BOOK: Snowpiercer – The Prequel Part 1 – Extinction (2019)

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Snowpiercer - The Prequel Part 1: Extinction Year: 2019 Author: Matz & Jean-Marc Rochette Length: 90 pages One of the best original sci-fi movies to come out in the last decade, in my opinion, was Snowpiercer (2013). The story originated as a 1982 French graphic novel under the name of Le Transperceneige. While I haven't read the original source material, I decided that a prequel graphic novel was probably pretty safe to read. I figured the events leading up to the world ending and a perpetual train being launched wouldn't spoil anything for me (I also haven't seen the TV show either). While it's only a scant 90 pages, part 1 of this prequel trilogy, Extinction, had nothing I didn't already know in it. Most of the plotlines in this book were fairly generic end-of-the-world-type stories. Each one obviously would lead to the last of humanity boarding this infinitely running train, which was no surprise. It probably didn't help that there weren't that many distinct...
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MOVIE: Tár (2022)

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Tár Year: 2022 Rating: R Length: 158 minutes / 2.63 hours I hate to say that Tár (2022) is what's wrong with Oscar nominees, but it's really what's wrong with Oscar nominees. I had only seen a trailer for this movie once and it was a vague two minutes of Cate Blanchett blowing smoke, followed by her briefly conducting an orchestra. There was nothing to indicate to me what this movie was about. Then it was released on the coasts, never making it to the Colorado Springs cinemas until it was nominated for Best Picture and I was given the chance to watch it. Tár is weird. It's psychological and unapologetic about never explaining itself. I get that it's intended as an almost "out of body" experience following the titular character around. The "artsy" aspects of Tár's clearly untreated mental illness left me scratching my head more often than not. Still, I enjoy classical music and attending the Philharmonic, so it was interesting to see...
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VIDEO GAME: Portal 2 (2011)

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Portal 2 Year: 2011 Rating: E10+ Time Played: 8.5 hours While Portal felt like an innovative leap in gameplay, its bare-bones test chambers left a little to be desired for the variety of puzzles. Fortunately, four years after the release of Portal, Valve released the masterpiece that is Portal 2. Everything about the original game was taken into consideration and improved significantly. The environment was chock-full of lore, the gameplay added interesting mechanics with the addition of the gels, and the characters were funnier than ever. Even playing through this game over a decade after my first time still felt fresh and entertaining. Exploring the different areas of Aperture Laboratories (in various levels of decay) brought a much-needed ambiance to the series that was merely enhanced by the narrations of Cave Johnson (J.K. Simmons). That the game acts as a sort of prequel and sequel to the original merely emphasizes how well-considered its story is and how much lore can be crammed into a physics-based...
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MOVIE: Ant-Man and the Wasp – Quantumania (2023)

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Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Year: 2023 Rating: PG-13 Length: 124 minutes / 2.06 hours I'm not sure how much more of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) I can take. After a lackluster Phase 4, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) is what they chose to kick off Phase 5? Don't get me wrong, I truly enjoyed the first Ant-Man (2015). However, this was because I saw it more as a comedy heist film than as an action-packed superhero film. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) initially indicated this shift for me, but now Quantumania has cemented the averageness of Marvel movies in my mind. The part that hurts most is that they could have leaned more into the comedy. They tried with M.O.D.O.K. (who had a fantastic comedy spin-off TV show before being in the MCU) but most of those jokes were childish at best. I have to give them props for making this bizarre character make sense in the greater scheme of MCU continuity....
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BOOK: Virtual Boy Works (2021)

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Virtual Boy WorksYear: 2021Author: Jeremy ParishLength: 176 pages A few years ago, I found myself down a YouTube rabbit hole and stumbled across Jeremy Parish's "Works" series of videos detailing the history of video games. Specifically, he was making videos that chronologically documented the games released for the Nintendo Entertainment System,  Game Boy, Super NES, and Sega Genesis. One system that I was able to watch all the way through was his series on the Virtual Boy, Nintendo's oft-maligned 32-bit console. This book is a written-down version of the scripts from that series. While I enjoyed the bite-size chapters on each of the 22 games for the system, the few additional chapters on fan games were a nice addition that wasn't part of the YouTube series. The book also included a pair of blue/red 3D glasses so readers could catch a glimpse of what these games might have been like (it works OK, but it's no Virtual Boy emulation on a VR...
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MOVIE: All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

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All Quiet on the Western FrontYear: 2022Rating: RLength: 148 minutes / 2.46 hours There has been a trend in recent years of remaking films that had previously been nominated for the Oscar for Best Picture. Movies like A Star is Born (2018) didn't win the highest prize in previous years like West Side Story (2021) did in 1961. The latest in these remakes is All Quiet on the Western Front (2022), a German-language film based on the 1929 book of the same name that had a Best Picture-winning adaptation in 1930. And while visually beautiful, I think this new version misses parts of what made the 1930 version stand out. I'll admit that I haven't read the book these movies were adapting. However, there was a powerful message that the 1930 version conveyed that was missing in this newer version. Both successfully showed that war is hell and completely pointless for those fighting on the front lines. And while the 2022 adaptation...
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VIDEO GAME: Portal (2007)

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Portal Year: 2007 Rating: T Time Played: 3 hours When it comes to video game mechanics, it feels like most of the foundational concepts were born in the early years and merely perfected over time. The endless puzzle possibilities of Tetris. The platforming of Super Mario Bros. The first-person-shooter perspective of Doom. It still amazes me that a game made in 2007 could combine these foundational elements of video games into something truly original. Portal is more than its gameplay, though, which is part of what makes its story so iconic—enough to be part of some of the earliest memes. While the length of this game makes it feel more like a tech demo, the gradual reveal of the game's story adds some heft to its impact. As the player slowly uncovers the reality of their situation and the insanity of the expertly written GLaDOS, the portal mechanics become less about solving puzzles and more about trying to survive. That the one-sided banter of the...
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MOVIE: M3GAN (2023)

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M3GAN Year: 2023 Rating: PG-13 Length: 102 minutes / 1.70 hours I'm not usually one to watch "horror" films, so I was going to pass on M3GAN (2023) until a friend requested to see it together. By genre standards, this PG-13 cross between Child's Play (1988) and The Terminator (1984) was light on blood and gore that could have bumped it up to an R rating if they showed more of it. Perhaps this was intentional to emphasize the horrors of Artificial Intelligence (AI) overall. Because we all know unchecked machine learning algorithms will always lean toward some kind of murder. I think if you go into this movie understanding that it'll be goofy, then you can munch on your popcorn as it hits all the standard tropes. It's not quite funny enough to be part comedy, but there are some chuckle-worthy scenes sprinkled throughout. From a sci-fi perspective, though, any robotics or AI rules that you'd usually see in these scenarios were mysteriously absent....
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