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benjmiles
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Starfield (2023)
Urgh. More familiar jank and loading screens galore
I'll start by pointing an accusatory finger at the reviewers giving gigantic reviews with 10/10. You are clearly shills so your "review" was clearly paid for. You are the filth oof the world. Go find a real job.
My experience of this game has been VERY negative. The level of jank is something we have come to expect from Bugthesda. But given Todd have his usual hollow brag about how much they had refined the game then how many more years did they need to fix the rest of the jank that remained. On to my next comment ...
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Yeah, loading screens. That's basically all this game is most of the time. It is a incredibly UNrefined experience. You literally fast travel almost everywhere, especially in space. This has been such a disconnect for the experience. You can literally do most of your travel from the Map menu and don't even need to board your ship, take off, or fly from system to system. Just find your destination, hit Travel and arrove. Wow Todd, WOW!! SMH.
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I'm sure many people have heard about the absolutely infuriating NPCs. Not only do they fall out of your ship sometimes but they also disappear through walls, floors and vanish completely. But, the most infuriating thing they do, is interior you DURING COMBAT to discuss their feelings or something that happened in their past. OMG Sarah just STFU and shoot!
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Space combat is infantile. If you have played Elite Dangerous and play this you'll probably throw up in your mouth. It's pathetic, it really is.
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Travel on a planet is so damn boring! Everything is so far away and so generic or boring when you get there. Probably my favourite thing to do when I land on a planet is wait for the obligatory ship that lands nearby and go and steal t. It literally happens every time.
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I got the Mantis early on and several Eclipse and Crimson fleet ships. But it combat just feels so childish and inelegant that I'd rather not bother. There's no tactical finesse to it at all. Plus shields never seem to recharge. It's just dumb.
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One of the first things I did was remove the carrying limit, something I do with all Bethesda games. So I can now carry 1 million tonnes of items. Haha.
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Mods. I have installed so many already. You need to. It's basically essential to get the game to work well. Space UI, Inventory, texture packs, etc. This just feels like the hassle I had to go through with Skyrim and the Fallout games to make them look and work better. Bethesda should just give up. They suck at games. They just don't realise it.
Loading screen ... OMG loading screens!!!!!
Ahsoka (2023)
Sloooooooow!!!! Boring.
Dave Filoni is so overrated. His writing is sometimes infantile but mostly just a dumb person trying to act smart. But of course a certain group of 'fabs' are lapping it up as they sit watching Saturday morning reruns of Rebels in their 20's or 30's.
As someone who actually trained with swords and the bo staff the dance fighting in this show is just vomit inducing. They are slow and boring (just like the dialogue and acting) deliberately missing each other with poor cinematography showing they were nowhere near each other. It's just appalling to observe when you know what a real duel can be like. If you watch the fight between Maul,Qui-gon and Obi-Wan in Duel of the Fates (done by Ray Park but uncredited for it) and this- there really is no comparison. Whoever did the dance fights for this show, and the other Star Wars garbage made by Dismay, should be fired, preferably out of an airlock.
Ray Stephenson is wasted in this show and it's such a poor send off for him since he passed away before or near the end of production.
Until she and Filoni are gone I don't think there is any hope for Star Wars under the rule of #DarthKennedy.
The Witcher (2019)
Absolute garbage without Henry and a writing team pushing agenda politics
It gets a 3 because of season 1. Otherwise it would be a 2 or even 1.
As others have said already, this is the perfect example of what can go wrong with a show when you ignore, or have complete disdain, for the source material. Not only did this mean the butted heads with Henry, who is as most people know a mega nerd over the books and the games, but openly mocked the source material.
I would have thought that 'The Witcher' would be the primary character in a show called ... you guessed it "The Witcher.' But no, the agenda and personal hangups the writers and producers have in their own lives meant the ruined this show. Game of Thrones will long sit as an example of how to set a stage correctly, giving us insight into each faction and location so we have a clear sense of where and how far things are from each other. Whereas, even from season 1, the show failed to do that.
