Human beings are a famously contradictory lot. While our thirst for knowledge, for the new and the boldly imaginative has defined us as a species for thousands of years, we also creatures of habit, keen embracers of certainty and reassuring routine. That oddly-oppositional coming together of restless, driving curiosity and potentially stultifying Continue Reading
Talk to me! The New Mr. Peabody and Sherman Show interviews history (all of it)
Isn’t it a wonderful thing when treasured characters from your childhood spring forth back into the zeitgeist, looking and acting pretty much as you knew them with a few judiciously-executed, simpatico modern flourishes? Indeed it is, and much rejoicing is had. Such a welcome, and alas rare occurrence is Continue Reading
How about You, Me & the Apocalypse baby? (trailer)
Forget the vampires (The Strain), the zombies (The Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead and Z Nation), aliens (Falling Skies and Defiance) and nuclear armageddon (Jericho). What we really should be worrying about, say the producers of new TV comedy/drama You, Me & the Apocalypse are great big fiery comets crashing Continue Reading
Weekend pop art: Mark Hammill is hilariously brilliant at signing Star Wars trading cards
We’ve all had something signed by someone fantastically famous at one point or another. Whether it’s a book signing – in my case Hilary St. John Mandel autographing her book Station Eleven at this year’s Sydney Writers’ Festival – or a Comic-Con line-up to have photos signed the stars of Continue Reading
Movie review: Mr Holmes
The Divinyls’ Chrissy Amphlett famously observed that there is “a fine line between pleasure and pain”, but the same could well be said for the all too often permeable barrier that exists between fact and fiction. While many would argue the two are mutually exclusive, never the ‘twain shall meet, Continue Reading
Time is ticking tocking away for Continuum in the trailer for its final season
Why syfy why?! (*add agonised wailing and gnashing of teeth, and if you’re Old Testament Biblically-inclined, maybe even some sackcloth and ashes; yes it’s that serious) Why must you end series so earlier in their runs? Why shoot the horse – relax! It’s a metaphorical horse – before it’s Continue Reading
Falling Skies: “Non-Essential Personnel” (S5, E5 review)
*SPOILERS AND BALD, GRIEF-STRICKEN SOCIOPATHS AHEAD* It’s official! Rage Tom (Noah Wylie) is now our Messiah. (Sorry Jesus, Buddha, and Sponge Bob Squarepants but the aliens have spoken and there’s nothing we can do to dissuade them apparently). And not just any Messiah either, nosirree Cochise. He has been anointed Continue Reading
Get on and up dance Ned Stark! Games of Thrones now has a catchy dance remix
Life is Westeros is not usually a lot of fun for its inhabitants. Sure people occasionally fall in love … well not for long but you know it happens … and they hold weddings … and um, OK moving on … and they don’t get eaten by White Walker Continue Reading
The short and the short of it: Lovebites, a story of love, sweetly delicious, insect love
Awww, ain’t love edible? Wait, what? You mean “grand” don’t you? Not if you’re a female praying mantis, no. As Love Bites, a delightful 2014 short film by Agaki Bautista, Aram Davern, Michael De Caria, and Jonathon Iskov (then students at the Academy of Interactive Entertainment Sydney), with music by Peter Continue Reading
Michael Keaton stars in the captivating true story Spotlight
SNAPSHOT Spotlight stars Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schrieber, and Stanley Tucci. It tells the riveting true story of the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigation team who uncovered a scandal that would rock the city and shock the world. For years, whispers of the Boston Archdiocese’s cover up Continue Reading