Stuff I Watched in 2017

It's New Years Eve and I'm yet to make a Films of the Year list. Or a top TV list but then I barely watch much TV due to playing games for 90% of my leisure time. But then this year I also watched The Handmaids Tale and I can't not talk about that... So this here blog will be a meandering spiel about stuff I watched.

Comic stuff first of all because I'm a big geek and there was plenty of it. This year we had Thor Ragnarok, Guardians 2, Spider-Man Homecoming, Wonder woman, Justice League, Logan and even Lego Batman. Safe to say that Justice League was the worst film I went to the cinema for this year. Less offensively bad than BvS or Suicide Squad but it was dull as dishwater, made feck all sense as a sequel to BvS, gave us Henry Cavills CGI top lip and turned Batman in to a completely useless comedy sidekick. Flip me. Don't call me a Marvel fan boy just yet, I happened to really like Wonder Woman... It's not perfect and the final act is rubbish but Gal Gadot is superb and both she and the film in general just ooze an endearing charm all over the place. Oh and it has that No Man's Land scene which is probably the most memorable from any film this year.

Marvel stuff next! I was all really good... Thor Ragnarok took cues from Guardians and dished up colourful sci-fi and jokes aplenty to give the god of thunder his best film yet and many peoples favourite Marvel film. It's not mine admittedly, I seem to be the only person who thought there were too many jokes and not enough actual threat or melodrama. Unlike Guardians which for me had a better balance. On first viewing I was a bit disappointed but only really because the predecessor might just be my favourite film ever. The second entry has a little bit of overindulgence in some areas but for the most part its still flipping great. Spider-Man was a confident and lovely reboot with a geeky, fast talking, actual teenage Spidey/Peter.

Logan was a different beast altogether, ditching many genre tropes and taking our grizzled hero on a road trip with an aging, swearing Xavier. These two have been so good for so long, through great and terrible films and this was a brilliantly heartfelt exit for them. Oh there was some violence too and then that new kid who managed to steal the show from the experienced pro's on multiple occasions. What a film.




Non comic stuff.... Loads I haven't seen. Way to many. So don't berate my favourites and reply with 'but you haven't seen this yet...'




La La Land. You've all seen it. I loved it, you probably hated it. I can't remember a film with as much praise being so disliked by fricking everyone I meet. Maybe the hype affected it, who knows. I adore Emma Stone in this, I love that divisive ending and I came out of the cinema humming the music with a smile on my face as my wife told me to shut up.

The Big Sick. Only just saw it last week but oh my, that was a lovely film. Took me a little while to open up to it but by the end I was lauding it. It's a great character piece about one man and two sets of parents. His own happen to be Pakistani and want a traditional arranged marriage for him but he falls for a white American girl. You could probably write the rest of that story in a clichéd romantic way, but this film really isn't that. It surprised me, amused me and  it made my eyes water a little bit. Twice.

This blogs really long now, oh dear. Quick bits: War for the Planet of the Apes was epic, an actual brilliant third film. Blade Runner was good but a bit too slow and kind of forgettable for me. Star Wars was a fun popcorn munching action drama. Dunkirk was tense and brilliantly directed. Lego Batman was the funniest film I saw this year. Girls Trip was the least funny comedy I've watched in perhaps ever. Kingman 2 was a riot, tons of fun with that. Baby Driver was really nifty and it's gimmick of action scenes matching music is a joy to see/hear. Mother! was the weirdest mind fuck of a film. Never bored but found it completely baffling. Read up on it after, thought about it for days. I can't say it was good, but it was an experience... 

Right, my actual favourite film of the year. I think. Definitely on first viewing anyway but that opinion could change on repeat viewings. Get Out. I went in knowing of the surrounding buzz but at the time I really didn't know much about it. I was blooming mesmerized the whole way through. It uses racism, jokes, horror movie jump scares and some deliberately confusing weirdness to produce a work of genius. I really liked this film.

TV stuff!! Then you can go back to reading tweets or doing anything more respectful of your attention span. The Good Place is nice. I pretty much like everything about it but yet I'm a fan that doesn't find it that funny. It puts on a smile on face though so job done. The Handmaids Tale. Lets be honest, I'm only chucking TV in here so I can splurge my praise for this show on your screen. It is majestic TV. Grim and hard to stomach for much of it but that what makes the other moments so powerful. The way this show takes the tiniest of victories for its lead character and has you cheering inside.. Amazing. The soundtrack choices and the facial expressions of Elizabeth Moss are all it takes. She is perfect in this role, it is a faultless performance. The direction of each episode and the design of the world, all brilliant. I still rave about that one scene shot in the back of a van, when the doors open... Just watch it.

