Category: Reviews

July Reading

This Gaming Life: Travels in Three Cities by Jim Rossignol.

A whistle stop tour of gaming culture which avoids the usual clichés of describing gamers as nerds or gaming as an antisocial and harmful habit. Rossignol splits his essay into three parts each dealing with the different types of gaming that have emerged across the world and it’s not only a decent essay about gaming but touches on some exciting developments such as gaming with purpose and games-as-propaganda.

The Vesuvius Club: Graphic Novel by Mark Gatiss.

An adaptation of Gatiss’ novel about an Edwardian James Bond type getting into scrapes around London and Italy, which seemed like the Cliff Notes version of the original novel. The story itself is pretty camp and leaves you unsure whether to give the book on which it’s based a chance. Quite disappointing considering Gatiss’s track record on Doctor Who and Sherlock.
Warning: May contain hand-drawn penis.

The Wheel of Time, Book 12: The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson.

Just when I thought I was getting to the end of a very long slog, I found out that this final volume in the twelve book series was to be split into three huge books. From notes left when Robert Jordan passed away, the epic battle between light and dark is being finished by fantasy writer and fan Sanderson. Definitely a commitment, but Sanderson’s input has given the story a sense of urgency that makes the reader know the last battle is only around the corner.

A tear heals faster than a cut

Even though the terrible acoustics in the Corn Exchange forced him to slow down his trademark fast delivery but Dára Ó Briain managed to squeeze his entire show into two of the funniest hours I’ve ever spent in the company of a fellow countryman.

The set pieces ranged from our obsessions with keeping up with “stuff” to being stalked by the lonliest man in the world (Will Smith in the abominable I am Legend, coming soon to every format imaginable) and managed to keep the laughs going through the uneven audience participation section.

The tour is selling out quickly but it’s definitely worth traveling to get to a show if only to see there’s certainly more to Ó Briain than being the token Paddy on the BBC.

Slumprawn Millionaire

Bus Stop For Humans OnlyBased on his short film, Alive in Jo’burg, Neil Blomkamp has come up with an intelligent science-fiction action movie in District 9. Shot mostly in a mock-documentary style the movie chronicles an alternate Johannesburg twenty years after an alien ship arrived.

In a plot heavily influenced by Apartheid era South Africa, the aliens are forced into the eponymous District to keep them separate from the native Jo’bergers but this does nothing to quell unrest. We follow newly-promoted bureaucrat Wikus Van De Merwe (in an amazing breakthrough performance by Sharlito Copely who improvised most of his dialogue) as he leads a team to move the Prawn to a new camp, two-hundred miles away from any human settlement.

Despite the science fiction plot and more obviously fantastical elements, there is a gritty realism that pervades the whole movie, especially in the more mockumentary parts. The effects are flawless and fit into the dystopian background of the shanty town that has built up in the aliens’ ghetto and the aliens themselves are a far cry from the plastic and latex creations of Alien Nation. Many difficult questions are asked and few answers are given – like most good science fiction the movie is more than just an excuse for spotty teenagers to see some explosions, but serves to make us think about xenophobia, racism, and how we treat each other as a society.

One of the best films of the decade.

The Original Sims

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Alter Ego was a video game released by Activision in 1986. The brainchild of psychologist Dr. John Favero it allowed players to play out an entire lifetime as if it were a Choose Your Own Adventure novel by playing out events based on hundreds of interviews conducted with people about their lives.

Now you can play a very faithful reproduction online.

Update: For $5 you can get a version for mobile phones using the Android operating system in the Android Market

Doomed to repeat its mistakes

Sid JenkinsSkins in its present form had its final episode last night. True to form it was a rather stylised presentation of an A-level results day with some smashing music and a hard hitting performance from Larissa Wilson.

Next year’s series will feature a while new cast of rowdy teenagers with Sid and Cassie popping in occasionally. I’m not sure how it’ll work as, for me, it was the characters that made the show, but I’m prepared to give it a chance.

Kinky Serenity

A while ago I sawKinky Boots, a very British comedy set in the north of England about a shoe factory saved from bankruptcy by changing their product line from quality mens’ brogues to womens’ boots that could hold the weight of a man for transvestites.

While the film was very simple and had some quite sweet moments, it was made all the more odd because the transvestite in question was played byChitwetel Ejiofor, who had previously played the Central government assassin inSerenity.

It’s not every day where you see someone as an assassin one week and a very convincing transvestite the next.

As if that weren’t strange enough, Stephen Hawking was in the front row and appeared the enjoy the movie quite a lot.

Only in Cambridge.

Musicology

Inertia strikes again. Not only had I not been to a gig in ages, I go to two in a week and don’t bother reviewing them. I’m feeling lazy so I’ll only tackle the first one for the moment.

On the 25th of September I went to see The Broken Family Band at the Arts Cinema in Cambridge. It’s the first time a concert’s been played there and I have to admit it was quite strange standing in a fairly well-lit bar-type atmosphere watching a band.

First up was Candidate (which through some strange quirk of acoustics I thought were called Pieces of Eight) which seemed pretty good quite jolly and acoustic. A conversation about Badgers set up what was to happen later on.

The main band themselves were on good form, singing a mixture of new and old stuff and they really seemed to enjoy themselves. Because of the badgers, it became an ad hoc cheer after each song (well for two of us, at least) and when we got a little rowdy it ended up confusing the band. So much to that “I Don’t Have the Time (Too Mess Around)” was changed to refer almost exclusively to badgers.

Elbow review in a day or two, followed by Frank Black and the Catholics.

Ta Ta.

[Listening to: Ana – Pixies – Bossanova (2:09)]

It’s been Five Years

I approached last night’s gig with much trepidation; The Polyphonic Spree could either have been very good or absolutely terrible but before going onto them I have to describe the first band we saw.

Mull Historical Society, a Scottish band, were really happy and chirpy. Even though the lead singer’s mike was plagued by feedback problems for the first couple of songs, he just carried on with the keyboardist’s one and made light of the roadies running about the stage. They put on a very happy, rocky, almost 80’s sounding set which left me feeling uplifted and happy that I went to the gig regardless of how The Polyphonic Spree were.

A bit of a break later while more setup was going on The Polyphonic Spree came onto the stage. If you don’t know anything about the band, just imagine twenty five Texans in robes singing, jumping, playing instruments, and just being infectiously happy. Every song was just a glorious multi-layered mix of Pink Floyd, the Flaming Lips, and a gospel choir. Backed by videos of some of their bigger gigs, the dream sequence from the Big Lebowski, and Disney’s Robin Hood they weren’t so much a band as an experience. And as if all that wasn’t enough to sate, they did an encore in their spiffing Glastonbury red robes, finishing with some beautiful harping to make us sleepy. Wonderful.