When something is intrinsically a part of your life, it can be almost impossible to see it as might appear to someone lacking with any familiarity with it. Take Christmas, for example, which is, on the face of it, a holly jolly time of the year when peace and goodwill Continue Reading
Movie review: Strange World
There is often, though not always for everyone, safety and surety in family. It’s a place of belonging, of identity and of love where we can be assured, again most of the time, that we will find sanctuary, affirmation and the certainty of who we are and how we are Continue Reading
Birthday retro movie review: While You Were Sleeping
Given they’re about love, longing and the good feelings that make life worth living, it’s easy to assume that romantic comedies aka rom-coms are full to the brim with real, actual emotionality, the kind that sears the soul, makes the heart feel truly alive and reminds you that you are Continue Reading
Birthday documentary review: Street Gang – How We Got to Sesame Street
When you’re a kid, and you really love something, you assume without thinking about it (because kids are nothing if not instinctive) that it’s always been in existence. After all, when you switch on the TV and a program you love is always on when it’s supposed to be, you Continue Reading
Movie review: Slumberland
All too often when you lose someone close, it’s a catastrophically sudden thing that leave little to no time to deal with either its occurrence or its emotionally chaotic aftermath. You are suddenly cut adrift, unmoored from the certainties of your life, and wish with every part of you that Continue Reading
Book review: Devotion by Hannah Kent
Hannah Kent is one of those infinitely talented writers who takes the gloriously supple words of the English language and wields them with such beauty, meaning and emotional impact that it’s impossible to read one of her novels and not feel something shift deep down inside you. Her rare gift Continue Reading
A violent splintering: Thoughts on House of the Dragon (E1, S7-10)
SPOILERS AHEAD … AND SOME *BIG* DRAGON MOMENTS … Power is inherently seductive to quite a lot of people. Makes sense – you have control, you get to set the course of events and remake whatever small patch of the world falls under your purview in your, hopefully benevolent and Continue Reading
Graphic novel review: Twig by Skottie Young and Kyle Strahm
Saving the world is a big job. A huge amount is resting on whomever the protagonist happens to be – the fate of all life, time itself often and existential everything – and the one thing you don’t want to be on your first day saving whatever your world happens Continue Reading
Graphic novel review: Wynd Book Two – The Secret of the Wings by James Tynion IV (writer) and Michael Dialynas (artist)
Fantasies always seem to convey, by some intangible sensibility woven into the word, the idea of limitless, epic adventure where anything can happen, anyone can exist and the world can be anything and everything. They are a feast for the imagination and that’s why they are seductive for so many Continue Reading
May your days be merry and bright … The luminous joy of Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock’s “Night of the Lights”
SNAPSHOTIt’s the Night of the Lights, the most Fraggily holiday of the year, and the Rock is filled with songs and cheer. When Jamdolin (voiced by Daveed Diggs) encourages Wembley to make a special wish, the Fraggles head out on an adventure to find the brightest light and, maybe, the true meaning of the holiday. Jim Henson’s fun-loving and Continue Reading