Still with me? I'm talked out. If I've left stuff out it's because I found it average (Punisher, Trainspotting 2) or I haven't seen it yet (Moonlight, Hidden Figures). There isn't enough time in the world and there's always something new. Here's to not watching all the new stuff in the New Year! Sure as long as we see Avengers it'll be grand.

My 2017 in Games

It's Christmas next week!! Which means your social media will be filled with 'best of the year' lists, in between Star Wars debates, Donald Trump and cat gifs. I want to join in, mainly so I can talk in a sensible, reserved and unbiased manner about how Nintendo have created actual magic and changed my life forever...


Yeah ok, I do love me some Nintendo but I promise I'll talk about other games too. Should also point out that I haven't played all of 2017s releases because I'm not doing this for a fricking living. I haven't even bought a game since the end of October, which in internet time was a lifetime ago.

I started the year playing Christmas and birthday presents, so sorry to bore you with talk of 2016 games... Ratchet and Clank was a fun and technically pretty charmer. Dishonored 2 was superb and the only game I've played through twice this year. The level design is second to none and the toolkit of powers it gives you encourages investigation and experimenting in each perfect playground.

Lets cut right to March time and a big ol' paragraph on the tiny release that was the Nintendo Switch. I've said it in about five other blogs and I'll repeat it till my keyboard battering fingers fall off, I bloody love this machine. The shape of it, the speed of it, the ease with which I can play two player Mario Kart on a train... and of course, the games.

Zelda is my game of the year. There was that one weekend in which I doubted it, caused by a binge play of Mario Odyssey, but I've been revisiting Hyrule in the past week and it is just magnificent. No game matches it for sense of exploration. It takes the open world design and removes the usual map markers to leave you just going. Go up there, go over that way, go anywhere you want. You will find something. It's a huge and incredibly detailed world that can be tackled anyway you want. It manages to be both charming and challenging and it somehow recreated the same sense of awe that I hadn't truly felt in a game since I was about 14 and playing Ocarina of Time. It is has overtaken that now as my favourite game of any year ever.

It did have some blooming competition though. Mario Odyssey is weirdly similar in that it asks you to poke around and discover new joys. It's more condensed however with the power moons (the games reward/currency) being crammed in to every nook and cranny. You'll be jumping platforms on your way to one moon before dressing up a pirate for another then turning in a stack of ten Goombas in order to impress a lady. It's a non-stop grin fest of creative genius.

Enough Nintendo? Ok then... Horizon was pretty good eh? I t took me a little while to really get in to it, but when I did I fell in love. The combat in that game, taking down robotic versions of wildlife and dinosaurs, is thrilling and rewarding in a sense barley matched in a game of that size. I completed a bunch of the unnecessary side quests just because they usually led to a fight and those fights never got dull. The games narrative was the biggest surprise though in that it somehow made robot wildlife in an empty world make sense. It also presented us with the one of the best leading characters this generation, the feisty and committed Aloy.

If narrative is your thing then I can't recommend strongly enough the beauty that is What Remains of Edith Finch. It takes you through the stories of a family who have nearly all passed away and with each one we are presented with changes in gameplay and visuals. From a cell-shaded walk through a horror comic, to being a baby in a bath or out with your dad in the hills getting photography lessons. It is a short experience but filled with ideas and carefully crafted moments. I've no shame in saying my eyes watered twice. There is little as moving as having to do something you don't want to do, of having to push the buttons that will create a result you don't want to see. Damn you game, I'm thinking about that scene again...

I played a lot of games this year and I can't write a paragraph for each. I've really enjoyed Splatoon 2 and ARMS on Switch. Both have kept me coming back due the constant free updates Nintendo treat us to. I liked Shadow of War for its core basics and nemesis system but the mission structure was weak and it got a little repetitive.  I'm getting Nier for Christmas and I'm excited by its regular occurrences on everyone else's end of year lists. Haven't played any of the big FPS games or Persona or Assassins Creed because I just don't have the time or money. All are supposed to be great though so my January and February should be pretty fun.


In summary: 2017 was an utterly brilliant year for this hobby. Barely know what's coming next year but Spider-Man should be on a similar blog post around this time in 2018. Maybe Metroid? Please give me Metroid. Till then its back to Zelda.