June 19, 2026 – SparklyPrettyBriiiight

(courtesy IMP Awards) As mysteries go, and yes, the world appears to be full of them contrary to all appearances, the huge question about whether aliens exists, and even more pertinently in the case of this review, whether they have visited us, is a BIG one. People debate it endlessly, Continue Reading

Movie review: Disclosure Day

“Everyone thinks teenage relationships don’t last” … but what if they do, asks Heartstopper Forever

(courtesy IMP Awards) SNAPSHOTHeartstopper Forever, written by Oseman and based on the highly anticipated final installment of their graphic novel series, bids farewell to a group of friends who have won viewers’ hearts since the series debuted in 2022. “Heartstopper starts like a fairy tale and a bit idealistic, in Continue Reading

You’re invited to a strange new community … thoughts on The Boroughs

(courtesy IMP Awards) Any time a streaming series subverts expectations it’s a very good thing. While there’s nothing wrong of course coming straight out and delivering what it says it’s going to since sometimes all we need is uncomplicated narrative certainty, having a series take its initial, obvious premise and Continue Reading

Deep TBR June book review: Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite

(Pan Macmillan Australia) Somewhere back in the dim dark days of my youth, when dinosaurs roamed the earth and the world wasn’t ending at the hands of several hundred disparate and palpable threats, I was heavily into crime fiction. To be more exact, the books of Agatha Christie which my Continue Reading

Get animated! Trailers drops for Pixar’s Gatto and Disney’s Hexed

(via Shutterstock) I am just a big kid at heart. And while there are some parade rainers and miserable naysayers out there who would ridicule me, a man who is most certainly not a child, for liking animated storytelling, I prefer to celebrate the fact that my inner child is Continue Reading

Is it the end of the world or a new beginning? The Dog Stars asks some very big, action-packed questions

(courtesy IMP Awards) SNAPSHOT“The end of the world was just the beginning.” 🛩️ Set in Colorado after the world’s population has been ravaged by a pandemic, a man lives a lonesome existence in an airplane hangar with his dog and a door gunman he has befriended. When a mysterious transmission Continue Reading

Songs, songs and more songs #138: Lady Gaga + Doechii, Nelly Furtado, Hyd, Robyn and Marley Wildthing + EXTRA! Toy Story 5 song by Taylor Swift

(via Shutterstock) It’s a heady mix of the old and the new this time around with three artists I have long loved, admired and listened to, and two relative newbies on the block who are well and truly making their mark on the musical landscape. It’s a thrill listening to Continue Reading

“Make a choice: your friend or this organisation.” Trailer drops for Ride or Die series

(courtesy First Showing) SNAPSHOTRide or Die is a comedy series following the best friends Debbie Claybourne (Octavia Spencer) and Judith Burton (Hannah Waddingham) who thought they knew everything about each other, except Judith turns out to be an international assassin. When a mysterious figure emerges from Judith’s past and a Continue Reading

Deep TBR June book review: Gus and the Missing Boy by Troy Hunter

(courtesy Wakefield Press) Growing up, it’s often well nigh impossible to feel comfortable in your own skin. Things are changing fast, and figuring which way is up or down emotionally, socially and in a thousand other hugely challenging ways, becomes the stuff of exhausting everyday coming-of-age parkour-ing. It’s not as Continue Reading

Graphic novel review: Lightfall (Book 4): A Place Between by Tim Probert

(courtesy Harper Collins Australia) I cannot begin to express how much I’d love the storytelling brilliance and imaginative bravery of Tim Probert’s darkly warm and beautiful Lightfall series. Now four instalments in with the release of Lightfall: A Place Between, which follows from The Girl and the Galdurian (book #1), Continue Reading