It's surprising to find out that Henry had to push for the 'goodbye Roach' scene as the writers had zero intention of making it an emotional scene. Why? Did they never ride a horse as a child? Do they have zero empathy at all for the pet or animal? Whatever the reason, not having a scene to mourn Roach would have been unforgivable.
Here's a tip - write the show the way it should have been written. This obsession with writers assuming they are above their station is a joke. Know your place! You write the script and that's it. The director and actors then interpret that script or correct it. Thinking they are the showrunners and have full control over the show just shows how out of touch these people are.
This has gone from a fairly decent show to an absolute disaster. Season 3 was the real what the moment for me. Sorry Liam but given how the writers have injected their identify politics, casting diversity to the point of choking the show and anti-male/hero sentiments, there is absolutely no way on Earth I would ever consider watching a season 4. But, apparently if the rumours are true, it has just been dumped anyway. Thank the Gods!!!
I hope the writer's strike drags on and on till many of them end up finding pother jobs that they will probably also suck at. Maybe Trump was right about draining the swamp but he chose the wrong swamp. I think it's the film and TV industry that needs draining. Or maybe just call in the Inquisition to perform an exterminatus and we replace the damn lot of them. I look forward to Henry's 40k show.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023)
Indiana Jones and the Insuferable Femanist
What utter sh1te. This is the Indiana Jones film no one wanted but #DarthKennedy just had to make it so she could humiliate Harrison Ford one more time. Honestly does this woman have dirt on him? What did he do to her in the past? This utter desicration of our beloved IPs and characters needs to stop.
This film is a trainwreck and the most expensive film of all time with all the reshoots. The editing is terrible, the teleporting bad guys are ridiculous, the plot ... fk me! Phoebe is as insuferable as always. Heer character is clearly yet another self-insert by #DarthKennedy. Just like Rey Palpatine. If Back to the Future were owned by Disney I can imagine Phoebe and Daisy being cast as Doc and Marley and their missions would be to stop their parents form kissing.
This film is a friggin train wreck. It was a waste of my money and time.
Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)
A visually stunning film with a garbage story, again.
Let's be honest. Avatar 1 was Dances With Wolves in Space. The visuals were amazing but the story was terrible and predictable. This isn't any better. Honestly how much.visual spectacle is nothing new in films today and the more you see.the less impact it has. The more you see towering jungles, underwater reefs.and floating mountains before my brain becomes numb.to the whole thing. If you are fed the same cake morning, noon and night you are always going to get sick of it eventually.
The whole family angst and teen drama junk went on for 90 MINUTES!!!
How has no one recalled the events from the first film? They completely destroyed the tree in the first one but no one seems to recall that.
The cliche of humans vs Navii is just contrite and tired noble savage trope. As if we don't have enough tropes already in films and TV right now.
James, you need to stop writing your films because you actually suck at writing. But the technical side is amazing so stick to that.
As the Critical Drinker said:
"I struggle to decide whether or not to recommend this film to people. If it had been an hour shorter and maybe a bit smarter and more nuanced it would have been a no-brainer for me but as it stands even though it's better than almost anything else put out by Disney this year it's so long, so bloated and so self-indulgent that I really don't know if it's worth your time and money and if the early box office results are anything to go by I might not be the only one."
Greyhound (2020)
Absolute perfection
This goes in the "must watch" category of films for me. Tom Hanks at his finest again. For those who love Band of Brothers and The Pacific you will be left wanting here. The atmosphere, the music and, above all, the suspense is fantastic! I cannot recommend this film enough.
Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017)
Train wreck of a film
What can I say? Rian Johnson literally attempted to destroy everything that had come before. The Force Awakens had some major issues to begin with but this sequel just went off the rails, crashed into a school and exploded into a fiery ball of death.
Rian should be shoved out of the nearest airlock for this abomination. It's unforgivable what he did to Star Wars with this film.
