BOOK: Le Morte D’Arthur (1485)

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Le Morte D'Arthur Year: 1485 Author: Thomas Malory Length: 1,974 minutes / 32.90 hours While the Arthurian legend has always fascinated me, I wasn’t entirely sure how much of what I knew was just condensed through other adaptations and interpretations and what was in the original story. I finally took it upon myself to read through this huge multi-volume set to find out what it’s actually about. To say it disappointed me would be an understatement. Perhaps it’s the prose, or the translation, or just the story structure, but I have never been so bored by a piece of literature since I forced myself to read Ulysses. Early on, Le Morte D’Arthur had enough recognizable events to keep me engaged. The origins of Arthur’s birth. The Sword in the Stone. Lady of the Lake and Excalibur. Then, things fell apart. So much of the focus in this book was on random battles and jousts that I could hardly believe the famous stories that were gleaned...
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MOVIE: No Other Land (2024)

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No Other LandYear: 2024Rating: Not RatedLength: 92 minutes / 1.53 hours Documentaries like No Other Land (2024) are not fun. They are necessary. Sure, I’d much rather watch a documentary about street art or an octopus, but a film like this shows just how bad it is in a war-torn part of the world that maybe gets a few minutes a day on a news broadcast. Bringing the human aspects of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians into focus paints a picture that’s hard to ignore. There’s a reason this movie won several awards for its content because it’s necessary viewing to understand what’s happening in that region. What’s initially shocking is how long the territorial conflict between Israel and Palestine has been happening. That the Palestinians have put up with this treatment for decades isn’t really about their persistence but more about the fact that they have nowhere else to go (thus the title of this documentary). It’s depressing to see...
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VIDEO GAME: 2048 (2014)

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2048 Year: 2014 Rating: E Time Played: ~6 hours There are some games that are so innately simple that they feel as if they’ve always been around. While I usually associate this with that set of Windows 95 games like Solitaire, Minesweeper, and Space Cadet Pinball, I think some mobile games also have this feeling because of the simplicity of their touchscreen aspect. Sure, other mobile games like Angry Birds or Candy Crush feel iconic for mobile games, but have grown too complex over the years. One game that stands out in both its timelessness and simplicity is the tile-combining game, 2048. In 2048, the goal is to combine random tiles of 2 and 4 together to reach the titular 2048 tile. Aside from the fact that this is a great game to learn the different exponential powers of 2, the limitation of the 4x4 grid makes it a challenge to reach the 2048 tile, let alone get much further than that. This is the...
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MOVIE: Thunderbolts* (2025)

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Thunderbolts* Year: 2025 Rating: PG-13 Length: 127 minutes / 2.12 hours The problem with a movie like Thunderbolts* (2025) isn’t necessarily that it feels like yet another reboot of Suicide Squad (2016) but that there are already so many of the heroes in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) that have hardly had any meaningful character development so why are we now collecting these semi-villains to fill an obvious gap left by the disbanding of the original Avengers after Endgame (2019)? Sure, it’s fun and the group of anti-heroes shows promise, but it doesn’t quite telegraph a purpose in the larger MCU (similar to how Eternals (2021) kinda went nowhere). I will give Thunderbolts* some credit: it does a good job of highlighting the mental health struggles of these second-string quasi-heroes who have checkered pasts. The last time we had anything close to this was Tony Stark’s PTSD in Iron Man 3 (2013). And with the introduction of another powerful hero who has dangerous side effects...
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BOOK: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (2020)

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The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes Year: 2020 Author: Suzanne Collins Length: 517 pages I’m skeptical of any franchise that feels the need to explore the world of their original, highly successful franchise with a prequel. Often, it adds nothing other than some background that ultimately doesn’t matter because we all know how things start with the original stories. That being said, after watching and enjoying the movie adaptation of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (2023), I figured I would give the book a shot. Once again, Suzanne Collins broke my expectations with some of the best writing and continued world-building in literature. Following the rise of the main villain of the Hunger Games trilogy, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes provides engaging and well thought out plot twists that show the reader the specific circumstances that led to the rise of Coriolanus Snow. That I was actually rooting for this kid all the while knowing what he would eventually become is quite a...
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MOVIE: Gran Turismo (2023)

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Gran Turismo Year: 2023 Rating: PG-13 Length: 134 minutes / 2.23 hours When I first saw the trailers for Gran Turismo (2023), I had my doubts. I know video game adaptations are in vogue right now, but I couldn’t figure out how a plot about a realistic racing simulation game would even work. On top of this, I had become skeptical of Neill Blomkamp’s directing, with his last few movies being somewhat hit or miss. Fortunately, once someone close to me—who doesn’t usually watch video game adaptations—recommended this film to me, I figured I should give it a shot. I’m glad I did. What helped set Gran Turismo apart from other video game adaptations is like how Tetris (2023) made a movie about a puzzle game that used simple blocks. Neither Tetris nor Gran Turismo has any plot in their respective games, but the stories around and featuring these games are much more interesting. I’m reminded of the Far Side comic where the parents are...
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VIDEO GAME: Pokémon Legends – Arceus (2022)

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Pokémon Legends: Arceus Year: 2022 Rating: E Time Played: 3,312 minutes / 55.20 hours For decades, the Pokémon franchise has continued to use the same turn-based formula for their games. But with the rise of more open-world games, it was time for a change in how the monster training/battling gameplay could (for lack of a better term) evolve. Enter Pokémon Legends: Arceus, a pseudo-open-world adventure that plays to the strengths of a 3D space that had been long overdue. Unfortunately, as was also the case for Pokémon Violet/Scarlet that came shortly afterward, the truly limited graphical considerations thwarted the effectiveness of the game. Growing up with the Pokémon franchise, and especially the early years of the anime, there was this conceptual idea that battles were a much more fluid and challenging experience than the one-at-a-time battles that mostly boiled down to knowing the most type-effective move to use. Legends: Arceus still has turn-based combat, but with the twist being that you can sacrifice speed for...
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