SNAPSHOT Exiled from their home planet, alien heroes Zan and Jayna must navigate life as teens on Earth at South Metropolis High School, where they’re even bigger outsiders than the typical awkward young adults. Under the watchful eye of Superman, the brother and sister pull monitor duty at the Hall Continue Reading
Can you sing 22 musicals in just 12 minutes? Emily Blunt, Lin-Manuel Miranda and James Corden can!
James Corden, host of, as luck would have naming-wise, The Late Late Show with James Corden, love musicals. And Emily Blunt and Lin-Manuel Miranda are currently starring in a musical at the moment by the name of Mary Poppins Returns (which is a supreme delight, and yes you must see Continue Reading
Rip’d from the pages of my childhood: Bottersnikes and Gumbles by S. A. Wakefield
(cover image courtesy Penguin Australia) SNAPSHOT Set in the landscape of the Australian bush the stories recount a series of conflicts between the lazy, destructive Bottersnikes and good-natured, hardworking Gumbles. Inspiration for the series came from the emerging environmental movement. The two species were intended to represent opposing attitudes towards Continue Reading
Sweet arachnid music: Lucas the Spider and his one man band
Lucas the Spider might be little but boy can he create some beautifully-big music. In this delightfully musical piece from creator Joshua Slice, Lucas uses violin, xylophone, drums and other instruments to create a jauntily-upbeat slice of mellow rockabilly that’s sure to get you up and dancing. (Just watch where Continue Reading
Songs songs and more Australia Day songs: KAIIT, Carmouflage Rose, Eilish Gilligan, Samsurah, Jesswar
Australia’s national day is not without controversy. Situated since 1994 on 26 January when European settlement of Australia began, displacing an indigenous people who had been on the continent for 60,000 years, the day is increasingly seen as marking invasion rather than a celebration of nationhood, with calling to #changethedate Continue Reading
Book review – Spoiler Alert: The Hero Dies by Michael Ausiello
Michael Ausiello is a brave man. Though I have never met the highly-respected US entertainment journalist, and know him only by his work on TVLine, which he founded, I have come to this opinion based solely on the heartbreakingly-hilarious book Spoiler Alert: The Hero Dies (A Memoir of love, loss Continue Reading
“I feel the need … the need for …” the cast of Sesame Street to recite famous movie quotes
I love the Muppets so much that frankly they couldn’t recite the telephone book (well the online version anyway), naturally with their trademark whit and whimsy and I would more than happily sit their in rapt attention until they were good and done. Vanity Fair, in a moment of inspired Continue Reading
Star Trek Discovery: “Brother” (S2, E1 review)
SPOILERS AHEAD … AND QUIPPY QUIPS, RED STARS AND A SPECTACULAR CASE OF FATALITY-INDUCING ARROGANCE Balancing exposition and a fast-moving narrative is always a tricky undertaking but “Brother”, the first episode of the second season of Star Trek: Discovery managed it with aplomb in a story that had thrills & Continue Reading
They comes in highly-listenable earworm pieces: Theme song for Lego Movie 2 released
SNAPSHOT A sequel to the original 3D computer animated film, which follows Emmet, an ordinary, rules-following, perfectly average LEGO minifigure who is mistakenly identified as the most extraordinary person and the key to saving the world. He is drafted into a fellowship of strangers on an epic quest to stop Continue Reading
Book review: Someone Like Me by M. R. Carey
It will surprise precisely no one that the world is a dark and violent place with little of the storied justice so beloved of the sorts of Hollywood thrillers which, by law, must now star only Liam Neeson. That is not to say though that the world is without some Continue Reading