The plot can be solved within the first 10 minutes. Aside from the absurdity of having big slow bombers have to drop bombs DOWN in space instead of blasting them out like a shotgun burst from distance, the premise following the fleet to a distant planet and then not just warping some Star Destroyers right on top of the Rebels, sorry Resistance, shows how pathetic the skill of the writers is. I was is desperate hope for the two lines of dialogue in the digital and Blu-ray release from Hux saying exactly this and Adrian Edmondson's character saying it wasn't possible because of some spacial disturbance from the star or the planet. But alas it never came.
This film sucks. Just forget it exists - just like JJ Abrams did when he directed Rise of Palpatine, sorry I mean Skywalker. Which is also a terrible film. See my other review.
Godzilla (2014)
Still amazing after 5 years
The audio!!! It's worth it just for this experience alone, especially when the MUTO is near the railway bridge. They did an incredible job of making the monsters sound massive and loud. But when Godzilla finally appears (definitely an intentional tease for half the film and worth it) the realism is astounding.
The story, well it's alright I guess. There's clearly a hint towards our obscene misuse of nuclear power and the waste it produces. But it's still better than a lot of monster movies. I'm not how the protagonist survives though. That's probably the most unlikely part of it all.
This is, in my opinion, the Pinacle of all gigantic monster movies and absolutely the best Godzilla movie so far. Hopefully the new one doesn't stray from this format and gives us the same suspense. I haven't seen King of Monsters yet so I'll wait to review that.
But this. Oh my! Watch it in the dark, CRANK UP THE SURROUND SOUND, and enjoy the edge of your seat suspense and epic fights.
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Truly glorious
Extended edition. 4 hours! So worth it.
This is a truly glorious, if very long but we'll deserved, ending to the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
This is Jackson and co at their finest. It was always going to be a full-on final piece to the incredible journey. The acting is perfect, sets are breathtaking and
utterly amazing, the action and effective TS are brilliantly done. Honestly there really is nothing at all wrong with this film.
This trilogy will stand the test of time as being the pinnacle of film making for fantasy.
A Quiet Place (2018)
Superb and suspenseful. Well worth watching.
*I'm really surprised by the amount of 1/10. Are the fake reviews?
I give this a 9/10. I clasped my hand to my mouth several times; and I'm generally not inclinded to do that in a horror. Seems appropriate and I applaud them for the job they have done making this. It really is a great film and well worth watching.
The use of sound, or lack thereof, and your typical 'scare the pants off you' music and audio really builds things up.
I'm very glad to see Michael Bay was able to resist SPLOSIONS!!!
My only critique is the lack of noise makers. The use of noise makers in the game Alien Isolation is key to distracting the alien from finding you and giving you a chance to escape. As are the firecrackers and explosives in the game Dying Light. If they didn't have any firecrackers available then surely they could have rigged up bells or metal objects in remote locations, gas cannisters primed for release on wire lines would have worked too. Or single fireworks in various locations with a battery/wire igniter. I guess it was all they could think of to work with. Anyway, it still works really well and I recommend watching this.
Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight (2008)
Utterly awful
This cheaply drawn, badly scripted and poorly acted animated version of Dragons of Autumn Twilight should never be viewed by anyone who has read the books. It is utterly awful.
The animation is so bad it reminds me of the cartoons I watched as a kid in the 1980's; with nowhere near enough cels being used so the movements of the characters are jerky and there are clearly very jumpy moments during many of the scenes.
The voice actors did try, some of them way too much, to compensate for the badly penned script but in the end it's still just cringe-worthy for most of the animation. I cannot call it a movie as that would be to give it more praise than it deserves.
As previous comments have stated, if you can't do a decent job - don't do it at all! If only Peter Jackson would take up the gauntlet and give us three glorious films everyone could be proud of. Then go on to make the Time of the Twins too. That should keep him busy for the next 20 years.
In conclusion - don't watch it if you are, or are not, a fan of Dragonlance, because either way you will be left thinking 'what a steaming pile of dragon dung this is'.