MOVIE: How to Train Your Dragon (2025)

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How to Train Your Dragon Year: 2025 Rating: PG Length: 125 minutes / 2.08 hours With Disney making so many live-action adaptations of their previously successful animated movies, it was only a matter of time before other studios like DreamWorks would do the same. Enter How to Train Your Dragon (2025), a live-action, almost shot-for-shot remake of the 2010 movie of the same name. While most of these live-action adaptations are much worse than their source material, somehow this one works. The slight changes are mostly beneficial, but the few cuts from the original erase a setup for the climactic battle. Of course, one issue with an almost-faithful adaptation of the original movie is that the cadence and tonality of some lines just feels off from how they were said in the previous version. Probably not noticeable to people who haven’t seen the 2010 version dozens of times, but it just felt off to me. Additionally, while I understand cutting some scenes for run-time, one...
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BOOK: Daring Greatly (2012)

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Daring Greatly Year: 2012 Author: Brené Brown Length: 390 minutes / 6.50 hours You know that meme where someone asks others to just post what their therapist tells them so they don’t have to go to therapy? Well, this book is my answer to that question. My therapist at the time suggested reading Daring Greatly, and I think it helped frame half of the equation when it comes to loneliness. Often, we can self-exclude ourselves from community because we are ashamed of who we are, but Daring Greatly challenges the reader to overcome the fear we have of the potential shame we feel when being vulnerable with others. Much like Relational Masks highlighted how we use subconscious coping mechanisms to keep others at an arm’s length, Daring Greatly approaches from the other side of the relationship and shows how the fear of vulnerability is holding us back. Sure, there’s a risk we take when we try new things and don’t immediately succeed. Fear of failure can...
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MOVIE: Paw Patrol – The Mighty Movie (2023)

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Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie Year: 2023 Rating: PG Length: 88 minutes / 1.47 hours It was inevitable that I would eventually watch a Paw Patrol movie with my kids. And with the rise of the superhero genre over the last few decades, it makes sense that this franchise would capitalize on it with Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie (2023). As is usually the case with movies based on shows intended for children, the rise in quality for this film is definitely noticeable, not only in the visuals but in the deeper storyline as well. I’d almost prefer watching this movie as compared to a string of Paw Patrol episodes. The basic premise of The Mighty Movie is that a strange meteor has given all the pups different superpowers that align with their core competency (i.e., Skye can fly, Chase is fast, and Marshall is a dystopian version of a firefighter a la Fahrenheit 451). These powers then allow the pups to tackle much more...
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VIDEO GAME: Cocoon (2023)

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Cocoon Year: 2023 Rating: E Time Played: ~5 hours There’s something about a top-down third-person puzzle game that I truly enjoy. Maybe it’s the somewhat cozy feel, but I think it’s more about the ability to view all the pieces of the puzzle at once and control the tiny character that puts the solution into motion. It’s why I like games like Moss and Lego Builder’s Journey, and why I also liked Cocoon. Of course, Cocoon had another game mechanic that blew my mind and also stumped me a few times. Still, after taking a few breaks, I was able to finish this innovative puzzle game. The puzzles in Cocoon revolve around the ability of the player character to jump in and out of worlds that they carry to special spots that allow them to transition between the spaces. Each of the colored orbs has a world that has a certain aesthetic that matches its color, which only partly helped me to track where I...
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MOVIE: Ballerina (2025)

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Ballerina Year: 2025 Rating: R Length: 124 minutes / 2.07 hours I can appreciate that the relatively new John Wick franchise feels that it already has enough lore to expand into spinoff territory. Ballerina (2025) attempts to expand on the classy, pseudo-religious world of organized crime families by focusing on someone other than John Wick (Keanu Reeves) for once. And while its execution doesn’t feel terribly original with some of the tropes it chose, Ballerina is still a fun action film that relies on fantastic stunt work, just like the other four movies in the John Wick franchise. While Wick can usually just muddle through all the violence he has to endure to achieve his goals, Eve (Ana de Armas) needs to be smarter with her engagements. While there’s sexism in the message that she’ll never be physically strong enough to subdue her targets, it feels fresher having the action be more about her speed and agility (because of course female assassins are all dancers)....
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BOOK: The Gallowglass

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The Gallowglass Year: 2019 Author: Jason Henry Evans Length: 337 pages In trying to expand the genres that I read, I ventured into historical fiction with The Gallowglass. Set in Ireland in the late 1500s, this book was quite educational for a time and place about which I knew very little. Sure, it has modern morals thrust into a historical context that makes them seem out of place, but that conflict between what we know as right and what the majority would have done is part of its charm. The action is intense and the details are impeccable, but the proofreading needed some work. The Gallowglass doesn’t shy away from the adult nature of war and romance in this era. Its injuries are brutal and the sex is somewhat explicit. Racism and sexism are also on full display, as you’d expect of the English from the 16th century. The realism felt authentic, and the clearly researched details of everything didn’t seem to impede the story...
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MOVIE: The Phonecian Scheme (2025)

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The Phonecian Scheme Year: 2025 Rating: PG-13 Length: 101 minutes / 1.68 hours After a few “COVID years” of Wes Anderson films like The French Dispatch (2021) and Asteroid City (2023), it felt good to get back to an Anderson film that felt classic in its themes and presentation. The Phonecian Scheme (2025) has all the hallmark traits of modern Wes Anderson with its all-star cast, monotone affect, hilarious running gags, and geometric/symmetrical cinematography. But, even more, its plot has a driving force that doesn’t feel as fragmented as the films he made during the COVID years. I have always appreciated modern Wes Anderson films for how they have a signature visual style. The Phonecian Scheme takes it even farther by making the camera almost like a character in itself, almost justifying the head-on centered framing that has been a staple of his style for so long. The colors here are definitely bold, like in The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), with the dream sequences featuring...
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