Welcome to Issue #29

I was pleased to wake up to the Oscars results on Monday and see that Everything Everywhere All at Once had swept up not only best picture, but several of the best actor, screenplay and film editing prizes.

It was easily my favourite film of 2022 and in case you missed it, you can read my review written last September:

In recent weeks I've managed to tear through a few series as well as a couple of films so in this issue we'll be reviewing those.

Film

The original Black Panther film was released in 2018 and was an excellent addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After its lead actor Chadwick Boseman sadly passed away in 2020, plans for the sequel were amended and the decision was made not to include any new scenes with his character, King T'Challa.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is the second film in the series and was released in November of last year. The plot centres around Wakanda (a fictional country located in sub-Saharan Africa) trying to protect its supply of vibranium from getting into the wrong hands. In a slight parallel to the similarly late-2022 release, Avatar 2, we spend a chunk of the film below sea level as a new underwater kingdom is introduced, Talokan.

It's nowhere near as good as its predecessor, which really did set the bar high. Without Boseman, the film lacks a strong lead and it feels a little confused about what it's setting out to achieve. On one hand the film feels like a two and a half hour tribute to Boseman and in places, its handling of grief and loss are delicate and poignant. However it's a superhero film and the inevitable sandwiching in of typical MCU epic fight scenes with a handful of comedic one liners didn't quite work for me.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, but looking back now and writing this review I'm just not sure I understood how the writers of the film wanted the audience to feel at the end. Perhaps it was an impossible task to deliver something that lived up the original; I'd probably be criticising anything more akin to a typical superhero film of disrespecting Boseman's legacy.

Rating: 6/10

I recently watched Sammy Paul's Top 10 Films of 2022 video and was surprised to see Jackass Forever getting a strong shout out. I'm pretty sure I haven't seen any of the previous Jackass films (I've just googled and apparently there are eight in the series, wtf) but I do remember watching the TV series on Channel 4 around 20 years ago and feeling equally engrossed and horrified at what I was seeing.

In case for some reason you've never head of Jackass, it's essentially a group of friends pranking and daring each other to do often highly dangerous stunts, all in the name of comedy.

The Jackass Forever film hasn't changed a bit and if my memory serves me well, the antics have become even more extreme. There were parts I literally couldn't watch and had to skip forward but I have to admit there were also a lot of laughs at some of the more unexpected moments.

I didn't think this was a line I'd ever be writing on here, but if any of this makes you feel like watching the film, please be aware there are a lot of penises and balls throughout. You've been warned.

Rating: 5/10

Lockwood & Co. is a British TV series which follows three young operatives of a psychic detection agency as they fight ghosts in London. In this alternate reality, children and teenagers have the power to sense ghosts and so it's just an accepted part of society that before they become too old and their powers begin to fade, they are recruited to help fight, knowing that a good chunk won't survive to adulthood.

One of the biggest draws for me was learning that Joe Cornish is the developer-writer-producer behind the series and directed the first and last episodes. I've been a fan of his work since the Adam and Joe Show which astonishingly first aired 27 years ago!

I really enjoyed the series overall, particularly the performances of the three leads (Ruby Stokes being the standout) and the witty, fast paced, banterous dialogue between the characters. The visual effects work well and there are genuine moments of unease as the team work their way through rather grim haunted houses.

Without all of the above, the plot on its own wouldn't be enough to carry it through. It's all a bit 'if we can just secure this magical artifact, everything will be ok' and some of the episodes feel like a computer game level to be beaten, before the next slightly harder challenge comes up.

Don't let this put you off though; there's a lot to enjoy here and if a second series is made, it'll jump high up on my watchlist.

Rating: 7.5/10

Amazon Prime Video spent a good few months heavily promoting their shiny new sci-fi The Peripheral. Having watched the trailer I concluded it looked exactly like my kind of show and recently got round to watching it. It's set a few years in the future where technology has advanced, but society still functions more or less as we know it today.

In the first episode, using a VR headset, the lead character Flynne (played by Chloe Grace Moretz) explores an ultra-realistic London in an alternate-reality future, before realising her actions have triggered her present day life to be in serious danger.

The plot ticks along at pace as Flynne unravels the connection between her world and the future dystopia. It can feel a little confusing at times as we're introduced to new characters almost every episode, but while some of them are brilliant (Alexandra Billings as Inspector Lowbeer is a real stand out), others I struggled to remember how exactly they fit into the narrative.

I enjoyed the stark contrast between Flynne's rural American hometown and a futuristic London. As an audience we spend a significant proportion of time within both and there's enough going on at either end to keep me wanting to go back to the other.

I wouldn't recommend this to everyone, but if you're a fan of sci-fi it's definitely worth giving a go. I really enjoyed it and got more and more into it as the episodes went on.

Rating: 8/10

Finally this week we have something a little different in the form of a South Korean reality competition called Physical 100. We get to watch 100 of South Korea's top athletes compete in a series of individual and team elimination challenges to find out which is the ideal human physique. Men and women from many different disciplines entered the show, including bodybuilders, gymnasts, wrestlers, MMA fighters, rugby players and more.

I'll start by saying this was very bingeable and I got through the nine episodes in two or three days. It doesn't mean I necessarily enjoyed it; almost every episode finishes on a cliffhanger, not quite revealing the winner of that particular challenge and it's so frustrating that you have to carry on.

The premise is interesting but the format of the competition doesn't make much sense. In Physical 100, if the challenge doesn't suit an athlete's body style, they are eliminated and unable to continue competing. When you have such extreme body types (a tiny 60kg gymnast compared with a 120kg body builder), if the challenge is to hang from a bar for as long as possible, there's only going to be one winner. In this sense, the order of the challenges pretty much determined the outcome of who made it through to the final.

What would work well is if no one is eliminated and instead points are awarded throughout the challenges. Much like a decathlon event, where the highest number of points at the end marks the winner. Of course this would be far less entertaining without the tension of who would survive to the next round and so I understand why I wasn't on the writing team!

My other irritation was the editing. I haven't watched any other Korean reality shows, so I've no idea if it's the typical style, but they had mini instant replays of every slight grunt, trip or exclamation, two to three times. There must be literally tens of these every episode and it becomes tiring quickly. I also found myself fast forwarding through some of the early challenges; once you've seen it being tackled a few times, you don't need another half an hour seeing the same thing being done by every remaining contestant.

The show could have easily been trimmed down to three or four episodes and that would have been enough for me. Like I said, I binged it as it was intriguing to see the setup of the different challenges, but ultimately I wish I'd spent the time doing something else.

Rating: 4/10

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Thanks for reading and have a great week.

Adam