t encountered the source material, which was somewhat frustrating. Furthermore, what made the references entertaining and fun in Ready Player One was that they were tied to unravelling the...
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